Trapped in the Afterlife

Chapter 5- Last Friend, First Enemy

I was ripped from the vision and found myself sitting on the couch again beside Margaret. I was panting – although only in the act of doing so. Margaret sat calmly beside me, poking at the fire with a metal stick.

''Tell me what you saw and I'll explain the details of it.'' she whispered.

I stared at the flames some more, remembering the entire vision and finally turned to look at her, recounting what I had seen. She then proceeded to explain that this had been during the Salem witch trials and that the first girl I saw running away was one of my ancestors and so was the one who had been killed. Other than those two, three others – the five that were not accounted for – had been hidden from the Lord and his second.

The woman who was killed by the well was the head of the Rose family at the time. She was the one who had managed to hide away the five females of her line. Before hiding them however, she had proceeded to removing the 'witch craft' memories of three of them. The two who kept their memories were Elenia and the little girl from the begining.

Elenia had known that she was at high risk of losing her life by infiltrating the Kaiser family. But it was necessary at the time, considering that the Kaiser clan had dug their fingers into the town's council to have more power over the removal of the Rose Witches. The day Elenia was killed, Kaiser had created a curse – the same one I had been cursed with.

''Eventually, Callie found us and we proceeded to helping her find a counter-curse. This took many years and generations. During this time, the Kaiser searched for the four remaining branches of the Rose family. Many were found, killed and cursed with this curse. By the time we managed the counter-curse and retrieved most of the women, the world had changed so much that most of them ended their lives shortly after being given their life back.'' she explained, after specifying that Callie had been the little girl from the vision.

''The counter-curse gives life back?'' I asked, not quite comprehending this part.

''Indeed, it consists of taking the life energy of the one who cursed you and giving you a solid body while they get to be stuck in Limbo. A fate worst than the one you are stuck in as no one can see, hear or feel souls that are in Limbo.''

We turned silent, staring into the flames. Fourty years or so of roaming the land without a body and I would be given one back... at the cost of someone else's life. Did I want this? Would I end up with a nearly sixty year old body? Would I return to my seventeen year old body? Would I be able to adapt to life as it was now? Would I be able to take someone's life in order to have my own one back? I could understand in a way why the women had ended their lives so shortly after retrieving them. It made sense, I was hesitating over it and it had only been less than a century. Some of those women had been cursed for over a century. The world changed so quickly. It was hard to adapt when you were alive, try adapting from life to death to life.

''What if I can't do that?'' I asked in barely a whisper.

Margaret looked at me and from her eyes, I knew that I didn't need to specify. She understood my question in its ultimate vagueness. What if I couldn't kill someone? What if I couldn't adapt? What if I couldn't live again?

''Think about it this way; this person took your life over a war that happened more than two centuries ago. All this in order to avoid your awakening.'' she put the metal stick down and stood up. ''As for the other part, although I am highly against it, you could do as all the others did – end your life in the regular fashion and meet up with all your loved ones.'' She headed towards the door and just before leaving turned to look at me again. ''However, unlike them, you've already made friends and allies. Unlike them, you're in a time where we can give you a new identity and you CAN start over or continue from where you left off.''