Natalie didn't stop running until she saw the castle. She didn't want to stop then either, but she was getting tired, and Gwen even moreso. The wolf really wasn't strong enough to carry a full-grown man on her back for such a long distance, but she put up with it for Natalie.
"Let me go," said her father. "Please."
Natalie didn't answer. She walked toward the castle, Gwen at her side. Percy fluttered forward, seeking shelter from the neverending storm. Scrappy did likewise, and soon it was just the three of them—Natalie, her father, and her wolf.
"We built this," said Natalie quietly.
She stopped at the moat, which had formed from all the storm water flooding down into the forest. Beyond, the castle stood strong—burnt several times over, once from a forest fire, once from a fight between Alpha and Omega—and resolute, without a single piece out of place even with the lightning and thunder all around them.
"Please."
"Dad, don't you remember?" asked Natalie, her voice high-pitched and trembling. "Me and you. We spent all summer on it. It was my birthday present."
"Just let me go."
"I just wanted to find you," she went on, heedless of his words, while the tears started to drop from her eyes once more. "That's all I wanted. I've barely thought about anything else."
Her dad didn't say anything. Natalie took a short leap over the moat, landing on the harder stone they'd laid outside the front door to keep water from flowing inside. Gwen followed.
"I went to school," said Natalie. "A girl made me her nemesis. I still don't really get why. I made friends. I learned how to play a really fun game, and I met someone really great. I've got a boyfriend, dad."
She untied her dad and helped him down off Gwen's back. He didn't run, to her relief, but he didn't seem to want to talk either. He took the chair near the staircase and sat down.
"You know, I found it right here," Natalie went on, glancing at the ceiling, up at the second floor where a cat had once drawn her attention to a yellowish piece of parchment paper. "I found a page, and I learned magic all on my own."
She sat down next to her father, on the ground, wrapped up tight in the pink raincoat he'd gotten her while they worked on the castle. The pink strand on his bracelet matched it in color perfectly. She was cold, and she felt him shivering too, so she started to cast the spell to warm them up.
"No…" said her dad, obviously terrified.
Natalie stopped right away. "...It's not going to hurt you," she said. "I just wanted to make it warmer."
"Please, just let me go," he said again.
I just want you to be my dad again! cried Natalie in her head. I miss you so much!
"My boyfriend's name is Quinn," she said, trying to stave off the tears by talking.
She didn't want her dad to see her crying anymore—Natalie wanted to be confident and brave, wanted him to see who she could be. See how her life had gotten better, even though it hadn't. Even though she'd been abandoned, beaten, broken, torn apart… and now, at the end of it all, she'd lost the person most important to her in the whole world.
"He's super nice, and really smart. His parents' names are Annette and Damian. His mom's a public defender. I didn't even know they had those. She's so cool." Natalie glanced at her dad. He was crying now, and that hurt her even more, but she forced herself to keep talking. The thunder rolled through again, rumbling her little castle, shaking the foundations. "His dad's a bartender, and he's the coolest guy ever."
Her dad was trembling in his seat now. A tear fell on top of Natalie's head, soaking into her hair. The rain continued to pour outside. Percy was perched on the little table across the room, and Scrappy curled up beneath next to Gwen. All three watched the door, knowing Natalie didn't need anyone watching her right now.
"Quinn and I never really went on a real date though. I didn't… didn't really have time. But we've been boyfriend and girlfriend a whole month now." Natalie glanced up at her dad. "I think you'd like him. He knows what to take seriously, and he really cares about me."
Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.
Still, he said nothing.
"I also have a bunch of new friends," Natalie went on, forcing her voice steady, though it kept threatening to break into a horrible mess of sobbing. "There's Kelsey, who's a… she'd call herself a badass," she added with a wince, but also hoping it would get a reaction out of him, get anything from him.
Nothing.
"She loves sports," said Natalie. "But she also loves video games, 'cause she says there's no reason people can't love both. Then there's Mitch, her archenemy. Except I think they totally have a secret crush on each other. They're always fighting about everything, but they spend so much time together, they play all the same games now, and they made secret plans to help me."
Natalie picked up the neck of her dress and dabbed her eyes with it, lacking anything better. The tears were coming again, as much as she'd tried to fight them off.
"I had a really bad time, Dad," Natalie murmured, giving up on her plan.
Her dad wasn't reacting at all to the positives, so she had to try something else. Anything else. He'd withdrawn inside himself. She'd give anything for him to be mad at her, to be frantic, to do anything like he used to whenever she upset him.
"They tried to kick me out of school. People told horrible stories about me online… and all the stories about magic too…" Natalie trailed off.
She knew she wasn't going to get to him with stories about magic… even if they were awful. It just made everything so much worse… All the rumors, people being scared of us because we could do magic, all the videos and headlines. It made everything so much worse.
"I got hurt… I went downtown on my own, because… well, because of stupid reasons now."
If I'd just told Quinn in the first place… instead of trying to hide it and running because I was terrified of him finding out…
"People still tried to help me, but… I ended up in places I shouldn't have been. I met… I met people dad, and they…" She took a deep breath. "There was a guy… and he… He grabbed me and…"
Her dad took a sudden breath, a gasp. She looked up, and his eyes were wide, panicked.
Natalie nodded. "I didn't know what to do. I was so scared."
"Natalie—" he said, and his voice got stuck in his throat.
"I…" Natalie trailed off, her own caught as well. More tears dropped from her eyes, so much that she was getting lightheaded. Dehydrated. I need water. She dug into her bag for a bottle and drank deep.
Her dad twitched, as if to move forward. His arms lifted just slightly. He rose out of his chair just a little. For a moment, Natalie thought he might finally do something, might hug her, might say something, might show that he still cared, that he still loved her.
Then, his eyes spotted the wolf at the other end of the room.
He fell back into the chair again, and he didn't move.
Natalie broke down. She fell against the stairs leading up to the second floor, and she sobbed openly.
Dad, please! I'm still your daughter! Your turtle! Say something!
He didn't say anything.
Natalie got up and ran outside. She couldn't be in that room anymore. Gwen would watch him. Natalie plunged back into the rain, into the storm, into the horrible world that she'd been forced into, that her father had abandoned her to.
She'd lost the person most important to her in the whole world, and at that point, what good was the world anymore?
"Natalie?" asked a voice.
She turned, and she saw… Hector. Hector Peraza, one of her oldest friends, the grocery store owner… or at least, the former grocery store owner. He had a huge overcoat on, which protected him far better from the storm than her simple coat and dress, but even so… he looked as miserable as she felt.
In any other situation, she'd have been overjoyed to see him—but not today.
"Hi," she finally managed, barely forcing a word between the sobs.
"I didn't want to be around them anymore," said Hector. "Everyone…" he trailed off.
Natalie nodded, too overcome to speak. Hector walked forward and took one of her hands, and his hands were soft and warm. He stood over her, sheltering her from the rain a little.
Everybody wants something we can't do for them.
"So you came here?" she choked out.
"Nowhere left for me to go…"
Me too… we can't go anywhere anymore. This is all we have left.
"I don't know what to do now," said Hector.
Make it ours.
Natalie glanced back at her castle. "I asked Dad to build this for me 'cause of you. Did you know?"
Hector can help us protect it from the world.
"No, reinita." Hector sounded confused.
"It was after you told me you owned your store," she went on. Natalie put a hand on the solid wooden beam, slick with rain. "I wanted a place for myself."
"Oh…" Hector nodded. "It's a good place. But we can't live here. It's not enough. You'd need more than that."
The world is the problem. We don't need it anymore.
"It's not enough," agreed Natalie. She looked back to Hector. "I don't ever want to go back."
"To the city?"
"Anywhere," she said. "I want to live here."
"But—"
Hector has the answer.
"We'll make it bigger," said Natalie. She held out a hand to Hector. "We'll make our own place."
"Natalie, I don't know if—"
"Help me? Please?"
Hector looked around in the pouring rain. There was nobody in sight, and given the storm, she doubted anyone would show up. All she knew was that she wanted to leave the world behind forever. Hector's magic—a spell he'd invented and then perfected—was the key.
Create it as it should be. As we wish it to be.
In her memory, Natalie saw Rallsburg at night, as it was in her dreams—peaceful, quiet, sky full of stars and not a single thing in sight. She wandered the streets and the woods with Gwen and Scrappy, under a blanket of moonlight, never worrying about anything.
Natalie Hendricks would create a home, away from the roaring cities and angry people. Away from the hate which spread like a virus, infecting her father, infecting her school and everyone around her. She'd be free with her friends at her side. She could build it, a home flowing with magic just like Cinza had—and better, because Natalie Hendricks was one of the most powerful people in the world.
Her world.