Fortunes

Gazing at the small fire in the pot, he simply didn't understand why it was always glowing, it looked a bit disturbing, and looking at it any longer, he felt that he would be able to spill out his darkest secrets as the fire seemed to be looking into his very soul.

He quickly turned his head and stood up, he made sure that everything was in place while scanning every corner of the shrine with his brown eyes. Everything seemed to be in order along with all the animal parts and other mysterious things but somehow, his gut feeling didn't let him be. It felt like something was a miss but that couldn't be seen with his normal eyes. Finding nothing, he decided to cast a spell as if he left something, it would have bad consequences for him.

He recited some words in a kind of tongue and after he was done, his eyes glowed a bright red. The spell can only last for a short period and depending on his strength, it would last about forty-five seconds. He looked around in the shrine to find a green slime hiding in one of the corners. They were practically impossible to see with normal eyes and only experienced witches and wizards could spot them without the "brightened eyes" spell.

They could be mischievous but overall weren't that harmless. He picked it up and put it in a jar that held a whole bunch of slimes for his guardian's purposes. To someone else, the jar just seemed empty. He looked around the shrine one more time and saw a faint glow of orange behind one of the shelves. The shrine was small on the outside but quite big on the inside although all the spare eyeballs, body parts, and animal heads kept in the jars was kind of revolting to most but the place was organized to his guardian's liking and finding something a miss or not in its proper place normally meant that they were having a visitor.

Before deciding on what to do with glow, the spell ran out and to his surprise, the glow went with it. He thought that it was already a materialized object but something that held infused magic within it and able to make itself disappear would be so valuable and deadly at the same time. Such objects meant that whoever was coming for it was making some kind of sacrifice.

"Abaeze" A loud voice called.

He was brought out of his thoughts by the voice and immediately rushed out of the shrine. Once he was outside, he said a few words in tongues, and a glimmering light came out of his hands that enveloped the century-old shrine. He then ran to his guardian as his brown skin shimmered in the sunlight.

He met with a curvy woman who could bring any man down on their knees although, to Abaeze, only disgust ruled his heart for this woman, his guardian. She had only adopted him because she needed eternal youth and a healthy boy with a blemished heart and the reason for his adoption had been made clear to him from the very start so now, he worked as a witch doctor's apprentice for the streets of Nigeria. If only they knew what they were getting themselves into in the first place. His guardian's fate was already decided as making deals with the actual devil wouldn't lead anywhere else.

"I hope you guarded the shrine," Adamma said with her soft voice as she saw her house help in close distance to their mansion. He was nothing but useless anyway, he had served his purpose and his only use now was to be an errand boy, his future had already been decided as he was introduced to witchcraft and even though he learned well, he didn't want to sell his soul and what use was that, at least in her line of thought plus one had to accept the offer meaning that he had to travel that path by his or her will. The act could free him from the restriction of morals as that was already the worst thing you could do.

Abaeze saw the curvy woman up head residing in a glorious mansion got through the worst of means.

"Yes Mam," He said with a slight bow to show respect.

"We are going to have visitors today so I expect your at most respect as this might just make us wealthy" Adamma said with a hint of greed in her voice.

Abaeze simply bowed his head and tried to keep a straight face to hide his inner disgust for the greedy woman but at the same time, his pride as he had unraveled the mystery of the faint glow in the shrine but that only meant that the man was willing to sell his soul.

His expression changed slightly at the revelation but good enough, Adamma had already gone inside. He just couldn't imagine why one would willingly do that as his guardian had once tried to make him do the same act but even at the age of ten, he knew better than do something of such monstrosity.

He kept quiet and went into the mansion to get something to eat. He looked around the first of three floors with stairs winding to the second floor. The floors were a shining marble while the walls were an elegant white. He just couldn't imagine why one would want more than this before releasing that Adamma's greed had no bounds. Before he could get something to eat, a knock came from the front door. Next, he saw Adamma hurriedly run to the door with a look of enthusiasm and excitement.

"Aah," he exclaimed as he realized that the person at the door was their long-awaited customer.

Adamma opened the door only to find a handsome well-dressed man looking ever so frustrated. Well, that was before the man looked at the woman in front of him and made the grave mistake of looking into her eyes because as soon as he did, he was automatically put in a trance. It was one of her spells to prevent anyone from going back on their plan to initially come to her for their purposes. It only worked on those with just enough greed in their souls and that was practically anyone who came to her for her services.

The man at the door was around six feet with brown skin and brown eyes, just like any other man in that area of Nigeria. He was already fairly well off but wanted more, enough to sell his soul to her. "What a helpless fool," she thought with a pouting expression "but it works in my favor, so I don't have a problem," she said with a tinge of greed in her eyes.

Abaeze watched the scene unfold, from the man following Adamma to them entering the shrine.

"What a pity," he thought as he saw the greed in both of their eyes.

"Potion" he heard Adamma shout. He started pacing towards the stairs that lead to the second floor. He ran up the tiled stairs only to find another set which he quickly paced up to find a marble floor with a corridor that had lots of doors on the sides of which he did not want to know what was on the inside. He ran to one of the rooms with big doors and entered to find a luxurious bedroom with a king-sized bed in the middle. He ran to one of the cabinets where he found a purple bottle with a smoking liquid inside. He secured it in his hands and ran down the staircase with a dangerous speed.

Reaching the ground floor, he dashed to the back door and raced to the shrine entrance where he found a lustful Adamma lying on top of a dazed man. He cringed at the sight and handed her the bottle hurriedly so that he could leave but before he could, he noticed the faint orange glow in one of the corners which surprised him as he didn't think that he could see it without the brightened eyes spell. A purple smoke brought him out of his thoughts as he looked to see Adamma pouring the potion around the man. The potion was meant to derive one's soul and would forge wealth for every particle of soul one heard.

One's soul size depended on the amount of divinity one had in his soul and if one got a small amount of wealth that would mean that one heard a small soul. She made a circle around the man using the liquid and yellow fragments could be seen coming out of his head. The yellow fragments floated until they reached the fire in the pot in the center after which they descended and burned and out of the fire came notes of money that kept stacking up until they amounted to 569,000 Naira roughly about $1,380.

The two conscious people in the shrine frowned slightly at the amount, surely his soul must be bigger than that. Adamma smiled slightly as her eyes shone with lust.

"A dirty one, I like," she said licking her lips. If it wasn't for his morals, Abaeze would have thrown up all over this woman but he swallowed as he did not want to bother the witch knowing the consequences.

He turned around and looked at the glow once again and subconsciously and curiously started walking over to it. It grew brighter and brighter until even Adamma was taken out of her lustful thoughts to look at it. Her face froze as she saw the three stones that were glowing a bright orange. The stones were an inheritance from her parents that was a curse from one of the witches in that area. Through many gruesome acts did she manage to get the stones out of her stomach and store them away safely. But they were powerful and could only be spelled for a month before they would need to be spelled again and today was the beginning of the new month. They could not cause harm to anyone without souls but to those with souls, they could be very dangerous and could cause death.

Before she could do anything, Abaeze was an inch from the stone, she quickly cast a time freeze spell in some tongues which sent out some red waves that hit the stones right when Abaeze's finger came in contact with the stones. The stones glowed red before fusing with his body at which he immediately dropped dead on the ground.

Adamma rushed in the boy's direction, she passed the body and continued to the corner, the stones were nowhere to be found and thus she broke out in tears.

"They were going to be a fortune to that man, what will I give him now" she cried out not sparing the dead and unconscious bodies behind her a glance.