Disclaimer: I own zip. Nada. Zilch. Here's hoping this one actually makes some kind of sense. I promise I work really hard on it, buy in the end this what I got. lol. Hope you enjoy?
Chapter 5
A glow of purple magic forced the containment bracelet off my wrist with a pop, where it spun on the hardwood of the table. It hadn't stopped spinning before I left. Chest tightening certainty that I had to leave. Now. Using my magic to teleport me straight where I had seen the witch, and changing into something a little less conspicuous than P.J's I took a deep breath and slumped against the wall. For a moment I let my feelings about the last couple of days run free. Overwhelming to the extreme.
"How am I going to deal with this cluster fuck?" I muttered to myself in a near whisper, and letting my fist slam into the wall behind me. The hand that bore my soul gem, it was with yet another breath that I actually checked on the status of said soul gem. Fuck, it was worse than yesterday morning, and I really wasn't doing so hot then. Let alone now.
I pushed the thoughts of the two nosey old men, how clever they may or may not be - because I doubt the headmaster would marry someone stupid, or whether I was even going to go back. I simply let the ring transform, and began using it to track the witch. I took the ground route, trying not to draw to much attention to myself in the daylight.
It didn't take long to find It, and more concernably I hadn't noticed when I had walked into the labyrinth. It was with an inhale that I looked up to see razor sharp snow fall just staring to come down in flurries.
"Not this time," I said calmly, letting power overtake me. A black skirt looking thing that was actually billowy shorts formed over my legs, high boots with laces and a steep skinny heel, and stockings that weren't actually stockings. I had been wrapped in sheer satin ribbons of violet left tiny gaps that showed slivers of skin. A small bustier in a soft skin of some kind of reptile settled tightly over the high waist of my skort. Ribbons of, once again, purple - you're beginning to notice a theme - started wrapping safe and unnoticeably under my shirt at just smallest part of my waist, and tied over my shoulders and all the way down my arms in intricate swirling patterns. They encircled my hands and halfway up my fingers, before curling back up to tie in beautifully symmetrical bows.
The witch sprang up and I called forth my weapon. An ebony bow accessorised with a gleaming violet circular gem set into a silver triangle, and held in place with a thin tapered bar over the top striking through the centre of it. The ends, where the strings tied, were wickedly sharp and flaming with concentrated magic. I pull an arrow of pure energy into existence, feeling something inside me stretch uncomfortable, and promptly get bowled the fuck over by a flood of black sand.
"Are you kidding me?" I muttered, as I landed painfully hard scraping across the ground and scrambling up as quickly as I could. Wonderful, now I was back where I started. Bloody, muddy, freezing and standing in this shithole. No amount of irritation could stop the panic though. Running rampant as if it was the first time, every time.
It wasn't easy, keeping out of the way and clawing out of the grip of the hordes of mindlessly attacking monsters. My ribs rife with stitches, it took me a little time. Eventually finding my rhythm, I'm able to dodge them for the most part. The sting of scratches, which as long as no one is listening let's be honest were more like gashes, a stern reminder to be quicker. The thwack of my bow rang with a musical sound with every arrow I let fly. Accompanied by a distinctly magical reverberating thud as they met there mark. Like rushing air, breaking glass, the and sound of something heavy and valuable being dropped had been covered in sparkles and fairy dust.
It didn't take long for the witch to do something more that just stand there screaming. Not that It stopped It's undefinable shrieking, and this forced me to actually start processing the facts that my eyes were sending my brain.
For starters It was an awful grey-blue colour that made me think of dead things. Not that you could really tell, It was covered in black sand, glittering coldly and compounded under layers of frost. A sandy orange-red mouth that was too big for its face, and show-casing more oversized razored teeth than half a dozen sharks. Eyes the size of an anime protagonists an unseeing white. In the same way you'd see in an unpainted doll. Missing entirely, but still giving the impression of where they were supposed to be. Hair-that-wasn't hung in ropes. Oily seaweed down Its back, adornments that I paid very close attention to avoid looking to closely at. It's talons looked like dirty spikes attached to webbed fingers, and spines like a lionfish. All along her back and elbows, and almost certainly poisonous. Mostly because that must would be my damn luck, now wouldn't it? Fishing nets gathered around It artistically to form a shawl, or shirt. Some kind of combination of the two that hung in torn triangles over a skirt that ripples in the wind so much it might as well be dancing.
"Shit," I realised, forcing myself to snap out of it as the not-a-skirt reared back and shot forwards. It... It was too fast... My heart gave a violent thump so hard it hurt, and I closed my eyes with a flinch... and just waiting for It to hit me. Instead there was total silence, and I opened my eyes and stood, fists clenched and breathing hard, looking at the frozen world around me.
"Stupid bloody brain dead fucking moron," I chastised myself in a harsh whisper. A black hole exploded in the back of my thoughts. Wondering what I was doing? Why was I trying so hard? Especially when I knew how this was going to go in the end, how it always ends. Did I really think I had it in me to make it to September 1st? An awful sob escaped my throat, and tears splashed so hotly they burned because it was so cold. I was so fucking cold, and fucking tired. I was burnt out, and like an idiot I had let instinct overrule my ability to take that hit. I'd frozen time, knowing that I didn't have the magic reserve to pull it off without severe consequences.
"Focus," I whispered harshly and pinching my thigh painfully. For a single touch-and-go second I wasn't sure what was going to happen, and then I jerked my eyes back up to the witch, and struggled to keep them there as much stomach lurched. I thought they were tentacles, well first I'd thought it was a skirt, then it was tentacles. I was wrong... sort of, they could be tentacles, if tentacles were supposed to be some snake-eel thing with needles for teeth and... and... I shivered in an unsettlement so severe it turned into an unreasonable revulsion. Why? Why for the love of everything bloody magic, did nothing in here have FUCKING EYES?! Urgh, and it got worse. The legs that were revealed in this dramatic deadly fan of death... they were... broken. Broken to the point that bile crept up my throat.and I shook. Bone reduced to shards that pop through the skin. Each what could charitably be call a leg twisted around each other tightly and held like that with barbed wire. Circled so thickly around crossed ankles and perched on unnaturally positioned tippy toes until the overall effect resembled a disturbing mermaid-ballerina. Every laceration, small or big, was frozen in a waterfall of thin navy blood. Rainbow looking scales dotted the infected parts of It's skin.
"Oh my..." I gasped, willing with everything I had for my hand not to let go of my bow. I wanted to. It was heavy, and again the questions pounded away. What was I even doing? Circles go around and around, no matter how hard I fight or how fast I run, I'm always going to end up right where I started. So... why? If an inner voice could whimper and beg, mine did. It was pathetic, and borederline mind-shattering. It was enough to spark something, not anger - not really, but something quiet enough like it that it would do. It was quiet, the air a kind of still that only ever happens when time has stopped, and I could still hear it. Time ticking away. Like I was standing here running and running, running out of time in a giant timer that would never run out of sand until I drowned. Even then never stopping, burying me with the rest of the dust. I could feel it, with a blood pounding terror clawing intensity. My arm shot up and with a terrible scream, I let the arrow go so suddenly I staggered a few steps backwards. Flinching violently and shaking in suprise, it stopped inches away from It's not-quite eyes. For a moment, I stood there wondering where the will had come for, before releasing my hold on time. My ears almost burst at the sudden cascade of noise, before it was taken away permanently. Everything faded away, as It screamed. My shot enough to make it explode with enough force to evaporate completely. Glimmering bubbles in rainbow floated away a shimmered out of existence. Reality restored.
This was done. I was finished. I dropped to the floor, bow flaring out of existence and my transformation ripping away in little beads of light so dark they were almost black. I rested my head on the rough concrete, eyes glassily fixated on a the crack where the grief seed sat perched still crackling with dissipating energy. About two and a half feet away. I sobbed again and the small hollow at the back of my ears ached somehow worse than the injured half-frozen rest of me. Two and a half feet away... and I didn't know if I was going to make it.
Okay, done. Let me know what you think, I promise I'm not shameless fishing for compliments. I'm genuinely unsure about this chapter. On that note, I hope you enjoyed.