37: Magic
The instant that the witchdoctor trainer had entered the small room that had been given to the unnamed little girl, the child had practically leapt upon her – even though the top of her thick – haired head barely reached up to Vadima's hip.
"Show me!" She pleaded playfully, tugging on the purple shawl that was tied around the witchdoctor's waist, the numerous charms and trinkets sewn onto it generating a variety of light sounds as they collided together.
"Show you what, my dear?" Vadmia responded evenly, yet playfully, kneeling down in order to make eye contact with the girl – the girl who played with the rats.
"The magic!"
That explained it, Vadima thought – for she had known that there was someone watching her while she taught the young trainees of Skull Island during the day – but she had never suspected it to be this one.
Seeing no problem with appeasing the little girl's curiosity, Vadima opened her hand so that it laid palm up, fingers outstretched, before whispering a single unintelligible word, a sphere of green energy leaping to life within her hand.
The rat girl's grey eyes practically lit up with joy, although she made no sound, no movement – she did not attempt to reach out for the flame, or to grab it or hold it, as most small children that were her age would often tend to do – instead, she merely stared, seemingly entranced.
"I can't." The girl's strangely defined eyebrows furrowed, as if she was concentrating hard on something that the witchdoctor trainer could not quite place her finger on.
This confused her.
"You can't…what, dear?"
"It's not green when I do it."
Ah, so she speaks of the flames.
Naturally, the girl must have tried to imitate the master witchdoctor, as many young children often did of their mentors or parent figures – and she had turned out unsuccessful.
But of course, Vadima thought, for no matter how much she would wish to place her powers into practice, she would never be able to until the day came in which she was old enough to receive proper training.
And, dismissing this, the master witchdoctor was just about to turn and leave the room when –
"See – look!"
The shrill voice of the girl called out once more, and Vadima looked down –
Only to see her tiny form surrounded by what seemed to be an entire envelope of energy – of black energy.
What…?!
She could not have been more than five, or six years old – there was simply no way that the girl could have mastered the channeling of energy simply by watching or imitating, rather than by receiving formal instruction and examples.
And then, of course, there was the fact that the energy that was generated from her form was black.
Hoodoo energy was not this color – every witchdoctor – no, scratch that – every pirate who had ever seen or heard of hoodoo knew that the energy and forces that were utilized with it gave off a green glow.
Vadima did not speak these thoughts out loud, of course – but it was only then that she had fully realized that the rat – girl was capable of an entirely different form of magic – and this scared her.
Dangler's backstory is interesting in my opinion, because it isn't really "tragic" at all - and yet, she still ended up meeting an extremely unfortunate fate.
I hope you found this interesting, and be sure to leave a review!
- Severina