A Gift from the Goddess

Chapter 13

Chapter Thirteen

“Is there something wrong?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at her.

She wasn‘t touching the drink and instead was staring at the teacup a little strangely. My heart sank. Had she only been pretendin g to not know what I‘d just done?

But her eyes then began to water, a timid smile twitching at her lips.

“No, it‘s just… this is really nice of you, Miss. Thank you for being so considerate,” she said, softly. “I kno w I‘m just an attendant, but you‘ve really made me feel like a part of the family by doing this.”

I watched as she took a sip and instantly my heart leapt. She‘d drunk the tea and hadn‘t hesitated when asked to serv e it to my parents.

A bright smile instantly broke out on my face and I ran to her, grabbing her hands in mine excitedly.

“Thank you…,” I said sincerely.

“Miss?” she asked, confused. “What‘s wrong? Why are you thanking me?”

“Because the letter I gave you yesterday was to say that I would poison my parent‘s tea tonight, and you happily served it to them and even willingly drank it too. This means you didn‘t read the letter,” I said,

calmly explaining.

She jolted away from me and frantically turned to the tea she had just drunk in disbelief.

“It‘s okay! Relax! It was just some lemon and green tea leaves. I‘m terrible at herbology anyway.”

“Miss, why would you play such a nasty prank on me like that?” she asked furiously, raising her voice.

I hadn‘t intended to make her angry, but I suppose I did just admit to trying to poison her.

“Please lower your voice. It wasn‘t a prank. I did it to make sure I could trust you,” I explained. “There is s omeone after me, Lucy. They‘re going to kill me. I can‘t give you all the details and you absolutely cannot tell my parents. If you do, then I won‘t be able to protect myself. I can‘t do this without your help.”

She looked at me warily like I was insane, unable to find any words to respond.

“I‘m not crazy, Lucy,” I said adamantly. “If you help me, I‘ll even pay you double your yearly salary for you r time and discretion. So please… help me.”

It took a few moments but, finally, her eyes softened and she nodded her head in agreement.

I think she could feel now that this wasn‘t a prank but actually a very real threat that I was begging her to help me with. Not just a child‘s silly fear, but something far more substantial.

I sighed heavily, a weight lifted off my shoulder as I was finally able to tell someone about my very real problems. Or, at least, some of them … in a vague way.

I closed my eyes, feeling my body relax. “Thank you…” I whispered.

She came over and engulfed me in a hug, something which quickly triggered old memories of my last att endant, Sophie. But I allowed her to embrace me nevertheless, despite that pain inside. I needed to push those thoughts out if I was going to survive. I needed to learn to trust and rely on others this time.

“What do you need me to do?” she asked after pulling away.

And I didn‘t waste any time, jumping in immediately to explain the first steps.

“To begin with, I need a separate bank account set up under an alias in order to amass some funds independently. I also require some investment accounts… but that will co me later. Oh! And I need you to

Chapter Thirteen

find a private investigator for me. The best one you can get,” I said, listing everything off. “I will have a fe w more instructions but if you can help me with these things to start off with, it would really help me so m uch. Being fourteen I, unfortunately, can‘t do any of these things myself. You‘ll be acting as my represent ative for all of my business matters going forward until I‘m of age.”

She seemed a little shocked at first, hearing all of my requests. I think these were probably the last words she ever expected a child to be asking for.

“I know I look like a kid, Lucy, but I really need you to trust me. Can you do that?”

She looked hesitant but eventually nodded her head.

“Oh… and one more thing…,” I said, and looked her dead in the eye. “If someone approaches you and offers s omething in exchange for betraying me… I‘ll double whatever they’re proposing.”

Her eyes widened a little. “How do you plan to make so much money?”

“Don‘t worry about that yet,” I said. “I‘ll be coming into some wealth within the next few weeks that I plant o invest.”

She nodded her head again before, suddenly, my mother walked into the kitchen, oblivious to the serious conversation that had just been taking place.

“What are you two talking about?” she asked with playful curiosity, putting her teacup in the sink.

I looked up towards her, breaking the tense air that had just been between Lucy and I only moments befo re.

“Oh, you know… boys and stuff…,” I said slyly and turned to smile up at Lucy knowingly.

She gave me a reluctant smile back.

“Oooooh! Having a girl talk about Aleric, are we?” my mother said with a wink.

Thad to stifle the urge to cringe and, instead, forced my smile in place to remain composed.

“…Something like that!”

After the conversation had died down, I quickly excused myself by saying I needed to finish schoolwork, and left before any more awkward topics came up. By the time I was safely back in my room, I was imme nsely relieved to be alone with my thoughts again. Because whilst stage one of my plan had gone succe ssfully, there was still a lot more to organise.

The next day I was extremely distracted in my thoughts. I was excited that things had gone so well last night and was eager to move on to the next part, but unfortunately, I had to wait. There were things that needed to happen first before I could orchestrate stage two.

On the way to school, I had the driver stop by Main Street where I collected the unopened letter from the abandoned lot. I was pleased to see that the seal still was intact and the driver didn‘t question the odd detour; both of whi ch I was thankful for.

At school, I found I was just as distracted but I did see Myra in passing who gave me a small smile and wave. I returned the senti ment which made her even more excited. 1

She seemed like a very sweet girl. However, seeing her still nagged at me over where I could possibly kn ow her from. I felt like there was something important I really needed to remember. Like some sort of… majo r event? I had to shake it off though. Whatever it was would come back to me eventually and I had more important things to figure out.

The day was going by painfully slow. So much so that I found myself looking out the window during Modern History, in my own world. I could hear the teacher in the background but nothing was reall y registering.

Chapter Thirteen

“Aria?” a voice then suddenly called from the front of the room.

I looked up and saw Mrs Newman staring at me expectantly. Had she wanted something?

When I only replied with silence, the class quickly all turned their eyes towards me in surprise.

“Sorry, I missed that last part. What was the question?” I asked politely.

Immediately, the class quietly snickered at my unpreparedness which I ignored.

“I said, ‘what were the three main factors that contributed to the loss at Triad River?” she repeated. “If you

| stared at her, irritated. How naive she was to think I had time to waste on trivial history.

“Now,” she continued. “If you‘ll pay attention, I will explain–.”

“The three main factors that equated to the loss at Triad River,” I started, cutting her off, “were the landscape, the resources and the warriors.”

She narrowed her eyes at me in response. “That‘s fairly common knowledge, barely worth praising you fo

I gritted my teeth. She obviously was trying to make me look like a fool. A game she probably didn‘t want t

And so, whilst I definitely should have just let it go, I couldn‘t help but continue.

“The Ruby Night pack were surrounded by the rogues who were familiar with the territory far better, having means to cover themselves. The Ruby Night pack lost all morale and the soldiers surrendered not long after. The rogues became known as the Howling Wind pa

The teacher‘s face flushed, clearly annoyed that I was fighting back instead of just taking the humiliation s

“And their first Alpha‘s name?” she asked smartly, thinking she was asking a question I wouldn‘t be prepared for.

“Patrick Lux.”

“Incorrect!” she snapped triumphantly. “It was Wilson James. Moving on… –.”

“Actually,” I said, cutting her off again, “if you do your research, Wilson James was just the leader who helped manoeuvre the rogues during the battle. He died before the pack was officially esta legally recognised Alpha of the Howling Wind pack. I can understand the confusion though. It‘s a common misconception.” I smiled calmly back at her.

“Get out!” she yelled, her face now fully red in colour.

Her eyes were flared in anger and I knew I‘d taken it too far. Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.

Sighing, I collected my books and walked to the door, acknowledging that this was probably deserved.

“I‘ll see you at detention, Miss Chrysalis,” she huffed out after me. “Here. Four o‘clock. Sharp.”

Back in the day, I could have had her sent to the cells just for talking down to me like that. But I wasn‘t a Luna anymore. No, instead, all I could do was just roll my eyes and leave, thankful that at that moment s

Chapter Thirteen

And so, that‘s how I found myself in detention for the very first time in my two lives.

Well, shit.

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