July 22, 1859

A Chapter by Havatara

Somewhat longer chapter than normal.

July 22, 1859

Dear Lucy

There’s a man staying in your room? Do you know his name yet? It’s very strange that you don’t even know his name. Very strange indeed. We’ll have to wait and see, won’t we?

And I think it would be obvious that the people attacking were from the mainland. I’ll get back to the story, though. When Julia was in the mountain, she didn’t get to see much of Thomas. He was always busy talking to some men, leaders of the group he was in.

However, Julia had plenty of company. One of the people she talked to nearly every day was a young girl named Sara. No one really knew where Sara came from. Except Sara, of course, but that’s a different story. Anyway, Sara had been ordered to follow Julia for most of the day, and so no matter how annoyed Julia was with Sara, she just couldn’t get rid of the little girl with short, brown hair that reminded her of a baby deer.

‘Why do you keep following me? I’m not that interesting,’ Julia snapped one day.

Sara just laughed. ‘Of course you’re interesting. If you weren’t, I would have left you weeks ago.’ Exasperated, Julia let it be and just stayed talking to the little girl.

Finally, after almost two months, Julia was able to talk to Thomas again. He went to have dinner with her one night, and signaled to Sara and the others who were sitting at the table that he wanted to talk to her alone.

‘I’m sure you want some answers,’ he said. Julia just nodded, staring down at her plate. ‘Do you have any questions in particular?’ Julia shook her head, and Thomas sighed. ‘You’re mad at me for not speaking to you, I know, but it was necessary. Many things have happened since your uncle disappeared, and I had to help fix some of them. And some people don’t want me to talk to you.’

‘Why not? I’m just a girl,’ Julia muttered.

Thomas laughed. ‘I’d hardly say just a girl.’ He took her hand, and she blushed. He ignored that and said, ‘I think you should know about the prophecy. There’s really no set words to it that I know of, but it states that there will be a family of magicians who will bring back the old magic, and whoever was their allies would rule the world.

‘Now, no one really knows who the family is. So wouldn’t you want to be allies with everyone? The people on the mainland think that if they try to find the old magic on their own, then the family will find them and become their allies because they had the magic. I do not understand the logic behind their thinking, but now they’re trying to find the old magic on their own. But there are leads that the old magic is here, in Scotland, and the mainlanders want to come here and destroy our country to look for it. Some people just want to destroy these mainlanders. Others want to find the old magic so that the mainlanders won’t have to come. I’m one of the ones who want to find it.

‘Even still, some of our own people want to use the old magic for their own gain. These people are in line with the mainlanders. We’re thinking that they are the ones who took your uncle.’

Thomas looked at his plate and sighed. ‘There is another part of the prophecy. It is that a young man will fall in love with a member of this family, and he will help them to their allies and raise their power in the world. I’m not entirely sure this is right, but that is what I know.’

‘Why do you tell me this?’ Julia asked.

Thomas shrugged. ‘You were dragged into this mess. It’s your right to know what’s going on.’

I think I’ll stop there. How are things going with Jamie? And that man?

Yours always, Safiya

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