Chapter 3 #2
Before I know it, the bush is almost bare, which gives me a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach.
After all, the witch might not notice if four or five of her flowers go missing—even ten or twenty might not be missed.
But when almost all of them are gone, she’s bound to notice.
And when she does…well, let’s just say that one doesn’t become a witch because one’s heart is flowing with the milk and honey of human kindness.
They’re usually Sorceresses or Priestesses who have gone bad—like cream curdling in a pot because of some wickedness that takes root in their heart.
Still, the girls go on recklessly snatching flowers and wishing until the entire back yard of the witch’s house looks like its full of swarms of magical, multicolored fireflies. I’m sure they would be happy to pick the bush completely bare…until a startled scream stops everything.
“Oh, my Goddess!” It’s Mirabella. She’s standing in the center of the yard, her hands on her hair. “Oh my Goddess—what did it do to my hair?”
We all stop and stare at her and in the light of the floating seedlings, I can see that something is, indeed, strange about her hair.
Her previously silky locks have gone rigid on her head.
Instead of flowing down her back like a waterfall and moving naturally with her when she turns her head, the long strands seem to have gone rigid and fused together somehow.
Her hair is all one mass now and it has an odd, metallic sheen.
“Oh my Goddess—it’s actually turned to gold. Real gold!” one of the other girls says. She knocks on Mirabella’s hair, and we all hear a hollow sounding clang-clang when her knuckles make contact.
A collective gasp goes up and everyone stares at Mirabella in horror. Apparently the flower she wished on took her words literally when it granted her wish.
Then, as the floating seeds begin to touch down, other wishes start coming true.
“My head…why is my head so heavy?” Shantilla gasps.
She reaches up to touch her head and gets a handful of hair.
A closer look shows that her wish for longer hair has come true…
in a truly amazing fashion. Her hair is in a massive twist beside her on the ground and it’s still growing—shooting out of her scalp at an alarming speed to add to the pile of hair at her side.
“Oh my God—just like Rapunzel!” Lorelei gasps. Then she clutches at her face. “Oh…why can’t I breathe right?”
A look at her face tells me why—her nose, which was just a little larger than normal before—has now shrunk down to the size of a fingernail. It’s smaller all right—just what she wished for—but there’s no way she can breathe through those miniature nostrils, each no bigger than a pin prick.
Hortence has the opposite problem. She wished for plumper lips—and got more than she bargained for. Her lips are huge and rubbery now, taking up over half her face. They’re so big in fact, she seems to be having trouble seeing over them.
Seeing isn’t a problem for Viselie, who wished for bigger, more beautiful eyes. Her eyes are now the size of teacup saucers, and they’re fringed thickly with dark lashes as long as my index finger.
“Oh stop it—stop it!” she moans, trying to cover her oversized orbits with her hands. “Don’t shine that light in my eyes!” she begs Terylin, who made a wish for shining, shimmering hair.
“What light?” Terylin moves her head and her hair—which is now glowing brightly, throws beams of light everywhere.
“Oh stop!” Viselie begs again. “Oh, why is everything so bright?”
“I can’t move!” Shantilla moans, and indeed, she’s now sitting on the ground, slumped to one side as the heavy pile of hair continues to grow—shooting from her scalp at a dizzying rate.
In short order, they’re all blundering around the witch’s backyard, moaning and crying as their wishes are granted in the most literal way possible.
I feel a tingle run across my skin and know this can’t be a mistake.
This is malicious magic—but the kind that only activates if you steal or break some kind of rule, I’m sure of it.
So I was right not to pick a flower and make a wish. Why, if I had tried wishing my freckles away, who knows what might have happened? The magic might have made big holes in my face where the freckles used to be! Or maybe just made my entire face invisible—no thank you!
I’ve always been sensitive to the magic of others. Though most of the acolytes have to work to pick up traces of another magic-worker’s craft, it’s like a sixth sense for me. I might be nothing but a half-breed, but I’m good at feeling and recognizing magic signatures.
And suddenly, I feel something new—a magic so strong and malevolent I shrink away from it.
I move to leave the yard, but it’s too late—there’s a blinding flash that makes all of us gasp—and makes Viselie positively shriek as she claps her small hands over her enormous eyes—which does no good at all.
“So! You dare to steal my flowers!” a cracked and angry voice rings out.
Oh dear—I fear that things are about to get very sticky and it’s too late to run.