Page 53 of A Velvet Kiss After Dark

Tabitha glared venomously at him. "You're an ass."

His eyebrows rose at that and he, too, leaned in to square off with her. "Why? Because I'm right? Unless you have something worth trading to these folks, then all that remains are our weapons, which we need, okay?"

She slouched back in her seat in defeat. "Fine," she muttered unhappily, despising the way he was treating her. "Can I have another drink of that, Graham?" She enjoyed the flicker of ire her question wrought in Kane's gaze.

Graham shrugged. "Go for it. It's barely digestible anyway."

She chugged a decent slurp, then belched away the rest. Kane glowered at her. "Tabitha…" His words trailed off as the front door opened and in strolled a group of four tough-looking demons. Their horns were pointed and sharp and they each wore a silver chest plate of metal like that of a knight.

The team seemed to eye them shrewdly, before requesting a table by a now nervous-looking innkeeper. He looked between them and the new crew with a worried expression, and Tabitha had a brief thought of a movie she'd once seen where the nice guy in the bar wasn't so nice after all and instead called the villain to inform him that the good guys were at his place. She hoped this was nothing, but she and her entourage each tensed as the newcomers took their seats and ordered food and drink.

Tabitha closed her eyes, fearing she'd lack energy after all once they had to beat feet out of town. In her mind she saw the townspeople chasing them away with pitchforks and bolts of magic fire and terrible singing.

When she peeled open her drooping eyelids, however, she found herself not sitting in the inn with Kane, Graham, and the two vampire siblings, but in a whole other dimension. She stood up in a flash and she found herself in a golden room of shimmering energy. Gold dust seemed to fall like rain around her. She waved her hand through the substance, yet felt nothing. A doorway on the other side of the room called to her like a sweet, enticing chant that beckoned her with welcome arms. She daintily moved toward it, her dress swaying around her knees.

Hands reaching in front of her, she grasped the doorway only to feel it disintegrate into fine gold dust at her touch. Through the doorway was a golden arched bridge that seemed to lead somewhere important, somewhere unimaginable. She took the first step and it held like a solid object, though it appeared made of the same magical dust that swirled in the air around her. It was beautiful, enchanting, and glorious!

Her heart swirled with warmth and love and joy! She felt happy and a smile bloomed across her face as she suddenly raced across the bridge. This had to be a dream! How happy she was! Like a child crossing a draw-bridge, she laughed and even the sound of her laughter seemed to tickle the air around her, sounding lighter and brighter than normal. What was this magical realm?

She wished her father were here to see this!

As she neared the other end of the golden drawbridge she saw another doorway, sternly closed but glowing with hieroglyphic symbols etched into the surface. She traced her fingertips across the surface and whispered words unfamiliar to her, yet she felt in her soul like she knew this language and what it meant. Although foreign to her, she read the words aloud:

All heed who enter thee, for I am unremarkable most, and contaminating least;

Prerequisites shall be: thou ought be truthful and honest most, heritage pure of menace and free from injustice;

Speaketh these words thrice and open I shall, or forever more be turned to the Halls of Glory.

Beneath the passage was another enchanting sentence. Tabitha giggled like a child and rubbed her thumb across the ordained passage before reciting it impeccably in this foreign language she somehow didn't know, yet understood.

The door disintegrated before her and only a shimmering luminous gold dust appeared in its wake. Giggling, she walked through it and found herself in a busy hallway. Paintings adorning the walls moved at will, from one wall to another as if never quite finding the correct spot to rest. Ghostly apparitions walked through her as if unable to see her, yet she could see the women and men chattering back and forth. She waved and called out to them, her smile wide, yet they heard her not and continued down the hall. Tabitha couldn't fathom where she was, but she ran down the passageway opposite from where the ghosts had gone and found herself in a lavish room as grand as any she could recall.

Gold statues posed along the ends of the hallway illuminated by might statues that reminded her of Athena and Apollo from Greek myth.

Atop an impressive dais sat two thrones made for a king and queen, empty as could be.

She giggled uncontrollably with gee and raced for the chair like a child. She couldn't fathom it. Just knew she'd never felt so free or innocent in all of her days. The largest throne housed a red sturdy cushion and she took it gleefully as that spiraling gold dust swirled around her.

"How wonderful!" she said aloud, her voice echoing and different from her real, natural voice.

Golden grapes and apples sat in a bowl beside her, and she snatched one and bit into it; the sweet juice spilled over her lips and down her chin, and she shucked it across the room, giggling all the while at the lightness in her form, at the joy in her life! She was so happy! She wanted everyone in the world to visit this wondrous hall with its ornate history and mosaic paintings and artful carvings painstaking created to evoke awe and wonder.

She deftly skipped across the humming and singing, swinging herself in circles when suddenly a nasty green lighting strike ripped through the roof and blasted beside her. Yelping in fear, Tabitha darted away as a glowing green light filled the room and turned the golden hall to black. Cold blasted over her making her shiver. Gooseflesh coursed over her arms and legs and she held her arms tight to her body.

"Is anyone out there?" she said, her eyes darting all around the pitch-black room.

A cloaked figure appeared in the center of the room. A male garbed in all black with a swirling cloud of lime green energy traveling around him like magic. This man emanated terror and vitriol. Tabitha skirted behind a massive pillar, cowering with fear as all the joy she'd ever felt seemed to be sucked from her very body and pulled into the man as if he drank her happiness from her.

He sighed heavily, then spoke, his voice like whispering snakes in grass. "Tabitha Burke. We meet at last. Come here, child. I shall not harm thee."

Not of her own volition, her legs remaining stiff, she was suddenly jerked ramrod straight as if by a spell and pulled directly in front of this heinous creature. She began to weep, pure hopelessness and despair consuming her. Fervent prayers burst from her mind as she beseeched help from God.

The man cackled at her. "He does not exist here, child. Tell me, Tabitha. Where do you come from?"

The man's cloak hid his face from her, for she imagined him to have a thousand insects crawling across a ghoulish visage, for this was no man; this was evil.

Her eyes diverted to the ground where he seemed to float in air with no feet to speak of, Tabitha recoiled as skeletal fingers lifted to caress her cheeks. She flinched as the icy touch, his touch leaving a trail of burning fire in its wake. Her skin popped and bubbled and she tried to break free and cup her cheek, but the magic spell he cast around her kept her still before him, frozen like those statues.

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