December Prompted Fiction: Random: Martina: 512 words

[k_a_webb]

Written for skjam's prompt: New Year's: The pause between old and new.

The energy was hard to capture because it only lasted for a moment, but it was important. Most witches didn't bother to even try. Some sorceresses did, as they had spells that they could only do if they had the energy from that moment when the old year ended and the new one began. Everyone could, if they wanted to, collect the energy, as long as they were in the right place at the right time. It did, of course, mean spending time around people, which wasn't something that every witch or sorceress would do. Martina didn't mind much, she actually kind of like people, so she was the one in her coven who was usually chosen to attempt capturing the energy.
 

 

Over the years Martina had gotten better at it. The first year it had proved impossible. She had felt it, and understood it, but she hadn't got the right timing. The second year she got slightly closer and by the fifth year she had managed it perfectly. Every single drop of energy was capture within a crystal jar, so the energy couldn't break out, and then the jar was placed into a cupboard. The jars she had collected in the five years after that also ended up in the cupboard.

It was very annoying, because Martina knew there were spells the coven could be doing with the energy she had collected, but they didn't. She had tried to get her coven leader to explain why they weren't using it. As one of the younger members no one actually had to tell her anything, so no one did tell her. They just continued to send her off on New Year's Eve to collect the energy, bring it back, and put it in the cupboard.

Sighing, Martina sipped her drink, which didn't have any alcohol in again, and forced herself to focus on what she was meant to be doing. It was still an hour before the bells chimed, but the preparations needed to be done so she was ready for when they did. She just didn't know why she bothered. All of the other members of her coven would be celebrating the new year with a party and plenty of alcohol, while she was alone with a soft drink in her hand because she had to work for the eleventh year in a row.

Martina tried not to think about what she could use the energy for. It wasn't hers to use. When she was out collecting on behalf of the coven it was for the coven. Nothing she gathered or bought was hers, no matter how much money she had spent on it or how much energy she had expended. Some days she wished she could just walk away, but she knew that if she attempted that then the coven would find her and try her for deserting her 'sisters'. If it hadn't been for her mother.... she shook her head. The woman had always made stupid mistakes and leaving her witch daughter with a coven was one of them.

© K A Jones 2011

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

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[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

I like the concept of the story, working with ephemeral energies. I've done this, though not quite the same way.

>>Most witches didn't bother to even try.<<

Split infinitive; switch to "didn't even bother to try."

>>she actually kind of like people<<

That should say "liked" above.

>>energy was capture within a crystal jar<<

That should say "captured" above.

>>It was very annoying, because Martina knew there were spells the coven could be doing with the energy she had collected, but they didn't.<<

What a pathetic coven.

[skjam.livejournal.com]

Hmm, this looks like it could go one of two ways--Martina finally takes actions not sanctioned by the coven, only to find out there actually was a reason they were being so stingy (and one that might have made sense if anyone had ever bothered to explain it, but personality conflicts got in the way.)

Or she stumbles across the reason the coven is so stupid-seeming, and has to flee for her life.

Interesting, though.