Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
Dafni
I’d lost track of the number of days I’d walked.
Whenever I came across the occasional stream I’d attempt to fill my stomach with water, only to heave it back up again moments later.
My stomach was so empty that the momentary relief of the water filling it felt worth the agony of it all coming back up again.
The pail was getting heavier, and my feet began to feel like cinderblocks.
I started to forget to refreeze my mother—especially when the sun had come up and the air warmed.
One time, the ice had melted down low enough to where her orange fur had stuck out like spikes from the ice, the block holding her body bobbing in melted water inside the pail.
My heart had never beat so furiously in my chest. The pounding had still rung in my ears even after I’d refrozen the water.
Maybe that was when I’d realized I was slipping away.
I hadn’t slept for days for fear of my mother thawing.
I wasn’t eating.
My body was no longer absorbing water.
But still, I kept my feet moving, let the pull of the Coven guide me. The pull was getting stronger, and I had assumed that meant I was getting closer. I had to be getting closer. I couldn’t last much longer.
No. I would last. I had to. If I didn’t make it, my mother would thaw, and everything would resume as she’d planned it. With both me and my grandmother gone, she’d still be Prime.
Leaving no one else to challenge her.
I would keep going.
As I crested a steep hill, I spied a large silver rectangular box, its sides worn and weathered, in the distance. It had a door and a couple of windows.
I laughed.
I might’ve cackled. The way the sun glinted off the sides of the box made my eyes squint. This had to be some sort of joke—a mirage, perhaps. We were in the middle of the woods, with no signs of civilization in any direction. I really was losing it.
A silver house in the middle of the woods.
Good one, Dafni.
I just needed to rest for a bit, close my eyes for a second to clear my mind.
When I opened them, the silver house wouldn’t be there—maybe I wouldn’t be here.
Maybe this would all be some weird fever dream and I’d wake up with a cold washcloth on my forehead and my grandmother’s homemade chicken broth being spooned into my mouth.
The woods were quiet. Or maybe my hearing was going. With my palm still on the handle of the pail, I leaned against a tree, its papery bark tickling the exposed skin on my upper back and shoulders. I tucked the skirt of my green sundress under my legs and closed my eyes—just for a minute.
“Are you okay?” I could hear a deep baritone voice. A man. My eyes, though, refused to open. They felt gritty, like a mix of sand and water had pasted them shut.
“Let’s try to get you sitting up against this tree,” I heard him say.
Aren’t I already sitting? The thought came to me as I realized my head was currently pressed into the ground. I must’ve tipped over at some point after passing out.
“I’m going to have to touch you, okay?”
To my surprise, he waited for a response that I couldn’t give him. Eventually, rough hands scooped under my arms, and my head fell to my chest as my body became more vertical.
“There.” I felt his rough fingers beneath my chin, my ears ringing as he righted my head into the correct position atop my neck.
His fingertips were warm against my cheeks.
His thumb reached above my cheek bone, dipping into the hollow of my eye socket beneath my lower eyelid.
Pulling down, he cracked the gritty paste holding my eye shut.
Bright light I wasn’t ready for flooded my pupil.
My reaction was less than perfect. I slapped his arm and attempted to headbutt him. He easily dodged my head, my movements comically slow as I tipped forward. I took a minute to catch my breath, bent over on all fours in the dirt. What an embarrassing demonstration of strength.
Tucking my feet beneath me, I slowly stood, making it about halfway up before I wobbled.
“Hey, careful.” He reached out to steady me, his hand brushing against my arm.
I swatted at him again, an unintentional hiss leaving my lips.
He backed up with his hands raised in front of him. “I don’t have time for this, okay? I’ve got to get to work.”
He looked as though he might’ve been telling the truth.
He wore tan leather work boots that went up over his ankles.
Both his pants and shirt were a thick cargo material.
His hands lowered, his eyes trying to focus on my own bobbing eyes.
I didn’t make it easy—there was too much to take in.
The forest, my weak body failing me, the man standing in front of me.
The woods. I’d been in the woods and had seen that…silver house. I glanced behind him. The metal house was still there…
“Hey.” His voice brought my eyes back to his.
They were green, like mine. Shaggy blond hair fell across his forehead.
He had it swept to the side like he was due for a haircut, but just like dealing with me, he didn’t have the time.
The lines across his forehead made me think he either worried too much or was several years older than me.
Probably both. “Are you going to be okay?”
I tilted my chin in a nod. I’ll be okay…I think. Pressing into my heels, I straightened my legs, trying to stand upright.
“Can I carry that for you?” He reached for the pail beside me, its handle stuck upright like a rainbow.
“No!” With one hand, I channeled my air magic, pushing the man away from me.
Like a rag doll, he flew backward, landing on his butt ten feet away.
With my other hand, I used my water magic to refreeze my mother.
This was the closest she’d been to being thawed out completely.
Bright-orange fur, although wet, had stuck out from the ice block.
The tip of her tail had been flicking back and forth above the water.
That had been close.
Too close. How long had I been unconscious before he’d found me?
Catching my breath from the exertion of using my magic, I let myself lean back against the tree behind me.
It caught me, the rough bark against my back giving me something to focus on instead of fixating on the way my body felt completely out of control.
My chest pushed against the fabric of my dress, trying to take in enough oxygen to replenish my magic.
I could sense that I’d used it all up. There was an emptiness in my gut that I’d always attributed to low magic, like I was missing an organ.
I needed time to replenish. It took oxygen, rest, and food. All of which I was in short supply of.
My fingers brushed against the top of the ice block that held my mother.
It looked frozen and opaque, but I needed to feel it.
I needed to feel that she was still confined.
Imprisoned. That the world was still safe from her wrath.
I could tell that the pail had completely frozen solid from the dry surface of the ice. Relief flooded me.
Only then did I look in front of me at the man I’d pushed away. He was still sitting on the ground. I could see the green of his irises from ten feet away, his eyeballs almost popping out of their sockets.
“Uh…” His voice wavered as he produced several non-words before snapping his lips closed and reopening them, this time without sound.
“Don’t touch my pail,” I said. My knees locked straight beneath me.
A breeze from behind me billowed my sundress between my legs, my hair blowing over my shoulders in front of me.
The man’s nostrils flared. Could he…smell me?
Did I smell bad? I probably did. I’d been out here for who knew how long in the summer heat sweating.
“Got it. Message received. I will not touch your pail.” He lifted one hand in the air in surrender as he used the other to lift himself to a standing position.
Now that he stood farther away, I could see how tall he was—he’d tower over me if we stood side by side. He could easily overwhelm me if I didn’t regain my magic.
“So, you’re…a witch?” he asked with an equal amount of inquiry and observation.
I tilted my head to the side. He wasn’t a witch. If he was, he would have surely retaliated with his own magic when I’d blasted him away. So, he was…human?
“You must be a witch.”
Okay. A human, for sure. My tongue was dry. I kept my words to myself.
“Say, I work for the Coven.” He motioned with his arm to the space beyond the silver house I’d been staring at behind him. “I can help you get back there.”
My chin tucked into my chest as I tried to retreat, my heels only hitting the tree behind me.
If the last several days had shown me anything, it was that I wasn’t ready.
I was ill-prepared for this world—a world outside my grandmother’s cottage, outside the protection of the Cedar Moon Pack.
I could hardly talk to anyone…especially men.
My body went into a panic when I was around them, my muscles tightening and my words vanishing.
There would be men in the Coven, men that I was supposed to lead.
Right now, I didn’t have the strength or the experience to walk into the Coven and claim my birthright as Prime.
“All right, all right, I won’t bring you to the Coven.”
I lifted my chin, letting my eyes reach his once again.
“But I can’t leave you out here. They’ll…find you.” He glanced around at the invisible threats around us.
I followed his eyes, my chest tightening.
“Just let me help you.” He extended his arm, his fingers uncurling right in front of me, waiting for mine to land in his.
He was close. Too close. One step closer and he could grab me, overwhelm me in my weakened state.
I glanced down at my mother, still frozen in the pail by my feet. How much energy could I spare if I had to use my magic to defend myself from him again? Would it be enough to keep my mother frozen at the same time? Did I even have any to spare?
My wobbling knees doubted me. The sweat on my brow questioned me. Was I strong enough?
As if in answer, I felt a faint tingle deep inside of me—my magic growing.
His fingertips brushed my upper arm.
“No, wait”—he grabbed onto my arm—“stop…” I tried my best to scoot away.
He kept hold of my arm. “I’m just trying to help you—” he said as he attempted to pull me up to standing.
Struggling in his grasp, I looked down at his hand on my arm and flicked my wrist. Pointing at him with my index and middle fingers, I sent him flying away from me, his hands and feet trailing his torso in the air.
I’d overestimated my strength. I didn’t get to hear the satisfying thump of his body landing on the ground—instead I heard the echo in my head of my body hitting the soil.