Page 2 of The Witch's Fate
Like me, the cottage is alone. For company, it has my small well and outdoor oven and the firepit, as well as my garden plots. I added a small bench last summer. Although I believe I’ve only sat on it once and no one sat beside me. I merely enjoy the idea of company and the aesthetic of such things so that those who have passed and yet have not passed may feel welcomed.
I detour to the garden beds, putting the invitation firmly out of my mind for the moment.
One power I’ve developed so well I barely have to try to conceptualize is growing edibles from a seed with ease. Fruits and vegetables, whether from bushes, plants or trees. It is no bother. At the closest garden bed, I kneel at the side of the tilled soil and brush my fingers over it, searching for the presence of seeds hidden below. It’s been some time since I’ve tended this section.
It’s only a few moments before I find a seed, its life and future concentrated in a tiny patch in the earth.
Then I close my eyes and imagine setting that life free from its small vessel. I imagine what the seed—the small piece of the whole, in this case—will become.
What it will become is a sweet potato. I feel it growing under my fingers, pushing the soil around it as it grows, until finally I can stick my fingers into the soft dirt and pull it out. The soil falls delicately, revealing the plump morsel for me to take.
That is the feeling of life. Of sustenance. It will do nicely for my supper.
Once I’ve brushed the dirt from the potato, I head inside. A bird calls as I pull open the door and enter; my gaze takes a few moments to adjust to the dimmer light inside.
The cottage is made up of only two separate rooms—the main room, and a small bathing room. However, the main room is large enough to house a coven of several members, especially if a few of those members prefer to sleep under the stars or in hammocks or on mats on the floor. What once was settles uneasily in my chest, and I close the door behind me.
After it was only me here, I turned the spare beds into other uses. I could not stand to look at the emptiness, so now my bed is the only one in the cottage. It’s tucked in the far corner, a beautiful quilt and plush pillows lay over it. The makeshift bedroom is divided from the rest of the room by a low half-wall. My kitchen is on the other end, separated by another half-wall, and between is the rest of my cozy space. A blue velvet chair with embroidered florals on the back sits in the nook that consists of stacks and stacks of books. Plants in glass vases of all colors and finely painted porcelain pots line every window sill. From mint to dill and of course rosemary and lavender. The scents mix so heavenly.
It is quiet in my home. It is always quiet. So much as it can be.
Peace is why I live here—why I stay alone, in my solitary cottage, with no one else.
For a moment, a small moment, I envision bursting through the door to share the invitation with my coven. They would have taken the fine envelope from my hands and passed it around, leaning their heads close together to look at the writing and to test the thickness of the paper. I can hear the clucking of a sister’s tongue as if she were still here. Their ghosts are merely memories, and I cannot bring them back.
But such invitations—such changes—never bring peace. If they did, I would not be here, well away from other people. In the last few years, I have missed many events and declined many opportunities to change my life once again. I cannot risk what happened happening again.
My heart races at the thought, though there’s nothing in the cottage itself to worry me. If anyone remembers me—aside from Prince Adom, whose household has sent this invitation—they likely wonder why I have withdrawn from all others. I’ve heard the whispers that my solitude has turned to a tale children use in an attempt to startle one another. Some powerful witch alone in the woods…such a dreadful scary thing, I suppose, if told with a malicious tone.
Unless, of course, they all know what happened to my coven. In every land.
I do not withdraw to isolate myself. I withdraw toprotectmyself.
I am the only member of my coven remaining. I do not wish to become part of something else. It is too much agony to lose people like that, and I will be happy if it never happens again in my lifetime.
And so I have not gone to the Convergence Games, the contest held in the capital city—a battle to the death.
I have not gone to the United Nations meeting that takes place every three years.
I know of all these events. Even if I do not speak to anyone of them, the news comes in the letters people send to my letter box. There are mentions here and there of what is happening in the wider world. I read them with little interest and forget about them until the next one comes.
Whenever an invitation comes, I decline. If there is an event Imustattend, I go in secrecy, disguised to hide my identity. This is the way of human witches. We do not trust other beings. I will never trust other beings again. I cannot remember the last time I ventured away. No, the contact I have is the one I’m most comfortable with: others needing my aid for magic. The spell to cast for a loved one or a tincture for a sickness medicine fails to remedy. That is where my comfort lies. Letters of pleas and wants from those I will never know apart from their script.
If I thought we could have peace, then I might have already tried to find a new community.
But I do not. The war brews on and I stay in my quiet place, helping where I can and living my life without causing harm and without being harmed.
With the memories racing in the back of my mind, I stare down at the invitation.
As it stands, I cannot take the risk. The invitation falls to the old wooden desk, my worktable that houses oils and crystals and salts that work in both spell jars and recipes, as I softly sigh.
I prepare the potato for dinner and spread out the other letters on a clean section of the worktable. This is how I make a living—by casting spells for others. They write their requests to me on parchment, and I send them back a spell or recipe for a tincture. With the money they pay me, I buy rare goods anddelectables to live my version of luxury. It is a pleasure to coax spells from the earth and provide for others less fortunate.
It is a quiet life, but it is a life, and it is mine.
The invitation seems to stare at me from its place on the worktable, daring me to open it.
It does not matter what the letter inside says. I will not go. Even if it will be safe, which cannot be guaranteed, I do not know how I would bear being among all those people without my coven.
