“Rosemary, Lavender and Daisy.”
I wracked my brain, but the names meant nothing to me. Whoever the victims were, they hadn’t been present at my curse induction. That didn’t mean they weren’t real women though. Real women who could very well be as gutted as Pansy’s mattress. The knot in my stomach tightened.
“How do we save them?” My voice came out small and hoarse, but the knowledge that three witches were suffering steadied me, strangely. It made things clearer. Helping them was the only thing to be done, but how?
Hyacinth’s gaze softened as she turned it on me, her lips pressing together in a sympathetic smile. “We don’t. They are beyond our reach now.”
I didn’t mean to laugh, but the scornful scoff burst from my lips anyway. “That’s it then? We just give up?”
The idea was ludicrous. There was almost always something to be done. Some course of action to at least try, however bleak the outlook.
“It is not a matter of giving up, Aliza–”
“Has anyone ever tried to get people back from the shades? They can’t just disappear. There has to be something we can do.”
“Oh, there is,” Hyacinth agreed earnestly. “But it will not make a difference to those we have lost tonight. It will, however, save countless innocent lives in future.”
My argument dried up in the face of what was coming next. The answer. The experimental solution, untried and undesirable, but the last hope. Like a rabbit in the headlights, I waited for the blow to fall.
“Prince Anwir is the only known wielder of lightning magic, which, incidentally, is the one brand of weapon effective against the shades. Only he can kill them. The curse must be broken, Aliza. There is no other way.”
My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth, damming whatever excuses might otherwise find their way out.
The two witches watched me, as though waiting for an answer to what hadn’t sounded like a question.
Along the corridor, doors creaked open and wary faces peeped out. Innocent faces. Any of them might have been lost tonight, might still be lost in the future. It could have been Pansy. It shouldn’t have been possible for shadow to slash fabric, but the evidence was undeniable. What if Pansy had been in her bed tonight? Would something other than feathers have been spilt? This was bigger than me. Bigger than my parents. How could I turn my back on an entire world?
“Okay.” I nodded stiffly. “Okay, let’s break this curse.”
10The Witch Is A Bitch
Ididn’t sleep again that night. Nobody did. The coven was a hive of activity, preparing for my noble quest. Dawn’s golden light was creeping across my room, making the rekindled candles useless when Pansy appeared, bearing a woven basket propped on her hip.
“Clothes,” she announced, depositing the basket on my bed. “For the expedition.”
This was it then. It was really happening. Reluctantly, I uncurled myself from the armchair by the fire and crossed to the bed. I hadn’t fancied putting my feet on the floor where a lurking shade might grab them, but now the sun had risen, I had one less thing to fear.
Yeah right. I was heading out into a world ruled by a human hating king, where monsters would stalk my every step, intent on my blood. I was supposed to break a curse that had claimed the lives of countless other people. There was every reason to be afraid. Terrified. To change my mind and make a run for the rift.
But shades were real. Magic was real. As unbelievable as any of it was, I could no longer deny that the witches had told the truth, which meant the rifts were sealed. Even if I made it to the Blood Gate alive, I would only find the way barred. What choice did I have? Had there ever been a choice at all?
Even if the rifts had been wide open, could I really leave Neath to its fate? Leave its people to suffer? The tick of the clock on the mantlepiece, barely noticeable yesterday, had boomed like a gong through the hours following the attack, rattling around my head. Three witches gone, as easily as that. Were they dead yet, or did the king have a worse fate in store for them? Vet school had taught me that death wasn’t always the worst case scenario. Some things were not meant to be endured. Did every passing second bring a new wave of suffering upon those three witches? I had a chance to put a stop to this. How could I turn away?
On the other hand, every hour that passed meant my parents’ torment grew. Had they given up hope yet? I couldn’t see it. Even if I never found my way back, which I would, they wouldn’t give up. Even if I were here until well beyond middle age, Dad would still print missing person posters with my twenty-four-year-old face plastered across them, begging for information from anyone who would listen. Mum would keep my room clean, never changing anything, ready for my return at a moment’s notice. Did they worry that I was rotting in a dark cave somewhere, or worse, did they think I’d been snatched, spirited away to meet a grisly end in some weirdo’s cellar? My stomach knotted, writhing like maggots at the thought of what they must be enduring at this very moment. At least with the witches it was abstract. With Mum and Dad, it was all too easy to picture every harrowing moment.
“Are you alright?”
I blinked rapidly, clearing away the scenes unfolding in my mind. Pansy stared up at me, her doe eyes ringed in shadows. It robbed her of some of her youthful looks, or maybe that was the horror we had endured together.
“Just tired,” I lied, forcing a small smile. “What are you wearing?”
For the first time, I noticed her outfit. Gone was the quaint dress of yesterday, the old-fashioned nightgown of last night. Instead, she wore a collarless shirt and trousers in muted shades of green and brown, the colours merging and weaving in a sort of organic wave. Witch camouflage. Chunky soled brown boots came up to her knee, a far cry from the dainty pumps she’d favoured the day before.
Her smile was slightly more enthusiastic than the one I’d managed. “Do you like it? It’s my quest outfit. I managed to talk Mother into letting me come along. I played on the whole ‘history in the making’ and ‘I’ll be safer with you’ thing.”
My heart tried to sink and leap at the same time, resulting in a strange flopping sensation in my chest. I didn’t know who else was coming along, but I had a vague idea of the dangers awaiting my team, and I didn’t believe for a minute that Pansy would be safe anywhere near me, even if her mother was there. At the same time, a friendly face, a… friend, could be exactly what I needed to get me through whatever lay ahead.
“It looks great.” Great wasn’t an accurate description, but I could see how the patterns and colours would provide protection. It wasn’t entirely dissimilar to zebra stripes. Not that it would hide me. My colourful hair would be a beacon, and for the first time in the years since I’d picked up the bleach, I felt a twinge of regret. My natural dark blonde, boring as it was, would have been less noticeable in a landscape of grass and trees. “Hyacinth is your mother, right?”
I already knew the answer after witnessing their reunion, but I needed a distraction. Something to take my mind off my looming, impossible task.
Pansy rolled her eyes. “Yes. Do not tell me how much I look like her, it’s all I ever hear.”
My laugh was brittle but genuine. “It could be worse. Everyone tells me I look like my dad.”
Too late, I realised that Pansy’s own dad was probably long dead. He had been human, after all. But if I’d offended or upset her, she didn’t let it show. I risked probing further. “Witches breed with humans, yeah?”
“That’s right.” The witch looked… proud. Impressed that I’d bothered to listen, maybe. She laughed. “It’s been problematic in recent years. The coven is half the size it once was, and shrinking. Every winter takes more of the old ones, and the last one was particularly bad. Mother says that we won’t be strong enough to defend our borders if it goes on much longer. Maybe that’s why the shades attacked. Maelgwyn must know we’re weakening. When the curse was first cast, the witches and fae of Tir o Gaeaf combined our powers to create wards protecting both kingdoms. They don’t work against shades, but they keep Maelgwyn out. They need constant renewal. Without new witches, the wards will eventually fall.”
So much for the distraction. “What about fae? You can’t breed with them?” They looked human enough, in a god-like sort of way. A memory of my dream rushed to the forefront of my mind. Fangs clamped onto my shoulder, a hand around my neck. My ears heated and I shifted my feet.
Pansy sighed. “There were attempts, long ago. The babies were stillborn, every single one of them. Some were malformed. It’s believed that our magics clash in a way that can’t support life.”
Interesting, if terrible. There had to be some tangible link between magic and genetics. It would make a fascinating study. With time and proper resources, maybe a treatment of sorts could be found. A way to counter whatever was going wrong. Maybe humans wouldn’t be needed at all, though, in my experience of men, they would be more than happy to be used in such a way.
“Anyway, you’d better get dressed. Sage has us on a tight schedule.” Pansy pushed the basket into my arms. She crossed the room and pulled out a tall, woven screen set near my dressing table. “I won’t look.”
As I draped my nightdress and robe over the top of the screen and picked up the trousers, I couldn’t decide whether the fizzing in my belly was excitement or terror. These were the things I would wear to break the curse. My hero uniform. Except, I was no hero. I was just Aliza, an ordinary woman with a boring, safe life. I had a much better chance of joining the ranks of dead would-be heroes than I did of succeeding.
