Morana knows she's different from other people in more ways than one. Firstly, she's sixty-seven years old but stopped ageing in her twenties. Weird things have also happened around her right after she's wished for it. But most importantly, no matte...
I was glad that Morana seemed too occupied by her own thoughts to notice anything else while we sat in the cab. I expected that she was in a slight shock, though she seemed calm enough about everything. She was a bit of a pain in the ass, but still weirdly acceptant of everything. Such as the fact that she hadn't blinked an eye as I had conjured clothes right in front of her. Instead, she had just teased me.
If I had been weirdly intrigued by her before, it was nothing compared to now.
I let myself properly look at her while in the cab. I doubted that black was her natural hair color. Was the blonde of the highlights closer to her actual color? Maybe. I wished I knew and would get to see the color sometime in the future. Her eyes were blue. I was sure they reminded me of something. The ocean? The sky? No. I couldn't figure it out. She was a bit taller than the average woman, which made her not that much shorter than me. I could also clearly see that all the extra fat on her body had gone to the right places, giving her perfect curves.
My eyes lingered on those curves and my thoughts went off. I wanted to touch, squeeze, lick, kiss, bite. Quickly, I had to put a stop to those thoughts as a certain body part reacted.
One thing bothered me though. She was, without a doubt, the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. Smooth skin, a perfect softness to all of her features. I could not imagine someone that would appeal to me more. But there had to be at least one person like that out there because Morana was not my mate.
I looked back at her, our eyes briefly met again, and in my head, I cursed. How could the woman next to me not be my mate?
It wasn't only the way she looked, but I did, weirdly enough, feel safe and at home next to her. Like we had known each other for our whole lives. And that sure was a first for me to feel around any witch.
But the bond wasn't there. I didn't feel all of those emotions that I knew should come when I looked into the eyes of my mate. The emotions which would let me know she was it, that we belonged together. That our souls would never be complete without the other.
I tried to not think about it, but all I could think was how perfect she seemed so far. Or well, yes, she seemed to have a bit of an attitude, I couldn't deny that. But there was the casualness I liked. I also got a feeling that she wasn't the least bit judgmental. Thinking back to the conversation in the hospital, I was surprised that she hadn't called me crazy or anything of the sort. I had a feeling she didn't take nor give a shit.
I got more proof of that assessment of her character when we got to my apartment. I felt the embarrassment wash over me as I remembered what state my apartment was in. I didn't think of myself as a messy person, I just didn't like cleaning. So when I had a lot to do, I didn't clean.
But her sincerity about not caring about it made me like her even more. Though I still felt utterly embarrassed as I saw the plates from my latest dinners on the living room table. I quickly offered to make tea simply to get away for a moment so the embarrassment could fade.
Once I got back and started talking to her again, I was once again struck by how unfairly stupid it was that she wasn't my mate. How unbelievable it was that she wasn't. There was an easiness being with her, which I didn't understand.
That thought, though, brought worry to me.
Having been close to her for a while, I knew something was off about her magic. There was a darkness to it I couldn't place. But could that be it? Was she perhaps some elaborate prank constructed by one of my sisters? I wouldn't put it past them. Everyone in the coven treated me like dirt, used and ridiculed me. I could imagine Astria laughing as she reveled in that I was too dumb to not understand that Morana wasn't real.
I knew an easy way to see the truth, or at least get a feeling of if Morana was someone I could trust.
I was extremely proud of the spell I had managed to cast over my safe. Since I had never been instructed but only self-taught in all things magical, I was still at a rather basic level. But the protection charm around my safe was far from basic.
It could read a person's true intent and would only open if the person's intent towards me was pure. If a person had the least bit of malice towards me, it wouldn't open. In some cases, like when my oldest sister, Senalda, had once tried to open it, she had received a minor shock instead. Though I wasn't even completely sure how it worked. For instance, I had a friend, Maya, who sometimes could open it and sometimes couldn't. And apart from her, I only had one other friend who was able to.
But if Morana somehow knew my sisters, then it would stand to reason that it would give her a shock at least.
Barely had I decided I wanted to test her when she asked the question that made it all too easy to make it happen.
"What did you mean about found the right place to look?"
I smiled and immediately pointed at the framed poster that was the door for the safe. It was of a dead tree, standing alone under the night sky. I didn't know why I had chosen that poster. There had been something about it that had spoken to me.
"Go ahead and touch that one," I said and made sure to keep my voice light.
"Touch it?" she asked, and I could see the question all over her face.
"Just do it," I pressed on.
She sighed, but did as I had asked. Right before she touched it, I started to wish I hadn't asked her. Not because I was worried about the outcome, but because I knew I was tricking her. The idea of tricking her and not trusting her filled my stomach with knots. Knots that only grew in size, amount, and tightness as I watched the poster melt away.
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