House of Enchanted: The Revelations of Oriceran (Soul Stone Mage Book 1)

by Sarah Noffke

  “I’ll do you one better and tell your mistress to pick you up some fresh fish from the market the next time she’s out,” Azure offered.

  “You’re a good witch. I can already tell,” Toby said, taking off down the hallway to lead Azure to the bathroom.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  “How do you wash your clothes in Virgo?” Toby, the house cat asked.

  Azure regarded him with an annoyed look. “With magic, of course.”

  “I guessed as much. Watching you trying to operate the washer and dryer was the most entertaining thing I’ve seen in a while,” Toby said, licking his paw.

  “You don’t leave this house, so I’m guessing you don’t see much,” Azure snapped, drying her hair with a plush towel. She hadn’t felt right about wearing a stranger’s clothes. Heidi had already been so generous to offer her the house and food. That was why she’d taken on the complex task of washing her clothes using the electric washer and dryer. Yes, she could have used magic, but she was trying to conserve her resources since she didn’t know what she’d face when she left the refuge of this house.

  “You know, in Virgo cats are allowed to roam free. They are highly respected. Mine is named Finswick, but he’s more a member of the family than a pet,” Azure informed the cat, who jumped off the counter in the bathroom and headed for the hallway where a scratching post stood. He sunk his front claws into the post and kneaded it several times. It was bizarre to see the things humans had created that nature usually took care of. Cats didn’t need scratching posts if they had trees, but Azure hadn’t seen a single plant since she’d entered the Land of Terran. She’d guessed that they’d all been leeched to death.

  “Virgo sounds like a cat’s dream,” Toby said.

  Azure tightened the towel around her, hoping her clothes would be done soon. She was running out of time, and needed to locate her father fast. But using her human magic to enchant her soul stone was currently her largest obstacle. She ran her hands through her blonde hair.

  “Do you want me to teach you how to use a curling iron?” the feline asked, rubbing against the doorframe.

  Azure eyed the device sitting on the bathroom counter. “I think I’ll pass,” she said, grabbing her wand and pointing it at her hair.

  “Oh, you won’t waste your magic to clean your clothes, but you’ll use it to do your hair?” Toby asked, his green eyes skeptical.

  Azure smiled into the mirror at her loose blonde ringlets. “Hey, I have priorities!” she exclaimed, just as the front door closed.

  Azure popped her head out of the bathroom to find Heidi standing in the hallway, a strange expression on her face.

  “Who were you talking to?” she asked, looking around like expecting to find someone.

  “No one,” Azure said. Toby strolled forward, rubbing his body against Heidi’s leg.

  “I could have sworn I heard voices when I was opening the door,” she said.

  “Oh, well, I was talking to myself,” Azure said, pressing past Heidi, conscious that she was wearing only a towel in a stranger’s house. “I used your washer and dryer, so I hope that’s okay. I’ll just grab my clothes and be out of your hair.”

  “Girl, don’t you fret. I’m happy to help. You know, I slept on my friend’s couch for a week after I broke up with my last man-mistake. I could have kicked him out, but I wanted to start over,” she explained, and stared around at her tidy house. “And I think I’ve done pretty well for myself since then.”

  “Yeah, your house is great,” Azure agreed, pulling her clothes from the dryer. They were still hot. Electricity was a strange thing.

  “And I got to keep the cat, so fuck that guy,” Heidi said with a laugh.

  “Good. Toby is a fantastic cat,” Azure said.

  Surprise sprang to the other woman’s face. “How’d you know that his name is Toby?”

  Azure considered pulling her wand from where’d she’d stashed it in her bosom and casting a memory-erasing charm on Heidi. However, that killed brain cells, and she rather liked this lady. She was generous and kind, and besides feeding her cat trash, she was a good pet owner.

  “You told me earlier, remember? You said not to let the cat, Toby, out,” she said, using a complex memory charm on Heidi that might not work without her wand.

  To Azure’s relief, Heidi nodded. “That’s right. Anyway, get your clothes on. The Harvest Celebration starts in less than an hour. My boss gave me the rest of the day off for it.”

  “Harvest Celebration?” Azure asked, realizing she wasn’t pulling off this human impersonation thing very well.

  Heidi simply waved her hand at Azure. “Oh, maybe you call it something different. Anyway, you know, it’s when they bring in stuff from the Dark Forest for us to leech. My magic reserves have been depleted for over a week, but I don’t want to be like those hikers the dryads froze.” She shivered. “Could you imagine being a statue? So creepy!”

  “I’m sure that they only do it to humans who leech all of the energy out of a tree or whatever,” Azure said, heading back in the direction of the bathroom with her clean clothes in her arms.

  “I’ve often thought the same thing. Emperor Richard says that we should always leave life in the things we leech from. However, the Consumer Party says filling our reserves to the maximum is more important than plant life that can be regrown,” Heidi said.

  “Consumer Party?” Azure asked. It made no sense that the humans were being inundated with incorrect information. Growing a tree took decades or even centuries, depending on the type. No wonder their section of the forest was barren!

  “Candace, I’m getting the impression that you’re not from Terran.” Shock covered her face. “Oh my gods! Are you…”

  Azure’s eyes widened as she reached for the wand in her towel. Heidi held up a finger and beamed.

  “You’re from Earth, are you?” she asked eagerly.

  Azure redirected her movement, hugging her clothes to her chest. “Yeessss,” she agreed, drawing out the word.

  “I knew it! You were smuggled through an illegal portal, weren’t you? That’s totally tubular,” she said.

  “Yes, but you can’t tell anyone. I didn’t mean to lie to you.”

  “So there is no ex-boyfriend, is there?”

  “No, and I’m sorry, but—”

  “Don’t be sorry. This is so much better. You’re from Earth!” Heidi said again, and looked down at the cat. “I have a real Earthling in my house!”

  Toby looked at Azure and a hint of a smile crossed his face, like he thought this was incredibly entertaining.

  “You’re not mad? You’re not going to turn me in?” Azure asked.

  “Hell, no! I’m going to pick your brain about all things Earth. You know that we only get information from sources in the black market. Advertisements, old books, magazines. Asking someone from Earth is so much better. You have to teach me all about your ways,” Heidi said.

  It all made sense now. That was why the fashions were so strange and things seemed off. The humans in Terran were using old resources to imitate Earth, but they had obviously missed things in translation.

  “I absolutely will, but first I’ve got to put on some clothes,” Azure said, closing the bathroom door.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Azure didn’t think going to the Harvest Celebration was a great idea, but how else was she going to fuel her human magic? She knew it was likely that the Duke of Terran had security looking for her, but he didn’t know that she was in Terran. They’d met in the forest. Actually, he probably thought she’d run as far from Terran as possible. That was what most witches would have done. No one would voluntarily invade the borders of this strange society, except someone who had everything to lose if she didn’t.

  Heidi was waiting for Azure with eager eyes when she exited the bathroom, her skinny jeans and see-through tank fresh and clean.

  “First things first. On Earth, have you been to Los Angeles? That’s supposed to be the entertainment
capital, from what I’ve heard,” she asked, speaking rapidly.

  “I have,” Azure confirmed, glad she didn’t have to lie…yet.

  “Wow! Tell me all about it! What’s your favorite part? I hear that the movie stars live there, people like Marilyn Monroe and Abraham Lincoln,” Heidi gushed.

  Azure wasn’t sure what she’d gotten herself into. Not only was she hiding the fact that she was a witch, but she was impersonating an Earthling. The only thing that made her feel better was she knew the people of Terran really didn’t know much about Earth and Heidi wouldn’t know if she was lying. “Well, the shopping is great. You can buy anything you want at the mall. Traffic absolutely sucks. And there are theme parks, like this place called the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.”

  Heidi’s bright eyes suddenly dulled. “Oh, a theme park devoted to wizards and witches? That sound like a horrible place. Why would they build something like that?”

  Azure worked to keep her face neutral. “We love wizards and witches on Earth. They are considered a really special species, and are revered for their use of magic,” she said, catching the wink Toby gave her behind Heidi’s back.

  “Special species is right, like they all ride the short bus,” Heidi snorted. “The Consumer Party says that witches and wizards are all incredibly poor, and will be extinct in another hundred years.”

  “That’s not true. We just… I mean, they are just conservative. Not wasteful like humans,” Azure said, her voice flaring. “I mean, like us.”

  Heidi regarded Azure with a new expression, one that spoke of a sudden hesitation.

  “Sorry, I’m just passionate about witches and wizards. On Earth, we all want to be like them, hence the theme park devoted to Harry Potter,” Azure said, hoping she’d covered her blunder.

  “Well, we actually have witches and wizards here, but they’re filthy. More disgusting than Orcs,” Heidi said, strolling down the hallway to retrieve her keys. Azure followed behind her.

  “Have you ever met a witch?” Azure asked.

  “No, but the Consumer Party details them in their pamphlets.” Heidi pointed her finger in the direction of a piece of folded paper that was pinned to the large box that kept things cold. Azure had eaten something Toby called a Popsicle from there when she was waiting for her clothes to cycle through the washer.

  The front of the pamphlet read, What You Need to Know. This Consumer Party was telling the people of Terran how to act and what to believe. These people were really brainwashed.

  “You ready to go?” Heidi asked.

  “Yes, but tell me, is it possible that I’ll have the opportunity to meet the Emperor at this celebration, or anyone connected to him?” Azure asked, adding, “I’m obsessed with the royal house.”

  Heidi seemed to believe this and nodded. “I totally get it. Frederick, the Emperor’s son, is so sizzling.”

  “Sizzling? Like on fire?” Azure asked.

  “Like fine. He’s drop-dead gorgeous. And no, we won’t have a chance to flirt with him at the Harvest Celebration because the royal family is holding a press conference at the palace. Who knows what it’s about, but we can check it out on the television later,” she said, pointing to a flat screen on the far side of the living room.

  “But if the Emperor and his family aren’t at the Harvest Celebration, how do they restore their magic?”

  Heidi gestured for Azure to follow her as she set off for the door. “The royal family has a greenhouse where they leech their magic. That’s how the maintenance workers fill their reserves, which fuel our electricity. It’s actually a pretty smart idea, and they’ve talked about installing more greenhouses around the city. However, we are still learning how to grow plants. Maybe you could lend some of your knowledge from Earth!”

  Azure followed Heidi out of the house, again noting the fake grass in the manicured yard. “Wait, don’t you grow your own food? How do you get fruits and vegetables?”

  Heidi turned around, her forehead creased with confusion. “Why would we eat fruits and vegetables?”

  “Because they’re part of a healthy diet,” Azure said, speaking slowly, as if Heidi were hard of hearing.

  Heidi laughed. “That’s funny. You’re telling me humans on Earth eat things that grow? That’s so wasteful. They could be leeching magical energy from a carrot rather than wasting it by consuming it.”

  “Well, it would surprise you to find out that on Earth humans don’t have magic,” Azure informed her, walking next to Heidi on the pavement. Small cars and bikes passed on the road, many of them angrily honking their horns.

  “No way! Those poor humans. No wonder you came here,” Heidi said. “The poor things have had to resort to eating vegetables? That’s even sadder.”

  Now that Azure thought about it, there hadn’t been any fruits and vegetables in Heidi’s kitchen. It was all packaged stuff, and most of it contained sugar.

  “If you don’t grow your food, where does it come from?” Azure asked. They were in a tract of duplicate houses, all with the same straight lines and no individuating details. In Virgo, each cottage resembled the witch or wizard who inhabited it, and was accented with bright colors and artwork. These houses were mostly brown and tan.

  “We create it using magic,” Heidi explained, not moving over on the sidewalk as a group heading in the opposite direction approached. Azure veered into the road to make way for them. It was like everyone was out for themselves.

  “You start with supplies, correct?” she asked.

  “Yes. You want a Twinkie, start with some sugar. We buy that stuff in huge crates from the black market. You can make anything with just a teaspoon of sugar. It’s like gold,” Heidi said.

  “And also like poison,” Azure added, remembering the donut she had ate earlier. It was now making her stomach churn.

  Azure veered back off the sidewalk as another group of humans passed them.

  “You know, you’re going to have to learn to stand up for yourself,” Heidi told her.

  “Is that why the citizens here don’t pause and allow the other person to go first? It’s like they have no manners,” Azure said.

  “Oh, we are plenty polite,” she said, waving at someone approaching and offering a giant smile. The guy smiled back widely, but neither of them moved over on the sidewalk as they passed, and they knocked into each other’s shoulders.

  “That’s fake niceness,” Azure said when the stranger had passed.

  “Well, the Consumer Party says we have to look out for ourselves first, but to smile as you do it,” Heidi said, turning down a new street.

  There was a large crowd in the distance. It gave Azure hope, that there were so many people here. She wouldn’t stick out, and would be that much closer to finding both her father and her mother’s soul stone. She was aware that time was running out. Monet would be worried and would make Ever come after her if she didn’t return soon.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  The crowd, to Azure’s surprise, was only the line to get into the Harvest Celebration.

  “It’s in there,” Heidi said, pointing to the largest structure Azure had ever seen.

  “What happens in there?” Azure asked, taking her place in the slow-moving line beside Heidi.

  She looked at Azure like she had suddenly turned into a pixie. “Are you serious? You’re the Earthling. I would have thought you’d be the first to recognize a football stadium.”

  “Oh,” Azure said, holding her breath momentarily while she constructed an answer. “Well, this one looks different than the ones I’m used to. Ours are…bigger.”

  Heidi’s eyes widened. “I cannot wait to go to Earth one day. You have to smuggle me through an illegal portal.”

  “The celebration is in this stadium?” Azure changed the subject, trying to peer around the people in front of her. They were almost to the entrance.

  “It’s the only place big enough. And what’s awesome is that we get to go down onto the field for the whole thing, instead of sitting
in the stands like if we were watching a game,” Heidi said.

  Azure had absolutely no idea what Heidi meant, but she nodded and pretended it made perfect sense.

  “Hey, will you teach me how to leech and use human magic when we get inside?” Azure asked, her voice a whisper.

  “Absolutely, if you’ll answer a quick question for me. Is it true that Earthlings celebrate the day they were born each year and get presents just for existing?”

  That did seem like a bizarre thing to celebrate. If Gran got presents for each year she’s been alive, the House of Enchanted would be exploding with cauldrons and strange potions.

  “Yes,” Azure nodded, knowing she shouldn’t deliberate on it too long. “They’re called arrival parties. There’s a big feast, and people sing songs to the person.”

  “Wow, that’s crazy. If we did that I’d be at an arrival party every single day,” Heidi said, striding forward through a hallway.

  Azure followed and squinted in the bright light as they stepped out of the corridor onto a green field that had been carpeted with the fake grass. She spun around, taking in the metal seats that surrounded the pretty green field. There were large fork-like structures at either side of the field, which were flanked by security guards. She lowered her chin and brought her eyes down.

  “It’s coming!” Heidi exclaimed, nearly jumping up and down in place as excitement spilled from her.

  “What is it?” Azure asked, trying to what was being dragged in from the opposite side of the field.

  “Maybe it will be a boulder like last time, although they don’t have as much energy as a plant, so I hope not,” Heidi said, gripping Azure’s hand and pulling her through the crowd. “We want to be close so we have a good spot. Once the energy is all leeched, it’s done. There was one time that I didn’t even get any energy because I was at the back. Talk about a long time without magic!”

  Azure nodded, not understanding at all. It seemed so strange that humans had to rely on a source. She was intensely grateful for the ancestry that gave her internal magic. As she placed her fingers on her soul stone, she felt the object warm. It was formed from the accumulation of the power she was growing since she was born. The unused power created the stone, and now that magical object was her insurance for the rest of her life. The witches and wizards of Virgo were amazing. Simply incredible.