Deals & Wishes

Part I

She felt the chill of the late evening clashing with the heat within her body. She was walking through the forest for hours now, and it was beginning to feel as if the world itself was spinning as she wrapped her arms around her stomach. Folding slightly into her torso as she continued to wonder.

She knew she was getting close, had to be. She comforted herself as the pattering of strange feet and odd coos began to surround her. The stone alter had to be around here; all the research she’d done had stated such. Piecing together the location of an ancient tribe with a relic so powerful it can alter reality with the writing of a single wish, she traced the origins of the mythology and folktales to this very forest. She couldn’t help but feel something was off however, as she heard a wolf growl warily in the distance.

Her body spent no moment to think as she ran off into the distance, the trees becoming a blur of obstacles in her way. Each breath ripping at her chest, afraid to look back. That is until her boot got caught in the middle of a large tree root, and her face grated against the hard dirt and moss of the ground. As she quickly placed her palms to the ground to get up, she turned around to come face to face with a pair of black and gold eyes.

She tried to back away while she was still on the ground, pushing her feet and legs away as she crawled backward. Yet, her back crashed into a hard stony surface, and the wolf took this as it’s opportunity to pounce as it opened jaws to bite. The body however froze in midair, jaws agape, as if stuck in time itself.

A voice then began to boom in all directions, as if the winds itself were speaking.

“State your purpose”

Her eyes began to look around erratically, as her mouth struggled in letting out her response.

“I want...I was... I-I...”

The voice yelled even louder, the air around her starting to circle. Calling up all the stray particles of dirt, leaves, and rocks in her vicinity. Growing stronger every second until she felt she was in the middle of a tornado, barely keeping her feet to the ground as her soot black hair flew into her eyes and mouth. She yelled out in the chaos, worried she could barely be heard.

“I want to make a wish; I want the book!”

“And why should I give a person like you, the last remaining part of the Seelie tribe?” The voice spoke again more voices joining in an off-tune choir. The winds picking up until her body was fully in flight hovering above the ground.

“I’ll give you anything for it” She chocked out as her eyes began to fill involuntarily with tears. Visons of her research however started to flash across her mind, things she momentarily forgotten in her panic. What she’d have to say in order to get the book in the first place, what she’d have to lose out of her desperation.

“I’ll make your deal” she almost whispered with what was left of her hoarse throat in the howling winds. They slowed to a complete stop, dropping her not to the ground where she was before but in the comfort of her home. Sinking her sore mud and muck covered body in her creaky bed frame as her breathing began to slow. Gripping in her callous hands a tiny black book and falling asleep with it pressed close to the tank top on her chest.

…

Part II

She awoke to banging on the door. Her body rolling off the bed and hitting the ground, she instantly fled under the bed thinking it was one of the many debt collectors on her case.

“I just can’t catch a break can I” she whispered under her breath, as she opened her little black book and grabbed a dusty pen that must’ve rolled down from her dresser weeks ago. “Let’s see if this really works”

The banging was soon accompanied with a semi familiar voice, but her focus was intently on the words she managed to learn in the dead Seelie language. “I wish for enough fortune to repay this current 20,000 debt” it roughly stated translated.

For a brief second afterward, nothing happened. Leading her to wonder if all that had transpired last night was some sort of odd fever dream, as the voice of the man at the door began to become clearer.

“Lena, you just can’t keep running away from your problems like this. You’re going to have to pay up someday. You hear!”

“You’d know I’d have your money if Jessie wasn’t in the hospital, what am I supposed to let her die” As she said this however her left arm lit up with green runes, tracing down from her fingertips and up to her shoulder blade and neck. Her caramel skin glowing a fluorescent, almost radioactive green. She went to open the door to face him, but instead she was meet with awe as the gruff man with a suit before her was looking up stuck in utter confusion and bewilderment as a small green hole formed in the roof above his head.

“What?”

Golden coins started raining down on him like hail. Filling his empty palms and falling down to the ground. She picked one up in a quick inspection and found the center was carved with a tiny notebook as the perimeter of the coin itself was covered with similar ruins to her arm. This was clearly not a dream, but the man appeared to not feel the same. As the portal closed, and his gaze fell upon Lena’s arm, the glow slowly fading away as a bold black runic tattoo was left in its place. For once she felt powerful, and she did not let this newfound confidence go to waste. She walked up to the man’s stunned face, so close she could smell his overpriced cologne, and spat

“You have the money you wanted now go pawn it or something.” He could barely stutter out any words to say, as he fumbled with the coins on the floor while running to the nearest elevator. Leaving a golden trail in his wake. She wondered as he fled if that was how she must’ve looked like the previous evening. If the cacophony of voices surrounding her, where or whatever their source. If they had felt as wonderful as she did right now. Her eyes twinkling, as she bit down a smile.

…

Part III

After that she spared no time in scrawling other wishes in the book. Multiple expensive houses, gold bars galore, and new clothes. Anything a luxurious person would desire. Of course, getting rid of all previous debts and duties, in the pettiest of fashions along the way. As she was doing this, the runes began to spread. To her right arm, across her abdomen, all the way down her thighs and legs. Even to the crevices between her toes. They were everywhere, the only place now free of them was her own face. She seemed unbothered by this, even satisfied as she called over a limo to take her over to the hospital. The closer she got however, the more the calm facade she gained began to slowly chip away. Until the driver opened her door waving her to the entrance of Jenkin’s Cardiac and Vascular Institute. Each footstep feeling as if her movements were being weighed down, as her peripheral vision began to blacken and blur. She talked to herself in reassurance as she made her way to the same hospital room, she became so familiar with.

“This is what it was all for, just put a smile on and complete the deal” her hands trembling as she stared at her warped reflection in the door handle and turned.

“Honey, is that you?”

Before her she saw a tall smooth-skinned dark brown woman, worn down and exhausted in a cramped small hospital bed. Her short afro hair highlighting her mask of a smile, that seemed to put hers to shame. She quietly walked up to her side of the bed and held her hand in hers as she knelt. Lightly knocking against the IV pole at her side.

“Why do you have such fancy clothes on, are you proposing to me again” she started to snort a little as she laughed.

“Why do you have to be so cute, you are making this so much harder”

“What do you mean what’s going on, are the collectors back?”

“No don’t worry everything’s settled, I paid everything off” her eyes began to gloss over, as she tried in desperation to pull the tears back inside. One hand picking at the turtleneck pressing on her throat.

“Everything how, with what money, wait do you have a tattoo on your neck?”

“I-I made a deal”

“No, it couldn’t have worked those were just stories” Lena pulled back her collar and revealed the runes on her shoulder and a part of her arm.

“Why? but you know what happens if you accept, you’ll become part of the forest forever, how many wishes have you made already maybe it’s not too late.” Lena kissed her forehead as she got up to take a few steps to the back of the room.

“You have houses, multiple as beautiful as you to do anything you want with, all the money you could ever spend-” She said as she took out the little black book from her bag and began writing her last wish in the book. A light gust of wind rotating around her ankles

“Honey no…” she said climbing out of her hospital bed in an attempt to reach out and grab the book from her grasp, but she was already too late.

“This last wish is for you, it all was, please live the life you’ve always deserved” The winds began to pick up obscuring her from view, only the faint glow of green breaking through. They pushed back the bed and chairs in the room throwing over sheets.

“I love you Jess; I’ll always be here for you just a forest away” The wind whirled and inflated as Jessie pushed her one hand against her face as she continued to reach out as the IV pole crashed to the ground. The winds dispersed in a gentle breeze, and all that was left standing there was nothing but a ripped piece of paper. Jessie scrambled over, the strongest she has ever felt yet somehow also the weakest. Gripping on to the page, the breeze brushing past her cheek in reassurance, it read…

“You were the only thing I ever truly wished for.”