Call Out My Name

EPISODE ELEVEN

“In 1987” she paused, her voice sounded strained. Grabbing her bottle, she gulped down its content. Her hands shook, she rubbed them to calm herself down. “I was in a car accident. I was seventeen. I was a really stupid teenager. We were drunk driving. It happened so fast. Next thing I know, I’m dead. My parents didn’t bury me. They found witches who agreed to help. They brought me back to life with necromancy”

“At what cost?” I leaned towards her. She shook her head, whimpering.

“My little brother” she gasped. As cruel as it was of me, I was relieved a witch wasn’t the cost.

Brady dropped Leah’s hand, tucking her hands between her thighs, eyes wide and lips trembling. Carl had his mouth covered with his hand.

“That’s normal” I muttered to myself.

“Normal? You call killing a child normal?” Brady was upset. Really upset.

“For a life to return, a heavy price must be paid. Most at times, it’s a life for a life” I explained.

“Your parents couldn’t have known. Maybe the witches didn’t tell them” Brady comforted Leah but it pissed me off.

Was she calling my people evil? I looked around, the cafeteria was empty by then. The bell had rung a long while back and we were the only ones there. We could get in trouble.

“Velarys” I waved my hand around the room. The air shifted, green sparkles suspending in the atmosphere. “It’s a spell. We won’t be heard and we won’t get caught” I elaborated. My Vosh was still perfect and so were my spells.

“A witch always tells you the cost of a spell. It’s a code. No matter how corrupt or rotten or evil a witch is, she never casts a spell without telling the costs. She’s bound to say it. It’s in our blood. Whether we like it or not. It’s how my mother made us” I hissed at Brady.

“Your mother made you guys?” Leah frowned.

“My mother was the first witch, conceived under moonlight with powers that no one had ever seen. She turned women into witches by putting a piece of her in them. Called them the first ladies. It is how witches have been called since forever” I said.

“My mother knew the price. She told me so herself” Leah coughed into a tissue, defending the witches who had brought her back to life. What kind of mother was she? Why would she give the life of her child to save the other? It wasn’t adding up.

“What was your curse?” I asked.

“Immortality” she replied.

“Curse? I don’t understand anything” Carl looked utterly confused.

“A curse. A life for a life but a curse is the price” I recited. “She paid for her life with her brother’s, her change was a curse—immortality. It’s like buying something from a shop, your money is too much, they give you change. In necromancy, life is a hefty price to pay so your change is a curse for taking another’s life just so you could live”

“Wait. Shouldn’t her parents be the ones to pay the price?” Brady seemed outraged but I didn’t make the rules.

“I didn’t make the rules. The one who was resurrected pays the price not the people who did the resurrection or the ones who wanted it to happen”

"From now, no more secrets. All of you" Brady spoke, her tone serious as she looked around the table.

“What are you going to do? You’re a witch. If anyone finds out, you’re dead” Carl said.

“You think I don’t know?” I gritted. “I do but for what I have planned, I need your help. All of you”

“I might not have really liked Toby but you still killed him” Leah admitted.

“Who even liked him? He was pushy and a p*****t too” Brady chuckled, the tension slowly ebbed away.

“We’re bad friends” Carl banged his head against the table.

“He was worse” Brady gasped. “I mean come on, a panther prince”

We laughed.

“I’ll help” Leah squeaked. “I have a debt to pay to your people. Even if it costs me a lot, they risked their lives to give me mine”

“I got nothing better to do. It sounds fun and I would kill for a magical adventure. Normal is boring” Brady rolled her eyes.

“I’m scared but I’m more curious” Carl winked at me.

I had my team now. We were all going home even if I drag them screaming.

At home, Soren was behind my door when I opened it. He had bags under his eyes and a cut on his upper lip. What happened to him?

“I wanted to talk to you” he rasped.

I did not want to talk to him. I wanted to talk to Aysa but he was nowhere to be found and once again, he wasn't replying to any of my texts.

“Of course. We have a lot to talk about” I stood aside, signaling him to enter.

“Your hair’s still silver” he pointed at it.

“So….”

“I thought it’d be gone”

“I was born with it Soren. It’s not just gonna go”

We took a seat on the couch, he looked like he had so much to say and didn’t know where to start.

“I knew who you were when I first saw you” he cleared his throat.

“Why were you enrolled in highschool? You’re over two hundred years old and in highschool?” I asked.

“I was bored” I didn’t believe him. He was lying to me.

“Why didn’t you turn me in? Give me up to your father”

“Because I love you Alphea” he jumped to his feet. “Since Valrok. For two hundred and eight years, I have loved only you”

I pursed my lips, amusement dancing in my eyes. I was a horrible person. Here, a prince was baring his heart out to me and I was trying my hardest not to laugh. What was wrong with me? I couldn’t hold it back, laughter bubbled out of me.

“You’ve been counting” I laughed harder, clutching my stomach. The nerve of him. How dare he preach love to me?

“Alphea. I’m your mate” he furrowed his brows at me.

My laughter died down and my smile dropped. A piece of the cold icy feeling I had kept bottled up for years run through me like a chill. My heart iced over even when I fought against the feeling.

“You imbecile. You spineless gutless fool.” I breathed, standing chest to chest with him. “Who’s fault is it that we're not together? Huh? Who’s fault” I shoved him.

“Mine” he whispered.

“I can’t hear you. You sounded louder when you were announcing that we were mates” I gesticulated wildly. “So tell me. Who’s. Fault. Is it?”

“Mine” he spoke out louder this time, looking me in the eye.

I let out a bitter laugh. “Thank you though. For not selling me out to your father” I took a few steps away from him. “Again” I added.

“I am sorry for what I did and I will be probably for the rest of my life but I need my mate” he begged.

“Find another one because this one is done with your s**t” I shrugged. A moment passed between us. A moment of understanding.

We would never be. It wasn't only because he always chose his father over me but because I always chose someone else over him. A boy I loved, a boy I was hoping would come back to me now that I remembered everything.

“Tell me what happened. Tell me everything. Everything”

“I can show you,” he said, smiling. I knew what he was suggesting but I was still weak. I doubted I could cast a memory spell but the fact that he was willing to make himself vulnerable to me, surrender himself to me, did things to me.

I smirked. Aysa would be so proud of me right now. I was about to get inside Soren's head. Goddess, how Aysa hated Soren.

Soren had always known how to play the game and now he held a very powerful card. One I wanted badly. It was the only card I could trust.

His memories.