Startouched

"The river ran backwards the day the Queen vanished."

That was it.

That was all Cassie knew.

The only reason she knew anything at all about the Queen's disappearance was from overhearing people speaking to each other about it at the marketplace, which mother didn't let her go to very often because she always wanted to buy everything.

Cassie scoffed and kicked a pebble into the lake, watching it skip across the surface three times before breaching the surface and sinking to the bottom.

Her parents and friends wouldn't tell her a thing about what was happening, so she'd had to scrounge up pieces of information herself from here and there.

The last time she'd gone to the marketplace, she'd managed to scrape up a bit more information.

"The river's gone mad." She'd heard a man mutter to a shopkeeper as she was passing by. Cassie had stopped abruptly, ducking behind an empty stall and straining her ears to hear what they were saying.

"Haven't you heard? The river started running backwards the day the Queen vanished." The shopkeeper explained to the man. He picked something out of his teeth before continuing, "Sure gave the villagefolk a scare. Nobody knows what's going on with it."

"I've heard it's a curse." The man said, lowering his voice a little more. "Something linked to the Queen. Sure is a complicated mystery, I'm..."

Cassie didn't get to hear anymore before a woman saw her hiding behind the stall and scolded her, quickly ushering her away.

She sighed and sat down, pulling her knees into her chest. She picked up another pebble and bounced it in her palm for a moment before throwing it across the lake. It skipped twice before sinking.

She scowled.

Cassie hated being ignorant. She didn't like the feeling of vulnerability it left her with. What was she missing?

There's something going on with the river. She thought, the one thing she knew. And it's somehow linked to the Queen's disappearance. Nobody even knows how she disappeared. Maybe she was kidnapped? Or... killed? If that's true, then...

Cassie gasped as a possibility popped into her mind.

Does that mean... she was the one controlling the river's direction?

Now the floodgate had opened.

Oh my gosh, she could have been! Cassie thought, Because if she really was controlling it, then that means her death would make it go the direction it had been going before she became Queen!

Cassie scratched her chin.

I wonder why she made it go in a different direction in the first place...

Cassie continued to think about the possibilities as she watched the sun dip below the horizon line, bringing about the night.

"Cassandra!" Someone shouted from a little ways behind her.

She got up and turned around, seeing her mother standing in front of the house, holding a lantern.

"Cassie! Come inside!" She called.

"Coming!" She shouted back.

Cassie looked up to the stars once more, the moon lighting up the night sky and making it seemingly shimmer, each star like a small pinprick of ight dotting the deep blue tapestry that was the sky.

She inhaled deeply.

I wish someone would tell me something about what's going on. She thought, closing her eyes and exhaling. Willingly, without me having to fall to my knees and beg.

I can tell you, dear.

A jolt ran through Cassie as she heard the voice in her head.

Wait... no.

It didn't sound like it was in her head.

It sounded more like it came from...

She opened her eyes.

What she saw astonished her.

The stars above her appeared to be shifting, moving around and rearranging before her eyes, changing colors as they went.

Cassie couldn't even blink, not wanting to miss a single second of what was going on.

"Cassie!" Her mother called again.

Cassie couldn't respond.

She was to shocked by what was happening.

The stars rearranged a bit more, and Cassie gasped as she saw the shape it had created.

It was the crest of the Queen.

Hello, there, dear. The voice said again, and it took Cassie a moment for her to connect the dots.

The Queen was alive.

And she was talking to Cassie through the stars.