Sinister Secrets

An Outline of a Plan and The Lord of the Light

"What do you mean the Elders?" Ezra asked.

"The Elders are the six remaining Protectors." I said.

"I thought there were seven Elders?" Selena said.

"There are seven."

"Then how does that make sense?"

"One of them isn't a Protector, Selena." Ezra rolled his eyes.

"But what does that mean? How did that happen? Did one of them just be like," she shrugged to emphasize her point, "whatever I'm down to join?"

Ezra slid his eyes to me, unsure of the answer.

"We'll come back to the seventh." I said. 

Amos sat back in his chair, watching Sara like she might turn back into the creature at any moment.

"So the witch is involved, we know that." Ezra said. 

"I think she's involved, but I no longer think she's the one calling the shots." Erebus said.

I turned to him. "No?"

He shook his head. "I think whoever is running this is using her as a pawn. I think she gets all the information and takes it back to someone else. She has black magic to make things happen, but she doesn't really know how to make things happen if you get what I'm saying."

"Then who is she working with?" I asked.

He shook his head. "I don't know. Amos, Ezra, and I were so consumed by war at that point that we didn't know what was going on in the Lands. Selena was here, but she was taking care of her mother and Reginald wouldn't have had either of them involved in anything."

"The witch isn't running things." Sara agreed. "Erebus is right."

"Then who is?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. Reginald was already dead when they brought me back as a creature, but it's definitely not the witch."

"Okay, let's backtrack then." I said. "There are seven Elders. Who isn't a Protector?"

The group grew silent.

"Crispin's definitely one." I said. "He knew way too much about the whole thing from what it looked like by his notes."

Amos listed off the rest of the names. 

"Maybe Griffin isn't one?" I offered. "He doesn't do much talking, he's just there half the time."

Amos weighted the option in his mind and then frowned at me a little. "Griffin's kind of an idiot."

"A real follower." I agreed.

"Marcus?" I offered. "Marcus is the youngest of them."

"Why would they all agree to this anyway?" Ezra asked.

Erebus sighed as he sat down on the arm of the couch and pulled me with him to sit on his knee. "I think I may have an idea."

I turned to look at him.

"When we were young my Mother would tell us stories. She told us about the Ouroboros a little bit, but she called it the Dragon so we wouldn't think it was exactly real. She didn't want to scare us, but I think she knew her time was limited and she needed to get out any messages she could. She used to say the eighth being would be a host for the Dragon. They would be able to take a lot of power, but if you have all seven of the beings before than the Dragon could be used to do unimaginable things. The power would be unlike anything, even greater than me."