37. RevealedA Chapter by KiannaBrooke never thought she would meet the woman who had caused her family so much pain. Her mother. The pain subsided and Brooke
maintained balance as they progressed through the tunnels. She breathed and
found the horrible stench had gone away. Now, she smelled a minty scent. It
reminded her of the Lavender Stream in a snowstorm. What was this? Brooke
looked around, but only saw the rounded, metallic walls of the tunnels. In the
crevices of them however, a long trail of black substance stretched forward and
endless. As she and her friends traveled down the tunnel, she now understood it
was obsidian rock. How could that be? There were no signs of a volcano
anywhere. She glanced back at her friends and internally groaned to see
Meredith still had that disappointed expression on her face. Brooke didn’t get
it. She checked her arm and saw that the purple color remained, but the blood
had receded into her skin. Secretly checking her temperature, it had cooled.
Everything was fine. There was no need to trouble Meredith for nothing. The
unusual color will probably fade as well. After
a few minutes of silence, Brooke found out she was right and the color had gone
away. A little soreness kept its place, but that was normal. Meredith and the
rest heard a choir of humming. The humming mounted to an old miner’s song. The
sound of pickaxes crushing a kind of rock mashed together with their voices and
created a rhythmic beat full of blues. “Rustlin’ cross the Eastland Sea,
through the tunnels we will be…oh….we been working in the mountains, riight
below the sky, giants be sure to pass us by and…!” The
voices had soul in them, Brooke mused as she and her friends listened, but what
were they. Brooke saw tiny creatures, tinier than a dwarf, which was fairly odd
to her. Then she remembered her mom talk about them. Gnomes they were. They
hung miner tools over their shoulders and cracked the rock, scooping it up, and
throwing the pieces into a pail. The gnomes didn’t stop working as Meredith
clapped and laughed to their song. One of the gnomes stopped to wipe a bead of
sweat from his forehead and noticed the giggling princess. “Goodday, mates!” he
chirped. He narrowed his eyes at Ross as if hard at seeing. “O, it be you, ey,
Ross!” “Hello,
Malik, how’ve you been?” Another
gnome left the choir and frowned at that familiar name. “Is that Ross, that
sonofab-” “Watch
yer language, mate,” Malik warned, restraining the aimless, feisty gnome. Meredith
stared curiously at Ross as he urged them all to continue. “That sonofab- I
mean b*****d, or whatever gave my daughter that crack stuff and now she’s some
addict, come on, lemme take a whack at em!” She glanced at Ross, but he said
nothing. They
continued down the tunnels that had started to become long. Meredith decided to
speak her mind. “Ross, what was that gnome talking about?” Ross
shrugged. “Nothing important.” “Oh yeah,
Ross, give me my stuff!” exclaimed Ellis, who for the past hours had been
silent, only making squeaky scared sounds when it looked like Brooke was going
to fall off Athena. She propped her hands on her hips, lifting her light brows.
She held her hand out, waiting, impatient. Meredith
saw Ross blush and he shook his head at the anymalis, almost telling her to
shush. “Come to think of it, who are you, Ross?” Ross
grinned. “You know who I am.” “You know
what I mean.” “Enlighten
me,” he encouraged. “That
dwarf woman yielded to you like a…like a….you know what I mean,” Meredith
faltered. Ross chuckled.
“I see.” “Oh God,
he’s a renowned drug dealer who owned that rave you went to,” Ellis said
exasperatedly, angry that she had not gotten whatever it was she wanted. Meredith
stopped altogether, her mouth agape. Brooke was annoyed with this. “Y-you’re a
wha-?” There she went faltering again. Meredith had never been at a loss of
words like this. She wasn’t a judgmental person or at least she liked to think
that. She had made sure to be unlike her elfin brethren and feed into their
condescending attitudes. But a drug dealer was too much. Drugs hurt people.
Meredith despised people who hurt others. Ross attempted to place a hand on her
shoulder, but she shook it off, disgusted by his touch. He looked hurt.
Meredith led the way, confused and angry. Her knuckles reddened. Athena
and Ellis’s ears moved like antennas. What did they hear? “What I do doesn’t
make up for the person I am, Meredith,” Ross muttered. “Have you
no morals?” she yelled, facing him. Why had she been so mesmerized when they
hadn’t even spoken, but few words? They were going to go on a date if it had
not been for the zoanthrope, but that didn’t matter now. She thought about the
sensation, the chemistry between them as they danced- when in reality he was
probably there to sell…drugs. Her body shuddered at the memory. Then, her
redness disappeared to a dreaded white. She climbed atop of Athena and everyone
followed suit. “Forward Athena, go now!” Brooke
looked back at the panther that chased behind them. He was still alive and
simpering at them. She swore because she didn’t have her sword. Behind him, a
black wolfhound followed. Its azure eyes held a stern intelligence, and she was
suspicious of it. It gave a simper of its own. Did two things hunt them? The
gnomes ceased their song and ran around like confused ants beside Athena. They
reached the end of a tunnel where they saw an iron door. Ross jumped down,
opened it for them, and they escaped the tunnels. Ross closed the door, bolting
it closed. It was
then that Brooke saw the cottage house and her heart nearly pumped out of her
chest. She heard its rapid beating and wished it would stop. That was the house
in which her mother lived. Her mother. How did she look from all these years?
Her sockets burned. A curtain pulled back and mature blue eyes stared through
the pane window. They narrowed and widened in surprise. Ross ran up to the door
and knocked on it. The woman opened the door partly. “How dare you bring these
people here, Ross!” she seethed. He cocked
his head to the side. “I thought you wouldn’t mind.” The door
to the tunnel exploded. They all turned to see the two hunters in human form.
The puncture wound where Brooke stabbed him had healed. The other one was bald
and had scars around his eyes shaped like lightning bolts. He was buff, his
muscles large beneath the sleeves of his turtleneck. He wielded a sword and the
other hunter wielded a gun. Brooke moved from the door and she took a basic
stance. Meredith stood beside her. The panther hunter shot the gun and Brooke
cart wheeled out of the way, but as soon as she leaned her weight against her
wrists, she fell hard on the ground. The arm with the knife wound burned and
the purple color had returned now covering her entire upper arm. She clutched
the wound and screamed. The
wolfhound hunter approached Brooke and motioned to stab her with the sword.
Brooke couldn’t react; the pain was too great. She closed her eyes. Meredith
raced towards Brooke to stop the wolfhound, making caution to dodge the panther
hunter. She kicked him in the knee and someone cut him in the stomach. Meredith
had no time to see who it was and flipped backwards to avoid the next set of
bullets. Brooke couldn’t gasp as she saw her mother, gripping the handle of a
sword. She studied her mother. Her hair didn’t have the same luster, but she
looked no different than when she last saw her, snuggled close to her,
listening to another one of her stories, her breath warm and steady against her
face. Rain
lifted her sword above her head, her front leg stretched out, and her rooted
leg bent. The wolfhound hunter grunted at his wound, but stood straight. The
panther hunter shot his gun. Rain blocked every bullet as she charged at the
hunters. She was fast. Really fast. Maybe faster than an elf. How was that
possible? Brooke had never known her mother as the fighting type. She was a
mystery, yes, but a fighter? Well, Brooke had to get her athletic abilities
from somewhere and it sure wasn’t from her father. She took her basic stance
and raised her sword to slice the panther hunter’s wrist. He screamed and
backed up, blood gushing. She flipped her sword pointing its hilt at the
hunters. She jabbed the bald man in the throat, kicking his shin and him off
his feet. She dragged her sword across the bald man’s neck and decapitated him.
As the panther hunter moved to grab his sword, wrapped around his belt. She
elbowed him in the rib and made an x across his chest. She stabbed him in the
heart. She stepped on him as she sheathed her sword, making sure to jab the
sharp heel of her shoes in his skin. She was so brutal. Rain
glared intensely at Ross. Before she began to yell, Brooke a pain fluxed through Brooke. She screamed and she felt it through her throat. She choked
against the ground and passed out. © 2013 KiannaAuthor's Note
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Added on July 5, 2013 Last Updated on July 5, 2013 Tags: Kianna, Kianna Taylor, Taylor, God, love, song, fantasy, book, elves, dark, romance, princess, king, queen, kingdom, epic fantasy, urban fantasy, epic, urban, young adult, occult, magic, depression Song of the Keeper's Sword
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By KiannaAuthorKiannaHouston, TXAboutHello. Hmm, about me. I am a pre-nursing student hoping to become a psychiatric nurse and work with mental health patients all day. Eventually, I want to establish my own clinic. Besides writing fanta.. more..Writing
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