Chapter 10
The next few weeks was like a blur . The medication messed with my head as the dose was stronger . Since the horse incident the house parents treated me like I was a demon. Everyone was sent home from school as the entire school contract head lice. My new house parent bought rid and was treating our hair as the chemicals began to burn in mine. The school sent me to a specialist to get my hair done. In the end I had to cut off all of my hair like a boy to get rid of the lice. I looked like a boy. You couldn't tell the difference unless you payed attention to my clothes.
The summer was especially hanious and I was stuck on alot of yard work during the summer . I could feel the yellow cat stalking me . Waiting for me to come to him. It had been almost a year since this. At first appeared to me. I haven't seen the cat in it human form since the baptism batha t the church. I looked at the woods as I kept hearing him whisper my name.
" Not now . I'm working. " I hissed in my head .
" Then when ." I heard the yellow cat growl in response .
" Can't you go away. I don't have time right now." I continued to think.
" I will go once you return what is mine. " He hissed as I could hear his steps grow louder as he got closer to the edge of the woods.
I grew angry as I let go of the gas latch on the pushower and walked into the woods . I was very tired of this cat bothering me Everytime I was working. I came in as I saw the cat sitting in the center of the woods.
" Turn into the man . I don't like you in my head like that." I demanded.
" Then make me get out, witch ." He retorted .
" How? I am only a child after all. How can I do something I don't even know I'm doing." I said frustrated at how annoyed I was becoming.
" I tell you what. If I teach you will you give me back my blade?" He negotiated.
" That too I have no idea what I did? " I Shouted in distress.
" How did you do it last time." He insisted as he prowed in my head for answers.
" I don't know. Get out of my head now. " I screamed as I imagined doors shutting in my head one by one . As the doors slammed I saw his exiting my mind. I was frustrated how I did things and confused how I didn't know how I did it either .
I was confused why this was happening to me. Why it all was happening to me. I didn't ask for the family I was born into. I didn't ask to be abused by my father and my mother did nothing to stop it. I didn't asked to be put in home after home. Rejected or dismissed when the fit wasn't right. I didn't ask for these things I now have . Things I can't explain or control. Doing things I couldn't understand.
I was told I was ADHD and needed medicine. I was told that it's okay to be broken in my therapy sessions talking to a stranger in a group of kids also in the system. I was told my dreams were night terrors from a traumatic times . Then why did they come true. Why can I hear voices and thoughts. Why was I able to project a bubble that throbs and repairs itself. Why did I pull a sword underground. Why was I even alive.
During the time of chores you had a lot of time to sort out your thoughts. Sort out your life and where you were. I was nine years old and I didn't know why or what I was. Why this hunter was after me. I did sessions with my therapist and she always asked if anything happened to me that week and if I had anything to share that was important. I look down at my paper I was working on knowing the course I was going to take . I looked at my therapist as I shook my head no. What can I tell her. I'm a witch and a hunter that sometimes looks like a large yellow cat and I have strange abilities.
I was already on medication I had shoved down my throat and was in mandated therapy. The school placed me in special education classes and people talk to me like I'm slow or broken. If I said what I thought they would think I am crazy . They would put me on more meds . They would send me to a ward. I've seen it before girls that was uncontrollable. Being carted off to one place or another. I have had four homes in one year. I was tired of be the new girl. Tired of having to retell my story to new curious kids my age . Tired of keeping things from them because I know I'm not normal.
Every once in a while I would hear the buzz of the hunter becoming impatient with me .I told him I didn't know how to bring his sword back. What was so significant about that sword that made him uneasy without it. I needed questions answered I knew he wouldn't leave me alone until I did.
The next day I made it a point to get questions and answers. I might have been a child but a child's mind I did not have. I've seen things. Experienced things. And knew about things all before my ninth birthday. You can say I was forcefully acclimated to the evils of the world that his behind cookie cutter facades .
I marched in the woods expecting to see the yellow cat . But I saw the man. He had his cloak removed and laying on a fallen log. His marks faded and more like scars instead of magical markings. His eyes full and lack of life. Black and deep like coals waiting to be reignited with flame.
He looked so lost so forlorn in his state of mind. I could hear his thoughts if I wanted to but I don't like him in my head so it be rude to go in his. I tried to walk up behind him as silent as possible. Like a cat hunting a mouse. I thought I was being quiet when he spoke up.
" Finally little one you came to see me." He sighed .
" You could just go. " I Retorted.
" No I actually can't . My sword . Is like the extension of my soul . Without it I can't ." He explained.
" And if I could give it back?" I asked already knowing the answer before I asked it. I just needed confirmation my thoughts were rational.
" I would kill you. Complete my mark on you and move onto the next witch. " He said plainly confirming my thoughts.
" Your mark?" I asked confused by the term.
" My mission. We don't kill at random. It's not a prejudice thing. It's a business. We get marks or missions to carry out. I can not return to collect my payment until my mission is completed. I can not get another mission until the previous one has proof of elimination. I am worthless without that sword." He said showing his weakness to the little girl.
" Why don't you just leave this work?" I asked now digging deeper.
" I was born into this. There was no joining it. It was thrust upon me at birth and my father's birth and his father before him. Our name, bloodline, and honor will always be attached to this line of work." He said sounding defeated .
" And your daughter. Will she be like you if she was alive?" I asked thinking of a childlike hunter that could be in my presence.
" Hunter are not allowed to have a families. We can breed to create numbers but the happy wife and kids in a home out of love is not in our vocabulary. Once the child is born they are raised by others. They don't get to bond with their parents. We know of them but there is no room for love just acknowledgment." He said sourly .
" And how did you." She paused afraid to ask about her death.
" She was killed . My partner refused to relinquish her to the order. So they put a mark on her and my partner." He explained sadly.
" Hunters can hunt other hunters." I asked confused.
" We can. If we fail to fall in line. If we go rouge . We become the mark. If we fail to complete a mission we become the mission. So it's kill or be killed." He said as he looked in the distance.
" So who got this mark as you say on your partner and child?" I asked suspicious I already knew the answer. At this point I was just testing the danger.
" I did." He said defeated as I saw his fingers red from him rubbing the skin off with his nails now smeared with red and black stain.