AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Teleporting with Ronny's hand in mine is an odd sensation. It's like we're on a spinning top with our vertigo off balance and our sight blinded for the duration of the travel. When we land, however, there's no lasting effects and the time it took to get here was mere seconds.
Looking around the area in which we landed, I see there are hikers and joggers. Not many but enough that they should be panicking at the six people who just popped into existence.
"Do they not see us standing here?" My question is answered by a female jogger running through our bodies without a second glance.
"I have us cloaked because this place has been a public park for ages. No mortal can see or feel us."
Once the humans leave the area, Ronny and her sisters drop the cloaks.
We make our way to the scattered picnic tables and sit at one to figure out where to go next.
Everything looks so different here. In our time there were far less people and the land was wilder. The late seventeenth century was such a new beginning for the people of what was then called Louisiane. We lived in simple homes made of flat stones, logs and mud.
Looking at the visitor's building I see even that looks modern to what I grew up in.
I follow the trails with my eyes and in my mind I can picture chasing my hound as he ran through the trees after rabbits. The trees look bigger and much older but I can still see young Drac and Draven racing up the trees to see who can reach the highest.
"Drug? You okay?" Ronny asks quietly as her sisters separate items in their bags.
Her eyes are bright blue and concerned. Why?
"You were growling like a weirdo, dude." Roxy says without looking up from the pages I know she can't read. I swear, that little pink monster is Drac's doppelganger.
Ignoring her, I answer Ronny, "Yeah, I'm good. This place just brings back a shit ton of memories, things I haven't thought of for centuries."
A hiker passes by and stares at us as he passes. He stumbles when Drac barks like a rabid dog and Roxy falls into a peal of laughter. Yeah, and I'm the weirdo.
"Things certainly have changed around here but as I look around, memories start to come back to me." Draven says as he looks up at the treetops, probably remembering how many hours we spent in them waiting for small prey to wander close enough for our bows.
"Remember when we planned to hang Merelda from a branch?" Drac asks with a laugh. The memory comes back to me like a flash.
Merelda was jealous that Father helped Drac carve a bird for our mother. She took the bird and threw it into the flames of the hearth and slapped our mother.
While mother cried, Merelda screamed, 'Your worthless runts should be learning magic, not playing with toys for their craftless mother.'
Father threw her out of the house for it but it was as if a spell kept him from completely disowning her. Merelda always came back.
We planned to hang her from the tree used to carve the bird from.
"Too bad you didn't. I'd take not existing than having that horrible woman alive." Ronny's voice cuts through the dark memory.
As much as I hate Merelda and her wickedness, looking at Ronny and knowing her more and more, I can't picture life without her now. I can easily see Drac and Draven have yet to reach the same conclusion for Roxy and Rory. More so Draven.
He's never been one to want love or a partner. He took the brunt of Merelda's cruelty and perhaps it has made him the hard hearted man he is. Rory has a long road, if any, ahead of her with him.
"Were you guys born here?" Rory questions Dray.
"Yes. I can't remember the dates but it was during the French Colonial Empire in the seventeenth century. A very different time."
"Hmm, that's where the sexy accent comes from." Ronny says with an elbow to my ribs.
I chuckle at that and throw my arm over her shoulder, grabbing the book she was looking at. It feels so natural to banter with her. I can see what kind of human couple we would have made had we met long ago. Although, I can't quite picture this gothic girl in colonial clothing washing linens on a washboard. Still, she feels right by my side.
"The writer of these books was French." I bring the topic back to more important matters.
"Have you any idea what the talisman could be?"
I look through the pages and reread what Darren told us earlier but it all seems like a riddle. No real starting point aside from the fact that the items will be in a place that meant something to Merelda.
