First four chapters of The Rose Cauldron

The Rose Cauldron

Leighanne Colfield

 

Chapter One: Locked Away Beautiful

Year 1000 (ish)

I’ve heard my mother saying that there’s always been magic in this world. In the songbird’s voice, the colors we paint with, the breeze blowing through leaves in the springtime. It’s never stopped. So that’s why I never understood why it’s banned. Ever since our people was established, leaders of the Serpentine Government, or Evadmae, kept all people of magic descendants tested and locked away in The Cell. A dark, horrid place where my mother was once freed.

When my mother was 18, she watched her only friend get pelted to death by the Committee. My mother had just received her application sheet from the adjudicators and her date set for her interview. She was eventually placed as a curator for the Museum of Human History.

The government takes children once they’ve become 18 and files them under specific jobs needed for the care and prosperity of our society. Mom hates that job but one day she found a book titled “Our Predecessors” in the far back section of the bookkeepers cellar. She stole it and keeps it under the floorboard in the kitchen. She told me not to tell Dad about it.

My mother was once very beautiful; though she has scars and drooping eyelids now from the years of torture in The Cell. However, her eyes maintain a bright amber color, like a fire ember flitting away from the show-stopping blaze.

 I knew my mother was a mage. People of the government say they are witches, but mother is nowhere near witch-like. Witches are hideous creatures that have warts on their noses and conjure black magic. My mom, however, says that the beauty of life and nature fuels magic in our society; and it brings out true human essence. Serpentine, though, bans the use of all magic stating that it is wrong, immoral, and that the world operates purely and justly by man-made machine. Not Mother Earth.

Mother has always strived to ring out true beauty in our days on Earth. She was born the day before Halloween, so she was kept under scrupulous watch by the government because Hallow’s Eve babies were highly cautioned and warned about. On my birthday, which was the day after, and much more scrupulously watched, she would conjure a beautiful pink rose to put in my hair. Her roses were sparkly and vibrant, just like her eyes. Mother was always conjuring roses, my favorite flower.  

However, on the night of my third birthday, I woke up to my father screaming and demanding at my mother to, once again, stop conjuring. He worked for the councilmen, an advisee to the higher-ups. His job was undesirable by most yet he showed pride in it. He knew my mother was a mage, and he beat her for it, though at night always apologizing. The government was starting to crack down on mage’s and weed them out from ‘normal’ society; stating that mage’s were the reason that we all will go to hell. Father never gave her up to The Committee though, like everyone in the nation is ordered to do if they have any suspicions of someone being magic.  He just told her to keep quiet so she wouldn’t get caught. He loved her, but not enough to be gentle to her. I always hated this about my father.

For the next several years mom stayed locked away in the house, like a beautiful princess awaiting her prince, which sadly, still hasn’t come yet. The day the government is overruled and magic can become the normal part of society like it once was, is when mom’s prince charming will come and save her, but for now, all magic people have to live under the radar in fear of being outlawed, stoned, or exiled to the north.

 

Chapter Two: Trouble Brewing

“To illuminate on the subject matter further, please open your books and turn to the section titled “Walking with Nature” in A Wanderers Guide to Out-door Hiking. The sound of ruffling pages and subtle groans shifted the energy in room 238B as my best friend and lazy comedian Mila quietly passed a folded note to me.

“What are you doing?” I whispered harshly. “You can’t do that or the professor will see--”

Suddenly Professor Krippler popped up next to me. “Professor will see what?” He proclaimed, his unshaven beard inches away from my nose. The way he accentuated the last ‘t’ syllable with extra emphasis sent a shudder down my spine.

“You would do well to hush your intrusive mouths and stop passing notes.” He snarled as he snatched the note from my fingers. “Pay attention”.      Krippler shredded the note to pieces as he walked back towards the front of the class as tiny bits of white paper fluttered behind him.

Mila smiled mischievously at me and looked precocious. She swished her hands under the desk with a pulling motion and sewed each of the tiny pieces back together in the air without a single finger touching the white paper. She was careful not to let Krippler see, who was standing with his back towards the board, as she glided her fingers through the air keeping the bits of fluttering white paper low to the white colored ground to disguise her from onlookers.

“Here, read it.” Mila mouthed with her lips. Her hands swished the note under my desk into my open hands lying in my lap. My eyes were wide with fear, as I opened the note soundlessly, and began to read it:

Mages beware- they’re after you

The words were scribbled in ominous red ink, the color of blood. My eyes were glued to the letters, noting the particular curvature of the word “beware”.

Professor Krippler snapped his head back, his eyes glaring out towards us, sensing a disturbance. Suspense filled Mila and I as he peered among us students. I silently pushed the note into the crease of my legs. Krippler turned back around and continued writing on the board.  I let out a tiny breath of relief as I looked at Mila, who sat in her chair with a sly smile.

“I swear that is the most boring class I’ve had to take yet.” Mila complained as we escaped the narrow doorway leading from the Hiking class. “I mean, who comes up with a Hiking class? When are we ever going to need to know the importance of ‘blowing gently into a roaring fire’ I swear Krippler can be so poetic it’s creepy”.

I have no idea why Hiking was even offered at school, and I wondered even more why Mila signed up for it in the first place if she hated it so much. Probably because Gabriel was in the class… Why then did I even sign up for it?

“I don’t know…” I said absent-mindedly, my mind still focused on the forbidden act Mila did in class. “You know, I can’t believe he didn’t catch you…I can’t believe even more no one saw you.”

Mila half smiled, “Yeah, me neither. Old Krippler sure is a prick, but he sometimes doesn’t make sense, it’s almost as if his overgrown beard clouds his judgment or something. Like, you think he would have caught me, but he didn’t. He didn’t say anything.”

“Yeah, weird isn’t it?” We stopped short in the hallway as we heard Professor Krippler and Dean Killstone speaking right around the corner. Mila grabbed me against the wall and perked her ears as we eavesdropped. In forced hushed tones we could hear Krippler and Killstone arguing:

            “You know the consequences, Dr. Krippler. Any sign of that disdainful magic and you have to report the student immediately to the Committee. I know of two students currently enrolled who I suspect are using that witchcraft. I will dismiss them as soon as the government gives me their word. I suspect you wouldn’t have any trouble handing children over to them, Luckas. After all, you did it to Liane-” Killstone was interrupted by a student asking him a question. Mila looked at me with an intrigued expression.

            “What was that all about? Who’s Liane?” Mila smirked as we turned the corner and walked towards home.

            “I’m not sure, what did he mean by two students? The only” I leaned in for a whisper, so no possible authority could hear, “Mage I know of is you.”

            “Beats me. Well, it’s whatever. I mean, I won’t get caught.” She said with a rather proud stance. “I’ve never been noticed. The only people who know are you and my brother Jasper. People can’t tell from the outside,” Mila obviously noticed my concerned expression, “I’ll be fine Kyrie”. She said.

We walked in silence along the dirt road as a soft breeze rustled the leaves in the trees; the purest form of magic. I noticed a flock of black birds escape the willows as a burst of wind blew through the branches. I remembered mom telling me that seeing that act of birds flying through trees was Mother Earth’s magic trying to send a message to us. I looked back to Mila,

            “Okay, well be careful”. I turned in the fork in the road to go to my house as Mila went the opposite way towards hers. The ancient, discolored, tattered sign on the worn down fence separating the two roads proclaimed: ‘No Magics Allowed’. I had been seeing this sign for years, and looked like no authority was ever going to polish it up. We live too far from the city for people to read the sign anyway except for Mila and Jasper and my family.  I looked at Mila.

            “See ya later.” she said.

            “See ya.” I said with a bowed head, my mind in thought, as I walked up the dusty road to my worn-out house.

I thought about how Mila must be so lonely living alone with her twin brother, Jasper. The government kidnapped their parents three years after they were born, right before my family moved here from the other side of the nation. My family raised them like my siblings until we built them a house on the opposite side of the dirt road from us. They turn 18 in a year, I only have a little while left with them until they, and myself, get placed into jobs in the society.

 

I can’t sleep. The fear of what could happen to Mila plagues my dreams. I lay awake in my bed thinking about the things Krippler and Killstone said earlier today in the hallway. Who is the second mage in the school? Who was Liane and what did Krippler do to her? Then the big question entered my brain, why was something so natural as magic even banned in the first place??

Before the apocalypse, magic was a normal everyday occurrence. It was quick, efficient, and people were healthier thanks to the healing mages. My mother was a garden mage; she conjured and made flowers of all sorts. She was right hand woman to Mother Earth. She was the sole provider of beauty for the society. I was never passed down the magic gene, though. I guess I was passed down my father’s genes. There were many other types of mages as well, and there were also people called magics, people who simply did magic for the hell of it, witches were definitely in this category. They neither benefitted the society nor did wrong. They were typically mixed with non-mage people and usually could not control their magic powers. These people were usually the first to be spotted by the government, and most, if not all, have already been abducted and placed in The Cell.

When the apocalypse happened, my mother had to go into hiding with a group of people who bunkered 500 feet under the ground. I was not yet born; in fact, my father was not yet born either. Queen Mother Earth attacked her people and every living thing on the planet during the wars. The apocalypse happened nearly 1000 years ago so, in theory, my mother is technically 1035 years old…She just says she’s a ripe old 35, though. I’m also supposed to keep this a secret from my dad. However, once he starts getting around 60, and she still looks 35, a problem could possibly arise…

But for now, I lay awake thinking about how I had been sheltered my whole life; daydreaming about how I hardly saw the world as a child, and how even more I wished I could have seen the world my mother lived in a long time ago. I was practically brought up in a cage with the door locked, my mom says.

My father, who is an official for the city, kept me away from the outside world, only giving me a few hours a day to go outside and play; he always said he wanted to protect me from outside danger (or at least from magic). My mother, who was against boarding anyone up, would sometimes sneak me to the outside yard and show me how to tend the flowers when dad was away at work. On my third birthday, my mom unlocked me out of my room, and took me to a patch in the yard and showed me what true beauty was.

She took me over to a straggly bush with twiggy branches and about three rats nest embedded inside it.

“Mommy, this plant is dead. It can’t do nothing.” I remember saying.

“Anything, sweetheart, remember your grammar. And yes, it can do many things” She corrected me sweetly. Mom swished her fingers in a cyclone spiral as a bright red rose began to bloom under her will. I remember my eyes lighting up when I saw the rose bush coming to life.

“Wow, Mommy! Make more, make more!” I exclaimed.

Mom conjured the whole bush to blossom into thirty different colors of roses and the whole garden came to life with a magical vibrancy. The yard transformed into a magical oasis of childhood youth and splendor. My eyes sparkled and glowed as mom conjured beautiful roses and daffodils and lilies into a wreath to wear on my gold hair. For three whole hours mom spun her hands and wove her fingers to create a paradise of roses, lilies, hydrangeas, and violets, all in hues of red, pink, purple and blue. We created rose beds and played hide and seek. We transformed our human bodies into works of floral art. We laughed in each other’s faces and blew petals in the air then danced under them as they slowly spiraled back down to Earth.

However, this magical moment was suddenly cut short when the sound of a car door slamming forced my mom to abandon her smile and kill all the flowers in the garden with one quick swish of her hands. She stood with her hands behind her back, knowing full well what was about to happen. I stood innocent with a single red petal twisted in my blonde strands. I watched dad pelt up the garden path towards us with a fiery glare in his eyes as he said,

“Kim! What the hell were you just doing!?” He looked around at the dead twigs and brown crinkled petals surrounding mom’s feet. She lowered her eyes as her husband demanded to know.

“Answer me!” I saw my mom wince, his words sharp in her ear.

Mom whispered down to me, “ Kyrie, go to your room, now.” The next thing I remember is backing away slowly, and then bolting inside the house. I barely heard my mother telling my dad, “I was doing nothing, I promise you! I was telling Kyrie to pick up the dead blossoms, because they are unsightly.” Her voice trailed away as I ran up the dirty steps.

            “You lie. You’ll tell me the truth!” I heard dad backhand her across the face. I made it to my room and watched from my window and watched my mother walk back inside as my dad kicked around our once sparkling garden. I cried myself to sleep, stroking the red petal between my fingers.

 

I got out of bed and went to that same window. The same window I’ve looked out for all these years. I opened the tiny locket box I had on the sill and inside pulled out the dried up, crinkly brown petal that surprisingly hasn’t disintegrated yet. I looked at the yard outside, how dead it was. Barren, unfertile, like a tree that lost its leaves in the cold. Mom always said the cold seasons were a time that lacked magic; that if you wanted to truly find magic and experience it, you had to wait till the warmer seasons. But mom could make a rose bush blossom right out of the snow for me to see if she wanted to, given that Dad wasn’t around.

Right now it’s the middle of the cool season. Not quite cold, not warm, but cool and breezy. In the next few weeks or so it will start getting warmer mom says. Afterwards, in the next cycle of cold seasons, is my birthday. I have to get through this next warm season and then I will turn 18. I was born on the coldest day of the year my mom says, but I was a ray of sunshine on a cloudy day for her. My father couldn’t make it to my birth. He was too busy at the office. But my mom had a midwife and she said that when I was born, my bright blonde hair and green eyes shone like diamonds as the snow and ice pelted the window outside. My mother often phrased things in poetic ways. That was one thing I loved about her.

I lean back in bed with a smile on my face thinking about my mother. I hold the tiny box containing the last bit of my childhood as I slowly drift off to sleep, and forget all about the troubles in this world.

 

Chapter Three: Bunk-Bed Bunker Nightmare

I wake up in cold, dimly lit cellar, with walls only 6 inches above my head. Where I am? I’m definitely not in Brin, the village I’ve known and grown up in my whole life. My dirty, unkempt house is nowhere to be seen. Just a cold damp cellar. It looks like a bunker. I feel a presence, and then suddenly people start showing up, but I can’t get their attention. “Hey!” I shout out. Nothing. One woman, dressed in a primitive black fuzzy jacket sits alone at a table, reading an untitled book. And about 12 other people sit at the opposite side of the room. They wear black, most of them, and fur coats and jackets, but they don’t look like the people I’ve seen back at home. They’re more built, with defined jaws and cheekbones, and have thicker hair. I hug my shoulders, realizing how cold it is and wishing I had one of their fuzzy jackets.

One man with a baldhead and scruffy black beard starts talking. He looks as if he’s a leader of some sort. I walk up to them, unnoticed, and sit down beside one of the women; I listen.

“By our charts we should be able to leave the bunker in about a year. The destruction wiped nearly seven billion people, except for several stragglers in parts of Russia and the Nordic countries, and us thirteen in Canada. It appears the majority of people below the Equator have perished according to our latest equipment.”

He pointed to a big machine with a map of what looks like the world, spewing out data and radar signals. The continents look too separated to me, though. We only have five continents; in this display I count seven. Suddenly it dawns on me, this must be a flashback from the apocalypse! I wonder what I’m doing here and if this is dream, but I listen closer:

“According to recent data, we thirteen here in this bunker in Northern Canada are the only survivors from the North and South American Continents. It seems our plan of burying our bunker deep down into the depths of ice saved us after all!”

The crowd cheers.

“Our destroyer, whom brought on this apocalypse, is still out there, according to our tracking data of the substance Magonium B25. Otherwise known as, The Magic Particle.”

The crowd boos. The woman reading the book shuts it defiantly. The others don’t notice. I keep listening:

“Once the system detects a decrease in this substance can we know it is safe to venture outside and see what Mageiane, or ‘Queen Mother Earth’ as she likes to be called” He said in a mocking tone, “our blasphemous murderer and destroyer of Earth, has done to our poor planet! Afterwards, we shall repopulate Earth and create a magic-free land in which values and virtues are held first in hand and no one will have to suffer another ex-communicable act such as magic! Magic is the sole purpose why our people died. Our ancestors burned witches at the stake and we shall one day do the same to Mageiane and all other magic peoples! She is why our Earth is no more. Ever since people found out that magic was more efficient, people’s greed multiplied and instant gratification became a normal thing. It was as if our technology had no meaning to them! We created technology to aid our fellow humans. But with the discovery of Magonium B25, it seems that all hell broke loose with the spawn of mutant creatures such as witches entering our world. Didn’t it!?” He roared. That isn’t at all what happened. How could he think this??

“We must bring back the Word of the Creator and destroy The Destroyer! Magic shall be banned and all experiments and people containing the particle shall forever be tortured and put away in a holding cell for future experimentation and to figure out its origins. We will put a stop to Mageiane and her vicious witchy ways. She who destroyed our land shall one day meet Teh, the creator! And we will live technologically, with order, the right way!”

He concluded and the crowd erupted; except for the woman reading her book. These guys were seriously off their rockers. There was no such thing as magiuninium or whatever he called it. Mom says magic is the most natural part of human nature; that true magic is found in everyday life. If you possess the ability to harness and tame energy, then you have the ability to experience magic in its truest form. Like leaves blowing through trees and the simplicity of beauty. Magic is only realized when a special being, like mom and Mila harness a truly kind and selfless spirit, only then can you witness true beauty. I, on the other hand, do not possess magical ability for some reason my mom and I are still yet stumped about. Whilst thinking about this, I ventured around the bunker and found numerous posters and newspapers. The bunker was only 200 feet wide and 6 feet tall so there wasn’t much to explore.

 The realization that I was time traveling in my dreams fascinated me. How was this possible? My dream thoughts traveled a mile a minute as the fact dawned on me that these people were of the civilization from before the apocalypse. The only information I know of about this time was from the book mom stole. I wonder how much of what I’m witnessing she already knows too.

I pick up a newspaper sitting on a side table and noticed the date- March 15^th, 2015. I love how way back when people had specific dates for things, we only have cold and warm seasons and yesterday, today, and tomorrow. We don’t time stamp our days. The government doesn’t let the people know specific times in fear that we will be able to better plan a rebellion, which I’m sure people could do anyway without defined time. We read the sun and go by the shadows.

 

I look down and read the newspaper I’m holding out in front of me.

The headline reads-

MAGICS RECRUITED, MAGEIANE AND TEHNOS DUEL IT OUT

IN A RECENT UPDATE, MAGEIANE, SELF-ACCLAIMED SORCERERESS, HAS DECLARED WAR ON TEHNOS, LEAD COMPANY OF TECHNOLOGICAL AFFAIRS FOR EARTH, A COMPANY STARTED IN THE 21^ST CENTURY THAT ‘PROMOTES EFFICIENCY AND PAVES THE WAY TO THE FUTURE’. IN AN ALL OUT POLITICAL AND MORAL DEBATE, MAGEIANE WAS QUOTED AS SAYING, “I STAND FOR NATUAL BEAUTY, FOR MAGIC, FOR HUMAN COMPATIBILTY.” TEHNOS’ CEO, JURO VARN, SAID IN RESPONSE, “MAGIC IS WORK OF THE DEVIL. TECHNOLOGY IS EFFICIENT AND MAN MADE, THEREFORE MAKING IT EASIER TO PRODUCE AND PROVIDE AN INCOME AND JOB OPPORTUNITES TO OUR PEOPLE. WHAT YOU DO IS FORBIDDEN UNDER OUR RELIGION AND WE AS LEAD PROVIDER OF THE WORLD, WILL NOT STAND FOR IT.”

LATER THIS MONTH, AS MAGEIANE HAS STATED, SHE WILL DO ANYTHING SHE CAN TO RECREATE EARTH AND RETURN IT TO ITS ‘NATURAL’ PLACE WHERE MAGIC IS THE SOLE SOURCE OF INCOME, MEDICINE, AND HUMANISITIC SOCIETY. WE ARE ADVISED TO BUNKER AND PREPARE FOR THE WORST. A ONCE UNITED PEOPLE, TEHNOS AND MAGEIANE ARE PREPARED TO FIGHT FOR THE TITLE OF WORLD LEADER. THEY ARE PREPARED TO END EVERYTHING WE KNOW.

A note at the bottom scribbled in red ink says, “TEHNOS lies, Mageiane cries”

Confused and bewildered, I find myself walking towards a dull yellow poster with burnt edges. On it is a picture of a logo that reads:

TEHNOS: YOUR WORLD WIDE PROVIDERS OF QUICK, EASY, EFFICIENT DATA ACCESS TO ANYTHING YOU MOST DESIRE. FOOD, CLOTHING, TECHNOLOGY, WE PROVIDE IT ALL! VISIT YOUR NEAREST TEHNOS SUPERCENTER FOR ALL YOUR NEEDS!

Tehnos, that name does ring a bell now that I think about it. There’s a supercenter called Tehnos in the upper part of the nation but hardly anyone visits anymore. It’s run down, abandoned almost. It’s littered with ancient gadgets and devices that we no longer use. We don’t use technology. In the stolen book it says people a long time ago carried devices in their pockets to call people across the world. Well, that’s not very hard these days. Our world is small, only about a 100,000 people. If you want to talk to someone on the other side you just take a train and visit them.

We have some forms of technology, though, like trains, and trolleys, but no one has their own personal mode of transportation or personal phones. We have indoor plumbing but no electricity. Only politicians get that luxury. I read that people back then had electricity in almost every room, though. Our government, The Serpentine, who has been in power since we were created, prohibits technology for commoners, and they have also outlawed the use of magic. They promote simple living that is devoted to the Creators, Evadmae. Our people have lived for 1000 years p.a. (post- apocalypse).

Suddenly I’m spun around mid-thought and find myself in the arms of the woman who was reading the book. Frightened, I stare into her vibrant yellow eyes. She’s hauntingly beautiful. I stand mesmerized as she grabs my shoulders and says very harshly, “Do not repeat what you see and the master will give you the key”. I jerk back and awaken violently in my room. I’m drenched in sweat. I brush my blonde hair out of my eyes and grab a pen and some paper and immediately write down the eerie riddle the woman told me.

CHAPTER FOUR: THE GODDESS OF WINNEPIG LIBRARY

 

         I wake up the next morning to an unnatural silence; normally the house is filled with pots and pans clamoring downstairs from mom making the morning meal. Dad usually sets out to work at four in the morning, so mom always conjures the dishes to clean and cook themselves, however, they normally fight over who the better pan is. It’s quite a funny sight. But this morning, all I can hear is emptiness. Like the whole world drained itself of its people, plants, trees, animals and everything, even the magic. I go downstairs to find Mom sleeping on the couch, curled up in a handmade blanket. Half of her face is smooshed into the pillow. Her eyelashes look as if they were glued down to her cheeks.

         “Mom…” I say, gently shaking her shoulder. “Why are you down here? Why aren’t you in the bedroom?”

Silence.

“Mom?”

Silence.

What’s wrong with her, I wonder. I shake her shoulder more violently now, but careful not to hurt her.

“Mom!!” The realization of the possibility of her being dead sinks in. I panic but remind myself to stay calm. I notice the slight rise and fall of her chest. She’s breathing. Slowly and softly, but she’s alive.

I walk away thinking she’s just in a deep sleep. I walk over to the pots and pans and they prepare me a slice of toast and orange juice for breakfast. The toaster oven turns itself on and pops out a hot burnt piece of toast onto a plate for me to eat.

“Thanks” I say sarcastically, feeling pitiful for the old, over used, pots and pans that mom refuses to replace. She’s had the magical set since she first learned to cook and now doesn’t ever want to get rid of them. They turn the magic part off when dad wants to use them, but it’s mostly mom that does the cooking. After the pots and pans fail miserably to pour my orange juice, I head out to see Mila and Jasper.

         As I stroll down the lane to their house I notice a peculiar shift in the wind’s energy. It’s violent at first with huge pockets of wind hurling at me, and then it’s soft and gentle and breezy. Mila and Jasper greet me as I walk up to their house.

         “Hey Kyrie.” Jasper says to me as Mila only just half smiles at me.

         “What’s wrong Mila?” Mila stares straight ahead into a void that Jasper and I can’t see. I wave my hand in front of her eyes. Nothing.

         “Oh, she hasn’t spoken since last night. I don’t know what’s up with her. Probably some mage thing that I will never understand.”

         “Funny, my mom was dead asleep on the couch when I woke up just now, I wonder what’s going on.”

         “I don’t know. Hey, let’s go get some tea at the Tea Shoppe. Maybe that will perk Mila up.” He says to his twin sister with a gentle jab to the ribs. She doesn’t budge.

         This is really odd, I think. Mila is never quiet. She always has something on her mind to say. Her unusual silence is really beginning to worry me. As we’re walking the long trek to the Tea Shoppe, Mila stops and listens to the birds singing in the trees. Two crows are gawking at each other and fighting over a piece of bread as two finches whistle to each other in the next branch over. Jasper and I grab Mila’s arms and get her to walk beside us again. Suddenly, as if out of nowhere, one of our classmates appears a few kilometers down the road. I squint to see who it is. Gabriel.

“Gabriel? What’s he doing here? He lives on the opposite side of the village.” Jasper notices a second after I do.

“I’m not sure. He’s coming this way, though.”

Gabriel comes closer and immediately Jasper and I notice the blank expression on his face.

“Hey Gabriel, what are you doing"”

And just like that he brushes right past us, without saying hello or anything. Mila doesn’t even stop to ogle at him. She just stares straight ahead as if something is controlling her. At this point, Jasper and I are really starting to think something is up. First my mom asleep on the couch and not responding to me waking her, then Mila’s stoned expression since last night, and now Gabriel, walking aimlessly right past our shoulders…

I turn to Jasper and we both decide that something needs to happen- we have to get to the bottom of this.

 

Not knowing what to do, Jasper and I went back to his house to sit Mila down and try anything to wake her up. We splashed her with cold water, hot water, and when that didn’t work, we yelled at her a couple times. Knowing we were both being complete idiots and flabbergasted by the situation, we decided to consult mom’s book that she stole from her workplace several years ago. I remembered in a sort of eureka moment as Jasper played with the books on the shelf in their living room as we sat there wondering what to do. We walked back to my house, leaving Mila in her living room. She was stone silent, there wasn’t anything she would possibly do, and we lived so far out from town that it was unlikely for someone to bother her.

“I think she kept it under the floorboard in the kitchen.” I say as we take the screwdriver from the kitchen cabinet and unscrew several nuts and bolts to take apart the floorboards.

“I don’t know which one it is!” I say as we unearth half the kitchen. Mom still dead asleep even after all the ruckus we’ve made. We tear up forty "two boards in my kitchen, enough to see the dirt on the ground below the house from where we’re working.

“How are we going to fix this?” I exclaim.

After two hours of constant digging and searching we finally have a victorious moment.

“Found it!” Jasper at last exclaims as we finished destroying the floor.

He pulls out a very worn-out distressed book from the farthest floorboard in the kitchen right next to the outer wall. We both peer inside it as we gently pull back the cover. A creaking sound escapes its spine as it struggles to open without breaking it’s back. It coughs.

“Did you hear " the book just coughed!” Jasper exclaims.

“No it didn’t, it’s just an old book.” I say, disbelieving him.

“No seriously, it coughed! Listen!” We both press our ears to the pages of the book and wait…

“Get out of my face!” The book screams at us. Jasper and I jump back, appalled that this book just spoke to us, and in an unfriendly manner at that.

“What did you just say?! You’re a book!” I scream back to it.

“That’s right I’m a book! And my name is Ingrid if you must know. Now place me down"gently! Please, what do you all want with a book like me and why have I been forced to live under your disgusting floor for years on end?!”

Jasper and I look at each other, trying frantically to come up with something to say to a book for mother’s sake.

“Um, Ingrid…” I start, “We need your help.”

“You need my help. And that’s why I suppose you dug me up, eh?! Well, I very much want to be returned to my home. I was quite happy and pleased with my shelf before that mage stole me from my bed!”

“That mage happens to be my mom and she’s in a lot of trouble! We need you to help her.”

“There’s nothing I can do until I’m in my true form.”

“True form? What do you mean?” Jasper asked Ingrid.

“I… if you must know, am Ingrid. Sister to Mother Earth’s true form.”

“And who is Mother Earth’s true form? What is this ‘true form’ thing you talk about anyway?” I wondered.

“True forms are the human versions of us deities. Mother Earth is your goddess, I am simply her sister. Her true form’s name is Mageiane.”

That name. It rings a bell. I think back to when I may have heard it.

“Mageiane? Well what makes your secondary form a book?” Jasper asks.

“I am a book because I am the goddess of pure wisdom. My sister and I are two parts to the same whole. She is the goddess of life, and I, the goddess of wisdom. When both of these things are combined, we create humanity.” Ingrid said with a matter of fact tone.

“Okay, how then do we get you to your true form?”  Jasper asks.

“Oh that will take some time. But for now, I will offer you a deal. You want me to help your mom, right? Well, get me back to my home and I’ll tell you everything you need to know.”

“So you know what’s wrong with her then?”

“Not quite, but my book holds many truths. I am sure I can figure it out.”

“Mageiane. She’s the destroyer. The person who created the apocalypse.” I say.

“Yes, that is correct. And I feel in my spine that another one is soon to happen. But don’t you worry! Get me back to my shelf and I will more than happily tell you all there is to know.”

“Okay, well where is your shelf, your home?”

“The National Library of the States in Winnepig, Wyoming. See, it’s on my spine!” The brown and dusty book shifts to show us her spine: on it says, WYOMING LIBRARY L.A.K. K452 .84. I look at the spine wondering what LAK and the numbers stand for.

“Winnepig, Wyoming? What’s a Wyoming?” Jasper wonders.

“Why, it’s a state! Aren’t we in America?”

“America?” Jasper and I both say at the same time.

“Oh no…” Ingrid says, “This is bad. This is very bad! What year is it and what state are we in?!” She says very frantically.

“Um, we don’t have states. We have a nation, though. We’re in Brin Village in the Nation of Teope. We’re sometime in year 1000, 1000 years after the apocalypse. There’s only about 100,000 of us humans on Earth.” I say to Ingrid, remembering all the national history we had to learn in history lessons.

“Oh my, oh my. Is that why my spine is labeled “Our Predecessors?” I thought this old book had to do with Neanderthals!”

“Wait, so you don’t even know what your own book is about??” Jasper asks disbelievingly.

And just like that a blinding white light pierces through the front title of the book and out comes a blonde haired, fair skinned, naked woman. Jasper and my jaw drops as Ingrid transforms into an enchanting human woman. She is absolutely stunning with an unmistakable, faint, white glow surrounding her entire being. She is completely and utterly different than the dirty, falling-apart book she just transformed out of.

“Ah, that’s better. Oh my! I need clothes!” She says as she looks down at herself. She grabs the closest thing next to her, the kitchen tablecloth and makeshifts a dress out of the stained white fabric. She swishes her hands and cuts and sews a beautiful lace dress from the cloth. It doesn’t even look like the thing it used to be.

Our mouths stay wide open as Ingrid holds the book in her hand. She opens and checks it out, and then stuffs it into the pocket she sewed.

“Hey! Since you did magic on the tablecloth, you think you could fix up Kyrie’s kitchen here?” Jasper said with a smile.

Ingrid swished and pulled and grappled with her fingers and hands until every floorboard was magically put back into place.

“Phew,” I said, “Now my dad won’t kill me!”

Ingrid smiled as we thanked her.

“Now that I’m free I suppose we have a bigger problem on our hands! I apologize for not being aware that my sister already completed the apocalypse. I have been trapped in that book longer than I thought! Well, now that Wyoming no longer exists I suppose I’ll never see my shelf again.” She said with a frown, her now extremely bubbly attitude surfacing. “In any case, I’ll be willing to solve your mystery if you can help me on this second condition.”

We both nod our heads.

“Take me to my sister.”

Jasper and I look at each other skeptically.

“But, we don’t even know where she is, or what she is, or if she even exists!”

“Oh, she exists alright. She’s not in true form, however, I can sense it.”

“What form is she in then?”

“Her secondary, she is in the form of a beluga whale.”

Jasper and I have really had it now.

“And how exactly are we supposed to find a beluga whale?! The ocean takes up more than three fourths of Earth now! We’ll never find her!”

“Of course we’ll find her! She’s my sister! With my knowledge and her being in the biggest form of life there is we’ll for sure find her!”

I looked over to where my mom was sleeping. If waking her from her sleep meant finding a gigantic whale then I’d do it. I could see Jasper felt the same way about his sister. And Gabriel. I didn’t know he was magic. He must only be half though because a second after Ingrid reassured us, we heard a knock on the door.

“I’ll get it.” I said.

“Gabriel…what are you doing here?”

“Hi, Kyrie. Um, something funny is going on with the wind and birds and everything, and well, half the population of Teope, too.”

“Yeah we noticed…” At this moment, he peered in and saw the beautiful enchantress radiating light in my kitchen.

“Who’s this?” He said, looking her up and down.

“This is Ingrid, um, goddess of knowledge.”

“Wow, this is day is just getting weirder and weirder!”

“You, my boy, I see you have it within you.” Ingrid said with a suddenly serious expression. “We must extricate it from him immediately, or else they will take him away too.” Ingrid said gravely.

“What do you mean, take him away?” I inquired.

“Now I see why you needed to find me. This boy, I see it in his soul. Someone has implanted within him a tracking device and a sedative to control his mind. However, he resists it quite strongly. You’re only half mage, aren’t you, boy?”

“Yes, my grandmother was one and I got it passed down from her. Both my parents aren’t alive.”

“This is why he is able to resist it for some period of time. He may succumb to it at points but for the most part he’ll be okay if we find him the elixir of retaliation.”

“What is that?” Gabriel wondered.

“It’s a special draught sought by those who wish to rebel against governmental forces. I see that Tehnos, or, what is now called Evadmae, right, are the ones controlling who lives and dies as a mage, correct?”

“Yeah, that’s been the source of our oppression our whole lives. My mom and best friend constantly have to hide or disappear into the society.”

“Right, and my grandma took care of me after my parents were slaughtered by the government…” Gabriel said, dragging the energy down with him. We all stood a moment’s silence.

“Okay, so we know that it’s time to seek action, right?” Ingrid said excitedly. She was jumping up and down, ready to start this adventure that she’d been hoping for since she was locked away on a shelf. Her white glow radiated a good two feet out from her actual being. We all smiled with her as she jumped for joy.

“Just tell us what we have to do, Ingrid. We need to fix mom, Mila and parts of Gabriel before it’s too late.”

She nodded her head and took out the book that was in her pocket. She drew out a map from the back of the book and circled an island, thousands and thousands of miles from our nation, which looks like is situated on what used to be the capital city of America. We packed several things from my house, clothes, non-perishable food items, and anything else and set out. I went upstairs and tore through my belongings, grabbing a roomy but small bag that held a pen and notepad, a few herbal medicines that mom conjured up last week, several loaves of burnt bread made by the dough maker, a canteen for water and iodine drops, three shirts and two pairs of pants, and two pairs of underwear. I scribbled down a quick note to my dad, too:

Dad,

I know this is short notice, but my school has planned a trip to go to the other end of the nation in Monter Village. I wanted to say bye before I left. Mom is passed out on the couch, I don’t know why. But she won’t wake up. I don’t know how long I’ll be away, it’s kind of an abroad study program type thing. No need to worry, Grandma lives over there and I figured I’d stay with her. I’ll keep in touch.

- Kyrie

I felt badly for just leaving him, but he was never truly there for me anyway. Honestly, he probably wouldn’t even notice I was gone until tomorrow morning. I don’t know what he’d do about mom though. She wasn’t responding to anything. I came back downstairs, pinned the note to the icebox and said,

“Are we ready to go, guys?”

Gabriel and Jasper nodded at me but Ingrid looked at me with a peculiar smile.

“What?” I said.

Just then, Ingrid grabbed all of our hands with her left and with a quick snap of her fingers we were transported to a world I, Gabriel, and Jasper, have never seen before.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Author's Note

This is the first four chapters of The Rose Cauldron. Let me know what you think.