Illusion and Reality

Strange man

The week went by normally, the nightmares were not that bad, they did not hurt me in the real world. Lily was still ignoring my existence and things were still weird with Lucius.

A line that caused distance between Lucius and Astrid was drawn, they were hardly talking to each other, their conversations were mostly formal, like two strangers living together and somehow I felt responsible for that.

Lucius would accompany me during my visits to Valeria but he never entered inside her home. Lily and Astrid would go to the palace almost every day. 

“You were too busy looking for the perfect family that you never saw the family you already had,” Valeria said looking at me with a serious expression like she was reading me.

“What?”

She tucked the strand of hair away falling from her loosely braided hair, with a sunflower clip in the center, “Family is more than the people sharing the same bloodline.”

Then it dawned to me, she was right Lily was not just a friend to me, she was a sister who was there for me at every step of life.

“But Lily hates me now,” I replied softly.

“She does not hate you, she is just angry and if she really is your friend then she will come back to you eventually.“

I nodded but did not say anything. Lily was angry and it was normal, she almost lost her life because of me. The stone was activated by my blood, I was responsible for all of the bad things happening in our lives.

“What about you? What’s your story?” I asked.

“I have a huge family,” she chuckled, “it’s about following the rules and being perfect. Everything is a competition with them, you either succeed or do not bother coming back,” she said jokingly.

“But you have extra powers so they must be happy with you,” I asked, her source of powers being both moon and the sun.

She gave a humorless laugh, “I wish. I am an outcast in my coven,” her eyes held sadness as she said that.

“Don’t listen to them, you are amazing,” I smiled.

She shook her head with a grin.

“Do you have a map or something, I want to know about this place more. Like about the lakes and the forests,” I wanted to know about my dreams, and finding out about the lake was my first step.

She scrunched her eyebrows at this, “Yeah I do have a map and I am pretty sure Astrid has maps too.”

“I don’t want to bother her, she is with Lily most of the time,” it was not the entire lie, after the woman in the purple cloak said not to trust anyone, I could not help but get suspicious of my own shadow.

Valeria pressed her lips in a thin line, “I will bring it.”

I sat in the room admiring the different paintings, some of them were the places she might have visited, some were animals and some were of random things.

“Here you go,” she brought back a thick book with a blue leather cover. 

“How will I take it back, Lucius will be here soon?” I asked, looking at the heavy book in her hands.

She put the book on the table and brought back a pen and page, quickly she scribbled something on it. 

She held the note inside her wrist and closed her eyes, blue sparkles formed around her wrist as she mumbled some foreign words.

“And your problem is solved,” she said with a wide smile.

The paper was no longer in her hand. I smiled at her, “Thank you so much Val, but what did you send?”

“I will accompany you today instead of Lucius,” she winked at me, “now you can tell me how amazing I am.”

I laughed, “You are the most amazing witch I know.”

“I know,” she replied with a laugh.

“How was your trip to the dark forest?” she asked, “I have heard it is dangerous,” she asked with curiosity. 

“It was memorable, I never thought something like that existed, the creatures were….. fascinating. Wait, you have never been to the dark forest?” I asked in surprise.

“We are not allowed to go in there.”

“No one from your coven lives there?”

She shook her head, “No one in my family would ever give up on magic. It is almost against their nature. My coven takes huge pride in doing magic.”

"Is that why you live here?"

"Our thoughts do not match with each other, I felt suffocated there, being controlled by them."

After hearing about her family, her decision of living alone made complete sense. I did not ask anything else.

I looked outside the window, the birds were already chirping outside, “I should leave now, Val, it’s getting late.”

She nodded and passed me the lavender cloak. I hid the book under the cloak and we started walking home.

“Valeria, how are you today?” a man asked on the way. 

I turned my head down, to avoid him from looking at my face.

“I am fine, thank you, John.”

“And who might this be?” he asked again.

“This is a friend of mine,” Valeria answered quickly.

“A friend?” he asked, his voice raised slightly.

“We are in a hurry right now,” Valeria started saying.

“Oh yes, I understand. One should not stay out at this time especially nowadays.”

Without responding we started walking faster.

“Who was that?” I whispered.

“Just keep walking,” she whispered back in a hurry.

And that’s exactly what I did. Astrid was standing at the front door, so I never got the chance to ask Valeria about the stranger man.

.

.

.

After a very silent dinner, I was sitting in my room, with the book in front of me, “Let’s do this, Samara.”

I opened the book, it was similar to the book Astrid had. The water was flowing and the leaves on the trees were moving in the direction of the wind.

I started turning the pages without knowing how I would recognize the lake but lucky for me there weren’t many lakes in the area.

There were 3 lakes close to my location, one in the forest where Lucius went to meet someone, one in the woods near the palace and the last one was not important as there was no forest around it. 

The first lake was in the middle of the dense forest, but the lake in my dream had the forest only towards the right side.

I opened the page to check the lake near the palace, it was the same lake. Some trees were around it but the forest which I could not forget was on the right side, it was the dark forest where Astrid’s grandma lived.

It was the lake, but who was the woman? She was not the witch but who else had the excess to go there? Either she was someone who lived in the palace or in the dark forest.

I went to get something to drink from the kitchen, with my head filled by the mystery of that woman, she was right I had to solve the mystery.

 I suddenly bumped into someone, “You need to stop meeting me like this,” said Lucius with an amused smile.

“Sorry,” I smiled sheepishly.

“What are you doing here at this time anyway?” 

I showed him the bottle of water in my hand, “What about you?”

“I was working on something,” he replied, without giving details. 

I ignored it and decided to ask him my question, “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure,” he replied walking towards the living room. Papers were scattered on the table, I wondered how I failed to notice them before.

“Is everyone a witch here?”

He looked at me with a surprise, “No. Why are you asking?”

“I just thought I should know more about this place now, considering I have to live here.”

“Hmm,” he replied, “it is a choice some people give up magic and live normally, while some of them can not do magic in the first place.”

“Like Olivia?”

“People living in the dark forest can not do magic and it is a life they chose for themselves.”

I frowned, “But Olivia did magic, when she held the pendant, there were some sparkles around it and her eyes were white.”

He thought for a while before answering, “Olivia helped in making those stones, she was not using magic she was just activating it. It only worked for a few hours because she was alone without her coven.”

I nodded. 

He started reading something, I tried to see what he was reading but it was written in a different language.

“You should get some sleep,” he said when he saw me looking at those papers.

“You too,” I replied.

He raised his eyebrow slightly.

“I will, first I need to finish this work.”

“What are you doing?” I asked.

I was sure he would not tell me but then he replied, “The king needs to know everything about the attack, I am trying to keep him away from Lily and you.”

“Did you find anything about those men?”

“No,” he replied with a scowl.

“You will find something but you need to get some rest as well. Go to sleep Lucius.”

He shook his head but started collecting papers from the table.

I smiled at my victory.

We started walking to the hallway together. 

I turned to look at him when I reached my bedroom, “Goodnight, Lucius.”

He stared deep into my eyes, moving closer, “Goodnight,” he whispered, making my heart beat madly.

I opened the door quickly and went inside, biting my lip.

With a smile I sat on my bed, hiding the book under the pillow I was not using.

I closed my eyes, waiting for sleep but the thought of that woman kept running in my head. 

She was either a witch who gave up magic or a witch who could never do the magic. It meant she lived in the dark forest.

But why was she helping me?

After tossing and turning when I could not sleep, I opened the book one more time. I started looking at more places I saw in my dreams. 

The place with the oak tree was in the book but it only had the oak tree in the middle and nothing around it, the whole page was blank.

I put the book back under the pillow and hoped this time sleep would have some mercy on me.