Post by Erosaf on May 20, 2011 12:10:19 GMT 1
I knew as the sun rose that there was going to be a lot of grief today. Thought there would be no one as affected as myself. No other vampire knew Julia Andrews as well as I did. Though I was not truely related to her by blood, she was one of many who had raised me through my countless years.
Getting out of bed was not easy, but somsomehow I managed to. I looked over at the sleeping Henry. It was dawn, so he could sleep for another hour while I went and sated the burning feeling in the back of my throat. I knew what that feeling meant, I was hungry, and I rarely let Henry see me in such a state.
Not to mention the fact that my canines were longer and sharper than was normal for a human at the moment. I had to gget out of the room and fast, before it was too hard to ignore them. Especially with henry lying there, completely out of it. I would not allow myself to feed on him.
Out of my bedroom I hurried, heading towards my usual feeding place. one of the servants met me in the huge dining room, he had a big glass of blood warm and ready for me. It was not long before he refilled it for me. With every mouthful the complex golden unicorns adorning my face seemed to brighten.
As soon as I knew I was full, I headed back to my room, slipping into the bathroom and having a shower. That done, I pulled on the long black dress that I was going to wear for the funeral. Then I moved into the bedroom, wondering what Henry would say, and what Ashleigh would say when they found not a single mirror in the two bathrooms. neither mine, nor the one attached to Ashleigh's room.
Ashleigh woke with a groan, looking around the room.
She noticed a brush on the dresser table. She picked it up, feeling grim.
Now, all she needed was a mirror. She looked around the room, the was none.
"It must be in the bathroom," she reasoned.
She walked out of the bedroom and headed for the bathroom.
The bathroom was large; much larger than hers. There wasn't a mirror in the either.
"Jenny?" Ashleigh called out, "Where do you keep your mirrors?"
She sighed as she fastened the long ebony cloak's clasp near her own throat. Henry would wake up soon, but she was not so sure that today would be a day she would get through. There was too much to be done. Not to mention her facial were brighter than they had ever been at the moment. That was due to the amount of power that was growing inside me after my rather inhumane meal.
Hearing her freind's voice she chuckled from where she was in her own bedroom. Her long ebony hair was immaculately done up in a rather intricate bun in the middle of the back of her head. She slipped out of the bedroom though, smiling slightly as her eyes met Ashleigh's bed head.
“Thats not something that we're allowed to keep in our homes, Ashleigh. Vampires don't reflect in a mirror. If one of the council was to come here and find one, they'd defang me. I think you can understand why that is. It's one of our traditions.”
She sighed. “I do have one though. Hidden where they cannot access. Who would suspect me to have an item that is taboo in my house?” She knew that the brightness of her tattoo's no matter how beautiful they were, would surprise her friend. "Even I must follow tradition, they can even do such a thing to me."
"No mirrors?" Ashleigh gasped.
She blinked, feeling as though she was in a nightmare.
She smiled, remembering the glass picture frames hanging on the walls.
She peered into one, looking at a peculiar black rose. She tidied her hair, and then went down the stairs to join the others.
Henry woke with a sad smile.
Today, his Jenny would be feeling sad. He didn't like her feeling sad, and hoped that he can help her through her pain.
She could not help but laugh at her friends remark. “No mirrors, except one,” she called after her. “It would seem you're not interested in knowing where it is.”
Then she turned, heading back to her own room. “Morning,” she said softly. She was smiling now, but later, she would not be at all. “I don't have all that long before I have to meet with the School board to discuss the events later today. Funeral's not for another two hours. Meeting will take at least one and half hours.”
She sighed. It was not something she was looking forwards to. “It's going to be a long sad day for everyone today. Though some would call the end part something to be happy about, though I can't see that being possible personally.”
This was not going to be the easiest of days, but she would survive the things to happen. Soon she would have more power than ever before. A thing that was going to stun some people. She would absorb the power of a hundred Nightstorm's before her. Her past lives. There was so much to do today, and she wanted none of it to happen. Power though was something that she was built for. No one else had the power to absorb what she would later.
“If you think I'm powerful now, wait until this afternoon, you'll want to rethink it.”
She sighed as she reached for the silver broach on the dresser. It was the shape of a bronze and silver angel, arms upraised so they cupped a crescent moon in the palms of the hands. She clipped it onto the front of her dress. “This is one of our school's symbols. Its the one that the teachers wear, something that I actually started, over fifty years ago.”
Thinking about the school made me smile. “It resembles the Goddess of my own real people, The people of Gaurdiaus, the planet on which I was born. Her name is Empusa which translates to Dawn Fire in the English tongue. There are four other versions to this, all completely different designs. I chose them all, and now they are well known. There are Vampyre Finishing Academy's all around the world. I do a lot of travelling.”
There was more to the tale than I had shared thus far. “Come on, you need to get ready. What do you want to have for breakfast? I'm heading towards the kitchen now, so I'll let them know what you want while I'm there.” By them I meant my servants. ”I'll only be gone a few minutes. When I get back, I'll show you the way there.”
Ashleigh thought for a moment, her sweat dripped from her brow, threatening to sting her eyes.
"Maybe some toast?" she asked. It was simple, and not too much trouble.
Henry frowned, deep in thought. His shirt was wet, drench in his own sweat.
It clung to his body, though he appeared not to be too bothered by it.
"May I have some egg sandwiches?" he asked.
Ashleigh smiled, despite the sad day, it was suprisingly extremely warm.
"Very specific, Ashleigh." She smiled though. At the moment she was happy. She chuckled and then she was gone from the room, using the speed none could match other than another vampire. She placed the order, including her own, and then left the kitchen, heading back up to them at a more natural human pace.
"Come on, it'll be ready soon," she said. Then she led the way through the twisting corridors, into another large room, with one long old fashioned wooden table in the middle with four chairs spaced out one on each side. She moved towards one of the two end ones, seeing as that was her prefered seat. It was a dark room but she looked at the candelabra above the table and her eyes flashed for a second. The wicks of the candles leapt aflame, lighting up the bare room.
"Have a seat guys."
Ashleigh and Henry sat at a small table, waiting.
She smiled saddly at her friend, feeling apprehensive.
"What are we waiting for?" Henry asked, his voice a mere whisper.
There was a sudden gut wrenching feeling in her stomach which made her shudder and gasp involuntarily for a few seconds. "What the hell?"
Then the door opened and she looked up quickly as she saw one of the undead take a few steps into the room, carrying their food. Then the undead girl stumbled as something struck her and fell, dead before she hit the ground. Jenny screeched as she spotted the crossbow bolt in the girls back.
"Stay here!" she almost shouted at Ashleigh and Henry as she leapt into the air fangs bared. "How dare you eter my house, slayers!" She was out of the room within seconds, breakfast forgotten. All she wanted was wreack havoc now on the ones intruding.
It did not take long before the Slayer's ran from the house in fear.
Soon though Jenny moved back into the room, grimacing. One of them had managed to hit her with a crossbow bolt, but it iwas nothing serious. As she entered the dining room once more, she reached down and pulled it out of her thigh, not even making a face at the painful thing coming out.
Ashleigh ran towards the dead girl, her heart pounding against her chest.
Stopping abruptly, the dead girl's face came into view. A wave of relief washed over her.
"Oh thank goodness," she gasped.
"Poor girl," she said again, sighing sadly.
She looked around, calling for Ella.
"Ella? Ella? Are you okay?"
She blinked, looking worriedly at Jenny.
'Are you ok? Are you hurt? What about Ella- she's not hurt is she?'
She growled as she thought for a moment. She still looked like a huge human shaped bat, though her toenails were long talons. Thena moment later she was completely human again in appearance.
"One of them did get me and Ella. I've already healed Ella, she needed a bit of extra blood, they shot her in the wrist." She indicated a tiny cut on her own wrist. "She lost a lot fo blood when I pulled that bloody crossbow bolt out of her." She snapped the bolt in her hands from her own calf muscle in two pieces.
"They were stunned for a moment when I came flying out at them, in a rage. Teaches them a valuable lesson. We don't all sleep during the daylight and only come out at night. The guy who shot me has a broken arm, and a few pulled muscles in his torso. Not avoidable, I moved to grab his crossbow off him with my feet and the fool held on. He told the others to shoot me and not worry about hitting him. I dropped him when I heard that,"
She sighed. "I ended up using the elements to scare them off."
She moved over to the seat that she'd knocked over when she's leapt into the air minutes before, picked it upa nd sat it down the way it was before the attack. Slipping down onto the seat, she examined her torn right calf, knowing that both her feind would see the blood that seemed to be fountaining out of it.
"Inas optus manus," she muttered. It was the language of her real birth, so neither of them would know what she had said. Blue light glowed on her hand as she ran it over the injured flesh. The skin and muscles knitted back together.
She sighed. "I was going to tell you of something that happened in one of my dreams night, before we were so... rudely interrupted."
ashleigh's shoulders sagged with relief hearing that they were both ok.
Though the undead girl wasn't as young as she looked, ashleigh still thought her as a child- and found herself caring for her, as a mother would care for their own children.
"What happened about the dream night?" she asked, intrigued.
This was the first she had heard of it.
Henry, blinked, making himself known.
"Something has happened to me," he stuttered.
He waited for everyone to face him, before turning his back.
Ashleigh gasped, her eyes tranfixed on him. He had grown a pair of webbed wings, and a spikey tail.
"What has happened to me?" he asked, slightly afraid.
She stared at him for a few moments, not comprehending what she was seeing. Then she gasped. "You've changed, into something I never thought would rise again, especially seeing as I had to destroy the last person who became one. You've become a Protector, in a way a Gaurdian like me, though a weaker version of what I am. Because you are originally human you have that weakness still. Wheras I have never truly been human."
She grimaced at the reminder of the old one. "I can only hope you won't meet the same fate the old one did, it was not something I liked having to do, destroy him."
Then she looked at Ashleigh. "Empusa, the godess of the people of Gaurdiaus, spoke to me in the dream. She said she would be there for the funeral, because it seems that my mother has something to tell me before she moves on. Plus, Empusa wants to be there for me, because she is like a mother to me. She even calls me her daughter. After all, she named me as her eyes and ears here on Planet Earth."
She sighed though looking out at the other room outside where the undead girl had ignited. She was burning to nothing and it was not long before not a flame or piece of grit was where she had lain.
Ashleigh nodded, tearing her eyes away from Henry.
"Finally, something I can partically explain," she said, motioning Jenny and Henry to approach her.
"Yes Henry, Jenny is right. You've become a protector- but not in the same form as the last one. You have transformed into a demon form protector- this is very strange- demons and vampires hasn't been allies for long. The wings would help you fly faster than the average protector- and the spikey tail is a defense magnitism as well as a weapon. The end of the tail is leathal."
She turned to Jenny, smiling.
"I am sure he won't turn on you- through demon form- and his bond to you, would make it impossible for enemies to get into his mind."
"Part Demon? Thats not something that is normal." She was surprised though when Ashleigh did not react when she mentioned Empusa. That was not normal for Ashleigh, seeing as Empusa had marked Ashleigh as one of her own as well. "Sardonia will be with her." If she did not react to Empusa's name she would to the demon's own goddess.
She sighed though as she looked at the clock on the wall nearby. "I have to go, but i'll eb setting up more protections around this place while I'm gone. I don't want anything to happen. Oh and learn to hide those wings and the tail, henry, even though they suit you. It won't do for the other vampires to see that tail in particular. The wings are nothing different though so they are okay."
Ashleigh blinked, she was sure she was missing something, something important.
"Empusa and Sardonia is coming!"
She immediately brightened up, amazed that it had slipped her mind.
With so much going on, it was hard to remain focus.
"Who and who is coming?" Henry asked, puzzled.
Ashleigh guestured to Jenny.
"You have the honour of telling him," she said, beaming happily.
"Empusa is the goddess of the people of Gaurdiaus, the planet from which I originally came, over five thousand years ago, Henry. I do not ever prey to any deity but her. Sardonia, is the Goddess of the demons, though she is not yours, for the Protectors are bound to Empusa. A long time ago, when I was born on my native Gaurdiaus, Empusa chose me and send me here once i was complete in my training."
She smiled. "It is a great honour to be named as her eyes and ears on this planet. Though she did have some dire news for me in that dream as well. I am the last native member of Gardiaus left in the entire solar system. The rest have been hunted out of hiding and destroyed. Even my home planet has been destroyed, and it was protected by the most powerful Gaurdians alive, I would be infantile in strength in comparison to those two."
Ashleigh fell silent and watched henry let the information sink in.
"So, you're being hunted," he questioned; his tail twitched.
Ashleigh couldn't help but wonder if demons would be hunted too.
"Yes, I am being hunted, but its said that as a gaurdian falls, their power is devided amongst those who still stand in other worlds, its a way fo saving our powers from the ones who hunt them. That is something else that will happen at the funeral to come. I will get my powers fully. It's not a responsibility that will be easy for me to handle."
She smiled though. "Now I better get to my meeting."
It was then that Elle came in carrying another tray of food. "Here you go." She was a little paler but there was nothing different to her really. "Thank you again, Mistress."
Ashleigh ran at the girl, throwing her arms around her.
"Thank the spirits, Ella, you are all right."
She pulled herself away, releasing the girl from her embrace.
"I was worried sick."
She turned to Jenny, still worried.
"You'll be fine. You're stronger now either way. One day, my strength will grow again too.
But for me, that won't happen for another year yet."
"All this getting stronger is getting annoying. It's getting that much that I am finding it harder to get used to the strength I have. I swore to protect humans, not hurt them, and yet I just broke someone's arm. How is that protecting them?" She knew she had a point there. "Back soon."
She sighed and headed for the front door, muttering in her native tongue as she left the house and started flying towards the school. It was a long and boring meeting really. All they discussed what was going to happen that day. Not that Jenny needed to talk about that again.
Then she was on her way home and back where her freinds were. At least she had managed to clear Henry and Ashleigh coming into the school for this. The other teachers were still not cool with Ashleigh being around yet, except Karen. She was looking fowards to seeing Ashleigh again.
"I'm back guys, though you'll have to get ready to go. Time to get over there for the funeral. Oh and Karen sends her regards, Ashleigh, she looks forwards to seeing you again."
Ashleigh grinned, smiling at her friends.
"Yes, it shall be good to see her again too."
They followed Jenny to the funeral site.
Henry looked at Jenny sadly, feeling her pain as if it were his own.
He held her hand tightly, for comfort.
"We'll get trough this," he promised her.
I sighed as we approached the place where my mother's broken body was being kept for today's events. “Wait here,” I said. “I will be back shortly.”
I knew they would not move from this place. Henry was safe, but Ashleigh was in too much danger to try anything. Of course, I knew the demons were tough fighters, but this was out of her hands. It did not take me long to find the way back to my school house's corridor.
The griffon who guarded Fyre house yawned sleepily as it spotted me coming.
“Might I pass, noble griffon?”
“You may, since you were in this school house. The other students are getting ready to come out to the hall.” It shifted out of the way and I moved passed, though I was not smiling as I had been.
As soon as it had covered the hole in which we entered our corridors, I called loudly, “Arise Fyre House. The time has come for you to head down to the funeral hall!”
After calling this, I entered my old common room. That caused a lot of staring. Not often did a fully grown and changed vampyre enter the common room of Fyre House. A lot of them were grinning as they recognised me as I passed them by. I hurried up the stairs, choosing to fly as that was so much quicker, to my old room.
Entering the room I found my red Fyre house uniform and pulled it on. Since I was going to command the element after which the house was named, it was only fitting that I wore red. Quickly I braided my black hair out of my face and then flew back down to the common room. It was crowded now, as some of them wondered who was calling them all out to the funeral hall.
Carefully I landed, making sure not to hit anyone with my large wings. That was a slight challenge seeing as even though the room was large, there were many more faces in here than the times I had been here. And those times were not many.
“Hey Professor Nightstorm,” one of the newest fledglings, a red haired pale skinned girl said.
“Hey Chelsea,” I replied. The girl was a really nice girl and I knew that at the moment she did need to toughen up a little. Else she would never be able to defend herself against the demons and werewolves on her own. We all knew that but no one ever teased her about it. Some of us were aware that she was hiding something from us, but no one was sure what.
I was fairly certain that she was gifted in some small way. Though I was yet to ask her about that. Now was not the time. “Time to get moving towards the hall. The ceremony will start in about ten minutes,” I said.
The room instantly started to clear. There was one hole in the room a fair way up, none of the fledglings except the senior fledglings used as an exit. I leapt gracefully up into the air and winged my way through it. Certainly a quicker way out it was.
When I hovered in the corridor, I saw that many students were making their way to the hidden exit of the Fyre House corridor. No point in me walking like everyone else. I could see the exit the teachers used when they were flying. The older students were releasing their wings and partnering up with the younger students, to fly out with them.
When I took to the sky, the others all followed after me. I saw them out to the grounds then dove to find the werewolf who was my soul mate. He was waiting where I had left him outside the hall. All the other guests had already entered and I knew they would have taken their seats.
A huge wave of red, blue, yellow and green rushed past us into the hall as all the students took their places. I had a few moments alone outside. "We'll head into the hall shortly," I told Ashleigh and Henry.
The vampires around them gathered, their fangs revealed.
Henry looked around, in normal circumstances, he'd be nervous.
Ashleigh grinned, her head held high.
Henry could see that she was tense, and expecting trouble.
Getting out of bed was not easy, but somsomehow I managed to. I looked over at the sleeping Henry. It was dawn, so he could sleep for another hour while I went and sated the burning feeling in the back of my throat. I knew what that feeling meant, I was hungry, and I rarely let Henry see me in such a state.
Not to mention the fact that my canines were longer and sharper than was normal for a human at the moment. I had to gget out of the room and fast, before it was too hard to ignore them. Especially with henry lying there, completely out of it. I would not allow myself to feed on him.
Out of my bedroom I hurried, heading towards my usual feeding place. one of the servants met me in the huge dining room, he had a big glass of blood warm and ready for me. It was not long before he refilled it for me. With every mouthful the complex golden unicorns adorning my face seemed to brighten.
As soon as I knew I was full, I headed back to my room, slipping into the bathroom and having a shower. That done, I pulled on the long black dress that I was going to wear for the funeral. Then I moved into the bedroom, wondering what Henry would say, and what Ashleigh would say when they found not a single mirror in the two bathrooms. neither mine, nor the one attached to Ashleigh's room.
Ashleigh woke with a groan, looking around the room.
She noticed a brush on the dresser table. She picked it up, feeling grim.
Now, all she needed was a mirror. She looked around the room, the was none.
"It must be in the bathroom," she reasoned.
She walked out of the bedroom and headed for the bathroom.
The bathroom was large; much larger than hers. There wasn't a mirror in the either.
"Jenny?" Ashleigh called out, "Where do you keep your mirrors?"
She sighed as she fastened the long ebony cloak's clasp near her own throat. Henry would wake up soon, but she was not so sure that today would be a day she would get through. There was too much to be done. Not to mention her facial were brighter than they had ever been at the moment. That was due to the amount of power that was growing inside me after my rather inhumane meal.
Hearing her freind's voice she chuckled from where she was in her own bedroom. Her long ebony hair was immaculately done up in a rather intricate bun in the middle of the back of her head. She slipped out of the bedroom though, smiling slightly as her eyes met Ashleigh's bed head.
“Thats not something that we're allowed to keep in our homes, Ashleigh. Vampires don't reflect in a mirror. If one of the council was to come here and find one, they'd defang me. I think you can understand why that is. It's one of our traditions.”
She sighed. “I do have one though. Hidden where they cannot access. Who would suspect me to have an item that is taboo in my house?” She knew that the brightness of her tattoo's no matter how beautiful they were, would surprise her friend. "Even I must follow tradition, they can even do such a thing to me."
"No mirrors?" Ashleigh gasped.
She blinked, feeling as though she was in a nightmare.
She smiled, remembering the glass picture frames hanging on the walls.
She peered into one, looking at a peculiar black rose. She tidied her hair, and then went down the stairs to join the others.
Henry woke with a sad smile.
Today, his Jenny would be feeling sad. He didn't like her feeling sad, and hoped that he can help her through her pain.
She could not help but laugh at her friends remark. “No mirrors, except one,” she called after her. “It would seem you're not interested in knowing where it is.”
Then she turned, heading back to her own room. “Morning,” she said softly. She was smiling now, but later, she would not be at all. “I don't have all that long before I have to meet with the School board to discuss the events later today. Funeral's not for another two hours. Meeting will take at least one and half hours.”
She sighed. It was not something she was looking forwards to. “It's going to be a long sad day for everyone today. Though some would call the end part something to be happy about, though I can't see that being possible personally.”
This was not going to be the easiest of days, but she would survive the things to happen. Soon she would have more power than ever before. A thing that was going to stun some people. She would absorb the power of a hundred Nightstorm's before her. Her past lives. There was so much to do today, and she wanted none of it to happen. Power though was something that she was built for. No one else had the power to absorb what she would later.
“If you think I'm powerful now, wait until this afternoon, you'll want to rethink it.”
She sighed as she reached for the silver broach on the dresser. It was the shape of a bronze and silver angel, arms upraised so they cupped a crescent moon in the palms of the hands. She clipped it onto the front of her dress. “This is one of our school's symbols. Its the one that the teachers wear, something that I actually started, over fifty years ago.”
Thinking about the school made me smile. “It resembles the Goddess of my own real people, The people of Gaurdiaus, the planet on which I was born. Her name is Empusa which translates to Dawn Fire in the English tongue. There are four other versions to this, all completely different designs. I chose them all, and now they are well known. There are Vampyre Finishing Academy's all around the world. I do a lot of travelling.”
There was more to the tale than I had shared thus far. “Come on, you need to get ready. What do you want to have for breakfast? I'm heading towards the kitchen now, so I'll let them know what you want while I'm there.” By them I meant my servants. ”I'll only be gone a few minutes. When I get back, I'll show you the way there.”
Ashleigh thought for a moment, her sweat dripped from her brow, threatening to sting her eyes.
"Maybe some toast?" she asked. It was simple, and not too much trouble.
Henry frowned, deep in thought. His shirt was wet, drench in his own sweat.
It clung to his body, though he appeared not to be too bothered by it.
"May I have some egg sandwiches?" he asked.
Ashleigh smiled, despite the sad day, it was suprisingly extremely warm.
"Very specific, Ashleigh." She smiled though. At the moment she was happy. She chuckled and then she was gone from the room, using the speed none could match other than another vampire. She placed the order, including her own, and then left the kitchen, heading back up to them at a more natural human pace.
"Come on, it'll be ready soon," she said. Then she led the way through the twisting corridors, into another large room, with one long old fashioned wooden table in the middle with four chairs spaced out one on each side. She moved towards one of the two end ones, seeing as that was her prefered seat. It was a dark room but she looked at the candelabra above the table and her eyes flashed for a second. The wicks of the candles leapt aflame, lighting up the bare room.
"Have a seat guys."
Ashleigh and Henry sat at a small table, waiting.
She smiled saddly at her friend, feeling apprehensive.
"What are we waiting for?" Henry asked, his voice a mere whisper.
There was a sudden gut wrenching feeling in her stomach which made her shudder and gasp involuntarily for a few seconds. "What the hell?"
Then the door opened and she looked up quickly as she saw one of the undead take a few steps into the room, carrying their food. Then the undead girl stumbled as something struck her and fell, dead before she hit the ground. Jenny screeched as she spotted the crossbow bolt in the girls back.
"Stay here!" she almost shouted at Ashleigh and Henry as she leapt into the air fangs bared. "How dare you eter my house, slayers!" She was out of the room within seconds, breakfast forgotten. All she wanted was wreack havoc now on the ones intruding.
It did not take long before the Slayer's ran from the house in fear.
Soon though Jenny moved back into the room, grimacing. One of them had managed to hit her with a crossbow bolt, but it iwas nothing serious. As she entered the dining room once more, she reached down and pulled it out of her thigh, not even making a face at the painful thing coming out.
Ashleigh ran towards the dead girl, her heart pounding against her chest.
Stopping abruptly, the dead girl's face came into view. A wave of relief washed over her.
"Oh thank goodness," she gasped.
"Poor girl," she said again, sighing sadly.
She looked around, calling for Ella.
"Ella? Ella? Are you okay?"
She blinked, looking worriedly at Jenny.
'Are you ok? Are you hurt? What about Ella- she's not hurt is she?'
She growled as she thought for a moment. She still looked like a huge human shaped bat, though her toenails were long talons. Thena moment later she was completely human again in appearance.
"One of them did get me and Ella. I've already healed Ella, she needed a bit of extra blood, they shot her in the wrist." She indicated a tiny cut on her own wrist. "She lost a lot fo blood when I pulled that bloody crossbow bolt out of her." She snapped the bolt in her hands from her own calf muscle in two pieces.
"They were stunned for a moment when I came flying out at them, in a rage. Teaches them a valuable lesson. We don't all sleep during the daylight and only come out at night. The guy who shot me has a broken arm, and a few pulled muscles in his torso. Not avoidable, I moved to grab his crossbow off him with my feet and the fool held on. He told the others to shoot me and not worry about hitting him. I dropped him when I heard that,"
She sighed. "I ended up using the elements to scare them off."
She moved over to the seat that she'd knocked over when she's leapt into the air minutes before, picked it upa nd sat it down the way it was before the attack. Slipping down onto the seat, she examined her torn right calf, knowing that both her feind would see the blood that seemed to be fountaining out of it.
"Inas optus manus," she muttered. It was the language of her real birth, so neither of them would know what she had said. Blue light glowed on her hand as she ran it over the injured flesh. The skin and muscles knitted back together.
She sighed. "I was going to tell you of something that happened in one of my dreams night, before we were so... rudely interrupted."
ashleigh's shoulders sagged with relief hearing that they were both ok.
Though the undead girl wasn't as young as she looked, ashleigh still thought her as a child- and found herself caring for her, as a mother would care for their own children.
"What happened about the dream night?" she asked, intrigued.
This was the first she had heard of it.
Henry, blinked, making himself known.
"Something has happened to me," he stuttered.
He waited for everyone to face him, before turning his back.
Ashleigh gasped, her eyes tranfixed on him. He had grown a pair of webbed wings, and a spikey tail.
"What has happened to me?" he asked, slightly afraid.
She stared at him for a few moments, not comprehending what she was seeing. Then she gasped. "You've changed, into something I never thought would rise again, especially seeing as I had to destroy the last person who became one. You've become a Protector, in a way a Gaurdian like me, though a weaker version of what I am. Because you are originally human you have that weakness still. Wheras I have never truly been human."
She grimaced at the reminder of the old one. "I can only hope you won't meet the same fate the old one did, it was not something I liked having to do, destroy him."
Then she looked at Ashleigh. "Empusa, the godess of the people of Gaurdiaus, spoke to me in the dream. She said she would be there for the funeral, because it seems that my mother has something to tell me before she moves on. Plus, Empusa wants to be there for me, because she is like a mother to me. She even calls me her daughter. After all, she named me as her eyes and ears here on Planet Earth."
She sighed though looking out at the other room outside where the undead girl had ignited. She was burning to nothing and it was not long before not a flame or piece of grit was where she had lain.
Ashleigh nodded, tearing her eyes away from Henry.
"Finally, something I can partically explain," she said, motioning Jenny and Henry to approach her.
"Yes Henry, Jenny is right. You've become a protector- but not in the same form as the last one. You have transformed into a demon form protector- this is very strange- demons and vampires hasn't been allies for long. The wings would help you fly faster than the average protector- and the spikey tail is a defense magnitism as well as a weapon. The end of the tail is leathal."
She turned to Jenny, smiling.
"I am sure he won't turn on you- through demon form- and his bond to you, would make it impossible for enemies to get into his mind."
"Part Demon? Thats not something that is normal." She was surprised though when Ashleigh did not react when she mentioned Empusa. That was not normal for Ashleigh, seeing as Empusa had marked Ashleigh as one of her own as well. "Sardonia will be with her." If she did not react to Empusa's name she would to the demon's own goddess.
She sighed though as she looked at the clock on the wall nearby. "I have to go, but i'll eb setting up more protections around this place while I'm gone. I don't want anything to happen. Oh and learn to hide those wings and the tail, henry, even though they suit you. It won't do for the other vampires to see that tail in particular. The wings are nothing different though so they are okay."
Ashleigh blinked, she was sure she was missing something, something important.
"Empusa and Sardonia is coming!"
She immediately brightened up, amazed that it had slipped her mind.
With so much going on, it was hard to remain focus.
"Who and who is coming?" Henry asked, puzzled.
Ashleigh guestured to Jenny.
"You have the honour of telling him," she said, beaming happily.
"Empusa is the goddess of the people of Gaurdiaus, the planet from which I originally came, over five thousand years ago, Henry. I do not ever prey to any deity but her. Sardonia, is the Goddess of the demons, though she is not yours, for the Protectors are bound to Empusa. A long time ago, when I was born on my native Gaurdiaus, Empusa chose me and send me here once i was complete in my training."
She smiled. "It is a great honour to be named as her eyes and ears on this planet. Though she did have some dire news for me in that dream as well. I am the last native member of Gardiaus left in the entire solar system. The rest have been hunted out of hiding and destroyed. Even my home planet has been destroyed, and it was protected by the most powerful Gaurdians alive, I would be infantile in strength in comparison to those two."
Ashleigh fell silent and watched henry let the information sink in.
"So, you're being hunted," he questioned; his tail twitched.
Ashleigh couldn't help but wonder if demons would be hunted too.
"Yes, I am being hunted, but its said that as a gaurdian falls, their power is devided amongst those who still stand in other worlds, its a way fo saving our powers from the ones who hunt them. That is something else that will happen at the funeral to come. I will get my powers fully. It's not a responsibility that will be easy for me to handle."
She smiled though. "Now I better get to my meeting."
It was then that Elle came in carrying another tray of food. "Here you go." She was a little paler but there was nothing different to her really. "Thank you again, Mistress."
Ashleigh ran at the girl, throwing her arms around her.
"Thank the spirits, Ella, you are all right."
She pulled herself away, releasing the girl from her embrace.
"I was worried sick."
She turned to Jenny, still worried.
"You'll be fine. You're stronger now either way. One day, my strength will grow again too.
But for me, that won't happen for another year yet."
"All this getting stronger is getting annoying. It's getting that much that I am finding it harder to get used to the strength I have. I swore to protect humans, not hurt them, and yet I just broke someone's arm. How is that protecting them?" She knew she had a point there. "Back soon."
She sighed and headed for the front door, muttering in her native tongue as she left the house and started flying towards the school. It was a long and boring meeting really. All they discussed what was going to happen that day. Not that Jenny needed to talk about that again.
Then she was on her way home and back where her freinds were. At least she had managed to clear Henry and Ashleigh coming into the school for this. The other teachers were still not cool with Ashleigh being around yet, except Karen. She was looking fowards to seeing Ashleigh again.
"I'm back guys, though you'll have to get ready to go. Time to get over there for the funeral. Oh and Karen sends her regards, Ashleigh, she looks forwards to seeing you again."
Ashleigh grinned, smiling at her friends.
"Yes, it shall be good to see her again too."
They followed Jenny to the funeral site.
Henry looked at Jenny sadly, feeling her pain as if it were his own.
He held her hand tightly, for comfort.
"We'll get trough this," he promised her.
I sighed as we approached the place where my mother's broken body was being kept for today's events. “Wait here,” I said. “I will be back shortly.”
I knew they would not move from this place. Henry was safe, but Ashleigh was in too much danger to try anything. Of course, I knew the demons were tough fighters, but this was out of her hands. It did not take me long to find the way back to my school house's corridor.
The griffon who guarded Fyre house yawned sleepily as it spotted me coming.
“Might I pass, noble griffon?”
“You may, since you were in this school house. The other students are getting ready to come out to the hall.” It shifted out of the way and I moved passed, though I was not smiling as I had been.
As soon as it had covered the hole in which we entered our corridors, I called loudly, “Arise Fyre House. The time has come for you to head down to the funeral hall!”
After calling this, I entered my old common room. That caused a lot of staring. Not often did a fully grown and changed vampyre enter the common room of Fyre House. A lot of them were grinning as they recognised me as I passed them by. I hurried up the stairs, choosing to fly as that was so much quicker, to my old room.
Entering the room I found my red Fyre house uniform and pulled it on. Since I was going to command the element after which the house was named, it was only fitting that I wore red. Quickly I braided my black hair out of my face and then flew back down to the common room. It was crowded now, as some of them wondered who was calling them all out to the funeral hall.
Carefully I landed, making sure not to hit anyone with my large wings. That was a slight challenge seeing as even though the room was large, there were many more faces in here than the times I had been here. And those times were not many.
“Hey Professor Nightstorm,” one of the newest fledglings, a red haired pale skinned girl said.
“Hey Chelsea,” I replied. The girl was a really nice girl and I knew that at the moment she did need to toughen up a little. Else she would never be able to defend herself against the demons and werewolves on her own. We all knew that but no one ever teased her about it. Some of us were aware that she was hiding something from us, but no one was sure what.
I was fairly certain that she was gifted in some small way. Though I was yet to ask her about that. Now was not the time. “Time to get moving towards the hall. The ceremony will start in about ten minutes,” I said.
The room instantly started to clear. There was one hole in the room a fair way up, none of the fledglings except the senior fledglings used as an exit. I leapt gracefully up into the air and winged my way through it. Certainly a quicker way out it was.
When I hovered in the corridor, I saw that many students were making their way to the hidden exit of the Fyre House corridor. No point in me walking like everyone else. I could see the exit the teachers used when they were flying. The older students were releasing their wings and partnering up with the younger students, to fly out with them.
When I took to the sky, the others all followed after me. I saw them out to the grounds then dove to find the werewolf who was my soul mate. He was waiting where I had left him outside the hall. All the other guests had already entered and I knew they would have taken their seats.
A huge wave of red, blue, yellow and green rushed past us into the hall as all the students took their places. I had a few moments alone outside. "We'll head into the hall shortly," I told Ashleigh and Henry.
The vampires around them gathered, their fangs revealed.
Henry looked around, in normal circumstances, he'd be nervous.
Ashleigh grinned, her head held high.
Henry could see that she was tense, and expecting trouble.
