Chapter 22
White Magic
MUAHAHH! I love it when you guys start freaking out and questioning my characters judgments. It's very amusing. Glad you guys liked the chapter! Please read and review!
Ichabod lay there feverish as the glow of the candles cast dark shadows along the walls. He was walking in and out of conciousness and this worried the Van Tassel's to no end.
As quietly as she could Selena entered the dark house. Tip toeing up the stairs she heard moaning and whispering coming from Ichabod's room.
Peering through the crack in the door she found Dr. Lancaster bending over him as her father stood by to watch. The raw piercing could be seen again his glistening pale skin. She cringed slighty at the image.
"Remarkable", doctor Lancaster murmured.
"A wound like this should have killed him…but it needs no stitch and there's hardy any loss of blood".
"He stirs", Baltus remarked, as Ichabod shook lightly his eyes opening.
"You must be still, the fever is still upon you..", as Ichabod turned his direction to Baltus.
"Katrina…?", he whispered. (yes I know. This is not a mistake! That's right ladies he said HER name)
Selena turned away her hand covering her mouth to hold in her gasp. Her eyes widening in shock. "He calls for her and yet he says he loves me…", as she walked away from the door as if in trance.
Ichabod was in a deep haze. All he could remember was Brom's body being sliced in two, worrying about Katrina and Masbath being safe. But what of Selena? Where was the woman that had captured his heart disapeer to?
Katrina stood there over a large caldron simmering a white liquid in the hearth. As she murmered things of latin and greek. Grabbing the dead crow that lay in the hearth she cut off its foot and added it into the mixture as she lay the sharp knife on the table.
Turning back unto the cauldron she began to chant phrases, "Nostradamus Mediamus, Milk of Mercy In Media Nos Laudams…", as she turned around to find Selena standing right behind her knife in hand.
Grabbing her chest, trying to catch her breath she stared at her sister terrified. "Selena where did you come from? I have been so worried about you!", as Selena only ignored her and stared at hearth.
"I made it Selena. Something to put him to sleep…is is correct..?", as Katrina stared curiously at her older sister, as a cold look seemed to pass over her eyes but disapeer immediately. Her eyes became alight as a smile grew on her face.
"I think to give it a better affect we should add one more crows foot, just so he has no bad nightmares..", with knife in hand she chopped off the other foot and added it to the mixture.
Pouring the mixture into a cup she handed it to Selena, but Selena shook her head. "No..you take it to him. I have things to take care of".
Turning away she walked into the darkness of the hallway disapeering. Surprise grew across Katrina's face and also shock. Her sister said no? But why? What was the cause of this?
Slowly she put the cup on the table as she stared at the hearth. Brom was dead. He was dead. A man she had adored so much was slaughtered this very night.
Her knee's began to tremble as she fell to the floor in a heap sobbing as she cried out his name. Selena stared at her sister in the darkness feeling sympathy for her sister. She adored Brom, and yet he did not give Katrina a second glance.
Averting her gaze from her troubled sister she stepped out the door into the dark. Steadily she made her way to the small graveyard. Walking along the cool grass as fog flowed over it in large waves as if looking at the ocean.
Flowers in hand, she stopped standing over and facing her mothers grave. Feeling her heart breaking she fell to her knee's dropping the flowers in the process on her mother's grave.
Leaning against the grave she whispered to it.
"Mother I'm worried. The Crow is dead, the man I love is wounded, and the Horseman is still not caught. My heart is breaking…"
"I need your wisdom more then ever now. I don't know what to do. I am at a lost…", as she felt tears building up, as slowly the tears began to flow.
Then she felt some. Looking up eyes bloodshot from tears, raindrops began to pour from the sky. She didn't move. She just sat there, as a large wave of raindrops fell prickling her skin.
Goosebumps grew across her skin, as the cold water continued to fall. Getting up she kissed her mother's grave and went on her way.
Entering the already dark house, she tip toed up to Ichabod's bedroom. Water dripped from her body, but she ignored it as she stood by his bedside.
He was tossing and turning moaning in his sleep. "I wonder what you dream?", Selena whispered.
Dream Pov.
Seven year old Ichabod had followed his father to see where he had taken Selena. "Selena where are you?", as he stood in a white chapel. The only thing that was unusual was the red door that stood in the distance.
Then he saw it. His father entering the chapel closing the red door behind him. Ichabod crouched down, scared of his dark figure as his father walked pass him ignoring him.
Ichabod growing curious opened the red door as he entered the dark room. The entire room was covered in torture devices, different chains lay along the wall. Screws of all sorts, and a spiked chair sat in front of a sarcophagus.
"Hello Ichabod…", as he turned around quickly to find Selena leaning against the sarcophagus grinning. But this grin wasn't the warm sweet one that he had fallen in love with.
Something was dark about it. It spoke of hatred, and evil. He backed up slowly, as Selena stared at him curiously.
"Your not leaving are you Ichabod?", as he slowly shook his head no scared.
"I have a gift for you!", as she gestured towards the sarcophagus.
"Go ahead darling. Open it…I promise you'll love it. Go inside. I'll be in there very soon", as she moved forwards grabbing his hand.
Ichabod had to hold in his gasp. Her hand was ice cold. "Your mother wanted me to show it to you…", she whispered giggling as she dragged him towards it.
Pushing him towards what he soon discovered was an Iron Maiden his eyes grew scared. Standing behind him she whispered coyly in his ear, "Go ahead….open it Ichabod. Find your surprise..".
He moved closer, looking towards the peephole of the Iron Maiden he saw eyes. His mothers eyes. His mothers dead looking eyes.
Giving out a strangled cry he reached out trying to open it., clawing at the lock. Finally he fell back into the spiked chair his hands digging deeply into the spikes, as lines of holes all along his hands began pouring blood.
Sobbing he looks at his hands, as drops of blood fall to the floor. Slowly Selena walks towards Ichabod bending eye level to him.
"Do
you like your present?", taking his bloodied hand and licking it,
as his blood drips down her chin. She grins once more.
Standing up, she walks towards the red door leaving him there. Slowly the Iron Maiden's door began's opening as Ichabod looks towards it.
It flys open, as his mother's body falls from the Iron Maiden, puncture wounds all along her body, as a wave of his mother's blood envelopes him.
End Dream Pov.
Sobbing Ichabod jerks awake, straight into the arms of Selena. Immedialty realizing it is her, his hold tightens and she shush's him softly in his ear.
"You were dreaming….", as they break apart there eyes locked on each other.
"Yes..things I had forgotten and would not like to remember..", as he looked down as the puncture wounds in his hands began bleeding slighty again.
"Perhaps the remembering is the hard road to piece of mind. What ails you Ichabod?"
Ichabod sighed, falling back into her embrace.
" I was well, it was the world that was ill. But since I came here…."
"You were not a happy man when you came. I think your wound was deeper then the wound you received from the Horseman…", as she put her warm hand to his forehead.
"But your fever is broken, and though I cannot cure the world I would make you live happily in it. Tell me what you dreamed.."
Ichabod sighed, "How I found my mother dead. How good and evil sometimes wear each other's clothes", as Selena stared at him curiously at this.
"She was an innocent, a child of nature, condemned…murdered…by my father…", as Selena's eyes widened in disbelief at this.
"Murdered..?"
"Yes, murdered to save her soul! A bible-black tyrant behind a mask of righteouness. I was seven when I lost my faith", as Selena turned away from him, holding her chest over her heart for she could have sworn she heard it breaking.
Turning around feeling more tears to pour down her face she held them in to look at Ichabod. "What do you believe in Ichabod?"
"Sense and reason, cause and consequence, an ordered universe. I should not have come to this place where my rational mind has be so controverter by the spiritual world…"
Her shoulders fell. He would not believe. Not in the power that really controls this world that we live in. He was too caught up in believing in what could be proved.
"Is there nothing you will take from Sleepy Hollow that was worth the coming here?"
Ichabod looked up surprise in his eyes as her question. She stared at her hands, trying to stop the shaking in them. Covering her hands with his, she lifted her head up to meet his gaze.
"No…not nothing. A kiss…and how rare a thing…a kiss from a lovely woman before she saw my face or knew my name", as Selena blushed.
"I found love with you. You are the only thing that has brought joy to my heart since I had stepped into Sleepy Hollow", as he softly nuzzled her warm neck.
Selena felt tingles travel all across her body, as her heart grew slightly quicker but Ichabod stopped his nuzzling to look up at her curiously.
"You are wet? Why? And where have you been all day!", as she hushed him to calm down.
"I was outside and I went to the cememtary to visit my mothers grave. That is why I am wet. It began to rain", as he nodded slowly bending back to her neck kissing and nipping at it gently.
Selena giggled. "But you still did not answer my question as to where you were the rest of the day?", as he continued his ministrations.
"I was out in the forest making sure that you were alright. That is all…", she whispered, as he began kissing to where the swell's of her breast began.
Gently he lay her down on his bed, as she stretch her arms out on each side. Slowly he began unbuttoning the front of her dress, as he pulled it off over her head.
She lay there in her petticoats and corsets. He gently unlaced her corset, as more and more flesh appeared into his reached as he caressed her soft pale skin.
There was something about her. Everytime she was with him, a primal hunger grew within him. He grew animalistic around her, and these feelings and urgings that he never had around any woman seemed to ignite once he touched her.
She was intoxicating and he couldn't have enough of her. He bent over her form and took her lips into a sweet passionate kiss, as he softly licked her lips.
Getting up on the bed he straddled her as he moved alittle to the side and blew the candle out, as darkness enveloped him.
Well there you go! The next chappy is done! I especially enjoyed writing this chapter! Not sure why but I did! Please review!
