NIGHTS OF HALLOW

Perdita and Sthena arrived at their destination which didn’t take time before they got there thanks to Sthena’s teleporting ability they had been using as a means of transportation to wherever they wanted to go.

Perdita scanned the new environment she found herself in. The place looked nothing like a place humans inhabited. The only thing she could see was darkness, but thanks to her vampire ability, she could decipher where she stood and things not so far away from her. If she had ventured here alone, her legs would have quickly taken her out of the place as soon as she touched her foot inside.

Looking around the place covered with more darkness than she had seen earlier in the forest they just came out from, she noticed things that looked like people that seemed as though they were hiding. Their body blended in with the darkness. But on a closer look, she found out that nothing was there actually.

She heaved a sigh of relief and turned around to face Sthena while still keeping a conscious eye on her environment. A tingling sensation on her legs caused her to look down, and that was when an ear-piercing scream erupted from her mouth.

Sthena was quick to come to her side with a worried look on his face. He questioned the terrified Lady, ”What happened, Perdita?”

Perdita’s eyes were wide with fear as she was still looking down at her feet, but what made her scream had suddenly disappeared. She pointed to the ground and spoke in a stutter, ”The...the....there was something here, Sthena.” As she spoke, she continued to look around her searching for the thing.

She moved from the place she stood on and pointed at the spot as she continued to speak in a horrified tone, ”There is something under that spot. I was about to face you when I felt something on my legs. I looked down to see hands, no, people’s hands crawling from underneath the ground wanting to grab my legs. Two already held my legs before I screamed.”

”I don’t know where they disappeared after you came to my side. Where is this place, Sthena? There are ghosts in this place!”

Sthena chuckled at the way Perdita shouted that there were ghosts in the place. Her wide terrified green eyes stared expectantly at him to teleport them out of the place immediately. He walked forward, took her hand in his, and rubbed the back of her hand. He spoke in a reassuring voice, ”Calm your heart, Perdita. Remember what I told you?”

Perdita nodded her head in an answer. She said, ”I remember you saying that you wanted to confirm if the ghosts can scare me. Yes, they can. Please take me out of here, Sthena.”

Her plea and her sense of humor made Sthena chuckle in amusement. He remarked, ”You are not dead yet, so you should survive more things coming.”

”More things coming?” Perdita questioned back in horror. What more was she going to expect? A walking dead that would want to choke her this time?

”Relax, Perdita. You do not need to fret. Nothing is going to happen, especially to you who is the owner of the land.” Sthena said and let go of Perdita’s hand he was holding.

What he said in turn caught Perdita’s attention. She asked, ”What do you mean by me being the owner of the land?”

”What I mean is that the land on which you are currently standing used to be the place where the witches, precisely your coven stayed in,” Sthena revealed, his red eyes staring back at Perdita who took a while to process what he told her.

After a while, Perdita questioned him, ”If this place used to be where witches stayed, then where did Serena take my brother to?”

”Good question,” Sthena remarked. He walked forward while inspecting the place they were in. He continued to speak, ”As I said, this place used to be your coven’s abode. Meaning that this is the first place Serena and her family came to stay. But with time, they were able to expand their territory and later moved over to where they are currently staying and that is the place where they took your brother to.”

Perdita stood at a spot afraid that if she moved another ghost would get hold of her leg. The wind carried a bone-chilling breeze that swept at their faces, sending shivers down Perdita’s body. It was then she noticed that unlike where they had come from, where it had started to snow, this place was left out. Was it because it was a witch’s abode that made nature frown at the place?

”You see...” Sthena drawled, bringing the attention of Perdita back to him as he went on to speak, ”This is my first time of coming here since Serena and her coven left this place. Not only me, no one has ever stepped foot in this place.”

Perdita’s brows squinted in doubt and she asked, ”And why is that?”

”It is because this place has been locked for eons. No one can step in here. Not even the first-generation vampires can set their foot inside.”

”But we were able to come in,” Perdita stated.

”Yes, we were...” Sthena affirmed with a nod of his head. He then turned to stare back at Perdita as he said his next words. ”.... because you are the key to unlocking this place.”

”What do you mean by that?” Perdita quizzed with furrowed brows.

”Hold your horses, Pretty Lady,” Sthena casually stated meanwhile Perdita’s heart skipped a beat at the endearment he used on her. He began to speak, ”You know the ongoing tale of you and your brother being the two great witch siblings?” Sthena asked and saw Perdita nod her head.

He went on to speak, ”There was once this rumor of the great witches locking this place and one other place just before their assumed annihilation. The tale then had it that it would only be the siblings—either of them— would be able to pass through. So here we are fully confirmed that you are truly one of the siblings and your brother the second.”

”I know everything seems kind of confusing right now, that is why I don’t want to rush you into explaining everything at once.”

”I am confused,” Perdita admitted as she suddenly felt dizzy. She asked, ”Is this what we came to confirm?”

”Yes,” Sthena confirmed. He then walked back to where Perdita stood. He said, ”I came here to fully confirm who they say you are because only you and your brother can own such a great power to fall a building without touching it.”

There was an obvious confusion written on Perdita’s face at what Sthena said. She repeated what he said in a question, ”Fall a building without touching it?”

”Yes,” Sthena affirmed. He further spoke, ”You see—the building of the Witcher we came from some minutes ago that is now in ruins was not fallen by those vampires that attacked us, but you, green eyes.”

”What?! How?”

Sthena took her hand again and began to walk them deeper into the place they were. The darkness didn’t help at all but Sthena being a pureblood, was able to see through the darkness. He asked, ”Did you know that the darkness you see has always been like this for ages it was locked?”

Perdita shook her head and muttered a low ”No,”

”This place has never experienced light since then.”

”Why is that?” Perdita asked.

”I don’t know,” Sthena shrugged his shoulders still holding Perdita’s hand as he led them further inside. ”You have your witch family to ask though I also heard that only you or your brother can bring light back in here. You are the light, Perdita.”

Perdita was still speechless over everything happening. And it seemed as though as they discovered more truths so did the mystery behind everything increase.

Firstly, Sthena said she was the key to this place and now she was the light? But on a brighter approach, she felt the feeling of being able to open a locked place and bringing light to the place that has been filled with darkness was some kind of achievement. The thought made her smile.

She asked, ”How do I bring light to this place then?”

Sthena turned to look at the Lady by his side and smiled. He said, ”We will get to that stage. This place has been in darkness, so waiting a little more wouldn’t hurt it. As I was saying...” Sthena drawled as he went back to their earlier topic.

”As I was saying, the building where the Witcher lived is not a real building but an illusion created by her. And only creatures of purebloods would be able to see the building. The vampires who attacked us are lowly turned vampires and they cannot be able to see the building. What they saw was us standing in the middle of the forest.”

”From my analysis, Vetis must have given them the location where we were, so they came to attack us.”

Perdita kept mute as she silently listened to everything Sthena was saying. She heard him continue to explain.

”So—what am I saying? What I am saying is that when the Witcher told you that your brother couldn’t be located, your emotions got the best of you and it invoked your powers which in turn collapsed the building. It was just the timing that made it look as though it were those vampires that fell the building. It was a mere coincidence that everything happened simultaneously.”

”In another aspect, this means that your abilities and powers are slowly coming back.”