Mystik Legends

Pandora's Story

Chapter One

The bleak black void in her mind faded to gray, raining down a snow of ash all around the space. The place smelled of burning and char. She listened hard, to see if she could hear anything in the gray ashen daylight of her own world developed inside her mind. There was an asphalt road, cracked with age and tall trees on either side, surrounding it. She stood in the middle of the road, waiting, looking up at the green leaves of the trees. She took one step toward the darkest of the gray of some hidden place shrouded in mist and flying ashes. A great rumble from the ground below shook the road and her body so hard she fell onto her knees.

The gray day descended back into darkness quickly as if the mist was swallowed by black ink. She sat back on her heels in the road, watching the world around her change dramatically. She looked up at the trees who’s leaves burst into bright blue flames, illuminating the unspeakable horrors around her, only visible in the darkness of the ink-colored void around her. As the creatures grew closer to her, she saw their faces. Terror rose of from the depths inside her and she screamed so loud and with such ferocity, the creatures paused, shaking their heads and bowing to her as if she were their queen.

Pandora took a breath and coughed. The monstrosities gathered around her backed away slowly. One of them paused and grabbed a flaming branch from the tree beside it and used it to write a hieroglyph in the street before her. Oddly, she knew what it meant. “Master” it said. Pandora stood at her full height, fangs glistening in the dark.

“You’re my monsters?” she whispered.

“Yes,” they hissed at her. “We are also your demons.”

She narrowed her eyes at them and stood her ground. “Go,” she whispered at them.

No sooner had she told them to go, the scene began to fade from black to shades of gray with snowy ash falling from the sky once again.

***

“Pandora! Wake up!” Warren said, anxious, holding her tightly. “Please wake up, love.”

“What? What’s happening?” she asked him with the haze of sleep still about her.

“I think you were having a nightmare. You screamed and grabbed me hard around the collar of my shirt, nearly choking me.” He winced and half-smiled at her. “I’m all right. Are you?”

She sat up in bed and looked up at Warren with a little pain in her eyes. She shook her head, eyes welling up with tears. “No,” she whispered in a watery sob as she crumbled in his arms and put her head on his chest, shaking.

“It’s all right. I’ve got ya, lass. Promise.” Warren held Pandora while she cried and shook from the sobbing as it wracked her body hard for a minute or two. When it eased, he stroked her hair and pushed her gently away so he could see her face. “It’s all right. I mean it.”

“Yes. I know,” she said, grabbing his hand. “It was a frightening place. I feel like I’ve been there before and the things inside my head have a face and a body now. It’s hard to explain, but I think you know what I mean. Maybe. You remember me talking to you about depression and demons? Bad deeds? Any of that?”

“Vaguely. You saying your demons have a face now?” he asked her.

“No. They’ve always had a face. I just never saw it before now.” She looked at him with seriousness. “I’ve never been so scared of anything in my life as I was of seeing those monsters, being face to face with them. The funny thing is, those are my monsters, I rule them.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“I mean, in the dream, those creatures, they represent my demons or inner sins, whatever you want to call them, they belong to me and I to them, I guess. And the place from my dream was like a paradox version of Hell. My own hell...the Black Void,” she said, trailing into silence, staring back at him.

“I find it hard to believe you’ve done much wrong in order to have your own Hell,” Warren told her. He studied her face, grasping her hand.

“We all have our sins. I’m not innocent. I’ve done things I’m not proud of, Warren. You have to know that. I’m a vampire for fuck’s sake. Just surviving for some of us means killing your kind.”

“Yes, but that’s not you! I know better than that,” he said. He narrowed his eyes at her. “What are you trying to say?”

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me,” she whispered, looking away.

“I would if you’d tell me.” He lightly turned her chin back toward him, making her look him in the eye. “I would if you’d tell me,” he repeated. “Please?”

She sighed hard. “Okay. You asked for it, mister. I’ll tell you, but you may not enjoy what you hear.”

“As long as it’s real, love. That’s all that matters.”

“Be careful what you ask for,” she said, her golden eyes glittering in the candle light of the small room.

Mystik Legends--Prologue

PROLOGUE

Light danced its way across the murky water flowing through the creek one last time as the sky faded into night. It was the marked fiftieth year for the ancient cursed ghost, an urban legend from the mid-country, to return to his killing spree. The vengeful spirit of a Viking haunted a part of the country where no one believed in supernatural occurrences other than the Holy Ghost. As he stalked his next victim, he waited for the cover of night to come, shading him from the fading daytime sun.

A man lay on the ground, his thick chestnut brown hair stuck to his forehead with sweat. He was petrified with fear, his eyes wide, barely able to breathe, What the hell? Am I really seeing this? He can’t be real! I’m not seeing this! My eyes are not right! Ghosts aren’t real! My parents said he was, but that can’t be! Folk Legends are bullshit! Yet…here we are. I wonder if I’m going crazy right now… Am I going to die? Oh, God!

The specter came closer, gliding, his feet never touching the ground, rags and his weapon belt dragging in the dust. With wide green eyes, the victim stared at Leif Eriksson, Viking warrior and explorer. Shock spread across his face, his eyes bulged further with fear, his pulse raced, and his breath quickened.

Leif smiled a ghastly smile. Old Scenic—as he was sometimes known—a figure with blood dripping and matted all over him; it seeped from his pores as he hovered over his next victim. The man couldn’t scream. His breath rattled in his chest and he was sweating. It made Leif happy knowing he still put fear into his victims. He had his battle ax poised above his head and laughed about the stench of fright he smelled on his victim. He had no time to waste. The damn people—most of them—heeded the warnings. Plus, he promised himself it would be more interesting that year. Some new people will show up soon and the fun will begin. He felt them coming closer with each passing hour, his smile grew wider as he looked down at his victim’s body shaking on the ground. It was time to kill.

He said in Ancient Norse, “All people with fear such as yours deserve to die a coward’s death!” Leif swung his ax with ease, taking the man’s head off his shoulders. As it fell to the ground with a thud, Leif saw his eyes were permanently locked in horror. His body fell on the hard earth and went limp as blood oozed out of his neck, pouring out of the new hole his head was previously attached to. Leif went to work cutting the man’s body into several pieces, hacking with almost motionless ease, throwing the pieces into the trees above him. He tossed back his head and sinister laughter erupted from him. Feeling victorious, he picked up the man’s head by his thick chestnut brown hair and carried it into the woods surrounding the creek in Tipton Ford, Missouri.

***

Where exactly do roads lead? What path were we meant to take? As these thoughts played inside her head, Rain saw a woman torn between life and death rise from the shadows to stand beside her best friend. It felt like they’d live to continue fighting battles no one in the normal realm knew existed. She stood solid as a soldier staring into the eyes of evil, she was unafraid. Her face stone cold, her hair pulled up behind her, her gaze more terrifying than her scream.

Bits of gravel beneath her feet shifted as she stood looking into the face of some horrible monster. The ghastly bleeding face, the blond matted hair, and white-eyed stare were enough to make even the bravest of men fall to their knees. This beast saw much and killed many over his years of torturing people, two angry women didn’t appear to be a match for him. Killing them would be easy enough in his mind.

Insanity stood in the way of proper judgment on the road to hell; for every right move, a wrong one waited in its stead. Being matched blow against blow, Jen and Morgan seething and ready to walk away, looked at one another, giving one last smile before getting low to the ground.

Powdery dust flying through the air was indication something bad happened in the woods. The ground shook and the ghost howled in agony. Whatever was left of his chance at freedom was gone.

The beeping of an alarm clock woke the sleeping Indian woman named Rain, who awoke startled and confused. She never had a dream so real in her whole life. Being of Native American blood, she believed sometimes dreams were windows to the past or the future. That journey scared her to the core. She lay in bed shaking, thinking about her friends. She knew, deep down, this trip would be her last. Finally, Rain did the only thing she could think of. In order to grasp what she saw and to mentally deal with it, she wrote it down and tucked the pages into the open suitcase sitting on the chair beside her bed. Her next move was to decide whether or not to tell them.

Is it superstition? Is it chance? Why is it I’ve never had a dream this real before, like a vision in my sleep? As Rain questioned the vision, she worried over her friends and hoped the trip would go smoothly. She hoped it was nothing but stress messing with her head.