Legions (30 page)

“Alright, man.” Athen said,
grabbing Cyril. “Keep an eye on my sister. She tends to get herself
in trouble when we aren’t all together.”

Cyril obviously appreciated
Athen’s lighthearted goodbye as he let go of Athen and
nodded.

“You got it, man, but
you’ve got the klutz. You should be more worried about
her.”

“Alright, I’m happy
everyone is able to feel better about things at my expense but come
on! I’m not that bad. Especially lately, right? You’ve seen my
moves recently. Pretty impressive right?” I almost didn’t want to
hear the answer, because I thought I’d actually been doing pretty
well; all things considered. Granted, I did have a shapeshifting
accident, but that could happen to anyone.

“Yeah, Cy. You got me
there.” He rubbed my shoulders as if that would make me feel better
versus his words as we all left our home in Victoria to go our
separate ways.

***

I woke up in a dead panic.
I hadn’t felt this level of fear for quite sometime. Athen shot up
in bed beside me, flipping on the lamp next on his bedside table.
We had only been in Kingston a short time.

“What’s wrong, sweetie?”
His eyes were full of concern. “Did they get to Cyril?”

“No, it’s not that. It’s
something else. They’ve started something else.” My fingers were
running along my temples. My head was pounding. I wasn’t certain of
what I saw, but the images were beyond terrifying.

“Who has started?” Athen
already knew the answer since he was getting out of bed, heading
for the phone. “Fill me in.”

“They’re lighting fires.” I
ignored his question. I couldn’t help it as a lump began to form in
my throat. “Surrounding Whistler.”

Athen had already dialed
Arie’s number. We thought we had made it through the biggest hurdle
with Cyril, not realizing more was to come so quickly.

“What did you see, Ana?
Give me all the details you can.” Athen was waiting for his sister
to pick up.

I’d already grabbed my
notebook and begun writing. I liked to keep track of things since I
was still learning the ins and outs of everything. Trying to write
in words and condense the images that had haunted me minutes before
seemed almost impossible.

“Yeah, hey.” Athen began.
“Ana’s visions led her somewhere pretty horrible. Here she is.” I
stared at him not really wanting to take the phone.

“Hi, Arie. So fire is going
to be their main weapon, and it’s directed where you guys are. They
are going to attack Whistler.” I let my mind wander to what I’d
dreamed minutes earlier, doing my best to let the images reach
Athen, Cyril, and Arie. I felt the images would speak louder than
anything I could relay in words.

Closing my eyes, left me
with the latest images I was attempting to place in their minds,
those of the streaks of fire streaming down from the sky. No one
would see it coming. Humans would think it nothing more than
lightning strikes or human error with a campsite. Unfortunately,
those were events that can be handled pretty simply in the scheme
of things. There can be an end to those kinds of flames. What I
didn’t see with these images was any sort of immediate end to these
events unless we stopped them. Every time one fire was
extinguished, it looked as if the demons had started another,
trapping everyone up in Whistler. The images formed of the
beautiful, thick forests being turned into charred remnants of
sticks and twigs. Thick smoke was filling up the beautiful skies,
confusion setting in for the tourists and residents of the most
quaint village the Northwest had to offer. I did my best to shut
off the images before letting them all escape. There were some I
couldn’t let them see. I didn’t want to believe them.

“So, I think you guys need
to leave.” Was all that escaped over the phone as the last of the
images found their way into them. “Now.”

“Ana, we can’t leave
everyone up here. We’ve got to help. As soon as I hang up, I’m
gonna let everyone know. We have to stay, you guys. We can’t
leave.”

Unfortunately, Athen and I
already knew they would say that. It would be so much easier to
think that they would be self-serving first, but of course, they
weren’t. Athen took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. It must
have been loud enough for Arie to hear because she uttered
something quickly into the phone, I almost didn’t catch before she
hung up on us.

“Guys, we’ll be fine. We’ll
call you after we contact everyone up here.” Hanging up the phone,
Athen wrapped his arms around me but not before whispering quietly
into my ear.

“Why don’t you tell me the
images you didn’t want any of us to see, sweetie?”

Chapter 32

Cyril, Arie, and the entire
Whistler community were cut off from all contact. The forest fires
had begun. Of course, everyone thought it was the unusually dry
spring, and the lightning strikes. If only it was so
simple.

We were glued to the news,
but truthfully, we were able to get more information directly from
Cyril and Arie who were constantly communicating to us. The demons’
attempt to cut off Whistler from aid was a success. The hillsides
were either a charred mess of ash or brilliant new flames that the
demons had set ablaze. It was an absolutely sickening sight. The
beautiful wildflowers, which had only barely begun to bloom, were
now fighting with fleeing animals, flames, and firefighters to
maintain their beauty.

Miraculously, there had
been no casualties, yet. Unfortunately, that could change in an
instant, and we all knew that. Cyril and Arie were meeting nonstop
with all our fellow counterparts in Whistler trying to gauge damage
and next steps. The flames hadn’t gotten to the village but rather
had cut the town off completely from help. The smoke was too thick
for air support. Help was working its way up from the backside and
the upper mountain to get the flames to a manageable level, but
unfortunately, the demons were laying in wait to start them up
again.

I felt completely helpless
and was completely riddled with guilt. If I hadn’t told anyone
about the dreams I’d been having, none of us would have separated,
and we would all still be together.

Athen flipped off the
television and slid the remote across the table at me.

“I think I’ve had enough
for the moment. Between the reports from Cyril and Arie and that, I
don’t think I can do it for another second.”

“Why won’t they just
leave?” Knowing the answer already, I wasn’t sure why I asked
it.

“Listen, I’m just as
worried about them as you are, but to your point, they can get out
of there if they need to. They just don’t want to leave all of
those humans. I think they feel they can somehow stop this before
it takes any human lives.”

“Do you believe that?” I
asked Athen.

He reached for my hand
across the table. His was cold as ice.

“If anyone can pull off
something like that, they can… But they are going to need our
help.”

I nodded knowing that it
was only a matter of time before Cyril and Arie were going to call
us up there. They had been working with the other families up
there, figuring out what method would work best to evacuate the
humans if needed or put an end to the flames. As of now, neither
alternative seemed very plausible. Then again, I hadn’t been
exposed to this type of thing recently.

“Evacuations would be more
risky. Pulling something off like that without any humans figuring
out seems almost impossible. We would have to help their memory
out, and in those numbers I’m not sure we could do it as timely as
we would need to. I honestly think that we’ll be up there to
attempt to extinguish the flames. I think that’s our best bet. I’m
just waiting to hear that from Cyril. I’ve already contacted about
700 of us locally who could get up there and fight.”

“So, we are going to have
to
fight
to get
these fires to stop?” My stomach began twisting in knots. This kind
of battle seemed far larger in scale than anything I’d dealt with
before. Sadly, I knew it was nothing compared with what we could be
facing in the future, but regardless, it frightened me. A huff
escaped, alerting Athen to my worry.

“There will be a lot more
of us than them, sweetie. I promise. We wouldn’t attempt it if we
knew we couldn’t win it.” His calming, green eyes immediately began
to soothe my worries. “Plus, I’ve seen your sweet fighting skills,
hun. You’re better than all of us.”

“Haha, very funny!” I said,
taking my hand back.

“I kind of feel like this
is my fault.” I blurted out.

Athen’s eyes were full of
confusion. I knew on the outside of it, it might seem like a
stretch that I was responsible, but it seemed pretty matter of fact
in my world.

“If we hadn’t split, they
wouldn’t have been up there alone. The demons might not even have
attacked.” It was hard for me to say it aloud.

“Regardless of location,
they would have found a way to get to us.”

Athen had gotten up and
moved to stand behind me, hugging me from behind. I needed that
comfort so badly. I didn’t even realize it until his arms continued
to keep hold of me.

“This will be over soon, my
love.” He whispered so quietly I almost didn’t even hear his words,
the very words that I needed to hear.

Closing my eyes, I did my
best to focus on the needs of our family, feeling as blessed as I
had in a long time. Having Athen here was everything I needed to
maintain my strength, and began planning for whatever might be in
store for us.

“So do you believe Cyril
when he says he hasn’t been approached yet by Azazel?” I asked
Athen.

“Yeah, I do. I don’t think
what you saw has happened yet.”

“So there’s hope we can
divert it or change it somehow then?”

He shook his head in
agreement as his cell began receiving text after text, giving us
the signal that the time has come.

***

The amount of smoke that
was hovering in the air was beyond anything the TV images showed.
How many blazes the demons had been setting was unclear, but it had
to have been a ton. We had called in help from everyone in the
Northwest who could come as quickly as possible. The fires hadn’t
been burning for long at all, but so many were being set; the
destruction was building and we didn’t want to waste anymore time
on their plan.

Being in the presence of
the demons’ wickedness put everything that was ahead of us in
perspective. Because of the work that the fire teams were able to
achieve, the road back up to Whistler had been opened so the
evacuations were beginning rapidly. However, since our goal wasn’t
to evacuate but rather go in and fight the true source of the
flames, we knew we wouldn’t be able to take our car. We were going
to have to get in by our own abilities. We left our car in
Squamish, and Cyril and Arie were meeting us along the railway
tracks so we could plan next steps.

It was such a wonderful
sight to see Cyril and Arie land together, holding hands.
Obviously, my visions didn’t set them apart. Hopefully, it made
them only stronger. We had to protect each other no matter
what.

“Arie!” I squealed,
squeezing her with all of my might. I was so happy to see her
again.

“Are you doing okay?” I
asked.

“Yah, I think. We’ve been
working nonstop up there making sure the flames wouldn’t get near
the village. We’ve been on watch so whenever a new fire was
started, we were able to put it out immediately. It’s getting
really tiresome, though. We’re all worn out. That’s why we need you
guys and the back-up.”

Nodding, I grabbed Athen’s
hand, completely understanding their exhaustion.

“Well, we are surrounded.
They are waiting for the word from us to swoop in, so to speak.”
Athen said grinning. “How many of the demons do you think there
are?”

“I honestly don’t think
that many.” Cyril stepped in. I think they are just quick. I’m
guessing no more than 75 or so.”

“Really. That’s good news,
cuz there’s about 700 of ours waiting for our call.”

“Nice. Let’s get on it.”
Cyril echoed. “We were able to figure out where they were all
congregating at. That’s what took us the longest, and why we didn’t
want to call you up here too soon.”

“Awesome, then let’s just
do it.” Athen announced.

Hearing those words began
to send fear through my body. I hadn’t met up with this many demons
at once before. Knowing we had the numbers we did, waiting for our
directions should have calmed me, but it didn’t. The fear of losing
Athen again was beginning to overwhelm me. I focused on the
gratification that I had gotten so many times before when fighting
these creatures, hoping that would replace the fear.

“Honey, you’re going to be
fine. I’m going to be fine. We’ve got this. Don’t let your mind go
there.” I nodded, knowing he was right.

“Let’s get going shall we?”
Arie asked.

I watched her take off
towards the heavens, with Cyril following right behind her. Athen
let go of my hand, and he shot into the air next, pausing only to
look back at me and call my name. The adrenaline began pumping
throughout my body as I let my body head towards the treetops as
well.