Rich Boy: Awakening - 4. Chapter 4

“You are looking at me like I am crazy.” Stacy said with a slight chuckle and he nodded at her. Naturally he thought she was crazy! Talking about magic as if it was real. Next she’d probably talk about Gaia and Mother Earth as if the planet had a spirit, a mind of its own! She didn’t speak though, but what she did caused him to rock back on the bed and flinch.

“It’s a simple thing of course, but in additional to being a very useful basic cantrip, it is quite satisfactory in proving the existence of magic.” Stacy stated while holding up a hand. In the palm of the hand was a ball of purple light, perfectly spherical in nature, and casting shadows on the wall, as well as bathing the room in a soft, purple radiance. She lifted her hand as if tossing a ball and as the purple sphere reached the level of her head, another sphere of light appeared in her upraised hand. This time it was red, and as her other hand ‘caught’ the purple sphere, the red went into the air, to be replaced by a green sphere. As she juggled the three spheres, a blue one appeared, followed by a yellow. The room flickered in the multi-colored lights as she juggled them for nearly a minute. Then, one by one they each disappeared until the room was lit normally again, by the sunlight from outside and the lights overhead. Worthington knew his mouth was open, but his unspoken protests were fading from his mind at what he had seen. A little voice wanted to claim she had just tricked him with holography or something, but he knew better. Suddenly all those little comments from Jamie, one or two from Richie, and even comments from Randall Smythe suddenly fell into a pattern.

He believed.

The first thing that popped into his mind was all those times he was having sex, and imagined what kind of life the other person lived. Had he just been imagining, or was he sifting through their minds, taking their memories into his own? What about all those times it was like someone was reading his mind here? Had they really heard all the things he’d been thinking?

“Only sometimes, like this moment.” Stacy said with a gentle smile. “When you get really worked up, you broadcast a bit, but then so do all young people. I thought you knew what you were doing, but you probably didn’t even realize it. That’s good. Your family has always had a different set of ethics, but if some of the things you were doing were simply because you didn’t know what you were doing, then we might be able to reach some accommodation.”

“I…I’m not sure.” Worthington admitted quietly and she smiled in a way he knew instinctually was kindly meant.

“There is a way to find out exactly what is going on in that head of yours.” She said calmly. “I still find it hard to believe that you have managed to go all these years without learning some basic control. Yes, it’s possible to go without any training and still maintain equilibrium, but people like that never really use their abilities at all. You have been using yours. Jamie’s shared how he links with you whenever you two are in close contact, and that would not be possible if you were untrained at all.”

“I think I understand what you’re talking about, but it’s not deliberate.” Worthington responded carefully. “It just happens.”

“But it should not be happening at all if you have received no training.” She persisted.

“I’d remember it if I had been trained, right?” He countered.

“Not necessarily.” She said and he was surprised. “It is possible, although many consider it unethical to make you forget your training. Then you would do things on what you believe to be instinct, and quickly forget about it after.”

“I… that sounds too much like what happens.” Worthington admitted. “How can we know for sure?”

“I will have to do a deep reading of you.” She said with a sigh. “It’ll be best to do it in the workroom, and I’ll want Jamie there.”

“Why?” He asked, suddenly defensive. For some reason he didn’t want Jamie present at all. The idea was frightening.

“Because of the way the two of you link by instinct.” She answered. “I think, yes, he will need to be there.”

“What if I don’t want him there?” Worthington nearly snarled that, and he was surprised at the vehemence. Her eyes narrowed and then she nodded.

“If you are uncomfortable with him there, then he’ll not be there.” She said in a comforting tone. He relaxed at that and she smiled. “That’s better. You know my workroom is in the basement. We can meet there. Give me about fifteen minutes to prepare, okay?”

“Is there anything I should do?” He asked a little nervously, but the momentary surge of anger was gone.

“Yes, I want you to try and think about times when you might have used your gift without really knowing what you were doing.” She answered.

“I’m not sure if you’re going to want to see that.” He said with a slight blush. Most of the things that came to his mind involved sex.

“Don’t worry, I operate by a very strict code of ethics.” She assured him. “Whatever is seen in this reading will remain private, known only to those involved. Not even Elizabeth will know anything you show me.”

“Okay.” He said exhaling a deep breath and she nodded once more before leaving the room. Yes, he was nervous he realized as he began to do what she’d instructed. Steph, the motorcycle rider came to mind, followed quickly by Emilio, the Hispanic guy who had studied kung-fu all his life. That was where he’d gotten the moves that he’d used in the fight with that white trash at the convenience store. Even as he thought about these things, though, he could feel something stirring deep inside him, something that wanted him to forget, to explain it all away. Maybe she really had used holograms, or lasers or something for her little display. She could have set all those up while he was out of the house.

“No.” He growled to the empty room and pushed away those thoughts. Something was trying to make him forget, again, and he didn’t want that this time.

Again?

Even as he began to wonder where that word came from, he realized that slightly more than fifteen minutes had passed. With a sigh, he stood up and left his room, heading for the stairway he’d seen Richie and Jamie using to get to the basement. Down there, only a single light lit the dark, cool room filled with bottles of wine and other things he didn’t spend any time examining, even though a very strong urge came up inside him. Something was trying to distract him, and it was bothersome. Gritting his teeth, he rallied his willpower, and pushed on for a room at the far side of the cellar.

“Come in.” Stacy said as he opened the door. Passing through the doorway, he felt a buzzing sensation, and his skin tingled as if he was passing some kind of barrier. Stacy was wearing the same caftan as before, and stood in the middle of the room. There was no furniture here, just plain concrete walls that glowed softly, unnaturally, providing a soft white light in the room. It smelt like incense, and there was something inside of him snarling slightly, but he did his best to ignore it. “Welcome to my workroom, young man.”

“I… part of me doesn’t want this.” He decided to warn her.

“I expected that.” She said firmly. “Come here to me.”

“Okay.” He said and crossed from the entrance towards the middle of the room.

“You felt a buzzing sensation as you entered?” She asked him.

“Yes.” He replied.

“Good.” She said as he stopped just in front of her. He could smell her breath, faintly like cinnamon at this range. “This room has many wards built into it, to protect the rest of the house, and those inside. In here, nothing from outside can intrude, and nothing we do here can affect the outside. Only those in here, within the wards will know what transpires.”

“I think I understand.” He said.

“You do.” She smiled again. “Relax, this shouldn’t hurt at all.”

“I’m trying.” Worthington said through gritted teeth. A little growl escaped his lips and he took a deep breath, trying to relax. The smile slid from her face, replaced by a look of determination and her hand whipped out, lightning quick to touch his forehead.

His entire body vibrated with that touch, and it felt like a thunderclap had sounded in the room, but he knew it was just inside his head. He could feel her presence there, inside of him. Here was Jamie’s bedrock. It was like she was rooted firmly in the ground, down to the core of the Earth itself. Her cinnamon-laced breath filled him with its scent, and the room spun.

No, he was eight years old again, and quivering in the corner of his playroom. Trina, his governess was laying in the middle of the room with a line of drool dripping out of her mouth and onto the carpet. He hadn’t meant it to happen, but she’d been angry at him for refusing to put away his toys, and he’d pushed at her with his mind. His father came into the room, looking immaculate in his casual slacks and dark polo shirt, with his hair perfectly in place as always. Worthington shivered at the look of anger on his face as his father crossed the floor in a rush and bent over the woman with his hand stretched over her head.

“Worthington, not again!” His father snarled, turning on the boy and moving until he loomed over him. He hated when his father was angry, and his last thought before the room spun again was that he’d disappointed his father again.

Now he was twelve, and he’d had a good day. His mother had thrown him a birthday party attended by almost all the kids near his age at the country club. It had been fun. He’d gone to bed with a smile on his face, but had woken with his father standing over him.

“Worthington, come with me.” His father had said without any emotion in his voice. He knew this was important, and followed his father down into the basement, into a room he’d never seen before. His skin tingled as they entered, and there was a strange man in the middle of the room.

“Come here, young man.” The man said and Worthington had looked at his father who nodded. With a gulp, he complied and the man reached out to touch his forehead even as his father touched the back of his head. That was when it happened.

Cold darkness reared inside of him, and snarled its defiance at the cinnamon-tinged presence inside of him. The cold froze at the granite rock, freezing it to make it brittle, and he thought he could hear the scream of a woman in pain. Sharp teeth bit at the frozen rock, chipping away at it, and part of him screamed with the woman. He was helpless to stop it though as the cold turned even colder, until some other presence entered his already crowded head. This was a warm, gentle light that felt familiar and clicked into place within him.

Somehow that light countered the cold, even as a wind came up to blow it out. The darkness faded to be replaced by the warm light, and the rock became less brittle as it warmed. Part of him could feel Jamie’s arms around him, and he leaned backwards into the warm embrace, welcoming it as he had not really welcomed the cinnamon-tasting rock.

This was what the cold darkness was afraid of, this gentle, warm light. When it first felt the light, it thought it could conquer it as it had so many others, but the light was stronger, and so it had hid deeper in its home. Hiding deeper kept it from discovery, but it also lost some of its control. Feelings that were normally turned aside were allowed to flourish, and the rigid controls it had set grew lax. New thoughts were allowed to grow into patterns never before allowed, and now the rock and the light moved together to expose more of its secrets.

Worthington was thirteen, and at school. He liked the school. Here he was not alone. The school was filled with others like him, raised in old families, families that had money, power, and influence. These other kids understood him, understood why it was proper to not be overly emotion, why self-control was important, and the cold darkness refined its controls, shaped his thoughts down safe passages, and stretched itself like a web across his mind.

Once a week, his Housemaster would come late at night, and he would follow him down into a room beneath his dormitory. Most of the time it would be just the two of them, but on occasion he would practice with one of the other students. At first the lessons were simple.

“Reach into yourself, feel your connection to the Earth, and ground yourself so that your power has a base.” The man instructed, and Worthington did it instinctively, naturally. He felt the click as he reached his grounding, maintaining his equilibrium as he did so. From here he could reach out and affect the world around him.

Shielding was even easier, keeping his thoughts inside. That he had been taught from earliest childhood. Here he remembered everything, from the first time he had accidentally crushed the mind of a governess and his father’s rueful shake of his head at that. It was bothersome to clean up the mess, but that was all his father worried about. Otherwise, he was proud his son who was so strong at such a young age.

As he learned early on, the shields of his classmates were like poorly patched holes compared to his, and he was constantly sensing things from them. Which ones were sad, or jealous came easily to his mind, and he could slip little tendrils of thought into them, forcing them to do what he wanted. Most of the time it was instinctive, because each time he left the Housemaster’s workroom, his memories of his training and his abilities was subsumed, given over to the cold darkness.

At home during the summer, his father took over his training, talking mostly about ways to use the things he had learned in business and the world. Each time they finished the discussion, his mind would be put to sleep. At first it didn’t make sense why they would put part of him to sleep, but he grew to understand as the years went by.

It was that first summer, shortly before he turned thirteen that he woke for the first time outside of his training. He knew what sex was, and he knew what the feelings inside of him meant. His father’s only advice on the subject was to never get a girl pregnant, or make sure she aborted if it did happen, and to always make sure whoever he slept with would not spread tales. Part of him had been unlocked for that, at an instinctive level, but his father had been thinking about something else when he set that, and unlocked more than he expected.

Worthington’s first sexual contact came with one of the gardeners. He was a sixteen-year-old boy, always horny, and had gone into one of the bathrooms on the first floor to relieve the horniness. Worthington had walked in because the boy had forgotten in his haste to lock the door. As soon as he saw that uncut cock in the teenager’s hand, his mind had blanked. The boy’s sexual desire had slipped past Worthington’s shielding and filled him. Without thinking, he went to the boy, fell to his knees and wrapped his mouth around a cock for the first time.

He knew what to do because he lifted the information right from the teenager’s mind, and he got more than that as well. His last lessons at school had been about scanning a person’s mind, and he did it instinctively as his conscious mind imagined what it would be like to be this gardener, this older teenager. This set the pattern for what was to come, and always as he ransacked the mind of a partner during sex, he left them with a deep sense of shame, and a desire to never mention it to anyone. Sometimes it didn’t quite work, and money was required, but those were few and far between.

When his father found what he’d been doing, the man had laughed and tweaked his controls on his son to encourage it more. He had worried his son might one day wonder what life was like for others, and he knew the pitfall such daydreaming could become. His wife’s sister had fallen into that trap, and turned her back on the family. The elder Worthington wanted to make sure his son grew up the way he wanted, no matter what he encountered. If this allowed him to daydream but led to nothing more than that, he would let it happen.

It was just a few months ago that his training at school took a new turn. Worthington had mastered the basics, shielding not only of thoughts, but energy and matter as well was easy for him. Slipping into the minds of others was even easier. He had a firm grip on the ungifted he’d been given to practice on, and even the gifted often found their shields no barrier for him. Many times he’d slip into the mind of his classmates without them even sensing him, and they’d find themselves nude, on the floor, and putty in his hands. His master enjoyed those experiences almost as much as he did, taking a cruel pleasure in the humiliation of those students who had thought they were better than they actually were.

No, that last year Worthington had been taken to the next level, and he started to learn what the Master called High Magic. These were the powers most people associated with magic, instead of the powers of the mind like he had been using before. Like Stacy had shown him, they started with creating spheres of multi-colored light. This took more power than ever before, and Worthington excelled here even more. He had a great store of personal power, and he soon learned how to recharge it more quickly from the simple life around him.

It was on the last day of the term that Brandon Meyers had been brought to the training room. Brandon was the shortest boy in their class, just barely five-three. He was skinny as a rail, but he had the glossiest black hair in the school, and an almost elfin face. Oh yes, Worthington knew Elves existed, although they rarely entered the human world these days. More than likely the Meyers boy had elvin blood in him several generations back.

Brandon was one of the scholarship cases. Every year the school took one or two smart boys who could not afford their tuition and gave them scholarships. Many boys ostracized the ‘scholies’, as they were called. Brandon had few friends in their year, and Worthington often wondered why the boy kept coming back year after year.

“You know it is possible to drain power from living things.” The Master said in his deep voice. “We do this slowly, normally, but on occasion it is necessary to have more power very quickly. This boy is a channel. He is gifted, but can do only the most basic of things on his own. His real use, his best use, is to provide power for someone like you. This is his sole purpose in life, and tonight he will be bonded to you so that for anyone else he is worthless, but for you he will always provide the support and power you need.”

“This is what Randall Smythe is, for my father.” Worthington had said with a sudden joy at his grasping that, and the nod of approval on the Master’s face was both affirmation and approval at his ability to understand. The ceremony that followed, the bonding itself was disgusting. Brandon’s willingness to submit was frightening. Why had the boy been so willing to debase himself, to turn over the keys of his life to Worthington?

The answer had come bubbling to the surface of his mind as their blood mingled from the many cuts on Brandon during the ceremony, and in each one, over each of the body’s natural nexus points, Worthington shed a single drop of his own. Heart, Mind, Mouth, Eyes, Ears, Smell, Taste, Arm, Hand, Leg, and even Genitals were cut ever so slightly and a drop of Worthington’s blood applied. When Worthington wondered why the boy would submit to this, the answer came automatically.

Brandon’s family was the poorest of the poor, and he wanted more in life. He wanted comfort, and he wanted security. What Brandon craved most in life was to have a place, to know that place, and to know it would never be taken away from him. Like Worthington, he had been taught at the school about his abilities, and he knew he was the weakest of the gifted in the year. When he had learned he would be given to Worthington, the most powerful in the school, stronger than any other student, and richer, he knew he would find his place. He even accepted that Worthington would not remember anything until he was an adult, but he knew that when they returned to school next year, he would be Worthington’s roommate.

Brandon Meyers knew he would have a place in life, security, all the things he craved. He knew of Randall Smythe. The attorney had been one of his teachers in the early years, and he knew his life would by like Smythe’s dedicated to the Sinclairs, and that he would never want for money, or security. That was enough for Brandon, and so Worthington took the boy totally, heart, mind, and soul, and forgot about him again before going to sleep a few hours later.

There was more, but for a moment, Worthington could not continue, and he could feel the trembling of the warm light, and the shaking of the bedrock. They were disgusted, and he was disgusted too, but he was already moving past the disgust to realize he had even more obligations than he had imagined. Even now he could feel the little line, the little tendril that said “Brandon” just like he could feel the stronger line that said “Jamie”.

As surely as he knew why Brandon would surrender his life in the most binding of rituals, he knew now the reason why Worthington was kept bound. He was strong, stronger in power than his own father, than his Housemaster, than anyone in the school, and everyone knew that fact. As a child he was willful, and because of how a Sinclair was expected to be, his parents had faced tough choices. They could teach him self-control, teach him a code of ethics that would prevent him from harming others, but he would be expected to do such things as an adult. It was a real concern that if they taught him to use his powers the way his father did, that he would lack the maturity necessary to wield such powers wisely, in the best interest of the business and the family. Worthington might turn that power on his family to get what he wanted, so they hid the power, they hid him from himself.

Nor did he resist, because he knew the time would come when he could claim the power as his own. He would bide his time until then, and each time they put part of him back to sleep, he went willingly, waiting for the day when he would wake for the final time, and never return to sleep. That day would be soon after his graduation, when he turned eighteen, and could claim the full right of a Sinclair adult.

That day was still years off, and the lightning had come before. Oh yes, he’d been partially awake, savoring the life of the laborer even as he savored the older boy’s body. It had been a nice body, and an even nicer soul, filled with hopes and dreams. How he savored those, and even more savored the new skills they brought with them. Lightness of feet, from years of kicking a soccer ball, a desire to succeed, to improve, but he was ready to reject the happiness that shined in that soul, the ability to get along with nearly anyone, and enjoy their company. Those were not things that he needed to succeed as a Sinclair. He wanted skills that would make him better, always improving, not skills that would make him weak. Sure he could use the suave personal skills that allowed this guy to get along with almost everyone, to have people like him, but he couldn’t take them without also taking in the way this guy looked at other people, accepted other people, and valued other people. They were locked hand-in-hand, and he didn’t need such goody-goody feelings cluttering up his life.

Then the lightning struck.

The house was warded of course, protected from such attacks by other powers. The Sinclairs had many enemies, and some of them were gifted. This attack though, penetrated through the shielding like it was tissue paper, and struck where most of the family was gathered. Another fork of the lightning struck towards the youngest Sinclair, but buttressed against the stronger personal shields that he always erected unknowingly when he was doing this with another boy. Once, his father had interrupted, and the interruption had left the boy nearly brain-dead. That was why, when he took another boy to his bed, the silent part of him, the sleeper deep inside that always acted without his knowing or understanding would throw up strong shields to keep from being interrupted.

It was those shields that saved his life. The lightning left little more than a scorch mark outside his room, but inside the room it had a more profound effect. That was because there had been nothing natural about the lightning. It was mage-summoned lightning, and the mage doing the summoning was strong, and had something special beyond normal magery behind the attack. There was something spiritual to the flavor, and it was a Sinclair, which was how it slipped past the most powerful of the defense spells on the estate.

Worthington’s secret self, that cold, bitter darkness knew the secrets of belief and power. It had been part of his teaching over the last year, how to use the support of your followers as a source of power. It was part of the Sinclair gift to be able to do this, although it was something they used only rarely.

Most Sinclairs were so powerful they didn’t need that method.

David William Sinclair, younger brother of Worthington Michael Sinclair the Fourth did need it, and got it from the ‘Christian’ worshipers who followed him. He had probably been hoarding their power, leeching it from them for years in order to make the three lightning bolts that had hit the Sinclair estates. In some ways he could have leveled a mountain easier than that strike.

His bolt meant for Worthington the Fifth didn’t break all the way through the shield, but some of the power did leak through, just enough to set him off balance. Even as the conscious Worthington was basking in the afterglow of sex and dreaming what he thought was an imaginary life and the darker part of him was picking and choosing what it would take from the young man, the lightning had hit and some of the power leaked through the shield. It was just enough so that what the darker part had rejected came through anyway. Even as that darker part retreated in agony and surprised pain, quickly erasing thought and memory in Worthington, some of the best qualities of Miguel were left inside Worthington.

Qualities that were the antithesis of Worthington’s life so far.

They were not immediately evident in him, but when Worthington traveled to Arizona, they found fertile ground. The dark part of him recognized the power of the women, and their sons. It felt the wards of the house search him as he entered, and the darker part of him retreated into the tiniest cracks of his mind. Safe there, hidden away, it wouldn’t be noticed by the female mages and half-trained boys around him.

Then had come Jamie and his damn hand.

The bedrock in Worthington’s mind rippled with amusement as he remembered the mutual handjob, and the first link forming between them. The darkness had thought it sensed an opportunity there, an opportunity to consume the light and find a home for another piece of darkness. Everyone carried darkness like it inside of themselves, and he could find the piece inside Jamie, and bring it to life. Then the house would be less dangerous for him, but it didn’t work. Jamie’s barriers were proof against him, stronger than any he’d come up against before, until Jamie relaxed them a bit and reached out from behind them. There was no hope for the darkness in that gesture, and it fled before it could be noticed, and something it hated happened.

Jamie linked with Worthington in a perfect symmetry, because of secrets the darkness had stolen from Worthington’s father and never let that other part of himself know.

Worthington the Fourth had been so proud of his duplicity, of his cunning, his guile. His bitch of a wife had only been able to bear him one child. Younger siblings were dangerous to the heir, but the breeding specialists had said a rejoining of the Bradwell and Sinclair lines would produce powerful children. Sinclairs were among the strongest of the families known to have Power. He wanted powerful children to strengthen the Sinclair line. Unlike his own father, who had foolishly believed his sons would support each other, he would bind his sons with his power, force them along paths that he wanted until the time came when the hidden compulsions would rise up, and the son would be integrated with that secret part of himself, but would always follow the compulsions set by the father. None of his children would realize they were controlled from birth.

But his plans had been foiled when a seer had told him his wife would be unable to bear more than one son. He could sire children on other women, but they wouldn’t have the power of a Sinclair/Bradwell match. He had known it would be a difficult birth, and she would never bear another child before he even married her. As with every Sinclair before him, he had hired the services of the oldest, most powerful Seer in the world. She died two years later, but her answers to his questions had given him the answers he needed.

No Seer would tell you when you were fated to die. Such things were forbidden by ancient codes that not even a Sinclair would violate. Still, the questions he asked were about new life, not death, and so he spent money to accomplish what he needed. He knew of his wife’s sister, the lesbian who had rejected her family to live as she wanted openly.

The seer had told him that if he wanted a second son, it would have to be from her, and so he had bribed the fertility clinic she was using to conceive a child. Her partner had conceived a child there the year before, and she wanted one of her own. Elizabeth had asked for sperm from the same father as had been used for her partner’s child, little Richie, but Worthington the Fourth’s money came between what she wanted and what she got.

The light embracing Worthington the Fifth trembled, and the darkness inside of Worthington sprang up from its hiding place, sensing its one opportunity. It had hidden, knowing that once it returned to school, it would be set free again. It had sensed the Jamie child, and knew from the memories stolen from the father that the child was his half-brother. How the father had hoped to take the boy, and corrupt him, it didn’t know. Those secrets had died with the father, but it hoped when it was freed, it would be able to use this new bond, this link between them to awaken the darkness inside Jamie once and for all. Its first failure was just that, its first attempt.

Now though, it was discovered, and it knew that it was in danger. Worthington had been seduced by first those feelings from the Miguel creature, and then by the similar qualities of those living in this accursed house. When Worthington decided not to return to school, the darkness had known it would have to act, to leap out and set Worthington permanently on the path his father had nurtured and prepared it for.

Then the Stacy bitch had intervened. Oh how it had tried to sway Worthington from letting her into his mind. But it knew it was strong, strong enough to overcome her, and then it would be easy enough to use her to trick the Jamie child and to seduce him. Once Jamie was seduced and the seeds laid, the rest of this house would fall, but the woman had not fought fair. She had brought Jamie into this, and the boy’s light combined with her steadfastness had pushed him into retreat, but they had gotten lax, careless, and now it struck.

The dark heart that resided in Worthington struck hard and fast. It wasn’t stupid, in fact it was every bit as intelligent as its host, and much more experienced in many ways. This time when it struck, it was a spike of force, hitting the rock at its fulcrum point. Even bedrock could be split, and this strike caused that bedrock to heave up, throwing off those that depended on its support.

Without hesitation, the darkness changed again, becoming the cold, vast empty void of deep space, sucking away the warmth of that light. Deep in space, there were things that even light could not penetrate, things that swallowed light itself, and the darkness became that thing, sucking in the now-flickering bits and pieces of light that were Jamie Bradwell. The fact that the strange part of itself, the part that had awakened in the last few weeks was being sucked into it was a bonus. There they would meld, become one again, with the darkness in control. The rock was splitting and would be easy to finish off, leaving it to reshape that which had been Jamie into something like it, so that there would be two instead of one. That had been the plan by its creator, by the Fourth, and it would carry it through.

Not my son you don’t! The mental cry was filled with all the fury of a mother protecting her cub, and the darkness trembled as a new force entered the battle. Even a black hole had its limits, and the force that swept into the battle filled it with so much concentrated furious red light that it couldn’t absorb it all at once. It was too much, and everything it had swallowed burst out, free from its grip.

The blackness knew when the fight was lost, and as the rock healed, and once again became a bastion of support for the others, it retreated. Over a lifetime it had spun itself into the corners and recesses of this mind, and no matter how many webs they burned, there would be more still hidden. Even as the three outside presences sought to do just that, the darkness retreated further and further.

The hunters went after all the webs they could find, and the darkness was hard-pressed not to laugh when they stopped, convinced they had gotten all of it. Worthington was still there, but little more than a crying presence, torn by what had happened, and verging on the border of madness. The three outsiders scoured another web out, but the darkness could sense their certainty that they had gotten all of it.

It would take time.

They would be watching, waiting just in case it came back, so it would have to hide deep, in the deepest recesses of Worthington’s mind, but its time would come. They would grow lax, and it could spin itself out again, taking the boy and forcing him onto the path its creator had chosen for him. The Sinclairs had been servants of darkness for a long time, and this latest offspring would follow in the path of his forebears. That was a certainty.

Even as the other presences gathered up the tattered bits and pieces that was Worthington the Fifth, the darkness watched and waited. It saw the healing as another presence spread into all of them. Yes, they would try to encourage this new Worthington to reject the darkness, and he’d probably go along with them. The attack at just the wrong moment had done more damage than it had imagined.

There were elements of young Worthington’s psyche that not even it had truly understood until now. Young Worthington, when he was just a child had been influenced unduly by a kind and generous governess. The parents had thought the woman understood her duties, but behind their back she had been kind, caring, and giving to the child. The young boy, no more than five had responded to those qualities.

The father had taken steps when he discovered the near-ruining of his son. The woman was sent away, and died a week later in a freak auto accident. To kill the damage done, the father had created the darkness, to spin its web and keep his son on the right path. It knew that now, and would bide its time to set the son on the right path again.

Time was its ally.