Spliced

Katrina spent the next few hours restless.

She wandered all through the house. She sat down in front of the computer but found herself not much in the mood for surfing the web or doing schoolwork. She went back downstairs and read the spell again. Then she took the book up to her room.

She hesitated at the doorway, remembering what had occurred only a few hours prior. Finally she went in and she lay the book down on her desk. Suddenly she didn’t much feel like reading either. She glanced toward the window, then she climbed up onto her bed so she could look outside.

Down below in the training paddock near the front of the house, she watched Gemma riding her energetic palomino named Ginger. The creature had come to them as a young filly violent and wild, abused by a previous owner and thought unrideable, but Gemma had tamed her, and now only Gemma could ride her. She rode well, a natural in the saddle, Gemma had inherited all her mother’s skill with horses and then some.

Katrina watched with a tinge of envy. Gemma looked so relaxed, so unworried, while Katrina’s stomach was in a ball of knots. She hugged herself and shivered in spite of the warm sunlight streaming through her bedroom window.

As she watched, a figure approached the end of the driveway and rode up toward the house on a white slightly speckled horse. Katrina recognised Tobias, Gemma’s boyfriend. He slid down from the saddle once he reached the training paddock. Gemma met him from the other side of the fence. They chatted there for a bit. Ginger tossed her head once or twice but Gemma calmed her down with a gentle pat. Tobias showed Gemma some books and then the two shared a couple of kisses. He’d probably taken his free period to bring her homework. Gemma only went in to some of her classes at the moment. Mostly she stayed home with Kate who Katrina assumed was asleep in a bassinet on the front porch because once the lovebirds were done with their kissing, Gemma nodded that direction and Tobias vanished under the roof while Gemma stayed by the fence watching and soothing Ginger.

Katrina turned back toward the spell book as a wave of nausea washed over her. She took off running and barely made it to the bathroom to be sick. By the time she’d returned to her room and looked out the window again, Tobias and his horse were gone and Gemma was back on top of Ginger again.

Outside, as if matching her mood the sky turned from bright and sunny to an overcast grey that threatened rain.

Katrina lay on her bed for quite some time, barely moving, until she heard the front door open and then close. She sat upright and glanced out the window. Was that snow? It was early in the season for snow. Small gentle flakes of white were just beginning to dust the paddocks. Sasha would be thrilled even though it probably would stick around for long.

Gemma was still out there in the training paddock, although she was in the process of unsaddling Ginger, and Katrina could see Lily standing on the lower rung of the fence and leaning over to talk to her. That meant her mum was home, somewhere downstairs.

Katrina didn’t immediately move. She wanted to know what had happened, what would happen, but a large part of her was terrified to find out and she just knew she was going to be in big trouble. Then again, it wasn’t like this morning had been blissful ignorance.

Her mother was in the kitchen alone, pouring over a pile of papers. A cup of something sat on the table next to her.

She looked up when Katrina entered the room. She pushed the papers to the side to focus her attention on her daughter.

Katrina hesitated in the doorway, unsure exactly how much trouble she was in or where to start.

For a moment her mother also seemed at a loss for what to say.

“Are you okay?”

Katrina nodded weakly.

Her mother gave her half a smile but it came out more like a grimace. She nodded at the seat next to her.

Katrina took it, slowly.

Once she’d sat down her mother asked gently, “Where did you get the vase?”

Katrina frowned. She looked down at her hands which she twisted in her lap. She glanced up, briefly met her mother’s eyes, then glanced away again. Her mother’s eyes were kind but Katrina knew she could put up a good front if she wanted to. She couldn’t tell what her mother was thinking. If she was angry or worried...

“Katrina-”

“Am I going to disappear again?” Katrina blurted out. She felt like she was on the verge of crying. She’d spent all morning waiting for an answer and now she was about to get one it was all a bit too much. She kept her eyes down and tried to choke her threatening tears back.

“No. The spell fixed that.”

“The rewind spell?”

Her mother was silent for long enough that Katrina was suddenly scared that she wasn’t supposed to know about that. She dared a peek at her mother’s face.

Her mother was giving her curious look, one that Katrina couldn’t quite read. But when Katrina met her gaze her mother replied, “Yes. That one.”

“I took the book upstairs. I was just, I was just having a look...” Katrina trailed off meekly, knowing that it seemed like she hadn’t learnt anything.

And when she snuck a glance at her mother again, Amanda’s eyes were briefly closed. She opened them with a sigh. Then she started to open her mouth.

Before her mother could speak however, Katrina continued. “Did... did...” or at least she tried to. She wanted to ask about the unicorn but she couldn’t get the words out.

Her mother closed her own mouth and waited patiently.

Eventually Katrina gave up and she just resumed staring at her own lap in silence.

After awhile Amanda spoke. “Katrina, I need to know where you got it. What you were doing with it.”

“I was just... I don’t know... Coal had one-”

“Coal had one?”

Katrina nodded. “It-”

“How do you know Coal had one?” Her mother’s questions were faster now, more urgent.

Katrina looked up as she nervously chewed on one finely manicured fingernail. She could see similar levels of worry reflected in her mother’s face.

“Katrina?”

Katrina glanced back down. She forced her fingers from her mouth to her lap again. Yes, she was definitely going to be in trouble if she wasn’t already. “Because I went to his house.”

A beat of silence.

“When? Why?”

She could hear the tremble of anger in her mother’s voice and she decided she better explain fast.

“Because Gemma said I couldn’t even steal a rose from his garden and so I... I went there and the door was open so I went inside. I thought I saw someone but it was just a ghost or something... and I wasn’t there very long... but he had this vase on the table and it looked like that one and so when I saw that one at the house the other day-”

“Hold on. Hold on.” Amanda held up a hand to stop her. “The Milton house?”

Katrina nodded. “When I saw it, I just took it. I figured since Coal had one then it must be important, powerful you know?” Katrina risked a glance at her mother again.

Amanda had one eyebrow raised.

Katrina shrunk back in her seat. “I wasn’t really doing much. I was just trying to read it, I didn’t think-”

“No, you didn’t think.”

Katrina was silent.

She heard her mother sigh.

“So, I’m really not going to disappear?”

“No.” The reply was more gentle this time. “If you were then it would have happened already.”

Katrina’s lip trembled. She brought her fingers up to them. “I... I thought...” She blinked and felt a couple of tears fall. She could see her mother’s blurred arms reaching for her, pulling her into a hug. Vaguely she registered that her mother still had both her hands. “Did you really have to kill a unicorn for it?” Katrina asked finally as Amanda stroked her hair.

“I did.” Amanda replied softly.

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m just glad you’re okay.”

Katrina felt all her worries fade away in the warmth of that hug. For a moment it was almost as if the morning hadn’t happened.

“Why’d you go to Wolf’s?” Katrina asked when they finally broke apart.

Amanda hesitated. “I wasn’t sure if it worked and I went to see him about Lily. I thought maybe the spell would help her too.”

“Would it?”

Her mother hesitated. “A little.”

Katrina frowned. “You did it on her at the same time?”

Her mother nodded.

“To slow the zombification? Does that mean-”

“It wasn’t just for you. The unicorn was worth more than one person today.”

Katrina frowned. That hadn’t been what she was going to ask but the speed at which her mother had interrupted and the shift in her posture told Katrina that maybe she was deliberately avoiding answering the other unspoken question. Was Lily safe from turning?

Her mother seemed determined to draw her attention away for the issue as her next question changed the subject. “So Coal had one like that one?”

Katrina took the hint. She nodded. “Just like it. Only his was red.”