Forbidden Choices by Jen Weddle
Chapter 17
My grandmother has decided to join us on our shopping adventure. We all stagger into the carriage and fit snugly inside. I run my fingertips along the familiar silky interior and pull up the curtain to reveal the vast greenery around me. My grandmother stares outside with her luminous eyes that match the enchanting forest surrounding us. They grin at me from across the seat.
“I know it may be a bit soon but would you mind if we started your training a bit earlier, Ali?” My mother asks sweetly, her voice squeaking at the end.
“I can’t wait to start training!” I exclaim eagerly. “Will you be my trainer?”
“No, you’ve been placed with Lily—she’s our best Healer. She’ll just teach you basic incantations and you’ll be in a class with the other Healers. We’re starting you a bit late, but I think with your ability you’ll have no problem catching up with the rest.”
“Do I have another Ability?” I ask anxiously.
“You may have another Ability that hasn’t presented itself yet.” She replies.
“What’s yours?”
“I’m a Seer—like Riley.”
“Riley is a Seer? But I thought he was a Wolf.” I reply.
“He’s a Halfling, which means he gets an ability trait from the Elves and Shifting from the Wolves side.” My Grandmother replies.
“There are three rare abilities that died out with the bloodlines long ago: Healers, Seers and Elementals. They still exist but are much harder to find now that we’re allowed to create Halflings and breed with other species. The Elves no longer have pure bloodlines as they did before the start of the Great War.”
“What’s an Elemental?” I ask.
“Theo is an Elemental, which means he has the ability to control the Earth and any material it creates.” My mother replies.
“Amazing.” I sigh deeply, thinking about the kiss that I accidentally saw between Theo and Blair. I suddenly feel nauseous and the pit in my stomach grows.
“What’s your ability?” I ask, trying to change the subject from Theo to something else—anything else.
“Charm and Energy.” She responds.
“I can make you do anything I want.”
“Will you show me?” I request.
She places her warm, wrinkly hand around my wrist and whispers a language I can’t understand under her breath. The next moment her touch fades to an icy cold grasp and thousands of knives plunge into my skull, demanding me to close the window. I try to force my hand away from it, but just as quickly I grab the window and yank it down. The warmth returns to my body and I feel normal again.
“I’m positive that you’re the coolest Grandma ever.” I breathe enthusiastically. “So what can your Energy Ability do, since that was Charm obviously?”
“You’re absolutely right. I just used Charm on you. I create Force Fields through manipulating the Energy around me. It’s useful in combat to block magic attacks, incantations, weapons, and any other abilities.” She whispers grinning mischievously.
“I’m using a Force Field around us to make us appear invisible at this exact moment.”
“So in the circumstances of the Great War you would have been the most important weapon on the field?” I ask in utter awe of this tiny woman. I try to imagine my small Grams standing out in a battle field protecting soldiers from attacks. It seems impossible.
“I wasn’t the most important person; everyone had a role to play in the Great War. It was fun to beat the Wolves, alongside the Humans then. I was the Elves secret weapon. They had never had anyone possess the ability until I came along. The Wolves were outnumbered and outplayed, and they quickly surrendered after they realized what I was capable of.” She says, clearly reminiscing about a time that has long since passed.
“Alright, Mom, enough with your war stories—you’re going to scare her.” My mother announces wrapping an arm around my Grandmother.
“No. It’s amazing that you helped end the war. It’s hard to imagine that the war could be ended by a tiny heroine such as yourself, but it means that we’re all capable of doing great things—if we dig deep enough inside of ourselves.”
The carriage jolts to a stop. The three of us climb out into the bright city square. People are walking past us not paying attention to the three Royal women standing in the middle of the square, underneath the blazing hot sun of midday.
Everyone ignores us. It’s very unlike my arrival to the city yesterday when people were shouting my name from every corner and cheering loudly.
“Why are they ignoring us?” I ask.
“The energy force field I have in place will keep us invisible.” My grandmother replies.
“It’s nice to not have to dodge everyone and hide from the embarrassment of having my name shouted and all the cheering.” I babble on, as my mother and grandmother ignore me and look straight ahead.
I stop suddenly aware that these two are up to something. The air has changed around us. I can’t place the feeling at this moment but something feels off about it.
“Where are we going?” I ask. Although, I’m afraid of where they may be taking me—my mother points directly ahead an eerie shop just ahead of us. It’s the only shop on the street. I look around and see now that the street is full and overcrowded. A strange odor lingers in the air.
The shop is painted a dark gray, unlike the bright cheery colors of the bakery and the jewelry shop from yesterday. The yellow door is horribly large and takes up a good portion of the front. It’s painted the color of a vulture’s beak… and there is mold growing on the sidewalk in front of the shop. I look up the sign above reads:
“Murphy’s mayhem and mishaps”
“I really had a bad feeling you were going to say we were going in there.” I gulp.
“Don’t worry; it’s where we all go our first time in the city when we come of age.” My Gran replies, trying to ease my discomfort.
The closer we get to the store, the creepier the people begin to look. They start to transform into people who only wear black robes and chant strange spells, looking suspiciously around at everyone their eyes happen to meet. We finally reach the front of the distastefully wide door and a cheerful bell jingles.
“Ah ladies, I have been expecting your arrival. What can I do for you?”
A tall, bald man with beady bird-like eyes asks. He’s wearing a long yellow cloak that barely touches the floor with each massive stride that he takes. A tiny black cat appears, purring and wrapping its elongated body around one of his legs.
“We need a trusted Seer to tell us who the Princess is connected with. You see two boys have claimed to be her Soulfire. But we all know what the chances of that are…” She trails off. “I’ll pay you double what your normal asking price is, and you must keep this meeting a secret from the Elders.”
“What? I’m not destined to be with anyone. I don’t want him to touch me.” I protest, but my mother and my grandmother each take one of my shoulders, gripping it tightly and shoving me forward. They ignore my objections.
“Wonderful. We’d be happy to oblige, your highness. If you will follow me I will deliver her to the Seer.” He answers, rubbing his hands eagerly together. The cat hisses at me from his side. I struggle harder to free myself from the tight grip. This is embarrassing… I can’t even escape my grandmother’s grip.
“It’ll all be fine.” My Grandmother croons releasing me, as we enter the darkest, deepest catacombs of the shop. We crawl through tiny doors to finally reach the end and even if I wanted to escape I would get lost in my feeble attempts.
The only light in the room are a few small candles and a large glowing orb exuding green and purple flecks on the ceiling. In the center of the room is a small oval table with a few mismatched chairs.
I always imagined a fortune teller’s place to look exactly like this. I sit down uncomfortably in one of the chairs and only because my Grandmother has used her Charm to make me do so. I would never do this willingly. She al
I’ve decided I hate the Charm ability. It’s not a fair fight. The Seer enters the room—she’s a bubbly older woman with long, curly blonde hair and too much makeup. Her lipstick is too dark and her eyes are too large for her obscenely round head.
She’s wearing what appears to be the attire of a belly dancer, and her stomach bulges angrily out from the flowing fabric. The bells on the belly shirt jingle with each step that she takes.
“Hello. I am Madame Serenia. I am here with the solution to all of your problems.” She says in an extremely raspy voice like she has smoked too many cigarettes in her lifetime.
“I doubt that.” I respond sardonically.
“You would doubt my ability, young Princess?” She demands sneering.
“I’m sorry for my daughter’s unpleasant behavior. We made her come here to get answers. You see she has two boys that claim to be her Soulfire, but we want to know which one is the true one.”
“Your hand, Princess.” Madame Serenia demands as she reaches across the table.
Her hands flow towards me and her cold hand grips mine tightly as she places my left hand on the glowing orb. It begins to change colors from white to bright blue. I grab onto her hands and hold tightly as we are transported to another universe. I’m floating now, watching my own life from afar. Images pass before my eyes of me in the human world. I’m sitting in high school eating lunch alone and then Theo enters the picture. I go back to the day we met while I was sitting on a bus. And then I see Riley riding on a majestic black horse. Theo’s face appears again, but this time its bright red, full of loathing and he’s spitting fiery words from his mouth. All of the images disappear and we fall back to the room—our hands slamming on the table, giving my mother and grandmother a fright.
Serves them right, I think to myself.
“So?” My mother probes.
“It’s unclear. Both men are true candidates, but I found deep in her mind she may know which one is true.” Madame Serenia replies hesitantly peering at me from behind the glowing orb.
“So?” My mother pries.
“It is unclear at this time. Both men are good candidates but I found deep in her mind that she knows one of them could be a traitor and only here to play tricks.” Madam Serena replies.
“You didn’t get an answer?” My mother sneers.
“It’s peculiar. I’ve never seen anything like it before, but she’s had a connection with both of them. They are both entangled in her soul.” Madame Serenia replies.
My mother grabs me and hands the tall man a purse full of jangling gold. He apologizes profusely as we crawl through the tunnels of the store. He quickly escorts us to the exit.
“What’s going on?” I demand, spinning my mother around. “You drag me to the creepiest, deepest part of Newhollow for a fortune teller to tell us what we already know.”
“We had to know for sure.”
“I will never forgive you or Grandmother for that.” I say spitting on the ground.
My mother seems to be ignoring me. “This can’t be happening. She can’t possible have two Soulfires. It means that the Prophet was right. That it’s going to mean something much worse is coming.”
“I think we need to go back to the palace. We need to figure this out.” My Grandmother replies.
“Fine.” I respond, folding my arms. My mother looks at me her face full of concern and worry. She peers begrudgingly at me once we get back into the carriage. I would love to read her mind right now. Maybe, then I would understand what was going on since no one around here wants to include me in anything.
The entire ride is spent in silence. It’s a long, awkward ride back to the palace.