by D. N. Hoxa
The problem was, my body wasn’t going to ask me what I wanted to do.
“Who are you?” the young girl asked me, wiping her tears with her dirty hands and making a mess out of her cheeks.
“I’m Scarlet, and this is Elisa.” My voice sounded funny, too.
“What are you?” she asked next.
“Elisa is a Hedge witch.” And Elisa was feeling better after the spell stone did its healing, it seemed. Her wound was closing fast. “And I…I’m like you.”
The others looked at one another in confusion. “And what are we?” a different girl asked, this one easily my age and height, only much thinner.
“What are we?” I whispered, surprised by a question I’d asked myself a thousand times. But I was still getting used to knowing the answer to it, it seemed. I smiled at all of them, bringing myself closer to passing out with that small gesture. “We’re witches,” I said. “Storm witches.”
“Storm?” Elisa asked, shaking her head at me. Her wound had closed now, and she could move on her own. She sat up straighter, looking at the ground for a second. “I like it.”
“Me, too,” the young girl said, and a hint of a smile transformed her face completely.
And that’s how it was decided. From that moment on, the world was going to learn that we weren’t Dirts. We were the new witches in town.
Fourteen
If you guessed that I passed out in the next two minutes after that, you are right. Elisa wouldn’t heal me because of the adrenaline shots I took. She was pretty sure a healing spell was going to break me to pieces, so she decided not to risk it, no matter that I first demanded she healed me, than begged for her to do it.
Even in dreamland, the fear of getting caught by the ECU didn’t let me rest. Too much had to be done still. We needed to get to North Hills, then Eddie’s men needed to show us how to get past the protective spells of the house we were going to, errr…rent for a few days, and then we needed to make sure that nobody had followed us. That nobody knew where we were.
But higher forces than my sheer will were at play, and though it sometimes felt like I could hear people speak, I could understand nothing.
When I woke up, the sun was on my face. Such a beautiful, simple thing. It was unfortunate that it scared me shitless.
I was lying in a bed inside a room almost completely made of marble. The high ceilings were decorated with plates of it, the table was made of it, even the floor was set in brown marble, covered in very expensive looking carpets here and there. The TV across the mantel by my side said this was the living room—and I was indeed lying on a couch. I smelled like shit, worse than a Manhattan alley, but I was alone. My body seemed to work normally, not a part of it numb, but every part of it aching. The pain wasn’t intense, or I didn’t let myself focus on it while I took in my surroundings. My vest was no longer on me, and my shoes were off, too. Standing up, I had to hold onto the couch for a second to keep from losing my balance. I could hear chatter coming from the other side of the building, and it didn’t sound like screaming. Which could only mean that we had arrived at our destination safe and sound. The ECU hadn’t caught us.
The other side was another living room, this one even fancier. It had shelves in the wall and a shining black piano in the very middle. Behind the piano, the floor to ceiling glass doors were open. Outside, under a large oak tree, a lot of people sat on the slightly overgrown grass.
It was them. The witches. The kidnapped witches we’d saved.
My heart grew to the size of a mountain. They looked so—
“They look good, don’t they?”
I jumped at the sound of Elisa’s voice. She was coming toward me with a large glass full of ice cubes in her hands, smiling brightly. There was no sign of the fight anywhere on her, and she was showered and dressed in new clothing.
“Holy cow, we made it,” I whispered to myself, looking down at the dragon around my bloody, dirty hand.
“We sure did,” Elisa confirmed.
“The ECU?”
“They’re still searching for us. This place is a thousand times more protected than mine,” she said, moving her index finger in a circle. That’s when I noticed the cameras—three at every corner of the room.
“Are they working?”
“Yep, but they’ve been modified a bit.” Elisa grinned. “And the spells are in place. We’ve been here for almost a day now, so I think we’ll be safe.”
“A day?!” She was right. The sun was about to set already.
“I told you those adrenaline shots were going to get to you.”
She did tell me that, but it had been worth it. In the end, all of it had been worth it. We’d gone against all possible odds, and we were still alive. It was a miracle, and nobody could deny it.
“Are they okay?” I asked Elisa turning to the others again.
“Not yet, but they will be. Nobody died, so that’s worth celebrating.” She showed me the glass full of ice.
“Is that what you’re doing? You’re celebrating?” I wanted some part of that, too. But I wasn’t sure if this was the right time.
“We are,” Elisa said. “Come on.”
“Hold on, hold on. Eddie mentioned a summer house. They’re out there in the open for everyone to see.” If the right passersby heard even a word, all of this would have been for nothing.
“There’s nothing around us for miles. This place is amazing,” Elisa said, waving her hand around. “Relax, just for a little while. We’re going back to reality soon, anyway.” With that, she left me to go to the others.
For a second, I felt like I was about to walk into the Academy for Troubled Witches in Washington all over again. Taking in a deep breath, I promised myself that I wouldn’t blow it this time the way I had then, and I went to meet them.
They sat on four blankets on the ground, eating and talking, some even laughing. They didn’t look at me funny when I approached. All they had to show for me were smiles. It was as amazing to sit among them as it was terrifying. I didn’t know these people, and they didn’t know me, but the universe had brought us together, had intertwined our lives in a way we had yet to understand, and they were…eating. My stomach growled.
“Where did you get these?” Wrapped sandwiches, lots of fruit, a couple large bags of snacks, and lots of chocolate.
“I got them,” Elisa said, distributing the ice in her glass to four other plastic cups.
My breath caught in my throat. “You went out?”
“I did.” She didn’t even sound concerned.
“Elisa, what the—”
“Before you freak out, I had to. It was either buying food, or starving. And you should eat, too. Grab a sandwich before they’re all gone.”
“When did that happen? Did somebody see you?”
She shook her head. “Nope. It’s been eight hours, and we’re still here.”
Letting go of my breath, I ordered my thoughts to calm down. She was right, they had to eat. The condition we found these people in…
Looking at them now, they were all clean. And in new clothes. Very good clothes, too. They were still pale, and still very thin, but they looked considerably better, not just broken versions of their true selves. I turned to Elisa.
“All the shops in this place are expensive as fuck,” she said with a grin. “I couldn’t find anything cheap to save my life. Just don’t have a heart attack when you see what I had to spend.”
Oh, no. All our money! But… “Did you get me something new, too?”
“Oh, yes.” She probably knew that was going to save her. What more could I say? I would have paid a lot of money to change from the clothes I was wearing, too. Eddie didn’t exactly care if the grey shirt he gave me would fit me, or the black pants I had to tie tightly around my waist so they wouldn’t fall off. “Okay, so, let me introduce you to everyone.”
And she did. Twenty-seven people were around me, all of them watching me, analyzing me inch by inch. I hadn’t had that kind of at
tention on me since the Academy, but this time, the witches weren’t judging me. They were just curious.
“What’s that thing?” the guy with dark skin asked. His name was Franky, if I remembered correctly. There was just so many of them!
Franky was looking at the dragon, and so was everybody else. Fear and excitement both rolled in waves off them, making me want to put my hand behind my back.
“It’s a weapon.” One that was slowly killing me, but they didn’t need to know that.
“It was…it was…it killed them,” a girl said. She’d been with Franky and the other three who’d thrown fire at the demons in the hospital. They’d saved our lives.
“It did. It does. It’s….complicated.” I wasn’t about to tell them what the dragon really was because I didn’t want them even more freaked out.
“I don’t care what it is. As long as it kills those people, it’s the best thing to have ever existed,” Franky said, excitement dripping from his words.
“Thank you for saving us,” the youngest of them all said. Maddy was her name. She couldn’t be older than fifteen.
“Hey, don’t mention it.” My cheeks suddenly felt like they were on fire. “You saved us, too. I had no idea fire hurt the demons.” Did the ECU even know this?
“It doesn’t really hurt them. They just don’t like it. It makes them angry. Distracts them,” Franky informed me.
“Oh, and thank you for giving us a name!” Maddy said, not interested in hearing more about demons, apparently. Who could blame her? Her smile was so innocent, it made me mad to think about all she’d been through at such a young age. “It’s so much better than Dirt.” They all agreed, laughed, and high-fived each other.
Mortified, I lowered my head. “I didn’t give us the name.” Had I been out of my mind sharing that name with the rest of them? Possible, considering all the wounds I’d attained in the fight.
“So who did?” This came from a very confused Elisa. I bit my tongue hard enough to draw out blood. I shouldn’t have said that, either.
“What’s going to happen next?” a man asked. I could have kissed him for speaking before I had to. “I’m not going back to the ECU. They’re almost as bad as the suckers.”
“We’re going to lay low for a while. Hide here for another day until we find another place to go.” Which was going to be a bigger issue than I’d realized, because twenty-seven people was a lot.
“But we won’t get separated,” Franky said. “Right?”
“Depends on our options,” Elisa said reluctantly.
“We’re sticking together,” a girl said. “We’re weak as it is. I don’t want anybody killing us after everything.”
“Nobody’s going to kill us, Tanya,” Franky said.
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. Tell me, how many of you know how to block your powers?” I asked halfheartedly. Six hands rose up. “How many know how to fight hand-to-hand?” Two hands rose up, Franky and another girl with ginger hair and big, blue eyes.
“Looks like we have a lot of work to do,” Elisa whispered. She was right.
“What does that mean?” Maddy asked.
“It means you’re going to have to learn how to fight.” I racked my brain for anything that could help us teach these witches how to defend themselves faster, but I came up short. It had taken me two years of training, six days a week, and I still wasn’t where I wanted to be. How long was it going to take them?
“What about our magic? Can we use it?” Tanya asked.
“No!” I said, way too fast. “Do not use your magic. The ECU can find you even if you don’t, and if you do, the demons will be after you, too.”
“But that’s all we have,” Franky said. “There has to be a way.”
“For now, there isn’t. We have no idea what’s going on with the world, but it’s changing. We are proof of that. Let’s just figure out a way to stay alive first. We can deal with everything else as long as we’re still breathing.”
Franky was right, there had to be a way for us to use our magic freely, but safety came first.
“So where are going to go?” Maddy said. “Can’t we stay here?”
“No. We’re, uh…renting this place for a couple days only. Is it okay if I ask how many of you have homes? Someplace to go to?” Seven people rose their hands, Maddy included. “How many of you were thrown out?” It was sad to have to ask that, but when I did, eleven people raised their hands. My heart broke some more. “How many of you left on your own?” My voice was dry at this point, hurting my throat. Nine hands rose up.
So we only had seven people who had homes they could go back to.
“They got another two,” Elisa said. “Two more witches dead.” I raised my brows at her. She wanted to tell me this in front of them? “They deserve to know what they’re up against.” She might have been right, but those witches, some of them still just kids, deserved to be spared for a day, at least.
“We already know that,” the guy with the wide shoulders said. His name was Cade and he was the biggest among us. “We know what the ECU can do. What we don’t know is what we can do.”
“We do know what we can do,” Franky said, but Cade shook his head.
“I’ve spent my whole life hiding my powers.” He was one of the nine who’d chosen to walk away from home, just like I had. “My family, my friends had no idea about who I truly was, but I didn’t, either. All I did was hide. I never got the chance to explore what my magic was truly capable of.”
“You make a very good point,” I said. I doubted any of us ever tested the limits of our magic. “How well protected is this place?” I asked Elisa. Her flinch said it all.
“I wouldn’t risk it.” I wouldn’t, either. There would come a time for testing, just as soon as we no longer feared for our lives.
“Do you have a plan?” Tanya asked us.
“We did have a plan to get you out of that place.” Elisa laughed. “We never actually thought we’d get to this point.”
A sad smile took over my face. “And we couldn’t have done it without you.” The five of them who’d come to our rescue by throwing things on fire at the demons had made all the difference. Without them, we wouldn’t be here.
“It’s why we need to stick together, no matter what,” Tanya said. She looked the same age as me, which reminded me: “Do you mind telling me how old you all are?”
They did. Most were from eighteen to twenty. Only Maddy was fifteen. Tanya, Frank, Cade, and two others, Jessica and Vince, were twenty-one. Jessica was the oldest—still two months younger than me. My stomach rolled again but it had nothing to do with anger. It had everything to do with the green-eyed man, who’d called me the first Storm witch. Could it really be that I was the firstborn of this madness?
“Let’s talk about the places we’ve been to. The places we’ve seen. There has to be something big enough for us to live in,” Franky said, and they all jumped at it. I nodded at Elisa and stood up, desperate for some time alone, and for a shower. She followed me inside the house and showed me to the bathroom, which was white and gold, terribly similar to the one in my parents’ house. I couldn’t wait to get out of it already.
“Why are you always asking for people’s ages?” Elisa said as she handed me a plastic bag with my clothes.
“Just out of curiosity,” I mumbled then quickly changed the subject. “I need to talk to Eddie. Do you have a way to reach him?”
Elisa nodded. “His people left me a disposable phone.”
With a sigh, I rubbed my eyes. My head was starting to ache, too. “We should have thought this through more.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself. We had no idea we’d make it out of there alive.” She closed the toilet lid and sat on it.
“What are you doing?” Confused, I stopped unzipping my pants.
“I’m not leaving you alone. That thing’s still on you.” She nodded at the dragon.
Holy cow, I’d forgotten all about its nasty habit of making me p
ass out. After all the excitement of meeting everyone downstairs, I hadn’t felt like hitting the ground yet, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t happen. Turning my back to Elisa, I quickly stripped off my clothes and walked into the shower.
“I’m going to ask Eddie for one last favor before I let him take this off me,” I said to Elisa, and that made my heart beat triple, because I already knew that the dragon couldn’t be removed from me for as long as I lived. I was just going to have to accept that.
“Another place to stay?” Elisa asked.
“No, protection. We’ll find a place, but we need to protect it.”
“I’ll help as much as I can.”
“Or you could just leave. Right now.” Not that I wanted her to—far from it, but she’d done what she thought she owed. She’d helped me save the witches. She no longer had any obligation to stick around.
“You’d be lost without me,” she said, trying to joke. “I’ve got a dark magic spell I’ve never used before. It’s supposed to alter the appearance of everything it touches.”
“I heard you chanting dark magic at the hospital,” I said, raising my voice so she could hear me over the pouring water. I tried to avoid looking at her, and instead, my eyes fell on the large mirror behind the bathtub, which was right across the shower, a step above the ground. The water kept pouring down my body, but it refused to wash away all the dirt and blood on me.
“Yeah…” Elisa whispered. She didn’t seem to like that fact.
“You did what you had to do,” I reassured her, rubbing my skin, but the blood and dirt still wasn’t coming off.
And the pain made me realize that the water did nothing because it wasn’t dirt and blood. It was bruises. They were all over my body, most on my arms and back, my ribs, my legs…I’d never seen myself in such a condition. It positively terrified me.
“The spell I’m talking about alters appearances, but you can never know what people see when they look at it,” Elisa continued, calling me to the present. Turning my back to the mirror, I continued to rinse my hair. There was no point in counting my wounds now, or to wonder why they hadn’t healed yet. Bruises like that should have turned yellow in a day. Instead, they were blue and purple and green, as if I’d just acquired them.
