The lady next to me smiles, pushes her silken, black hair aside and says, “Off to school?”
“Yeah.” I tuck a strand of my lavender hair behind my ear and keep my eyes down. I’m a bit shy when it comes to new people. And that’s something I will need to work on because I intend to make lots of friends at the Academy of Enchantment. It’s one of my resolutions—to come out of my shell and be more social.
“Which academy?” Her eyes are completely black, with no flecks of color. It gives her an eerie ambiance, but her smile is wide and genuine.
“Enchantment.” I can’t help my smile as I look up at her approving expression.
She nods. “It’s a good fit for dryads. You’ll do well there.”
Just before the doors close, a person-shaped shadow steps onto the train. This shadow-person is like seeing the aura of someone or the outline of a person, but not really seeing the face inside the shadowed shell.
Instantly, all my senses curl in on themselves. A ball of sickness, fear, and the taste of rot lodges in the pit of my stomach, and I double over in my seat. The passengers in the full car hastily part and make room as the shadow-person steps past everyone and heads towards the back of the car.
Full body shakes overtake me as the lady beside me gasps. Nausea and the absolute feeling of repulsion go straight to my head. My seatmate grabs my hand, and the overwhelming need to throw up abates. I take sips of air, letting my mind relax.
A wave of compassion, not mine, but from the lady beside me, washes away the spinning in my head. In my mind, I see her stirring pots, tending to the sick, and prescribing medicines to a host of patients. Her compassion rivals my own family of healers.
Witch doctor. She’s a witch doctor.
“Thank you,” I whisper, and a plume of heat warms my cheeks as visions of her daily life play in my head. I hope she won’t be angry with me for the intrusion, but the uncontrolled clairvoyance is the bane of my perfect school record.
“I’m sorry, dear.” Her expression lifts into concern. “I didn’t mean to touch you, it’s just…”
“No, no, thank you.” I try to smile, but feel it more as a grimace than a genuine grin.
She extricates herself and flashes a sneer at the back of the car. “Shadow demon. Nasty things.”
“That’s a shadow demon?” I don’t dare look back. Just thinking about the creature makes me feel sick all over again.
“Yes.” Her lips compress to a thin line. “I don’t know why it insists on being shadow dressed. No doubt it has something to hide.”
“Shadow dressed?”
I watch her straighten, pulling her hands closer to herself. “It’s what they call that…” She waves her hand towards the back of the train. “The aura thing. It’s them being shadow demony.”
Her term makes me laugh. But my amusement doesn’t last long. Even from the back of the aisle, residual pain seeps to the front. I cringe as the backs of my eyes prickle.
My passenger friend furrows her brow. “Is it true, dryads are empathic?”
I nod.
But it isn’t the whole truth.
Clairvoyance is the only class I didn’t get a grade of at least a ninety-eight percent. I still technically got an “A” in the class, but I never fully learned how to control the ability. Especially when someone touches me. Thing is, these flashes don’t happen all the time. Thus the reason for my ninety percent grade. I couldn’t control it.
My clairvoyance mishaps combined with my natural empathy as a dryad compounds my senses. Pain stabs at my head. “Why does it hurt so bad?”
“Shadow demons, all they know is pain,” the witch doctor explains with a shrug. “Inside and out.”
“How… how was it allowed on here?” I ask as she touches me again and the pain abates.
She shrugs. “There are no rules prohibiting them from entry… anywhere.”
“I’ve never seen one before.”
She nods. “They are rare to find in these parts. Usually they stick to Dread.”
How horrible. A life knowing nothing but this agony. My very nature as a healer, a dryad, draws me to fix the problem. I look back at the shadow demon.
“Don’t,” the lady next to me says, shaking her head. “You can’t help him.”
“But…”
“Trust me.” Something in her eyes tells me she speaks from experience.
As I sit, I reach my hand out to touch her, to distract me from this swirling queasiness.
She looks down and clutches it with a smile. “Better?”
The bile rising in my throat stops and the need to vomit fades. “Yes.”
“Good.”
It’s a testament to how clouded my senses are when the train slows. I don’t remember it taking off. We stop and people push their way out. Unfortunately, the shadow demon stays. More than half the car leaves and I have to wonder if the shadow demon has anything to do with the mostly empty car. Especially when a businessman takes one step inside, whips his head to the demon and then steps back onto the platform, letting the train continue on without him. A huge nope if I ever saw one.
Another station goes by, and another. More people get off. Few come on. It’s as if they know
