I was still shaken up by what I saw in the shop but handed over the supplies to Mama Lucy the second I was through the doors to the living room.
She took them and went to work, mixing and mashing ingredients together in a bowl on the coffee table.
“You… made it back,” a gruff voice said from the couch.
The guy was pale, very pale.
I sank to the ground by his side and held his hand, not sure why I did it, but he attempted a smile. “Yeah, I did. You have to hang in there. Can’t die on Mama Lucy’s couch, that’d be rude.”
“Trying… not to… poison makes it… hard, you know?” He tried to laugh, but it turned into a hacking cough.
I shushed him. “I never caught your name.”
“Craig,” he whispered. “Name’s Craig, and you’re Kate.”
Mama Lucy must’ve told him. “Yeah, that’s me. The girl who saved the crazy guy.”
“Did you… did you see anyone else… out there?”
Huh?
“That’s quite enough talk,” Mama Lucy said firmly and came over with the bowl filled with a foul-smelling salve.
I breathed through my mouth, but then I tasted it and gagged.
Mama Lucy’s smile was grim. “It’s potent, I know, but it’ll work.”
Craig swallowed hard and sucked in a pained breath when she pressed the thick, grey substance to his wound. I let him squeeze my hand, confused by his last question. I saw people out there, but I sensed he meant something else. Maybe the person who stabbed him?
“Craig, what did you mean?” I asked, earning a scowl from Mama Lucy.
“He needs rest,” she said.
“She needs… to know…” Craig gasped when she pressed more salve into the wound. “Has to know.”
“What’s he talking about?”
“Nothing, he’s delirious.”
“No, I’m not,” he growled.
This time I knew it was a growl. A beast-like growl that no human should be able to make.
Mama Lucy’s hands stilled, and I froze, heart, pounding as I stared at him.
Panic was in his paranoid gaze as it flickered past me to the window. “They’re coming… for me… I sense them… she needs to know the truth.”
Mama Lucy opened her mouth probably to yell at him some more, but I cut her off. “Are you saying the person that did this to you is out there? Mama Lucy, we have to call the cops.”
“No more humans,” he rasped. “They’ll only get hurt.”
“Humans? We’re all humans,” I replied confused. “Craig?” He closed his eyes, and they didn’t open again, but his chest rose and fell with his breathing. “What’s he talking about? What do I need to know?”
“It’s from the wound, dear, ignore it,” she said.
I shook my head. “Mama Lucy, what’s going on? Really? I know things have changed. Something’s happening, and I have no idea what it is and at the shop…” I trailed off, unsure if I should tell her what happened at the shop or not.
“Kate?” Her hand held my cheek as she stared deeply into my eyes. “What did you see?”
“There… there was a dagger, and I touched it, and then I wasn’t here anymore,” I whispered. “I was flying… I was a dragon, and there was fighting. People dying.” I gulped at the fear and anger racing through my veins. “And a darkness spreading over everything. Killing everything. I tried to fight it, but then… then I was back in the shop as if nothing happened. It was like my dreams only this felt… this felt real.”
Now I sounded like a crazy person. That was just great. But when I looked at Mama Lucy, she wasn’t staring at me like I was crazy.
She stared at me like she already knew this day would come. “Oh, my sweet girl, maybe he’s right.”
“Told you,” Craig chimed in followed by a harsh cough.
Mama Lucy glared at him. “She has to be told the proper way. Not just blurting out the truth!”
“No time… can’t you… feel it? They’re here… running out of time.”
“No one is getting into this house!”
I glanced from one to the other and wondered if I was the only sane one in this room. “Would someone please just tell me what’s going on?” I snapped and felt the strange sensation of something shifting through my body as if trying to break through my skin again.
There was no pain like the other day when I tried to take off my bracelet. No, this was different. This felt powerful and strong, and I closed my eyes, ready to embrace it when Mama Lucy grabbed my shoulders hard and the sensation died.
“Not here, you can’t do that here,” she ordered. “Never, do you hear me?”
“I don’t understand! What’s happening to me and who is he?” I was ready to tear my hair out if no one came clean.
Harry’s sharp bark interrupted our arguing.
Mama Lucy let go of me and ran to the window. Her face paled, and she backed away. “Kate, get the kids. Lock them in a room upstairs.”
“What? Mama Lucy—”
“Do as I say!” she stormed.
I bolted from the room, stopped for a second to peer outside and saw someone I never expected to see again.
The guy I ran into on the street was there along with the guys I assumed were his friends.
But there were more guys headed towards them and from the looks on their faces, they weren’t happy. Why were they all here?
“Kate!”
“Right,” I muttered and ran through the house to the backyard. “I need you all to come inside, come on!”
“What, why?” Jerry, one of the younger boys, asked. “I don’t want to go in.”
“Mama Lucy says so, now hurry up. It’s an emergency.” I waved, urging them all inside.
They groaned complaints as they came inside, and I hurried to lock the back door. I counted heads, making sure I had everyone, and ushered them towards the stairs.
“What’s going on, Kate?” Mary asked.
I was about to make up some lie when a horrible roar came from outside. It shook the walls, and the kids shrieked in fear.
Mama Lucy yelled something I didn’t understand, and then the sound of glass shattering had me moving faster than I ever had before in my life. Leading the way, I took the kids upstairs as sounds of fighting erupted at the front of the house. All I could think of was Mama Lucy staring down those men and yelled for the kids to move faster. I had to get them to safety before I could go help her.
“Inside,” I said and opened the door to Mama Lucy’s room. “Now you lock this door, and you don’t open it for anyone except me or Mama Lucy, understand?”
“Wait, where are you going?” Mary asked, grabbing my hand. “What’s happening?”
“I don’t know, but you’re going to stay in here. I have to go help.”
“No! Don’t leave us!”
I stared at all the faces and wished I could tell them everything was going to be alright, but how could I do that when I had no idea if it would be or not?
“Keep this door locked,” I repeated and closed it. I waited until I heard the bolt slide into place then rushed off back downstairs to help.
But downstairs was chaos.
A guy I didn’t recognize went sailing down the hall, past the stairs, and landed with a thud somewhere in the kitchen. He yelled curses from his tone, but what he actually said I have no idea. The language was weird and very guttural.
I heard Mama Lucy yell and I took off in the direction it came from.
When I skidded around the corner to the living room, Mama Lucy was backed up against the far wall, her hands out before her and blue and white light emanating from them. It formed a bubble around her and kept out the men trying to get at her.
“Mama Lucy!” I screamed and without thinking about the consequences, barreled into the men invading my home.
I took them to the floor in a heap, but once there had no idea what to do next.
“Kate!” Craig yelled in a panic.
I turned to see him using the sword he’d been carrying and fighting against another man with a sword.
No, not just a strange man.
The other man I ran into on the street! Why was everyone running around with swords?
“Grab her!” the man I ran into earlier ordered and a strong pair of arms wrapped around me, pinning my arms to my side.
“Get off me! Let me go!” I screamed, but the one holding me was too strong.
“Forrest! The demons are back,” one of the others I’d knocked down said, staring out the front window. “And they do not look happy!”
Forrest, the man attacking Craig, the one I’d knocked down in town, snarled and pressed harder with his sword against a still weak Craig.
Craig sank to one knee, and I caught his eye.
I urged him to get up and keep fighting!
I had no idea who he really was or what the hell was going on, but I was not going to watch the guy I spent all morning trying to save be stabbed to death in my living room!
“Get the portal open,” Forrest ordered.
“No! You’re not taking her,” Mama Lucy screamed, and more light shot from her hands.
My jaw dropped, but there was little time to stand around being shocked by what I was seeing.
The man near the window was blasted through the glass to land on the front lawn, but another rushed in to take his place.
Craig suddenly sprang up from the floor, whirling the blade faster as he went on the offensive.
I kicked and flailed, trying to break loose.
The guy’s arm moved closer to my mouth, and I bit down hard until he finally let go with a snarl.
Forrest spotted me falling to the floor and opened his mouth to yell, but I picked up the closest item I could find, a brass bookend, and chucked it at him.
He ducked, and it thudded into the wall instead.
“We’re trying to help you!” he bellowed at me.
Craig scoffed, swinging the sword wide.
Forrest’s blade caught it just in time from slashing into his side.
“Then why are you attacking her? Kate! You have to get out of here!”
“She’d be safer with us, demon,” Forrest snapped.
“Demon?” I repeated and screamed in annoyance. “Would someone please tell me what the hell is going on!”
Forrest looked as if he was about to do just that when the guy I bit slammed his open palm into the nearest wall.
He’d used his blood to draw symbols around where his hand was, and the sheetrock crumbled away.
“Demons are coming! We have to go, now!” the man yelled.
Mama Lucy was back on her feet, and light bloomed in her palms. “I’ve had enough of this!” she snapped, but it wasn’t Mama Lucy’s voice anymore.
This, this was different, powerful, and it slammed into me, nearly sending me off my feet.
She raised her hands towards the glowing hole in the wall.
Craig ducked under Forrest’s blade and lunged towards me, taking me to the floor just as Mama Lucy let loose.
The power shot towards the portal, but instead of closing it, which I think was what she tried to do.
It exploded outward.
The man who stood before it was sucked in and a moment later, Forrest followed.
Craig started to go, and I held onto his hands, struggling to keep him there, but his grip slipped.
“Kate!” Mama Lucy screamed and rushed forward.
We couldn’t hold on.
Craig cursed as he was dragged into the swirling light and my fingers grazed Mama Lucy’s as I was sucked in after him.
“Mama Lucy!”
Her face filled with fear right before the room was filled with more strangers and then everything was gone.
I fell and fell, screaming as I tumbled head over heels before finally, I landed with a thud on something hard and the world around me went dark.