Helena and the Rings

Chapter 12: Invisible Storm

Bishop finally came back inside after a few minutes. Oddly enough she was smiling then randomly bursted out into laughter. Was this a joke to her?  She could probably see the confusion on my face for sure. She walked up to me and sat down then leaned on me and let out a sigh then some more laughter.

"I wanted to believe my mom was crazy," she said. "Before she died she told me my purpose was to help save the world. Isn't that funny?"

"Save the world?" I repeated.

"She almost predicted this, you know?" She continued. "Said someone would come to me and I'd have to help them save the world from something. I thought she was just drunk and having her moment. She always raised me like she prepared me for something but I guess...I guess I never believed her."

I shrugged. "Has she ever mentioned demons, magic, and what not?"

Bishop let out a nervous laughter. "Yeah all the time. And I always did my best to just bury it in the back of my head. I didn't want to know the truth. I didn't want to believe there were other creations than humans. Now you're here telling me what I feared. This was the moment my mom was talking about."

"You're supposed to help me figure out my powers?" I asked her.

She looked at me and laughed once more. "I don't have any powers. I don't even know what she wanted me to do. I'm just somehow supposed to figure it out." Bishop got up. "I need some water."

I followed her to grab some water from a container we had sitting on the table. "You know, when you looked at me, my ring began glowing."

"I remember you said that," Bishop took a long gulp of water. She shrugged. "I don't have powers, Helena. I'm not sure what it all means."

"Well..." I looked at my ring and slowly pointed at her. "look at it again."

Bishop hesitated for a second before looking at the ring. The ring began glowing. Not a lot, just like an eerie glow of bright light that faded in and out. It stopped then glowed again.

"So strange," Bishop said. 

She slowly stuck out her finger and touch the very tip of my finger. Suddenly my breathing sped up, and I felt my heart pounding. I had strange pings of pain in my head. I quickly snatched my finger away. "Well," I said, my eyes wide open. "that was intense. Did you feel that?"

"I didn't feel anything..." Bishop said.

Suddenly the winds outside picked up, howling hard into the night. I could hear it shaking the old wood in the cabin. Some bottles left outside fell and I heard the tree leaves being hit by the wind, swaying back and forth like they were going to fall on the cabin. 

"Something's...happening." Bishop stood up. She got spractic and turned off all the lights and candles. We then both sat underneath one of the windows where some moonlight shine through. The wind was picking up heavy and things were hitting the house. 

"Is it a storm?" I whispered.

She shrugged. "It doesn't storm over here. Not much and never like this. This isn't a storm."

She looked at my ring again. I felt the need to grab something. I was feeling so uncomfortable and tense. I grabbed my legs and bit my lips. "I...feel weird. Stop looking at the ring!"

Bishop replied with something I didn't expect. "I can't," she said. 

Bishop didn't stop looking at my ring, and I couldn't seem to take my eyes off her. Till suddenly, we heard a faint tap from above our heads. We looked up. The weird feeling I felt finally went away and was immediately replaced by fear. Bishop literally smacked her hand over my mouth. A dark figure pressing its entire body against the window looked directly down at us. 

It could see us.

My heart felt so detached from my body in that moment and I struggled to breathe, especially with Bishop's hand around my mouth. I moved it away and breathed deeply.

"What do we do?" Bishop asked in a panic voice.

"What is it?" I asked.

"You tell me!" She looked at me.

The two had the same thought at the same time and got up, ran towards the front door and almost opened it. I grabbed Bishop's hand first to stop her from opening the door. "It's gone," I said. 

The winds stopped. The storm stopped. It was suddenly very quiet. We couldn't hear anything. We wait. 10 minutes, 20, 40. 

"I think it's okay to turn the lights on," Bishop said. 

"Can we light a candle?" I asked. "I'm a bit scared."

"Me too," Bishop nodded. "Whatever's out there, I don't want it watching us too much.

We lit a candle near a corner far away from the window and both snuggled together under a blanket. We sat side to side. I could feel her warm, shaky body against mine. She looked at me. "We should go to the library. Find out something about all of this. What do you think?"

I didn't think it was a good idea for me to leave but I didn't say that. She was right. We needed to find out what was going on. "That's a good idea. What if something follows or track us though?" I asked.

"Alcohol, we can pour some on our clothes or something." She said. 

"We can't go into a library smelling like that," I said. "they might kick us out and I don't really want to go into town smelling like my mom."

"Then we drink it. Drunk adventures," Bishop smirked at me.

I chuckled. "That could work."

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