by K. A. Poe
“I—what?” Mathias glanced up at me, looking disgruntled and surprised. He composed himself and shrugged. “He might be. His room number is twelve, you can check there or the lobby.”
After checking room twelve and getting no answer, I wandered down the corridor leading to the lobby, where I hoped to find someone new to talk to — anyone, really. A brown-haired girl I’d remembered seeing during my first visit to Haven was sitting on the sectional with one leg curled up under her. It was Lydia. Her hair fell in a mess of frizzy curls against the back of her black cotton shirt, and she had her head resting in her hands. I stepped further into the room, half-hoping to get her attention without having to say anything, but she was completely zoned out.
“Ah, I see that Castus Fisher is occupied with her own thoughts again,” said the warm voice of Artemis from behind me. “Don’t let her intimidate you with her cold exterior. She truly is divine.”
Artemis smiled warmly and placed a tender hand on my shoulder, turning me toward Lydia to where I could see her eyes. They were a natural color at that moment—a dark blue that reminded me of sapphires, yet they were so empty.
“She seems so out of it, like she’s barely there at all.” Just like Eila had seemed …
“Zoning out like this is her way of coping.”
“Coping with what?”
Artemis cleared his throat, as if to see if it got Lydia’s attention. She didn’t even flinch. “Castus Fisher arrived here roughly five years ago, on a whim, in hysterics. It was difficult at first for me to understand a single word she was saying, but after an hour of calming her down with a cup of tea and assurances that we could aid her here, she relaxed enough to explain what happened. She had thought she was going mad. Her parents couldn’t remember who she was and swore they had never had a child before. They were so startled by her presence in their home that they forcefully kicked her out. They weren’t the only ones who seemed to have forgotten who she was, and she had been devastated.
“I explained to her that she was a witch — and a strong one at that; I could sense it, just as I can sense that you are. She possesses a very unique gift that, while it is rare, is highly unfavorable. Castus Fisher is a memory-manipulator.”
My eyes had gone wide and I was staring, transfixed, at the bushy-haired girl on the sectional. She was sitting directly ahead of me but was so focused on whatever was on her mind that I may as well not have existed. “What’s a memory-manipulator capable of?”
“Many things. The Nefastus could actually use such a gift to their advantage, but they do not know of her, as far as I am aware. Unlike regular manipulators which solely focus on physical manipulation, a memory-manipulator can steal, replace, or insert memories in anyone’s mind.”
I gasped in surprise. The idea of such a gift was terrifying — I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to have my memories stolen or replaced. Then again, I wouldn’t even know that they had been.
“Unbeknownst to Castus Fisher, she made the mistake of wishing she’d never been born, while surrounded at a birthday party, by friends and family. It wasn’t until after the celebration that her parents noticed her hanging around once the event commenced and they grew suspicious. All memory of her birth and life thereafter had been removed from all of the guests’ minds. A mind-manipulator must be extremely careful with what they think or say ... that is why she zones out like this, in order to keep her mind blank. It is also why she avoids everyone as much as possible.”
Looking at her, I felt a twinge of despair and need to comfort her. She must have had a terrible time adapting to life in Haven, not being able to make friends because she was afraid she would lose them with a mere thought. She didn’t look unhappy, just lost.
“Could she just replace those lost memories?” I asked.
“It’s not possible,” he said grimly. “Once a memory is removed, it cannot be restored.”
“Where do the memories go ...?” It seemed like a silly question and I briefly wished I hadn’t asked.
“That is unknown. They may still exist in the recesses of the person’s mind, merely blocked by some sort of magical barrier, unable to be accessed again.”
“Wouldn’t her parents have had like, pictures and stuff? Wouldn’t that bring it all back?”
Artemis shrugged. “I’m sure they did, but she never returned. I doubt the memories themselves would have ever come back to them. Though I imagine the pictures gave them quite a fright.”
“She won’t ... she won’t mind that you told me all of this, will she?”
Artemis smiled his typical warm smile. “Of course not. She truly is friendly, when you get to know her. Perhaps you will have the pleasure of getting to.”
“I hope so. Does she do anything outside of ... this?” I asked, indicating her sitting there, unblinking and uncommunicative.
“Oh, yes, indeed. She’s a painter, and quite a talented one at that.”
I was instantly intrigued, being an artist myself. “I draw ... maybe we could do some together sometime,” I said with an ounce of hope.
“Perhaps,” he said thoughtfully. “You should bring her a drawing of yours sometime; it might encourage her to open up to you.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“Just … be careful. As friendly and humble as she is, she is both powerful and dangerous. It would be more than a shame for you to have any memories inadvertently lost, or worse.”
“Worse …?” I asked, unsure if I really wanted to know the answer.
“I heard of another manipulator once, far from here, that used their power to completely wipe the minds of their victims. Their minds were essentially returned to that of a baby’s again, or worse.”
I gulped. “That’s horrible …”
“It is. But the same can be said regarding nearly any power. Power in itself is not good; it is not bad. It is how it is wielded and who uses it that determines its alignment. You will do well to remember that.”
“I will …”
He smiled again, patted my shoulder, and strolled from the lobby.
Chapter Five
Even after Artemis left the lobby, I stayed and made myself comfortable on the sectional, observing Lydia silently. Warily, I looked in her direction now and then, wondering what it must be like inside her head. This gave me an idea. I cleared my mind of all thought aside from those of Lydia, focusing solely on the girl sitting on the opposite end of the sectional. Shutting my eyes, I found my mind filled with nothing but the soft glowing halo of red-orange light from the lit lamp beside her. Then, to my surprise, came the sound of loud, empty static — the apparent blank thoughts of the other girl. How was that even possible? Could it be that Lydia knew how to push others out of her mind, or was she literally not thinking about anything other than white-noise?
I opened my eyes and directed my voice toward her, “Are you really not thinking of anything at all?”
To my surprise, Lydia looked in my direction with her sapphire eyes and scowled. “It’s really not nice to interrupt people when they’re thinkin’.” There was a subtle accent in her voice that reminded me of my English teacher from middle school who was from Georgia.
“But ... you weren’t thinking. Were you?”
Her expression didn’t change, but there was a curious gleam in her eyes. “A mind reader, aren’t ya?”
I nodded.
“Ya won’t get any answers from me. In fact, it’s rare that ya can see into the thoughts of another witch.”
Thinking it over, I knew she had to have been wrong. I had heard Mathias and Hannah thinking before.
“I’ve heard other witch’s thoughts before,” I countered.
“They must’ve allowed you in. Now, if ya don’t mind, I’d like to avoid erasin’ any of your precious memories today ... but if ya continue to bother me, I just might change my mind.”
Taken aback, I returned to my silence. Had I imagined Artemis saying she was friendly?
The front door creaked open
and a boy walked in. He wore a thick gray scarf around his throat, a gray-blue thermal long-sleeved shirt and jeans; the shoulders of his shirt were damp with specks of glittering snow. Thick, wavy dark-brown hair met at the nape of his neck in a curling wave, and a few strands hung at the sides of his face. Admittedly, I was surprised by his appearance, having not known any boys to actually take the time to make themselves look nice. Startled, I saw that he was looking at me through dark eyes, and smiling crookedly at me. Lydia seemed to be ignoring him altogether, which didn’t surprise me, and didn’t appear to affect him at all.
“Who might you be?” he asked as he removed his scarf and shook it, sending drops of water onto the tiled floor.
I blinked and struggled to find my voice. “I, uh, Madison. I mean ... Castus Young.”
His dark eyes lit up with recognition. “The Summoner and Clairvoyant?”
With a slow nod, I answered his question. “How’d you know?”
“Rumors spread quicker than wildfires,” he said. “I am Castus de Quincey; Alan, if you like.”
I gasped in shock, and clasped my hand over my mouth, only embarrassing myself further. “You’re Alan?”
He looked surprised, then smiled and nodded. “You’ve heard of me too then, I take it? See, things travel quickly. Here of all places.”
“Math — er — Castus Forsythe mentioned you earlier today. He told me about your gift, too. It sounds awesome.”
Alan grinned. “It is exquisite, I must admit. Would you be interested in letting me demonstrate it for you?”
“How? Isn’t it something only you can see or do?”
With a shake of his head, he offered me a hand and helped me up from the sectional. He released my hand and led me down the corridor to room twelve, the very door I had knocked on only an hour earlier. I was semi-expecting it to look like Noah’s, but then reminded myself that he took great care in his appearance, why wouldn’t the same be done for his bedroom? As we entered, I could see that I was right; it was impeccably tidy. There wasn’t a single speck of dirt on the floor, and his bed was better made than even my mom’s.
He approached his dresser and pulled open the top drawer, gathered an object wrapped in cloth, and pushed the wood shut. Unveiling it, I discovered that it was an intricately woven silver necklace that looked like it had been around for a long time.
“It’s my favorite item that I have ever looked into the past with. It was a family heirloom.” He held out his unoccupied hand expectantly toward me. “May I?”
Nervously, I laid my hand palm-down against his and removed the necklace from the cloth as he instructed, then laid it in his other hand. With a startled gasp, I felt my vision blur and everything surrounding me faded away until a new scene developed before me.
A young woman—probably around twenty-five—sat rocking back and forth in a creaky old rocking chair, a bundled up child nestled in her arms. I could hear the faint humming of an unrecognized tune that was lulling the infant to sleep. A man approached from behind, muttering something in another language — French, I suspected — and the woman glanced upward when he came into focus in front of her. He was holding out the silver necklace and offering it to the young woman.
“Ma wanted you to have it,” he said in a sullen voice and dropped it onto her lap, disturbing the child. I was unsure if he was now truly speaking English, or I could somehow understand the language through the magic of the vision.
The woman grasped the necklace in her spare hand and shouted over the wails of the infant, “Wait! Edmond! Why are you giving me this? Where is Ma?”
Edmond turned around, looking gravely, and said, “Ma is dead, Abigail, Ma is dead,” before falling to his knees and bawling.
When the vision faded, I was startled to find my hand clasped tightly onto Alan’s. I pulled away and looked at the necklace in shock, and then back at him.
“Wh-why does this mean so much to you? Why is it your favorite? It’s … it’s so sad …”
Alan concealed the necklace with the cloth and returned it to the drawer, then situated himself in front of me with a serious expression on his face; his eyes flickered an unearthly green. “Life is one big tragedy, is it not? We are born, we adapt to the world, learning and growing, working until our bones are brittle and weak, only to die in the end. This specific memory holds all of that raw emotion and reality in one single image — the baby, the mother, the devastated brother and son, and the death of their loved one.”
“That’s more than just a little morbid, don’t you think?” Mathias asked from the doorway, where he was leaning against the doorframe, arms across his chest.
“It’s merely the truth, Castus Forsythe,” Alan answered. “You will learn this someday, to your sorrow.”
“Who were those people in the memory?” I asked, ignoring Mathias’s intrusion.
“My mother told me that it was handed down from my great-great-grandmother Abigail.”
“Are you an ‘orphan’ like Mathias and Noah?”
Alan’s expression was complicated to decipher — I couldn’t tell whether he was upset or not. “No. I chose to come here, and my parents kept in contact with me. They understood my abilities. I like to think they were proud of my choice in coming here. Although, my father possessed a gift, but he chose to be an Exile.”
I was surprised, not having considered that possibility. I knew that most of the members of the Castus Clan had to have had parents or relatives that were witches as well. “What do you mean ... were?”
He grimaced and glanced momentarily in Mathias’s direction. “They died ... two and a half years ago. My mother was a wealthy business owner, and my father was an Exile, as I said. They were both murdered by Nefastus witches when they refused to give up information to Constantine. Vital information that could have aided them in putting an end to Haven, from what I have been told. What that information was, I do not know. It was our servant, Michael, that last spoke to my father.”
“That’s heartbreaking,” I said with a frown. “It does make me wonder what your parents might have known, especially since your dad was an Exile.”
“It’s something that I wonder about often, and none of their possessions have yet revealed anything useful to me.”
“He owns a mansion,” Mathias said, as though he thought that might interest me, though it almost sounded like an insult in the tone he used.
“Do you really?” I asked toward Alan.
He shrugged. “I do, but might as well not. I seldom go there; I prefer the comfort of my room here at Haven. I feel that it is safer as well.”
“What about you, Mathias? Do you know if any of your relatives are witches?” I asked, thinking that he was feeling left out of the conversation somehow, although he was the one that had intruded.
He shook his head, causing strands of silvery hair to fall across his eyes. “I was too young to remember anything about my real family. Just a baby. I consider Artemis the only father I ever had.”
“Do you know much about any of the other witch’s families that live here?”
“You certainly are curious, aren’t you?” Alan asked with a playful smirk.
“She is new to all of this, Castus de Quincey,” Mathias said dryly. “To answer your question, Madison, I know a little about some of them. Castus Fisher’s parents never showed any signs of abilities, while Castus Chance and his sister’s parents are both witches, as you were told earlier today. I believe that their mother is a healer of some sort. Castus Bowman’s grandma is a witch; however she was deemed insane for saying so in public and was thrown in an institute. Probably for the best, all things considered. And —”
Mathias had unintentionally upset me with his words and I pushed past Alan, then stumbled through the door, shoving my way by Mathias.
“I think I have upset her,” I heard him say with obvious confusion toward Alan. “Madison, wait!”
Running down the hall, I found the door to my room, unlocked it and shut it behind me b
efore Mathias had a chance to reach me. He knocked on the door but I ignored him, as my attention was now on my mother who was sitting on the spare bed and talking quietly on a cell phone. I remembered going shopping with her and Jason to pick out a new phone for her, and all the numbers she had saved over the years in her notebooks. Judging by what she was saying, she must have gotten a hold of Desmond — her adoptive father — and was telling him what had happened, from being released from the hospital, being reunited with me, to temporarily living in an ‘apartment’, as she called it. She was asking if he could come and see us sometime soon. She looked mildly disappointed, which led me to believe that he had said no. I was just shocked that he had retained the same number after all these years.
Mathias knocked again and I reluctantly opened the door.
“What is it?” I asked, harsher than I had intended.
“I wanted to apologize ... I hadn’t meant to upset you with anything that I said.”
He looked distraught and it felt impossible to stay upset with him, although I wasn’t directly unhappy with him — just what he’d said and how it reminded me of my mom being taken to Littlehaven for what everyone thought was insanity.
“It’s fine. I’m not upset,” I said quietly, hoping not to distract my mom from her phone call. “It’s just ...”
“That I said Forrest’s grandma had been considered insane, and it made you think of your mom. I should have thought before I spoke ... I hadn’t realized it would have upset you, though. It was a much different situation.”
“And you shouldn’t have. How could you have?”
He sighed and reached a hand toward my face, then reluctantly lowered it before it could make contact with my skin. “Do you think we could go out tomorrow evening?”
Blinking in surprise, at both his question and gesture, I forced myself to nod. “Umm, yeah. Sure. That’d be fine. Where?”