The Nosferatu Adventures s13 p5

The Nosferatu Adventures
page 335, chapter 335

Out of Time

"Are you okay?" Seward asked as he sat down on the top stairs beside our heroine. She was sitting just outside of the attic, a cup of tea in hand.

"I needed to be alone." she hooked her thumb over her shoulder towards the attic door. "Ironic part was, once I got up here, I was suddenly hit with this uncertainty. Just couldn't bring myself to go in there by myself."

"What do you need me to do?" the dark haired human asked slapping his hand on his knees. "You need me to hold your hand?" he blushed holding his left hand out then palm upward. "Or get a flashlight for you or something? Shoo all the monsters away."

"Monsters I can handle. It's the emotions being back here have kicked up that I can't seem to face."  the banshee's voice got quiet, almost to a whisper as she ran her fingertip around the edge of her tea cup. "I'm not the same person I was when I left here." she scratched at her eyebrow, not able to look at her companion. "Um, there was a necklace...talisman actually that was with The Seer's grandmother's spellbook. I can't seem to find it." our heroine replied now suddenly needing to change the topic. "Leather cord, Celtic knot, two dragons made out of iron a rune in the center."

"Sorry, didn't see it. Important?"

"Sentimental." she remembered suddenly the latest trinket she'd brought back with her from the other reality. It was still hidden away with the clothes she'd been wearing when she returned. Given the fact Seward had dreamed of Bryon, she didn't think it appropriate to be wearing it. Bryon, herself and Harker had gone to see the Sea Witch. While there, Bryon had gotten into a fight at the tavern, and our heroine had to pull shards of glass out of him. He'd taken the largest piece which had cracked allowing some of his blood to seep into it staining it; and had it set in gold. It ended up creating this deep crimson spiderweb pattern. Nosferatu had worn that ring for the last year she'd been in that reality.  Now, it sat wrapped in her t-shirt in a drawer.  "Uh?" she shook her head clearing her mind, having been lost in her own memories.

"I asked why it was sentimental?" Seward was standing now a few steps down his body turned towards the bottom of the stairs.

"Uh...yeah sorry. It was a gift to me..." she cleared her throat trying to focus. "Edmund. The guy in the coffin...he gave it to me. The other me. Aurora. Back in the middle ages." she cleared her throat again standing up. "It was just from a simpler point in all this." she gestured with her left hand as if to brush the whole question away. "Just thought it would be nice to play with it." nodding quickly, our heroine sighed to herself as she opened the door to the attic, disappearing inside. She didn't move once she closed the door. Didn't barely breathe. The female was nearly shaking in her skin at what she knew was waiting for her in the darkly lit attic. Fear was something she hadn't felt in a very very long time. Our heroine was no longer used to it. The way it turned her flesh cold, or her teeth to grinding. But since she'd returned, it never seemed to let it's grip off of her. And this time, her fear brought friends. Doubt and guilty. They played with her, toyed with her the way a cat does a mouse before it bites it's head off.  And this cat had managed to find a way to land itself in every reflective surface it could.  Vlad had helped her banish her Harvey, but there was someone else now taunting her. Someone she'd decided to keep to herself, stay quiet about. Dax had cast a spell allowing him to turn every mirror and window into his own private magick mirror. And our heroine knew it wouldn't be long before he figured out a way to open another portal. She was actually surprised he hadn't already.  He wanted the spellbook, and he wasn't taking no for an answer anymore. Our heroine jumped as something touched her shoulder. Spinning around in a blur, she didn't see anyone at first. Then the shadows began to move, to take a solid form as they grew.
He was upon her before her mind caught up with her body, as she shoved the male hard sending him flying across the attic again. Arthur snarled as he sprang once again to his feet, his teeth snapping at her shoulder. Wiping the back of his hand across his mouth, he crouched down on his heels taking a fighting stance, ready to pounce again. Our heroine's eyebrows knitted together in confusion. Why hadn't she sensed him? Smelled him?  The male werewolf shook himself like a dog, clumps of mud, sewage and leaves still clinging to him. Relaxing her shoulders, the female banshee realized why, as Arthur had been so filthy.

"You're back." he manage to growl. Our heroine nodded. Arthur stood up then, rubbing a hand down his arm, exposing a bite mark. It wasn't healing. Quickly he turned his head lowering his injured arm as if ashamed of it. Hiding it from her. She realized then, that was the whole reason he was covered in filth. So no one spotted the bite. "Nothing. It's nothing." he said moving around the room. The table was covered in books on folklore.  "I should...I...should shower. Since you're back." he breezed past her the door closing the only evidence he'd moved.


Meanwhile...

The dark haired male struggled to open his eyes, his lungs burning for air. Another scream escaped his cracked parched lips, as his arms were slowly dislocated from the sockets. His muscles strained and snapped as he realigned himself again, popping the bones back into place. How long had this torture been going on? Days? Weeks? Months? Years? Loki had no idea. He was so disoriented from the spells that constantly wound around him. He didn't even know where he was. The dark haired god couldn't even remember how he got there? Or where there really was? The spells were well secured constantly rotating around him in laser like bars, blinding him to the darkness beyond. He didn't know what was truly worse, the torture or the fact his captor taunted him daily. A formless voice that he nearly remembered from some long ago place. The tone it took when it asked him over and over again if he was ready to go another round, or just give in. Just give them what they wanted, it said over and over and over again; in a timeless loop. What was it they wanted again? He couldn't remember. They had asked so long ago, when they first brought him here. When he first woke up to find himself trapped. At one point he thought he had known. Thought he was making sense of his situation. A brief few moments when the formless voice had disappeared, and Loki's mind had cleared. But then it was over. Any thoughts of freeing himself were once again gone, overrun by the chatter and pain. There were whispers suddenly, the formless voice confessing something to a second voice somewhere in the distance. The pain lessened for a half second as he strained to listen in the fog, catching a name. A name he thought sounded familiar, that he had once spoken himself. Someone he felt was important to him. Or at lest had been once. "Nos..."he barely formed it on his empty voice before the next bolt of pain coursed through him, burning in the back of his throat as it ripped down his spine. Loki's mind seemed to grab hold of a long forgotten image as the adrenaline coursed all too quick through him. A half shadow of a female figure ruptured like a breeze as he blacked out.


Tune in again for another installment of the Nosferatu Adventures starring your heroine...me(straight up story. At some point everyone needs to be rescued.)