Revenge, Denied by Verba Joan Marie

Author:Verba, Joan Marie [Verba, Joan Marie]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: FTL Publications
Published: 2012-02-14T04:30:00+00:00

Taking to heart the only clue that she had, Marlys began to try to feel magic at every opportunity. When she performed “household spells” to help her with chores, she tried to concentrate on how she felt. Nothing happened, until one day, while out hunting near a swamp she had not visited before, she slipped into a clutching bog—so called because the mud closed around the victim, sucking the victim to the bottom. After a moment of panic, Marlys calmed herself. She would not sink all at once. She had time. For now, only her legs had been encased. Reaching for her knife, she jerked it out of the sheath and stabbed the hard ground, trying to pull herself out. But the knife broke. She reached for a nearby young tree, narrow enough so she could grasp it, but she could only brush it with her fingertips. She tried her household magic: reach, bend. Not enough. Closing her eyes, she tried to put the spell on herself, something her mother and grandmother warned her not to do, lest she injure herself. But she could not think of anything else. Stretch.

When she cast the spell in her mind, she intended to stretch out her arms. Instead, her left leg straightened, and she felt a horrible pain as if she had stepped on a long nail. Her leg, from her heel to her knee, stiffened and she threw back her head and gasped in agony. At the same time, her body jerked forward, about an armspan, out of the bog. Panting, she collapsed on the ground, on her side, until the pain subsided, though she still felt as if a long needle remained in her leg.

Slowly, the bog attempted to pull her in again. This time, Marlys concentrated on mentally pushing the sensation of the needle out. With each effort, the needle seemed to move, and her body correspondingly moved out of the mud. But it was too slow, and the bog continued to claim her. Finally, annoyed and desperate, she surged back at the bog with all her might. She popped out, landing hard on her stomach, clear of the mud.

The internal backlash was excruciating. She rolled on the ground, hugging herself. It seemed as if a thousand needles had jabbed through her heels, her palms, her head. She found she could not even cry out, could not breathe. Breathe! There, her lungs filled with air. The pain subsided. She lay there on her back, spent.

After some time, she crawled, then got to her feet, and found she was uninjured. Exhausted, she staggered back to the lodge.

Elspeth, Janna, and Kelsie watched her come in. They all sat at the long table.

“All that time hunting, and no success, I see,” Kelsie sneered.

“Hush,” Elspeth said.

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