.: Entry Seventy-One :.

My name is Elliot Parker, except I am not.

My parents chose that I should perform the marriage ritual, they want me to become a monster. I know the myth, the horror story, the cautionary tale, the reason why syphons are normally destroyed or kept from sight or knowledge. I don’t want to be a monster.

“You don’t want the power?” he asks so softly I forget why I remained quiet before. I shake my head no. He is trying to charm me to be quiet. “They scared you so badly that you never wanted marriage, to perform the ritual, to be turned.” I look away. “You know what a night child is?” I keep looking away. A faint echo of a voice says one thing, they are mistakes. “You know what a night walker is?” I keep looking away. They are the rulers of weaker kingdoms; the ones my parents show no concern of. I hear a small voice in my ear say, like a distant memory. “You know what a day walker is?” I search for the answer, I should know it, it’s like the word has been wiped from my memory. I look at him and shake my head, my confusion is clear. “We come from families that are day walkers. We are the more powerful kingdoms.” He says, and I nod, like it is an echo in my ear, a vaguely recognisable fact. “You know what a witch walker is?” My eyes widen, a feeling of fear bubbles up. The monster that they want to turn me into. “That’s what we will be, together, the first witch walkers in thousands of years, the most powerful beings on this earth.”

Does he not grasp the horror of his words? The danger he is willing to unleash upon the world. We come from day walkers, yes, that means that is what we would be, if we were normal. But we are not. I put my hand on his and look into his eyes. He is right I am a syphon. I begin to slowly pull away at his magic. The charm slowly fades as his face hardens, he can feel me pulling at his magic. He begins to fight it, to fight me pulling the magic from him. It won’t work, I have kept myself hungry for too long, my connection was pinched away from the magic for a while, long enough to create enough of a vacuum to weaken his. This is what I had been waiting for. The chance for his guard to be down enough to pull some truth from him, then some damn magic.

I could feel the magic flowing back, I no longer feel so weak. I can feel the warm buzzing filling me from head to toe. I feel my own essence, my magical signature flowing from him. So he is a syphon too. I didn’t believe the likelihood of his being a syphon too, we are rare, or at least we are supposed to be. But there we go. And here I am. I pulled my own signature entrancing magic back, it feels a familiar warmth. I keep pulling magic even as he fights it. I didn’t realise this had become a fight for the magic. Through gritted teeth I hear myself, I am angry, I can’t be blamed for being angry. “You syphoned my magic?”

“I was trying to get through to you, you put yourself in that damn bubble, until you couldn’t. Then you were just stubbornly ignoring me.” I can see the pain of the magic being pulled from him. I begin to taste his own magical signature; I can see how weak he is becoming. I stop. I let go and I watch him fall back, weak.

I stride to the door, no longer resisting the magic, no longer pinching myself away from it, I pull the spell from the door. He had magically locked me in this room, it took a lot of magic to do, and now, I am syphoning that into myself. The buzz and the warmth of the magic flowing through my veins. I touch the door handle and I hear him calling for me, I turn to look at him on the floor picking himself up. Look back at the door handle and before I have turned it he has pulled me back. “Don’t go out there, you can’t go out there.”

“Why?”

“I syphoned the magic from the boat to be able to stop you leaving, you can’t leave until I say, we are floating because I allow it.”

“You are alive because I allow it.” I hiss through gritted teeth as he pulls me further from the door handle turning the lock and resealing the room. I glare at him. He doesn’t syphon from me completely; I feel his magic leave me but no more. I hadn’t cared that he hadn’t thrown me from the door, that he had pinned me to the wall next to it. He had chosen the least painful retaking of power. A small part of me thanked him for that. But the rest of me was full of fire and fury. I could see the same temptation in his eyes. That weakness I recognised. I slowly soften the glare and bite my lip, just like I do when I am thinking, the habit I know he watches. I drop my gaze and then ever so softly let him watch as I trail my eyes up his arms and shoulders, pausing at his neck, his chin, his lips and then his eyes. I see how his observing of me has softened, it’s less focused. I feel his arms ease from being tense around me. Stopping me from running, he is granting me movement. Rather than let him step away, my hand has snaked around the back of his neck pulling him a little closer. I look up into his eyes again. This time when I pull him a fraction closer I meet him in that tiny distance and let our lips brush so softly, before he pulls me tightly to him and kisses me fiercely. Does he really think he is the one with the power in this moment?

.: Entry Seventy :.

My name is Elliot Parker… Normally… Here… Not so much.

Here my identity that I thought was a well-kept secret is not. My name, my identity, who I really am, well I am a princess. I have never been that fond of the title. I have never been fond of the fear some people have of power, or the perks it brings. But the thing is, it turns out, I am pretty powerful, pretty entrancing. Part of me wished I could be the stowaway girl and runaway forever, it was a beautiful fantasy, but I will never be free. I am Princess Ellainor Parkrovia and I am being taken home.

My running away was covered up in a lie, that the man I thought was helping me run away told them. He let me believe he was simply “the Captain”, turns out he was the prince my parents wanted me to marry, that they had chosen for me, Prince Adrian Ferislekraig. Even thinking his name bothers me. I continue to sit in the desk chair and stare out of the window. The moon is beginning to rise on the sea, it’s pretty. The prince has fallen asleep again, it happens every so often when staring at me, waiting for me to talk or move again gets to exhausting. The words on the reverse of his sketch are bothering me. What does “day walker” mean? Who is he really? Why the hell have my parents agreed to this marriage.

“You pull magic from your environment?” He is awake and talking to me again. I return my eyes to the window. As engaging as the conversation might be I don’t know if it is one I want to have. “You pull magic from everything, don’t you? From those around you, from the simple to the strong, you pull at the magic from the very essence of life.” Why is he asking? A secret is a secret and that is what I want to keep it. “Your parents, their magic comes from the earth, from the elements. But your magic is more complex, but it is easier to access than if it was just from elements, isn’t it?” His line of questions feels dangerous, like he knows the answer, like he knows what I am already, like he wants me to confirm his suspicions. I stare defiantly out of the window. “Do you know why your parents chose me to be your husband?” No. It was probably a strategic alliance choice. I keep my answer silent. “Do you even know what you are?” Not a day walker, whatever that is. I still my tongue and chew it a little, I realise I moved, it’s a tell and I stop chewing my tongue and set my jaw again. I can see his reflection in the window and the intensity of his eyes pull at me. He wants me to answer. “You know, you are lucky, your parents know what you are and haven’t tried to destroy you once. Your parents protected you, but my parents had to be charmed.” That’s wrong, you shouldn’t be able to charm them, they are meant to be more powerful than you, they should see through it. This isn’t right, their position of power should be greater than yours, their access to the elements should be greater than yours.

He’s got to me, he knows it, I can see him watching my eyes dart across the window as I try to work out what he is saying. I see the smile creep across his face. He turns the chair around and his face is close to mine, he is leaning over me, resting his hands on the arms either side of me. “You are a syphon.” I try to look confused by what he says. I know that word. I remember hearing my parents whispered conversation. “You know, if you wanted you could have more power than your parents, you could over power them and take over at any moment, they have lived with you, a ticking time bomb. But they made you weaker, docile with love for them.”

“It’s not weakness, it is strength to choose who you want to be.” I didn’t want to speak, but I did. He knows he has my attention.

“Did you think you were the only syphon in this world?” I glare at him. “We are rumours, we are weakened, hidden away. But they couldn’t hide me, just keep my secret. Just like they did you.” I try not to flinch as he inched closer. “What do you think will happen to us after the marriage ritual?” I shrug. “Our magic is meant to change, our connection to the world is meant to change. Our parents changed, they were pulled further from the elements, traditional magic is harder for them, but not impossible, after all, that is how we exist. Those that are born without power or status, they have no magic for a reason, the ritual is different for them. The ritual is tamer. We can give the magicless some power but it is different, it is dark and twisted. So we don’t, we remain the top of the chain. We are the jewels of the crown for now. Until our own marriage ritual and then our magic will change. Are you ready to change?” He is trying to scare me. I feel my nails digging into the seat of the chair. He is trying to get a reaction. Any reaction. I try to keep my face like stone, but wearing a mask is too much a drain and he can see right through me. His features soften slowly. His arms stop tensing either side of me, he draws back from leaning over me. He steadies himself still with the arms of the chair but now he is crouching in front of the chair. “You don’t want to change?” He asked so softly.

I know what happens in the ritual, what will probably happen to my magic, to my connection with the world. I know what I am likely to become. A monster.

.: Entry Sixty-Nine :.

My name is Elliot Parker. For a while now I have felt lost and confused and I have been searching for clarity. Of course, you know this.

I have been wanting to run away from my life. I have wanted to change my life. I have wanted to change my past. I have been trying so hard to undo life that I have forgotten to live in the now. I have forgotten who I am. I have forgotten that I am choosing my experience. I have gotten sloppy in my thinking. I have allowed myself to be resistant to what I want, I have allowed myself to look at others and compare myself to them and where my life is. It is so easy to feel like life is stagnant, like it is a cycle of being trapped and unable to do or be who you believe you are. I know that is simply resistance. I know that I don’t have to feel that way.

They are no more successful than I am, they are just more in tune with who they are and the future that is on their path, they care about how they feel and they are doing what they want and it shows.

Why am I measuring myself by something other than feeling good? Because that is what we are taught, to compare ourselves and our journeys to everything around us. What a screwy concept.

So I had this great epiphany. Of course I did, in the middle of feeling at ease the answer I had been asking for that I hadn’t realise I had been asking for as I compared myself to others and felt lost and unsure.

I get to define my success. That’s the big ball of thought. I am able to define my success and have it be unique to me. It is un-comparable. It is mine, all mine and not one other person is able to be comparable with who I am, what I want and what I achieve. I can redefine what I see as success. It doesn’t have to be aiming for a goal that feels so distant, so far out of reach. Success doesn’t have to feel like a complete struggle, it doesn’t need to feel impossible. I can make it as easy as I want.

I can make my own success easy to achieve or I can make it hard. For example, I could define success as making millions of pounds in a week; if that is the only goal to measure my success for than it will be easy to feel that failure, to feel un-successful. If I allow that feeling of lack to grow daily; to look at others and see them doing that thing that I want to do or be or see or have and allow myself to feel that jealousy of the success, to feel my own not-enough-ness, to feel that un-successfulness it will attract more of those feelings. That feeling will be confirmed and manifested time and time and time again.

However, if I say to myself, if I do this small thing towards my goal today, or if I can learn this one thing, if I can create this small thing that will create the bigger picture; if I make those things the things that I measure my success by? Well then I will feel that successful feeling I am desiring, that joy I am desiring. That feeling will attract more of its like.

The more of those small successes I breed from small moments, the bigger they will build to be. The more successful I will feel, the more joy that I will feel. The less I will even consider comparing myself to others, it is not my job. It is no one’s job; I do not need to compare at all.

Soon I will feel that wild successfulness and the world that I live in will relay that back to me as others will be able to see and acknowledge the aura of success that I possess. I will be basking in my own enough-ness and the world I live in will reflect it and I will be living more in the moment searching for that good feeling thought that is racing to me at all times. I will be choosing to feel good so frequently that the natural wellbeing within me will be reflected throughout the world.

A small success each and every day, ok almost every day, let’s be gentle on myself, will add up to something bigger. As the successes and the feeling of success adds up each day, each week, each month, each year and so on, the success will take care of itself.

Sure I have ended up on a bit of a rant/rampage. But I can feel that I am successful, that success, luck, lucky breaks, wonderful thoughts and feelings and experiences flow easily to me.

That’s the thing, success, can be as simple as the goal to feel good as often as I can, as often as I allow it and that in itself is successful. Success is feeling good, feeling good is success. I can define anything and what it means to me. It is whatever that feeling of ease flows from and that is the path that is right for me. Whatever path I choose, whatever I decide will always be right, there is no wrong because it is what I choose to be the path for me.

It feels great to just feel so invigorated to be able to choose, to be able to decide who or what I am, it feels good to choose to stop sleepwalking through life and stop comparing myself to others. I can train myself out of that habit and into the habit that serves me, choosing to feel my successfulness in the now rather than that final goal. I can start putting these new beliefs and feelings into my everyday life. Small goals, small successes. That attracts unto itself, and grows and multiplies.

My name is Elliot Parker, and I am planning to change my life, again.