A Bird of Praise: Act I

Chapter 3: The Tale of La Llorona

In the black, Tara got up and looked around. "Will?" She called.

"Barb?" she called more meekly, hoping with everything she had that part of her dream was fabricated.

"Will!"

"You can't save him," a gravelly voice rasped.

Tara turned her attention to see the nightmarish iteration of the warlock from her Swan Lake dreams.

"What do you want, Rothbart?"

"I've always found that question to be redundant. It's not as though you intend to give me what I'm after, so what makes you think you're entitled to make me explain myself?"

"The fact that you hurt my friends!"

"Your friends... hmmm... but it would seem as though you have a habit of turning your back on and forgetting about friends... so why the sudden change of heart?"

Tara was genuinely confused. To her recollection, she had NEVER abandoned, betrayed or turned her back on a friend. It was something she prided herself on.

"Let. Will. Go." Tara brandished her hand. "You don't wanna know what I'm capable of."

"Making demands. Cute."

"Last chance, Rothbart!"

"Really, Tara. I'm just heartbroken that you don't remember me. But it doesn't matter. You're going to suffer the consequences of your actions, and the world is going to know what kind of monster you truly are."

Tara opened her eyes. It was pitch black again and she felt a very damp spot on her upper lip. She searched for the light by feel, thankfully found it and looked in the mirror, seeing a nose bleed. She cleaned herself up, turned the lights back off and decided to try again.

No dice. She couldn't get back in.

Eventually, she saw the faint rays of sunlight peer through the gap between the door and the floor and decided to open the door and give up.

On the bus, she looked for Nancy and Barb but saw neither, giving her a horrific pit in her stomach.

School was also becoming more and more cumbersome. The effects from not getting enough sleep at night were already starting to cause significant problems. Tara was irritable, sluggish and was having flashbacks of her hospital stay a lot more frequently. And she was also concerned that it could be having an impact on her psychokinetic capabilities. Abilities that she has only been aware that she has at all since she got her first period.

It all came to a head when she fell asleep in class and woke up screaming Will's name. It doesn't take a genius to know how her peers might have chosen to weaponise that.

The rest of the day was a blur until she saw some coiffed jerk vandalising Jonathan's camera while his cohorts tore his photos... and... was that Nancy watching it happen?

Absolutely not. Tara will roll over until the cows come home when she's the one under attack. But when her friends are the ones getting licked? Let the games begin.

Tara picked up a shard from the camera's remains and marched forward, intent on accosting Jonathan's assailant.

"Hey."

Nothing.

"Hey!"

Still nothing.

"HEY!" she shouted, chucking the shard directly at the back of his coiffed head, causing him to whirl around.

"Ow! What the hell?"

"I've got a bone to pick with you!"

"Who the hell do you think you're talking to?" he asked, raising a brow.