CHAPTER 46: 46

NYLAH

"What’s going on?" I asked even though I knew that something was wrong.

At the slightest, I was supposed to see something happen, the flowers, they didn’t change colour. They were still dried.

"Maybe you need to try again." I quipped.

"Did you read the words well? Maybe you mispronounced them." I tried to make sense of what was going on, but my friend looked like she’d seen a ghost.

She was shocked to the bones.

"It’s not the words, it’s... me," she replied, her gaze fixated into space, and her mouth was slightly opened.

"You weren’t paying attention." I prodded, but she shook her head vigorously.

I had the feeling that she was going to break into tears any minute.

"It’s obvious, Nylah. I’m not a healer." Her words threw me off guard.

"What? What are you saying?" I asked with squinted eyes as I tried to make sense of her sudden reaction.

"It didn’t work because I’m not a healer." She cried out, holding her chest so tight I was scared she would punch a hole into it.

This was bizarre. Why would she even think that? Both her parents were healers. At least, that was what I was told, so why won’t their child be a healer?

"Try again," I replied, strongly believing that she would have a change of mind when she did.

The spell was written in a foreign language, and she stopped being interested in books like that when her parents passed, she might have mispronounced some words.

I was sure.

Sofia wiped her tears and said the words again, her hands placed just like they were placed the first time, and just like the first time, nothing happened.

We both stood in silence for minutes, staring at each other, with no words coming out of our mouths.

"We should ask the herbs store keepers what the matter is. I’m still possible you mispronounced some words." I concluded and pulled Sofia by her hand out of the office to the direction of the herb store.

I guess she was too tired to even fight me. She succumbed to my force and followed me.

We met them looking through large books with foreign inscriptions on their covers.

"Excuse us, we have a question." I started, making them divert their attention from the large books to our frames.

"Is there a possibility that a spell wouldn’t work because a healer mispronounced some words?" I asked, hoping that they would reply "yes, " and I’d give Sofia the "I told you so" look, but they all exchanged glances from Sofia to me.

Their faces were expressionless, and their silence was unbearable by the second.

"What is it?" I asked out loud but started asking myself if they understood English or if they were all deaf.

"Who did the spell?" One of them finally spoke up.

I looked between Sofia and I.

Were these people okay? How could they ask such a question when Sofia was right here?

"The healer’s daughter, of course," I replied, already getting irritated by their attitude.

"There’s something you need to know." He spoke up again, directing it this time around to Sofia.

Finally, he was going to talk some sense into her and tell her not to worry. Maybe she needed to practice some more.

Or so I thought.

"You’re not the healer’s daughter." His words seemed sharper than they previously sounded, I wasn’t even Sofia, but I felt his words cut through my heart.

What on earth was he saying?

"What?" Sofia asked, her voice already shaken from the previous event now more shaken from the news.

He sighed as if trying to arrange his words so that they wouldn’t hurt the female.

"When your mother married your father, he came with you, he had you with another woman whom he lost during your birth but after the healer helped him treat you after he almost lost you one night, they fell in love and he decided that she would be your mother."

"What is he saying?" I asked, more confused than I was when I brought Sofia.

"It’s the truth." Another one of them spoke up.

Finally! They can speak!

And what the fuck were they even saying?

’Were they high from reading all day?’ I wondered.

"How come I didn’t know all these years? How come my parents didn’t tell me?" Sofia seemed to believe what they said but I had other thoughts. They were messing with us.

"Your dad asked us not to say a word to you, he wanted you all to be a perfect family. We asked him how you would feel when you found out that you’re not a healer because you were not her biological child and he said they would tell you themselves but death took them before they could do this."

"I’m sorry Sofia."

"Don’t tell her sorry. You all are just playing around with us!" I expressed my frustration and tried to pull Sofia but she pulled her hand from my grip. Making me stand there in confusion.

"We tried to prepare the plant of life and it worked." She spoke, her voice more fierce as though she’d accepted her fate.

Sofia gestured towards me as she spoke and their eyes followed, landing on me.

"Okay, what’s wrong? What now?" I asked, moving backward, they were probably high or something.

"It worked when you did it with her?" The man who explained everything previously asked again, his gaze pinned on me.

"Yes. It needed a strong wolf and a healer. Since I’m not a healer, Maybe I’m a strong wolf and she’s a..." Sofia trailed off as she glanced at me.

"What are you insinuating?" I asked half laughing.

"You’re getting it all wrong. I’m not a healer, hell, I don’t even know anything about plants except the ones I read from that big book." I tried to convince them but they weren’t listening.

"Which pack are you from? Who are your parents?" The man asked, examining me.

"I’m from no pack, my only family is Arianna, a human. And I have no parents. At least I don’t know them. I grew up in an orphanage." I frowned as I was forced to remember my painful past.

"She might be the lost daughter of the great healer." The man said again and I almost burst into laughter at his words but none of them showed any signs of smiling only then did I know that they were serious.

"No no no, I’m not what you think okay? I can prove that to you, uhh, okay, how about I do that thing Sofia tried to do? When you see that I can’t do it as well, you’ll leave me alone." I suggested and they all followed us back to the office.

They taught me foreign words and asked me to cast the spell.

I pronounced the words just like I was told so that they wouldn’t say I mispronounced and I should try it again.

After I cast the spell, I looked at the flowers expecting them to remain dried so I could laugh at them but a bright light shone from my hands to the flowers on the table, turning every one of them as new as day.