Warriors Descendants by J.N. Jacobs

Author:J.N. Jacobs
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Green Hill Publishing

FOURTEEN

The next morning, Paige sat at a coffee shop with Hubert sipping his green tea next to her. She fought to keep her eyes open as she watched a blur of people line up for their caffeine and cake.

‘Now, find your peaceful place, Paige, and separate yourself from them,’ Hubert said calmly, taking another sip from his cup.

Paige leaned forward to inhale the tea’s aroma, doing her best not to snatch the cup out of his hand. Like the other addicts, she was desperate for her dose of caffeine; her nostrils seemed hyper-attuned to the whiff of coffee that seemed to pull her head towards every person that whizzed past her.

‘Focus, Paige,’ Hubert barked.

‘Easy for you to say,’ Paige said, rubbing her eyes to keep them open. ‘If you let me have my morning coffee then I can focus better.’

‘No coffee,’ Hubert said in a stern voice. ‘I don’t want your powers affected by external drugs.’

Paige narrowed her eyes at him, overcome by an urge to pull his beard apart. ‘Caffeine is not a drug,’ she muttered, her forehead centimetres away from the table.

‘Put up that one-way mirror, now.’ His loud and crisp voice sliced through her like a knife.

She pushed hard on the edge of the table to keep her bobbing head from falling onto it. Through a sleepy haze, she did as she was told. The image appeared in black and white, wavering as she tried hard to focus on it.

‘Put your focus on one object first before moving on to the whole scene,’ Hubert instructed loudly.

Paige magnified the large tree by the riverbank in her mind and imagined putting colour first to its trunk, then to the leaves, and the tree sprang to life. Then the river came alive in a vivid flow of blue-green water washing over the rocks by the bank. The mirror came into sight at the river’s edge and through it, she watched the patrons in the coffee shop hustle around and wait for their orders. The fog in her mind gradually dissipated and she began to feel more alert.

For the next two hours, Hubert made her repeat the exercise, moving closer table-by-table to the crowd at the counter. Paige endured waves of sleepiness and sudden alertness as she worked to sharpen the barricade in her mind. She quickly grew bored of the exercise and requested that they go to the marketplace.

Paige stood at the gates of the marketplace once more with Hubert and his silver staff by her side. The Maines Market was a quaint country place with wooden stalls lining both sides of a central, gravelled track. It was packed. Young families with children stopped at the stuffed toys and games stalls, while older ladies stood at another purchasing fruits and nuts. The younger men were looking at tools and utilities, with a smattering of ladies by the clothes and accessories.

Paige was beginning to regret her request. She was a metre from the entrance but could still feel the emotions coming at her like a tidal wave.

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