Phillip Morety – character study “The Secret Keeper” – “The tale of the witches” series

Phillip is the main voice through the most of the first book in „The tale of witches“ series. „The Secret Keeper” is mostly written from his point of view.

Phillip was a fifth child born in a very Christian family. He has four older brothers and three younger siblings, a younger brother and two younger sisters. His mom is a housewife and his father works for a lumber company. He has two brother who are at collage and two twin brothers who go to the same high school as him. At the beginning of the book Phillip is 16 years old and goes to the same class as Alexis. He has light brown hair and green eyes. He is very tall for his age and plays soccer along with his two brothers and their best friend Marcus, who is also Alexis’s cousin. He is lean and fit. Cute, as girls call him. His lips are full and he has almond shaped eyes. His hair is cut in a modern haircut. When he smiles he has little wrinkles around his eyes. Alexis once said he has something Victorian in his look. That must have been as he likes to wear turtle neck shirts.

Phillip and Alexis meet in kindergarten and have been best friends until they were 14. Phillip found out that Alexis belonged to a long line of witches and her family did magic. As he was raised in a religious family he thought they did bad things and were not normal. Having high sense of his religious upbringing he cut all connections to Alexis and her family. He never told what had happened and why he stopped hanging with the red haired girl. His brothers have been giving grief about it since it happened.

“I still can’t believe that you stop being friends with them.” – said Adam as we were taking food to our usual table at the school cafeteria

“Adam, stop talking.” – I said. My brothers were annoying me with that subject ever since Alexis and me had our big fight and stopped talking to each other.

Phillip and Adam “The Secret Keeper” By Marta Z. Skeledzija

As Phillip grow older some of his views about life changed, but his pride and not understanding the other side prevented him to apologize to Alexis.

Phillip is kind and smart, he questions things that happen, but can be pig headed at times. As his father sends him to get the fire wood for the stove, Phillip takes a walk to clear his head and ends up at the witches’ house, like an invisible force was pulling him there. There he is forced to talk to Alexis who appears in front of him.

I decided not to get the wood right away. My dad won’t mind if I take the walk first and then come back as long as I come back with the wood for the fireplace. In these two years I found myself walking towards the same bloody house. Alexis and Cora’s house. It was like an invisible gravity was pulling me to the house. The witch’s house. I still can’t believe they did magic, and not just for fun, magic and witchcraft was they life style. That was the reason of our big fight. I didn’t approve of what they were doing. How little did I know that the reason of the fight with my best friend would save me and my brother’s life in the future?

“The Secret Keeper” by Marta Z. Skeledzija

Later he is again forced to talk to his long lost best friend when his brothers decided to throw a party while their parents and younger siblings are at their grandparents. With baby steps Phillip starts to make Alexis explain what she does and introduces him to her world.

I stayed looking at the evil eye moon. This was the start. Baby steps Phillip, you have to take baby steps with that girl. Winter sun spell, evil eye moon, black magic and protection, I just wonder what is next. I lowered my eyes to the woods behind my house and there between the trees I saw a red glow, like two rubies, like two bloody eyes looking back at me and then in a blink of an eye it was gone. I just took my drink, run in to the house and locked the porch door. I sure hoped that spell of hers works.

“The Secret Keeper” by Marta Z. Skeledzija

A world hidden inside a human world. And to Phillip surprise he starts to feel more connected to Alexis’s magic world then his own one. Stereotypes of what was thought to him come crashing down and Phillip is unable to stop it, not that he wants to stop it.

Different was wrong and bad. The only right way was God and his way.

Phillip “The Secret Keeper” by Marta Z. Skeledzija

Whit a lot of strange things happening around him, Phillip is pulled in to the world he knows little about and has to act without knowing how or what to do.

Then I saw something very strange. Vivian’s eyes were looking straight at me. And as the sunset light shone on them, they turned ruby red. The same ruby blood red I saw in the forest that day of the party, the same color red I saw in the park that day of the fire, the same red I saw that day that Alexis putted on a fire show for us, that day I saw that ruby red twice.

Phillip “The Secret Keeper” by Marta Z. Skeledzija

Something inside of him starts to change, the hidden, dormant cells in side of his own blood and being start to wake up changing him from the inside. Phillip will gain a power that has been sleeping since the last big war, make a connection to Earth and become the first Secret Keeper in five hundred years.

Alexis looked at my eyes carefully and then few minutes after said: “Where does it burn?”

“My back. How did you know?” – I said

“Everything is written in our eyes. Lift your shirt up and show me your back.” – she said

Alexis and Phillip “The Secret Keeper” by Marta Z. Skeledzija

Along whit everybody else involved with Alexis and her sister Cora, Phillip has to grow up in order to save himself, his friends and his family. Along with learning about Alexis world, Phillip discovers secret thing about his own family history that have been changed and altered by false facts and fake stories hiding the real truth from generations and generations. That Phillip and his brothers have more in common to Alexis and her family then they do to the humans that surround them.

My grandfather was looking after us and kept an eye on Phillip and the girls. After a few minutes of watching them play, he told my twin brother and me: ‘Your blood is strong. They will have to bend the rules for you all. You belong in their world more than in the world of your parents.’ I thought it was babbling of the old man and never understood what he meant by that, but I do now.

“The Secret Keeper” by Marta Z. Skeledzija

Also unexpected gain of magic in teens who were not born into a Magic world and a rise of one of the warrior houses that has been lost, tells the old magical family’s that something big and scary is going to happen soon.

“Prepare yourselves my children because this is just the beginning.” – said the soft voice of the summer breeze and we all heard it loud and clear – “It is just starting.”

“The Secret Keeper” by Marta Z. Skeledzija

You can buy the book and learn more about Phillip and the gang here:

The Secret Keeper Paperback cover

The Secret Keeper Hardcover

Or you can get an ebook copy:

Payhip site

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