Gertie's Choice (4 page)

“It is and its power grows
stronger with the sun.” Just then the carriage pulled up and a very
pretty young woman with long blond hair and big brown eyes got out
along with her equally attractive husband. Gertie rushed up and
hugged Cynthia and spoke in a rush.

“No time to explain, we
are all as one, Julia will explain, I will be back!” She said and
then got into the wagon with William.

When Gertie arrived at
William and Ophelia’s house she saw two of the cutest little baby
girls she had ever seen. She started to pick one up and then said
“Oh my!”

“Yeah, about that, sister.
I can’t believe you actually did that to me! Worse, I can’t believe
you would do that to my beautiful daughter!”

“I forgot all about it.
I’m sorry.” Gertie said as she held up the little girl named Luna
who had been born a minute before her twin sister Thelma. Luna had
the biggest posterior on a child that she could ever
imagine.

“You gave my baby a
watermelon backside!” Ophelia said.

“She is still a beautiful
baby, both girls are. Listen, where is mom? I have something very
urgent to tell you both. We have to leave here, all of us, and
right now!”

“What are you talking
about?

Gertie told Ophelia
everything she knew and that although she wasn’t certain how it
would all take place, she was sure that it was going to happen that
very night. She told her how Julia was one of them and had
reinforcements now to help them. She told her of the ring and how
they had to be at a certain location at the moon’s rising that
night if they were going to be able to live. Ophelia thought her
heart would beat out of her chest.

“I have to go back now,
William will come back here with the exact details. Tell no one
except momma and make sure you travel light, we have to protect
these babies!” Gertie said, giving her sister a big hug before
leaving. “Hurry, Ophelia, you and momma and the babies be ready to
leave when William comes back.”

“William is going too!”
Ophelia screamed.

“Of course, yes, he is,
but please, hurry, but do not let anyone see you preparing to go.
Remember, at the moon’s rising tonight at the edge of the forest
right before the clearing of the land.” Gertie said.

When Gertie arrived back
at the Palace she was just in time to see Julia in the carriage
with Cynthia. She had told the other servants that she was going
shopping with her friend. She said very loudly “I was waiting for
you to return, Gertrude, please watch over Hugo for me. It will be
a day or two before my return.” She then kissed Hugo and handed her
over to Gertie. “Your mother will be back with a lot of nice
clothes for you, Hugo. Goodbye, Gertrude.”

She then told the other
servants that they would not be needed at the Palace until she
returned from her shopping trip. “Gertrude is quite capable of
fending for herself.” She said and snuck a worried look at Gertie
before turning and telling the driver that they were to leave
now.

The other people on staff
were only too happy to be receiving a couple of days off. “Sorry
you got stuck with the kid, Gertrude. I had already prepared meal
for tonight, so you won’t have to worry about that.” The cook told
her.

Gertie waited until the
last of the staff had left the Palace before she went in search for
the garments she was looking for. The King’s mother had died
several years ago and her clothes had been stored away in a trunk.
Gertie took a matronly looking black dress out and a heavy shawl.
She found a hat and pined all of her glorious bright red hair up
and put on the hat.

She then prepared two
containers of wine and placed one in the room that the Great Evil
had occupied and the one that Julia and her husband Mathew had
shared. She searched the royal chambers until she found the royal
gem encrusted crowns and staffs and took them with her.

She went down the stairs
with Hugo and said “Are you ready, Hugo?” Hugo smiled and laughed
and seemed to know exactly what was coming. Gertie chanted and spun
in a circle and when the heavy blue mist cleared, all that was left
was an old woman who was leading her deer on a path that led away
from the Palace.

Gertie looked at Hugo and
exclaimed “Oh my deer” and then she laughed. “You were supposed to
be a mule.”

Gertie limped away from
the Palace walking next to the deer. The night was fast approaching
and it was near time when Gertie and Hugo arrived in the clearing
near the forest. She looked up and saw Julia and two miniature
ponies that were hitched to the wagon. Gertie knew instantly that
they were Cynthia and Ashton.

“Time is short, Gertie,
where is your family?”

Gertie was in a panic and
then she heard her sister’s voice begging them to wait for her.
Ophelia was carrying her two daughters in her arms, but their
mother was not with her, nor was William.

“Where is mother? We have
to leave now, Ophelia, where is our mother?” Gertie
screamed.

“William is looking for
her, she did not return to the house so he went in search for her.”
Ophelia said.

Gertie started crying and
said “We have to leave her, Ophelia, we have to leave mother.
Otherwise none of us will live if we don’t leave right
now.”

Ophelia handed Luna and
Thelma to Gertie and smiled. “Take them with you, Gertie, make sure
they are safe. I cannot leave William and mother. Take them and
this as well.” Ophelia said handing Julia a fairly large sack of
coffee beans. “Take these and grow more on the other side. Don’t
let my babies forget me! I promise we will be together again, I
promise you that!” Ophelia screamed with tears covering her face.
“Godspeed, sister.”

“Ophelia, I have left
poisoned wine for the Great Evil.” Gertie told her sister, leaving
out the part where she had left the same for Julia’s husband. “You
have to make sure no one blames William, you or mother. You have to
leave this place as soon as you can! Promise me,
sister!”

The wind started to blow
very strongly and the ring on Julia’s hand started to glow brightly
in the night. Waves of color, blues, reds, greens, and yellow
filled the night sky along with shooting stars. Julia grabbed
Ophelia’s hand and transferred a necklace into it. A necklace with
a large ruby red stone in the center of it. Ophelia then ran as
fast as she could back towards the woods, tears streaming down her
face, blinded by her own long brown hair in the high
winds.

Gertie held the two little
girls tightly, her tears blurring her vision. A giant lightning
bolt lit up the sky and there was a great thunder, causing Ophelia
to fall to the ground. Then, it was all over and calm came again to
the night time sky there in the clearing.

Chapter 6

Luna and Thelma sat on the
porch watching their little cousin, Ophelia, play with a rabbit. “I
am surprised that little Ophelia was not born with her mother’s
fierily red hair.” Thelma said.

Julia, who now went by the
name of Janet, answered her. “Gertie’s hair is a beautiful shade of
bright red, but little Ophelia’s hair, although somewhat auburn,
also has a lot of red in it.”

“Do either of us look like
our mother?” Thelma asked Janet.

“Your mother, Ophelia, was
also a beauty. She had long dark brown hair that was very shinny.
She loved you girls very much. She wanted you to be safe and we
should be safe here, we have been so far.” Janet
explained.

“But the mountains have
been split open and the people of this place are building a road
near here, so how safe can we be?” Luna asked the woman who has
been helping their aunt Gertie raise them.

“We have taken every
precaution of course, but I am very sure that we are safe and that
we are here for a purpose. We escaped to this beautiful place and
although times are changing and we will be welcoming a select group
of people from the other side of the mountain, so to speak, the
forest behind the houses here will forever be hidden from the
outside world.”

“I still don’t understand
fully why our mother and father cannot be here with us.” Thelma
said, although she had been told the story of her parents and their
own arrival to this new land many times before over the several
years they have been in their new home.

“Your father, William, was
a good man who loved you and your mother, Ophelia, very much. When
your grandmother went missing on the very night that we were to
depart the old country and come here, your father went in search of
her. Your mother, while refusing to leave her husband and mother,
your grandmother, brought you girls to the assigned meeting place
to make sure that your aunt Gertrude could keep you safe.” Janet
explained again to the two little sisters.

“Did our father ever find
our grandmother? Where was she?” Luna asked. “Will they come here
when he finds her?”

“I’m afraid we do not know
the answer to those questions, dear. When we traveled here, we
crossed over many centuries and miles. Your father was a mortal,
you understand what that means as far as life spans go.” Janet
said.

Thelma, being the younger
by a few minutes, but more abrupt of the two sisters, said “Yes, of
course we do. But our mother and grandmother could still come here
if they wanted to, couldn’t they? What about little Ophelia’s
father? Is he still back in the old country too? Is he a
mortal?”

“Many changes took place on
the journey here, girls, all of us have gone through changes that
we would not have gone through otherwise. But yes, little Ophelia,
whom you know was named after your mother, her father was a
mortal.”

“Why didn’t he come with
us?” Luna asked Janet.

“Janet was saved from
answering that question when Thelma said “Because he had to stay
behind with our mother and father and help find grandmother. But he
and our father are no longer breathing because they are mortals and
that was so long ago.” Thelma explained to her sister.

“Oh. Is the old country
really as pretty as it looks in the pictures that you paint of it?”
Luna asked, apparently satisfied with her sister’s explanation to
her questions.

“It has more waterfalls
than it does here, and the mist and fog hung lower over the land.
There were many species of animals running free in the forest
there. The houses there look very much like they do here. All of
the houses in the old country had thatched roofs, only they were
nowhere near the size that this house is, or the one behind this
house. All of the houses that are now being built on the other side
of that bridge in the distance, will be built in the modern day
style. A few will be designed to look more like those of the
Victorian era. The stores and school and other building will be
built on the other side of the bridge and hill as well.”

“That sounds like a lot of
work to me.” Luna stated.

“It is, and that is why
your aunt Gertie is making a trip even as we speak, to the other
side of the mountain to speak with some people about finishing
building the town for us.” Janet said.

“But won’t they tell on
us?” Luna asked.

“Not if we offer them some
coffee.” Janet said and winked at the girls. The sisters laughed
and even little Ophelia joined in.

Chapter 7

Gertie looked upon the
town she was in and her eyes grew wide. Here there were stores with
beautiful gowns in them and materials of all sorts to make any
covering your heart desired. She had only been to this place once
before, but she had not time to explore then as she could now.
Janet was watching the girls and today Gertie had all the time she
needed to recruit workers and obtain the goods that the Village
would need.

The first time had been a
real eye opener for her. Janet, Cindy and Ashton had filled the
wagon with gold and gems before leaving the old country. None of
them knew if the valuables would transfer or in what condition they
or each other would arrive in. If they had stayed in the old
country they would have surely perished. It was a risk they had to
take.

Gertie wiped a tear off of
her face. She missed her mother and her sister, Ophelia very much.
When Gertie’s form started changing she knew she was with child.
What she did not understand then, and probably would never
understand, is how her precious daughter, named after her sister,
had been in her womb for years before starting to grow and become
the beautiful child she was today. She knew it had to have been the
transition to the new Village and she had worried that her daughter
might be born deformed, or resembling her evil father.

But from the moment that
she was born, Gertie loved her daughter with all of her heart. That
she looked just like her was an added bonus. Gertie knew that she
would have loved little baby Ophelia no matter what, but she
thanked the heavens every day for her beautiful, perfect, healthy
daughter. She knew not if this child was born with special powers,
or if being in the womb at the time of transfer would change, or
take away, any powers she was meant to possess. It was not
important to Gertie, she vowed to love and protect her child
throughout eternity.