Continued from Part II, here.

I felt like I was drowning in a vat of tar, falling beneath the waves of a choking black sea. Grandma Higgins’ aura came washing over me, hitting me in repeated waves and pushing me down deeper into the blackness. I couldn’t do anything against it.

I was going to die.

The realization hit me like a bucket of cold water poured down my spine, like when Tommy snuck up behind me once during a test and dropped an ice cube down the back of my shirt. Somehow, that sudden fact, so cold and hard, galvanized me into action.

I pushed back wildly, desperately, against that black aura that wrapped around me. I opened my mouth in a silent scream, pushing, tuning my very thoughts into a focused blade to try and push through that suffocating blackness.

And then, just as I felt myself fading for what I knew would be the last time, the darkness recoiled from me. Continue reading →