Chapter 18
Agnon gazed out the bay window in the living room of Scott’s house and watched as snow continued to fall. A layer of white already blanketed the picturesque neighborhood, draping on boughs and lampposts as perfectly as it would have if it had been painted by an artist’s hand. The entire landscape before him begged to be put on a canvas, in fact. Puffs of white smoke plumed from the chimneys of several houses and warm golden light glowed in the windows. Dusk had not befallen the area yet, but it was coming soon. The world beyond the windowpane was swathed in the preternatural glow of newly fallen snow and impending twilight. The view was breathtaking.
He would have thought himself bored with snow. After all, he did live in one of the coldest, snowiest locations on the planet. But where he called home was less hospitable than Hallowed Hills, and far less inhabited.
People filled this part of the world and made use of every little act of nature, found a way to make it pleasurable for themselves, a fact that fascinated him almost as much as it amused him.
He watched as a school bus pulled to the far end of the street and several children climbed off. They immediately dropped their backpacks and began playing in the snow, scooping up mounds and forming them into balls, lying in it and making snow angels. As he watched, he could not help but think how human beings certainly knew how to take advantage of the world around them. And they knew how to exploit every resource and bleed it dry.
Enjoy yourselves, fools. This will likely be the last winter you ever see, Agnon thought as he stroked his silky beard.
He lingered by the window for several moments, watching the children play, until Scott’s Jeep Cherokee made its way down Merryville Road then turned in to the driveway. The sound of the garage door opening was followed by the rumble of the SUV’s engine beneath his feet. Seconds later, heavy footsteps could be heard stomping up the steps.
“Hello Scott,” Agnon greeted Scott before he stepped into the room. “Lovely day, isn’t it?”
“No,” Scott snapped huffily. “I hate driving in this crap! It’s so annoying!”
Scott was not Agnon’s favorite among the younger warlocks he’d met, but he was fearless and arrogant, traits Agnon respected and admired, traits that mirrored his own.
“Now, now, it isn’t that bad,” Agnon said calmly. “Besides, doesn’t that monstrous contraption you drive have four-wheel drive?”
“Yeah it does, but it doesn’t matter. You can’t get traction in this sloppy shit!” Scott blustered and dropped his backpack to the floor dramatically. “And why the hell are we talking about the weather and shooting the breeze all nonchalantly when two of our own are missing.”
“I am a bit concerned, I’ll admit, but you have to ask yourself: are they really missing?” Agnon asked and did not acknowledge Scott’s haughty tone. “They are teenagers. Perhaps they’ve gone off on their own on a road trip or done something impetuous like that.”
“Impetu-what? Speak English! Or at least speak like a normal person! Damn, you and your fancy talk,” Scott ranted.
Agnon felt the slow roll of his insides as they began to simmer at Scott’s increasingly disrespectful tone. How dare he address an elder in such a voice, and with such vulgar language? And he was not just any elder. He was Agnon, the most powerful living warlock. Perhaps Scott needed to be reminded of his place in the order of their kind.
“I know Arianna had something to do with it too, by the way,” Scott continued.
Agnon shot him a look of disapproval and hoped it would end the conversation about Arianna then and there. But Scott persisted. “She is involved and I know it. Who else could it be?”
“It is not Arianna. She is with us,” Agnon assured him in a stern voice that left little room for argument.
“She sure as hell doesn’t seem like she’s with us,” Scott bickered and Agnon felt his insides begin to teem with white-hot energy.
“She will be when the time comes,” Agnon raised his voice, the sound of it filling the room intimidatingly.
“Look, man, I know she’s you little pet, or maybe you have some kind of old man boner for her but,” Scott stormed, but Agnon raised his hand and silenced him. Pure, white-hot energy branched between Agnon’s fingertips making it look as though a small lightning storm were raging among them and, using only his powers, he gripped Scott’s throat. Scott gasped and choked as if his windpipe were being crushed.
“Silence!” Agnon boomed. “How dare you speak to me that way? You are an insolent, insignificant part of our movement. I could kill you now, do you know that? Oh, of course you know that. You can’t breathe right now, can you? And if I don’t stop what I’m doing, you will pass out and die of oxygen deprivation,” Agnon said levelly. “Oops! There I go using big words again. Shall I give you the rundown of what everything means? It may take a while, I must warn you.”
Scott’s face had turned an unhealthy shade of magenta and his hands clutched his throat. A thrill of delight raced up Agnon’s spine. While he did not enjoy harming his own kind, he did enjoy putting others in their rightful place. Scott’s hands and his powers were useless. Agnon’s powers surpassed all others and would until the full strength of the Sola’s powers manifested itself.
“Raise your hand if you wish to live,” he ordered Scott.
Scott raised his hand feebly and Agnon relaxed his invisible grip just a bit.
“When we take the school and begin to execute the students, she will feel it. The urge to join us will compel her to act. It will be beyond her control. It is her destiny.”
Agnon dropped his hand and Scott collapsed to the floor, wheezing and struggling for breath. The scene was disgraceful, a pitiful flurry of hair gel and skinny pants. Scott, the future of warlocks, was not like the warlocks of Agnon’s early days. He was puny, and not only weak of body and strength, but also weak-minded. The thought of seeing Scott attempt to heft a sword like the first he’d ever wielded made a smile tug at the corners of his mouth. No, warlocks today barely resembled the ones he’d had the pleasure of knowing in the past. They were not even remotely comparable to warlocks of centuries ago. Scott and the motley crew he lived with lacked discipline, intelligence and most importantly, they lacked respect. Agnon knew the world was to be overtaken by their kind, young and old, but eventually, the younger among them would have to shoulder the responsibility of leading. He did not have much confidence in their ability, and that was why the Sola was so crucial to their movement. She would guide them, mold and shape them into what they needed to be; she would prepare them to rule the world.
“I just don’t get why we need her, why we need Arianna,” Scott croaked, his vocal cords tender from being compressed moments earlier. “You said that the Sola was going to rise after it begins and that it would set off a chain reaction across the world. You said we would all rise and begin to rid the world of these useless humans. Why do we need her for that?”
Agnon felt his anger coil tightly like a snake ready to strike. “Because she is the Sola,” he shouted at Scott. “Arianna Rose is the Sola!”
The color drained from Scott’s face, shock and confusion replacing all of the overconfidence he’d been feeling. “What? How?” he stammered. “Why didn’t you tell us before?”
Agnon leveled a steely gaze his way. Scott’s features withered and he seemed to sink into himself, into the wall behind him. “You and the others did not need to know. But now you understand why she is not to be touched by you or anyone else,” he growled. “She needs to be at that school tomorrow morning when it begins, when we take the school and begin the chain reaction. She is the key to everything.”
Scott stared at him with his mouth partially agape and his eyes glazed over. Agnon wanted nothing more than to kick him like the wretched dog he was. They were nothing alike. Scott was arrogant and fearless, but lacked the true fortitude necessary to support either. He was a step above
the drooling fools that currently inhabited the planet, the ones they would purge the planet of.
“Leave me now,” Agnon dismissed Scott and resisted the overwhelming urge to act on impulses that urged him to incinerate the immature buffoon where he huddled.
Scott slowly scrambled to his feet. His skinny jeans, already seated so low on his hips that they revealed garish bright-red and yellow boxer shorts, slid down further. With the entirety of his ridiculous underpants exposed and his equally ridiculous pants hanging at his thighs, any semblance of dignity Scott may have ever held evaporated along with the shred of respect Agnon extended as a courtesy to fellow warlocks. Agnon shook his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. The whole of his kind would someday be at the mercy of idiots like Scott. What would the world come to? He wondered.
He had to force the image of that future from his mind, along with the image of a pathetic teenage boy scuttling away as he clutched his dangling pants. Too much was at stake for him to waste time on morons with wardrobe issues. A revolution loomed on the horizon.
He stared out of the bay window once again, out into the darkening sky. Beyond the glass, the world had assumed an unearthly electric-blue hue. Weak rays of daylight, ashen and wan, had transformed the scenic landscape into an eerie, foreboding one. Arianna entered his thoughts. She swirled in his brain like a riddle, an unwilling participant in her own destiny, armed with more power than she could possibly imagine, and he began to wonder whether he was wrong about her, whether she truly was what he believed her to be. Such worrisome thoughts lingered in his mind longer than he would have liked, plaguing and irritating at him. But then he reminded himself of the prophecy, of his role in it, and was able to dismiss his troublesome musings with ease. Ancient predictions never lied. They were never wrong. They had foretold of countless occurrences throughout their long history, had prevented the fall of their kind even.
Furthermore, his hand had been guided by Asus himself when he’d written his entry in the Tome of Ares. He’d heard Asus’s voice in his head as clearly as he’d heard Scott speak moments ago. He’d only needed to revisit that glorious period in time to buoy his faith, to renew it. Desmond had been the only factor that had the potential to change Arianna’s intended course, if he had lived to tell her he loved her. For that reason, Agnon had been forced to kill his only son. He’d done what needed to be done to protect the fate of his people.
With Desmond thrust to the forefront of his thoughts, an unsettling sensation scurried over his skin, crawling and scampering like the legs of a thousand spiders. A familiar scent perfumed the air. It smelled of spice and leather and was accompanied by a hum of energy as calm as the sea on a windless day, but as profound as it as well. Desmond. The name whispered through his core and each of his senses identified Desmond.
He spun around to look behind him, convinced he would find Desmond waiting there, daggers in each hand, readied to exact vengeance. When he saw that the room was empty, just as it should be, he realized the feelings he’d gotten were completely irrational. Likely the work of the minimal guilt he’d felt about ordering his son’s execution, his body had been tricked into believing it had perceived him. Desmond was dead. No doubt existed in his mind about that. He had dispatched Thanatos personally, and Thanatos had never failed him.
Agnon smiled and reminded himself of Thanatos’ unimpeachable track record. Desmond never stood a chance against the murderous beast. His son was dead and had taken with him any possibility of upsetting their rise to power. The future had been preserved, and awaited them in just a few short hours. Tomorrow morning was going to be the greatest day in his centuries of life on Earth. It would be the beginning of a new age. He and every other being like him would rise and claim the world for themselves. The Sola would rise to the occasion and feel the full extent of her power swell. She would set into motion the dawn of a new day.
He turned from the window slowly. Darkness had swallowed the last light of day. Everyone had retreated to the warmth and comfort of their homes. Little did they know, the time to savor in the warmth and comfort of their homes were limited to mere hours. After Hallowed Hills High School was overtaken and its students and teachers killed, the rest of the witches and warlocks around the globe would be called to action. They would set about slaying every human being until the last one fell. Then they would begin their reign on Earth.
Agnon smiled broadly. He could hardly wait for morning.