Twenty minutes later, a steaming and almost too hot to handle cup of soup tickled my nose. My stomach rumbled loud enough for the person passing me on the side walk to hear, turn around, and give me a side eyed glance. Waiting until I got home to eat wasn’t going to be an option. That much was pretty clear. I paused on the side walk to shift my cup of soup to my opposite hand. There was a small neighborhood garden about a five minute walk from where I was. There were a couple of picnic benches in it that I’d been known to haunt once or twice to do homework. It’d be a good place to eat dinner… if I hadn’t been warned by Joel not to stay out to late.

I looked up at the sky before pulling out my phone to check the time. A good solid hour and a half stood between me and sunset. Twenty minutes was all I needed to eat and get back to the condo. I’d probably still be home even before Luke got back.

“I did want to get out for a little bit to clear my head—“ I mumbled under my breath. Without really intending to, I’d turned towards the direction of the neighborhood garden. I chewed on my bottom lip. It was fall and there were oak tree saplings in the garden. The leaves had just started to turn and when the wind blew through them it was like a wave of color rippling through the air. I loved the colors, and what better way to take my mind off of Queensmen, monsters, past lives and murders than being somewhere that I liked. Not thinking about any of it. Just able to eat and breathe in peace. I think I truly needed this.

I switched directions, jaywalking across the quiet side street and headed towards the neighborhood garden. A few years ago it had just been a tiny patch that sat between two building with dry, caked dirt and a chain linked fence. It had been too small to build anything profitable in. Then some of the science students from the university had gotten together and pitched an idea to turn it into a natural science space for the local elementary kids to the owners. Surprisingly the big wig developers had really liked the idea and had gone through with plans. Now it was a hotspot for the local children to come with their teachers to learn about plants, insects, and renewable energy. It also happened to be a hotspot for college students who wanted a fairly quiet place to study without being on campus or in a library. It definitely wasn’t the first time I’d crashed the place for one reason or another.

A couple of children played over by the sunflower patch as I sat down. They were probably kids from one of the buildings surrounding the garden. I waved a little to them before fishing out the spoon from the bag I’d been given at the diner. My head still hurt but a lot of it had dissolved to the back of my mind after I’d left the condo for something to eat. The rest of dull, throbbing pain started to lift as soon as I took the first bite of my soup. Tension practically slipped out of my back and shoulders. Time away. Exactly what I’d needed. I just wished that I’d brought a book or something. Maybe the spell book? I was definitely falling into a better state of mind now.

Another pang of pain shot through my skull at the thought. Okay, so maybe not. I knew I had to figure out magic at some point but attempting it when I was frustrated and thought my head was moments away from exploding hadn’t helped earlier. It wouldn’t help now either.

“Did anyone else hear that?” asked one of the kids.

My first reaction was to look over at the kids. I hadn’t heard anything at all. The only sound was the kids playing. However, I highly doubted that’s what the boy referred to. I furrowed my eyebrows and watched the group of kids, three in total, as they dropped what they were doing to look around.

“Hear what?” one of the others asked as he raised an eyebrow.

“I heard it! The weird ‘woosh’ sound, right?” another said.

The first one nodded vigorously. “Yeah! Just now!”

“I didn’t hear anything.”

“Come over here!” The two other boys waved their hands frantically to get their friend to join them.

A chill ran down my spine. I clutched my cup of soup a little tighter like the warmth was going to help. It didn’t of course. My attention remained riveted on the boys. I didn’t care if they realized I was staring like a creep. The other boy ran over to join his friends and I kept my ears trained for whatever sound the first two had apparently heard.

“Hey! I hear it now!” The third boy’s eyes went wide at the realization. He looked at his friends confused. Something turned in the pit of my stomach. I turned my eyes away from them, trying not to look and feel like I was spying on them. My gaze landed on the tree behind them. It wafted back and forth behind them.

There’s no breeze, the thought crossed my mind idly. Then it struck like a lightning bolt. And the tree itself… it was thicker than any of the other saplings. Too thick for it to have been planted only a couple of years ago.

“It sounds like someone breathing,” snickered one of the boys. The other two laughed along as well. “Kinda feels like it too.”

He brushed the back of his neck as he said it.

Something moved behind them. In the tree.

An old woman’s figure, hunched and crooked, separated from the tree. She reached for the three boys with long, clawed fingers and a hateful look in her eyes. I was moving before I consciously realized it. I jumped up, my still mostly full cup of soup in my hand. “Move!” I yelled, grabbing on to the boy the hag was reaching towards.

Hot soup flew into her gnarled face as I threw it point blank at her. The boys screamed but the hag’s scream was louder. It tore from her lips like nails on a chalkboard as she recoiled away from the boys. She raked her fingers down her face without any care to the long rivulets of blood that streaked from her nails. I dropped the cup and backed away.

Not human was the first thing that came into my mind once I remembered how to think again. Magic and monster was the next thing. The boys were still standing beside me, hands clutched around my arms and legs like vices. The hag shook her head out. Blood flung every where as she whipped her head from side to side. Her wispy hair looked a lot like vines and willow branches. Fitting seeing as how she’d come out of a tree. Her eyes fell on me with singular focus. My mouth went dry.

“Run!” I half whispered, half gasped. I turned and peeled the boys off of my body. Shoving them, I yelled again. “Run! Go get help!”

They shot off for safety. That’s when I realized that I was technically ‘help.’ The newest Queensman recruit. And I had a feeling I was one hundred percent screwed.

Something pulled the air around me. I could feel an energy pricking the back of my neck and arms. Magic possibly?

The ground rumbled beneath me. I nearly lost my balance as tree roots bulged from the ground. Definitely magic! I’d just poured extremely hot soup on to a magic user that actually knew what they were doing.

Great.

I didn’t have much time to think about it. The roots that the hag had pulled from the ground twisted through the air. I just barely managed to stumble backwards to avoid having one of them lash around my ankle and pulling me down. My hands shot up, arms extended, to try and recreate the shield I’d created last night. Nothing happened which was fantastic of course. The shield had been entirely on instinct. It would’ve been too easy had I just gotten lucky for a second time.

I dropped my hands and stepped backwards. The hag followed me step for step. Run, the voice in my head whispered. I’d never survive if I didn’t and something in the back of my brain told me that, unlike the Reapers, I had a fighting chance of escaping without fighting. Run, the voice said again.

So I did.

Or at least I tried to.

A strong blast of magic struck me in the face. A literal torrent of dust whipped around me. It was worse than the being at the park when a mini tornado kicked up all the loose dirt. Grit particles flew into my eyes. I threw my arms in front of my face and ducked my head away from the dust. The damage was done though. My eyes watered and burned on a level that would never feel natural. It was hard for me to figure out where the watering of irritation and the tears of pain began. “Oh God!” I breathed out, pressing my hands into my eyes.

Somewhere in front of me the hag screeched. Or laughed. It was kind of hard to tell. She was still nearby and looking to kill me most likely. I still had to run. It took me every ounce to remember that blinking was the quickest way to clear irritation from eyes. The torrent had stopped and for that I was grateful. Unfortunately, it probably meant that I didn’t have a lot of time before the hag’s next attack came. I pulled my hands away from my eyes and blinked fast.

My vision swam. Shapes floated in front of me, hazy and watery. Colors blurred and bled into one another. The hag cackled over top of me. I blinked again. The shapes blurred even more than before. The colors turned darker. And darker. And darker. Shapes turned to shadows. Shadows turned to blackness. “No. No!”

Horror filled my voice, “I…I can’t see. I can’t see!”

I passed my hand in front of my face. I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t see anything. Panic rose in me. It strangled me, cutting off my cry. Something physical hit me and sent me sprawling on to my back with all the air forced from my lungs. My head cracked against wood. Vaguely, I remembered that I wasn’t very far from the picnic bench I’d originally sat down on. If I hadn’t already gone blind, I’m sure that the blow would’ve made me see spots. The headache I’d had before leaving the condo was nothing like the one that shot through me now. Pain shot through my skull and neck. A concussion maybe? The hag’s breath bore down on me. Thinking was becoming very hard at the moment. Focusing on anything other than the pain and how much I wanted to shut my eyes was almost impossible.

I couldn’t though. If I stopped trying, stopped struggling, then I’d just end up dead. I hadn’t wanted to die last night and I still didn’t want to die today. Dizziness crept up on me though. There was also a heaviness in my head that made it hard for me to raise it. My eyes drooped. I couldn’t help it. I should've listened to Joel and not stayed out.

Yep, I most definitely had a concussion and thanks to it I was probably about to die.

The hag’s fingers dipped down. I felt them touch my face. The barest hint of nails scraped at my cheek. This had to be her final preparation before she killed me.

“Beauty!” someone shouted from far away. At least I thought the were far away. It was hard to tell through the fog in my mind. However, I was certain that I felt the ground shake and heard a roar right before I blacked out.