"Hey wait! I'm not sure what exactly I did but I know it can't be good. . . okay maybe that's even an understatement but at least tell me what's going on" Dana flailed her hands in the air as if trying to make herself visible to a rescue team in a helicopter, she knew this was her one chance to get anything out of this woman otherwise she was done for. She needed to more than just feel the lurking danger, this time she didn't want to go in blindly, this time she wanted to be at least a bit prepared to face it.
"I am sure we have the same blood running in our vessels so you must be able to at least feel its energy!"
Dana could tell the older woman was still trying to sort out a few gears in her head and hence her suddenly very snappy attitude towards her when she has always kept a calm demeanor with her but she wasn't just going to let up like that, especially since what the older woman had said was true! She could feel the sickening aura of its presence but above all else, its true strength. It sent vibrations in all four senses of the earth. Even the temperature that had been cool and a bit chilled had suddenly gone a few degrees up as if the sun was hanging just a few inches from their heads.
"I am aware all right. . . I am also aware you have an explicit idea of what we are about to face and I don't think cluing me in wouldn't change much of what is happening now, would it?" She resorted to being sarcastic and she knew it. It was the only thing she could think of that would get through to the thick-skinned old woman.
"That is the presence of an old being" she took a huge gulp of breath before continuing to say "some even called it The Punisher or The Messenger of Pain. A being at the level of a God. . . an immortal" she sounded pained, as if the mere mention of this being physically left cuts in her skin which granted Dana having chills run down her spine with hairs standing at the nape of her neck despite the apparent heat.
Is there really anything that powerful in existence. . .
Ariana saw the almost frozen state that the girl was in and wondered if her initial perception of the girl was correct, maybe she still wasn't ready after all. She had made herself out to be this brave and courageous young girl but she was still weak. For a second, she wondered if maybe her sisters had been right all along, maybe there was nothing special about the girl after all. It's been a long time and she had still not broken through despite showing signs of the destined child. One thing was clear to her though, she had not been lenient with the girl by any stretch of the word. She had been hard on the girl, obviously not hard enough according to the covenant but she wasn't barbaric so she was incapable of being absolutely unfeeling. . . its unnatural.
"Come here Princess" she beckoned with her right hand. That was enough to bring Dana back to her senses which brought her to another halting stop after just taking two steps towards the older woman. Was she planning to pull some funky voodoo crap on her?
"You're going to have to put a little bit of faith in me Princess" she encouraged, seeing the hesitation in her steps she instantly knew what went through her head.
Dana often wondered if the older woman could really read her mind somehow.
"I am still not sure if I can fully trust you. I know I am no friend of yours, I am just not sure if I can say without a doubt in my head that you're worth labelling a foe" she stood defiantly infront of the older woman, her chest puffed out. The older woman outstretched her hand until it touched Dana's forehead. She still gave off that feeling that she is standing without her feet touching the ground. The moment her hand made contact, she felt a tingling caress-like sensation wash over her. She hadn't even realized that she closed her eyes but the next second when she blinked, she could tell she was in a different place now. . . a different environment. She tried to get a grasp of her surroundings by turning around in a full circle and felt a hand grab her roughly as if trying to yank her, forcing her to stand still. She felt the vibrations in the air again, just a little too strong this time. She didn't know what she had expected when the older woman touched her but now, she was kinda having second thoughts. . . what exactly had she hoped for?
"Be still" that echoing, ominous voice again! Was it some type of command?
The only thing that had her obey was curiosity above all else. She had used the weirdly commanding voice on her again but this time she had done so in a hushed tone. Was she scared. . .?
"We are already too close to its vicinity, any closer and it will incinerate you"
"If I can't exactly see it then why are we here?" She asked, an undertone of annoyance evident in her voice.
"Give me your hands" she complied. The scene changed infront of her eyes again and before her now stood a monstrous body of fiery red energy that had a humanoid outline with of course the unmistakable presence of two sharp spiraling horns that resembled the horns of a rare antelope. She gasped in shock and almost staggered face first into the ground but the older woman had anticipated something like this to happen so she was ready. . . or so she thought.
"Druidum. . ."
Its lips moved but Dana hadn't heard it say anything, so why was she suddenly shaking? No, that wasn't it! The older woman's hands had suddenly gone ice cold, not hers but she was still pretty much a jelly mess of clattering teeth and banging knees.
"Quid tu hic agis. . .?"
They had been spotted!
"RUN!" Ariana shouted to Dana in panic, taking advantage of the slight confusion on the immortal's face. The younger woman might have not heard anything but Ariana heard everything just fine. After all they spoke the same native language. It hadn't expected to run into any druids in this plane so it had averted its gaze for a second to make sure it was in the right place. Not that there could have been any errors with it seeing as its slumber only ended and transported it to the place where there was a sinner that no longer had any chance of redemption. It was sure it was in the plane where only humans existed along with some other spirits that may have been cast out of their original planes but it was confident of its recollection of the druids being in a different plane all together.
Ariana was sure they couldn't outrun the demon but she hadn't expected it redirect its attention back to them so soon, there was no running anymore and she knew they couldn't exactly beat the immortal with just her and the girl, never mind that combat wasn't exactly her forte.
"Brace yourself!"
"What?''
She had tried to shout to the girl but alas, she hadn't caught on to her words in time and so she watched her fly through the air like a kite on a windy day, landing with a deafeningly loud crash of bones while she tried to steady the momentum so she can at least land on her feet. She braced herself but still landed harder than she had anticipated, with the sudden shooting pain from the sole of her feet and ankles hammering the message home. She flinched slightly and tried to absorb the pain as best she could without letting it show in her face but she knew it was useless. The demon knew the damage he had dealt just fine and it needed no physical show to confirm.
Ariana rushed to where she had seen the girl land not so graciously to find her eyebrows scrunched tightly together and her eyes. . . to say they were closed would be an understatement. Her lower lip was bleeding and Ariana didn't know whether she should be proud or expected to find her in a worser predicament but what mattered at that moment was that the girl lives. She had survived an attack from that monster and came out alive, she knew then that she was right about the girl. . . she was something special. She had allowed her thoughts to distract her and missed an important detail! The girl wasn't in pain from the blast from the demon, she had been reforming. . . but how? None of her sisters possessed such powers, not even the generation before her grandmother said anything about regenerating magic.
"Why are you looking at me like you just realized I'm actually that monster's offspring?" Dana said half teasingly.
This had become a type of coping mechanism for her, brushing the severity of the situation so it feels less real to her but judging from the look on the older woman's face, she could tell she had just had a light bulb moment.
"When did you learn to do that?"
Dana couldn't understand the older woman's question for a second before it dawned on her, so there were things that were beyond her cryptic brain's comprehension. . . this thought alone made Dana realize the woman wasn't a God after all. Wise, maybe but definitely not a God. She had nearly given an impulsive response but then an idea hit her.
"How about an exchange, I'll tell you what you want to know and you answer some of my questions too" she saw that conceding look that was always accompanied by a sigh and knew she had herself a deal so she pushed it a bit, "what was that? I didn't even see that thing move at all. . . except well maybe moving its lips but that was all I saw it move. . . when did it even get to us?"
"That, Princess is what you call a demon. You can't use common sense when analyzing anything it does or say" Dana had thought there was more to the explanation but after a long pause she knew that was all she was going to get. She was about to complain when she heard the older woman say "come with me, all this will make sense if I show you than just tell you"