Guardians Of The Zodiac

Chapter 12

The space around me was cold...dark...lonely. And yet, I felt relaxed. Like all of my tension and stress was slipping away. As I peered through the emptiness I saw the constellations begin to form together around me. Each star grew brightly and got in my face, but I couldn't help but laugh at the way they danced in place.

Suddenly I sensed them reacting to a disturbance.

"Guardian of Hope, you are playing with cosmic forces you couldn't possibly understand," a voice echoed into the air.

There was a soft murmuring filling the air around me but there was nothing else in the space except for me and the constellations.

"You need to break your connection immediately before you bring about the destruction of the whole world!"

"This one is a ticking time bomb."

"Hey, if you guys have something to say then say it to my face!" I shouted into the void, not quite as confident as I tried to sound.

"But maybe it's time for a change. What harm could it cause if we just wait and see what she's capable of?"

"A lot of harm!"

I had to cover my ears from the booming vibrations of their voices.

"Either way, there's an imbalance in the air and someone needs to take care of it."

"What's that supposed to mean? What kind of imbalance?" I tried to make sense of what the Stars were saying or trying to say.

But the more they spoke over one another the more their voices began to blend together and I couldn't pick out any words anymore. Eventually they faded out completely and the stars started to blink out one by one until I was alone once again.

"Tara!"

I woke up in a cold sweat to Serena, Trinkette and Iris pinching and stretching out my face.

"Ouch! What are you guys doing?!" I yelled as I shot up in bed and pulled them off of me one by one.

But before they could even answer, I noticed my dresser was knocked over near a large crack in my floor boards that lead outside onto my balcony and snapped the cement banister in half.

"You were having a nightmare," Serena spoke first.

"I see that..." I murmured and just held my head in my hands.

The stress was really getting to me lately and no matter what I did I couldn't get a good night's sleep for the life of me. We had received correspondence from the Council letting us know that they received the news of me joining Nexus and wishing to continue my training here. But to make it official they needed to send someone that the Council trusted to evaluate the situation for themselves. Miranda said that I should be put at ease knowing that the Council was willing to move forward with my requested transfer from the Estate to the Guild, but for some reason it just put me more on edge knowing and waiting for their official stamp of approval.

This kind of stress was also putting a strain on my training. Ryder would tell me that I was a lot better from when we first started, but all I was able to do was form sprite-size force fields that didn't even last long enough to become tangible. Every time Ryder had Iris toss one of her fireballs at me I wouldn't be fast enough to get up a barrier to protect me so I always ended up getting burned one way or another. Needless to say, Trinkette and Serena worked together and perfected a burn ointment that made my skin smoother with each use so at least that was something.