Sell you a Bridge chapter 171

February 13th 2011 The OZ 9:00 PM EDT

The  scene in the mirror was cozy, the woman laying next to her daughter.  "Two little princesses dancing row, spinning fast and freely on their  little toes, where the night will take you there's only one way to know,  two little princesses dancing in a row." The woman had a pleasant  voice, nothing impressive or earth shaking but mellow and soothing even  without any real attempt at flexing it. She smiled tenderly down at the  girl and kissed her softly on the cheek. "My angel, my life, sleep  well."

Glitch swallowed hard,  looking to DG. "That's you." DG's eyes were glued to the mirror, tears  flowing down her cheeks as she watched her mother kiss her goodnight for  what might have been the last time in her life. Glitch didn't notice,  staring at the screen with a puzzled frown. "I knew you too." He looked  so lost it was hard not to feel sorry for the addlebrained man. It must  have been awful to have your whole life on the tip of your tongue.

As  we watched the scene stayed fixed on little DG after the Queen left. A  girl walked in. Regal and arrogant, she looked only a few years younger  than me, but her eyes were hard and cold. There wasn't much human in  those eyes. She smiled cruelly down at the girl on the bed. "The  majestic Queen of the OZ, had two lovely daughters she." The way she  strolled forward into the room gave me a bad feeling. That girl was a  predator.

Glitch  swallowed hard. "That's Azkedelia. Marbles or not, evil like that you  don't forget." There was a slight quaver in his voice, and I didn't  blame him. The girl's body was moving, but there wasn't a person in that  skin. I got the same feeling looking at her that I did looking at my  Uncle. She walked and talked, but there was nobody home. There was only  darkness behind those eyes.

DG  was fixated on the girl. "Azkedelia is my sister." Her tone was  confused, but under it was something else. Hurt, loss, the knowledge  that she had yet another family member she never got to know, and that  the girl in question had become something so horrible. I put a hand on  her shoulder, offering her a small smile. With my aura sight, it was  easy to see how hard this was hitting her. Zee stepped up on her other  side to take her hand and squeeze.

We  returned to watching the mirror as the girl approached the bed slowly,  like a lion stalking a gazelle. Her creepy monotone voice began reciting  again, her voice almost sing song in cadence, though with no emotion in  it. "One to darkness, she be drawn, and one to light, she be shone.  Double eclipse it is foreseen, light meets dark in the stones between.  But only one and one alone, shall hold the Emerald, and take the  throne." The cold detachment in here voice was chilling as she repeated  part of the last line of her little rhyme and raised her hands.

The  roiling darkness that flowed from her palms and into the small body of  my friend's past self was somehow...wrong. Sick. It blazed with a  disgusting rot to my aura sight, even through the mirror, and more than  anything I had ever seen it made me want to vomit. The creeping smog  billowed down over little DG's face, and her eyes flew open as she  fought for breath, her body convulsing. Present DG gasped in horror as  she watched the sister she had only just learned she had smother the  life from her childhood self, gripping Zee's hand in terror and  confusion. "She...she tried to kill me."

Cain  laid a gentle hand on her shoulder, his voice sad. "No. She DID kill  you." As we watched, the creepy girl who reminded me of those twins from  the shining gave a satisfied smirk at the corpse of her dead sister and  turned to stroll casually out of the room without a care in the world.  It boggled my mind, the sheer callous...evil, of just executing a small  child, your own sister, in pain and fear and the just walking off to go  play with a smile. It was almost as sickening as that horrible power she  used to do it.

It  paled in comparison to the the heartbreak and anguish on the Queens  face when she walked back into the room to see her youngest child laying  on her bed, staring up at the ceiling with lifeless eyes. She gave a  heartrending scream and bolted to the bedside, trying to shake her  daughter awake. When it didn't work the Queen collapsed, sobbing, on top  of DG's body, weeping an apology for not protecting her better. She sat  there like that, holding her daughter and crying for a minute or two,  before her face hardened and she closed her eyes.

The  others probably didn't see much, it wasn't that flashy in terms of  magic, but in my aura sight I saw it all, and I was in awe. The Queen's  aura flooded into her heart, causing the organ to glow bright white even  through the chest. She reach down and tilted DG's head back and then  she BREATHED out her life force into the little girls mouth. I would  have expected the years to be torn from her, but they flowed out of her,  pulling her vitality from her flesh and pushing it from her mouth like  she'd squeezed years from that glowing heart as if it were a sponge.

The  sobbing Queen slumped down against the pillow as little DG gasped, her  hair draining of color and bleaching to blonde as life returned to her  gasping daughter. She clutched the little girl against her. "Oh my  angel!" She wept in to DG's hair, before pulling back, eyes still wet  with tears. "Fear not my child, there is still one thing that can stop  her. The Emerald of the Eclipse." Then she leaned down and whispered  something into DG's ear, so low even we couldn't pick it up. "The secret  to finding it, now lives inside of you. When the time is right, you  will return."

A  cold voice echoed from behind us. "Mother never could leave well enough  alone." I cursed myself for getting so caught up in the drama I forgot  to keep an eye out. That was the problem with super ninja detection  training, it didn't do shit unless you actually used it. In my defense  that had been pretty fucking traumatic for DG, but still missing the  evil sorceress walking up behind us could have been bad if she wasn't so  Bond villain stupid that she needed the last word. Common sense would  have just had her blast the rest of us an question DG after.

Not  that I would have died, but still, the monologue was just stupid. The  woman stepped forward, her gait that same careful predatory stalk as  younger girl she had been. "DG, the little sister I thought I no longer  had. I've always wondered what you look like." She grinned down at where  DG was clutching at Zee. "And you brought a lover home to meet the  family? I admit I pictured you more with this strapping young man over  here. " Her eyes flicked to me, her perfect teeth biting into her lower  lip. "Though if he's up for grabs I might take him for a spin. I've  heard such...chilling things."

I  blinked. Honestly...I was a little tempted in a physical sense.  Azkedelia was a fox. Milky pale, pouty lips, heaps and heaps of cleavage  in that shiny corset dress and some very fetching tattoos over top of  her generous and very exposed bust. Sadly she had an aura like rancid  sewer water, and I was taken anyway. I gave her a polite smile. "Sorry  honey, as sexy as you are, I'm already having trouble balancing the two  women I've got on my plate now. Plus, I only barely dodged the whole  sticking my dick in crazy thing with my last ex, be a shame to break my  streak."

Her  eyes flashed and she lashed out with a snarl, an arc of black lightning  shattering the air. I rolled my eyes and flicked a finger, opening a  void and absorbing the whole attack.Then I opened a second one and the  same bolt came shooting back out at her. She snorted and flicked her  fingers, deflecting the bolt into the body of one of her longcoat goons,  seemingly unbothered when the man went up in a billow of black flames  as he roared with agony. She clicked her tongue, pouting at me. "Well  that's no fair. I need to have a heart to heart with my baby sister but  you're getting me all hot and bothered."

She  ran a long nail across the top of her ample tits and the tattoos began  to squirm, clawing their way off her skin and into the real world. She  looked to the shapes of what were obviously flying monkeys. "Capture my  sister. Don't kill her, I have questions." I was still at about eight  thousand points. With a snarl of a flick of my wrist I reached for the  void, calling forth five more cornerpups. The spell to get them all at  once was exhausting, and took up a few hundred points. She raised an  eyebrow when she saw the summoning, giggling delightedly at me. "I love  it when boys are considerate. Bringing me a gift? Every girl loves cute  puppies."

I  snapped at the pups, Patches included. "Guard DG, don't let those shit  flinging bird freaks touch her." The pups, small but still powerful  shards of the very void itself, yipped courageously, bolting over to  join Patches who had beaten his smaller brothers and sisters to  protecting the girl. I addressed Zee without looking away. "Baby, take  everyone and go with them. I can handle Queenie over there, but I can't  have any distractions." That aura of rot and decay was roiling off the  woman, and she had a LOT of it. This crazy bitch was leaking power like a  sieve.

The  worst part is that I couldn't use my void form. Whatever that energy  was, it was ALIVE. It hated, loathed everything around it. I couldn't  take in living things, and whatever was running through Azkedelia was  definitely that, emphasis on the word THING. Zee bolted up to me,  kissing me on the cheek. "Fine, but only because I believe you when you  say you can handle her. Kick her ass." I gave a distracted smile as she  grabbed the others and ran, leaving me alone with Azkedelia.

She  gave me a coy smile, running a finger along the top of her exposed  cleavage. "What's the matter sweet boy? Don't want your girlfriend or  little DG to see you be rough with me?" She leered at me, exposing way  too many teeth. "Such a brave boy, protecting his friends. Don't worry  sweetie, after your spanking mommy will make all the pain go away." Her  eyes flooded with pitch black and she hurled a wave of green flame right  at me. Ruby lips peeled back from paper white teeth.

I  pulled on my power, forging a half sphere of fused shadow and ghostly  ectoplasm, but unlike the last time I did this, I knew what I was doing.  I fused the void into the mixture, swirling the two disparate powers  into its all consuming darkness to merge them into a black dome in front  of me. I couldn't absorb her power into myself with void form but I  could still wield the space between worlds.I'd learned a lot from that  grimoire already.

I rolled my head  in a circle, cracking my neck as my shield nullified her attack and then  condensed down to a floating buckler to hang on my arm. "That all you  got, bitch? No wonder you wanted me to call you mommy. It must be sad to  be slipping in your old age." And with another snarl, it was on.