Hazel prepared herself heading to the forest, its been long she last saw the wolves and she also wanted to use the opportunity to have her alone time. Xavier had recently got her, her personal carriage, so it wasn't gong to be hard getting to the forest. She informed Collins on where she was going since she didn't have time to tell Xavier, just in case he asks, which he will, definitely, cause he had strictly forbade her from leaving the .mansion. Alone. Without his notice. But she got to have this one alone time.
She went into the carriage carrying some food since she planned to stay for a while, and with that, she told the carriage man to set off. Xavier had told her they would recognise her scent, so there wasn't any need to be worried. The carriage man stopped at some spot while Hazel continued the rest of her journey with her basket of food. The carriage man left as per her orders.
She kept walking till she reached a lake but this wasn't a normal lake, it was the famous lake strictly forbade to go near, the Lake of Bones, literally in a way, cause some bones could be seen by the shore. Looks like she had walked quite some steps. It was a common topic at Bougreve but surprisingly didn't get to hear much on it here at Borreve, although Xavier had mentioned it once or twice before.
Out of curiosity, she came close to get a good view of it, avoiding getting close to the shore to avoid any trouble. The lake looked just like any other, peaceful and quiet with trees surrounding it. She decided to lie a bit before she goes back to looking for the wolves. She layer on the grasses and slept off after some while
Later on, she was woken by low growls coming from a small distance from her, well, she didn't have to look for the wolves again, they found her. She sat up to take a look at them, they were just three of them and they moved towards her growling. After waiting to see if they would recognise her, but they still growled, she stood up in a defense pose while they kept coming, still growling
'Did Xavier mean what he said, cause these wolves doesn't recognise me for sure' she thought
She decided to take a step backwards but it earned her a loud growl, and she immediately stood stiff. One of the wolves, came forward and carried the basket in it's mouth
"What the hell are you doing!!" Had shouted seeing that and again, it growled. The other two came yo her back urging her with their nuzzle to move forward. It was then she got their info, they didn't want her close to the lake, that was why they growled when she took a step back earlier. Animals and their instincts, they somehow know that this lake was bad news.
She quietly adhered to their instruction and followed them, they walked some distance and she came across the other three laying in the floor, to which the alpha was there. When they noticed, they had company, the alpha came closer to her and sniffed her, letting out a soft grunt, he later back down with the other five following making a circle around her with her basket in their middle.
'Xavier really trained them well' she thought as she made her way to their middle sitting. She them opener the basket and started eating, occasionally sparing them some food. Minutes later, she was done and she went to her third reason of coming here, which was to practice the wind ability, she had met the wind elemental bearer earlier and she needed to start practicing.
She crossed her legs in a yoga position,closing her eyes to concentrate, she chanted some spells still in deep concentration. After some time, she was able to create just a small whirlwind just before she most her energy and dozed off with the thought
'The wolves are here, so I'm safe'
During the evening, when the sun was preparing to set, Hazel was woken up by a faint laughter coming from afar which seems to draw closer. At first, she thought it was a dream but it kept repeating so she had to wake up, she noticed that the wolves were still sleeping which was strange, because they were always alert. She dragged her eyes to where the laughter was coming from and it led to a tree branch where a woman sat, just one look and she knew who the woman was and also knew why the wolves were sleeping. The woman was a dark witch, who was obviously here for her
"Hello, Lady Hazel Harlow, we finally meet" she said in an over excited tone which Hazel didn't respond to, hazel was looking for a way to escape from this witch "don't be shocked I knew your name.... You see, you're famous among us and a treasure that can bring me to a better position"
"A dark witch? You all rick and are ugly" Hazel mocked
"Oh, about that....." The witch came down from the tree still in her witch form with hard ugly scales on her body but she slowly my transformed to her human self, a beautiful young lady ".....much better now right?" She said smiling
"Even worse" Hazel sneered "What have you done to the wolves?"
"Oh, they looked like they needed a lot of sleep so I helped a bit with that and besides, we wouldn't want them disrupting out meeting"
"Fuck your meeting!"
"Look Hazel, let's make things easy for both of us OK, just comply, I'll take you to selles, you get Xavier for us, you kill him and we let you go, how about that?"
"Well, I don't seem to like the idea"
"I'm a bit disappointed" she said as she bowed her head to face palmed "but I expected it anyways"
"Good for you"
"I guess we'll use the hard way then"
"I'll love that" Hazel said bravely
The dark witch suddenly attacked Hazel by bringing her small knives out and threw at her, Hazel quickly dodged the attack. The witch was fast enough yo get at Hazel back and used the same method, this time, it cut Hazel a bit in her arm
"You still love it this way?" The witch mocked
"Yeah" hazel said chanting some spells to with the dark witch was horrified. Hazel had taken them to the mirror world, which was one where, no matter what damage was done at this realm, won't affect the real world. She did that because if the wolves, she didn't want to hurt them, since she would be using some spells which may be destructive
"Congratulations, you took us to the mirror world"
"And congratulations witch, you just stepped into your doom"
The witch proceeded to attack again but stopped when she noticed what Hazel was doing. She was chanting some spells which made the little sticks and branches in the floor come together to form a giant human like figure. The witch gave a smile
"You're not playing fair, Hazel" the witch said before chanting hers to make the same giant out if sand. The two giants fought while Hazel and the witch also did. The witch used her dark abilities while Hazel used whatever she had learnt.
After some minutes of fighting, from the looks of it, Hazel seemed to be losing along with her giant. Finally, she fell, and the moment she did, her stick figure also disappeared as the magic in it faded, same thing with the mirror world. They were at the real world which was quiet like nothing ever happened, whatever that happened at the mirror world didn't affect here
"We should have done this the easy way" the witch said walking closer to where she was on the floor and raised her chin up so she could meet her eyes, she noticed, there was bruises by the side of her lips and in her temple "awwn, don't you look cute like this" she mocked further. Hazel slapped her hands off her chin, stood and ran off. The dark witch seeing this, let out a hiss before following after her
She met Hazel close yo the shore of the lake, Lake of Bones
"I'm sure, you know it isn't safe to be close to the river" the witch notified
"I have that in mind"
"Then what's going on in that brain of yours!"