Page 61 of Mama Si's Paradise

Turning toward her, I wasn’t sure whether I should be relieved or even more worried. A quick glance at Assa, and I found her with her head down, shaking it as she smiled. That had to be a good sign, didn’t it?

“Oh, doll,” Mama Si said, bringing her gloved hand to her chest. “I wouldn’t take Hannah’s words seriously. Believe me, she didn’twarn youout of the goodness of her heart.”

Not that it was a surprise, but… “She didn’t?”

“Absolutely not. She’s jealous, Fall Doll. I wouldn’t think too much of it if I were you.” Her shoulders still shook a bit as we continued to walk close to the trees, their shade heavenly against the sunlight.

“Why is she jealousof me, though?” It made no sense that someone like Hannah would be jealous of anyone at all.

She gave me a quick look. “Can’t you guess?”

Could I?

“She…” My eyes closed for a moment andherscame before me, clear as the blue sky over us, hiding a million colors. “She’s like you.”

“No, doll, she waslike you.” Mama Si stopped walking and turned to face me at the edge of the shade. “She wanted to become an Enchanted, too. I offered her to Ennaris just a year ago.”

It’s like I swallowed a sack of rocks and it fell right in the pit of my stomach. “Oh.”

“Yes,” Mama Si said, pursing her lips for a moment. “Unfortunately, Ennaris didn’t accept her.”

For the first time since that night we spoke, I actually considered the possibility that I might agree to this and thenfail,have this very land reject me—it had apparently done it before.

I was twice as anxious within three seconds.

“Why not?”

Mama Si shrugged. “Because she wasn’t worthy,” she simply said.

My poor heart.

If someone like Hannah wasn’t worthy of being magical, what the hell couldIexpect to happen?

“Ennaris knows. It always knows, and it has its reasons why it didn’t accept Hannah.”

I fisted my hands tightly. “She must be devastated.” That’s why she’d come after me the way she had—it made perfect sense.

“She’s had time to come to terms with it. After all, even though Ennaris refused her, the ritual alone gave her so much more than she had as a human. She’s not exactly Enchanted,but she’s somewhere between your kind and mine, and there’s power in that. She’s learned to harness it better than anyone else I’ve come across.” Mama Si actually sounded impressed and a bit proud, too.

“That’s…that’s…” I couldn’t come up with the proper word, so I just shook my head.

“Smart,” she finished for me. “Hannah is a very smart woman. She’s a woman with a plan that lets nobody stand in her way.”

I narrowed my brows. “How couldIbe standing in her way—that’s ridiculous.” It really was. Anybody with a pair of eyes could see it.

“If you decide to stay and try to become Enchanted—and whether you are accepted by Ennaris or not doesn’t matter—you’ll have the same power as she does. You’ll steal her spotlight. She doesn’t want competition. After all, she can have anyone she wants and makes the rules all by herself whichever way she pleases.” She leaned a bit closer and whispered, “Power.”

I shook my head. “But I don’t want power.”

That surprised her more than finding me in that forest playing the piano in the middle of the night. “Everybody wants power, Fall Doll. You most of all.”

“No, I?—”

“You want to be free to do what you want with your life, don’t you?” she cut me off.

“Yes, exactly, but?—”

“How do you think that becomes possible if you do not have the power to make your own choices?” Her words hung in the air for a moment. “Freedomispower, Fall Doll. Because if you’re weak, you don’t get to choose. If you’re weak, those with power choose for you.” She laughed a bit. “Why do you think money rules the world you lived in? Why do you thinkthose who have a lot of it get so much more freedom to live whatever lives they want to live?”

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