Cooling down

Chapter 2

Angeliques hand moved over the box, she had known about it for a long time but her grandma told her the day will come when people will need to know. "Someday when you are old enough, and when you need it most, the thing that’s in the box will help you immensely, but it will cause you great problems as well.....Like Spiderman!" These were her exact words.
She started to breathe deeply now. Trying to calm down she placed the box on the desk and sat down in the chair.
"I need to know!" Lunging towards it Angelique scooped the box from the desk. Closing her eyes tight she took one last long, deep, meaningful breath and flipped the rusty lock. She lifted the lid slowly, it creaked like fingernails to a chalkboard, it was almost comforting and Angelique loosened up a bit. With a puff of mothball smelling dust, the box was finally open.
“Huh?” Angelique curled a cold sliver chain around her fingers and lifted it into the light. There was some sort of pendent hanging down.
“An opal bird? It’s nice I guess, but how will this help me? Or cause me problems for that matter? Oh well, maybe its magic!” She joked.  Angelique often talked to herself or Sairys since she didn’t have many friends. She was always lonely, but she didn’t want to tell her parents.
“What’s this, Sairys? A note?” she stuck a freshly painted purple fingernail under the folded piece of paper on the bottom of the box and pried it out. 
It was written in black on a piece of sandy coloured paper. It must have been from before June died eleven years ago, it was amazing that it was still there and in such good condition too.
Angelique unfolded the dusty note and began to read;
“Angelique, I see your curiosity got the best of you! Not to worry, I know that by now you would have to be old enough to carry the responsibility of this necklace. 
I’m gone now, but I wrote this for you and hid it in my desk so nobody, but you, can read it. You might not believe me, but some things have been hidden from the world, unbelievable things. 
When I was 21, I met a charming young man named Ernest Carmichael ; He was 23 and as far as I knew, he was working as a baker. We fell in love almost instantly and married a year later. We were very happy together, for three years we lived in our simple house in a small town; until I learned the dark secret that he had kept from me.
One night he woke me up and said there was something he wanted to show me and that it had been playing on his mind for quite some time. He walked me to a small cabin in the woods near our house; I had never seen it before that night.
He took me inside where I saw wolf pelts and head mounts hung up on the walls. He took me over to small table and sat me down to tell me his story.
You may not believe me but, Ernest, was a werewolf hunter.
Every full-moon we would go hunting, I was kind of like his apprentice I suppose. He taught me all I needed to know about werewolves and other ‘supernatural’ creatures; he told me that some, like the werewolves, were just animals, while others, such as vampires, succubi and even witches lived in our every-day society as regular human beings.  
We worked together, taking turns to go hunting, one night it was my turn to go out, but he insisted that he should go instead, because we had just found out great joyful news, that I was with child. That was the last night I ever saw him. The reports said he had been fatally mauled by some kind of large dog. He was only twenty-seven.
I set out to find and kill any werewolves in the area, and I kept on this way for two years, until I met a group of people who in one way or another knew about the supernatural world; there was Diana Thorne, who was one of, if not the most powerful witch of our time. Rowan Quinn, he was a dragon tamer from Finland. There was also the Daih twins; Arianna and Penelope who were, believe it or not, vampires!
The four of them accepted me into their group, which they called ‘The outsiders’. We lived together as a secret organization. They taught me that werewolves weren’t just animals like I had originally thought, and could function in a society as regular people. They told me their histories and where they came from, and the source of what kept their powers tamed and also helped them to be stronger!
Diana had five magical pendants that she had inherited, they were in the form of an opal bird, symbolizing the element of air. (The necklace that you now own) An emerald tree leaf, symbolizing earth. A sun created out of sunstone, symbolizing fire, a crescent moon made of moonstone, which held the power over water. And lastly, a jet cross, which symbolizes darkness as the fifth element, Diana had already passed on the cross to her son because all five of the pendants together, owned by the same person, would have been too much power for any one person to handle. There has been rumors that we are not the only ones with pendants but that there is seven others. 
A year after I had joined with the outsiders, something terrible happened. Diana went insane. None of the rest of us knew why, but she was far too dangerous with the pendants in her possession, so we all took one each and agreed to never use them and to pass them through our families until they somehow reached each other again.
Rowan took the earth pendant, Arianna took fire, Penelope took water and I took air. 
We never saw each other after that day.
So, when you are close to the other pendants, you, and whoever else has them, will transform into the l guardians, apparently after the first time you transform you will be able to activate your pendants by simple command. It is now your duty and the rest of the guardians to protect and help the supernatural world. It’s all four of your responsibilities now, it will help you immensely, but it will cause you great problems as well.
 Sincerely, Great Grandma June.”
“Whoa.” Angelique slowly placed the note back on the desk. “I didn’t know June was a writer.” she turned to Sairys and giggled; the bird crooked its head and hopped up and down, as if to be laughing with Angelique.
She automatically denied the letter’s content, naturally she didn’t believe in the fairy-tale creatures that her great grandmother wrote about. But still, she had a strange feeling that she couldn’t quite shake. 
Werewolves? Vampires? Witches? Dragon-tamers? Grandmother June must have been crazy! Angelique knew she had an imagination, but this was quite a story! And for June to lie about her own past, her husband’s death, it was all quite grim. 
“Oh well, maybe I was meant to read this when I was younger, for a bed time story or something. I guess I’m just too trusty, she told me to wait and I waited too long. Ha, funny how these things happen isn’t it Sairys?”
Sairys started flapping his wings and jumping around, Angelique thought it was hilarious and couldn’t stop laughing. She accidentally knocked the desk and the glass of water toppled off and spilled all over her dress!
“Ahh! Damn it!” Angelique groaned.