“Of course.”
“Are you going to do something with that?” I poked the dull black rock. It seemed to absorb all the light. There were no shadows or reflections interrupting its smooth surface, only flat, empty blackness. Like a void.
“That is a warp crystal. It will open a portal back to my ancestral home, but I thought it wise to talk first.”
“Oh, yeah, okay.” I took another gloriously sweet bite of my bread and wracked my brain for a polite way out of this situation. My new witch friend seemed harmless enough, but I had no time to waste, and if she wouldn’t help me, I’d have to thank her for her hospitality and move along.
Sage lifted her cup, taking a tiny sip. “Have you encountered anyone else since you arrived in our world?”
Why with the weird interest in my speaking to other people? Was I going to be held hostage as the new super-best-friend-forever? Was speaking to other people a crime?
“I met a man last night,” I admitted. If anyone would accept my stories of hallucinations, it was the crazy lady opposite me. Besides, it wouldn’t hurt to let her know that, if she did lock me in her cellar, someone nearby had seen me. Would remember me. The police would come sniffing… eventually.
Sage frowned, her green eyes burning. “What sort of a man?”
What sort of a question was that? “I don’t know, just a man type, I guess.” I certainly wasn’t about to reveal that I wasn’t convinced he was, well, human. Not with his cold body and strange eyes.
“Of what did he speak?”
“Not much. He was a bit weird, to be honest. He wanted to know my name.” I gave Sage a ‘crazy, right?’ look, but the self-proclaimed witch was far from amused. “Said that it wasn’t safe at night. Oh, and to go south.”
“That is all?”
“Pretty much, yeah.”
“He did not… do anything?”
“Just gave me his jacket.” I plucked at the sleeve, fastened around my belly. Sage glared at the leather as though it had deeply offended her ancestors.
“Very well,” she muttered. “If you came south, and arrived yesterday, I assume you came through the mountain rift?”
I stared blankly. “I don’t know. I’m not sure if I came south. I followed the river.”
“Where were you before you arrived?”
“In a cave. I slipped and fell, and woke up on a riverbank, just a few hours from here.”
Something flickered over her pretty face. “You slipped? Do you mean to tell me you did not come here purposely?”
I laughed again. My full stomach had improved my mood to no end. “Definitely not.”
“Then you do not know why you are here?”
“I’m here because I need to use the phone.” Not that I had any hope of finding one in this museum of a cottage.
“No, girl.” Sage shook her head. “That is not why you are here at all. It was no mere chance that saw you take a tumble in those caves. You are supposed to be here. You have come to break the curse. You are here to save us all.”
Crazy. Absolutely batshit crazy. Perfect. Exactly what I needed. Not.
My bland smile had become quite fixed. I was definitely going to end up bubbling in a cauldron full of stew before the day was out. Typical. It served me right for going camping.
“Erm,” I croaked, clearing my tight throat. “Curse? I don’t know anything about a curse. I just really need to get home—”
Sage sighed heavily, placing down her teacup, and settling back in her chair. “I can see you do not believe a word I am saying. Do humans really forget so quickly?”
Unnerved as I was, I was rapidly losing patience with this bullshit. I didn’t have time to sit around talking about curses and witches. My parents were looking for me. They’d be beside themselves. I wanted to go home, now, or better yet, yesterday.
“Look,” I said, injecting a steely tone into my voice. One of my workplace voices. I had a few. Most were varying ratios of gentleness and coaxing, but sometimes, a vet needed to be firm. “I don’t know anything about curses, or magic, or portals. I just want to go home.”
Sage giggled, a surprisingly high, girlish sound that didn’t suit her at all. “I have met many humans, Aliza with an A, all eager and determined, all desperate for their chance at the prize. I admit, it has been a long while since I saw the last one. We had begun to believe the rifts had sealed on your end, or the humans had learnt to stay away. I never dreamt that, in only a few generations, you would have forgotten us. Forgotten what has been promised.”
“Look, I’m sorry but—”
“Enough!” Sage slapped her hand on the table. “It is clear you are ignorant. Allow me to prove who I am, and then, perhaps, you will be inclined to hear the rest.”
The witch got to her feet and snatched down a brown cloak from a peg by the door, swinging it around her shoulders as she wiggled her feet into black ballet pumps. Then she pressed her palm flat against the door, closed her eyes, and began to mutter. At first, nothing happened, but then the house gave a low groan, like an old ship at sea, and all at once, the lock on the door clanked and shutters slammed over the windows, bolts sliding across of their own accord, plunging the cottage into semi-darkness. Gasping, I skidded my chair back against the wall. The fact that I was well and truly trapped paled in the face of magic.
Sage’s shadowy silhouette approached, causing me to shrink back against the unforgiving wood of my chair. She snatched the crystal up from the table.
“Get up,” she demanded. “We will only have a moment.”
“For what?” I squeaked, rising on trembling legs. So much for being firm.
The witch, the real, actual witch, ignored me. In the dimness, I watched as she held out her hand, the black rock lying on the flat of her palm. Sage began to mutter again, her words in no language I’d ever heard. Then, she moved her hand, pulling it back to her side, but the crystal stayed where it was, suspended in mid-air.
Not real. Not fucking real.
What little light was left in the room began to bend, as though sucked into the dark pit of the crystal. I gave another shuddering gasp and pressed myself flat against the wall, as though that would help me.
