The Light Among Shadows

Blood Oath

Snake lady started climbing up the steps which surprisingly didn't creek. But when I placed my foot on it, it groaned like I do when I'm forced to get out of my comfy bed. I forced myself to walk up the steep steps while wondering how Snake lady glided up the flight effortlessly. I was a quite a spontaneous person but not so when it came to stairs. After what seemed like hours but were in reality 2 minutes, we reached a door that looked like it led straight to the Renaissance. It  was carved out of ebony and had intricate designs of roses and vines decorating it.  Dominique placed her long fingers on the golden doorknob as and as soon she did so, a visible golden current passed through her. Her dark, wispy and thin hair billowed around her, her porcelain and stiff face started giving out this young glow. She looked beautiful. I wondered what had happened to her that made her lose that radiant young beauty and vibe she was currently giving out. True I should probably be peeing my pants right now seeing this unusual occurrence before me but after all that had happened, I guess things had lost their element of surprise for me.

Snake lady left the knob  and along with that lost the glow of youth she was giving out. Her face went back to being sour and her hair settled in thin locks on her frail looking shoulders. She pushed the doors ajar and the sight before me proved that I could still be surprised. 

The room guarded by the door was dingy. It had one bulb attached to the ceiling that gave out weak light. It was the only source of light in the room. In the centre of the tiny cubical stood a creaky old table accompanied by two old chairs. On the table there was a crystal ball surrounded by a few tarot cards, yellowed bones, a red covered book, a quill and a pot of ink. The shelves in three of the four walls, were occupied by old, almost ancient books covered with a layer of lint and cobwebs. The floor was made of cobblestones and the walls were painted brown. 

Dominique, with her usual grace and poise, glided over to the table and pulled a chair out. She beckoned to me to come and sit there with a wave of her wrinkled skin covered, bony hand. I walked over to her and plopped myself down on the chair she'd pulled out for me. She herself, then sat on the other chair. Her posture spoke so much so of royalty that I myself straightened my lazy, typical teenager posture, to sit more...respectfully.

I was observing the room, taking in the smell of old paper, the little cracks in the walls and ceiling, the thick layer of lint that obscured the color of several books, when Dominique's raspy voice shocked me back to reality. 'So, child, what information must I give you in return for my question's answer?'  

I hesitated before saying, 'Please specify the number of questions whose answers I'm entitled to hear from you Ms. Prior.' 

'You shall be allowed to ask 2 questions with no subparts. I shall give you a minute to think of the questions you want to ask.' With that Dominique leaned back in her chair.

I wanted to know about my ancestry, so that would be my first question. The most intriguing question other than about my predecessors was about the working of magic. There, I had my questions ready. I looked up at Dominique who then said,'I presume you have your questions ready now?'

'Yes, milady, I do.'

'Ask away then sapling.'

'My first question to you is, what do you know about my ancestry?'

'And what may I know is your second inquiry?'

'My second question will be, What is it I need to know about 'magic'?'

'Excellent questions child. But before we answer each other's questions,' she said leaning forward, palms on the table, 'you must take a blood oath.'

'A what, now?'

'A blood oath. An oath that will bind you to the conditions laid down.' she took out a circular iron plate, small enough to fit in my palm, from under the table and placed it in the centre of the small table. 'You must drip some of your own blood onto the iron after I've casted a spell on it.'

'Ok.....'

'Good.' She said with a smile that stirred my insides.

She took out a matchstick, lit it with a stroke across the table and placed it on the iron. The  tiny flame kept flickering even after the matchstick had burnt out. Dominique closed her eyes, placed her palms over the flame and started mumbling something to herself while moving her hands to shape the smoke into symbols. It looked like a scene straight out of a horror movie. I was frozen to my seat in fear. She suddenly stopped. When she snapped her eyes open, the little flame got extinguished, leaving a bright red ring on the iron

'It's ready.' She said, looking up at me through a curtain of her wispy hair.

My words got caught in my throat and I managed to let out a muffled 'uhh ok.'

She picked up a sharp blade, which I hadn't noticed before, from the table and handed it to me saying, 'Make a cut on your palm and let at least a drop of blood fall on the iron.'

I gulped and took the blade from her with shivering hands. The smirk on her face was making me feel uneasy. Should I do it? True I had trusted any strangers throughout the day/s, but she was particularly creepy. I brought the blade closer to my palm. I didn't want to trust her after that voodoo magic she'd just performed. What if this wasn't what she called a 'blood oath'? what if it was something else she wanted my blood for? No, she wouldn't do that. After all she wanted to find out about her sister as much as I wanted my answers.

I slowly pulled the blade across my palm, wincing at the pain and sight of little droplets of blood slowly coming out of the opening. I turned my palm slowly, letting the blood flow out of the cut and across my palm. The impatient excitement in her eyes kept rising with the progress of my blood across my palm. The blood reached the end of my palm and started forming a drop, which got slightly bigger by the second.

The blood was going to drip in a few seconds, when a female figure burst in through the open door, ran towards me and knocked me right off the chair screaming 'No, you fool!!' , causing the blood to fall on the edge of the table. Dominique stretched her hand towards the blood in an attempt to smear it on the iron herself, but the figure was already on her feet, pushing Dominique away from the blood. The slight moment in which Dominique looked up in surprise, the figure wiped a sterilized cloth across the table, wiping any trace of blood.

'Get up fast idiot, we need to get out of here.' She said, finally facing me, when I realized she was none other than Angelina.

A/n

Finally. I'm so so so sorry for the delay, but I can't promise it won't happen again cuz, well school sux. Hopefully this chapter was worth it. I think I ended up going a little off the story I'd planned with this chapter, but that just means more chapters, so yayyy.

Angelina is a frickin badass in the next chapter and that's what we've been waiting for. Yayyy. Also, they start becoming really close in the next two chapters, and we all love the formation of a brOTP, don't we now?

So I'll try to speed up the updating for you'll. But please stick around because I HAVEN'T GIVEN UP ON THE BOOK .

Please leave comments, and if you liked the chapter voooooteeeee. Oh, and thank you so much for reading. Ok byeeee.

Love ya
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