A Scripta

He wished he could use magical sight in the air. He wished for telepathy too, but he could only concentrate on one thing at a time. He dropped down at another village, this one just a few kilometers north of the other one. This one didn’t have a church. This one also had no people.

Confused, he started walking around. Something was here, he wasn’t sure what. He slipped into magic sight again and turned around in a circle. He stopped, facing something glowing gold, like a sun.

“Gotcha,” he said, and started walking toward it. He bumped into something, and blinked, his magic sight gone. He had walked into a wall of a building. He shrugged, turned the corner –

He came face to face with a statue in the alley way. First, Grim thought this was a stupid place to put a statue of a running man. Second, Grim saw the frozen look of terror on the man’s face. Grim stared at the statue, and recognition slowly came to him.

Grim went to the front of the building and tried to open the door, but it was locked. He made a rune of unlocking at the door, and he heard a bolt slide back. He tried again, and the door swung open.

He found himself facing a small dining area, with a family seated to dinner, looking in all different directions, all of them statues. Their food was untouched, and looked like it had been like that for at least a couple of days. He walked through the house. It had been ransacked, rooms and mattresses torn apart.

The more Grim went into houses, the angrier he got. Children with looks of terror or confusion were frozen in time. Adults tried to run but were caught. Some tried to hide their eyes but were too late. Babies were turned to stone in their cribs.

That last did it. Grim drew the dagger, no longer a sickle, but the black sword he had seen at his side. He didn’t care if Hades said he wasn’t allowed to kill anybody – whoever did this didn’t deserve to live. He went a little ways down the road and saw the car that had hit him, the engine stopped and the doors wide open. He peeked inside – the keys were still there, and it was in park. He looked in the back seat and saw the woman who had passed out, turned to stone with a look of astonishment.

“Oh, no,” Grim said, and whirled around to look along the side of the road. He looked at the ground but couldn’t read tracks. He stood there for a minute. “Think, think, think…what turns people to stone…?”

He raised his head suddenly, as his mind filled with the answer. Perseus had killed Medusa, with the aid of Athena’s shield, and when he did, Athena took the Gorgon’s visage and put it on her shield from that time forward.

“Oh, fuck.” He should use a mirror. He looked around, again using magic sight. He saw the golden glow. The golden glow wouldn’t form itself into the Gorgon’s face, so maybe if he kept his magic sight up, he would only see it as a glow, not as what it was. However, keeping his magic sight going used most of his concentration, which meant he had none for killing the son of a bitch. And he wouldn’t be able to see him defined, unless he was magical as well.

“Cover the shield, worry about the guy later.” Grim breathed in and out, and flattened his palms out at his sides, aiming at the ground. He began a chant that drew ley line magic, and the power rushed to him, like in the church. He kept his eyes focused on the glow, and walked forward.

He let himself be pulled this way and that, trusting that something was guiding him around the trees that he couldn’t see. He let himself be lifted and set down, and still walked forward. He surrendered to the power like he had felt with Marcus and Stefan. He knew it would buoy him up and keep him protected.

The glow became brighter and faced right at him. Grim looked into the heart of the sun and wasn’t blinded. He worked entirely by feel, as he reached out and grabbed the glow. A man's voice came through, "What...?"

Grim backhanded something, and was satisfied when it connected with a loud crack. His hand stung. He yanked hard on the glow, but it wouldn't give. The glow's holder pulled back. Grim now hauled off and punched something. The man gurgled and slipped back, and the shield slipped off his arm.

Grim turned the shield away from him, and blinked three times. When he focused, a man in stone lay on the ground, holding his neck with one hand and holding his hand out to stop something with the other. Grim set the shield down so its front was on the forest floor. He took off his coat, and carefully pulled up the shield, draping his coat across the front.

Grim began the chant to return home, wondering if he actually killed this man or froze his soul in stone as well. He didn't want to think about it. He wanted to go home.

When he arrived in the magic room, the shield was gone, along with his coat. He sighed disgustedly. “If you wanted a coat that bad, I would have given you one,” he muttered, as he headed to the grotto.