Katie the Witch

      She was special. Unlike the blue eyes that belonged to most blue Acaras, she had yellow eyes. Just like her family. All of them had pale fur. Except her father.

      Her mother's family had magical powers. When Katie's father had learned about this two years ago, her mother simply disappeared. No one knew how. But Katie's mother was never seen nor heard from again. Her father referred to his wife as "that witch", and never called her by name. He hated magic. He hated his children, but he was forbidden to leave them, as it as the last thing her mother had made sure of. But he was able to forbid them from revealing they had magic in any way. Katie, her three sisters and her brother were not allowed to use magic, or else. None of them wished to discover what "or else" meant.

      Katie's paw lifted to touch her small shell necklace. It was all she had left of her mother. She slowly took it off and hid it under her bed. She felt around for a book. Her last spell book. Her only spell book. The spell book her father would destroy if he discovered it. Just like the necklace.

      Just as Katie opened the book to the first page, a green Acara with golden eyes like Katie's burst in.

      "Dad's coming," the green Acara said breathlessly.

      "Quick, Mickey," Katie said quickly, opening her Slorg Wardrobe once she had put the spell book back. "Hide in here."

      Her little brother quickly obeyed.

      Katie, being the oldest of her siblings, worried that one of them might use magic and that their father might find out. She wanted to be free of their father. But she would not leave her siblings. Each of them hid at least one thing that their father would not allow them to have. The five of them had all promised that one would walk around and then warn the other four when their father was coming.

      A Maraquan Acara entered Katie's bedroom. "Have you been doing anything unusual lately?" he growled.

      "No father," Katie said monotonously. She quickly thought of what she was about to do. "I was just about to…" She opened a drawer in her Funky Lime Table and pulled out a Diary and a Water Faerie Pencil. "I was just about to write in my diary!" she exclaimed. She opened the Diary and started drawing Faeries.

      "Let me see what is in that diary!" her father ordered.

      "No way! Absolutely not! Why would I let you read my personal and private thoughts?" Katie replied. She didn't want him to think the Faerie drawings that covered every single page meant that she practiced the little magic she knew.

      "To tell me that you are obeying the father who has so kindly kept you freaks under his own care and spent so much money on his horrible brats and knows it's a waste. That witch taught you magic, and you are never to use it. Understand?" he yelled for what seemed like the one-thousandth time.

      Katie nodded. "I am not at all like my mother. I hate her as much as you. I regret ever knowing her. I am not a witch," she lied. It was one of the few ways to convince her father she was loyal.

      Katie did not mind being called a witch. She was a sorceress, after all. But not all witches were always evil. What wrong had her mother and siblings done? They only tried to help others. It wasn't fair that her father should treat her that way.

      Her father left.

      Katie waited for a few moments, and then opened the Slorg Wardrobe her brother had been hiding in.

      As soon as the doors opened, Mickey came running out. He quietly snuck out of his oldest sister's room and back to his own.

      Katie missed her mother, and, she knew, as much as her siblings. She would give Amy the necklace. She quietly left her room, the shell necklace in her pocket. She knocked on the door to her sister's room.

      Amy was a yellow Acara with eyes just as sunny. Of Katie's younger four siblings, Amy was the oldest. She was very sensitive. Katie knew that Amy had taken it hardest when their mother disappeared. Amy was the one who longed to be able to do magic. Amy was the one who tried hardest not to hate their father.

      But Katie was the one who their father thought was least to be trusted. He thought that since she was oldest, she was the one who was the most evil and knew the most magic. But Katie was as evil as her siblings, and had taught her younger siblings everything she had learned. But still, Katie was only allowed in her own room, the kitchen, and the living room. Her siblings were allowed to enter each other's rooms.

      Katie quietly opened the door to Amy's room. Inside were Amy, Tori, and Candy. They were playing a walking game of tag. Candy, her Red Acara sister, spotted Katie and pointed her out to the others.

      "Amy, I want you to have this," Katie whispered. She held up the shell necklace. "It was Mom's. Don't let Dad know about it," she told all of them.

      In the distance she heard footsteps. Quickly, she closed the door and went back to her own room, and continued drawing Faeries as though she had never left.

      Her father nearly ripped the door to her room of its hinges. "You…you…witch! YOU EVIL, EVIL WITCH! YOU DISOBEYED THIS LOVING FATHER AND PERFORMED MAGIC TO DO EVIL! WHY DON'T YOU JUST JOIN CAPTAIN SCARBLADE OR GO BACK TO THE OTHER WITCHES, WHEREVER THEY ARE! Tomorrow I am taking you to King Kelpbeard to expose you for the filthy witch you are!"

      "No, Dad, I-" The door slammed shut and it was locked from the outside. "-didn't," Katie finished unhappily. She hadn't done magic. At first she thought that he was simply blaming her for something one of her siblings had done, but they wouldn't. Was it something that had been done by no magical means? She would have known. Then it hit her. It was simply an excuse to get rid of her. Her siblings could not save her from this. Her father was going to make up some horrible thing that happened to him that no one else saw.

      She looked at the Techo Clock on the wall. It was late. She had to get some sleep.

      She lay down on her bed and began to have a strange dream.

      Katie walked up bound in ropes next to her father in the castle. "King Kelpbeard," her father said, kneeling. "This is my daughter, Katie. She and her siblings inherited magic from her mother, who is also a witch. My eldest daughter, Katie, came into my room one day. To keep the evil influence she alone in my family has, I did not allow her to go into her innocent siblings' rooms or mine. I did this for my family's protection. Then, yesterday, she entered my room. I barely escaped with my life, I suppose. She left me unconscious, obviously thinking I was dead. When I woke up, she was writing in her diary as though nothing had happened. I locked her in her room, and then brought her to you to decide her punishment."

      King Kelpbeard thought for a moment. "Yes, I do believe I have the perfect solution. We shall bring her far away from civilization and put her in a cage, where no one will find her and she will not be able to escape. She will never harm anyone again."

      Katie woke up. She had to get away before that happened. She knew that it was the future. She had to leave. She opened up her spell book, planning to tear out the last page to tell her siblings farewell. But on the last page was a map. Written on the bottom was "to my children, this is where you can find me." She recognized her mother's handwriting.

      Katie knew what to do. She tore out a page of her diary and drew another Faerie. After doing this so many times, she could do this quite quickly. But for the first time, she made a caption. "The Faerie Who Came Back To Save Her Sisters-And Brother-From The Forces Of Evil," she whispered, taking her ruby-red cloak and her sapphire brooch out of her Slorg Wardrobe. She quickly but quietly put them on. She grabbed her spell book and opened the door.

      Tori, of course. That small, young Acara with fur the colour of a cloudless sky had unlocked the door once everyone was asleep. Always trust the youngest but cleverest child to be loyal to Katie, who had helped her through the days since their mother had disappeared, even when those day turned into weeks, then months, and even a few years.

      Katie folded up the last drawing of a Faerie she thought she would ever make, and slipped it under Candy's door, as it was nearest.

      She headed downstairs and into the sea. She opened the spell book to the last page. "Good-bye, Candy. Farewell, Mickey," she whispered. "I love you, Tori. Be safe, Amy. All of you, remember me." She swam into the deep blue sea, following the map to her mother and silently promising to return for her siblings one day.

The End