"What's wrong?" Tonya looked at Helen who sat slumped over on the edge of the bed. "Should you be this exhausted?" Helen had started teaching Tonya about her powers and promised her niece that the more she learned, the less fatiguing draining life force should become.

"Get that thing away from me! Leave the room!"

Tonya backpedaled. What was going on? But there was no misunderstanding Helen's tone. "Come on Drake, let's leave her."

"No. Drake stays here. You have to go somewhere far from civilians, you understand?"

"I'm going to the dorm. You said I need to lie down and rest while you figure out how to cure me."

"That was before you tried to kill me." Helen looked away. "Sorry. That thing inside you seems to know exactly how to get me."

Tonya backed into the hall, but she didn't want to go until Helen explained herself. "I thought it was working . You were drawing energy out of the egg, and I was blocking you from taking the life force out of me."

"Is that what it felt like you were doing? You were draining the life out of me. And you're still doing it. Just go away far away from people. Oh, and the cemetery is completely off-limits. We don't want you taking down any mature trees."

"So, what you're saying, is I should go sit somewhere far away, preferably in a patch of poison ivy. Anything else?"

"This is for your own good."

"Sounds like it. Don't worry, I won't let the door hit me on the way out." She turned and stomped out. She was the victim here. Why was her aunt treating her like she was worse than the dragon that did this to her?

Tonya marched away, anger fueling her legs. She didn't slow down until she found herself in the middle of a farmer's field. She looked at the green cabbages surrounding her, like a leafy sea of jade bowling balls. Here at least, she would not put any of the kids in her residence in danger, and Helen and Drake would be safe to plot and scheme behind her back. She sat down between a pair of healthy-looking cabbages and held her head in her hands. If Helen couldn't help her, who else was there to turn to?

That was when she noticed the edges of the leaves on the cabbage closest to her curling and drying out. Impossible! She wasn't trying to draw life force out of the cabbage. She stood up abruptly and looked all around her. In a perfect circle, spreading by the minute, cabbages were drying out, dying, and turning brown. If she stayed much longer, the farmer would lose his whole crop.

Tonya ran off the field and along the highway. There had to be somewhere she could go that she wouldn't destroy. If only she lived in the middle of a desert everything would be fine. Unfortunately, every spot she could think to go was teaming with life. She could row out onto the lake, but it would kill every fish and plant inside it. She could walk into the woods, but she would kill the trees and animals there. She could go up onto the roof of the new condominium building that towered over Loon Lake Village, but anybody she met in the elevator would be doomed. She could feel the energy drain speeding up, the thrum of it growing so that she could feel the tickle of energy draining out of living things all around her and into the egg inside.

"You are a wily one, aren't you? You thought you'd kill everything around me and I wouldn't notice?"

I was counting on you to notice.

"How are you making me hear your voice in my head? Get out of me!"

What, now that we're having so much fun?

____________

2024 update: Good news! This story is revised and published as Double Dead Magic.

Read the serial for free without ads here: https://reamstories.com/maaja

Thanks, and happy reading!

Maaja