Trust From Within - Book 3 Daughter of a Monster Series

Chapter 34- Swamp Air

They found Steve. That's good. But... he's still out, after a week and a half. As Dad put it, an 'unusually odd amount of time for him to drag his ass back into action." Especially since he didn't die of blood loss, Dad's getting worried, even though he denies it.

"They may not have Steve anymore, but they're out there, we need to find them. They're desperate for my head, who knows what they'll do next?" I rant, pacing around the room as I tug at my hair, blood boiling and magic swirling. Nate's bottom lip is caught between his teeth, eyebrows furrowed, knee bouncing and fingers tapping out different patterns on his thigh.

"What would they do though? They want your head on a stake for the village... how the hell would he do that?" he inputs.

"Well, what do they love most in the world?"

"Callum loves his sister, and Kayla loves me," Nate answers instantly, confusion overcoming his features. "But I'm a taken man and he was with his sister, so..."

"Wait. You said that they were originally doing this to get popular in town because..."

"A prophecy was foretold by a witch that you would wreak havoc on the village," he tells me, the crease between his eyes not fading.

"That area is... what plains are those?"

"Great Southern Taiga," he tells me.

"That's where... shit!" I race out of the room, going straight to Dad's, running to make sure Nate can follow. I skid into the room, Dad's head snapping up to meet my eyes, hair untamed beyond the usual mess and magic fuzzy around the edges a bit, fatigue weighing over him. "Dad!"

"Jade," he acknowledges. "You okay?"

"Are any of those stories about you and the three sisters true?" I blurt out, remembering vaguely some of the old stories Steve would tell me.

"The ones that we ended up getting cursed by?" he answers, raising an eyebrow.

"The three that corresponded with the colours. Blue, white and gold," I urge.

"Yeah, it did happen, though probably not how you were told."

"Can one of you please explain? I'm rather confused," Nate cuts in, eyes flitting between the two of us.

"Okay, when the three of us were younger we were drawn in singularly to one location. We all arrived, drew our swords and almost started a full battle. But then three women suddenly appeared in flourishes of coloured smoke, blue, white and gold. They singled us out, to our corresponding colours, so I had the one in white, Steve blue and Notch gold. We were all cursed, each dropping off like flies. I don't know what happened, but the next thing I know, I wake up and Regina, the witch that had me, was standing in front of me with a sneer.

"Then I was suddenly bound by smoke, and my soul was brought forward, magic buzzing around it, it was the weirdest fucking thing. She attached something to it, something else, another being. She was able to manipulate it, she could've killed me if she wanted, but she didn't. Instead, when I woke up, a large, black wolf was standing next to me. My brothers were gone, and only this wolf was there. Said it's name was Mariko. It was- I could feel him in my soul, with me. He was just as confused, but he had the basic idea. Said he was some sort of spirit animal.

"When we went into our next battle over something or other, I see a cat around Notch's shoulders, eyeing Mariko up and down, and Steve, Steve has a snake, wrapped around his arm, beady eyes watching us. Half way through, the three witches appeared. It was the first time we worked together in much too long. We just wanted answers, because it wasn't just that we got these awesome new partners, I could constantly feel something else on my soul, like Regina had a door into it, and I couldn't get her out. It was the same with Notch, but according to Steve, he couldn't feel it. That could've been due to his magic though.