Tragic Innocence

Chapter 44: A Heart's Dread

            After several moments of deliberating silence, Zolata finally raised her head and sighed mournfully at Pentulla’s revelations.  “Come,” her voice remained low and deep, no one moved at her prompting.  “We must make haste, for we are no longer safe hear in my magic’s realm.”

            Crow heaved his eyes off of Pentulla’s wasted crouch and blinked several times at his sorceress friend.  To his shock, she appeared subdued, the evidence of darkened shadows beneath her otherwise bright with determination eyes.

            “Crow, Pentulla--come hither.  We must join our hands and recalibrate the rate and level of incidence of my enchantment upon this realm of mine, for it is has been breached by the very one we dread.”

            Crow nodded solemnly at her request and turned over to Pentulla, whom he was not entirely sure would be so willing to acquiesce.  Pentulla slowly stood to her bare feet, her slender legs trembling slightly with tentativeness.  Slowly, foot over foot, she shuffled closer as a fearful quarry would toward a huntress.

            Once she was within arm’s length of the enchantress, Zolata immediately grasped her hand and closed her eyes, her lips moving slowly as they formed the words of her incantation.

            Pentulla felt a burst of energy surging from her palms as they connected with the palms of Crow and Zolata.  It throbbed quickly at first, then slowly turned into a steadiness of a sleeping heartbeat.  She watched with awe her surroundings fluctuate as if they had been submerged completely into the deep of a water’s grave.  Clouds of black began to gnaw at her feet, which caused a great alarm deep within her breast.

            Pentulla shot Crow a look of fear, she longing to break the circle and flee to safety, but was surprised to find the warrior intent upon her deliberations.  He squeezed her hand firmly, a reassurance that all would be well.  Then a wink streaked through his lengthy lashes of ebony and a brown sparkle lit up his eyes.  Pentulla, at that very instant, recalled his oath to her safety.  She knew at once, that if he had interfered whilst undergoing her exorcism, he would not have been spared.  A shuddered ripped up her back and she broke contact.  How could she live like this?  Now Crow?

            Pentulla allowed her lowered her gaze to her feet and saw that the blackness had soaked the entire perimeter of the ground and began to surround the outer walls as well as the upper dome.  Slowly at first, the void began to swirl with a sickening slowness that evoked a slight breeze that played with the trio’s flowing hair.  Then, with quicker pulses, its tempo increased and began to whirl faster and faster until a gaping pit directly above her head yawned threateningly.  Then, all at once, the menacing clouds spun and vanished into the vortex of nothingness, leaving behind a soft shimmer of deep blue.

            The hold, in which the sorceress possessed, relaxed until Pentulla’s hand became a solitary shape by her side.

            “It is done,” Zolata whispered hoarsely and turned slowly to delve deeply into Pentulla’s pools of astounding gray.  “He can no longer sense you, nor can he threaten you any longer within my magical sphere.”

            “How…?” Pentulla trailed off, unsure how to voice her query at all.            “Come, let us sit and chat.”  Zolata held Crow’s lingering stare and demurely lowered her lashes with a dainty blush.

            Zolata majestically strolled the hard floor over to a recessed pool of ebbing light and stepped slowly into its wakefulness.  The glow instantly receded and revealed a circular settee with a small round table at the very center.   Crow and Pentulla copied her and joined her as well in quiet pensiveness.   “Where are we?” Pentulla dared to shatter the tense silence that had crushed her with too much weight.