The Beginning Read Online Free

tinged the air and she kicked her legs lazily, the hanging dry moss from the branch above brushing her feet.
    Even deep in the Black Swamp, where normally one would be on their guard, Jahrra couldn’t help but feel comfortable and at ease. The forest was enveloped in a great blanket of fog, but everywhere within this deaf silence echoed the small sounds of moisture collecting and slapping leaves as the water droplets fell to the forest floor. Both near and far the sounds of the dripping condensation sang in unison with the quiet crackle of Denaeh’s fire. The small noises of the tiny creatures searching out the driest spot to rest in the underbrush only added to the secretive atmosphere.
    The silence only enhanced Jahrra’s other senses as she continued to brood over her latest debacle with the twins. How? How do they keep getting away with it!? How do they keep winning even when I beat them?
    Jahrra had been so lost in thought that she failed to notice Denaeh smiling up at her.
    “Don’t let it bother you so much,” she said aloud, shocking Jahrra back into the present world. “It happened months ago. Besides, are you sorry that you accepted their dare?”
    Again, she’d managed to read Jahrra’s mind. This statement, if given by Hroombra, or worse, Jaax, would have raised Jahrra’s hackles and turned her pale gray-blue eyes deep cobalt. But coming from Denaeh it made perfect sense. Besides, she’d been listening to Jahrra’s thoughts again, and one couldn’t be angry with someone who had that kind of power.
    “I’m not saying that I’m disappointed,” Jahrra proclaimed. “I wouldn’t have met you if I’d backed down. But those two always seem to lure me into their trap, and no matter what, no matter how many times I succeed, I never can win. I just wish for once I could get back at them, not just for a few weeks, but for good. I’m still angry at them for trying to kill me on Solsticetide!”
    Denaeh merely nodded and smiled, still bent over her precious mushrooms. She hadn’t seen the young girl since the week before school had started and at that time Jahrra was still pleased with the results of their combined act to bring the dreaded swamp witch to life.
    “You had the lake for a while, did you not? And you and Gieaun and Scede alone have the satisfaction of seeing the twins’ faces and hearing their screams when I chased you from the trees. They can claim you lied all they want, but they were petrified.”
    “I know,” Jahrra huffed, “but I just wish there was a way to get them to leave us alone.”
    Denaeh stood up from her crouching position, black crumbs of soil tumbling off the front of her stained apron. She pressed her hands against her lower back and stretched, gazing off into the distance as if doing so would clear her mind.
    She stood that way for several minutes before she spoke, “I don’t usually partake in revenge because I believe that everything will one day come back to haunt you, even if those you are casting your vengeance upon have been deserving their comeuppance for quite some time. But I like you Jahrra, you remind me of what it truly means to be youthful, and these two children have stepped far over the boundaries of what should be tolerated. So I shall help you this one time in developing a plot to disrupt the evil twins, as you so claim them.”
    Jahrra’s head shot up, her cheek prickling after having left behind its mossy pillow. She hadn’t thought that Denaeh would ever propose such a thing. The Mystic was grinning up at the young girl underneath a halo of fire-red hair, a look of mischief soon replacing the look of calm composure on her youthful face.
    “Now,” said Denaeh clasping her hands together in a gesture suggesting she was about to clean an untidy room, much less plot revenge, “you’ll have to attack them in a place that is in your territory. Now when I say your territory, I mean a place that is comfortable and well known by you. For