Guardians of the Akasha (7 page)

Such a fierce joy overwhelmed Victoria that she had to sit down on a log to rest her trembling legs. “A child of such natural ability—at last!” she exulted.

As tempted as Victoria was to sweep the girl up in her arms and carry her far from that oppressive house, the child’s safety came first. Keira would survive longer if as few people as possible knew of her existence.

Over the next few years, Victoria kept a very close eye on Keira’s doings. The parents, completely in awe of ‘Aunt Victoria’ and her rumoured ‘bottomless pit of wealth,’ were flattered by the attention and invited her to every birthday party and family event. In time, Victoria became an integral part of Keira’s life, the doting aunt who was always there with a word of advice for anything and everything.

To Victoria’s unending relief, Keira’s magick survived the onslaught of puberty. But by then, Daemons’ threat had grown so as to make Victoria believe that it would be safer to keep Keira hidden from the magickael world which had suddenly become very violent.

The shifting light outside her window cast Victoria’s face in shadow. The time had come to reveal Keira’s destiny to her. For the first time in her life, Victoria was scared.

Chapter 9

Keira sat in her aunt’s private plane, sipping a glass of mineral water and picking at the dainty sandwiches a smiling crew member in an impeccable uniform, put before her. Outside the porthole window, between wispy clouds, she caught an occasional glimpse of the stone-grey North Sea far below them as they flew east towards Germany.

Victoria sat opposite her, reading documents from a thick file Simone had handed her as they boarded. Keira didn’t want to interrupt.

Simone sat with her back to the two women, a few seats away, busily typing on a laptop.

Victoria frowned, it didn’t seem as if the file contained good news. Then she sighed and looked up. “I apologise, Keira. I am not good company right now.”

“It’s all right, Aunt Vic,” Keira smiled. “It must be a full-time job keeping up with all your business interests.”

“It is not only the businesses, Keira. There are so many other things—” Victoria hesitated, looking at the documents on her lap.

“Is it the estate? I didn’t even know that you owned an estate in Europe. How long have you had it? Does it need a lot of work?” Keira asked, hoping to distract her aunt from whatever was weighing on her mind.

“It has been in our family for hundreds of years,” her aunt replied.

“I’m sorry, did you say hundreds of years?”

“Yes, and it is only one of the many things I have to tell you, Keira. It is perhaps the simplest, so let’s start with that. If all goes to plan in the next few days, it will pass into your care very soon.”

Keira’s eyes widened and she blinked.

Victoria tried again. “Let me start over. The Wilde Family is old, Keira; so much older than you can imagine. Over the centuries, the family name has changed a few times, but the bloodline remains. The estate we are going to has been in the family since before Julius Caesar became the Dictator of Rome, and it has always been in the care of one very specific person. During the past few decades, that person has been me.”

Keira was silent for a moment and then asked, “And you hoped the next person would be me? Why me? I mean—I’ve only just finished school, surely there is someone more qualified?”

Victoria smiled. “As always you go straight to the point. Unfortunately Keira, that is exactly where things get difficult.”

“What do you mean ‘difficult?’ Is everything all right?”

“Yes, and no. Actually, I’ve been putting this off, but I have no choice anymore. I have to tell you something, dear. Please try to keep an open mind.”

Keira leaned forward with increasing concern. She had never seen her Aunt this unsettled before. Victoria had always seemed so calm and collected, ready to face whatever the world threw at her.

Victoria looked out of the window, then back at Keira. “I had hoped to lead you to this slowly, but now—I suppose there is no easy way to say this, so I’ll just get on with it.”

“I have been aware of what you could do since you were a very young girl. Unfortunately, so were my enemies. They couldn’t find you once you stopped using your magick, all those years ago. But recent events brought you to their attention again and now, to my everlasting regret, I’m afraid that I have underestimated them.” Victoria paused and looked at the young woman with a sad half-smile.

“I’m sorry, Aunt Vic, but I don’t understand,” Keira said, trying to ignore her growing fear.

“You are a magickal being, Keira. A very powerful one actually. And you are not alone. Many members of the Wilde Family have magickal abilities, including myself. We keep this hidden from the rest of the world, for reasons you will soon understand. I am the Leader of the magickal section of our family. There is also an International Council of Elders, of which I have been the Chairperson for a very long time. Too long.”

Keira waited for her aunt to start laughing, or for someone to tell her the punch line of the joke, but it didn’t come. Victoria looked at her with calm compassion.

“No—I’m not—what do you mean I’m—” Keira stammered, her knuckles white against the dark-blue upholstered armrests.

“Keira, please calm down. I don’t have time to ease you into this gently. This is not a game, my child. We are in the middle of a war.”

Keira was shocked into silence. The woman in front of her was a stranger. Her body carried an aura of contained power, her eyes were wells of ancient wisdom.

A fleeting memory washed over her, of herself as a young girl, standing in a glade near her home, arms outstretched and hair whirling in the wind. She was surrounded by small forest animals and Nagwa sat on her shoulder. Then came the more recent memory of power surging through her body as she defended herself in a London alley.

“I’m listening,” Keira said and sat back in her chair.

Victoria nodded in approval and began again. “We are the Guardians of the Akasha.”

“There is a name for this?” Keira asked. “I’m not just some—freak of nature?”

“Of course not,” Victoria replied. “Everything in the universe has a name; a purpose. Everything is connected. Akasha literally means ‘space,’ and that is what we do. Who we are. Everything around us, from the smallest atom to the biggest planet is connected through the Akasha. We see it, feel it and work with it.”

“What do you mean?” Keira asked.

“How do you call the wind?” Victoria asked in return.

Keira hesitated, she wasn’t even sure herself how she did it.

“And that is not the only thing you are able to do, is it? You can draw energy from your environment and use it to defend yourself. I bet it manifests as heat in your hands, doesn’t it?”

“How do you know this?” Keira whispered.

“I followed you one day, a long time ago. I saw you go into the woods and call the little folk and the wind to you. Your friend, the raven—”

“Nagwa,” Keira interrupted.

“Is that his name now?” Victoria smiled. “Well, initiates are able to manipulate the elements only after years of intensive training. You have been able to do it by yourself, since a very young age. And you also communicate with animals. It is rare members of the Families who manifest powers beyond the manipulation of space and energy, and those powers are different for each individual. We haven’t yet been able to explain why or how this happens.”

Keira closed her eyes; she had to remind herself to keep on breathing. She listened to Victoria explain how she had been protected and watched over, ever since she was a child.

Victoria spoke about the history of the Wilde Family and of her own role as their leader. Their lineage could be traced back for centuries.

“Wildes have rubbed shoulders with barbarian leaders and with kings; with empresses and prophets. We have fled persecution during the witch trials and joined the Holy Crusade. Through all of this, our High Priestesses have kept a record of our history and built their knowledge to, above all, protect the Akasha against those who wish to use it for their own gain.”

Victoria told Keira of all the other Families around the world who kept in touch with each other through the Council.

“Each of the Elders has specific responsibilities,” Victoria explained. “Mine include training initiates who have been identified by the Families as having magickal abilities. They are sent from all over the world to a school at the castle, where we are going to now.”

“A school? They get training?”

“Yes,” Victoria said. She knew what was coming.

“How could you!” Keira shouted. “Why didn’t you tell me? Do you have
any
idea the hell I’ve been through? Do you even know what it would have meant to me, to know that I’m not alone, to know that I belong somewhere, with people who are like me?” Her voice trembled as she strove to control her emotions.

In a rush, that sense of exclusion and complete aloneness returned. That feeling that haunted her throughout her childhood. She had known and accepted that she was different from her friends, that she could do things she couldn’t even explain to herself. But she had been able to push that aside and concentrate on the job of being normal, always trying her damnedest to fit in with society’s expectations.

She looked over at Simone, who still sat typing. In the shock of Victoria’s revelation, Keira had completely forgotten that they were not alone on the plane, but Simone gave no indication that she had heard their conversation.

“Even
she
knew?”

“Yes,” Victoria admitted.

Keira’s eyes brightened in sudden understanding. “Marco?” she asked.

“Yes. Believe me, Keira, there were times when I wanted to storm into that house and take you away to come live with me, but how would I explain that to your parents? If your mother saw what you could do, talking with animals, commanding the elements, she would have you committed with no qualms about it. Not to mention how much unwanted attention it would have focused on you from people you were better off not knowing about.”

Keira took a few deep, slow breaths, trying not to hyperventilate. She had to clear her mind and try to understand this, logically, analytically.

“You mentioned an International Council,” she said. “So, this is a worldwide thing?” She had difficulty imagining the scope of this secret. “What exactly do they do?”

“Yes, this is a ‘worldwide thing,’” Victoria nodded. “The Council’s role is, and has always been, to utilise the Families’ vast resources to ensure that the Akasha is kept safe.”

“Safe against what?” Keira asked.

“The question is not what, but whom. Keira, you have to understand that the world consists of many layers of existence. The general public knows only one of those layers—their immediate environment and that which they can touch, hear and see. Even when they do experience anything ‘strange,’ or anything that belies the general doctrine, they don’t believe their own senses. They prefer not having a light shone into the darker corners of the universe. They feel safe in their cocoons and are suspicious of anything that threatens their view of reality.”

“But it is not reality, is it?” Keira asked.

“No. But it is to them, and we want to keep it that way.”

“Why?”

“What do you think would happen if the masses find out that the Akasha, and therefore time itself, can be manipulated?” Victoria countered. “We are powerful, but we are a tiny minority in the general population. We would be overrun. The world would be altered beyond understanding.”

“Time—it can be manipulated?” The enormity of the idea penetrated through the anger Keira had wrapped around herself.

“Yes, the knowledge exists to manipulate time. There is a record—a book—and it is one of the Guardians’ objectives to keep anyone from accessing the knowledge in that book and tampering with the Akasha. This is why we are facing a war. Only I never expected it would be with one of our own.”

“War?” Keira felt like a parrot.

“Yes. There is one who believes the Guardians should use their power to change history, to take their place as rulers of the world. Unfortunately his support has grown to the point where logic and reason no longer prevail.”

“Who is he?” Keira asked.

“His name is Daemon. He lobbied for years to have Council funds assigned to studying the Akasha and how it could be used for personal gain.” Victoria scoffed. “Oh, he was clever enough to not use those exact words. He tried to make it sound as if he’d be doing humanity a favour by altering time and changing a few historical events. That goes against everything the Guardians stand for. Who will be the one that decides what will be changed? Who will decide which child gets to be born—and which child does not?”

“He wants to be God.” Keira rubbed her arms where the gooseflesh had broken out.

“Yes, and I can assure you he will not be a loving or merciful God,” Victoria answered. “We were already funding research into the so-called metaphysical sciences, but Daemon wasn’t satisfied. He kept on pushing, manipulating, and attempting to intimidate Council members to support his cause. People who spoke against him disappeared, or suddenly, inexplicably, changed their beliefs and joined him.”

“Surely you could have done something, told the police and had him arrested?” Keira couldn’t believe that in today’s day and age, people could get away with such tactics.

“We did do something. We dispatched the Draaken. Daemon retaliated…” Victoria broke off.

“What happened?” Keira asked.

“We underestimated him, that’s what happened. He struck at Draaken families. Loved ones were murdered. This time he made no secret of the fact that he was involved and that it would continue if we didn’t back off. So we did, which was another mistake. We should have eliminated him when we had the chance.”

“Aunt Vic!” Keira was shocked at her Aunt’s casual reference to killing another human being.

“Well, that option is no longer available to us. He is too well protected, now. His support has grown to the point where they are threatening to overthrow the Council and take power. His arrogance knows no bounds. He has openly declared his intention to seize the Book of Knowledge, which will only happen over my dead body.” Victoria’s face reflected her grim determination.