In the Name of Prophecy

One moment I was dreaming and the other I was wide awake; searching for potential dangers around me. My breathing was ragged, senses alert and blood stocked with adrenaline. Every muscle in my body was taut and ready for fight or flight. It took me several moments to register that everything was fine and I was safe. It was just the usual fix of nightmares coupled with the blaring phone alarm. I let out a breath that I previously didn’t even realize I was holding. My shoulders sagged and tension seeped out of me, bit by bit. Arms open, wand still in my hand I fell back onto the bed.

Stretching my empty hand I reached to the phone placed on the bedside table, and turned off the alarm. Fuck. The phone screen read 4:05 AM. It was still three hours for the solar eclipse to start. I internally cussed at forgetting to reset the alarm and not getting much the needed sleep.

You didn’t really wanted to reset the alarm, said a voice deep down in my head. Maybe it was true. Maybe I was scared to be caught as vulnerable as sleeping and be unable to react on time; fight back and make my escape. Maybe my fears and paranoia got the best of me, but alive and overworked was far better than incautious and dead.

I put the phone away, and pulled the sheets closer to my body; letting the remnants of warmth linger on my skin and keep the cold away that I was starting to feel now with the adrenaline leaving my blood stream, and tried going back to sleep. For a few seconds I felt vulnerable yet safe and above all normal; normal like every other soon to be sixteen year old. But the bliss of the moment was not long to last, my worries, fears and doubts kicked back in like always. I just was not a normal teenager; it was never going to be my cup of tea. I took a deep breath and got out of bed, sleep was not going to come back.

Keeping the wand in my hand like almost any other time in the past few months for which I had been on run, I walked to the bathroom. Quickly, I brushed my teeth and splashed water onto my face, before retrieving the wand from the wash counter where I placed it for the easiest and quickest excess in case of any emergency. Cue; do not even think of calling 911 when I utter the word emergency for: a) you would have a very hard time explaining to them that your emergency consists upon a band of wand wielders trying to witchy woo you into imprisonment in one or another stale stinky dungeon cells of theirs, b) the resulting probability of you finding yourself in an asylum rather than a sanctuary from mystical creatures is higher by a very minimal of 99.99 percent, c) calling police for help in a magical emergency is just a rookie trying to play dirty, mind if I say rather uselessly, and d) running away is a much better alternative than having blood of a significant number if humans on your hands and still end up being sacrificed in a magical ritual.

Quickly putting on sweat pants, a tee and a hoodie, I pulled my Nike runners on and lifted the bag off the dresser, checking for the contents in. Salt, check. Pure water, check. Phoenix stone, check. Spare wand, there. Herbs, One, two, three, four and five kinds of herbs, check. I quickly ticked off everything on my mental checklist. The only thing missing was the book.

Bag in hand, I deftly made my way to the library; the only room in the house that I had discovered since last night when I had moved in till now. I had spent more than three hours roaming around the library and sifting through the thousands of books present there making sure Sybilian; in the eyes of world my brother, had gotten the library refurnished as such to cater to my needs. Quickly passing through the history, young adult, science, philosophy and medicine section I entered the section of concern, for now; Magic.

Slowing my pace down, I ran delicately my fingers over the spines of the thick, ancient, leather clad books arranged according to the date of publishing on one of the many floor to ceiling length, wooden shelves covering most part of the library. Skipping ‘The History of Illuminati’, ‘Night Crawlers: The Vampires’, ‘Recipe for the best healing potions’ and ‘Art of Defense for beginners’ I spotted the desired book; The Detailed guide to protection spells.

Turning to page two hundred and ninety six I double checked the contents of my bag, tallying them with the list of ingredients essential for a cloaking spell; the strongest of its kind, neatly written down in the book. Despite the fact that I knew page two ninety six and two ninety seven of ‘The detailed guide to protection spells’ by heart, I still placed the book carefully into the bag for reference purposes just to be certain I do not get anything wrong, and slung the bag over my shoulder after zipping it close. Going back to my room I picked up my smart phone and Googled in an incognito widow of browser to keep my location anonymous, for the thousandth time the latitude and longitude for the exact site where according to commoners of Red Water centuries ago cults and cults of witches were slain without an ounce of mercy upon such brutality. With the passing of time people of Red Water now considered the story of witch slaying just another myth handed down to them by their ancestors, but I knew better. The place was perfect for what I intend. On the burial grounds of the remains of numerous powerful witches I would find enough of magical essences from the dead to harness the protection spell; which will save my life or rather give me a life; a life of somewhat normality and no running at every noise I heard, every shadow I saw.

Entering the coordinates into my cell phone GPS, bag on shoulder I exited my house. Checking my wrist watch I discovered it was only 4:32 Am, yet. I had two hours and thirty five minutes, to be exact, for getting to the burial ground and setting up the spell before the solar eclipse started. On the account of my thorough research over the past few months since I escaped from my prison of years, I was aware of the fact that the power from just the remains of the dead witches should be enough to hold the spell in the place, but to be safer than safe I chose the day of imminent solar eclipse; to draw power from the celestial event as well as the dead and firmly cast the protection spell around me to conceal completely my magical essence to everyone human or else.

Every witch or wizard left behind a unique trail of magic. Just like dogs picked up onto scents to search and hunt down individuals, experienced magic practitioners could easily pick up magical trails and follow it to a particular person. My pursuers were no newbies, but more or less the most powerful ones amongst my kind; the Illuminati. Illuminati was just a fancy name my kind liked to give themselves, while the truth was we were just ordinary humans bestowed upon with certain uncommon knowledge and ability to connect to nature and our surroundings through our spirit, and do things which were defined as magic. Hence in all simplicity we were just witches and wizards.

Phone in hand for navigation of the exact spot, ear phones tucked in my ears and the hood over my head, I started to jog towards the back fence of my house; which happened to be an antique mansion, but I liked to remain modest and called it home. Climbing over the fence I jumped onto the forest grounds; which bordered most of my property, or better let’s put that way, the property owned by my so called brother Sybillian, who worked overseas and had graciously allowed me to move back to our family town into our family house seeing how much I missed our deceased parents and longed for home.

After a few miles of light jog I kicked into a full on run; zigzagging and dodging trees and branches and jumping over roots and heavy growth of shrubs to avoid tripping and falling over. An hour long run left me standing on the very site of the massacre of the cults according to the GPS. The sweat dripping mass of my black hair clung to my forehead and neck while I took off the sweat drenched hoodie and threw it away.

I could feel the magic humming lowly around me like electricity on charged fences. Beads of sweat trickled down my back under the wet shirt sticking to by body like second skin, as I took out the pouch of salt and drew a considerably large circle with it on the ground. Bringing my bag along I stepped inside the circle and the hum of magic grew louder. Carefully taking out the herbs, I placed four different types of herbs along the salt sketched circumference of my power circle. Next, I sprinkled the water all over the area inside the boundary. With that my work for now was done. Taking out the wand and book and placing them onto the ground next to me, I sat down cross legged waiting for the eclipse to begin. Over the course of next hour I had read the same two pages of the book again and again till the point that I was certain I could produce a copy of it with not even a dot missing or in wrong place.

At five minutes past seven I took out the last herb left in my bag and crush it between my palms. After crushing the herb I rubbed it thoroughly onto the palm side of both my hands. Picking up the wand I slowly chanted a series of intangible Greek spell words and tapped the wand onto the salt line to witness it erupting into a blazing fire circle around me; stationary at the point of its origin. At 7:10 am sharp I could notice the eclipse beginning. Putting my herb layered left hand onto the ground, I gripped my wand with my other herb covered hand, closed my eyes and started chanting the spell from my memory.

The closer the spell got to its finishing point, the strongly I felt the magic course through my veins. Every atom of my being felt the power oozing from the ground entering my left hand running around my body and finally getting concentrated again inside my wand. A thick continuous ray of blue light erupted from my wand and scattered all around before vanishing completely. It all lasted a maximum of thirty seconds, but had felt much longer.

Now that the spell was over and the high of magic was speedily leaving my body I felt exhausted and was drenched in sweat all over, again. Tired I fell on my back; arms and legs stretched a lazy smile on my face. The spell had worked. I had felt the shields of power locking into place on a perimeter enclosing me. After months of continuous run, sleepless nights, bad dreams and fear I was finally a tiny bit safe.

After a while of lying on the forest ground in considerable peace, I got up, brushed the dirt off my clothes, collected my belongings or whatever of them that was left and packed it into the bag. With that I started walking at a leisurely pace back to my house; breathing in the fresh clean air and enjoying the pleasant peaceful demeanor of the place. Birds chirped, leaves rustled and twigs and dried leaves cracked audibly under the weight of my steps as I whistled and paced towards my home.