After dropping your truck off around the corner from your house where you had your golem start leaving it ever since you switched, you jog back to the clubhouse to spend the night. You're sure even if Blackwell or his golem was watching your house, he wouldn't see you borrow the truck.
The night air is unusually cold, but it feels invigorating. For some reason you feel especially pumped from uncovering and using another spell and are anxious to get back to the book almost as if it is pulling you to it. However, what you had just found out about Melody and Umeko kept playing in your head.
You were damn lucky that Melody didn't recognize you in the Umeko mask before you could put a mask on her. You didn't think about Umeko involved in any of this; but If Blackwell was watching your house, he is bound to see Umeko come and visit. She's there often enough, and your replacement of a golem would act like you. That might give Blackwell other ideas, and he might do something to her!
When you get into the school's basement and secure the door from the inside, you are exhausted. Your mind is jumbled with the mess you've created, and.you're barely able to hide the masks and grab the book - cursing it and yourself - before you collapse, immediately drifting off.
A fitful sleep envelopes you. It may be due to the hard floor, strange sounds of the clubhouse and no covers from the cold night air; or it may be the stress of everything that was going on with the book and masks, your friends and Blackwell; or it may be of the upcoming exams you were about take including the one on medieval history; or it may be that your mind was wrestling with the thoughts and memories of Melody and Cassie as well as your own since you had been wearing their persona masks actually more than being your real self causing conflicts with who you really are.
None of these had you considered before embarking on your crusade to save yourself and family, and it seems now the world from Blackwell. You are blundering through, reacting more than being proactive, and ricocheting at each encounter like a pinball, ... or a typical teenager.
Whatever it is, bizarre scenes spark in and out of your head as the darkness keeps it grip. Visions of times way past lift you away. Soon you are immersed to that point where dream and reality merge and cannot be told apart. Possibly, because they are not separate.
~ ~ ~
The heavy smell of candle wax and chemicals mingle with a stench of filth, dampness and sweat. There is just enough flicker from the candles to see the rough plank table they are on and perceive vague forms between it and the blackness that destroys any light venturing beyond the warmth of the flame. The table contains various jars, jugs, boxes and bowls plus spoons and cups, a balance scale and a stack of small weights. Papers, or rather heavy parchment or tree bark along with some fragments of tanned skins all with diagrams or symbols drawn on them are scattered among the mess.
A leather bound manuscript sits open in the spot surrounded by the candles. A old man in a frayed robe sits beside it meticulously writing with a small quill, occasionally dipping it into a bowl of milky liquid. The page though appears as if he has written nothing.
Behind him stands a small boy whose eyes seem to be your entrance into this scene. You feel his restlessness, his anxiety, and his overwhelming devotion to the old man.
The writer puts down the quill, carefully turns back the pages, stops, and rips out the bottom half of a page. He takes two other pieces of paper from the table, each with a similar but different scrawl on them - a very intricate sigil - placing one in the book and another he balls up with the page he tore out. He sprinkles some powder from one of the jars on each; and as he quietly recites an incomprehensible phrase, he takes two candles and touches their flames one to the book and one to the ball. There a brilliant white flash.
~ ~ ~
The boy is running, fast, very fast. Terror is driving him through a dense forest and a heavy weight is strapped to his back under the old coat he wears. Behind him, he can hear the faint sounds of destruction or war: shouts, loud crackles of burning wood, and an occasional rumble and boom as if lightening struck. His nostrils still contain the scent of candle wax, and his lungs burn with smoke and the exertion of his fleeing.
~ ~ ~
Dawn trickles through rocks, a rough window of jagged stone. A fine table and chair. The air is clean and warm. Shelves with many books, all hand bound leather of big and very large. Two almost identical books are on the table. One of red leather, one of black. Behind them in a corner is a gray statue with indistinct features, but definitely a boy.
~ ~ ~
You start to awake feeling very warm, heart beating fast, and breathing deep. Pleasure is rippling through your body emanating from your morning hard-on. It is really intense and you sense someone else there. Opening your eyes to the mostly darkness, you can see Cassie riding you, gasping with her head thrown back and hair and breasts bouncing up and down. You immediately gasp uncontrollably as your body reacts to the sights, sounds, and contact of the golem.
~ ~ ~
"That was great, babe. I knew that first time you were a bit nervous." she coos then wraps you in a tender, passionate kiss.
"WHAT ... the ... fuck ... are you ... doing?" you growl while catching your breath.
"You looked so ... um, ready when I came in, I just wanted to give you a great wake up." she purrs. Then rising up on her elbows on your chest and sounding a bit offended, "Wasn't it good, love?"
"You know what I mean. Now off!"
"Well, excuuuuuuuse me, boss. I thought you'd be happy. No wonder you don't have a real girlfriend." the golem retorts and rolls off kneeling next to you.
Upset you rip the mask from the golem and leave the gray clay mass kneeling there while you stare at it then at the mask, considering that you just had one of your fantasies come true, but not how you expected. You didn't know whether to be thrilled or disgusted.
Putting the mask on seemed easy now with just a bit of dizziness. While you pick up Cassie's clothes and get dressed to go to school, you block out Cassie's most recent memories of here with you and do a quick scan for anything interesting that happened last evening. She was just at her house with friends in a study session.
As you take the Umeko mask and turn to apply it, you notice the golem looks a little different in the dim shadows this morning. You squint, then shiver. No. It can't be. You ignore the strange feeling you get as you approach it and slap on the mask. You think, "I'm just overly concerned thinking everything's Lisa."
"Yo, boss. Where are we now?" it asks in Umeko's lyric voice. You ignore it. "Oh, back at the club," it says as it stands. "But something feels different." You continue to ignore it even though you want to yell at it for the earlier encounter, but you don't knowing it's the Cassie mask, not the golem that wore it.
"Get dressed and finish off the masks and strips while I'm at school today."
"Right boss." it says as it grabs the pile of clothes from a corner. then rambles on but you pay little attention. Your mind considering what you have to do later but also craving to get back to the book and see what's next.
"It feels like this body doesn't want to follow what you tell it. I can make it though. It's strange, boss, real strange."
"Don't worry about that. Just work the masks. I gotta go meet Will before school. Keep the door shut unless we say the pass phrase. I'll be back later to fix everything and find a spell in the book."
"Right. The book is useless."
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