Warrior (Book Three of The Silver Society)

Chapter Five

CHAPTER FIVE

Everyone stared at Beth in shock. No one seemed to know what to say. Nothing remained where the warlocks and demons had once stood. Beth was horrified by what she had somehow done, and she couldn't understand how she'd done it.

She stared at her hands, which were trembling violently. She tried to process what had happened, but it didn't make any sense to her. One moment, her friends had been under attack, and the next, the demons and warlocks had started screaming and dying. Had she somehow learned to smite on her own? This hadn't looked quite like smiting, but what else could explain the sudden deaths of the bad guys? 

"Well," Arnie said, breaking the silence, "that's new..."

"Beth, where did you learn to do that?" Aideen asked in amazement.

"I don't know," Beth replied. "I have no idea what I just did... I just panicked, and suddenly, that happened!"

"Perhaps now would be a good time to find Alex," Spencer suggested.

"Find me for what?" Alex asked, joining them.

"How do you always do that?" Arnie asked.

"What's going on?" Alex asked, ignoring Arnie's question.

"Beth seems to have a new talent," Dylan replied. "We were hoping you might be able to explain it to us, because, um... Wow."

"What is it?" Alex asked in confusion.

"I don't really know how to explain it," Dylan admitted.

"Speaking from a physics point of view," Cierra began, "Beth rapidly split apart the atoms of a large number of demons and warlocks that had severely outnumbered us. This process continued until there was nothing tangible left of them. Beth saved all of our lives today."

For once, Arnie did not object to Cierra explaining magick with science. Normally, it bothered him, but this time, he was hoping science held the answer, because none of them had ever seen magick like what Beth had just displayed.

Alex paused to consider this, clearly as stumped as everyone else as to how this had occurred. "Well, that's certainly different," he said.

"You think?" Aideen asked. "Alex, seriously, is that normally one of Beth's abilities?"

"Not as far as I know, but you know the scroll likes to keep certain information to itself."

"Great. I'm an even bigger freak now," Beth mumbled.

"It's okay, sweetie," Alex said soothingly. "You aren't a freak... Whatever this new power is, you saved everyone today. That's a good thing, Beth. I'll look into this and let you know what I find out, okay?"

Too numb to answer, Beth simply nodded. What was happening to her? How had she destroyed the demons and warlocks by simply screaming at them? Nothing was making any sense to her.

"Come on, Beth," Jade said, sensing how badly Beth needed to get away from the others and sort out her own thoughts. "I'll take you home."

~*~

The sun had already started to rise when he woke up, but Timmy had decided to get a little bit more sleep. Something had pushed him to go back to sleep immediately, as if he was being summoned.

His dreams had been stranger than usual lately. He dreamed of battles, or of disasters. Everywhere he looked, he saw chaos and carnage. This dream, however, was different.

A beautiful woman stood before him. She had the body of a human and the head of a lioness. A fire burned brightly behind her, but it didn't spread. Timmy felt oddly safe in her presence.