Escaping Her Curse—Completed

Chapter Twenty-Six

Lauren squeezed her eyes shut and tried to hold in the tears of frustration that welled. Her hands were outstretched before her. She could picture the room perfectly in her mind. The old oak table standing before her. Three matching chairs with no cushions and a basic frame with two wider bars to form the back of the chair. One of the chairs had a shorter leg, making it wobble. She could see the rough, dark walls of rock that formed the walls of the room. Whoever had designed this room had used the rock for two out of four walls. Perhaps to save on wooden materials. She could see the lantern on the table and the pile of papers. She could visualize them staring at her expectantly, waiting for results. Two men and one woman. The two men were standing side-by-side, arms crossed, both wearing plain garb of dirty trousers and a loose–maybe once–white, linen shirt. The woman wore a dirty pink petticoat and a matching ruffled skirt with mostly missing bows sewed onto the fabric. It was probably over ten years old. She could see it all clear as day in her mind. The room was bare and dark. Only the lantern gave off a low light. So why couldn’t she interact with mana around her?

“I think that’s enough for now,” the older of the two men said, bored and clearly upset. “Take a break. We’ll try agin tomorra.”

Lauren opened her eyes and wiped away the unshed tears. “Okay. I’ll do better.”

“It’s not that ya need to do better, it’s that ya need to do sumthin’,” the woman scoffed. “Lydia said ya had extraordinary magic. We’ve literally seen nothin’ since ya arrived. Maybe Lydia was lyin’.”

“Lydia’s smarter than that,” the first man said, one hand absently playing with his goatee. “She mentioned ya needed trainin’, and I reckon this is what she meant. Give’r more than two days, Tiff. She’ll perform, else she’s outta ‘ere, eh?”

Lauren nodded. “Thank ya, Bossman.”

“But remember, we don’t give out no freebies,” Bossman stated. “Ya been eatin’ our food and drinkin’ our water; livin’ in our town. Ya owe us wages if ya can’t perform. No one gets anythin for free ‘round ‘ere.”

“Understood.”

“Burt. Stay ‘ere agin. Watch over ‘er. Lemme know if she does anythin’.”

Burt gave Lauren a lustful look. “Yessir, Boss.”

“No touchin’. Not unless she can’t perform,” Bossman glared at the other man, who looked disappointed, but nodded.

Bossman and Tiffany then left the room, leaving Burt and Lauren alone. She obviously felt uncomfortable being left with a man who would readily take advantage of her, but she was grateful that Bossman had absolute control over his subordinates. If not, she would worry about her safety here in the Undergrowth.

Growing up, she had heard rumors about this place, called the Undergrowth, but she had never dreamed of setting foot here, let alone living here. It was nothing like she had imagined either.

The Undergrowth, as it was aptly called by its residents, was an underground tunneling system that literally was under the Royal City and surrounding town. There was a full-blown society, complete with a mutated language that she couldn’t understand. Her ears wanted to comprehend the words because they sounded familiar, but it was too warped for her to make sense of it.

The ‘houses’ were also something that she needed to get used to. Most were more like shanties than traditional houses. The people with money had been able to make theirs out of wood, like the one she was currently staying in; otherwise, most were built out of cloth and linen and other materials to hold it up. The people in the Undergrowth lived in total filth with no hygiene or running water. One of the jobs offered to younger people was going to the surface and pulling water from a well and then making the trek back to the Undergrowth, where it could be sold. Only Bossman, who seemed to run the Undergrowth, had access to a private spring of water that ran near the city. He had wisely built a compound around the spring that he had deemed his home to ensure no one could steal his fresh water.

Bossman was an interesting character to Lauren the moment she met him. He was a tall and lanky man with a thick, unruly beard, which matched the mop of brown curls on his head. However, the way he held himself was with absolute control. Confidence oozed off of him, and no matter who he interacted with, the people responded to him well. In fact, Lauren had never heard anything negative said about the guy, and that alone made her suspicious. No ruler was without fault or complaint. He usually wore a knowing smirk wherever he went, seeming to understand just how much power he wielded in his kingdom.

She had been allowed entry as Lydia’s cousin on only one condition: she proved her magic useful to Bossman’s cause. This meant that she needed to control her powers enough to impress everyone before they actually gave her a real spot in the city. Burt was basically her jailor until she performed.

Lauren watched Burt settle into one of the chairs and pull out an ungentlemanly magazine. A lewd picture of a naked female stared seductively at the viewer on the front cover. It looked old and well used.

“Git inta the otha room,” Burt said gruffly. “I gotta take care of business. Unless ya wanna help.”

Lauren swallowed her disgust and walked over to the adjourning room. She quickly shut the door behind her and sat on the small, lumpy bed. She had a few hours to kill before she needed to make it back to the surface. Luckily, Burt was a terrible guard. After he ‘took care of business’, he’d often fall asleep until morning. She guessed that he was in his mid to late 50s and had led a hard life working in the fields before making his way to the Undergrowth.

She had promised to see Simon, and she intended on keeping it. Besides, she was worried that if she didn’t show up, Simon would turn over the entire city looking for her. The last thing she needed was him knowing that this is how she intended to live for the foreseeable future. She wasn’t sure that he’d let her.

Sighing, Lauren briefly wondered how she let things get this far. This hadn’t been the future she’d envisioned for herself. After having left for the first time, she had believed that she’d live as a maid until she passed on from this life. However, things hadn’t taken that turn, and had, instead, led her back to him.

“Stop it. Stop thinking about it. It won’t help. Instead, focus on what you can achieve here and now,” she hissed quietly at herself.

She needed to focus on her magic. She needed control and balance. She needed to see beyond what her eyes told her.

Closing her eyes, she pictured the small room in her mind. She then searched harder, seeing the manaforce in everything around her. All living and nonliving things contained various amounts of manaforce, though no one was quite sure why this was. It just was. It was in this where her power blossomed. She could manipulate the things around her and do with them what she willed. As long as she had tapped into the manaforce, it was hers to command. It looked like blue and purple light dancing inside an object or person. She could also see how much a person or thing contained. The more there was, the better her grasp on things.

Reaching out a hand, she coddled the small amount of light in the candle sitting on the small table beside her bed in her mind. The flame wasn’t lit, yet it was warm. Lauren then psychically dipped her fingers into the mana and let it roll around her palm, raising it up and twirling it. She projected the desire from her mind into reality, and opened her eyes. Unable to help herself, she grinned. Floating in front of her was the candle, doing exactly as she instructed.

Lauren then spent the next hour making different things in her room levitate, move, or whatever it is that she wished. It was exhilarating, though she nearly lost track of time. Quietly opening the door into the main room, she saw Burt snoring away, as predicted. She then stealthily crept through the room and out the door. She carefully trekked through the maze of tunnels that she had already memorized and found the exit that Lydia had told her about where there weren’t any guards. It was a small hole that led to the sewer system and out a grate into the streets. She then made her way to 1627 Daisy Lane. Based on her calculations from the bell that had tolled at the 9 o’clock hour, she figured she had about a half hour before Simon was to meet her. Taking her time and slightly cleaning up her appearance, though there was nothing she could do about the smell, she found herself in the old house.

Lauren sat in the old building, and after the bell tolled 10 times, she heard the crunching of footsteps outside. She felt her heart begin to pick up pace with anticipation. It had only been two days, but it had felt like a lifetime. So much had already happened in such a short amount of time, and she worried about how her meeting with him would go.

She heard Simon knock twice before creaking open the door. He peeped his head around the corner and flashed her a smile as he walked towards her.

Lauren stood to curtsy.

“There’s no need to do that, is there? Since you, in fact, are Lady Everlyn Monroe, the remaining duchess of the Monroe family,” Simon said coldly.

She froze, feeling all the blood drain out of her face.