Time's Tragedies- The Books Of Beginning [2]

3. The Threat

Lili's bare feet pounded as she dashed up the stairs. Her room was at the end of the hall, her door distinguished by the stickers she and her mother had decorated it with when Lili was little. Yellow and blue butterflies were arranged in a flying pattern. To this day, the sight made her happy. Her siblings, who technically shared the largest bedroom, but had divided it in half with a giant curtain so they could have private spaces a little over a year ago, also had stickers on their door, birds in two shades of purple. Lili saw them when she passed her siblings closed door, and knew the younger ones weren't upstairs. 

She opened her own door and shut it just as quickly, then flopped down on her bed. She took a look around her room - it was a nice room, with sandy colored walls and dark green curtains. The blankets on her bed were striped black and white and gray, and a thick gray rug lay on the floor. Her desk was littered with materials for her poems and her bookshelf was full. Everything about it represented her.

Once aware that everything was where it should be (that doesn't mean put away in this case, because Lili wasn't completely organized, it just means her possessions were in her room) since her siblings sometimes borrowed things without permission and left her very confused, she reached into the pocket of her pants and pulled out the letter. It was crumpled slightly, so she smoothed it out.

Why she had taken the envelope, she wasn't really sure. It didn't stand out in any way. Sure, it had no return address, but that wasn't uncommon. Magical mail was rarely addressed in the proper format needed in the human realm, because well, it was traveling by magic. And it was very normal for magical world information for her parents to come to Cambridge Falls instead of Westport for convenience and safety. So why had she taken it?

General curiosity, maybe, but more of a feeling than anything. Maybe it had to do with the storm raging outside, maybe it was the boredom she got from a lack of inspiration.

A part of her said that this was ridiculous and she should just put the letter back. But that didn't stop her from opening it up and pulling out the sheet of white, unremarkable paper from within. The envelope fell to the covers as she unfolded the letter. Those sharps eyes of hers scanned its words.

This is only a taste of what I can do now. This world will bend to me soon enough, and there will be no mercy for any of you. Be very afraid.

- R. L.

Lili's heart began to pound at the threatening words in the note. Someone had sent this threat to her mother. They were in danger. This couldn't be happening. This was something that took place in her family history, something they had cleared up ages ago. This was the kind of thing Kate had vowed would never come into her children's lives. But here it was.

Lili read the first sentence, wondering and fearing what this so called "taste" was. Her hand reached for the envelope lying on the bed, and she looked inside of it, expecting perhaps evidence of the evil deeds this R. L. that had sent the threat already committed.

Instead, a burst of magic, like a shadow, hit her in the face. It couldn't be seen, but could be felt, and it was cold and forceful and sliced against her forehead with a sting. Lili was stunned. She had heard of enclosing bursts of magic in objects before, but it took a rare level of precision to do so, coupled with power. That was a dangerous combination.

Fortunately, the spell seemed made to intimidate and as a show of force, rather than having a specific cursed effect. At least, that's what Lili thought before she reached up to gingerly touch her stinging forehead. She felt something wet and sticky, and when she drew her hand back, it was stained with blood at her fingertips.

Her eyes widened. That magic hadn't just caused the illusion of pain, it had caused a real wound. It was a lot stronger than she thought. And it had been sent to her mother, Lili realized. Someone had wanted her mother to get hurt. Someone wanted them all hurt.

Suddenly Lili was glad she took the envelope, since she had managed to avoid a worse wound going to someone she loved in exchange for this cut on the head. But the rest of her was filled with overwhelming terror, the kind that comes when the worst hits and you're unprepared. The kind that fills you up and consumes you until goose flesh has been raised and your heart is about to burst from your chest. The kind that reaches every pore until your brain is spinning and all you want to do is scream.

It was the kind of fear that snapped her energy far faster than the wound, and it was the fear and the shock of it all, not the blood, that caused Lili to pass out.

She crashed onto her bed, the now harmless envelope having been kicked onto the floor. Her hand fell limply on the threatening letter. Blood from her wound smeared her face and dribbled into her hair.

Lili stayed there for almost a half an hour, before Rafe came to find her. He knocked on her door once, then twice, then three times with no response. That was unusual. Lili wasn't the kind of teen to just ignore her parents. He opened the door, which thankfully she had forgot to lock.

He nearly screamed when he saw the blood. His daughter's face was smeared with it, she was unconscious, and he was about ready to kill whoever did this. Rafe would do anything to keep his family safe. How had this happened?

A more rational voice inside of him said that he needed to heal Lili and wake her up before he went around getting revenge. So he cooked his rage long enough to cast a healing spell - thankfully, the cut was a lot shallower than the smears of blood made it appear. Then he went about using a second spell to wake Lili.

Lili took a gasping breath and sat up, her hand crunching the note. She spotted her father sitting beside her, looking down at her with worry.

"Lili, what happened?" Rafe asked, "who hurt you?"

Lili was unable to speak yet, all the shock and fear was rushing back. She handed Rafe the crumpled note and rested her healed head in her hands, smearing the remaining blood around even more until she looked like a mess from a horror film.

Rafe read the note, his face going stony and cold, taking on a rage Lili rarely saw in her loving father. He looked at her, and though he made sure to keep his voice soft, Lili could hear the tension when he said, "go get cleaned off and calm down, Lili. Then we all need to talk."

"It's bad, isn't it?" Lili whispered.

Rafe nodded, "it is."

Silently, Lili stood and walked to the bathroom to clean up the horror that was her blood spattered face. And while she did that, Rafe went to find Kate. They had no time to lose.

Not when it seemed their enemy was coming for them with a vengeance.

A/N: Well, shit has gone down. And this is only the beginning.