Sunday, July 5, 2009

Chapter 6

It seemed to be getting harder and harder for Faith to wake up each morning. The nights were filled with restless sleep and elusive dreams. The moonstone she had placed in a small black velvet bag under her pillow on Sunday night wasn’t helping her at all. She reached under her pillow and closed her hand around the soft velvet, pulling the bag out to examine it. Flipping over onto her back she pulled the strings of the pouch to open up the top. She poured the contents out of the bag into her hand.

“What on earth?” she exclaimed out loud as she sat up in bed. In place of the one stone she had placed in the bag were two broken halves. “How does a stone randomly break apart?” she wondered aloud as she rubbed the rough jagged edge of one of the halves.

“Miss Faith it’s time to wake up,” she heard Robert call from outside of her door.
“I’m awake, Robert! I’ll be down in a couple of minutes!”
With a puzzled look on her face she headed for the shower trying to convince herself that the shiver that went up her spine was because of the cold room and nothing else.

****
“So, what do you two have lined up for tonight?” Aunt Libby asked the two cousins sitting at the table eating breakfast.
“What’s so special about tonight?” asked Faith.
“It’s Friday, dear! Alex usually plays a game during the season, but then goes off with Nick and Chase doing heaven knows what.”
“We’ll be heading over to Finn Flaherty’s after the game. You can come with us if you’d like Faith.”
“Thanks for the invite, Alex. We’ll see.”
“Why? Do you have better plans with Reese? Fine by me,” he added snidely, getting up to grab his back pack.
“Reese? Godfrey? Already stringing the boys along, Faith? Atta girl!”
“Don’t encourage her, mom. Let’s go Faith. We’re going to be late.” Alex gave his mother a kiss on her cheek and headed for the door.
“Bye Aunt Libby. He’s a bit of a crank in the morning, isn’t he?” Faith said giving her aunt a kiss on her cheek.
“Bye you two! Oh, I almost forgot, be careful tonight. The paper said something about a homeless man being assaulted down by the cove yesterday. I know you kids like to hang out down there, but I’d appreciate it if you stayed away from there for a while. No sense in taking any chances...”
“Don’t worry mom. We won’t go near the cove.”
“Thanks sweetie. Have a good day!”

Walking out to the car Alex looked at Faith. “My mom’s acting weird.”
“Weird? How?”
“She’s obsessed with knowing where I am every minute of the day. She keeps subtly restricting where I can go by finding random excuses. Like this homeless guy.”
“Alex, she’s still in shock over your dad and she doesn’t want to risk losing you. Besides, something weird is going on around here. It’s like something is watching us, you know?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Alex said sternly and got into the car. Faith followed suit. How could she guess that there was something dark out there? Maybe this thing was going to be harder to handle than he thought if normal people could sense it too. It was a good thing that he was meeting up with Nick and Chase to see if their parents had any advice for them. Who knows, maybe their parents would even help them out. It was too bad his dad wasn’t there to help him. It still made him angry to think about how his dad could have been so careless. His father had been using power to get home quicker to watch Alex play his first pre-season game when the dark energy had entered and used his father’s power against him. His father had only been able to send Alex that last dream-like message before he was knocked into a coma.

Faith could feel hurt pouring off of her cousin. Hurt mixed with anger and guilt. Knowing she could expose herself, she placed her hand over the one he had on the stick shift and quietly said a spell to charm him:

I send for song and beckon the light,
I take onto myself this young man’s plight.
Peace and light I bestow onto thee,
As I will, so mote it be.

Alex felt a strange heat coming from his cousin’s hand. He looked at her face and noticed she had her head bent as if in prayer. Then she opened her eyes and looked at him. Her eyes had turned an almost luminescent gold. He blinked quickly and looked back at her. The glow was gone. What the heck just happened? He refocused on the road and all of the sudden felt much more at peace than he had in the past month. It was as if he was being lulled by an unsung song into a sense of calm. It was nice.

In the seat next to him Faith took her hand back and was struggling to push her cousin’s tormented emotions to the side. He certainly had a lot on his mind lately. The least she could do was shoulder them for him for a little bit. As she pushed the emotions off to the side of her mind, she allowed a teensy look at the guilt. Why should he feel guilty? But then she saw it, like a movie in her mind, her Uncle Matthew trying to get home and the power taking over. Sucking in her breath she closed her eyes and braced herself for the inevitable crash.

As Alex pulled into a parking spot at the school he looked over and saw his cousin tense up like she was going to be hit.
“What? What’s wrong, Faith?”
“Nothing. It’s nothing. Just a bit of an anxiety attack or something I guess. I haven’t been sleeping well…”
Ok. Just take it easy for a second. I guess it must be hard sleeping in a new house and going to a new school. I haven’t been exactly welcoming either. I’m sorry if I’ve been snapping at you lately. I just have a lot on my mind it seems…”
“You can say that again.”
“What did you say?”
“Nothing, come on. Let’s hurry up. We’re going to be late.” Faith said as she hopped out of the car and grabbed her back pack from behind the passenger seat.
“Hey, wait up!”

****
It was their second to last class of the day, the one that Faith had with Alex, his pals, and Reese. She’d been stringing Reese along all week. He’d introduced her to his friends and she had been eating lunch with them for the past few days. The group was made up of Luke Darcy, Luke’s girlfriend Layla Quinn, Justin Cooper, and Cole Andrews. She knew that they were only allowing her to sit with them because Reese was looking to add her to his list of conquests; but that was fine with Faith. For now.
“Hey Faith, me and the guys are going to head out to Finn Flaherty’s after the game tonight. You want to ride along?”
“Sure! Why not, right?”
“Great. I’ll meet you at the game and then afterwards we can head over to Finn Flaherty’s together. Sound good?”
“Yeah. Sounds great,” she said just as the bell rang and Mr. Kovacs started the class.

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