Jacen’s POV:
“Yes. I retired a month ago. Now could you please get out of my house?” she politely spoke without yelling at us.
“No. Please, I need your help. You said you would help me whenever I ask. You can’t let me down now.” Nina shock us by pleading to her. I should be the one who needs to plead with her. But I did something wrong when she refused again.
“I said it when I was helping everyone. Now I am retired. Don’t make me tell the same things twice. Get out,” she firmly said, anger blazing in those eyes.
“Do you want money? We will give whatever or how much you want. Just help me once. What are you going to achieve by refusing to help us?” I yelled louder than her. Her eyes widened. My friend’s jaws dropped. I should not be disrespectable, but I got no choice. How much longer can I wait to rescue Sydney? It feels like it’s been a century. I don’t have patience and I don’t need to be patient.
“Iam absolutely sorry, Amanda. My son will apologize to you. Please forgive us.” Nina spoke in fear. Iam not going to apologize to her.
“Iam not apologizing, mom. Let’s find some other way to save Sydney. She will not help us,” I said, walking my way out of the hall.
“Jacen? What are you doing? Are you stupid? You are messing up everything. This is our last chance we got to save Sydney.” Noah grabbed my elbow and talked furiously.
“We can find many changes, Noah. She is not going to help us. Why should we waste our time?” I said, loud enough to be heard by Amanda.
“Do you think I will help you if you give me money? You can be rich. But you can’t get what you want just with that money. Try anywhere. You are not going to get whatever you want. I curse you,” Amanda shouted at me. She’s not angry at anyone. Only me. I messed it. In my point of view, I was not wrong. I was grieving for Sydney. How much longer can I wait? I never waited for anything in my life. This is new to me. It’s killing me even though Iam an immortal soul.
“I don’t trust your words. I will get what I...” I got interrupted by my mom now. No, it’s not Nina. It’s Kassidy. What?
“Cut it, Jacen. You are the biggest problem here. Look at yourself. Acting stupid whenever we are close to saving Sydney. You are the whole reason.” Kassidy blamed me. I was the one who wants to find her desperately. How can I be the reason for not being able to find her? What did I do? Indeed, I was acting stupid after losing Sydney. But no one is understanding my situation.
The next moment, Kassidy turned towards Amanda. “We need your help, Amanda. I may not know you. But your help is going to save Slateville. I don’t need to explain it to you. You are the oldest and greatest witch. You must have known who is the true heir to the Slateville kingdom. We need to find Sapphire, who’s the true heir to this kingdom. Right now, she’s in hell. If you could help us by showing the portrait of hell and finding the location where Sapphire is located, we would be so grateful to you. Yes or no. You will help us or not. It’s in your hand. We will accept whatever you say,”
Silence. Utter silence surrounded the hall.
“I... I don’t know what to say. I like your approach. I think I can help you.” She said, just like that. Is it that easy? Maybe I was the one who’s messing everything up.
“Follow me. Before that, I got one more thing to say,” Amanda said and looked back at me. Is she expecting an apology?
“Jacen,” Nina whispered, giving me the warning to apologize.
“I know how much that girl means to you. But sometimes you need to be wise and patient. If it means to happen, it will happen at the right time. No need to rush anything. I know many things which you don’t know. Iam not going to tell your future even though I can. But I can tell you one thing. I know you have never been a patient in your life. You always get anything experiencing no difficulties. This time it won’t be like that.” she told me. Only me. What does she mean by that?
When I hesitated to give a reply, she walked inside a room. “I will get the portrait in some minutes. Prepare a location to spell to cast.” Amanda instructed Kassidy by pointing her hands at a desk full of spell books.
“Yeah, I will,” Kassidy rummaged through the whole piles of large and old spell books.
“Don’t overthink. Just apologize to her.” Noah advised me while my mom decided not to talk about that to me. The clock is ticking. Kassidy was preparing for the location spell. Amanda is searching for the portrait. Nina is helping her. Here Iam, looking at the different crystals arranged in the hall.
“Hey, I think this is the crystal which will tell the future,” Amelia said, looking at a glowing crystal in blue colour. It’s the only biggest round crystal in a lot of collections. Amanda returned when Noah, Amelia and I keenly looked at it.
“That’s not the future predicting crystal,” she informed and approached us.
“Then what it is?” Noah asked.
“This will show any person who we want to see. I need this, so I could locate the girl who you all want to save. Time to see where the girl is,” Amanda said and kept it on a table. She closed her eyes and murmured some spells and the crystal globe glowed. Some blur images appeared in it. Within minutes, it gave a clear image of Sydney. My Sydney.
“Sydney’s in prison?”