World of Magick

One: The Palace

Chapter One: Enter the Palace

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It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. Really, it wasn’t. It was as if life decided to show her who was in charge once again, giving her things worse than death. But, living the life she did, death was the best option – the peaceful option. But whether she wanted to live or not, she had to, if not for herself then for others.

She knew how some of the people in her life could get.

Althea knelt over her mother’s limp body as tears cut paths down her cheeks. Her sobs were silent, her long dark hair shielding her face from view. She wouldn’t allow herself to be seen in this weak state by her brother and sister. She had to be strong for them, no matter what. She was all they had left.

She could hear Demi’s loud cries echoing across the cold room, pained and begging God or whoever else was listening to give their mother back. They could do nothing to help her. It was done. The large puddle of blood pooling on the cement floor told her as much.

Dragging her hands across her cheeks hastily, Althea looked up from her mother’s body to look at Demi. Her sister, sixteen years old and four years younger than she, was red-faced and pleading. She was a beautiful crier, Althea observed. She had never allowed Demi or Jonny to shed tears with her around, so she never knew how they looked. All she lived for in this wretched world was to keep them happy. Up until this moment, she’d always succeeded.

They lived in poverty, went to sleep with hungry stomachs, woke up close to famished, and went through the day in pain. But no matter what happened, whenever Demi and Jonny came home from school after a long journey, Althea was there with their mother, holding her hand and utterly ready for big hugs and adoring, motherly kisses. Elise Maelin had always been sick, ever since Althea’s father died. She couldn’t mother her children properly from her bed, so Althea did it for her.

Jonny’s sniffles were awfully quiet; much too quiet for a seven year old who had just lost his mother. Althea looked at her lovely little brother, and found his head of wavy white-blonde hair hung low. He was a carbon-copy of their father, as Elise had always said.

“Demi,” Althea croaked, her throat dry from grief. Her sister looked up and met Althea’s green eyes with her own hazel ones. She was the perfect image of their mother: short dark brown hair that brushed her neck, wide honey-brown eyes framed with curled lashes, a pointed chin and a small nose.

Althea, on the other hand, was the one with features of both her father and mother mixed together.

“Demi, you have to tell the priest. Bring him here, please, Dem,” Althea said, her voice cracking in the middle of her last sentence.

Demi snivelled and rubbed her eyes harshly. She scratched at her cheeks in an effort to rid herself of the tear tracks glistening on her skin. “Stop that,” Althea said gently, reaching over and tugging Demi’s wrists away from her face.

Her sixteen year-old sister had a tendency to hurt herself when angry or agitated. It was something that worried Althea too much.

“Okay,” said Demi, her voice broken and softer than a whisper. She gathered the tattered hem of her dress into a white-knuckled grip and rose off the grimy floor. Without warning, her knees buckled under her and she fell back to the floor violently with a pained cry.

“Demi,” Althea gasped, reaching for her over their mother.

Jonny was quiet, watching everything with agony flicking through his deep green eyes. Demi batted away Althea’s hands with an annoyed expression, mixed with sorrow and helplessness, and Althea drew her hands back to her chest with hurt coiling in her chest.