Free Within the Cards by Donna Altman Page A

facts that they were different and feared kept these clans at odds. Although, this wasn’t the only battle they encountered. The witches and wizards hated them for over-throwing and destroying Elizabeth.
    The youngest grandchild had a spell cast on her at the time of Elizabeth’s annihilation. Ellie was the brunt of the spell. This was the reason Ellie was different from the others. This spell made her feel the compassion of a human. The witches and wizards were not doing this out of kindness. They thought this would destroy the ruthlessness of the witchyres. They knew if they cast their spell on one, with the constant multiplying, the spell would pass from offspring to offspring and would eventually become the downfalls of the powerful clan.
    This spell didn’t work as the witches and wizards wanted because the rest of the witchyre clan saw Ellie as strange. They didn’t understand her need to protect the food in which they feasted. The witchyre clan considered her ridicules and weak. They fed on her weakness and treated her as if she were of a lower class. The other witchyres punished Ellie because of the way she believed. They made her feel inferior to the rest of the clan. The males of this race would not have anything to do with this fragile beauty. She was in her own right an outcast, a witchyre not accepted for her beliefs. Her sisters would not destroy her. She was the one that held a power of witchery that none of the others held. She could control the elements of the universe, and her sisters knew some day they would need her.
    Ellie’s differences in her compassion made her estranged from her sisters. She did not attract the males of the witchyres, so they allowed her to forgo the rite of passage into adulthood. She was never bred by a male witchyre. They feared her concepts would pass on as the witches had hope. Her family allowed her to leave and walk alone. Her walk would be limited. Her time alone would be short in the immortal world. However, this was the time she was free from the killing and pillaging of her clan. It was the time when she created me. She was happy during the years we were together, and she walked in peace. Ellie’s sisters controlled her right to walk freely, and they proved their control when they removed her from me.
    Ellie’s sisters were strong and unmerciful. Both of her sisters married other witchyres. These were cousins that came from somewhere in their family tree. Marriage in the clan was for power not love. A stronger force was all the true witchyres yearn for. They wanted to overtake the immortal world and rule the lands where all immortals walk. If they maintained the power, they would be the ones that all would answer to, and they would pass judgment without retaliation from the purebred of the other races. This wish was still not granted. Vampires still controlled certain territories and found ways to fight against the beings that considered themselves the higher race in the immortal world. The vampires knew the witchyres had a few flaws that one day would prove their downfall. They continued to hunt for these flaws so they could use them against the witchyres when the time came.
    Love was a word the witchyres considered meaningless. Ellie, on the other hand, thought differently. She wanted the love and compassion she saw in humans. During the time Ellie walked alone, she created me. It was a time when she found the love humans shared. It was a time when Ellie was mine, and I was hers. I would do whatever it took to return her longing need for commitment to love. I wanted the love we once shared and somewhere deep inside of her, she wanted that too. Had it not been for the spell her sisters cast to remove her memories she would remember me and would have never left me to go back to the ways of her family. She hated their ways. She would never go back to their ways without being forced. This force came in the form of a spell.
    This illustrious family did not tolerate being