The Last Witch

Penn hooked himself under the man’s other arm, and Asher strained against his single-leg balance to help the man up. Pain shot through his knee and his hip, but he grit his teeth against it as the stranger finally stood, then stumbled towards the front door. Asher strained to hear where the hunters had gone, or if Olive was waiting, but only silence claimed the air outside. He opened his mouth to tell the others to wait, but the stranger spoke first in that strange language, then pulled away from Asher’s hold and grabbed onto the frame of the door.

The doorway shimmered as they stepped through, and Asher’s senses exploded as colour and white noise burst across his vision, blinding him in a mess of white and green and red, flashing fast and against the back of his eyes. He cried out, aware of his hands covering his face, but he couldn’t see his hands, or the fields, or anything except for the violent puttering colours in his face.

Something grabbed his collar, and in a snap the sensation was gone, leaving only white spots splattered across his vision as the scene around him returned. Only he wasn’t in the slaughterhouse anymore.

The strength in his legs folded, and Asher fell into a wall, his brain searing as he tried to see where he was and what had happened. Colours still burst in front of his eyes, his ears ringing painfully. He tried to pull himself up, but pain radiated through his ankle, driving him back down onto the ground.

‘You okay?’ Penn’s face hovered in front of him, brow furrowed in concern.

Two large copper horns sprouted from his forehead, shining against flickering lamplight and protruding straight and sharp over his head and towards the sky. They made his face narrow, his cheekbones higher, and a strange, inhuman shine coated his skin, as though it was made from a still river on a sunny day. His eyes, still burning hot with fire behind them, were fixed on him.

Asher stared. The sight pulled him back to himself, but it didn’t fade like the other strange sensations. There was a terrifying beauty to his face like this, like the moment of disaster where everything was caught in destruction, breaking apart in the final moments of life. Asher couldn’t move. The joint of his ankle had locked somewhere in the pain, and he was paralysed as a result, pressed against the cold, cobblestone road like a frightened child.

The road…

They were in Dalvany. Somewhere in whatever had just happened, they were back in the familiar narrow streets, surrounded by the tall, pressed in buildings all crushed together. His mind tried to fill the gap, the hour of travel that would lead from one place to another, but trying only sent another flash of colour through his brain and a sharp pain across the front of his skull.

‘Are you okay?’ Penn asked again. His eyes traced up as he noticed Asher’s stare, and he flicked his hood back over his head. The horns curled down beneath it, disappearing and returning his face back to its human appearance.

‘We’re in Dalvany,’ Asher felt stupid saying it, but everything that had just happened crashed down so hard and completely he was ready to curl into the wall and disappear. He’d been accused of witchcraft. It wasn’t a fear he’d ever thought of having, because of course he wasn’t, but now there wasn’t any escaping it. There was no way to escape it, to prove Olive wrong. Olive would tell the others. She would tell Norrah, and Evelyn and Magnus, and soon the whole town would come down on him.

Penn glanced over to his companion, who was struggling to pull himself up. ‘He tried to go into Nakati, but it’s not safe.’

Asher could feel his breath coming out fast and shallow, but he was outside of his own body, not sure of what to do or where to go. There was supposed to be a protocol to follow, or rules set where he could dispute the claim, pull Olive through a legal battleground for pulling a gun on him and abusing her power. How could he show that he wasn’t what she claimed, in a way that went against what she could apparently prove?

It was her word against his, and he was losing allies more than he was gaining them.

His only option was to hide until he had more information.

He couldn’t be here. He couldn’t move.

‘He needs help,’ Penn said. He turned to his companion, just as the man’s legs failed and he collapsed against the ground. He still had nothing but Asher’s coat to cover himself, made the size of a handkerchief compared to the man’s size. He still had pointed ears and inhuman eyes. In the middle of town.

‘We have to get out of here,’ Asher’s voice escaped in a whisper.

Penn’s brow furrowed. ‘Why?’

They were going to kill him. Hang him outside town with all those other people. Penn and his friend wouldn’t be allowed to just walk away either. Who else would be questioned? Clyde maybe, proving the validity of his concerns, Sara and Gershwin who had only helped him, Iain, who he had barged in on without warning. Asher could imagine the questions, a possible investigation about who he was and what he planned to do.

It had been out of his control. An accident.

He couldn’t breathe.

‘The guardians of this world,’ the wolf-man said. He leaned against the wall, pressing against it so hard he would either knock it over or pass straight through it. ‘They did not simply disappear, did they?’

Asher shook his head.

‘Humans have killed them all. They would kill you.’

Asher nodded, the words sending a horrid chill down his spine.

‘We can go to Nakati,’ the man said. ‘You are a friend. You can be safe there.’

Penn hissed, cutting off the man’s words and making him pale. He replied low and calm in his first language, but Penn snapped at him, cutting him off once more. Asher remembered in a blink the events north of Valenda, and why Penn had dragged him out there in the first place.

‘It’s not safe for you,’ he said, feeling stupid.

Penn whirled around on him, staring with an expression he couldn’t read. He was still for a beat, then nodded. ‘The Fienta wait for me there. We can fight them, or hide here.’

Asher glanced at the naked man next to him, at his own crooked leg with it’s shooting pains. Neither of them were in any condition to fight those things. ‘We can find somewhere to hide.’

‘I need help,’ the wolf-man said. ‘A healer, if you have one. I would rather take my chances in Nakati. Being in my own world will help stave off whatever this is.’

‘Penn said the Fienta are waiting for him there.’ Asher pointed out.

‘That is not a guarantee.’

‘Do you want to risk it?’

The wolf-man fell silent, admitting defeat. Penn glared at him, then walked over and hooked the man’s elbow over his shoulder. Asher clawed at the wall, struggling to his feet. He didn’t know where they could go; he didn’t know the town well enough, but there had to be a building somewhere they could hide out.

They were close to the square, he knew that much. They had to go further out. Maybe a building near the farms was left empty with all the workers moving up into town.

Penn snapped to attention, his muscles clenching, and Asher froze as a shadow fell over the road. A humanoid shape inching towards them, heralded by bouncing lines of wispy smoke that flittered along. They moved with that hypnotic lull that pulled Asher in, stealing his focus in an urge to follow.

The human figure came around the corner, and Asher recognised her instantly. The bartender who had opened her inn to the injured townsfolk. The same one he had pulled out of Le Torkani. She looked better than she had in the hospital cot, though she’d lost a lot of weight, and she held a stuttering, struggling lantern in one hand. She jumped in surprise when she saw them.

‘I know you,’ she said.

‘I know you,’ Asher returned. His heart hammered hard against his ribs. ‘It’s Tippy, right?’

‘Only Clyde calls me that,’ the bartender said. ‘Temperence.’

‘Asher,’ Asher returned. ‘What are you—’

‘Not now,’ Temperence said. ‘Are you what they were leading me to?’

‘I don’t follow,’ Asher said.

‘The lights,’ Temperence said. ‘They were asking me to follow.’

‘We upset them,’ Penn said, ‘opening the door. You should not follow them.’

‘I can handle myself,’ Temperence said. ‘But you can see them.’

Asher swallowed. ‘I can.’

Temperence nodded. ‘And that place, you were there too.’

Asher nodded.

‘You pulled me out.’

Asher nodded again.

‘So it’s real.’

‘Yes,’ Penn said.

‘It’s real,’ Asher said. ‘Though I don’t remember dancing, if that’s your next question.’

Temperence glared at him for a moment, then her gaze swept across Penn, and then the stranger, who was still naked and covering himself with Asher’s coat. ‘Do I want to know?’ she asked.

‘No,’ Asher said. ‘It’s best you don’t.’

‘They accusing you too, huh?’

Asher stammered, not sure what to say. He didn’t want to admit it. He wouldn’t. It wasn’t true.

Was it?

Temperence nodded as though he had answered. ‘People have been throwing words at me too. Doesn’t worry me. Not until the officials get involved anyway. I just want to know one thing. What’s really going on?’

‘I don’t know for sure,’ Asher said. ‘I don’t completely understand what I do know.’

Temperence glanced the naked man up and down. ‘You give me everything you know, and everything you learn, and I won’t tell. Sound fair?’

Asher nodded. ‘That works for me.’

‘Good. Come on then.’

Asher stared, and she rolled her eyes.

‘No-one touches my place since I disappeared from it,’ she said. ‘You can hide there. Or you can stay out here. Your choice.’

She turned on her heel and marched back the way she came, leaving Asher to stare after her. In such a short time, in nothing more than a blink, this was all that was left of his life; stumbling down dark roads with a sliver of hope that he wouldn’t die by the end.