Ambergris: A Firestorm at a Midnight Mass

The post-funeral condolences from visitors continued well past dinnertime. The guests gradually filtered out of the house as the evening wore on. Around ten o'clock, Grey and Amber made a show of leaving for the few remaining guests. Noticing that they were being followed, Grey continued on to the hotel. After pulling into the lot, their follower disappeared down a side road leading to Red Lake Hunting Lodge. Free of their tail, Grey left the motel lot and headed back toward the town. Out of sight of the house, he turned down a gravel road that led to a field behind the farmhouse. He parked the SUV and waited while Amber slipped back into the house.

The last of the guests to leave were the mayor and his wife, the sheriff and his wife, and the minister and his wife. The minister's wife hesitated at the door for a moment before begrudgingly saying goodbye. "I'll come by in the morning to check up on things," she yelled from the bottom of the porch steps. Then she slipped into the car next to her husband while the Lawrences waved goodbye. Once the house was clear of visitors, Amber let Grey know that it was safe to approach the house.

"Thank you for letting us stay with you," Grey said while nodding to David Lawrence.

"We could use the extra help," Lisa replied, "especially with Michael being so frightened of his gift."

"Your mother Isabel has been helping him accept that he is different," Amber stated.

"My mother has been dead for nearly ten years. She died around the time that Michael was born."

"Which is why she is tied to him," Amber explained.

The last six people to leave the Anderson house gathered at the church in the center of town. Five paths crossed the circular green forming a pentagram with the church located in the middle. The six people put on black robes and formed a circle at the altar. Candles had been lit to cast a glow within the church while the six started a chant that was barely a whisper but gradually rose in volume.

The house had settled in for the night with David and Lisa sleeping in the primary bedroom, Grey taking residence in the guest room, and both Isabel and Amber watching over Michael. A few hours later, the entire house was awakened by Michael screaming. Amber rushed to his bed and hugged the frightened child. Placing her hands on his cheeks, she looked into his eyes and watched the horror that had awakened him replay. "You will forget what you have seen. Go back to sleep. Children need their rest." Michael calmed down and did as he was told.

Lisa entered the room at the moment Amber wiped the vision from his mind. "What did you do?" she demanded.

Amber smiled, but Isabel answered for her. "She took away his horror so that he could rest. She will deal with whatever disturbed his rest." She turned to Amber. "Won't you, dear?" Amber nodded in reply.

Lisa's jaw dropped. "Mother?" she stammered.

"Stay with him until he falls back to sleep. I need to talk to David and Grey." Amber walked outside the room into the hall where the two men stood. "I need the two of you to thoroughly lock down the house. Every window, every door must be shut and locked if possible. Leave no way in. I'm going to deal with what the boy saw." And with that she faded away.

Amber arrived at the motel several minutes before midnight. With Fred's help, she was able to locate the center of the lot on which the motel was located. Standing on the heart of the property, she raised her hands above her head and started her own steady chant. Fred watched her slowly turn with each recitation as a shield formed around her and gradually expanded outward. By midnight, Amber's shield had expanded to cover the whole of the lot the motel stood upon and much of the surrounding woods. The recitation at the church of the Lord's Prayer had strengthened the protection around the village.

Across Red Lake stood Red Lake Lodge, a local hunting lodge, where a group of hunters had also been chanting. Two of the hunters had stayed at the motel the same night that Amber and Grey had been there. They had also attended the burial service and gone on to the house. As midnight approached, the hunters directed their chant against the motel. For a brief moment, a sudden flash of light surrounded the motel, then vanished as Amber's shield bounced the spell back to its source.

When Amber returned to the house, all eyes were pressed against the windows watching the flames lick at the night sky. The night sky lit up when the spell hit the lodge. The flames generated by the fire imp were massive. Volatile gasses exploded out of their tanks from the heat of the fire. The six in the church stopped their prayer chant when the concussions from the fire struck the church, rattling the stained-glass windows. The mayor and sheriff made calls to the volunteer firefighters in the village. It happened so quickly that the hunters inside the lodge were unable to escape the ensuing fire. By the time the firefighters from Red Lake Village were able to respond, there was nothing left of the lodge except smoldering ashes and thirteen charred bodies arranged in a circle.

 . 

Ambergris: A Challenge at a Farmhouse

The Anderson farmhouse was imposing, consisting of three floors of living space, a basement, and an attic. The entire adult population of the town had attended their burial and had managed to squeeze themselves into the first-floor rooms. Amber grabbed a plate from the kitchen buffet table and filled it to overflowing before taking a seat at the dining room table next to Grey. She sat quietly stuffing forkfuls of food into her mouth while he talked to one of the local deputies about the fire at the motel. "Who called about the fire?"

"The night manager, Fred. He smelled smoke coming from the room and grabbed a nearby fire extinguisher. When he opened the door, he was hit by a lot of smoke and steam. Just as he pulled the pin on the canister, according to Fred, the fire just quit. Poof! Gone. It was out when we got there. He opened the room for us. Sheriff went in first. Smell was something awful."

"Photos?" Amber mumbled with a mouth full of food.

"Is it possible for me to see photographs of the room?" Grey asked.

"Sure. You want digital? I can email them to you," the deputy said as he pulled out his phone. "Just let me make a note."

"Do you have copies of them on your phone?" Grey pulled out his phone. "We can transfer them directly. Save you some data charges."

The deputy located the file on his phone. "That's the folder you want."

Amber turned her attention back to the ten-year-old boy. He had barely touched the plate of food in front of him and seemed on the verge of tears. He had been twirling the tines of his fork on the paper plate, basically rearranging the food on it. Suddenly, he dropped the fork and bolted from the table running up the stairs. His aunt started up the stairs after him, but the minister's wife stopped her. Amber wafted up the stairs while the two women argued over the right thing to do for the boy.

Amber paused briefly in his second-floor bedroom and glanced at the fantasy posters on his wall and the science-fiction books in his room. She could hear his footsteps echo as he ran up the second flight of stairs. A quick pass through the wall into his parent's bedroom gave her a sense of their level of devotion to their only child. There were photo albums by the mother's side of the matrimonial bed and several framed photographs of his from birth to the present day hanging on the walls

AS Amber passed to the third floor, she found abandoned bedrooms where the family had lived before the death of Mr. Anderson's parents. They had inherited the house and moved down to the lower floor several years ago. The remnants of the boy's nursery remained with a slight coating of dust. By the time she had finished examining the floor, the boy had found his way up into the attic.

Michael Anderson was huddled against an old steamer trunk that had been shoved beneath an eave. The only light streamed in through a porthole window located just below the peak of the roof. The attic was dimly lit and dusty. Spiders had covered a corner with cobwebs. Amber could feel a cold draft swirling about the room. Tears rolled down his cheeks dampening the knees of his jeans. Amber walked slowly toward the sobbing child.  "I won't hurt you." Amber tried to reach out to him, but something slapped her hand aside.  "I'm here to protect you from whatever killed your parents." She tried to move closer, but something stood in her way. She kept talking. "It wasn't you. I know you think it had to be, that you saw them die. But you didn't kill them."

"Kill them," a ghostly whisper echoed Amber's last words. A sudden gust of cold air tossed Amber to the other end of the attic where an old dressing mirror stood. Glass shards exploded outward from the frame while Amber fell forward. She picked herself up from the floor and shook loose the glass fragments.

After rising from the pile of broken glass, Amber chose her next words carefully, "I'm here to help Michael."

"Help Michael," the whisper echoed. "Keep him safe."

"Yes, we must keep him safe," she replied to the wraith. "You know what I am."

"Trouble," the wraith whispered. "Your kind are always trouble."

"I am Ambergris," she whispered in reply. "I cause no harm to the innocent."

"Your name means nothing," the wraith replied. "I am his grandmother, Isabel. I protect him."

"Yet you hide up here," Amber moved closer to Isabel. "Because the real danger is down below?"

"Too many shadows," Isabel explained, "I cannot see."

Amber smiled. "Please tell me that you are tied to the boy and not the house." Isabel nodded. "He will be safe with his aunt and uncle, but you must tell him what he is. My friend, Grey, and I will deal with the one who made him an orphan. Your grand-daughter and her husband are in danger."

Amber accompanied Isabel over to her great-grandson and properly introduced the young clairvoyant to his ghostly guardian. While the two of them became better acquainted, Amber made her way downstairs in time to rescue her unfinished plate of food. When she returned the two women were still arguing. Michael's aunt stood her ground, raising her voice to match the volume of the minister's wife. The argument ceased when Michael made his way back down the stairs, choosing to cling to his aunt and keeping distant from the other woman.