Page 4 of The Witch & the Tiger

He didn’t feel much like talking about any of it. The trouble was that when you lived in a tiny village in close proximity to Dreadmor Academy, nothing went unnoticed – unless it had to do with serious supernatural beings who could steal memories and make people forget the questions they wanted to ask.

The village lay in a southwestern bend, opposite the swamp area, but close to another woodland and mountain area. It was a beautiful place, except for one noticeable feature: It was completely landlocked, which was part of the reason people struggled to believe his tale. Even now, as he walked through the village, some of the locals stared, but they did so in a way that suggested they knew. Though their version of the story was warped by rumors carried from one person to another, none of them knew what had really happened, not even Martin himself at times.

Now, he stared beyond the village with its stone and wooden houses and stone fencing to the slightly fogged-out woodland beyond.

Fog. He shivered.

His teachers and family insisted it wasn’t his fault. But they didn’t really know why three people drowned in a place where there was no water and no coast or why one of them had gone missing and had never been found.

Still, he continued to stare at the fog, wondering if that might be the connection until his little sister crept into the fray.

“Hey, Martin.” Her smooth voice cut through his focus. “You’re not thinking about looking in the woods again, are you?”

“It’s foggy,” he murmured, though he’d also looked on other foggy days and found nothing. But on the day the world changed, it’d been foggy. All they wanted was some laughs, some fun, and games.

That was all.

“Remember that you asked me to look up some information about what happened?” she asked when her brother answered. “I thought about it a lot, and I asked around. I even talked to Professor Z’Hana about why the normal police force never found anything.”

Martin swallowed nervously, and in his mind’s eye, he saw the waters rising. His skin became clammy with sweat. Eva noticed, and her voice softened. “Unless you’d prefer not to talk about it. I just thought since you were staring again…”

“I’m fine,” he said. “What did you discuss?”

“The professor was sure that a fae with water-based powers most likely had something to do with what happened. She’s been carefully dipping around the fae areas to find out which ones have been active recently. But it still doesn’t really explain what you said you saw.”

“Fae with water powers.” He thought back to the student in the garden, the way she’d so calmly weaved the water as if such a thing would never be a threat to her – only an old friend.

“We already discussed that when everyone was interrogating me.” He’d hated every second of the interrogations. Sometimes, it felt like the police were fishing to find a good reason to lock him away.

“Yes, but the other thing that may be of interest is the idea of there being realm overlaps,” Eva said. “Which isn’t completely out of order when you think about it since this entire region has realm overlaps with the fae, including the swamps and the mountains. So, it stands to reason that we have an overlap in this spot as well. The professor confirmed as much.”

He nodded. “But we never found anything that might prove this to be true. After all, all the overlaps you see here – well, you see them. They’re not exactly hidden, are they?”

“True,” Eva said. “But Z’Hana says not all overlaps are visible all the time. Sometimes, there needs to be certain conditions. Until then, it’s a bit hard to get an investigator on the case since she said the local police wouldn’t be able to help with something like that. They’d need to find someone supernatural once we figure out where the overlap is and how it happens.”

He sighed. It offered a small explanation, but it didn’t leave any way to fathom when and where this place chose to appear. “Yannik’s still missing. His family might say I didn’t do anything wrong; they sure as hell don’t talk to any of us anymore.” He took a half-step toward the woods. “I wanted to find out about the place again. But what if I find it and more people die? What if I get trapped?”

He closed his eyes, and the faces of four friends swam before his vision. Samantha, Corey, Fox, and Yannick. The good version of them, where they smiled and laughed. Not the bad version, where none would ever move again.

An overlapping spot was his sister’s latest theory, hashed out with the professor. That professor would probably want to see Martin back at the academy again. None of them really made it a secret. But how could he?

How could he face everyone there? The friends of friends, the people who knew them all, and who were now missing. Better only to see them the times he visited the favorite spot of his lost friends.

In the end, his sister bravely joined him on a walk through the foggy woodlands, but they couldn’t find the place where it happened. Until it did, and until he knew how it happened, there would be no progress. Yannick deserved to be found. And, if they did find the place… His mind wandered back to the dark-haired girl.

He’d need someone with her type of powers. He’d needed someone like her five months ago.

“I’m glad you’re opening up more these days, big bro.” Eva patted his shoulder as they finished their weave through the woods. “I prefer being able to help as opposed to watching you vanish for hours at a time doing whatever the hell you were doing.”

Stalking off into his tiger form more often than not. Tiger-based emotions weren’t as intense as human ones, so he found it easier to cope with the whole situation. However, he needed to do more than just cope.

If that place did exist – if it only appeared sometimes, he needed to figure out how to find it again. Then, he needed someone with water powers so they could keep from drowning while searching for Yannick.

It was not the most well-hashed-out plan. It was not even a particularly noble plan. He just wanted to prove he wasn’t crazy, that the place existed, and that Yannick might finally be put to rest.

“I know you’ve heard it a million times from everyone and continued, “I really think that chasing this road is going to be endless, and you’ll never be happy so long as this is what you’re doing. I’m happy to try to help, but it’s also because I want you out and back with us. You know that, right?”

“Right,” he said. Her words made sense. All their words made sense. But he didn’t know how to adequately express how important it was to find that place again. It burned within him. It kept him awake at night, kept him wishing that, somehow, he might find that rugged coastal path once more, travel down the thin steps, and find that strange cave at the water’s edge.

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