“Witch, no …”
“Let’s start with your parents. Natalie and Remoulade — you know about them, I’m sure — I heard you mention your grandmother as you sat by the fire last night. I also saw the book Jack gave you. Witches: A Master Slayer’s Comprehensive Guide. Written by a bloodthirsty old fool, but very accurate, really. Most other literature about White-hatching is pure fiction.”
Rapunzel vomited. She had eaten little recently, and there was not much to come up, so it stayed in her mouth until she swallowed again, shaking.
This was Witch.
“But I know a better game,” said Witch, and she crossed the tower to Rapunzel’s bedside more swiftly than anyone of her age should have been able to do. “I call it Bargaining. Shall we? No one has beaten me at it, but there is always beginner’s luck, so don’t despair. You may yet win.”
Rapunzel sank onto the bed again and looked up at her, speechless with sickness and fear.
Jack had warned her. They all had.
“Here is my bargain,” said Witch, looking down at her with eyes that Rapunzel no longer recognized. “Allow me to take your memories of the time since Glyph first visited this tower. In exchange, I will neither hurt nor kill your Jack.” Her grin widened, and Rapunzel could see that her teeth had rotted. They were yellow and black. “Do we have a deal?”
Rapunzel said nothing. She was numb.
“Cat got your tongue?” asked Witch. “Not feeling brave and bold any longer? I can hardly blame you. But I think you’ll find, as bargains go, that this one is quite fair. You’ll never know what happened. You’ll live a happy life. And Jack will go on with his, unhindered.”
Rapunzel looked down at the bronze ring that moved on her finger, circling and circling. Why it should have made her feel stronger, she had no idea. But it did. She kept her eyes on it.
“Your turn, Rapunzel,” said Witch in a singsong rasp. “Do you have a better bargain to offer me? I’m open to negotiating.”
Rapunzel stared at her ring, unmoving. “I need time to think,” she said.
“Go ahead,” said Witch, and she sat on the bed beside Rapunzel. “Think.”
Rapunzel stood and moved to the window. She touched the window wheel.
“Time alone,” she said. “I need to think on my own.”
“Oh no,” said Witch. “I can’t be that sporting, I’m afraid. You cannot be trusted on your own. That’s been made clear. Now, take your turn and offer me a bargain.” She paused. “Or agree to mine, and our lives will return to the easy state we enjoyed before you disobeyed me.”
Witch picked up Rapunzel’s dagger from where it had fallen and tucked it into the pocket of her cloak. Then she joined her at the window and laid her hand on the wheel, atop Rapunzel’s. Her aged fingers bent like claws.
“Will it be so awful?” she asked. “Was I ever unkind to you? Were you ever unhappy?”
Rapunzel watched as Witch’s gnarled thumb caressed the back of her hand.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t remember everything, do I?”
Witch patted her hand. “No,” she said. “You don’t. The bad things are gone. Let me take the memories of your journey — I know it could not have been pleasant. I know there must have been many dangers, many cruelties. If you would give them to me, you would be happy.”
Rapunzel looked into Witch’s eyes. “But I wouldn’t be me anymore,” she said, remembering Amelia’s words in the Woodmother. “I’d be empty.”
Witch’s fingers clenched.
“You’ve heard those words before,” Rapunzel whispered.
Witch stared at Rapunzel, her mouth working silently.
“Do you remember Amelia?” Rapunzel thought she saw pain flash in Witch’s eyes. “You do,” she pressed, watching Witch’s face as it paled and flushed. “You think about her. You miss her. Are you sorry that she died?”
Witch made a noise Rapunzel could not place. Anger, or anguish, or —
“Time to take your turn,” Witch snarled, gripping Rapunzel’s fingers. “You’ve had plenty of time to think, haven’t you? Take your turn — or accept my bargain.”
Rapunzel’s mind worked frantically, searching for a way out. If she didn’t agree to forget her journey, then Jack would be in danger. He was smart, and he was strong, but Witch had already hurt him once. And if she killed him now, not only would he die, but his sister would be taken to Geguul.
She couldn’t let it happen. She wouldn’t let it happen.
Witch knew she wouldn’t.
Rapunzel closed her eyes. She had to accept the bargain — and then she would know only this tower. This tower, and Witch. Forever.
She began to weep.
“There, there,” said Witch, keeping Rapunzel’s fingers tight in her grip. “It will all soon be over, when you say yes.”
“But …” Rapunzel stumbled on an idea. She opened her eyes and spoke through her tears. “Jack will come for me,” she said, certain she was right. “I won’t remember him, but he’ll come.”
“Perhaps he will,” said Witch, who did not look worried about it.
“Don’t you think he’ll try to get me to leave again?” asked Rapunzel.
Witch shrugged.
“If he does, you can’t touch him. If I agree to your bargain, you can’t hurt him —”
“I won’t hurt him. I will take extra precautions with you,” said Witch.
Extra precautions. Rapunzel’s insides went cold. What extra precautions could there be? She would already be trapped at the top of a tower, already lashed by her hair to a window wheel — what more would Witch do to her? Chain her up? Tell her that the chains were for her safety? Make her believe she wanted to wear them?
She yanked her hand away from Witch.
“How do I know you’ll keep your end of the bargain?” she demanded. “If I don’t remember Jack exists, then how can I make sure you aren’t lying?”
“A witch’s bargain cannot be broken,” said Witch, “or the witch forfeits to Geguul.”
“And that’s where the White Fairy turns you into a giant and keeps you forever,” Rapunzel said. “Isn’t it?”
Witch’s face fell. Rapunzel saw in it, with sudden clarity, the same vulnerable Witch she had seen in the Woodmother, weeping over Prince Phillip.
“Witch — tell me. Is that what will happen to you?”
“You don’t care if it does.”
“Of course I do.”
Witch laughed a harsh and bitter laugh. “No wonder I’m not dead,” she said. “Your innocence is indestructible. Now choose,” she said. “And know this: If you choose your freedom, Jack will be dead within the hour, and I will tell him, as he dies, that it was by your choice.”
“He’d understand,” Rapunzel said. “He’d be glad I was free.”
“Not if it cost him his life.”
Rapunzel shook her head. “You don’t know him,” she said. “And it doesn’t matter. I would never choose to let you kill him.”
“So you agree?” Witch cried. “Then accept!”
Rapunzel found herself looking again at the Woodmother’s bronze ring as it flowed around her finger. She had told the Woodmother that she would return here to stop Witch from doing this again. And she had failed. Witch would go on as she was, perhaps forever, as long as she could trick some father or mother into giving her their baby.
She wondered what had happened to Prince Phillip’s other child, Justice. She wondered how Witch had gotten Amelia in the first place. She wondered how many other children there had been. She wondered if Witch had ever eaten anybody. She wondered who Witch had killed.
She wondered a lot of things. She still wondered why. Why did Witch do this? Was it to stay young and alive? Was it because Phillip had hurt her? Was there something more she wanted?
“I want answers,” Rapunzel said, and looked up from her ring. “I have questions, Witch. I want answers to my questions before you take my memories away.”
“What do
es it matter if I answer your questions? You’ll only forget everything I tell you,” said Witch impatiently. “Say that you accept, Rapunzel. Do it now, or I warn you —”
“No. I want to change the bargain.”
Witch’s eyes narrowed to hazel slits. “Go on.”
“First, you leave Jack out of it — you never touch him, or his sister either. Never.”
“And second?”
“Second, you stay with me until tomorrow morning and give me honest answers to all of my questions. And you stop acting horrible — you stop trying to make me feel afraid. I want to sit with you, and listen to you, and hear everything from you. Not from the fairies, not from Purl, not even from Jack — from you.”
Witch lifted a white eyebrow. “And if I do those things?”
“And if you do those things, then I’ll …” Rapunzel forced the words out of her mouth. “I’ll let you take my memory,” she said.
“I accept,” breathed Witch. Her eyes lit up, her white hair began to thicken, and roses came into her wrinkled cheeks, as though the very idea of Rapunzel’s restored innocence had awakened new energy and power within her.
“Tomorrow morning,” she said, coming forward to take Rapunzel’s face in her hands. “At dawn. I will make your life so beautiful again, Rapunzel. You won’t be sorry.”
“I won’t know to be sorry,” said Rapunzel, but Witch did not seem to hear her. She hobbled rapturously around the room, bringing the bath to a bubble, asking the harp to play, and making the fire burn. The tower came to life in the old, familiar ways, and Rapunzel watched it all with a sinking heart. Tomorrow, this would be her world again — her whole world. Forty paces across. One hundred twenty-five and a half paces around. In the morning, when the sun rose, the rest of Tyme would be her enemy again.
“Sit down, Witch,” she said. “I’m going to ask my questions now.”
“Very well.” Witch settled in the rocking chair by the fire and leaned back, smiling. “What do you want to know?”
Rapunzel stayed at the window and looked out at the sunlit Redlands. What did she want to know? There were so many questions. And there was no time to waste.
“Tell me about the memories you’ve taken,” she said. “What have I already forgotten?”
Witch nodded and began to speak.
The bargain was under way.
SINCE you were a baby, people have been coming to this tower.” Witch took the end of Rapunzel’s braid in her hands and began to untie it. “Some to free you, others to thrill themselves … It was easy to manage when you were a child. You were so frightened of the people on the ground that you would have nightmares when they came, and you would cry out to me and beg me to take away all the thoughts that made the nightmares. As you grew older, it became more complicated. But you were still fearful. You still preferred to forget.”
Her fingers pried at the knotted, dirty ribbon that tied Rapunzel’s braid together until she finally worked it loose. She unplaited the first few inches of tangled golden hair upon her lap.
“Don’t touch my hair,” said Rapunzel.
Witch raised an eyebrow. “Let me bathe it,” she said. “I’ll mend it.”
“No.” Rapunzel picked up her braid from the floor at her feet and gave it a sharp yank, pulling it from Witch’s reach. “You want to make it pretty so that when my memories are gone, you won’t have to explain why it’s all dirty and chopped up.” She flung it to her feet. “Too bad. I’m not taking off any of my fairy clothes either. That wasn’t part of our bargain. You’ll just have to deal with my questions about those things later.”
“So your clothes are fairy-made.” Witch sat back again in her chair. “You little liar …”
“Keep answering my question. I know that Prince Mick of Orange came, and Prince Dash of the Blue Kingdom.”
Witch nodded. “Yes. Both quite recently. You were growing older — a perfect target for romantic idealists.”
“And Nexus Keene? He said he tried to kill you, but he couldn’t.”
“No, he couldn’t.” Witch looked amused.
“Who else?” asked Rapunzel.
Witch shrugged. “Prince Aydan of Grey. Princess Histria of Crimson. Not long ago, Chieftain Fleet of the Redlands himself came to coax you down. But I had foreseen that you would have persuasive visitors. It is why I wrote your books and trained your mind to despise all those who would come here as rescuers.”
“It worked,” said Rapunzel, angered by her own gullibility, and angrier knowing that she would soon be gullible again.
Witch placed her hands on the arms of the chair and began to rock. Her hands looked older now, as though she had aged further in the last few minutes. Which, Rapunzel supposed, she had. Every word Witch spoke was another strike against Rapunzel’s innocence.
“What did you do to the people who came here?” asked Rapunzel.
“Nothing, usually.”
“Nothing? Then how did you make them go away?”
“The power of fear is remarkable,” said Witch. “You would ring your bell for me, and before I even arrived, the very threat of my coming would frighten your would-be rescuers so that they fled and never returned.” She gave a brief laugh. “Most of them, anyway. Nexus Keene stayed to fight. And Chieftain Fleet returned repeatedly — I had to punish his army to make him surrender. You were getting very difficult to manage.”
“Why?”
“Because you liked him better than the others. He is nearer your age.”
“Like Jack.”
“Ah, Jack.” Witch’s eyes narrowed. “The only one who ever climbed your tower with a rope and hook. The others were afraid, I suppose, that you would unhook them and let them fall. You did threaten to do it on several occasions.”
“Is that why you climb my hair?” asked Rapunzel. “And not a rope?”
“Yes,” said Witch. “I expected that a time would come when you knew too much and would not agree to unknow it. Under such circumstances, I would not want to climb a rope that you could easily detach. Your hair, on the other hand … You can’t get rid of me without getting rid of yourself in the bargain, can you?”
“I’d never detach a rope with you on it,” said Rapunzel.
“So you say. But people do unthinkable things when they are angry.”
Rapunzel considered this for a moment. “You said you didn’t usually do anything to the people who came here,” she said. “But you turned Prince Dash to stone.”
Witch paused in her rocking. “So I did,” she said. “So I did.”
“Why did you hurt him and not the others?” asked Rapunzel, and when Witch didn’t answer at once, she said, “Was it because he looked like Prince Phillip?”
Witch’s faint gasp was enough. Rapunzel knew she had struck truth.
“I suppose it was,” Witch said. “I didn’t think … But he looked so much …”
“They could be the same person,” Rapunzel finished.
“Phillip’s hair was more golden,” said Witch softly.
“Why did he leave you for that other woman?” Rapunzel asked. “What was wrong with you? Did he leave you because he could tell what you were really like?”
Witch flinched. “I …” Her eyes darted to the fire, and then to Rapunzel. “I don’t know.”
“Answer the question.”
“That is the answer,” said Witch. “Maybe he could tell. I don’t know.”
“Did you really love Phillip?”
“Yes.”
“Then why did you take his babies?”
Witch jerked. She wrung her withered hands. “The Woodmother showed you a great deal,” she said. “A very great deal.”
“Answer my question.”
“I took his children to punish him. To make him feel the helpless grief I felt.”
“You gave Valor back. But you kept the girl baby. Why?”
“Justice?” Witch shook her head. “I didn’t keep her for long.”
“Did you kill her? Did you eat h
er?”
Witch cried out in dismay. “No, I didn’t eat her,” she said. “I cared for her.”
“Because she gave you power?”
“Only my first taste of power. It was very brief. Phillip’s wife would not rest until the baby was returned. I was cornered when Justice was a few months old, and I had to let her go. But still that woman hunted me.” Witch’s eyes grew dark. “She pursued me like no other has pursued me since, and she had all the resources of the Blue Kingdom to help her do it. I spent nearly five decades in hiding after that foolish kidnapping. I paid the price — but so did she. So have her children, and her children’s children.”
“What do you mean?”
“I cursed that family,” said Witch. “Phillip’s sons, and the sons of his sons, have all been just like him.”
“Oh.” Rapunzel wasn’t sure she understood, but she had more pressing questions. “Who have you killed?” she demanded.
Witch gave a croak of amazement. “You ask so casually,” she said. “Doesn’t it hurt you to hear these things? Or has the world so hardened you already?”
“Of course it hurts me,” said Rapunzel. “You know it does. You’re growing weaker with every word you say to me. I can see it happening.”
And then it struck her that the bargain she’d made was a good one.
A remarkably good one.
If she asked Witch enough difficult questions and received enough terrible answers, then her innocence would be destroyed, and Witch would have no more power at all. Witch would wither away, and their bargain would die with her. This possibility seemed to occur to Witch at the same moment. A look of horror froze upon her face.
“No,” she said, meeting Rapunzel’s eyes. “No, don’t try it.”
“Who have you killed?” Rapunzel repeated. “Answer me now.”
Witch’s hands tightened on the arms of the rocking chair. “Chieftain Fleet’s parents — the old chieftain and chieftainess of the Redlands.”
“Why?”
“To create a distraction.”
“From what?”
“I needed the government and fairies of the Redlands preoccupied,” said Witch, “so that they would not notice when I planted my roses around the Red Glade and began to sink my magic into their clay.”
Grounded: The Adventures of Rapunzel Page 28
