Destiny Governed their Lives is a short story starring Catriona Wheatcroft, the sorceress in Shadows in the Stone fantasy novel. When the novel begins, she’s twenty-eight years old, but in the short story, she’s only seventeen.
Catriona is young, impulsive and believes she knows everything. Mmm, sounds a little like me when I was seventeen. I wasn’t, however, an apprentice studying with a sorceress who practised powerful spells. I also didn’t live in Maskil with the constant threat of an evil wizard creating terror on the streets. If I had, I might have done the unthinkable, too.
Destiny Governed their Lives by Diane Lynn McGyver
Catriona slammed the book shut. What did Rod know about magic? He’d been an imbecile all his life, an irritating sty in her eye. Little brothers irked her, and unfortunately, she had two of them.
She’d show Rod. Just because he called magic ridiculous and said she had a better chance of marrying the duke of Petra than casting a spell, it didn’t mean she wouldn’t be a master sorceress someday. If anything, his words fuelled her desires.
Grabbing her shawl, Catriona left her bedroom and raced downstairs where she found her mother preparing the evening ration.
“You’re not going out at this hour, are you, dear?” Her mother, adorned in a simple smock, tucked a loose hair behind her ear as she studied her only daughter. “Your father will be home shortly. Evening arrives earlier these days, and you shouldn’t be out after dark.”
Catriona rolled her eyes. Her mother always made excuses for her not to leave the dwelling. If she believed her elder, wickedness perched on the doorstep, waiting to snatch every innocent citizen of Maskil. Her mother thought of her as a child still, but at seventeen, she could take care of herself.
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Diane McGyver 