The Carver's Magic (3 page)

The council decreed that all Carver children were to be raised by humans for the first 18 years, in hopes that we wouldn't learn how to use our powers. Well the council messed up with me because, little do they know, I had used my powers before I started kindergarten. Their hopes to curb my abilities had failed long ago.

Then our little family reunion took a turn down the crazy street. My biological parents taught me the laws that affected Carvers. The Magical Council may not have been able to overpower us but they continued to make laws for us. The laws were so strenuous that if I was caught doing magic in front of a human, I could be sentenced to death.

As if I didn't know that being caught doing magic was bad. I grew up with humans! I knew how they reacted to those who were different and I was not dumb enough to get caught. But my biological parents added insult to injury by putting their fine touches to the rules. For example, I was no longer allowed to contact Cory or any humans, and not that I had any intentions of talking to purebloods, but I was forbidden to talk to them as well. For all their so-called parental guidelines, they had no idea what it was like to take care of a kid, let alone a teenager like me. If they did, they would know that I didn't take orders very well, or at all.

My biological parents informed me that the growing numbers of Carvers had set in motion some kind of war. The Carvers have been secretly rallying together so that we, I mean they, can stand as one powerful force against the Magic Council that has been making their lives hell.

Or at least that's what my parents told me the council did.

Then, after listening to all that war babble, I thought we might actually get to the part where we might get to know one another and start being a family. Oh wow, was I delusional.

My biological parents shipped me off a few weeks later to a place that Carvers gather to learn magic from one another. I secretly called it “The Carver Camp.” I went to their stupid camp against my better judgment. I didn’t speak to the other Carvers after meeting a guy who had an ego the size of Texas.

According to his ramblings, his adopted family gave him a hard time for being different. He didn't go into specifics, and I didn't ask, although he did make it clear he spent all his free time trying to make them miserable. But he wasn't like me, he seemed to only be able to control wind or the air. I made sure to keep my powers to myself. I still was not in a habit of showing others my abilities, regardless of their magical background.

The Carvers hated humans just as much as the purebloods. I never really had a problem with humans. My adopted family was normal according to what I saw growing up. My adopted parents loved each other even though they still argued every now and then. They wanted us to do well in school and have successful futures, which is why they pushed us to get good grades. If we did poorly, our chores doubled. We were normal kids. We did dishes, cleaned our rooms on Saturday mornings, went camping in the summers, and snuck out to go to bonfires and house parties in high school. All typical human stuff and I loved it.

I grew up with two sisters: Cory and Karen. Karen was the natural daughter of my adopted parents, and Cory was adopted three years after me when she was an infant. We were the three sisters who didn't look anything alike.

Thankfully, my adopted parents didn't shun me when they noticed I was different. They didn't let me get away with being different, either. I still had to do my fair share of chores. And if they found out I used my magic to do my chores, I would have to do everyone else's, too. Using magic was draining. One time I had to clean the whole house myself. After using my magic, I was so exhausted I slept for the rest of the weekend, unable to do anything else. Let's just say I learned my lesson.

My sisters were like any others I suspected, they were incredibly annoying, hysterically funny and amazingly loyal, especially Cory. That was my understanding of what a family should be like. It's what I based my perceptions on. And my biological parents didn't meet those standards. They didn’t love each other and they didn't look at me like my adopted parents did- with affection and understanding dribbled with very high expectations. Something about the way my biological parents talked to me just rubbed me the wrong way. I really didn’t like being talked down to just because I had no knowledge of the magical bloodlines.

My biological parents told me I was a fourth-generation Carver, which meant I had a mixture of every magical creature in my blood. The way my biological parents talked about the different generation Carvers, it was clear that they had been breeding to achieve a specific kind of offspring.

Both of my biological parents talked about the purebloods as if they were scum, weak and arrogant. I was raised to not be prejudice against others. I mean, technically I was the different one growing up and no one in my family judged me, so why would I judge others just because they were different. No, I judged others depending on who they were and what my gut said about them.

Needless to say, my parents expected me to be like them. Join their fight against the purebloods and such. In fact they would talk to each other about the man they said I would one day be matched – as in, creepy arranged marriage.

After that, I just wanted to go home. I wanted to forget about the madness that I had seen and heard. I wanted as far away from my parents as possible. I preferred to be around humans, specifically my sister Cory. I had never meant to leave her. That was my one big regret.

But now all that Carver war mumbo-jumbo is behind me. Just like Dar. All of those feelings are behind me.

"I don't remember him," Cory shook her head, bringing me back to reality.

I almost berated myself. I shouldn't be pushing this topic. He doesn't matter to me anymore. I shouldn't care if she knew who he is. Obviously, he still has no idea who I am, which only pisses me off more. So I should drop the subject.

Instead of dropping the subject I heard myself say, "I used to sneak out of the house and go to the hospital to see him." I continue to turn the glass clockwise. I really should drop the topic.

Her eyes twinkled, "Oh yeah." Then she smacks her thigh and points at me like she remembered. "You paid me twenty bucks so that I wouldn't rat you out to Mom."

I shake my head at her, "Extortionist."

I open my mouth, about to tell her more, but I stupidly sneak a look at Dar. His back is facing me so I can't see him, and it annoys me even though it shouldn't. I shouldn't care.

I don't care
.

Cory waits for a follow up comment. I don't have one. Actually at this point I am starting to feel like being alone. Tonight would be a good night to go to Pike's Peak.

I watch Cory sneak another look at the bartender. I want to roll my eyes, but I don't. The only reason why we come in here is because she likes him, but of course she won't admit it. She never will. Cory has an aversion to sharing personal feelings.

I sneak another quick look at Dar. He is staring at me.

Of course he would turn around when I don't want him to!

I fix his glare, letting him know I am not intimidated. I lift my chin and then give him my back, "Finish your drink, Cory. I'm bored and I still have work to do when I get home."

Not technically a lie. But originally I had not planned to look over my work until tomorrow.

She looks at me with a whiny face, but she knows better than to argue. I am her ride home.

The bartender walks by, and I lift up my hand to stop him, "We're outta here." He looks us over and lingers a few seconds to glance at Cory. Then he nods and brings back our receipt and my card.

Cory slowly finishes her martini. Not sure if she is being slow on purpose, but now is not the time to mess with me. I can start to feel my blood tingling. Not good.

I am ready to spring this joint.

I refuse to let myself look in his direction one more time. Why did fate hate me so much?

Screw him and his beer drinking cooties.

Sneaking to go see him while he was in the hospital was the stupidest thing I ever did. It was also the only time I ever talked to him. Well, technically, I used my magic to talk to him telepathically because he was in a coma, but still. It was the boldest thing I had ever done.

I never told him my name even though he asked me several times. I don't know why I didn't tell him, but when I first said hello in his mind he freaked out a little. He asked me a lot of questions that I didn't understand, something about his moon or the moon. I still have no idea what he was talking about.

On the second trip to the hospital he told me about the bear attack. At first I thought he was joking when he said the bear transformed into a witch. But after he described what she did with a blunted curved knife, I believed him.

That's when I looked over his chart and saw that his heart was weak from being overworked due to his injuries. In fact, the chart depicted each and every stab wound. When I asked him how he was still alive after what happened, he didn't explain. All he said was that the witch must have poisoned the knife with silver because he should have been healed by now.

I didn’t understand his comment about silver until my parents taught me about werewolves. Imagine my surprise.

I remember how sad I was when he told me that he knew he was never going to wake up. He told me that he was going to miss his family and his friends. Then, like a little liar, he said he wished he could have gotten to know me. That was the night I spoke to him in French, my blood language.

I was very young when I first started speaking French. The words came to me as easily as breathing. I didn't know that speaking in French somehow triggered my magic. It wasn't said in a spell or clever ditty. The magic inside took my words and formed it based on my instincts I think.

I didn't know how powerful I was until that night with Dar. I never knew I could heal more than a few bruises or skinned knees. As a kid I never needed to heal someone from stab wounds. In fact I only used it once since then, on Cory when she was really sick and the doctors didn’t know what was wrong with her.

That night, at the hospital sitting next to Dar I told him he would heal from his wounds. I told his heart to be strong like mine and to use mine when he felt weak. Then I told him to get some rest and I left. The next day at school I heard that he awoke from his coma.

I don't remember a time in school that I was more excited than that day. I started picturing and fantasizing about how Dar and I were going to get to know each other. Some thoughts, I am embarrassed to say, were not appropriate for a high school girl.

A week later he returned to school with all the pomp my fellow classmates could cook up. I looked for him every time I walked to my next class and during lunch, but he was always talking to a group of girls or his friends and I was too embarrassed to intrude. So instead, I waited for him to find me and remember me and our talks at the hospital. All my excitement and hopes crashed after he had been back a month and he still had never even glanced in my direction.

I remember feeling crushed every time I passed by him and he acted like I didn't exist. Maybe it was my fault for not telling him who I was. Maybe things would have been different if I would have introduced myself.

Regardless, that's what happened. My heart never healed from my senior year. I remained hollow from that time forward.

Cory places her empty glass back on the counter, and I stand up to pull on my tan leather jacket. I glance at Dar one more time before we dash. He is talking to some chick that looks like a stick bug. I lower my eyes and think about making Dar's drink break so that it spills all over his shirt but I hold back, barely. He really is not worth it, he wasn't worth my time in high school and he isn't worth my time now.

Not that I would go back and not heal him, I would still heal him, but I wish I could go back and erase all those memories. My chest started feeling heavy and I knew that if I didn't get out of here now it would really start to hurt. Zipping up my jacket after two failed attempts, I am shaking. I really hate my own weakness. Hate it. Screw him and his arrogant ass! In fact, why wouldn't I get some pay back? Why wouldn't I ruin his night the way he ruined mine?

I looked at the beer bottle and the stick bug creature next to him pawing at his shoulder. If she just took one more step to the… Dar turns to me right then and bores his amber eyes into mine as if he knows what I am thinking.

Warning me.

Averting my eyes with a dramatic eye roll, I pull out my keys and walk with Cory straight out the door, at the same time breaking the blasted bottle that I had a firm mental fix to. The validating whine from a female took some of the heaviness from my chest away. Even a little goes a long way.

CHAPTER THREE

SHANE

The blonde and her sister just left. And the Nickelback poser's beer was knocked over hard enough to burst all over one of the bar bunnies. I pulled my rag out from my apron and headed over to pick up the broken bits. It's going to be a long, boring night; actually it’s going to be a long, boring week before I see the shy blonde again.

The Nickelback poser has a steady eye on the back door where the two girls departed. I walk up to him and begin picking up the pieces.

"Another beer, and napkins," he says, in a dark timber. His displeasure, for some reason, makes me want to smile. Then I realize that as soon as the blonde left, I feel like my normal self again. Disconnected and patronizing towards everyone in equal amounts. I decide to ignore that realization to grab another beer, pop the top, and set the bottle in front of the poser.

I hand the skeleton looking bar bunny next to him a few napkins that she quickly makes use of. After she places the soiled napkins back on the bar she ignores me all together and leans in to the poser’s ear to whisper something. Lazily dropping her arm across his shoulder while she reaches for the bottle of beer in front of him with her other arm.