The Frog Collector
Chapter Seven

While Lilian told the story, the princess was already suspicious of this information, but still, she was in shock.

They arrived at the door of the wooden house that was not as big as Mirian’s, but was very nice and cozy. Lilian invited Agatha to come in and sit on the soft sofa in the living room. The woman brought a small table close by like Mirian’s, ordered some tea, and it was made on the spot. The woman stood looking at the princess who, although she could see the sofa, could not sit on it, because her body went through it without touching it. So Lilian sat down on the floor and Agatha followed her.

“I am sorry for this… almost everything here was made by magic. I guess we’ll have to sit on the floor anyway”, said Lilian and asked: “I imagine you can’t eat anything made by magic either can you?”.

Agatha, still ecstatic, shook her head negatively. Then the woman went to the kitchen and brought a basket of fruit for the girl and sat down again.

“These are not made by magic. You can eat as much as you want”, Lilian said to the princess.

The princess looked at the basket. It was filled with small, beautiful, circular, wine-colored fruits. She took them and, very happy because she could hold them in her hands, ate.

“They are delicious”, said the princess.

“I think they are even more so after the long trip you have taken here. Lucky for you there is always some of this fruit on the tree at the back of the house and it bears all year round. I never get sick of them, I’m always picking”, said the woman with a genuine smile this time.

After a while, Lilian noticed that the princess wanted to know the rest of the story and continued to tell it:

“Well… back to the story, we were living there. From time to time my daughter and I would go out, but then we always come back. Mirian was always mad at me for that. We had many arguments in which she said terrible things to me, but since I wished she would go back on her decision to use magic, I still didn’t leave her side. After a while she regretted having said so many bad things to me and said she would try to change. I believed that she was finally changing her heart and I was very happy about this. Until it happened…”

Lilian took a good sip of tea before continuing:

“Sometimes news would reach the king that people were using the magic flower without passing a test that the king forced everyone to do, and he would go out hunting for them. For this he would take people who were former magic users to help him in case he needed to use a counter-attack magic. It was the only exception to the ban on flowers and would only be used until the flowers were exterminated. One day he called me to go and, as we were already friends, I accepted. The place was dangerous and I had to leave my daughter with Mirian. At first I didn’t want to leave her, but there was no one to take her, and since my mother seemed to be becoming a good person, I left her”.

Lilian paused and her eyes watered.

“When king brought me back to the invisible prision, my mother was anxiously waiting for me. She took me to the bedroom where she showed me my daughter who was dead in bed. Mirian said she didn’t know what had happened, that she had tried everything, even magic, but she couldn’t save her. I don’t know if it was a trick of my mind, but for a moment I thought I saw a slight smile on Mirian’s face. I couldn’t believe what had happened. My daughter had looked a little pale before this event and was not smiling so much, but she looked fine. Then we had a big fight. I was angry with everyone and everything and ended up saying that Mirian should have taken care of her. She said that I was accusing her of negligence without proof and that I was supposed to leave since I was going through the invisible prison and never come back. She also said that she never really cared about the little girl because she would probably also grow up hating magical flowers and magic because of my influence. According to her, I associated with people who were against magic to mistreat her. In the end she was unrepentant and I saw that there was no way she could change. My world ended after my daughter died. She was five years old. That was the trigger for me to leave prison”.

As Lilian spoke the princess wondered “But who is the girl who is with Mirian in the invisible prison?“. Lilian wiped her eyes and continued:

“I’m sorry. I don’t know how to handle it very well. Well… after that, nothing else made sense to me out there. I wanted to disappear, I didn’t want to know anything anymore, or talk to anyone. So I asked the king to get me out of prison permanently. I got mad at him, stopped talking to him and never met him again. The last time we spoke was when he made this place and I asked him to put me here. I brought my daughter’s body and my magic flower roots too. I also took, without Mirian noticing, the book of spells that belonged to Isra and she loved so much. I never even opened it this book, it is just a bad memory and I did it as my only way to punish her. Here I buried my daughter and planted the flowers that are there. I have been here since that time. I have everything I need here. Water and food to spare and I use these flowers only if it is extremely necessary. That’s why this is my home”, concluded the woman with a shy smile.

”I’m sorry about that”, said the princess sympathetically.

“It’s all right”, said Lilian.

Agatha waited a while for the sadness of those memories to pass and then began to question:

“But who is…”

“Well… I have already told you too much about myself…”, interjected the woman, wiping her tears and smiling. “Tell me about yourself? How you had contact with these flowers, with Mirian…”

The princess cleared her throat and told the woman about the disappearance of her beloved, about the story the king told, and also about how Mirian got her there.

The girl continued:

“I realized that Mirian is not a good person and that she didn’t intend to do good things when she had the plants, so as I was walking along I was planning what I would do to make her tell me where prince James is before I gave her the flowers. I am just desperate to know where he is and I don’t know what to do”.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll help you”, said the woman.

The princess cheered up. Then Lilian took out a black flower, removed the yellow part and ate it. Her eyes turned white. Then she touched the princess’s hands and said:

“Now, think about him”

The princess did. Lilian whispered words in an unknown language and after a while, her eyes returned to normal, the princess was anxious to know what was going on until the woman said:

“Your prince is transformed into a frog and it looks like he is in a garden, but I can’t tell where, I think I need more plants”.

Agatha was silent with wide eyes.

“Why are you so surprised?”, asked Lilian.

“It’s… that… when I was with Mirian I saw a frog trying to get into the invisible prison, but it couldn’t. And… I put it inside at her request and there near the house is a garden. I wonder…?”, the princess remembered.

“Oh, that cruel witch”, Lilian exclaimed in surprise.

The princess, astonished, lamented:

“It is not possible that I had it in my hands and still gave it to her”.

“We will replace a way to free him”, said Lilian, trying to calm the princess.

Still incredulous the princess said:

“I don’t understand… How did the witch bewitch him if she was inside the prison?”

“Transformation spells only take effect when people hear it. Like the sound goes through the wall and when your prince heard the spell, even though he was outside, he was transformed”, answered the woman. “And it’s not only the transformation spells… Remember when you were running from me as soon as you saw me. Did you notice the ground shaking? I was using magic. I was going to stop you from running anyway, but I stopped when I saw that you stopped running and then came back. In other words, the magic goes through the dome”.

The princess understood and Lilian continued:

“However, I am surprised that she still had a flower to transform the prince after being imprisoned there for so many years. Although transforming people requires few plants she must not have that many because if so, I think she would have already left the prison. I don’t know how she intends to do that”.

“She asked me to bring at least thirty flowers for her. I decided to return after running from here because I hadn’t taken the correct number”, confessed Agatha.

“It’s all right. Now you know the truth. So this is the number of flowers she needs. So she knows how to get out of there after all…”, said Lilian thoughtfully. “But don’t be sad, I will help you rescue your prince”.

Agatha calmed down.

“But answer me… why did Mirian want the frog?”, asked Lilian, curious.

“She asked me to give it to a girl who stays there with her. She said that the girl liked frogs and I gave it to her without hesitation”, replied the princess.

Suddenly everything was silent. Lilian looked at her in astonishment.

“What do you mean ‘girl who stays there with her’?”, she asked.

“That’s what I was going to ask you after this story you told me. There were two people there in the prison. Mirian and Emily. If you left Mirian alone when you left the prison… who is this with the witch?”.

Lilian dropped the cup she was holding. Tears and more tears streamed down her face. Without saying anything, she staggered out of the house. Agatha followed her asking questions, but Lilian would no longer listen. The woman went to a place in the back of the house where there was a space where the black flowers did not grow, and began to dig up the earth there with her hands. The princess just followed the scene.

After a while of digging Lilian exclaimed:

“There is nothing here, not a single bone!”

She sat down on the pile of dirt formed by his digging and wept bitterly. Agatha didn’t know what to do.

“How is it possible?”, they both asked themselves.

Suddenly Lilian got up and ran back into the house. The princess followed. The woman kept looking through all the rooms for something as she wiped her dirty hands on her clothes until she found a dusty old book. She spent considerable time checking what was written in it. The book contained phrases in an unknown language that were the spells of magic and the description of what the spell did. Lilian flipped through the pages looking directly at the descriptions and said them aloud:

“Blinding light magic… Camouflage magic… Fainting gas magic…

She went to the last page of the book.

“Ohiah Wobh Gyon… This magic has no description”.

Then he looked over and saw magic written in a different font than the others.

“Here it is!”, exclaimed Lilian. “Cloning magic… It was here the whole time… She’s alive! She’s really alive!”, said while smiling and crying at the same time.

“What shall we do?”, asked the princess.

“We need a plan to get Emily and the prince out of there. Then I’ll turn him back to you”, said the woman thoughtfully and still in shock.

“Thank you”, said Agatha and remembered: “I almost forgot. Here are the flowers I picked when I arrived”.

The woman looked at the princess’ full hands.

“I already know what to do”, Lilian declared enthusiastically.