Magically Bound

Chapter two

Aurora’s POV

“Where have you been, girl?!” my father roared when I got through the front door. 

He slammed his beer mug onto the table, making the foam flow over the edge where the mug was chipped. It was only nearly seven in the morning, and he was already piss drunk. Too drunk for me to even try to bother with it. 

“Downtown like always father,” I answered politely, but apparently not politely enough. 

“Don’t get smart with me now, girl, or you’ll pay the price,” he slurred. 

I made a bow with my head as a sign of respect before I excused myself to the kitchen area where I found Mrs. Clemons waiting for the rations. Her eyes met with mine and no words needed to be spoken. We both knew that the walls had ears and, despite my father already being under the wagon, he was able to hear the smallest complaint. 

“How was the market dear?” she asked, trying to ease away the obvious tension in the air.

“It was fine,” I said and told her about Charlotte, who wouldn’t give it a rest, and about Nora’s thoughts about me being able to see the future. 

“Don’t let people hear you say that my child,” she gushed. “They might take you as a witch.” 

“If that was the case, I wouldn’t have let us live this way, Mrs. Clemons,” I stated, and heard her chuckle. 

“And how about him, dear? Has he bothered you any further?”

“No, I was blessed enough to avoid running into him today,” I sighed. 

“Let’s just hope that blessing continues,” she said, shaking her head. “He might be wealthy, but he is bad news, Aurora, and one sniff to your father about his courting, he will give you away like a bad apple at the market.”

“I know of that already, hence the discretion,” I pointed out. “Do you need further help here or can I go hang the laundry?”

“You can go,” she chuckled. “Be ready by dinner.”

“I will,” I called as I walked through the back door to avoid my father. 

I was in the backyard hanging the laundry when I heard the commotion begin on the street. I put the sheet I was currently standing with, back into the basket and made my way to the small fence where I peeked out behind a tree. People were whispering, some talking rather loudly and where some looked scared others looked rather excited, and I couldn’t help but wonder what was going on. In this small village, people only became like this for two reasons. 

One, someone special was to arrive and two, the local inn had run out of beer and, as of that moment, my guess was the first. Especially when I, not long after, heard Nora yell my name as she came running down the street, her skirt held in her left hand and the right waving at me.  

“Oh Aurora!” she panted as she reached the fence. 

“What is going on? What is all the fuss about?” I asked. “Even Mr. Peldridge looks excited,” I said as I tilted my head at the look on the grumpy old man’s face.

“I just heard! He is coming!” she exclaimed. “He is passing through our very village.”

“Who is coming?”

“The Blood Hunter,” she whispered, and I felt myself get pale. 

I had heard stories of him as most people had. He was very famous even in the smallest villages across the land. The immortal mighty warrior who had fought in the blood war 165 years ago against the blood witches and who still hunted them today, hence how he got the name. Some feared him while others looked at him as if he was a gift sent from God himself, and most people in Nemea saw him as the latter. 

“When?” was the only word to leave my lips. 

“Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow,” she confirmed. “Even the smallest glimpse of him will be enough to get the chatter running for the next year.”

“Don’t we have enough of that already?” I huffed. 

“I think you’re confusing the blood hunter with him,” she said knowingly. “Has he tried any further?”

“Not today,” I sighed, trying to hide the shutter that went through my body just by the thought of him. “But as he already told me more than once, he won’t give up until he gets the maiden he wants.”

“Even if it takes my last breath, I will make sure that he won’t get anywhere near you.”

“You don’t have the authority to do so, sadly, and one whiff to my father and I’ll be a maiden no longer,” I scoffed. 

“Then we had better make sure to keep him out of the loop,” she nodded. “He is bad news.”

“Funny, Mrs. Clemons said the exact same thing,” I snickered. “I have got to go back to the laundry, but I’ll see you in the morning, I suppose?”

“As always and seeing as we will be getting a visitor, I'll bring you a dress to wear that is a little more… presentable than what you usually wear,” she grinned. “And I won’t take no for an answer.”

I just waved her off, ignoring her statement about my dress, before I made my way back to finish what I started. 

Later that night when I was in bed, I had a rather hard time falling asleep. I kept tossing and turning, not knowing why, but an unsettling feeling kept creeping in on me and despite my many efforts at shaking it off, I simply couldn’t. 

I rose from the bed, letting my small bare feet hit the cold wooden floor, tiptoeing across the room to get my rope to cover my nightgown. I made sure the hallway was clear before I peeked into my father’s study and, as always and as expected, he was knocked out cold slouching over his worktable, an empty bottle of scotch next to him. 

I shook my head and went to close the door when the wooden floor gave out and creaked underneath me. I watched as my father’s frame shuffled for a second and silently cursed at myself before he finally went still. 

I didn’t do this regularly, but when I found trouble with sleeping, I went for a short night stroll around the garden, to enjoy the cold breeze and the fresh smell of the wet grass as the morning dew would soon start to settle upon it. 

I took a breath so deep and held it in until I felt my lungs burn a bit and exhaled before making my way out to the middle of the garden. I was standing there admiring the stars that shone so brightly in the heaven above me when I suddenly and out of nowhere felt a sting on my hand. I yelped in surprise as I let my fingers caress the now sore mark I had had ever since birth. A birthmark formed like a flame and, ironically enough, it was now burning, the burning intensifying with every breath I took. 

I rubbed it trying to ease the sensation, but all it seemed to do was make it worse. 

“What in the…” I mumbled to myself, but I was soon distracted as the sound of hooves crossing the gravel met my ear. 

“Whoever is out this late?” I asked myself out loud and, despite the fact that I knew I shouldn’t go further out than I already had, my curiosity got the better of me and I found myself walking towards the fence. 

I hid behind one of the threes that leaned halfway over the fence, in order to see just enough of the road without giving myself away. 

In the distance, the shape of a horse could be seen through the shadows as the dim street lights lit up the darkened road. It wasn’t because it was odd for someone to travel through our village, not even at that time, and yet something about this particular person called out to me. I wanted to step forward to be able to see more closely but I found myself starting to back up instead as the mystery rider came closer. 

One step after another, I backed up, trying to be as quiet as possible as the rider now was right in front of the fence and just as I believed that I had managed to sneak away, a branch cracked underneath me, causing the rider to stop. 

His face was hidden under the hood he was wearing but it was easy to see that he scouted his surroundings. I tried to make myself as small as possible, as I tried to keep myself from whimpering out from the intense burning on my hand. 

The rider lifted his arm and placed his hand on his face, rubbing it slightly before he continued down the road. A sigh of relief escaped my lips and once he was out of sight, I turned my back to the road and ran back inside, not bothering to look back. 

I had completely forgotten about my father being asleep until the second the door behind me slammed. My body froze down to the smallest cell as I felt a drop of sweat run down my forehead while I listened to the silence that I prayed would stay just that. As silence.