"Come on, Haizael, let me in," Rissa whined as she pounded on the wooden door. I sighed uncomfortably. I wanted to let her in, but I couldn't disobey my parents wishes. Especially my father. He worked so hard lately, yet our crops continued to wilt.
"You know I'm not allowed to see you Rissa," I said. I wasn't allowed, but boy did I want to see her again. The thought of her alone made my heart race. My hand began to shake as I thought about our last encounter. My whole body tingled as I thought of her soft hand on my forearm. Memories and emotions came flowing back to me, as I remembered the way she gentled forced her lips to mine and swirled her tongue around mine. It was like a lightning bolt striking the inside of my chest.
Eventually she gave up as I heard her walk away. A sigh of relief left my throat, I didn't want to get caught, and I had work to do. I grabbed a pair of slosh boots that were next to the door and put them on. They were a little bit to big for me, but that meant there was plenty of room to move around. Being so small, the boots went up to just below my thighs. It was probably for the better though, as I would be walking through the swamps looking for snakes to make dinner. My town's usual main source of income was the wheat from our fields, but recently the swamps were getting worse, slowly turning our dry land and fields into marshes. The community wasn't all too happy with this change, especially my father. Although, some of were thankful for the increased amount of snakes. Normally we traded our wheat crops with distant villages, we now used the snake skins and meat from the snakes. It was nowhere near close to the amount of goods we got with the wheat, but it was enough to get by. With each passing day, the swamps seemed to cover more of our land.
I looked up to the sky as I opened the door. It was darker than usual, even though it was barely noon.
"Today would be a great day for catching the snakes," I thought to myself as I headed off to the edge of town near Prymont River. It was the best place to catch snakes, ironically it was the same river where the swamps had begun over a year ago.
"Hey, Haizael," Lars waved to me as I was picking up a common water snake. I smiled as I put the hissing snake in the bag next to me. Lars was one of, if not my favorite older male. He was a close friend of my fathers, and being ten years younger, was like a little brother to him. So, naturally, he was like an uncle to me.
"Lars," I exclaimed, I would never call him my uncle. He began walking over to me with a cloth bag in his hands.
"How are the snakes today?" He asked finally reaching the spot where I was at.
"Pretty good." I pointed to the bulging cloth bag I had just put the snake in. The tightly closed bag wriggled from all the snakes inside.
"Haven't seen any diamond back water snakes," I said as I searched for another.
"That's good then. Them's poisonous dear. Hagar and I found one last week closer to the dried part," he said as he grabbed my full bag and replaced it with the empty one.
"Oh, gosh," I said as I spotted a green water snake. An unpleasant smell emitted from the snake as I grabbed it around its neck.
"Did anyone get bit?"
"Dorian Fletched," Lars nodded.
"He's not doing too well. Your mother is doing the best she can to take care of him though," he said as he held open the cloth bag for me. The unpleasant smell continued as the snake tried to bite me.
"Your father of course is furious. Ranting about all the snakes in the swamps, and the crops failing because of these swamps. He's blaming your lady friend you know."
"Rissa?" I asked, still struggling with the snake. He nodded.
"What for?" I finally had a good grip on the thing.
"Rumors are she's a witch," he said as he watched my expression change. Astonished, I dropped the green snake and wasn't the least bit concerned as it swam quickly away to safety.
"A what?! And what does being a witch have anything to do with it?" I had heard stories of witches far to the west and south, but they did good things.
"The river started merging into the land when she first came."
"But that doesn't make any sense. She's only been here less than six months. The river started merging over a year ago." I had stopped looking for snakes, and was beginning to get agitated.
"Some people said they saw her on the outskirts of town over a year ago."
My emotions started to overwhelm me. Was it possible, I thought to myself.
"It doesn't make sense," I said out loud.
"Not all witches are good," he said. I had had enough. My face was flushed with red, and tears streamed down my face. I didn't want to believe it. Maybe it wasn't even true. Perhaps the town needed someone to blame it on, and because she wasn't born here, she was a scapegoat. It could just be mother nature changing the land. Lars tried to say something else, but I just shook my head and walked away, leaving him there to catch the snakes alone. I was going to give my father hell.
"I told you I didn't want you hanging around that woman," my father said harshly as he took a sack of seeds from Malark.
"She's not a witch!" I stamped my foot. Malark cocked his brown eye at me and left with a tsk.
"Really, Haizael. You're acting like a child," my father said with a stern look once Malark was out of hearing distance. I didn't care.
"You don't even know her," I whined.
"Nor do you," he retorted with a hmph.
"I know her better than anyone else in this town." He stopped what he was doing and looked at me, anger in his brows.
"And just what does that mean young lady?" I glared back at him.
"I think you know what it means." I was only fifteen, but fifteen or not, I didn't care. Rissa made me feel things no other person, male or female, could not.
"Haizael Ayala Snowdon!" My father slammed his fist so hard onto the table that the sack of seeds tipped over and started pouring onto the floor.
"I do not want you seeing that girl. She is bad news." He began to pick up the seeds.
"You don't know that for sure." My voice had gotten louder. People outside were starting to look in.
"Your mother and I already agreed on who you are to marry when you turn eighteen," he shouted as he closed the wooden door, away from prying eyes. I don't think it mattered though, my father's voice when he yelled was loud enough to be heard all down the street.
"I'm not going to marry Baxter Angelmen," I said as I kicked some seeds to the other side of the room. It was common norm in our village for the parents to pick who their children would marry when they reached adult age. I think it was worse for me, because I was an only child. My mom had difficulty trying to get pregnant before me, there was a lot of miscarriages, and I was told one she time almost didn't make it herself as boy she delivered was still born. I grew up being told by many people that my parents were ecstatic that I had been born.
It wasn't that I didn't like Baxter, he was an okay guy, but I knew who I had feelings for. Even before Rissa came along, the men my parents tried to pair me with didn't feel right to me.
"You will marry him, and you will bare his children." A hard knot formed in my chest. The inside of my cheeks became filled with fluid. I tried to swallow, but tears started to flow from my eyes. I swung open the wooden door, knocked over a small bag of seeds sitting on the ledge of a window, and slammed the door shut behind me.
"Haizael!" He screamed through the other side of the door. I ran down the street, not caring about the other people staring at me. For years they had heard my fathers and mine bickering. Each step on the cobblestone sent a sharp pain through my chest. It became harder to breathe the further I got from the shop. I finally reached my house, ran inside downstairs to the basement where my room was. I collapsed onto my feather bed, out of breath.