lights flickered out and they were all in darkness illuminated by flashes of lightning. They huddled near the altar as a sound like a freight train approached them. The firefly spirits had all clustered in the deepest, darkest corners of the ceiling.
"What do we do? What do we do?" Maryann cried hysterically.
Derek held her closely. "Pray. We pray," he said, feeling frightened for one of the few times in his life.
But even in those terrifying moments, Isabella noticed something odd. "The windows aren't broken," she yelled over the noise of the impeding tornado.
"What? What does that have to do with anything?" Nora snapped back.
"The wind knocked out the power lines and I can hear hail bouncing off the glass. But the windows are just glass. Why aren't they broken?"
"Hey, yeah," Leah said, taking hope in this. "This place is still holding out. That tornado out there can't even break the windows. We might get through this."
The lightning outside turned red and thunder crashed all around them.
"Maybe," she said in a small voice. She clutched her necklace and started to pray in Spanish.
"Derek, what is it?" Maryann asked.
"Enemies. Maybe demons or devils or maybe worse. But your friend is right. So far whatever's out there can't get in," he replied.
"But how much of the town will be left?"
"I don't know."
The freight train approached and the tornado seemed to be right over the church. It spun around them for a few minutes.
"It's not going to hold," Isabella said, seeing cracks appear in the glass with her spirit sight.
She was right. Within in seconds of her statement, the windows shattered into thousands of multicolored fragments and rained down on them. They yanked blankets over their heads to shield themselves. Then the doors creaked and slammed open from the outside.
Something indescribly dark and evil stood in the doorway. It was less a shape as it was a thought, or feeling, of terrible cold and palpable malice. There wasn't much light anyway and what little there was seemed to be swallowed by its dark aura. With or without Isabella's spirit sight, it would have looked exactly the same. They were paralyzed by fear. It moved past the threshold and the rafters groaned as though the whole building was shuddering. The five stared at it in blank horror. It laughed. Even over the sound of the tornado they could hear that hideous laughter and nothing could shut it out.
Then the fireflies sped out of the dark corners and started to fly around the group. Their twinkling spirit light was not absorbed by the evil and oddly their flight seem to lessen the impact of the laughter. Butterflies started to manifest from the shards of glass like ghosts rising from a graveyard and they joined the fireflies to encircle the group.
"What is going on?" Leah whispered with great effort.
"The church. The magic in it; it's still trying to protect us," Derek replied.
"Will it-will it work?" Maryann gulped.
"Not for long," he replied grimly.
The dark being stopped laughing and said something in a language no one knew but understood all the same; it was going to kill them.
And then a shaft of light pierced through the raging storm and into the church only a few feet in front of where they were all still huddled within the protection of the firefly and butterfly spirits.
The dark being screamed obscentities with no translation.
The light coesleced into something that was the opposite of the dark being. It was light where once was darkness, hope where once was despair, and good where once their was evil. It was also terrifying.
The light being pointed at its counterpart and said in that same language that it was not welcome and should leave.
The dark being laughed and refused.
The light being suddenly manifested what the band and Derek's senses interpreted as a fiery sword and charged the dark being. There was an ear-piercing scream and an impossibly bright flash of silver light.
Leah came to first. The wind was still loud, but it seemed the storm was passing. The group was sort of awkwardly piled on top of each other and underneath blankets and mattresses. Leah threw off the heavy covers. The beings of light and dark were gone. The fireflies and butterflies were gone. She held up the small electric light. Faint lights glittered on the floor, so she guessed the floor was still covered in glass. Then she proceeded to wake everyone else up.
"What happened?" Maryann asked.
"I'm going to check the radio," Isabella said, and went into the minister's quarters and turned on the radio.
The others stood up and dusted themselves off.
"Well, it don't look too bad," Derek said. "It's quiet again. Whatever was attacking this place is gone." He took the electric light and walked over to the door. "And that was real. This mark ain't never coming out of the floor," he said, looking at a scorch mark.
There were puddles on the floor and a light rain was coming in through the broken windows.
"And this won't be cheap to repair," he sighed.
Isabella returned in a few minutes. "The storm's dissappating. I think we were out for over two hours," she said.
"Oh, that's why my neck hurts," Maryann said.
"It should stop raining soon. The wind feels normal again. Everything does."
"Does anyone have any idea what just happened here?" Nora asked.
Derek looked up at her, and looked at Leah. "Well, if I had to hazard a guess, I'd say some kind of demon attacked this place, and some kind of angel saved us."
"An angel," she replied flatly. "Really?"
"I can only go by what I see and what I feel," he said with a shrug. "The thing that stood here was as evil as anything I have ever encountered. What fought it off was as good, I guess, as anything I have ever encountered."
"But it was terrifying," Maryann protested.
"Just because something's good doens't mean it's not frightening," he replied. "With beings so powerful, well, that power alone is frightening to us mere mortals."
"I doubt you're a mere mortal," Nora said dryly.
"Or even us un-mere mortals," he said with a slight smile. "So maybe I'm wrong. But this was hallowed as a church, so it makes the most sense to me if anything was going to attack it, it would be the enemy of the church. Demons and angels."
"Huh. I thought angels were supposed to be nice," Maryann said.
"Not hardly," Leah said. "Derek's right. Good isn't nice. We should consider ourselves real lucky those other spirits were protecting us. I think that was to keep us safe from the angel as well as the demon."
"Leah, you don't really think that's what those were, do you?" Nora asked.
"I don't see why not."
"But really?"
Leah shrugged. "I know that we've seen a bunch of stuff that's way outside our faith, so why not something inside our faith for once? Why are angels and demons so much harder to believe in than fairies and ghosts?"
"I guess there's no reason," Nora said after a moment. "I'm just surprised, I guess."
"Oh, I am too. Anyway, right now we're safe, so we need to figure out what to do. It's the middle of the night, there's no power, and everything's wet. And possibly the van was wrecked."
"The van!" Isabella repeated, and dashed outside.
"Derek, do you think we're safe from whatever that was?" Maryann asked.
"I believe so. I do believe so. As for what to do, if the van is driveable and the roads passable, y'all can go get a room in New Roads. I'm going to stay here. The back is hopefully a bit drier, and I've got a mess to clean up."
Isabella returned. "Well, we'll need to replace some windows and vacuum out the water," she said, "but the engine starts up."
"Okay, you go to New Roads and get a hotel," Maryann said. "I'll stay here with Derek and help him clean up some. You can come get me tomorrow and we'll figure things out from there."
The other three looked at each
other, and then back at Maryann and Derek.
"Alright," Isabella said, "but we can only spare a day or two to help you out, especially since we'll have to find a repair shop for the van."
"You don't have to do nothing else for me," Derek said.
"We're going to help," Maryann said sternly. "Mee-maw would want me to," she said in a softer voice.
"Okay, we'll see what we can do," Isabella replied. "You two ready?"
"I would dearly love a bed and some dry clothes," Leah answered.
"Sure," Nora said shortly.
They left Maryann and Derek and headed down the rainy road back to New Roads. Luckily only a couple of side windows had been destroyed.
"Nora, are you okay?" Leah asked.
"Yeah, yeah. I guess. I just-I just never thought we'd see anything like that," she said.
"An angel and demon?"
"If that's what they were."
"Why do you doubt that?"
"Because of all the other crazy stuff we've seen," she snapped. "I've had to recalibrate what I think of as normal so many times I've lost count."
"I get it," Leah said.
"Get what?"
"Why you're upset. Because we've seen all this crazy stuff and there hasn't really been any confirmation what we believe in is as true as what Maryann believes in, right?"
Nora just stared at the window.
"And so now there's this thing that happens right in front of us and it makes you wonder why all this other crazy stuff happens. Where does it all fit in?"
"I suppose you have an answer to that too?" Nora asked snidely.
"I sure as hell don't," Leah replied. "I'm confused and maybe a little angry too. Why let so much bad stuff happen when there's something like that light being who just take care of it? Why are