Cruden Tale (Awakening spin off book)

Chapter 1 Leyanne's Journal

November 27th

My name is Leyanne Cruden, I have graced these lands for what feels like an eternity, although compared to humans I guess I have lived that. I have persevered through some of the worst and best decades and now I find myself in present day, the 2020 s. I keep this journal wherever I go to record my thoughts and feelings, my memories, so that my mind can let go of the mundane yet never lose a way to reminisce because I have lived hundreds of lifetimes. I hope that one day all that remains of me are these memories and I would have finally found peace in death, although it seems unlikely.

I have practised in the magical arts since my birth to my mortal mother and always known I was different. I was born with a knowledge she never possessed and abilities that terrified her, terrified people around me.

My father was non-existent, a travelling high priest known as a Dru wit, but in modern times you refer to them as druids. Little is known about them, where they came from, or to why he chose to bear a child with a mortal human. What my purpose may have been in his design for me as a child, for along the way I have yet to find it.

I am alone.

Only one of my kind it seems and although I have travelled near and far in an effort to find others like me or even remnants of the druids, I find nothing but fakes and mimics. People who want to be what I am, who convince themselves they have gifts and powers, but when faced with someone like me they soon pale in comparison. Even among the immortal breeds, I stand out as something else.

Witchcraft is a dying art and those of you who still possess power have lost the knowledge to harness it in any meaningful way. Very few true witches of great power remain. So I have been forced to dampen what I do and limit it to appear as human as possible while I navigate this modern world.

The beings you were once so afraid of now hide in the shadows and the cracks out of sight. You have no idea what dwells in your world with your little fairy stories and movies about dark monsters you think stemmed from bedtime stories and folklore. I know better, I can see all that would rip your little world apart, yet I am untouchable. Nothing can harm me; I have been graced with a power that so far is unmatched in any realm of this little planet that I can t even find a way to commit my own suicide.

I have researched the lineage of my father and find nothing to point me in any direction that may be of help. Conspiracy theorists believed they were of another planet, who stopped by to grace us with knowledge and ideology, but I find nothing to back this up. My powers seem to follow witchcraft in many ways, but then I also have other gifts which no witch has ever harnessed through no amount of conjuring or spell work. I don t know what I am.

Here, now, walking among you in a small southern town in the United States of America; I have travelled from my birthplace in the highlands of Scotland many times, I have travelled the world and always find myself back here as though being tugged by an unseen force of destiny. My gut tells me that somehow, the something I have been looking for all this time is manifesting in the warmer climates and southern accents around me. My powers brought me across the sea yet I'm still searching for where I am supposed to go. I cannot shake the sense that I have missed that detail any time I have left these shores and gone elsewhere.

I m staying in a small guesthouse run by a family called the Clairmont's. I have been here before, almost 200 years ago when this land was farmed by the Clairmont's of olde; I find it amusing to see the similarity in the faces that greet me now. How their genetics pass down reused features and colouring as though giving familiar comfort to those reborn into their new lives. My kind believe you will always return to something connected to you no matter how many lives you live.

I often wonder if I resemble the man who never stayed to lay eyes upon me and burdened me with this eternal life on a lost path. I know I never looked much like my mother or other clan members of my family name. I never knew him, saw him, or have evidence beyond my mother s brief tales.

I reached an age of maturity along the way; I cannot say when I stopped ageing as I am not sure. I don't know if it was something I did to myself or something I was destined to always be. I look young, yet old enough to be a mother. I guess you humans would put me at thirty or thereabouts. I'm tall and slender and have dark hair that hangs down my back with light curling of the ends. I am of ivory skin and dark brown eyes with green flecks that dance like a ring of fire around my pupils.

I am neither beautiful, nor ugly. I m average, considering the abilities I possess. I have a plainness that suits my longing to blend into my surroundings. Maybe I could have changed how I look if I was so inclined, but maybe I am meant to stay invisible and unmemorable as the druids faces seem to have been in artworks across the globe. Either way, I gain enough male attention on my travels, yet not so much as to be a hindrance. I prefer it this way.

I have a darkness inside of me that translates to humans as sexuality, if only they had the sense to take it as a warning to steer clear instead of flocking to me with hopes of amour.

I can wither plants and trees with a look, I can bring about a tornado with a glare. I can heal but I can also take life away if I see fit and I have a heart that can do either without remorse. I have no idea which path they would consider me to be on, light or dark, as I do not even know myself if I m someone you would call good or evil.

I don't kill unless I have to, I heal when I feel compelled. I do nothing unless I feel like it. Emotions are not my strong point and up until now I have been happy with my solitary lifestyle. Taking on tasks from immortals when I feel it benefits the peace and sanctuary of our secret lives.

Don't get me wrong, I am no sweet innocent virgin. I have had companions in my past who taught me a lot about love and pain and loss. Those who followed me and did as I asked, teaching me about seductive persuasion.

I have never needed to form stronger bonds other than physical with men for what would be the point? Anyone who links a life to me soon withers and dies over the years and I am left alone once more. My last lover died some 30 years ago, and I have grown bored of watching it. He had grown old and tiresome and although he confessed to love me, I felt nothing but relief when I walked away.

I left him when he no longer appealed to me and years later when I learned of his death, I felt no sadness for his passing. I know I m cold and unlikeable but that s what fate gave me. I can t push myself to have emotions I don t think I possess and if I ever did, then they are so far in my past that I no longer remember them.

I think there is maybe a part of me that is broken inside and what I see around me of love and happiness never seems to touch me. Maybe this is how I am meant to be for when my purpose reveals itself maybe I need to be the one with a foot on each side of dark and light to be able to do what needs to be done.

Maybe I was created to be this way so when the hard decision hits, I ll be the one who can make it.