Chapter twenty-three

Black Out

Right when I walked out side, no, before that, when I was walking through the nightly crowed to get to the little stable place to get to Ayden, I felt like I got up to fast, when you get dizzy and your vision goes black for a moment, but it went away quickly, so I just let it pass. It happens to me all the time.

I made my way to Ayden. (I couldn't help but notice how much better he looks already. It's only been a few days and he almost looks like a healthy horse. He doesn't even look like he was sick at all; just a little bit on the thin side.) Once again, I grabbed some hay for the road, and a chicken leg on my way out. (Gotta love drunks (the kind that are oblivious to everything) they never notice if you take something.)

I mounted Ayden, and the boys walked. (Leo didn't bring Zenith; he said he wanted the walk so he could be as slow as possible before we got to George, but I wanted to bring Ayden. I don't trust anyone but Scholor with Ayden. I guess I'm a little over protective, but can you blame me?) On our way out I asked Doyle, "Hey man, which way are we goin'?"

"What's today?" He asked.

"Wednesday, I think." I informed him. I have to add that this is the first time I have actually seen Leo just watch us. He didn't give us strange looks (well not many, anyway). He just went along with the program. It's weird seeing him so... I don't even know the word to use. He was just there. Not trying to figure out where we were going, or why Doyle needed to know what day it was. Does that mean he trusts us? If he does, it's not very rouge-like. Much the opposite, wouldn't you think? I can understand him trusting me, kinda, because George trusts me, I think, but that after a half a day, he trusts Doyle. Hummmmmmmmmmm. Sigh.

Anyways, Doyle took us in the general direction of Scholor's house. I thought, since we were headed out to the woods, and the boys didn't have a horse, it might have been unfair of me to bring Ayden. I was going to leave him with Scholor, but it was late and he was most likely sleeping. And besides, if the terrain got bad, I could brag that I had a horse to ride, so I just kept Ayden. Besides, he likes to ride, I think. He never seems upset or gives me sass about leaving.

I'm doing it again, huh. I'm telling you about Ayden like he was a person. And, for some reason, he is to me. Like I've probably told you already, Ayden and I have some weird bond thing.

What I thought was weird was when I went to mount Ayden, he kept sniffing me. And he almost head butted me. It was weird. And when I was walking with the guys, he tried to do the same thing a few times. It was odd.

When we got in to the woods, the guys where talking and laughing about the stupidest things. At first they where laughing about some woman named Kelly. Obviously she's one of the town harlots. I guess there is a whole gaggle of them, or something. I couldn't understand anything else that they said about her.

The next thing I didn't understand. Something about food, and white peacocks... do they even have white peacocks??? And after that Doyle started talking about this T.V. show called The Real World. One of the firsts I think, because he's from like 1999 or something.

I don't know how old this book/ journal/ diary/ whatever else you wanna call it is, or if you even know what a T.V. is. If you don't know, it's basically a box that has something like trapped lightning going through it, which makes pictures show on the glass screen.

There isn't really any way to explain it if you don't know what it is. I'll just tell you it's from mine and Doyle's world. And what I thought was funny is, even though Leo didn't know what a T.V. is, he was still laughing about it. That made me laugh, and I don't know why. But then I had to pull Doyle away because he was going to talk about more things that Leo wouldn't understand.

"Doyle," I tried to get his attention from whatever he thought was so funny. When we met eyes, we started to laugh more. I couldn't get any of us to stop. Then he fell, which consequently made Leo fall to the ground laughing also. I was still standing, being held up by Ayden, I think.

That was when Ayden started to head butt my back. Really hard. Then he bit me. I don't know why he did it, but I stopped laughing and started to feel really scared and I felt I had to get as close to Ayden as possible, for protection. When I got close, he moved me under his chin, and stood tall, seeing something I didn't. I threw my arm around his neck and looked blindly into the darkness.

That's when I remembered I could make light with my magic. I first tried using both my hands to try and make an orb, but the guys where distracting me. I tried again, but I was startled but a sound and Ayden's snort. (He was diffidently seeing something I couldn't.) That's when Ayden shoved himself closer to me. (I hade stepped away so I could concentrate better. Ayden was making me nervous, or scared, or something)

Now, about a million things happened in one second that seemed to go in slow motion. It was like I had all the time in the world to watch what was going on. So read this, then try to picture it all at one time.

The first thing I have to list was that my light was sent through, what looked like, the whole wood. It was that bright. Once that had happened, I noticed that I couldn't hear the boys anymore. Next to me, Ayden reared on his hind legs to ward off something. I looked ahead to see what he was freaking out about, and saw someone that looked like... now that I think about it... no it couldn't have been...

I know it couldn't have been, but he looked like George. But there has to be a lot of people who look like George around here...right?

But the man was advancing on me, but I never got a good look at him because of what happened next. Right then, I felt a trickle of warm, thick something on the back of my neck. I reached around, with the hand that wasn't flaring with liquid light energy, to see what it was. I pulled my hand in front of me to see my hand covered in crimson.

Ayden was now on all four legs, and looked concerned at me. I went to grab him, because, even though my brain didn't tell me I was falling, my body reached for something automatically. That something was Ayden, but I wasn't quick enough, and I just left a smeared crimson hand mark on his shoulder.

For a few moments, I lay still just looking up at the clear night sky. I might note now that the Milky Way isn't there. It was almost overwhelming to think that where I was now has nothing to do with where I was from. But then the sky was covered by Ayden's belly. He was protecting me, I think.

I remember I couldn't move, accept once, when my head fell to one side looking outward at what was man against beast. Almost beauty. Ayden was in front of me, protecting me from the evil's that where after us, like a father would fight away the boogieman in a child's dream.

After the light from me trickled into almost nothing. And so did the sound. I heard nothing except a few random sounds like Ayden's whinny and the clamor of steal on steal. I do remember feeling Ayden fall from the air and on to the ground, and his feet move from one spot on the ground to the other. That's when I became def to anything else.

After what seemed like a millennium, light, the light that is made by fire fueled with wood, came. And, along with it where men and women. A few on horses, but mostly on foot. There must have been a dozen at least. I didn't watch. I felt darkness coming on. But I did see Kia. She was one of the riders. She was beautiful. (I remind you, the darkness was coming on, and it was mostly blurs. Not like when your eyes are watery, not like that at all. Just imagine taking a wet painting or a piece of paper with ink on it, take away most of the light in a room, and dip the paper in water. How the paint or ink runs is what the picture looked like to me, but she was moving. So as she moved, her shadow and cloths melted into the background of the woods. She was wearing black, with silver jewelry, I think. She was like a black ghost. So terrifyingly beautiful. And I thought: that is what the Black God looks like. I know he is a he, but... death could be as beautiful as this.

That's when panic struck me and I had to look away. I looked to the top of a semi-close hill. And just before I was drowning in darkness, I saw what looked like someone looking down at me from the hill. And I was acutely aware of eyes on me. But I didn't care; I was already swimming in the blackness of my unconsciousness.

I had one of those dreams again. But it was broken up between reality and dreams. I was dreaming first about my mother. She was crying again. It was weird to see her crying. Especially when she looks like a tough woman who would be the last person u would ever think would cry. Than my step dad came in and grabbed her shoulder to comfort her. That she got up so he could hold her. It was weird because I haven't seen him hold her like that in a long time.

Than I was being carried by a large man. He was dark. Really dark. He was almost black. Than he told me to sleep, and covered my eyes with one of his hands. I didn't argue, because, frankly, I couldn't. I couldn't speak, let alone move. So I just did what he told me.

The next dream was the next person was my uncle. He wasn't there for long. He just said he was joining the Navy and he wanted to say good-bye before he left for some far off country. Than he left, and Dana and a boy came next to me. But than I woke up again.

This time it was a familiar face. It was Kia. She was giving me some foul concoction. It tasted a little like mud, grape and cherry medicine, and a blended up something from fear factor. She told me she would give me a few more hours to sleep and the "drink" (she called it) (ehhhh, ewww.) would wake me up, and than I would get more. (I can't wait...really...I'm jumping for joy...or is that with discuss, I can't tell the difference.)

When I dreamt, the only thing I saw was Dana leaving my vision. I couldn't move, and couldn't talk. There was no way to make her come back. So I just stayed where I was up staring in to whiteness. Nothing to do. Than the dream turned into a nightmare. I had horrible monsters that I've never seen before jumping out of the white. Than I was trying to move again and found I couldn't. Then I woke up in a cold sweat, but with a strange urge to move around. But I didn't. Leo told me not to.

"I was the same way earlier," Leo told me. "It looks like this fellow over here," pointing to Doyle. "Has built up a liking to it."

I sat up wearily. " You mean he like that foul stuff." I knew he was talking about that drink Kia gave me.

He took a big swig out of his cup. "I like root in it. It's the main ingredient, but its not what makes it tastes bad. That's everything else in it. I just pour a little bit of the juice from the root in my drink and it leaves a tingling sensation. Better than Vodka or brandy, I'll tell you that much." He raised his mug to cheers to me. "Down the hatch." And he drank what was left in his cup. I don't think it was that much because it was gone pretty quickly.

"Eww, can I have glass of water?" I asked. I needed it. My through was so dry.

"Here, you can have mine." Leo offered. I took it and drank greedily.

When it was trickling past my chin and down my chest, Doyle threw me a rag saying, "Wipe your ho-ho's. It's distracting me."

" From what?" I asked.

" From that blue fly above your head." And he looked above me. I looked also, but there was nothing. No fly, nothing blue. Leo was confused, too. I looked back at Doyle, but I don't think this was a joke. He was seriously concentrating at something I couldn't see. He was doing that for five minutes, and we watched him do it. Then I figured it out.

" Oh my- Doyle!" He looked away from nowhere, and strait at me, looking away briefly, than back at me. After a moment I knew my thoughts where true. "Doyle, you are so stoned!"

" Shhhhhh, you'll scare him. Than I'll have to find a new fire breathing, moon walking blue fly. There hard to come by." Then he went back to watching the invisible (or only visible to stoners on roots) fly.

" That root must be the root of the gods." Leo informed me. Then he went on, "It's funny to watch other people. I don't like it. I don't see flies." I looked at him. "What?" I decided I wasn't going to say what I was going to say.

So instead, "What, did you have a bad trip, or something?" I asked.

" I didn't trip. I saw scary images." ( Same thing........)

We watched Doyle a moment more, than Kia came in. I tried to stand, but she pushed me back down, literally, and told me to sit.

" I don't wanna sit. I wanna...I wanna eat. Do you have an food?" I asked, felling rude that I asked so bluntly, but it was necessary.

" There is food on the way. I brought you something to drink." She shoved some sort of animal skin made into a canteen at me.

" It's not what he's drinking, is it?" I indicated at Doyle, who was zoning out.

" I wouldn't touch that stuff. More often then not, it makes people see bad images." I looked at Leo, than remembered the last dream I had. The one with the monsters. She noticed. "Ah, that one has had the pleasure of the gods nightmares." She gave a little chuckle. It was almost evil sounding. "It's just a little watered wine. Drink. It'll make you feel better. Promise." So I did what she said. Then Leo announced that he was going to go do a little personal business, then tugged on his britches. For every guy here, that means he's going to go to the bathroom, and it might be a while. That left me and Kia, and the man who thought that flies could be blue, do the moon walk, and breath fire. So basically, me and Kia.

" I saw you," I said after a few moments of silence.

" Yeah? When? When we came, you where unconscious. Well, most of the time."

It was just than that I noticed that my head was wrapped in cloth. Al lot of it. And so where my armes and my ankle. Then a few wraps around a few area like my hand and small places on my arm. And most of them where bloody. I was wondering why I couldn't feel any pain. Or maybe it could have been a cruel joke to make me think I was hurt. I don't remember getting this hurt. I was also in a long sleeping robe, I think. ( the only thing keeping it together was a few ties sown on it and tied together) "No, I saw some of... whatever happened. I couldn't really figure out what happened. So what did happen?"

" Not quiet sure, really. First I saw you one the ground. You looked like you where unconscious. Your horse, the gifted one was standing over you until one of those men got him down..."

"What happened to Ayden!" I screamed. "What happened? Tell me. Where is he?" I tried to get up, and would have succeeded, but Kia pushed me back down.

" Sit still. The gifted one will be fine. He sleeps with the rest of our beasts. But as for you, you wont be fine if you try and get up like that again." She was scolding me. And she seemed older than she really was for that moment.

" As I was saying, the gifted one fell and you got up. There was a man, he looks familiar, but I wasn't sure if he was a rouge or not. It didn't matter though, his crew where attacking us now, and if they were rouges, than good riddance, I thought. And so where the thoughts of my group, I'm sure." I looked at her to ask why they thought like that, fearful of what the answer would be.

" I don't like rouges. None of us do. They robe us, and... other things. We just don't get along. It's been so since before me, and before my father." A thought occurred to her. "Father! You must meet my father and mother soon. I will let you see them when you can walk. After you eat, maybe." She went back to her original thought. "So, after you got up, you fought a man, and took him down very easily. You seemed to be trying to get to one man, the one who was familiar, and he to you, but there was too many people in you ways to be able to get close to each other. In the end, he and what was left of his men fled in a hurry. And that's when I saw you drop to your knees looking out at nothing. And the scary thing was you didn't fall as a person would, but you stayed on you knees looking outward.

" My men where afraid to touch you for a while. Even after your eyes closed. But Dagon offered to carry you. He does not fear your kind."

" What do you mean my "kind"?" I asked, quite confused. I couldn't figure out what was different from me and her.

" Your 'kind'. Dagoon called you the 'encased by light', I think. But he wouldn't tell me anything else about it. He was mumbling in his own tongue." (By now I was completely confused.)

She continued, "So, we brought you, Frost, and Atreyu back here. You've been sleeping for two days now, and the others woke up this morning."

I moaned. "Man, I've missed two days of work. I hope Solon doesn't mind."

" You call that work? Where is the fun in that job. You run around all day. If you'd ask me, I'd tell you I would never got a job like that. This life suits me well."

" What do you do?"

" Travel, dance, dance, and travel. My mother plays the bow-string," ( A bow-string, I've found out, is the same as a violin.) "and my father does trading. He's the leader here, and for good reason. He's good with people. We are happy to have him."

" Sounds like fun," I said.

" It is. You should try when you feel better." She was starting to get excited about wanting to teach me to dance.

" That's great. I would really like that, but I have a good question. Why was every one afraid of me?"

Kia was suddenly serious again. "You don't know. When you got up to fight, you she'd you cloths like a snake and around you, you burned like a white candle flame. And when you where on your knees, you still glowed, and your eyes where black. Blacker then a moonless night. That's why everyone there feared you."

I was speechless.

" You where the one to make the light in the forest, weren't you?"

" I don't know. I think so."

Kia stood up and looked me up and down. I couldn't tell what was in her eyes. It was a mix of fear, fascination, and joy blended together to make a hug gray-eyed cake.

" I'll get your food. It should be ready." She backed away still looking at me while she talked and walked.

When she left, I drank what was left in the canteen and looked for more. I couldn't find anything. It was than that I realized that I needed to go pee. It wasn't a pleasant feeling. I waited a few minutes, but when Kia didn't come back I decided that I couldn't wait. I slowly stood up and peered out of the curtain door. No one was around, so walked out side and walked as fast as I could with out falling to the closes unoccupied area.

I found a bush to relieve myself in. When I finished, I started to walk back. I reached a wagon, and looked to see if anyone was around. ( I was trying to not be seen because I'm sure my hair was a rats nest. My face probably had enough oil on it to cook a batch of fries. ( Not literally)( sorry for the in sight, but it's true. I have to wash my hair and face every day otherwise they get really oily.) And my robe was very revealing.

As I walked back to the wagon I came from, I turned to look behind me to see if anyone was there. No body. But when I turned back around I ran into someone.

I looked up and saw a very dark, tattooed man. (He was the man I saw when I woke up taking care of me.) He was very tall, and well built. He also wasn't wearing a shirt, and was very sweaty. ( Eww...) ( I looked and he had tattoos on his feet; his stomach that disappeared into his pants; on his arm, and lastly on his face. They looked like tribal tattoos.

When I looked up at his face, he gave a deep grown that came from the back of his throat. I was frozen. I couldn't move. The he picked me up and started walking with me cradled in his arms. I felt so small.

(Hides herself behind her arms) im sorry im sorry im sorry......i know its been a really really long time and iv actually had this chapter for like 3 weeks now and i was to lazy to put it up. But the good news is that while a was being to lazy to put this up, i wasn't lazy enough to work on another chapter. I think im pretty much finished, i just have to look in over again and add the final touches so im hoping it will be up this weekedn but than again this weekend is halloween and..... and dont kill me, i had a reason for not putting it up last wekk. On Sat. i was at a halloween party and i got so....never mind the public doesnt need to know. It's PG-13...not that bad but ill....nevermind again. ; S ....uhh and then i saw the grudge...aghhh...yeah hope for the next chapter...ppl fight...verbally....but it's funny/scarry.........bye