Hidden Magic

Found

There was a long moment of silence before Shane spoke again. “Rosie, you... You were there. I saw you. You saved me.”


She blinked and shook her head as panic sped up her heartbeat to a frantic craze. “No... No, I didn’t.”


“Yes you did! You were there! I saw you!”


She flinched back at the tone of his frustrated voice. Shane seemed to realise this and he softened. “Look, I’m sorry. I just know what I saw, okay? You were there. I swear.”


Rosie sighed. “There where? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”


“The Upperworld.”


A chill settled over her entire body. She was afraid for how much damage the impact on the tree had caused. She should have known it was too good – too lucky – to be true. No one gets through that without consequences. Bad ones. No one human. “Shane, I think we need to get you to Amber.” She started to rise up from the ground, but Shane’s strong hand pulled her back down and he forced her to meet his wide eyes.


“You don’t believe me.”


She looked away. “I’m not saying that. Just come on, let’s get you to Amber and we can sort this out together. Okay?” Rosie tried to get up and pull him with her, but his muscles were strong, steel cables that refused to snap. He kept the both of them rooted in place. “Shane please,” she pleaded. “Come on.”


“Tell me why you don’t believe me. And then you can also tell me how you’re still alive, because I’m seriously stumped.”


Rosie opened her mouth then closed it. She shrugged. She wasn’t trying to play the whole thing off as nothing; she just didn’t know how to say it all. Looking him in the eyes she said, “I’ll tell you when we’re out of here, Shane. Now. Let’s. Go. I mean it.”


“You don’t trust me, do you?”


She laughed, though there was nothing funny about it. Shane seemed to sense that too and his grip on her loosened a little. The anger that had been bubbling inside her since she’d found out suddenly exploded and she snapped, “You’re right, I don’t!” She ripped her arm from his grip and charged up to her feet, looking down on him with a look of pure disgust. “You’re a liar. You’re a backstabber. And you’re no frickin' friend of mine, Shane! If you don’t want to come with me, whilst I’m still giving you a chance. Giving you stupid sympathy. Then fine! It’s frickin’ fine with me if you want to hop on the crazy train and die up here! Be my guest.” She took a deep breath and tried not to lash out at him in mindless violence. The look of hurt confusion he gave her made her blood boil. “Screw you. Stay here. I’m not dying with you or letting you decide against my will. I guess that’s kind of what you’ve done with Amy, isn’t it? You’re fooled if you think you’re sealing my fate too.”


She saw understanding go across his expression and he looked down at his hands, not saying a word. Rosie nodded and felt her fury slip away, instead replaced by a loss that punched her in the stomach with brute force. “It’s true," was all she said before turning on her heel and walking down the hill that led her back down to the light forest.





Shane didn’t follow her back down the walk to the entrance of the forest. She saw his car along with his navy blue jacket slung over the seat. It looked like he’d left in a hurry. The glove-box was hanging open and inside items were messed around and a couple of them had fallen to the car’s floor, making a clutter of random CD's and a pair of cracked sunglasses. She noticed a cloth that must have held some kind of knife. On the frayed, brown cloth was the witch symbol Rosie was familiar with from the spell book she’d seen a couple times before. It was empty though, no knife was there. But there was an almost identical cloth still in the glove-box; still bound tightly over the weapon. She tried the car door and, to her luck, it was open. She reached inside and picked up the other weapon and unwrapped the cloth that held it. It was a medium-sized, carved silver knife. She touched the point lightly and pulled her hand back from its blade. It was razor sharp. It had only taken a little graze of her fingertip to draw blood. Rosie wrapped it back in the cloth, and then took a moment to look at the similar symbol on it. It was a star like the other, but it had a circle creating a border around it, which had other small symbols between it. An example of one was a weird, intricate shape that was three ovals making a pattern in one circle. Another was a simple cross.


She put the knife in her jeans pocket, but made sure it was carefully positioned so it couldn’t cut through her jeans and stab her. Rosie didn’t know why, but it felt important that she had it. It felt silly to not trust her instinct.


She started walking down the deserted road she’d come up before, but this time it felt like something was watching her. Pausing, she looked around, but it still looked empty. No signs of human life anywhere. She shrugged to herself and kept walking. As the eeriness continued she picked up her pace, but it wasn’t long before she stopped again, looking around, questioning her safety. Suddenly a wave of powerful energy pinched at her skin and her head started to throb. She reached her hand up, trying to ease the pain, but it was no use. It got stronger and stronger until... An arm grasped her from behind, covering her mouth to prevent a scream. It wouldn’t have mattered if it hadn’t; she had no energy to do anything. Fighting the weird attack of pinches and bangs to her head was consuming enough. She felt her lids close slowly as the fight went out of her.





Rosie awoke tied to a thick wooden chair. Her mind didn’t register what had happened at first. She felt hazy, sleepy, but not in the least bit safe. She moved around in the chair, feeling the resistant’s of the ropes, her head moving in puzzlement. It took a lot to fight through the haze and to finally open her heavy lids. What she saw made her wish she’d never opened them. Wish that she could glue them together. Die even. Anything not to have seen what happened next.


“Stop!” Rosie screamed, her lungs straining from the forced pressure. She saw a little girl, no older that thirteen being brutally smashed against a hard, cold brick wall. The girl had bruises all over her fragile little body. Black and blue. Black and blue. Rosie registered this in her mind with sickness. She wanted to scream out and stop the abuse. She wanted to pull herself from this chair and hurt what had hurt her and was hurting this girl. Badly. But she couldn’t. All she could do was yell, scream and screech at the top of her lungs, trying to find an entrance to any kind of humanity. She didn’t break through. The torture went on for hours, and all she could do was watch and cry.


Finally, the abuser stopped. She’d never been able to register anything particular about him. He was just there. A regular person. Average face, average hands and feet. A person. Someone you would pass on the street and think nothing of. Certainly no danger. But when he turned around and looked directly at her, for the first time she caught his eyes. Those cold, hard, empty hazel eyes.


Neither of them said anything as he turned to go, out of the strong metal door. She was still bound to the chair and the girl was still in the room. She lay lifeless on the ground, curled up in a motionless ball of protection. Rosie found her words “Are you okay?” Her mouth felt dry and her throat was choked up from all the yelling and screaming. “Hello? Are you okay?”


A sign of life came from the child. A slight tremble went up her body as she breathed. Rosie sighed in relief and her eyes watered with emotion. Is she okay? There was nothing she could do. She was bound here. For the billionth time that day she tried the ropes. They were still tight. Too tight for her to pull on. “Please,” she said aloud. “Let me out.” Rosie gasped as she felt a tug on the ropes. She didn’t know what had caused it, but she whispered a “Thank you.” She pulled free and nearly fell as she got up. Her legs felt like jelly. She looked down at them through her damaged, ripped jeans. They were sickly pale and bruises had formed on them. Rosie couldn’t remember putting up a fight or being taken to this room or being tied up at all. But she was betting whatever had taken her had knocked her out with something if she’d tried to struggle.


She fell to her knees beside the poor girl’s body. She reached her hand out to touch her arm. The girl immediately flinched away and cried out. The sound made Rosie want to burst out crying. It was so desperate, so afraid, and so human. “It’s okay,” she said softly and stroked the girl’s arm. “I’m not gonna hurt you. I want to help.”


Rosie caught a flash of chestnut hair. The strands of brown-red sparked recognition inside her and she gasped. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she realised who this was. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t recognised her before. But this was so unlike her. So...different. Unrecognisable even to Rosie.


With shaky hands she pushed hair back from the little girl’s face and when she saw the dark brown eyes so similar to her own, she cried, “Amy!” Amy looked up at her and Rosie saw the same remembrance go through her. Amy dived into her arms and tears soaked into Rosie’s top as she held her trembling sister tightly in her arms. “I’m so sorry for what’s happened, Ames. God, I’m so sorry.”


Amy hiccupped back tears and looked up at her. The look in her eyes was full of so much love, sympathy and grief. “You need to get out of here,” she whispered weakly. A cut on her sister’s lip ripped open, showing Rosie this wasn’t the first time something like this had happened.


“What? No way, Amy.”


“Please go. Go, Ro, before they get you too.”


Rosie shook her head and looked back at the door. There was no way she was getting out of this room until they wanted her too. “We won’t be able to get out.”


“No...” Amy’s voice faded and she coughed, spitting blood out with it. “Not we, you... Go, please.”


“I couldn’t if I wanted to. I’m not leaving you again.”


“You can.”


Rosie looked down at her sister in confusion. Amy looked afraid. More afraid than she had ever seen her before. But the strange thing was, she didn’t look so scared for herself at all. All the terror seemed like it was for Rosie. “Ro, I need you to get out. While you still can. Use it. You can.”


“Use what? I’m as stuck as you are.”


Amy started to shake her head, but then the metal door opened and a man in leather black boots stomped in.


Rosie lifted her head up to see a tall man with hair as dark as a pitch black night and eyes as grey as a deadly storm stand before them. His pale, pale skin was such a contrast to his other features, giving him an eerily irresistible, handsome look.


He smiled and Rosie thought she’d never seen anyone look so evil and inhuman as this. When he flashed a fang with his smile it was creepily clear what he was. “I heard you were here,” he said. His gaze settled directly on Rosie and she felt a shiver go through Amy beside her. It was then that she realised what all this was. Who he was. A heart-stopping second later he confirmed it. “I’m Charles. You won’t believe how long I’ve been waiting for someone like you, Rosie.”