Before she could recite the location for the globe, Pitch grabbed Lydia from her. "No, I think it best that we keep her nearby."

At his touch, Lydia seemed to freeze, her eyes wandered to take in the Nightmare King's face, this resulted in her opening her mouth and relinquishing a scream. The sound tore through Fable like a thousand knives. The girl struggled for a moment, but Pitch put her out with a small puff of black sand, putting her back into a void of un-waking fear. Making every attempt to remain calm, the knowledge spirit got to her feet. "You don't need Lydia to keep me here, let me send her home, and I promise I will remain here as long as you require."

Pitch shook his head. "I recall you singing the same tune over a hundred years ago, right before you left me, betrayed me."

The spirit stiffened. "That's what this is all about, me leaving you?"

He shrugged. "It is one of them. You recall an offer a made to you a few years ago?"

The very thought of the faceless figure made her shudder. "The Horrors."

He nodded. "Precisely, it takes a special brand of fear to make teenagers and adults afraid. They possess knowledge of the cruelty this world. You are the protectorate of all knowledge, with the capability of wielding it as you desire."

Eyes darting to Lydia, Fable averted them, focusing all attention on Pitch who continued his speech. "You and I are the same Fable, forgotten figures left to waste away while the mortals continue to strive for more modern ideals. The Guardians will never understand our suffering because tradition keeps them alive. And we are left to pitter away our immortality, until we are nothing more than dying memories. I know you've been feeling the years weigh on you."

At this statement, Fable felt her sand scar give a twinge. Her stance weakened and her hair fluttered into her line of vision. The thought of finally going to Death as his client instead of visitor was a great fear of hers. She knew not what waited past that spirit's embrace. Still, she knew that Pitch was picking; it was his purpose to know the fears of all his encountered, mortal or immortal. "This is why I will give you one last chance to come back to me, be my friend again…"

Her hands clenched into fists. Tossing her hair back she snarled. "I will say to you the same thing I did 5 years ago Pitch… We were friends once, only because you manipulated me into thinking that there was nothing for me past what you could offer. Never again will I let you trick me into being your puppet. Now, let the girl go before I make you!"

At her final word, it felt as if a bonfire erupted in her veins. As if the rage had awakened age old abilities. Still, this was something that Pitch Black was not aware of. His grip tightened on Lydia, and despite being asleep, the child began to scream and claw at his arms, only fueling Pitch's glee as he continued to feed off her nightmares. "I'm so terrified, what's a little knowledge spirit going to do eh? You have no power out here, no library to manipulate…"

In seconds, he towered over Fable, leaving the child to curl into fetal position on the street. Leaning inward, Pitch hissed in her the knowledge spirit's ear. "You are powerless…"

Without a second thought, Fable shrieked and threw her hands into Pitch's chest. An explosion of heat and light seemed to explode from her palms. Sending the Nightmare King several feet back, screaming in agony as he tried to put out the apparent flames that were currently making attempts to consume him.

Fable was left on her knees, staring at the light that danced in her palms. This wasn't fire, this was something else. Something entirely new to her, sure the light looked like flames, but it wasn't crafted of it…Exactly. No, upon closer inspection, Fable began to notice that words were weaving in and out to form the tell-tale shape of fire. Glowing gold in color, burnishing orange, dancing with reds, she could read out the descriptions that created the image. Descriptions such as

"A writhing army uncontrolled"

"In blind zeal, incinerate"

"Confusion, whipping, whirling never ending"

"The light is hungry"

"Burning bright, cackling, cackling with pure delight"

"DUELS THE DARKNESS

HEAVES ON COMPASSION"

At this line, Fable felt a smile slide across her face; slowly she glanced up into the night sky. Only to meet the kind gaze of the moon, for the first time in what felt like forever, she found herself laughing, feeling as if some void had been filled. In over 100 years, she had a power that could defend; she could pull from her mind, and not just from her books. Her books were needed, but now she could create images from memory of the words she held so dear, and those words she loved and made the purpose of remembering held a power that could stagger Pitch. Getting to her feet, Fable began to feed the worded fire in her hands, letting it go to consume her upper arms. Relishing in the obvious terror betrayed by Pitch's face as he beheld the knowledge spirit, flitching as Fable opened her mouth and cried.

"TIS A STRANGE MYSTERY, THE POWER OF WORDS!"

Author's Notes: Alright, so I feel inspired again. I pulled quite a few of these lines from a variety of well-known poems. If you type them into a site called PoemHunter, I'm sure they will turn up and you will be able to enjoy them fully. I hope that this installation was satisfying, and powerful. I wanted Fable to have some sort of actualization, something that she has developed in order to make herself more powerful. Before, she could only call things from books, but now she can call up images and such through her memory of lines that define certain objects. Fire being one of them. It seems natural that Fable would have a good sized archive of fire based description tucked in her head, seeing that she was once a fire elemental

So, as I stated before, a lot has happened in the last couple of years. I've been published in an online magazine called FictionMagazine, they accepted one a poem of mine entitled "Claustrophobe." If you want to find it, you will find the poem in the October 2012 edition. If you want, I can post it here in the author's notes in the coming chapters.