Waiting

Something was wrong.

Luviia stood on the old creek bridge and stared off at the pool of magic at the forest’s edge; that hadn’t been there before. That wasn’t so concerning, streams backed up into pools now and then, or their courses would change here and there. Typically this was when something strange happened; when a powerful magic user got desperate. But who was coming out to these woods?

Luviia came to the bridge a lot to smoke and escape her brother; that’s what she was doing now. The magic had always flown from the creek out into the woods; but she’d never seen it pool. She’d never seen another soul down here, so why would it be pooling?

Something had to be wrong.

It wasn’t just the pooling. That much she could accept; she understood enough to know that magic was unpredictable at times and the lines flood just as the creek does, but something about this twisted at her gut.

It looked odd.

The lines cycled through colors; most of which she could not describe but knew they had to be colors of some sort. The pools cycled too. The magic would ebb and flow and change as it was used by the world and the magic users (magicians?).

She had never seen this color.

The magic felt wrong. It didn’t radiate out like the line that flowed through the creek. It set her hair on end and curled her insides into knots; even from this distance. It turned the sky into a blinding white the longer she looked at it. It looked thick, and heavy. She was finding it hard to breathe.

She tore her gaze away from the magic and focused on the world around it. Nothing had changed. The trees looked fine, dull as they ever had been. The ground was green and overgrown. An opportunistic squirrel dashed through the shadows.

Fine.

She took one last drag of her cigarette before putting it out on the railing. She focused back in on the magic while she let out the smoke.

Something was happening.

What was it waiting for?