Among The Hollow

By Amanda Heit

Being hollow- devoid of magic-is the absolute worst thing imaginable. Curses stick harder and stronger without anything to buffer the blow. Life becomes one long struggle to flee from the missing power.

Kristin can't run fast enough. There is no safe location to hide. Her past is a curse. Her future is bleak. What she thought was an empty place inside of her is about to launch her into a five-hundred-year-old mystery. If she doesn't crack the curse, she will end up sleeping for eternity-or worse, become a wraith.

Kicked from her home six months early when her sisters reveal they hold magic without her, Kristin is to meet a mysterious uncle while staying clear of curses. That would be easier to do if it wasn't for the pack of werewolves chasing her down, or the pooka that keeps summoning her into a deadly forest. Then there is the uncle that wants her to locate a missing spyglass her birth father created before he turned mad and vanished.

Kristin turns to the one source of help that seems reasonable—a dragon-man. However, he is secretly using her as a cure while he guides her on how to thwart her other opponents. Kristin would feel more confident in her defense if she held magic, but she comes to learn that there is more than one way to connect with power. Not all magic is in the air. The ground runes hold an explosive force too, and might be just what she needs to survive. Unless the ground magic cursed her to begin with.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Amanda Heit
• Release date: Oct 11, 2021
• ISBN: 9781949858235

Amanda Heit

Finding meaning in life—feeling like you’re contributing to all of humanity in a good way—is a large undertaking. When I write, it’s the task I take on. Sometimes, that task is daunting. Sometimes, it’s full of laughter, joy, and fear. Reaching the end of a book can put me on top of the world or cause me endless frustration. But I can’t stop myself from trying. I can’t stop the inner clock that ticks and tells me that writing is something I enjoy the heck out of and there is nothing that will stop me from writing for long. As one of the quiet people in the universe, my best joy and flow in life comes when I’m creating new worlds and exploring characters. For me, each book I create finds new friends that share with me the intimate tangles of their lives. They cheer and I cheer. They succeed and I rejoice. They fall and I’m there hoping for that happy ending right along with them. I hope that you can find something in the stories I create that will bring you the same type of thrill. Thanks for sticking to the end!- Amanda Heit

Book preview

Among the Hollow

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Amanda Heit

This is a work of fiction. All similarities to real life are coincidental and unintentional. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

Children’s Fiction/ Teen

Copyright © 2021 by Amanda Heit

All rights reserved. No parts of this book may be reproduced in any form or means without written permission.

A similar story version was previously published under Spyglass Hill in 2014.

Heit, Amanda.

Among the Hollow / by Amanda Heit.

2nd edition.

ISBN-13: 978-1-949858-22-8

Ebook: 978-1-949858-23-5

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Printed in the United States of America

October 2021

To all who aspire to do more.

Never give up

Table of Contents

Fire

Ripple

Glow

Orb

Departure

Theories

Coercion

Spyglass

Whirlwind

Summoned

Guide

Temple

Visitors

Sleuthing

Pyramid

Pooka

Griffin

Family

Tingles

Heir

Ghost

Rings

Heart

Contract

Sintra

Crater

Fire

Everyone longs to be different and yet, when it really comes down to it, that longing is a lie. Everyone really wants to be the same, to be accepted, to be liked and loved. Everyone wants to feel needed and important. So, it becomes our task to make those around us feel like they are important when they are all the same.

What? Kristen asked as she came to a grinding halt. How can a longing, which can be described as a person’s innermost desire, be a lie? That’s what the person wants.

Her feet had only just entered the house. A quaint piece of architecture, the cobblestone walls had been added to and knocked down a few times to allow for additions when children had been born. It was easy to tell which was the newer part of the house by looking at the moss growing between the cracks of rock and the coloration from the weather lashing against the walls.

Kristen had been eyeing the juncture between her room and Ella’s room as she stepped toward the door, trying to keep her continued jealousy down. Six years younger than Kristen and the baby of the family, Ella had been the first to glow this last week, proving her inherent magic. People in town had talked a lot through the years about the lack of magic among the five Bowman daughters. Now they would have to adjust their gossip.

A controlling father, some said. He stifled their power and chained them against his will, refusing to let them use power least he not be seen as the greatest in the house. The thought was ridiculous to Kristin when she first heard it. Her father, Jay Bowman, had only ever encouraged his daughters to find the glow within. Well, he’d encouraged Jean, Susan, Becky, and Ella at least. Kristin hadn’t noticed that his encouraging words were not meant for her until the day she turned sixteen, didn’t glow, and cast upon herself the silent treatment from her family.

A cursed mother, others surmised. One who is magical herself but who gave birth to five daughters knowing that she never would give them the power of magic and that her offspring would be dead to the flow. Hollow. How heartless of her to have five children that way. Kristin didn’t believe that tale either. Her mother used magic daily, as did her father, so if she had been cursed, she would surely know about it and have found a cure long ago.

I could tell you again that you are special in your own way, her mother, Theresa Bowman, continued standing firmly between the entrance to the kitchen and the rest of the house blocking Kristin off, but it would be better to remind you to be civil instead.

Kristin set down the basket of herbs she had been collecting for the last three hours. It had taken only half an hour to put the herbs in the basket. Her remaining time she had spent dipping her feet into the stream listening to the chickadees’ charming calls of twee-dee, the pigeon’s mellow coos, the woodpecker’s hammering, and the high-low call of the wrens. Nature was her happy place more so than inside this house that had shunned her in silence since the night she passed sixteen.

It was startling to think that she turned sixteen a full six years ago. It felt like only a month had passed since that time some days. Other days, it felt like an eternity.

I’m so excited for you! Jean had told her before it had all gone wrong.

You’ll be remarkable! Becky had encouraged.

None of us will get any sleep with all your glowing, Susan had assured.

I hope I glow just like you, Ella had spoken.

Kristin had bounced around in excitement all day. With magically strong parents, she didn’t think for an instant that she’d be one of the hollow. One of the empty, lifeless, plain people of the earth. She had to adjust her opinion of the hollow after that day. It wasn’t so bad to not move magic. Not bad at all.

Okay, so it was exquisitely painful—a festering sore in her soul that filled with ooze and burst open over and over again, scabbing only to fill again the next month and bleed some more. Her desire to weld magic had never been satiated. She used to think she knew what it would feel like to glow. After all, she thought she knew magic. It was the whisper in the wind, the smell of the dirt, the shine of the sun. It was felt in the cryptic symbols that her mother used to teach her when they had gone walking together.

Kristin would ask what each symbol meant only to see her mother smile at her with her eyes both amused and fearful. Her answer that someday she would know what it meant had only bolstered her resolve to learn magic. Magic wasn’t something that was taught unless one could first prove they could work it. Her mother should have never taught her anything at all. A person had to glow first. A person had to shine. It usually happened in the sixteenth year after birth, and more often than not on the sixteenth birthday.

Kristin wasn’t even sure that the runes she knew related to magic in the first place. No one else drew runes in circles to cast spells. They waved their hands through the air and thought or mumbled the activating words to call upon their power. Their hands cast out energy of various colors and intentions. Spellcasting wasn’t found in playing with pictures. Her mother probably hadn’t broken the rules at all. She’d not taught her a thing about magic, but invented a fun game they could play on long walks.

Kristin had retired to bed on her sixteenth birthday without feeling anything different. Tomorrow, she had told herself. She would glow tomorrow. She was born in the middle of the night, so perhaps her magic would manifest itself when she was rested. She’d not slept waiting for it to come. For a full week, she fretted over the lack of light, waiting for her skin to burst out rays of glorious energy.

Then, at the end of the week, she had gone into the woods to gather her thoughts together. It was outside that she usually felt more centered. Away from the pressure and constantly worried glances from her sisters, she had knelt and told herself to glow. She’d closed her eyes, drawn runes she didn’t understand into circles, and accidentally set the forest on fire with her lamp.

After that, her family had stopped talking to her except for her mother. The whispers in town had been worse than the silence at home. The town claimed that she set the fire on purpose, that she and her siblings couldn’t hold magic because Kristin was a bad omen. That her father stifled everyone’s power around him because of her reckless ways. Even those who didn’t believe the tales who regarded the fire as the accident it was, didn’t take kindly to the forest, their livelihood, being burnt down.

The trees were starting to grow back now, but six years in a forest of trees looked young. The trees were still skinny. Too skinny to hide the animals people wanted to hunt. Six years of a depleted food supply to humans only made the reminder stronger to those around her about what she had done when she failed to glow.

Kristin was still holding out hope for the sensation, however. She wasn’t doomed just yet. There had been some people known to glow as late as twenty-three. It was horribly uncommon, but not impossible. She had time left to hope before she would have to accept the claims of the town—that she was devoid of power to move things through the air.

Kristin, her mother prompted. Miss Bowman? Are you listening?

A lecture from her mother wasn’t what she had been expecting when she returned home. To be honest, she had gotten used to them not talking to her at all. It had hurt at first, but if no one talked to her, then they weren’t demanding anything of her either. She knew her place in the household as the oldest daughter. Work the chores. Put on a good show for the neighbors. Pretend that she wasn’t the disappointment of the family.

It wasn’t like she was alone in being magicless. Up until last week, her other sisters hadn’t glowed either. Jean had cried when she passed sixteen without so much as lighting a candlestick with magic. Susan had met the day with dread and weary hope. Becky had flaunted everything she could in town, wearing a dress their mother had since conveniently lost, and rebelling against the thought that she wasn’t good enough.

It wasn’t that they would be tossed into a stampede of wild buffalo if they couldn’t glow, but it felt like it. To not have any magical ability meant that they wouldn’t claim a good marriage. They wouldn’t be desired by a man who could offer them comfort and safety. They couldn’t provide their own safety. They’d be at the throes of the spells that traveled through the air without magical protection. They’d be like the beggars in rags, picking up whatever stray curse came their way, covered in boils, missing fingers, and missing toes, living dejected and forlorn. That was their fate without magic. To be the scum of the earth, the creature who fought against their own inner madness and failure. The creature who couldn’t deflect the pulse that ravaged against their skin.

Then there was Ella. She had glowed. The look on her face when she had done so was burned into Kristin’s memory. Relief. Joy. She had danced around the kitchen, singing and laughing to herself. Mother had been the only one making excited sounds with her. The rest of them, including their father, had stood there silently.

Kristin didn’t know what Jay Bowman had been thinking, but she had been thinking that Ella was a no-good show-off. She had wanted to grab at the glow covering her sister’s body, stuff it into an envelope, and mail it away. Kristin had felt bitter and angry.

To control her urges, she had stormed from the house only to hear her younger sisters overcome their jealously easier than she had. They burst into congratulations as soon as Kristin was out of sight. Her father had called after her to not burn anything down. Kristin had stayed outside the house for a day and a half before deciding that she really should be better than this and get over herself. Ella needed that magic to survive around here.

It wasn’t like she would be a magical mage or renowned sorceress. Most people with magic didn’t have much of it. They had enough to aid them in their tasks and jobs and used what they had more for protection than working. Switching that up, as some people were prone to do, made them vulnerable to concealed curses. Ella’s glow hadn’t been particularly bright. To Kristin’s untrained eye, she guessed her sister was above average in ability and strength, but not prone to mastery or greatness.

Still, it hurt Kristin to not have found the pulse within her heart yet. She did not want to end up being the catcher of curses. That would not be the role for the rest of her life once she turned twenty-three and was asked to leave the household.

Kristin?

What? Kristin shrugged at her mother, trying to pull herself back into the present moment. She still had six months before her parents considered sending her away. They couldn’t be thinking about casting her out early, right?

What is it? Kristin asked again, trying to calm the churn of her gut from the look on her mother’s face.

Her mother was just about the only person talking to her regularly these days. If she was telling her she needed to practice being civil, then something happened that Kristin was sure to not like.

Stay inside tonight. The house has protections on it as you already know. It’s the best place for you to be. Your father is making an announcement in a few minutes now that everyone is back inside. Do your best.

With that, her mother gave her a brief nod of her head and crossed away from the kitchen toward the back of the house where Kristin could make out the sounds of light talking.

Kristin groaned. Her best. Her best self had been taken away from her six years ago when everyone decided she was a liar and that she burnt down the forest on purpose. Kristin scooped up the basket of herbs that were needed for dinner and carried them into the kitchen, only to give Becky a polite nod of her head. Becky was helping herself to a large slice of chocolate cake with an even larger smile on her face and tear strains on her cheeks.

Kristin assumed she had been told she could eat the rare dessert early as the glass lid slid back down to cover the treasure on the blue patterned plate.

I’m sorry that you were feeling sad, Kristin said to her sister, but I’m happy that you’re doing better now.

The herbs Kristin had collected went beside the three loaves of bread baked that morning. It still smelled like yeast in the kitchen, and the smell had Kristin inhaling to compare it to the earthy smell of dirt. Yeast came from outside, but when cooked, it had a tangy aroma that she loved to sniff.

Crossing to the sink, Kristin noted with satisfaction that the spell to bring water into the basin when her hands entered below the rim was still working. Water splashed at her palms taken from the stream. It wasn’t the first time that Kristin lingered in washing her hands, trying to guess how a spell like that could be cast. What was the word? What was the motion of the hands? Sometimes she thought people added hand motions to spells only to be fancy to throw off everyone else to what they were doing because there were a lot of spells that could be done without much of anything happening. The spellcaster performed the action with... well... with magic.

I did it too! Jean screamed, her feet hitting the hallway as she headed toward the kitchen. Becky!

Becky was stuffing her face with the cake, so she didn’t look up when Jean clamored inside, banging against the doorway as she went. Kristin did, and her smile wiped from her face as if she’d been slapped. Glowing. Jean was glowing. It was a sloppy glow, all yellow with ragged edges splitting off into the air, proving that she didn’t have control of the magic within.

She had said too. So, Becky had glowed today as well, which left only Susan and Kristin as the only two who had not glowed yet. Becky had only waited one year to glow, being seventeen at the moment. Well, to be fair, she’d waited eighteen months. Jean had waited four years to glow as she was twenty.

Susan was nineteen, only sixteen months apart. She raced into the kitchen after Jean, likewise excited. Kristin pulled her hands out of the sink, which turned off the water spell. Susan’s face said it all. Everyone had glowed today.

Why??

It wasn’t fair. The thought of being the absolute last stabbed panic through Kristin’s chest. Susan gave Kristin half a glance before she joined Jean in hugging Becky. Ella entered the kitchen, ecstatic for her older sisters.

It wasn’t the first time that Kristin had looked at the four of them with their straight black hair and blue eyes and noticed silently to herself that she had brown hair like her mother instead of black like her dad. She wouldn’t trade her hair away, as she liked it very much. It touched her elbows and gave her an elegant appearance. She matched her siblings with her blue eyes, but for an instant, she wished that her hair was black and that she was in that circle of excited chatter.

Those four were all going to learn magic together at the same time! They could help each other study into the night. They were now allowed to ogle the young men of the town where the guys could hear them because they were suddenly desirable. They wouldn’t be a burden but a helpmate, the perfect wife, the exuberant young mistress.

How horribly convenient for you. Kristin’s words lashed out when her father stepped into the room, followed by her mother, who shot her a look that reminded her of their earlier conversation. Kristin was to stay in the house. She wasn’t to run outside to pout. She wasn’t to cause trouble because she hadn’t glowed.

All of them glowing together when Ella finally turns sixteen, Kristin continued. You don’t have to take any of them secretly aside and impress upon them how they shouldn’t share the musings of their magical learning with the nonmagical. You can all sit down together after dinner and have a full family magical lesson. It’s almost as the villagers say. You’ve been holding back our magic until Ella was ready so you could conveniently do all the teaching in one session instead of repeating yourself for the next child.

Kristin. Her mother’s rebuke was sharp.

And you still think I can’t handle it. You still think I wanted to burn down the forest. It was an accident! How can one accident sentence me to be cursed for the rest of my life? I’m part of this family too, you know. I want to glow too!

The chatter in the kitchen was stolen away by her words. In the awkward silence that followed where her father gave her mother a certain look, her sisters helped themselves to the cake; a reward that Kristin didn’t think she was going to enjoy, even if it was offered to her for being less than normal.

We have been over this before, Theresa sighed. Magical ability is not something that can be taken or given. It is something that you are born with. Given time, it can manifest itself, and it will do so when the time is right.

Kristin eyed the cake, then looked at her father, who avoided her gaze. She shook her head. Magical ability could be taken away. It could be the result of a curse, one that had been placed upon them all until Ella was ready to learn magic. Well, if Ella had glowed and her other sisters had too, then the curse would be lifted.

Kristin looked down at her clean hands, still moist from the river water. It was uncanny that they all glowed in the same week. If only she could learn to control her jealous outbursts, she might find the stillness in her heart to pull up her own glow. She could do this. She could glow too. There was still time left for her to be more than the woodcutter’s magicless daughter.

She still burnt down the forest so that we had less wood to sell these last six years, Jean let slip from her mouth to justify why Kristin’s hand wasn’t glowing as she stared at it. It could be a curse that caught her for that.

What about the trees that didn’t burn down black? Susan whispered. I heard that some of them burned green. She tried to use dark magic and was cursed because of it.

I did not! Kristin’s eyes yanked off her hands, focusing on her mother’s. She’d tell them. All the trees that burnt were black. Didn’t you all see it? I know you saw it. I knocked over the lantern—

Those are horrible rumors, girls, Theresa chastised her children. The reason Kristin hasn’t let off a glow is because the circumstances are not right for her here. We’ve discussed it in length plenty of times over the years, and Jay has come to a good conclusion.

Theresa cleared her throat at her husband.

"Right. Catching your first glow is easiest done when you are about a task that calls to your heart. Some people call this task your life calling, and most people choose to pursue that task as a vocation because their magic is strongly suited to it. Ella glowed when she was arranging the flowers in the vase. She could be a fantastic gardener or botanist or herbalist. Becky glowed while connecting the links of a broken necklace. She could be a metal wielder or jewelry designer. Susan glowed while melting the tallow. She might become a candlemaker. Jean glowed when hemming a frayed end of Theresa’s old wedding dress, so perhaps she will become a seamstress for special occasions.

The point is that while we try to give you girls opportunities to find your best selves, we don’t have very many specialized fields inside this house. Perhaps what Kristin needs is something that will not be found here. Maybe she will be good at seeing the purity of gems or raising goats or any other number of things that she can’t do while around so much forest.

I like the forest! Kristin objected.

Not only were her palms wet, but they were now clammy. They had been thinking of casting her out early. She was going to be sent away from home, away from the protections that shielded her from danger in the very air. Her parents had given up on her completely. The realization had her breath coming out in short gasps as she staggered to keep her balance. Her sisters were all wide eyes, the joy of their glow taken away. Jean’s light was lost from around her hands and body, making the kitchen look empty without it.

Don’t be frightened. Theresa gave her the largest smile she could. It was so small that it didn’t help anything at all.

We’ve arranged for you to travel to Duke Narlan’s home in Willowton. His magical protections are better, and there will be plenty of new things for you to try. Most people who are sent there glow within a week. We’ve been saving up for you, dear, so you can find your heart’s desire.

Kristin glanced at the chocolate cake and felt a little sick. She’d heard about the place a time or two. It was true that people learned to glow quickly at Duke Narlan’s home. However, it was also true that those who didn’t glow were sent away and became the most ragged bunch of humans there ever were. Duke Narlan’s was a place for the desperate. If he claimed you had no magic. There was no magic to be found within, and the shame drove people out of their minds. No one came back from Duke Narlan’s. Those who didn’t cower away in shame were scooped up to employment in whatever field they proved competent.

When? Kristin managed to ask, looking at her sisters’ faces. They’d hardly spoken to her in six years, but she was going to miss them dearly.

Tomorrow morning, came her father’s reply.

Stay away from magical creatures. Particularly the ones that look human but aren’t, her mother added cryptically.  

Kristin crossed her arms. She had been taught what areas in the Desmond Isles to avoid, so she didn’t encounter demons. She wasn’t about to go running into them when she feared she couldn’t defend herself.

Jay Bowman slipped around Theresa to leave the kitchen. Kristin gulped and wiped away the tears as her sisters tried to be encouraging. Kristin would find something amazing. They could hope for her, but if she didn’t find anything at Duke Narlan’s, there was no coming back.

Ripple

Having spent most of her life among the cool soil of the forest, seeing a city instead of a town was most amazing. People didn’t go into a single store to purchase their wares. There wasn’t a Mr. Nip who coordinated what people could trade so they would be comfortable through the winter. No single store listed the current prices for wood or cloth or flour. There were dozens of stores with specialty trades.

Dresses were already sown, so the only thing Kristin would need to do was add a tuck here and there to make it fit instead of spending hours making it from scratch. Bread and cakes and pastries were already cooked. A full wall of clocks hung. Metals were already crafted into harnesses, axes, and chair legs. Rows and rows of colorful pens, mirrors, tapestries, and trinkets existed.

If Kristin didn’t know that she was going to be left alone as soon as they finished crossing Main Street, she would have asked to leave the wagon to stare at everything in wonder. As it was, she kept her hands folded into her lap, watching the people more than their wares.

Eyes gleamed back at her, but not because she was a stranger. The eyes were greedy, judging if she would stop for a purchase. When they continued to move onward, shop worker eyes become aloof and uninterested.

Then there were the shoppers. Some kept hands clamped over pockets to protect cash. Some argued about prices. Others laughed and teased everyone around them. They paid little attention to Kristin. The ones who did were the ones that made her shiver.

Beggars with soiled faces and cold fingers, even if it was sunny and humid, watched her passage as if trying to determine how easy it would be to steal the wagon itself. When they met her father’s eyes, they hesitated. Some slinked away into shadow. Others looked fiercely back. None made a move toward them.

Here we are, Jay said, pulling the horses to an easy stop in front of what had to be Duke Narlan’s manner. Welcome to Willowton. It looks impressive at first sight, but there are much grander places than this. Larger cities, richer settlements. However, the duke enjoys being able to access the countryside. He’s rather fond of morning rides. Due to that, he doesn’t let anyone inside his manor until mid-morning.

Kristin’s father glanced up at the sky, squinting as if to judge the time. It was late afternoon drawing near to supper time. She didn’t know why he had to look up unless it was to calm the beating of his own heart for talking to her after all this time.

Please. I didn’t burn it down on purpose. If this is to be our last meeting, depending on how things go, please offer your forgiveness.

At that, Jay jerked backward in his seat, tearing his gaze away from the air to meet Kristin’s pleas with astonishment.

Forgiveness? I don’t hold a grudge against you.

But you’ve hardly said a word—

Kristin sighed. They had drawn the attention of a servant of the manor. The place didn’t have a physical gate around the tall sandstone façade, but there was a sign both pictorial and in script declaring that a magical fence existed to keep out intruders. Unlike the flat and long buildings of her hometown, the manor was built several stories up, with narrow triangular windows and ledges adorned with flowered planter boxes.

They were at the main house and entrance, but Kristin could make out gray cobblestone slabs behind the house leading toward more buildings and rooms so that the manor itself looked like a town inside a city.

Kristin, we did what we had to do to hold the balance of magic in check. Had I said anything to you before, it would have only encouraged the inevitable. Your fate is not at home in the woods. It’s out here. We hung onto you as long as we could until we had no choice left but to let you go. The silence wasn’t a punishment. It was our refusal to let you leave because we’d miss you so much.

Funny way of showing it, Kristin muttered, but her feelings softened toward her father all the same. It could very well be that he detected no magic about her at all, and holding back her siblings’ powers was indeed his way of trying to be fair to her for as long as he could.

You still could have talked to me.

Had I, I would have been too tempted to tell you about the man who—

May I help you? The servant killed the conversation.

Kristin frowned at the elderly gentleman, because she knew she would never get those words now. Tell her about whom? Maybe her mother’s parting words were more telling than Kristin had believed. Stay away from those who look human but aren’t. How was she supposed to tell the difference without magic?

Was she doomed to be hollow, or was it just the opposite? She was destined to be fabulous, so the corralling of inner power was the opposite of what she had just thought. It wasn’t to prevent her jealousy over her sisters, but rather to keep her sisters from being jealous of her. Away from them, and they would have no idea what she discovered. It could be a good thing that she was here unless, of course, what she discovered was hollow.

I have the letter right here! Her father’s voice, that had just been warm and full of compassion, swayed with terror.

It will be alright, sir, the servant soothed, catching his expression. We take good care of the children entrusted into our care. Despite the rumors, we don’t breed beggars. If nothing can be done for her, she will be escorted back home safe and sound.

Oh. She could go back home! She would like that very much, even if she suspected her parents wouldn’t. Kristin glanced at her father as he finished pulling a thick brown envelope from his pocket. He passed over the letter with the reference saying that Kristin was to be admitted, but he didn’t let it go when the servant reached for it and gave it a tug. The man grunted, turning the