Enchantingly Different

Chapter 7

I stand stock still, not taking my eyes off her, hardly able to speak. My face drains of blood and I feel a coldness steal over my body, sending a shiver up my spine. Part of me hopes it’s not true, but one look at her dismayed expression tells me I hit the mark exactly.

“Robert, I…” She closes her mouth and reaches her hand out to me. Reflexively I step further away from her, my eighteen years of wariness of magic kicking in. Her hand drops to her side, limp with her disappointment. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I just didn’t want you to judge me based on that. I did try to tell you that I wasn’t the right one for you.”

“Yea, I just didn’t know how right you were.” My voice comes out sharp and cold. It sounds harsh even to my ears, but I can’t help my total feeling of surprise and I can’t control how my body naturally repels from her now that I know what she is.

Her face falls even more than I thought possible and an errant pang of guilt overcomes me for a moment. My emotions seem to be jumping all over, but how am I supposed to trust them? For all I know she could be putting a spell on me. I shouldn’t stay here.

I stride over to grab my jacket from the foot of the bed. My legs protest, but I ignore them as much as possible and pull my boots on. I snap back up and instantly regret it as my vision starts to blur and I can feel the blackness closing in, my head dizzy from the sudden movement.

“Robert, please-“

“Don’t!”

“It’s storming outside,” she whispers, taking a small step forward. I can see the panic in her tear-filled eyes and her lip trembles with emotion. I sigh and pull my jacket on, shaking my head and hoping to shake myself into sense.

“But I can’t stay here.”

She comes even closer, so that I could reach out and touch her if I wanted. I can see small droplets of water clinging to her long lashes and her cheeks are flushed.

“I want you to stay,” she mutters, looking down and playing with the trim on her dress.

“No,” I respond before turning to the door and pulling it open, walking away from the safety of her house.

The cold hits me in the chest immediately and the wind penetrates through my clothes, straight to my core. I trudge through the snow, yet I have no idea where I’m going. Where am I anyway?

As I scan the surrounding area, I realize that I shouldn’t have left. Large flakes of snow bombard my face and the mere density of them makes visibility extremely poor. Even if I knew where I was, I could easily get turned around in this and never make it home.

I pull the collar of my jacket up around my cheeks and walk to the tree line, hoping for some cover from the treacherous conditions. I glance back at the house and I see her standing in the door way watching me, her arms wrapped around her slim body. I should run back to her and take the hit to my pride in return for survival, but how am I supposed to stay in the same room as someone like her? Everyone knows that magic is the root of evil and anyone that practices it is dangerous.

I stop to lean against a tree, the bark rough against my back. My breath comes in gasps and I’m almost ashamed of how out of shape I am in the few days I’ve been here. Where would I have been if she didn’t help me? I would have been dead for sure and then there really would be no hope for Juliette. That’s the only positive I can say about Shae at the moment, but as I think of her, I feel a stirring in inside me that betrays even that thought.

I slide down the tree trunk, my breathing failing to return to normal and causing me to feel even more lightheaded than before. I’ll just sit for a moment, I think to myself, pulling my coat tight around me and pulling my knees up to my chest. My hands are already turning numb. She was right, it is unseasonably cold. The wind whips around me and pummels me with snow, despite the tree cover and an errant thought of me lying dead in the snow flits through my mind.