It Couldn't Be... Love? | Tom Nook x Redd | Fanfiction |

Chapter 17 - Katrina's Spell

This chapter will feature a flashback happening in Katrina's tent. For the sake of the story, both the exterior and interior of the tent have been altered. Katrina's services have also been changed for the sake of this chapter, expanding beyond just fortune telling into witchcraft. This flashback takes place in the Animal Crossing (the first game) days, shortly after Redd betrays Tom, which will be explained in the next chapter.

The memory of how his memories had been taken emerged slowly. Soon, it was overtaking him whole.

-

Smells of spices, the sharp stab of a dark musk, and the heavy perfume of old roses assailed Tom's nose as he ducked under the curtain flap.

Tom had always been a rational man - it was how he survived in the business world. Ghosts? Nah, mere figments of the imagination. Mermaids? Nope, tales made up by bored sailors. A whole paranormal world that lurked under everybody's noses? Please! There was nothing in this world that could not be explained, everything had some science behind it. The fact that he had ended up in the tent of a fortune teller and possible witch was beyond him.

Well, no it wasn't. He knew why he was here.

It seemed she did, too.

The woman was bending down over a table with heavy books on it, dust coating the worn spines. She did not seem to notice him, so Tom took a minute to look around the insides of the tent. The torches on the purple table in front of the odd-looking curtains blazed fiercely, and the small tent was alight in the darkness by the flames. There was a small bookshelf stuffed until it was bursting, with dusty bottles, ancient-looking books, and incense sticks and sage bundles. The rug on the floor, depicting all the zodiac symbols enclosed in a circle, gave off an overpowering smell of burning wood. Tom could understand why people thought she was spooky - this tent seemed proof of that. As though the woman could read his thoughts, which he wouldn't put beyond her, she stiffened and rose in a single fluid motion. Her back to him, she spoke.

"Tom Nook. How odd. I never thought I'd see you here." Her voice was smooth, seductive, and with a slight purr on the edge of every word. She really was spookily strange.

"Katrina." His words were formal, clipped, as he addressed the fortune teller.

"But then again, the stars do align in odd ways." She laughed at the end of that, and her laugh was like a cat's purr. As Katrina turned and stepped into a little ring of light cast on the walls by the torches, Tom finally saw her for the first time - and it was impossible not to stare.

Her skin was like the richest brown soil of the earth, and it was so impossibly smooth. Gold henna tattoos ran up her arms like constellations, and her sharp nails were curved and claw-like. Hair the color of the deepest black of the night cascaded down her back to stop at her waist, and a heavy fringe of bangs was like a curtain on her forehead. She had on a dark red silk headband, with little gold chains hanging off it, stopping just over her eyes, which were stranger than all her features put together. They were like two lovely golden jewels, but they were rich with an almost ferocious curiosity. Her pupils were smaller than a normal person's pupils, looking inquisitive and hungry at the same time. The red dress she had on was made of an odd, heavy type of fabric, and the many color patterned shawl over it was made of the same material. Her feet were bare, her toenails painted a deep, bloody crimson.

She was murderous and beautiful at the same time, like a poisonous flower.

"You feel great grief." Tom snapped himself out of his weird little daze and hurried to catch up as Katrina spoke. She moved out from behind the wooden table with the books and the gold bangles on her arm sounded like wind chimes as they clinked together.