IV.
"Penelope, my love…I've been looking for you for centuries."
Penny smiled widely as she sat up, the wind blowing through her wild mane. The long green grass brushing against her exposed arms, "I've been here the entire time, beloved. I've always been here." She glanced over her shoulder and saw a tall, slender man walking towards her. His hands stuffed into his jeans, a wide smile on his own face.
The blonde stood to her feet excitedly, her floral sundress catching in the breeze.
She watched as he slowly got closer, but then two old angry looking men appeared beside him. The sky that was once shining brightly, quickly turned grey as storm clouds covered the field. She watched as her lover fought off the two old men, screaming at them, telling her to run. She was horrified. The men started baring teeth, and quickly transformed into large gangly four-legged beasts. They each latched onto an arm, and bit down on it. Her lover produced a toe-curling scream and fell to his knees, blood seeping from the wounds.
The blonde tried to run to him, but the more she ran the further he got. She felt a pair of hands on each of her shoulders and turned to face two women, one looking apathetic and the other looking satisfied. "Leave the boy. It's better this way."
She wanted to scream at them, but the satisfied one's hand started to glow a deep shade of red and out of thin air, the wretched necklace was produced. "Leave the boy alone." She heard the tone, and she knew it was a threat. She looked back at her lover and saw him hunch over, his back arching. Within a blink of an eye, he transformed into his true form, "A beast," the satisfied woman smirked and then frowned in disgust.
Penny looked at him, her horrified green eyes locking onto his sad angry blue ones. His fur was a dark brown, and unlike the two men fighting him, it was shiny and full. He was an Alpha, he was strong, "No. He's beautiful."
"Penelope!"
"Penny!" Her eyes fluttered. She was about done with these dreams.
"Oh goodness, she's awake!"
Penny heard voices all around her, she couldn't make out who they came from—they all sounded the same. Her eyes struggled to open, there was a bright light being shined into her iris, a rough hand lifting her eyelids. Alarmed, she swatted the hands away quickly.
"What the hell is going on?" She tried to yell, but it came out hoarse.
The first person she noticed was Jessica, she had been in Penny's face, yelling her name. Trying to urge her to wake up. She looked frantic, as if she were afraid, she had lost her friend. It touched Penny deeply, at one point she used to think Jessica hung out with her out of pity. Since most of the town criticized her for working at the occult store. Penny entertained the friendship, out of curiosity but mostly out of loneliness. After a night of drinking and dancing, it took a too-handsy-guy and a kick to the balls to show their friendship was for real. "You were passed out. After the rally I tried finding you, I asked Kurt basically everyone. No one knew where you were," Jessica placed a hand to her head as if she were stressed.
"I thought maybe you went back to the library, but it was closed, ya'know how Mrs. Clarkson likes to go to the garden on her lunch break," Jessica waved off, "I went by your house, and I saw you passed out on your couch. You were unresponsive and no one was around so I borrowed your car and drove you to the hospital."
Penny frowned, she didn't remember much after the rally at City Hall, but she knew she never went back home. "Oh."
"Everyone was really worried, the church moms said it was the doing of the Devil," she rolled her eyes. "It took everything in me not to knock them old folks out," Jessica looked away. "Anyways, Kurt is in the cafeteria and your mom is here," she added the last part quickly. She knew how Penny's relationship with her mother had taken a terrible turn after her father died.
Before Penny could say anything, Susan Queen walked into the room. She didn't look worried at all, she looked more like she was partying and was put out of her way to have to come visit her daughter and check on her welfare. Susan Queen was a gorgeous woman. Long blonde hair, large brown eyes, skin so tan Penny was almost envious. How could she get that tanned when the sun barely shined? Susan Queen looked as if she hadn't aged a day past thirty. In reality, she was actually forty-four. At the young age of fourteen, Susan fell pregnant with Penny's brother Randall. Only to be followed three years later with Penny. Though not far in age, Randall and Penny never had the best relationship. As soon as he was eighteen, he had left home and left Newmist. Penny was envious, and of course missed her brother, but she knew someone would have to stay back and take care of their parents. Selfishly, he never gave her the opportunity to choose.
Randall hadn't even gone to their father's funeral. It was disrespectful, and from then she had written him off. In her mind she was an only child, and only a DNA test could tell her different. So, why was Susan here? She hadn't bothered to check in on Penny at all since her dad died, despite living in a small-town avoiding people was fairly easy to do.
"What are you doing here?"
She hadn't noticed that Jessica and the nurses left. Susan stood at the foot of Penny's bed, watching her daughter wearily. "How do you feel?"
She scoffed, how did she feel? "Are you seriously asking me that mom?" She rolled her eyes, "It took me laying in a hospital bed for you to actually come see me?" She folded her arms across her chest and noticed her mother's eyes trail down to the ring on Penny's finger.
An emotion crossed her mother's face, one she couldn't pinpoint.
Ignoring her daughter's jabs, Susan walked closer to her, "You still drawing?" She asked cautiously. Penny narrowed her eyes, "Yes. Why?" Her mother always loved to see her draw, so it didn't surprise her when she asked.
"I—" she trailed off, "I just wanted to know." She reached out and placed a hand on Penny's forehead, "Penny, despite what you think about me," she let her hand drop from her forehead and to her chin, "I will always be your mother, and I will always love you. I never stopped. Ever."
Penny wanted to shout at her, ask her why it was she abandoned her for so long if she actually loved her. She wanted to cry. But she refused to have her mother win, so she stayed silent and let the older woman speak.
"No matter what happens, or what changes you make in your life. I will always be there to love and help you," she grabbed at Penny's hand and laced their fingers together, her eyes dropped to the ring on her finger and she smiled slightly, "Your grandmother would be so happy you're still wearing her ring."
Penny cradled her hand to her chest and looked at the ring, "It keeps me safe." She had no idea where that admission came from and corrected herself, "I feel like, I mean. I feel like it keeps me safe."
Susan nodded and wore an understanding smile, "I know." She patted Penny's shoulder, "I'm truly happy you're alright." She said genuinely.
There was a moment of silence, Penny didn't know how to respond to Susan's confession. Though, her ears immediately picked up on a distinct sound, "Kurt's here," she said quickly. Her mother frowned, confused.
True to her word, nearly twenty seconds later the hospital door opened and in walked a disgruntled Kurt.
Susan smirked at her daughter and stepped back. She watched with judging eyes as Kurt approached the bed and began speaking to her disinterested daughter. Susan knew what was happening, she knew it would happen eventually, and she tried to prepare for it the best she could. Though, it seemed like now that it was happening, she wasn't prepared enough.
She knew after her husband died the word would get out, and she knew they would come for her. She was warned about conceiving a child with Wyatt, that trouble would fall upon them and a black cloud of misery would follow their offspring. They didn't listen, and for that, Wyatt paid with his life. She supposed it was her fault, they were given a chance when they were allowed to even be together, she shouldn't have pushed it.
They hadn't lived in Newmist all their lives, like their children had believed, or remembered. At one point they lived in Nebraska. However, it wasn't until Penny turned ten, that's when she knew and Susan had known that small action…the way Penny cried in anger her big green eyes filled with tears and her cheeks sobbing wet, the way she stomped her feet, the way she shouted at her brother, and the way Randall's scooter wheel had randomly come unhinged and he fell off the makeshift dirt ramp. From the way Randall cried in pain, holding his broken ankle, she knew Penny was gifted.
That small action had caused a ripple effect, they knew Penny existed.
She gave Penny a present to console the sobbing ten-year-old, a ring, a fancy one. She told her it was magic, and only the best-behaved girls of Nebraska got one. Though, she was to never take it off. Penny smiled widely, the gaps between her teeth from where her teeth had begun to fall out proudly on display. Of course, Penny had believed her mother at the time, but as she grew older, she knew it wasn't magic, but it had just become a part of her. It wasn't an ugly ring, and it was an heirloom.
Of course, Susan knew different, it was an heirloom, but it was also magic.
She had hoped the control the ring had on Penny would give them more time, but it wasn't long before Agatha and Agnes Blackburn, the meanest of them all, swooped into their kitchen. Ugly grins on their faces. They had taunted Susan and Wyatt, circling them like prey and placed a terrible omen on them. As a family they would live the same life over and over again, ending in the same tragedy unless…
Randall, being the first-born mistake, he would lose all his gifts and lead a mundane life.
Penelope, being the mix-breed, would only be able to love one man who would never be able to find her again.
Wyatt, he would die once Penelope's lover laid eyes on her for the first time.
And Susan, Susan would live an eternal life with an unforgiving heartbreak and guilt.
And so, Wyatt and Susan both lived on for centuries, watching as their children died with old age only for Susan to wake up pregnant again and for the cycle to start over. They'd have to move every so often, because their neighbors grew curious as to why the Queen's weren't aging while everyone else was. Their last move was Newmist while Susan was pregnant with Randall. She knew the cycle, Randall would resent Penny for not being human and would leave home to another state. Penny would grow tired and weary of the life she was leading, marry a man she didn't love and drink herself into a stupor. In the middle of the night, Wyatt and Susan would get a phone call, the police, Randall had died. And nine months later, Penny would follow suit.
Except this time, Wyatt died.
Not Randall, nor Penny. Wyatt died.
Wyatt, he would die once Penelope's lover laid eyes on her for the first time.
That had meant he had found Penny, the man who she was bound to had found her for the first time in over two hundred years. Her heart was broken at the sight of Wyatt's lifeless body, but she knew now her children no longer had to die. Once Penny and her lover found each other the cycle could be broken. Penny just had to remember. So, she stayed away for six years.
She knew once Wyatt died Penny would be too preoccupied with trying to coddle her, so much so that she would lose sight of her own life. She would never find him. So, she pushed her away, she just never thought she'd push her into the arms of Kurt. Her hopes died once she saw them living together. She knew Agnes and Agatha were somewhere watching with a smile on their faces, satisfied.
However, hope was restored to Susan once she caught glimpse of the ring on Penny's finger. It changed. The ruby was glowing, Penny's gifts were no longer dormant. The only way that was possible was if she had physically met him, and they touched.
Maybe she didn't have to brace herself for a call from the police this time.