Page 20 of Magic Blooms

nineteen

I fumbled and dropped both Fawn’s cloak and the now-empty bag into the murky swamp.

What had just happened?

My pulse raced as I tried to make sense of what I had witnessed. Fawn had stabbed herself! Was she dead? Should I do something to check? To help?

The waters of the swamp rose up and enveloped her body. First her arms, then her legs, and finally her chest, until only the small sliver of her face remained above the surface.

Her eyes remained wide open, but her pupils had vanished, leaving behind an opaque white. This was some seriously dark magic.

Was the ritual done? Had it gone as planned? And why had she even needed me? Just to carry her bag and hand off ingredients?

I glanced toward the horizon. The sun still hung high, but I had no idea where we’d gone or how to get back to Fox’s End. Should I venture out on my own and see if I got lucky? Or would it be better to wait here and hope that Fawn woke up?

I glanced over at her again. Her face had now sunk beneath the waters, but she remained close to the surface, floating unnaturally, easily visible.

This had to have been her plan. Maybe I was here so that I could pull her out of whatever trance she was in when she needed me. I might as well try to be patient and hope she’d return to me soon.

I used Lorraine’s watch to keep track of how much time had passed, the hours ticking away one by one. I left the embrace of the swamp and sat on a low tree branch near the shoreline as I waited. Worried.

Time seemed to phase in and out. I leaned my head against the bark of the tree, but every time I got too relaxed, more of those little bloodsucking bugs I loathed would appear to force me back into concentration.

The air began to cool as the sun sunk lower and lower in the sky. This was ridiculous. What was she waiting for? What was I?

I’d given this my best shot, but now I needed to hurry back to Fox’s End to meet up with Jasmine and the others, to start the ritual that would send me home.

I could only hope that my internal compass would lead me where I needed to go, which even with my desperate sense of optimism was definitely a long shot.

There was still some time left, but not much.

I’d give Fawn ten more minutes to snap out of whatever trance she was in, and then I was out of here.

Maybe it was better the goodbyes with my friends would have to be quick rather than long and painful.

Our last memories of each other shouldn’t be sad ones.

In fact, I wanted to remember Lorraine as the strong and stubborn woman she was.

Jasmine as the coldly logical magic expert, and Joshua as…

Well, I supposed he’d always be that surly handyman helping me search for pigs in the rain.

I smiled and rested my head against the tree’s trunk. I wasn’t looking forward to telling them what had happened to Fawn, but at least I’d tried to offer the help she needed. I’d done right by this town.

Maybe Fawn had been wrong about all of it, wrong about everything.

When my ten-minute waiting period ended, I carefully climbed down from my perch and over to the water’s edge.

Immediately all of my muscles protested. Apparently I’d been sitting still for too long. I wasn’t excited to get myself wet again, but I was looking forward to getting out of here. Looking forward to going home…

“Fawn?” I asked cautiously as I waded out to her.

She lay floating in the exact same position she had all day. Even the hemlock flowers still floated around her, close as if drawn in by a magnet.

“Fawn? Are you all right?” I asked, leaning in closer.

I could no longer see her features clearly. The water had darkened, and all I could make out was her vague form, just like the first time I’d seen her outside Art’s office.

I leaned closer still and reached out a tentative hand to feel for any sign of life. My fingers shook as I placed them to her neck in search of a pulse.

WHOOSH! The moment I made contact, Fawn shot up from the swamp, gasping for air as the bespelled swamp water shot up in high waves.

I leapt back in fright. Now that I knew she was fine, I definitely wanted to run.

She spun from side to side until her eyes landed on me.

I watched in frozen horror as her previously all-white eyes returned to their normal blue.

“You,” she said, her voice dripping with menace. Her lip curled up in disgust.

I took another step back. “Glad y-you’re okay,” I stuttered as she continued to glare at me. “I really need to be going now, so I—”

“No,” Fawn screamed so loud it caught me off guard. She took another step toward me and pointed at me with a shaking finger. “You don’t belong here.”

I swallowed nervously as the wind picked up and started to billow around us. “You wanted me to come, but okay. I’ll go now.”

I rushed to the edge, moving my legs as fast as I could in the heavy water. The moment I reached land, Fawn was upon me again.

The water flowed off her in rivulets, and she was so pale that she might as well have been a ghost. How had she moved so fast? I broke into a run, but she used her magic to drag me back to the swamp, to toss me into it with a might splash.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she raged, stepping in to join me once more. “My vision revealed all, the destruction you bring with you, the suffering. The end of magic.”

I took another step back, stumbling over some root under the water and losing my balance. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

My fear connected with nature, and thunder cracked above me, the wind twisting even harder. She was wrong, wrong about everything but especially me.

Fawn remained unbothered by the storm building around us. “It was you all along. Always you.”

I managed to jump out of the way right as she unleashed a plume of crackling blue flame in my direction. Its searing heat barely missed me, and she immediately sent a second blast my way.

This time the only way I could escape was by falling completely into the black water and hoping the murky depths would protect me.

But for how long? I’d have to surface eventually.

And when I did, Fawn would be there.

She grabbed the back of my dress and lifted me out of the water as though I weighed nothing.

“I can stop it, but first I have to stop you,” she growled from behind me. “Permanently.”

I should have made a run for it when I had the chance, shouldn’t have checked to make sure she was okay. Now I would never get back to my friends, to my home.

I kicked and writhed in Fawn’s grasp, but nothing deterred her as she readied the death blow. “No! Please!” I cried.

Fawn began to mumble a curse comprised of words in a language I hadn’t yet heard, didn’t yet know. Then suddenly her grip on me loosened and she disappeared beneath the water.

Now she was the one thrashing, screaming for help.

Had I done that? But how?

Her desperate screams rang in my ears as the winds raged and the skies opened up to dump buckets of fresh water into the swamp.

SPLASH!

A great blackish-green tail rose from the water and splashed down again.

Spinning, spinning with Fawn’s leg clamped between its massive jaws.

A gator had intervened, a blessed gator!

The beast was huge and determined, but Fawn was powerful, too.

She broke loose of its hold and sent an inferno spiraling in its direction.

No!

I couldn’t let her hurt it. I had to do something, and fast.

My magic!

I was surrounded by an entire arsenal out here in the swamplands.

I just had to use it. Bracing myself, I called out to every scrap of plant life I could find and stuck my feet and hands as deep into the muck as they would go.

I shut my eyes tight and called the swamp to me, respectfully requesting that it do my bidding. Willing it to protect me.

I didn’t have a plan. Only one desperate word reverberated through me: help.

When my eyes snapped open again, the gator had gone. I prayed it wasn’t too late for him. Wasn’t too late for me as Fawn rose to her full height and glided toward me, both hands raised above her head as she geared up for one final show of power.

I stood frozen, completely out of options now but also not ready to die.

Fawn smirked, knowing she had me.

But then something shot out from the water and wrapped itself around her wrist, yanking it down and away from me. The very earth was rising up to help me!

Fawn gasped and tugged at her arm, but then another vine shot out and grabbed her by the waist. Annoyance turned to panic as more and more vines emerge from the depths to ensnare her.

All I could do was stare as Fawn struggled and cried, my jaw agape as I watched the horrors unfold in front of me. The vines now acted as one, tugging Fawn beneath the water and out of sight, only a few bubbles left in their wake.

It was over. I needed to go, needed to run.

But I’d used up all my strength to plead with nature. I didn’t have anything left.

Would Fawn survive under the water this time? Without first conducting her strange ritual? As wrong as it felt to wish for her death, that’s exactly what I did. I needed her to be gone, to not come for my friends once I had left.

Slowly, I twisted myself back toward the shore. Or at least tried to.

Everything hurt.

The swamp in front of me parted, revealing the back armor of a large gator. He was coming right for me, but I wasn’t afraid. Was this the same one who had risked his life to save mine?

The water grew shallower as the great beast approached, and he dunked beneath the surface. When he rose again, he wasn’t a gator anymore…

But rather a human man.

One I knew quite well by now.

Joshua.