Amid the Shadows

Hello All, apologises for the severe delays, I was travelling..but am back and want to get this finished before the summer is over. Thanks for reading, all comments welcome.

Anna Dreamer

**

Alex stood at the front of the cave, puzzled and in awe. The intricate designs, so elegant and beautiful. Alex rang her fingers over the designs lovingly. Just in that moment everything she had been worrying about seemed to disappear.

The feel of the cool stone against her finger tips made her feel so free and along with it a feeling of inadequacy. She who had never really lived given a task that filled her with doubts and had more implications that she could have ever imagined. Her mind turned to Alistair and the nausea from earlier returned with vengeance. His face and his whispering words haunting her mind.

She spun and took in the scene around her, the rolling hills in colour ways of green and creeping clouds threatening the clear crisp cotton blue sky. Alex's eyes filled with tears the urge to run away was strong, so easy to imagine the scent and feeling of home. The large wooden door leading into the tiled hallway, the large living room with a sofa so big you could hide under its pillows.

The pull of the key around her neck , however, had other ideas. It yanked at her neck and began to sing a light easy tune, raising and falling like tiny fairy bells. Beautiful and endearing.

Alex turned back to the stone door way. She spoke the Latin words in her head, too scared to know if speaking them aloud would give them power. Something inside held another clue in the crazy tale and she needed in. 'Ok Alexis,' she spoke to herself. 'Time to get inside.' She closed her eyes and drew upon her inner magic, the sound of cracking stones filled her ears.

**

Diana pointed a hand to the left and set off walking. Paul stayed by her side, as George and Karl complete with Vampire accessory fanned out to the sides, keeping an eye on the rustle trees and undergrowth.

As Karl held back a branch and setted out, the sheer mass of fortress saluted them, all priers and shades of grey. Karl sneered to himself how adapt, he had a feeling more shades of grey were to come.

**

Jensen moved the back pack from one shoulder to the other, he and Claude had been walking for a good hour when the stumbled upon the less trodden path. Claude took a small piece of paper with a drawing. Jensen noticed the heading on paper, it was from the hotel they had just left.

'We heading the right way?' Jensen asked casting a critical eye over the landscape.

'According to this we are' Claude carefully folded the item and moved on without another word.

Alex had pushed her power against the wards holding the door way it was heavily protected and nothing had moved it, she tired an unlocking spell...nothing, tried Gaelic....nothing. Just a faint rumble of stone each time but no significant movement.

The key around her neck was pulling heavy on her mind and her physical body. Her arms felt weak. She rested a moment against a bolder and slowly opened the rucksack looking for water...She grasped the bottle, uncapping the metal lid and expecting a gush, when in fact dribbles fell from its head. She was so thirsty.

As she contemplated the benefit of large springs of water and bathing in water, her eyes resting firming on the entrance. 'There is something I'm bloody missing here!'

Alex tired to remember the small amount of training she had had about being a concealer, the few chased moments she had read Claude books on how best to approach these kinds of situations. Technically she should be able to do this, whether she could....

She flexed her hands and rubbed them against her denim clad legs. She was hot, like she'd run a few miles. Her body was reacting to the key. She slowly paced to the door way and spoke in a soothing voice.

'I know you can hear me.' She smoothed the stone, still marvelling in its construct. 'I'm asking permission to enter.' A rumble of rocks greeted this enquiry. Alex frown and closed her eyes.

As she contemplated her next move, she was assaulted with a memory, no an array of memories, flowing thick and fast through her brain.

A child on a swing, their face badly deformed and disfigured.

A man singing a song to the chopping of wood, One leg nothing more than a twisted branch,

A man killing another with an axe but as she starred down it was her hands holding the offending item.

Another man pining down a woman as she frantically scratched at his face and the fabric of his clothes. A swift back hand to the face had Alex cry out as her face replaced the woman's own, grubby hands touching her, grabbing her. She struggled until His hand grabbed and her breast his finger digging into her flesh, enough to draw blood. His foul breath on her face. 'Whore, I'll teach you to disobey me, Whore!'

A child, his hand outstretched as someone in darkness came towards him with a hammer.

'Tommy knows he should not steal.'

Alex searched around frantically, trying to pin point something to reason with. The scarred hand that held down her for the hammer to hit.

'Tommy must not steal! Say it'

One broken finger.

'Say it'

Two broken fingers.

'SAY IT!' Spit from the barbarians mouth hitting her cheek and eye as they stepped closer.

The sickening thud of the metal hitting flesh and bone. Alex screamed inside her head but the boy in the vision remained quiet and absolute. Alex was with them all but still somehow herself. She screamed to the boy occupying this torment with her, he pointed to his mouth and opened wide. No Tongue. No voice. The flood of pain hit her again and again and again until all four fingers and thumb were crooked.

A flood of emotion overwhelmed her, a loss of sensation in her mind, she was slowly slipping away to somewhere. The watery image appeared before her eyes. Alex tired in vain to push against the force of something....WATER! She push and panicked and scrambled against an unseen force. Heavy and unrelenting on her back pushing her deeper and deeper into the water. Her face scrapping against the jagged rocks under the current.

She pushed, screamed into the water, liquid flowing quickly into her mouth and flowing into her lungs. Her legs were getting tired. How peaceful would it be to sleep? The thought surprised her, to float away to peaceful slumber? The whoosh of her leaving water shocked her into alert. Her back throbbed, her face ached against the blast of cold to hot. And she was hot. Her head felt like it was going to explode.

People, people were watching. She tired to move her hands, they were tied, she looked down at her clothing. She wore Soft brown leather boots, cloth pants and tunic. She searched the crowd, a vision of people in plain black and white clothing, dots of people in clothes like herself. 'Please' she murmured to deaf ears and angry eyes before her.

'We should be burning her! Hanging is too good for her! Fucking Witch!'

Someone threw something at her face it stung sharply and hit her feet at the floor. As she looked down to the exploded fruit at her feet she felt the pull and jerk of the rope. Her neck cracked as the rope bit into her skin. It burned and she gagged, chocking on the lack of air and her own saliva, her feet now free falling a she pumped the air desperately trying to finding some footing on an invisible ledge.

Alex knew it was just a memory, something attached to the spirits in that cave but she needed to get inside. The souls and spirits projecting these visions and glimpses were all haunted by these deeds, that they had committed or had been done against them. Alex flung back her head and smacked it against the stone in an attempt to draw blood. Her strength was leaking away like water from a tap. She could no longer control her arms and legs. Flicking in her minds subconscious from the choking sensation, someone else's memory and the present, the cool breeze and morning sun on her face.

She smacked her head against the rock again thrusting her back into reality. Alex felt the warm gush of something as it hit the rock, dripping coppery liquid into her mouth, her vision doubled and blurred, she saw the symbols glow as the stone hummed beneath her hands. The flow of power and magic hit her hard, throwing her into the air and then flinging her into the damp grass and sweet darkness.

**

George stopped abruptly at the pain in his chest. He rubbed it absently as the shifting demon highlighted some of the things to watch out for in Alistair's House of Hell.

Paul's voice quivered and he dropped to his knees, Blood dripping from his nose as his mind was assaulted with the image of Alex being held down face first in, what, a lake? A steam? The pounding of running water hit his ears. Her face a picture of torture and agony as she fought against the weight pinning her to the stony bottom.

'ALEX!' George's cry was of pure agony as his son started to sob.

Karl watched in amazement as something passed between father and son and the air around them thickened with the stench of death. Karl took a sharp breath and dropped his prisoner to the floor. No, No! He turned to George as tears fell from his widened eyes, his face mirroring George's own.

The trees in the forest around them screamed in pain and the sky overhead shed the bright blue skies and sun as thick rolling black grey clouds and bolts of lighting took its place. Heavy pleats of hail assaulted them as Paul's agonising sobs echoed around them.

Karl felt his wolf stir, a sad strange whine, no longer able to picture the beautiful face of a friend and lover. Just sadness and grief. Karl inhaled slowly. The scent of burning cokes filling his nose, pain, regret and sadness.

**

Claude keep five steps ahead, his urgency had not gone unnoticed by Jensen. He kept a few easy stride behind as his uncle led them. He spotted Alex before Claude breaking into a slight jog. As he called out her name, she stiffened and she was thrown backwards, hitting the ground with a very fucking loud bang. Jensen felt his heart begin to suddenly pound. As he ran full force he was slightly aware of Claude calling his name. Nothing else mattered but Alex.

As he skidded to a hault and dropped to his knees, he took in her appearance, her face was scratched to hell, bleeding and bloody. Her clothes were torn and wet as was her hair. Her neck was badly bruised and the indentation on two running black, blue, bleeding rings around it shocked Jensen, where the hell had see been?

He gently lifted her hand to take her pulse, he felt it, slow and sluggish. In relief he bought her hand to his face to kiss, he noticed the crooked fingers. Her whole hand was swelling and every finger was broken.

'CLAUDE!' He screamed in agony.

'Is she alive?? Claude asked in a whisper, at Jensen's nod. His demeanour changed from shocked to urgent, 'Lewis we need to get her inside, build a fire and tend to the wounds.' Claude lifted her rucksack. 'Lift her gently.'

Jensen lifted her scared to jolt her in anyway. She never made a sound, no expression marred her blood stained face. Jensen's started to panic anew. He clutched her to him, she smelt damp and felt so cold. He followed his uncle into the cave, the symbols on the door was marred with crimson, glistening in the sun.

Claude was busy doing something, he didn't take his eyes from her face. He spoke to her softly. 'Don't leave me, I only just found you. I haven't had a chance to apologise yet...' he laughed nervously, 'I don't know what to do. Don't leave me in the darkness.' He kissed her cold lips and settled her onto Claude's jacket that had been spread on the cave floor.

'Jensen, I'm going to quickly access the damage. Getting her to a hospital would be pointless and the nearest wizard's healing halls is a good fifty miles away.' Claude babbled as he undressed the girl. Her body was cold. He touched her neck, a struggling heartbeat...slow...slow....

'I need your ability to assess Lewis, there could be internal bleeding.'

Claude looked Jensen who stood frozen in shock. 'NOW LEWIS!' he bellowed, his voice echoing off the walls.

Jensen dropped to his knees, his hand covered in her bloody form gently stroked against her t-shirt and skin. He tired to focus. He felt the familiar light headedness and the floating of himself entering some one else's body. He started at the bottom and worked his way upward.

Claude watched and then began starting a fire to add the fairy light he'd taken from his rucksack and stuck into the ground. It currently illuminated the cave but it didn't give out heat. A pit still remained in the middle of the floor from fire before he presumed and he set to work adding to it.

Jensen's could feel the sweat dripping down his face as he searched her body and fixed the more urgent injuries. There had been some internal bleeding on her brain, the skull had been cracked badly in one place. Three ribs had been broken and were dangerously close to punching a lung. He'd mended her fingers, a thumb and her ripped spleen.

He was exhausted. The bruises on her body would have to be rectified later. He pulled back and slumped back into his own body and onto the floor.

Claude handed him a bottle of water and they sat side by side for sometime before Jensen spoke. 'She's sustained injuries that would lead me to believe she had been tortured.' He commented after he'd listed her injuries, some of his own memories haunting him in the darkness.

'We were only a short time behind her Lewis, She had no time to be taken by anyone.'

'It could have been Alistair, he drank from her'

'Your brother maybe many things but even he can't shift through time.'

'I...'

Claude interrupted, 'If her visions came thick and fast Lewis that too could have cause this. It is not uncommon in powerful concealers. You said yourself she'd been attacked before by invisible forces. You must have seen the blood on the door way on the way in. Maybe she fought to gain entry.'

'Fought what? Spirits and ghosts? Jensen asked incredulous.

'Maybe so.' Claude raked a hair through his peppered grey hair. 'The book I read and gave to you, give some insight. Concealers can become tormented by the visions, they also can become a sponge for taking others pain and suffering into one's self. As it is their job to find inanimate objects, so too can they affect people, help ease them emotionally. It can be very empathetic.'

'How long do you think she'll be...' Jensen trailed off.

'As long as it takes.'

**