Destined Oracle (Completed)

Chapter Three - Reveal

Chapter Three

Reveal

I walked to the bungalow at the farthest, northeast part of the beach and sat down on a soft, cushiony lawn chair. I still couldn't believe my mother. Why would she try to tell me such an outrageous story? I leaned back, placed the book in my lap and opened it up. The handwriting style inside was in ancient script. Even the papers were tinted a dark, rusty yellow, signs of old age. The first few pages were in another language, but as I kept flipping through, the pages were written in English. It was a genealogy line with page after page of generations of O'Haydens with their dates of births and deaths.

Sometimes, it included their cause of death. After flipping through over a hundred pages, I noticed that very few of them died of old age, natural causes or diseases. The majority of the causes of deaths were murders, executions or accidents. Strange, I thought. What's wrong with this family? What surprised me even more was when I reached a section on the family tree where quite a few of my ancestors were actually burned at the stake during the Puritan era. On the last written page of the genealogy line were the names of my grandparents, my father and mother, and me. My mother had told me the truth. They all died on the same day, but in the book it said that someone named Gabriel killed them all. I hoped to myself that he was caught and imprisoned or better yet, executed.

After that, there were two hundred or so empty pages. I supposed that was where future generations of O'Haydens would be written. Past the empty pages began a new section with odd stories of magical battles, the history of magical beings and creatures, and the history of the O'Haydens.

The very last sections of the book were about spells and potion recipes, and an index of what each ingredient was, what it was for, what it did, what it could be used for, how to store it and where to find each ingredient.

I closed the book after flipping through the last pages and looked out across the lake. How creative some family member was to have written this large book, but it must have been written by several different family members over the years because of all the different styles of handwriting in it. So, either they all had a very creative imagination or some kind of mental disorder, which now my mother seems to be experiencing. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes as I continued to run through the events in my head from last night to this morning, thinking about what I was supposed to do now. I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I knew, strong hands were shaking me awake. I opened my eyes, blinking them into focus and Marcus was standing over me.

"Savina ... Savina wake up," he shouted impatiently.

"I'm awake. Will you please stop shaking me?" I asked, irritated. "What do you want?"

"Your mother's been looking everywhere for you," Marcus said, annoyed.

"I know. So?" I returned the annoyed tone. 

"So? It's getting dark and it gets very cool out here at night this time of year. You should come back to the house now."

I looked around and noticed that he was right about it getting dark. I was shocked that I had slept all afternoon. I stood up to follow him back to the house.

"Well, let's go," I said sarcastically.

He rolled his eyes at me and I guess I deserved it. I was rude first.

"It's very beautiful down here," I said, trying to lighten the mood.

"Yes, it is," he agreed flatly.

"So, have you lived here all your life?" I asked.

"Yes, I was born here," he replied, keeping it short again. Maybe he didn't like me.