Guardian (Part I): Last Winter

Chapter 9: Eris

The gargoyle's dark aura blade went right over my shield as I tried to raise it in order to protect Finn, and I heard a scream behind me. My heart sank. It was Finn. Before I looked behind me, I thrust my spear at the gargoyle's chest, sinking into the statue's stone hide, then twisted it to the left. A bright, white light came from my spearhead, and the aura of darkness of the specters animating the gargoyle faded, then the spear-shaped dark aura blade disappeared.

"Finn!" I screamed. I heard him hit the ground, but he was standing upright, completely fine. There weren't any wounds in his body, or blood dripping from his nose or mouth. He hadn't been touched, but I swear I heard him scream when the gargoyle's spear hit the ground. He was hit by the dark aura blade, which I specifically remembered hearing inflicted wounds couldn't be healed by a Guardian's powers, and he looked like wasn't even scratched. I bent down to look at him closer, where the gargoyle's dark aura blade ran through him, and saw a puncture in the center of Finn's leather cuirass. The spear did hit him! It had to have broken through his aura shield to get to him, or else he wouldn't have had this puncture in his clothes.

"Are you... alright?" I asked. Finn looked down, seeing that his wound was healed, as though it was never there, and his face went completely pale.

"I guess," he answered.

"Finn!" Jerome shouted, as he and Emma rushed towards us. Emma quickly turned Finn around by his shoulders and bent down on one of her knees to meet his eye level. I was reluctant to allow a stranger to examine my son in the way she did, but she was only making sure that Finn was well. After turning his head with her hands and lifting his arms to look for any blood, cuts, or any other wounds.

"You're alright," Emma sighed, placing her hands on Finn's shoulders.

"He is?" asked Jerome. "Are you sure?" Emma looked to Jerome and nodded her head.

"How?" Jerome wondered. I was wondering that myself. A spear that size should have killed him, but I put that thought aside as I lifted Finn off the ground and squeezed him as hard as I could. He had been impaled on an enormous spear-shaped dark aura blade, and lived. I couldn't have held Finn in my arms any longer, or pressed him against my chest harder.

"You're alright," I sighed. "You're alright." I had to release him after a moment.

"You're full of surprises, Finn," Jerome complimented.

"Hey, do either of you want help killing these things in your own worlds?" Finn offered.

"Well, I believe I can handle it, now," Jerome assured. "If I can kill the specters before they can get to the statues, I'll be fine."

"Me, too," said Emma. "Now that I know what I'm dealing with."

"Well, thank you both," I said. "A lot." Both Jerome and Emma's transparent images began to fade further, until they disappeared completely. They were back in their own worlds, now.

"So, how do you feel?" I asked.

"Just the same as ever," Finn answered. "I definitely don't feel like I took an enormous spear in the chest, if that's what you're really wondering."

"Well, good," I sighed. "In that case, we may as well keep moving. Only a matter of time before the sun goes down."

"Old Logres is in the direction we're heading," Finn warned. "It's where the first Abyssal fissure broke out in Chardan three decades ago, isn't it?"

"Oh, yes," I answered. "And also fifty thousand years ago." I was no stranger to Old Logres. When the War of Light and Dark broke out, it was the first place that Xyhra had sent me with my father, the first place that the Dark One set his army loose on Zenartha. We were overwhelmed by the demons he unleashed, the Lost that the people had become, and the Abyss itself. After cleansing the second gargoyle statue of the specters, there was no aura of darkness nearby. We would be safe until we reached Old Logres.