Hey!
Here's my first unedited draft at 1001 words! My hands were itching to edit as I typed!
Similar to most of my short stores, my MC's don't have names (they just don't want to tell me yet). But, this time, the story is in first-person. I wonder i'f I'll change it to my usual third-person writing after editing it.
Enjoy 
SMOKE AND FOGThe monotonous lull of the rain drops thundering atop my roof and the earthy scent wrapped me in a warm blanket of memories. Memories were painful now that I was far, far away from the ones with whom I jumped in rain puddles with and those who dried my hair after I’d become fully drenched.
My groggy eyes opened to the dim light of the cabin. The candle had burned low.
How long was I asleep? I thought. I stretched my frail limbs, deeply inhaling the wood spice of the incense and coughed when the pungent undertone of nutmeg struck my senses.
Nutmeg!
I jumped of the bed shaking its wooden frame, my anklets chimed in sync with footsteps as I went to take a look at my concoction that was set on my table. A tonic of sorts made from raw honey, dried lavender and smoked nutmeg to cure insomnia. It was one of my bestsellers. Apparently, the veil-dwellers had trouble sleeping as much as humans did. The crushed nutmeg was burnt to the core. Grunting, I dumped the contents away, taking a new batch of whole nutmeg to grind and then to smoke, just then the wind howled – a wailing cry.
I lit another candle and went toward the shuttered window that I had in my single room dwelling. I forced it open against the wind, its door swinging wildly toward the outside. The mountains in the distance were barely visible in the dense fog. The sky proudly displayed its palette of cool colors as night gradually took over. Another gust of wind plastered the raindrops on my face before I could shut the window.
But just before that, I saw a glint of sharp flaming eyes. This time it belonged to a cat with fur dark as coal. Every day, during dusk some animal would be perched near the large oak tree in front of my cabin. All had the same unblinking orange eyes. Mum’s voice rang in my head.
Have I not told you not to look or stray outside when its dusk or dawn!I had soon realized these animals who visited me were from beyond the veil – and they weren’t animals at all. They were shape-shifting Djinn.
“Do you want to come in?” I yelled above the sound of the rain, at the cat. I waited few seconds before closing the window. Same as the all the animals who stood there before, this cat didn’t move a muscle and continued its steady stare.
Mum always talked in a hushed voice. She was scared and superstitious and perhaps overprotective. I was not one to get spooked easily. Much to her distress, I was the only child with the
sight. Sight to see beyond the veil – the veil that becomes the thinnest during dusk or dawn.
I wiped my face and returned to my desk and flipped my notes to the page of potion to make labor pain bearable. Working methodically, I gathered the ingredients from the many shelves that lined one whole wall of the room.
The sight allowed me to learn about illnesses by touching the person or having their hair, nail or a bit of their blood. It also gave me the knowledge of which flowers and spice cure which ailments, making me the finest herbalist in the whole country – both in the human realm and beyond the veil.
The
sight, however, also made me hang out with dead children and keep animal spirits as pets when I was younger. This pushed my mum to the brink of derangement and led the village to banish me to the Spirit Mountains at the age of thirteen.
A knock thundered at my door and made my flinch out of my daze. Another knock sounded and I called out, “I’m coming! But enter quickly or the rain will wet the floor!” I fixed my emerald gown and re-did my hair in a messy bun. There was no way a human would venture out in this weather, it had to be the veil-dwellers.
I opened the door and a man walked in, drenched to the bone and trembling. I quickly closed the door and passed him a towel. He wiped his hair with the towel while his clothes dried on its own accord. Once done, he passed the towel back making eye contact with me. “Thanks”, he said in a calming, lullaby voice.
Darkness dripped from his tanned skin.
Wait, that isn’t darkness, it was black smoke. His eyes were shimmering shades of gold, while his now-dried dark hair moved on an invisible wind.
My heart thundered in my ribcage; I recognized these eyes. They were the same one from the deer last week, the owl yesterday, and the cat just now. In the two decades since my banishment and living with the sight on these mountains, this was the first time I saw a Djinn in a human-form.
“Uh-um, crazy weather right!” I said awkwardly, “Is there something I can help you with?” I couldn’t take my eyes of his striking eyes and sharp jaw line.
He smiled. “I’ve been watching you.”
With nervous energy, I busy my hands to crush the nutmeg. A thousand thoughts buzzed my head trying to remember any advice Mum had given me, or any instant when I might have insulted a veil-dweller.
The djinn wondered around my house taking in the jars that neatly lined the walls, the bed I was just sleeping in, the table where notes and diagrams littered, and the counter where I stood. He came up behind me, his black smoke pooling around my feet.
I fisted my hands and spun on my heels. “Have I offended you?”
“You’ve been calling me to come inside all this time, haven’t you?”
With a sinking feeling I remembered what my mom told me before I had left the village;
Always wait for them, never speak to a veil-dweller first or they will become irreversibly tied to you. I had.
Topic: First Draft - SMOKE AND FOG (Read 3497 times)