Imagined into being the.., p.18
Imagined Into Being: The Chronicles of Quinn Book 2,
p.18
I took another few steps toward the river, but I was still soundless.
Not wanting to scare her into running off the way that Tabitha kept doing, I said, softly, “Molly?”
She all but snapped her own neck turning to stare at me.
It was kind of an awful sight. Her eyes were as lovely as ever, somewhere between green and gray and blue and silver, and they were, as always, oh-so bright. Her eyelashes were thick and her eyebrows were dainty. Her skin was milky and totally clear.
She had a little button nose, and even with her eyes widened in fear and puffy from crying, she was beautiful.
But she had no mouth.
Just as before, Molly’s lower face was totally smooth, nothing there at all save solid flesh where her lips should have been. There wasn’t even a dip or a hollow. It was as though someone had just forgotten to even start shaping them.
She stood up, getting to her feet with the grace of a deer, and revealed that there wasn’t so much as a single speck of dirt, moss, or mud on her clothing despite the fact that she had been sitting beside the muddy river.
“Oh, Molly.” I stepped toward her.
She didn’t flinch. She wasn’t scared of me, though she did look scared. I supposed I would be too, if my mouth had simply gone and vanished.
My hand rested on her shoulder and then I pulled her into a hug. Molly collapsed against my front, letting her forehead press to the sharp jut of my shoulder. Her sobs were muffled by the lack of mouth, but her shoulders shook and she tangled her long, slender fingers into the back of my dress like it was the only thing keeping her up.
“It’s okay,” I told her. “I don’t know what happened, but I promise you, I’m going to help figure it out, alright? I need you to stop crying though, Molly. Something really strange has happened, and you’re the only person who can help me.”
After several long more moments of sobbing, Molly finally pulled away. She wiped at her face with both hands, flicking the tears away from her skin. They glistened like jewels in the non-existent sunlight. Her eyes were watery, but her face wasn’t red.
She breathed out hard through her nose, then reached up and carefully pressed the tips of her fingers to the place where the corner of her mouth should have been. Molly made a sound: mhmhm. It was almost the same tone that Grandma used when she hummed at me.
“You can’t talk at all, can you?” I asked. “Alright, that’s going to make it a lot harder, but we can still figure this out. Molly, have you been like this since I left last time?”
I figured that if I stuck to simple yes and no questions, she would be able to nod or shake her head, and let me know what was going on that way. And yes indeed, Molly nodded her head at me, just once. She looked absolutely miserable when she did.
I mean, I would have been miserable too. A whole solid month without being able to talk? Without a mouth at all? No laughing, or humming, or singing? No whistling or shrieking? Nothing at all?
I shuddered.
Molly looked even more miserable when I did.
I took hold of her hand and led her back over to the river, then guided her onto the ground once more. After we had both sat down, I shimmied around so that I was facing her, and I took hold of her hand once more.
“Once upon a time, there was a school teacher,” I said, doing my best to remember the story. “Who had a very big secret. It was a secret that no one else could ever know. The teacher knew that magic was real. And he knew how to use it, too.”
The look on Molly’s face could only be described as abject horror. She tried to get up, but I tightened my grip on her hand.
“Please, just listen.” I told her.
Molly gave a hesitant nod of her head.
I cleared my throat, thought about the wording, and continued, reciting, “The teacher didn’t like to use magic for fun and games. He liked to use it to expand his collection. He was always looking to add a new doll to his shelf, and once he had bought all of the dolls that could be bought, the teacher began to use his magic to make new dolls!”
Just like this world. Just like the magic that turned the dead kids into dolls.
Molly whimpered. The sound was muted by her lack of lips. Her eyes were watering again. I had seen her spooked before, but never like this.
I knew that if I made the mistake of letting go of Molly’s hand, she would take flight through the woods, and I would never find her again.
“One might think that the teacher would make dolls out of dogs or cats, perhaps birds or mice.”
And maybe he had. Maybe that was why there was a mouse here.
I hated that mouse. Even now, with everything else going on. I hated him so much.
The hate and anger creeped into my words, “But the teacher only liked dolls that looked human. And look at that, but there were plenty of cute little humans in his class!”
Molly whimpered again and tugged at her hand. I didn’t let go of it. She slapped her other palm up against her face, so she didn’t have to look at me.
That was fine. She didn’t need eyes or a mouth to listen.
I kept going, pushing forward, feeling like with each word that I spoke, I was getting closer and closer to finding out the truth about this world.
“The teacher knew he wouldn’t be able to turn all of the students into dolls, so he decided to just pick his absolute favorite: a pretty young girl named Molly.”
She made a sound like a dying animal, and threw herself away from me.
Her hand slipped from my grip but she didn’t leave. Instead, she threw herself out across the ground as though she were dying, one arm beneath her forehead and the other strewn out ahead of her. She wailed and whined and sobbed, all with no mouth, and I thought that if she were even an ounce less graceful, she might have been kicking her legs too.
But Molly was always graceful, even then.
I paused, swallowed, and finished, “Molly loved to dress up like a ballerina. She loved dolls, too. That meant that she was the perfect prize for the teacher.”
I wished that I had finished the story. But I concluded with the last line I’d read: “He didn’t have a ballerina in his collection. Yet.” I wanted to know how Molly had been caught by the teacher, but there was clearly no way for me to get that from her now. It was far from a yes or no question.
“Molly,” I reached out, putting a hand on the back of her calf. She wailed louder. “I found that story in a book, in my house, in my world.”
The sobbing and the wailing stopped all at once. She went so still that I thought she may have frozen the way that she had on the stairs leading down into the basement, what felt like ages and ages ago.
“Molly.”
She didn’t move.
I dug my nails in, hard. I didn’t know why. It was mean, but I needed her attention. It worked, too. Molly made a strangled yelp in her throat and jerked back up. She pulled away from me, twisting around and hauling her legs up to her chest, then leaning forward and wrapping her arms around them.
“Was that you?” I asked her, leaving no room for mess-ups in the question. “Were you the same Molly from that story?”
Molly began crying all over again. She picked up a stick and began writing, clumsily: “N-A-R-R-A-T-O-R.”
And even though I was still missing many, many pieces… I knew that before this full-moon cycle ended, I would be able to put most of them together.
I had to. It wasn’t an option anymore.
No more whatever, forever.
About the Authors
Qatarina & Ora Wanders are a fantasy-book-loving mother-daughter duo.
Ora published her first book, Children of the Elements: A Steampunk Adventure, at 10 years old, and has no intention of stopping there!
Qatarina already has a number of books in her arsenal—both fiction and non-fiction.
When these two aren’t wandering around the world together (pun intended!) in search of exotic experiences, they are probably sitting at home having adventures by reading books next to each other on the couch…or maybe playing with their two guinea pigs: Mochi and Edgar Allan Pig.
Also By The Authors
Other books by Ora Wanders
Children of the Elements Book One
Other books by Qatarina Wanders
The Owl Shifter Chronicles (Books 1-4)
Prequel: The Curse of the Owl
(Complete Series)
* * *
Rise from Slumber: The Exousia Chronicles Book One
Qatarina Wanders, Imagined Into Being: The Chronicles of Quinn Book 2
