by D. N. Hoxa
“You know, it’s been so long since I’ve seen an actual fairy. Poor things,” one of the women said, her blonde hair shining under the lamps mounted on the stone walls. It was weird—all things considered—that it made me curious where they were getting the electricity from.
“I know what you are.” I held on tightly to my knives so they couldn’t tell how badly my hands were shaking. “It’s all over. You’re surrounded. The covens and the ECU—” A sharp laugh cut my ears and didn’t let me finish.
“How did you think we survived all this time?” The blonde woman stood up. Moving her head to the side, she pushed her long, shiny hair behind her back and crossed her arms in front of her. “The ECU is right where they are supposed to be—sitting behind their desks. And the witches you gathered here tonight? They’re going to die, right after you.”
“Don’t waste your breath, Jane,” the man behind the beast I’d caught said.
“On the contrary, David. I want her to know why she’s dying. So many people never know before we hit them. It’s only fair to try to balance things up a bit.”
Jane grinned, and the rest of the Hedges laughed.
“Look, if you surrender now, you can still live. Prison isn’t nice, but you won’t be dead.” Even I was tempted to laugh at my stupid words, but what else was there for me to say?
“How about…no?” David said, and he stood up, too.
Behind him was his chain. I knew it. That chain was what turned him into a beast.
“We’ve spent far too long under weak witches who put shame on the name of magic,” Jane hissed. “Life after life we’ve had to witness the stupidity of the people around us, unable to do anything about it. Well, the wait is finally over. I’d say you should be glad you won’t be here to witness our wrath.”
Please take me back to Peterson’s attic. I’d choose a thousand ghosts over this woman.
“Listen, guys, you seem like good people.” Not really. If evil had faces, it would be theirs. “Let’s just put all of this nonsense behind us. The whole world thinks that Hedge witches are extinct. You’re not. Yay. Let’s just get out of here and clear the air with everybody.”
I was rambling. It sucked and I was ashamed, but I was still unable to come up with a plan of action and I needed more time.
“Magic is Hedge magic,” Jane hissed. “It can never be extinct. Your lips are far too filthy to even speak the name, fairy.”
“Okay, before this gets out of hands—”I didn’t get to finish my sentence.
David went first. One second he was this gorgeous witch with green eyes, standing in front of me like he was posing for a shot, and the next he was an ugly brown beast, also with green eyes. His chain was wrapped around his forearms, and his smile was the stuff of nightmares.
The second one to change was the woman sitting next to Jane’s feet, and then the other two men. They all transformed into brown beasts, the same ones I’d encountered at the Green coven in Delaware.
I swallowed hard as my life passed by in front of my eyes, and Julian’s face came to my mind. For some strange reason, he wasn’t smiling at me like he did most of the time I remembered him. No, this time, he was telling me: you can do this, Winter.
What a fucking liar.
My shield was already up in front of me. That was the only reason I realized that one—or all—of the beasts were throwing spells at me. I couldn’t even see their lips moving!
Subject: Hedge witches.
Weakest points: no fucking clue.
Favorite killing method: see Weakest Points.
Since I’d left my gun outside like a fool, my only options were my beads. They went through my shield like it wasn’t there, and as my fingers moved, they began to hit the Hedge witches in their faces, one at a time. They all seemed surprised by the sudden attack—and the fact that they couldn’t stop the beads with their magic—except David. The beast he’d turned into only smiled at me and took a step forward.
The next thing I knew, he froze. I wasn’t the only one surprised by it.
“Wayne, go!”
Bender was right behind me. I hadn’t heard him walk in, but I wasn’t asking questions. He began to chant out loud, and while the Hedge witches thought to shield themselves before they ended up like their friend David, I ran forward and threw a knife. It landed on the chest of one of the beasts—I couldn’t tell who was who any more. Jane and the other woman stepped back and let the beasts take me on. Not the best case scenario, but while Bender threw spell after spell at them, froze them, hit them with his magic and made them back down a bit, I reached them. With two brand new knives in hand, I attacked the first one.
He roared in anger and with a wave of his hand pushed me back a few steps. Thankful his claws had missed me, I jumped forward again like a lunatic. I knew I was going to die. Might as well take one of them with me when I did.
Bender stayed by the door and just chanted and chanted without even bothering to stop for a deep breath. It was the only reason why I was still fighting the beasts. His spells kept hitting them and giving me half a second here, a full second there, to attack. David threw his chain at me, and I managed to move away just in time. I grabbed the other end of it and wrapped it around my arm, then pulled. He didn’t move all that much, but I spun fast and wrapped the chain around my waist until I was chest to chest with the beast. He raised an arm, aiming his claws for my face. Too late. My knife sliced through his flesh and into his chest faster.
Through the corner of my eye, I could see Jane looking at Bender. She sure as hell was pissed, and I caught the second her lips moved. Conjuring my shield, I sent it all the way back to Bender. If it wasn’t for him, I would have no way of fighting all four beasts by myself. Now, I had to watch Jane, too, to see when she moved her lips. As if I didn’t already have enough on my plate.
The fighting continued, and in the next two minutes, my clothes were torn, my skin was all bloody and my adrenaline the highest level it had ever been. I moved my beads with my mind and with my fingers whenever I could. With them, with Bender behind me throwing spells, and with my knives, I lived for another five minutes.
When one of the beasts hit me in the chest with his claws, I flew back and landed on my ass. He came after me with a growl. My braid was on my shoulder. I grabbed the nearest stone and threw it at his feet, together with a surge of energy. I had no idea what the spell was, but when the beast raised his arm and brought it down on me, I thought I’d screwed up. My stones were trash. They weren’t even working.
But then, when the beast’s arm was halfway to my face, it slowed down. Bells rang in my head. The stone had been Quicksand, a spell that slowed shit down. It even worked in machinery, and it sure as hell was working on this guy. He looked at his arm with wide eyes, like he couldn’t figure out why it wasn’t moving fast enough. With a new wave of strength, I hopped to my feet and buried my knife right in his throat.
A scream filled the room, and my ears whistled. It was one of the beasts, and she was coming at me with mad eyes, both her claws raised. I conjured my shield as I was left with only one knife—the other was still in the beast’s neck—and by the time I brought my beads back from David’s face, she was in front of me.
Sparks flew when her claws hit my shield and broke it to pieces. I reached for my braid, and for the next stone in it, but by that time, she hit me on my shoulder and sent me spiraling backwards. My beads were on her face, but she didn’t look like she minded. She just swung her beast arms forward and made a mess out of my chest and face.
Magic, my mind shouted. Use your magic.
Bender was still by the door. He could see the whole thing. But what if I lied and said I’d used stones?
I would have to. When the beast hit me for the fifth time, I fell down, my knees too weak to hold me. I squeezed my eyes shut and began to chant. Screw Bender seeing. I’d deal with it when the time came, if I made it that far.
The spell I conjured was the Bone Wave. It was a wave of ene
rgy that pushed the opponent back like…well, an ocean wave. When it hit the beast, it set her back a step. I’d read the damage would be bigger, but I wasn’t asking questions now. I made it back to my feet and let go of one of my knives. My beads were my only option. I sent them to the beast’s face, and she screamed again. I held my arm up high and approached her, carefully, because she was waving her arms like mad trying to get rid of my beads. I swung mine with all my strength, but a second before it hit her, another clawed hand grabbed my wrist and pulled me back.
Now, a second beast was on me, and when it hit me in the chest and threw me against the ground, I could hear my bones break. Bender’s scream filled me with panic. A look at Jane made it was obvious she was spelling him, and Bender was now on the floor, barely holding himself with his arms. His legs weren’t moving.
“I’ll crush your very bones until they’re ashes!” Jane shouted as the two beasts kept attacking me with their claws.
I conjured my shield twice, and twice they broke it. So I tapped into my magic, felt it wild and burning within me, and I unleashed an Ashes spell on one of them.
It was the woman, and she screamed that high-pitched scream again, then went down to her knees, holding onto her chest. The other beast growled, intertwined his claws, and raised them up above his head then brought them down on me.
When he hit my stomach, I thought I would never breathe again. Air left my lungs in a rush, and my every cell cried in agony. I conjured my spell when he raised his arms again, and though it was weak, it was enough to stop him from hitting me like that again. I called my beads and sent them to his face, and two of them inside his ears. The idea was sick, true, but I was desperate, on the brink of dying. I wasn’t going to judge my actions.
The beast growled and hit his own head with his large paws. While I tried to get back to my feet, I looked at Jane and found her chanting. Bender cried out again. I conjured my shield and sent it to him. Sparks flew in front of his face. Jane’s spell had met resistance.
But the beast in front of me was already coming to his senses again. With shaking hands, I didn’t bother to try and stand up. I reached for my braid, and the second stone I had in there, this one a stripping spell. I charged it with my magic even before it left my hand. The beast roared when I called my beads back and sent them straight at Jane’s face.
When the woman-beast stood up, I realized my Ashes spell was over. The beast standing in front of me fell to one knee. He looked down at his foot, but I couldn’t see a single thing. The stripping spell I’d put inside that stone was meant to strip the opponent of his abilities. It looked like it was working, and before the woman could make it to me, I somehow managed to stand. I sent my beads at her face, and I buried my knife in the motionless beast’s chest. He screamed. A second later, he became a man again, looking down at his chest where my blade’s tip had broken a red stone tied in a thin silver chain around his neck. Next, I looked down at his legs. Bile rose up my throat.
My stripping spell had gone bad. So, so bad. Bad Winter. It hadn’t stripped the man of his abilities. It had stripped the man of his skin, and I could see the flesh on him all too clearly for my sanity.
Before I could start puking my guts all over him, I pulled back my knife and drove it through his right cheek.
Another scream. Bender was in agony. I risked a glance his way and I saw the other woman—the only one besides Jane who hadn’t transformed to a beast—in front of him, her hand above his head as she chanted.
Bender’s face was that of a man who’d seen all the horrors of this world, and the one after. My heart broke. My anger fried my nerves. My magic responded.
Bright orange filled my vision. The tips of my fingers were warm, almost like they’d caught fire. I raised my hands at the woman torturing Bender and felt every string of my wild magic cut loose. There were no words of a spell to shape them now, but it was ready, nonetheless. I felt it move through my veins as if it were one with my blood. It filled me from head to toe, and the orange light intensified. I shouted with everything I had in me as I let it out, full of anger and full of pain.
When it left the tips of my fingers, darkness covered my vision. The back of my head hit something hard. Something cold was around my neck, but all I could think about was that Bender had stopped screaming.
“Fucking fairy!” a woman hissed, and when my eyes opened, I saw the beast’s face in front of me, the only one left standing. My braid was too far away from my hand. The beast’s fist hit me in the face. My nose broke. Pain a thousand times worse than a vampire bite took over my whole body. My magic buzzed inside of me, still not ready. Maybe I’d used it all up already?
I closed my eyes again.
“You’re going to die and in death, die again!” the beast shouted as she hit me again. I was no longer even breathing.
Then, she screamed. My eyes popped open, and I saw her looking at her arms. Her arms that were covered in thorns that seemed to have come out from inside her.
I looked to the side and saw Bender, holding himself by his shaking arms again, chanting under his breath.
Standing up was out of the question just yet, but I did manage to reach my braid. Only one stone was left in my hair. The fourth—or third—must have fallen out. I had no idea what this one did, but I threw it at the beast’s feet and charged it with the little energy I could muster.
One of the stones I had with me caused an explosion that used the oxygen in the air to intensify its strength. The other was a fire spell. I sure hoped it was the first.
Only, it was the second. The fire started at the beast’s feet. To my horror, with only a few moves of her legs, she put the fire out in a blink of an eye. Goddamn it, Winter!
“You filthy piece of fairy shit!” she hissed as she came after me.
I dragged my body away as fast as I could. I had already begun to heal, but I couldn’t bring myself to focus for long enough to conjure a shield, or even send my beads after her face consistently so that I’d have enough time to stand up. When the beast raised her arm and brought it down onto me, I did the only thing I could do. I raised my knife and waited for it. One thing I did right, because the pointy blade connected with its paw and sunk deep into it. A loud growl of pain had me wanting to cover my ears.
I reached for another knife in my holster, only to remember that I had none left. Jumping to my feet, I tried to conjure a pain spell that attacked the nerves and made the target think they were in a tub full of boiling water, but it wasn’t working and I didn’t have time to try again. Damn it, I really had to work harder on my conjuring. This was pathetic.
I had to get close and personal with the beast again and pull the knife from her paw, so I could use it to end her life. The only way I could do it was through my beads. When Bender screamed again in pain, it got harder to concentrate, but I managed to tear up one of the beast’s eyelids, and when she raised her arms to her face, I took the chance and grabbed my knife. The loud sound coming from her made my knees tremble.
A second later, my knife was in her snout, my hand still in there, too, touching its wet tongue.
Disgusted, I left the knife right there in the back of her throat, and I jumped back.
Bender stopped screaming. He was on the ground face first, and it didn’t look like he was breathing any longer. My heart fell all the way to my heels.
“Well, now that you got rid of everyone else, let’s dance together, shall we?”
Jane’s voice came from the back of the room. She hadn’t moved a single inch from her place while she’d watched her friends lose their lives.
“You monster,” I hissed before I could help myself. Still, monster or not, she was coming after me, so I conjured my shield. I had no idea how much it would hold—I was exhausted and the pain was already starting to make itself known.
“There’s nothing wrong with monsters, little fairy,” Jane said. “And once I bring my family back to life, I’ll make sure they stay monsters, too.”
&
nbsp; Bring them back to life? A shiver washed down my spine. Did that mean I’d have to fight those beasts again? Because I was more than ready to run away and disappear in a cave somewhere for the rest of eternity, thank you very much.
“Give it up, Jane. Your time is over,” I said just to buy myself some time. I needed to breathe, and I needed to give my body a second to heal. How I wished I could conjure a healing spell in those moments, but it was impossible. If I had any energy left, I was going to have to save it for when she attacked me.
Jane didn’t take long in doing so, either. Before I knew it, my shield sparked bright yellow. I sent my beads forward and controlled them with my fingers, and while she took a second to look at them hitting her face, I dropped my shield and conjured Ashes.
Big mistake. Huge mistake. The mistake of the goddamn century.
Jane was cunning. She’d waited for me to drop my shield, so she could hit me before I even finished chanting my spell. A scream tore from my throat as my left hand caught fire. I felt every bone in it break and break and break until there was nothing let but flesh and skin.
Gritting my teeth, I brought back my shield just as her next spell hit me. Sparks flew, bright red this time, and two seconds later she hit me again. With my right arm in front of my face, I crouched, and the third spell that hit my shield pushed me back a few steps.
I was losing it. There was no way in hell she’d let me get anywhere near her. She’d eventually break my shield, and I’d be unable to conjure another. Without my left hand, my beads were useless against a witch like her.
Sparks flew as she hit me again. My shield broke to pieces. I conjured another. Jane laughed like the whole world was made out of dark little evil things for her fucking pleasure.
Tears filled my eyes. Bender was just a few feet away from me, and I couldn’t even look at him to see if he was alive. I’d messed it up. Now, this witch was going to bring the others back—however that worked—and all of this would have been for nothing. Such a fucking disappointment. I wondered what my mother would think.
