Witch Born

by Amber Argyle

  Senna shook her head in disbelief. She had lit up before she left to ride the winds? “Am I dead?”

  “You are more than dead. You are transformed. You have been judged worthy to become a Creator.” Lilette took her hand and suddenly they were in a castle made of stone that seemed to have grown from the earth. Intricate stone branches and leaves climbed the walls.

  Senna placed her palm on a stone plant. It was warm, thrumming with song. “It’s alive,” she breathed.

  “More alive,” Lilette corrected. “We woke it up. As a Creator, you can do the same. Build your own worlds and populate them with your people. Or stay here with us and keep this world beautiful.”

  Senna couldn’t begin to comprehend the enormity of Lilette’s offer.

  “Come. I have something to show you.”

  Trailing after her, Senna ran her fingers along a vine so intricate she felt the tiny veins. Stars grew out of the ceiling, diamonds and sapphires glittering from their centers. Lilette stepped out onto a garden balcony and pulled apart some of the branches to reveal a small pool with water as clear as the finest glass.

  “See for yourself.”

  Senna moved to the edge and leaned over to look at her reflection. What she saw shocked her to stillness. Shining like polished gold, her hair flared like flames around her head. Her dress shifted with the blood orange of coals, and her skin shimmered.

  Hesitantly, she touched the fabric of her dress. Her hands sank into fire and ashes. It wasn’t fabric at all, but real fire. It felt pleasantly warm and full of power.

  “Let your aura go,” Lilette whispered.

  The sweet seduction in Lilette’s voice made it easy to obey. Senna relaxed. Light flared from her skin. It curled at the edges, a delicate filigree of song made visible. “I’m a Sunlight Creator.” A God with the power of creation in her body.

  Lilette laughed. “That’s why I’m here with you and not one of the others. You shall be my Apprentice.”

  Senna had trouble forming coherent thoughts. “But I never chose my Discipline.”

  Lilette tipped her face toward the light that drenched everything in gold. “Sunlight chose you. It has been fusing with you ever since my lips touched yours. The process of transforming a mortal into a Creator must be slow and steady so as not to overwhelm your weak flesh—though you’ve no doubt noted that at times the power flared more strongly than others.”

  When Senna had heard the Four Sisters’ songs for the first time. When she’d sung her own circles. When she’d nearly lit the Caldashan boat on fire. And finally, when she’d moved the island.

  Lilette took a deep breath. “And so I will offer you the same choice that was once mine. Spare yourself the pain and hurt of mortality. Come with us and dance on the wind, sleep deep in the earth, swim in the seas, and grow gardens of such beauty as to make mankind weep.”

  Senna closed her eyes and felt the music strumming inside her. Joy sang through her, but there was also a hard kernel of sadness. Her mother, truly alone in the world. “You left your Witches behind,” Senna said. “They needed you.”

  Lilette inclined her head. “Yes. After I moved them, I created a barrier so Haven could do no more harm. I hoped that with time, they could become something better. When I met you, I thought perhaps you could bring them together. Apparently, that was not to be.”

  “So I failed.”

  Lilette smiled gently. “No. They failed. Not you.”

  Senna stared up at the impossibly blue sky. “Why did you stay?”

  “My love was here. It made the decision easy.”

  Senna closed her eyes. Joshen—she’d tried to save him, but what chance did that little boat have? And there were others. Cord. Her father and sister. “Can I see them?”

  Lilette gestured gracefully beyond the balcony. Senna stepped closer. Below was an entire city made of the same living stone. Trees and flowers and plants mixed among them like old friends. And there were people. Hundreds of them.

  “It would not, I think, be right for you to meet your father and sister. A brief moment would be cruel—unless of course you chose to stay. But there is another.”

  Senna turned at the sound of footsteps. Cord smiled at her, more beautiful than she’d ever seen him. With a cry of joy she ran to him and hugged him hard. In wonder, she felt the wholeness where his wound had been.

  He reached out and lightly touched her healed hip. “Such things don’t come with us.”

  Senna turned to Lilette. “What about Joshen? And Reden? Where are they?”

  Lilette’s brows dropped down. “They aren’t here.”

  Confusion and uncertainty welled inside Senna’s breast. “But surely they didn’t survive. That wave was taller than any mountain I’ve ever seen. ”

  “They have not passed from the mortal world.”

  Senna didn’t know whether she felt relieved or horrified. “Why did Grendi let me think she had killed them?”

  Lilette’s face hardened. “What better way to wound your Guardians than to force them to watch you suffer? What better way to hurt you than to let you think them dead?” Senna tried to imagine Joshen watching her at the mizzen mast for nearly three days, while she thought he was dead. And him unable to tell her differently.

  She took a measure of comfort from Cord’s solid presence beside her.

  “Grendi does not have a place waiting for her here.” Lilette fingered a bright blue flower. Yellow pollen stuck to her finger. “I knew love during mortality, and I watched him die. So my decision was not hard to make.” She sighed. “You could wait for Joshen. We do not feel time the way mankind does. It will seem a matter of days, not decades. If he is worthy, he will join the Guardians after his death, safeguarding the souls of those who have earned a life in our everlasting gardens.”

  Cord took her hand. “Stay with me?”

  Tears filled her eyes. Cord brushed them off her cheeks and stared at the gold on his fingertips. “Even your tears are filled with songs.”

  She saw her future unfold with Cord. No pain or sorrow. Joshen would eventually move on. He would be happy again—he wasn’t the kind of person to stay sad for long. “Isn’t there still a chance I could save them?”

  “If you return, it will be to your battered body. The power of a Creator will fade quickly, leaving you with little more than your own song.” Lilette pursed her lips. “We whispered warnings to the Keepers through you. And for it, they banished you. They are not worthy of more chances.”

  Senna remembered all the hurt and pain the Keepers had caused her. But there were kindnesses, too. Gentle nudges and laughter.

  Lilette walked to a climbing vine and picked a white flower growing along its base. “You would give up all this beauty and peace to go back to them who hate you?”

  Senna hesitated.

  Cord tucked her hair behind her ear. “Is it Joshen?” He didn’t seem angry, just sad.

  Senna looked up at him, her eyes imploring. “Not just him. There’s my mother, too, and the others.

  “You needn’t fear for the world’s coming death, Brusenna. It is merely a change for the better. The Witches will not end. Those who have earned their place will come here. Those who do not will go somewhere else.”

  Senna’s sorrow was like a slow burning coal in her chest. “But it would mean decades of slow decay. What kind of life will they live until then?”

  Lilette didn’t answer.

  Senna took a deep breath. “I have to go back.”

  Lilette sighed as she tucked the flowers she’d gathered behind Senna’s ear. “You have made your decision. Very well.”

  Cord studied her, his brow furrowed. Bending down, he pressed a kiss to her forehead—just as she’d done for him as he lay dying. “I will tell your father and sister stories of you.” He cradled her cheek and smiled as if he understood and it didn’t pain him. Then he turned and left, walking with a light step until he disappeared through the garden.

  Lilette reached out and placed so
mething solid in Senna’s palm. “I believe this is yours.”

  Senna stared at her complete moon pendant. The cord was gone, but other than that, it was perfect. The last time she’d seen it, Grendi has used it to find her. A wave of relief tumbled over her. “You made this a long time ago, didn’t you?”

  Lilette nodded. “So that my Guardian and I would always be able to find each other. Until he went where the pendant could not follow, but I could.” She sang softly.

  Senna watched in awe as a chain of gold grew through the loop.

  Smiling, Lilette reached forward and snapped out the waning gibbous. “Joshen can still use the other half.” Pushing the gibbous back in place, she gently clasped the chain around Senna’s throat. It felt warm and familiar.

  “It’s so beautiful. Thank you.” Senna fingered the waning gibbous that had been Joshen’s. In addition to her ring, it was the closest connection she had to him. “But Joshen doesn’t have his piece anymore. How will he find me?”

  Lilette looked sad. “He’ll have to use his wits, just like everyone else who is lost.”

  Senna was silent for a time. “How will I find the Witches?”

  “I will take you. But remember, time moves differently here. Four days have passed. The Tartens and Caldashans have already crossed the ocean and resumed their attack on Haven. They’ve nearly breached the last of the island’s defenses.”

  Lilette wrapped her arms around Senna’s neck. The Creator’s aura flared a blinding white. When the light faded, Senna found herself aloft in the sky. Lilette was withdrawing and fading. But she wasn’t alone. A tall, masculine shape moved beside her, and they were holding hands.

  Her Guardian. Lilette had followed him in death, while Senna had returned from it to find Joshen.

  Below her was Tarten. Men were locked in a pitched battle; smoke was thick and acrid in her throat. Ships rose and fell on an angry sea. But they were looking up at her now, their faces slack with wonder.

  Senna shone like the sun, her dress the orange red of glowing embers, her hair flaring around her like flame.

  She caught the sight of green dresses. Witches. She saw into their hearts. They had abused the power given to them. Instead of harmony, they had sought discord and chaos. They’d proven themselves unable to bear the burden placed upon them.

  She listened to the music all around her. The muted hum of brass, the high cry of the strings, the thrumming of the drums, and the confused chaos of the woodwinds.

  Senna sensed the pain waiting for her at the end of her songs, but there was no time to dwell on it. Power rapidly leaked out of her. She would need every last drop of the energy still strumming through her to accomplish her task.

  She let her aura flare. She sang and the Four Sisters went silent. She pulled a cord of music here, changed a note there.

  Slowly, the Four Sisters’ melody melded to hers until every sound, every pitch blended together into a symphony of might. Senna set the boundaries of the climate, creating self-contained orchestras of sound.

  When she was finished, the sound of the rich music all around her had wilted like a frostbitten bloom.

  She had taken the Keepers’ ability to control the climate and returned it to the Four Sisters. She knew the price of her song—hurricanes, floods, earth tremors, hard winters, and inadequate summers. From now on, Witches would be able to curb the weather, but not rule it. They would be able to stir the earth, but not rend it. Shift the waters, but not lift them. She left them the ability to control the plants.

  That done, her song shifted to Tarten. She restored every plant, every flower beyond the lands she had already healed with Lilette. As she sang, her aura faded, and her immortality and immeasurable power diminished, slipping from her body like water from cupped hands.

  Pain came in her power’s wake—a deep ache in her hip that spread down her leg and up her side.

  She sagged, her strength nearly spent. She was almost mortal again. The music that had become such a part of her had gone silent. She felt empty, spent like a guttered candle. She spoke to those watching her. “Why? Why were you not as you were meant to be? Songs meant to protect were used for destruction and gain. And so I have bridled much of your power, and all the world will suffer for it. But no more than the suffering you’ve already caused. And perhaps you will one day be worthy for that power to be restored.”

  She flicked her wrist and waves rose up, carrying the Tarten ships away. Then she called upon the wind to carry a single figure toward her. Grendi. Though weak, Senna was still a Creator. She looked into the woman’s heart and saw hatred and malice like a hard chunk of tar. Grendi’s veins ran with it. And there was more.

  Senna’s eyes widened. “You are a Witch.”

  Grendi flinched as if she’d been slapped.

  Senna read the woman’s soul like a diviner reads tea leaves. “A witch with no power—a Wastrel who watched her sisters and mother bend the world to their will while you stood in the shadows, powerless and alone.”

  “They were an abomination! A scourge I vowed to exterminate!”

  Senna winced in disgust. Grendi had aided Espen in her hunt to imprison the Witches. When their plot failed, she’d tried to slaughter them. She would have succeeded if the Witches hadn’t razed the city and cursed Tarten.

  Then, instead of using Tarten’s dwindling resources to evacuate her people from their dying lands, Grendi had plotted Haven’s destruction.

  “You will never stop, no matter the cost.” Senna loathed the words she knew must come. “The world cannot survive your hatred.”

  She sent Grendi back to the ground, where she sang Bindweed around her. Swathed inside a cocoon prison, the woman would be unable to escape or be freed by anyone but Senna.

  The power Senna had left was so little—a drop in the vast ocean she’d once held. All that remained was the agony. Blood dripped down her leg. She felt the fever robbing her of health and strength, the infection poisoning her blood.

  Perhaps she would be returning to the Creators sooner than she thought.

  Steeling herself, she dedicated the land to the Witches.

  City of Witches—Ashfall

  To all who need healing, we call

  Potions or plants to end a drought,

  Purchase wind to secure a trade route.

  Then she directed her power at Haven.

  Wastrel or power abounding

  All have a place, all bear power resounding.

  The last of a Creator’s power slipped from Senna. She was a Witch now, as before, one exhausted beyond any mortal’s endurance. The pain in her body was a dark pit of fire and burning.

  Burning.

  Blackness invaded her vision. The symphony she’d sung slowly faded to echoing silence. The wind lost its direction. She was falling.

  Falling.

  Falling.

  Hundreds of Witches joined together in song.

  The wind roared to life under Senna, catching the edges of the dress that had gone out like a spent coal, and cradling her as she drifted down.

  Down.

  Down.

  Down

  Only partially conscious, she was aware of the dozens of hands that reached out to bear her gently to the ground. Then she remembered no more.

  36. Ashfall

  Golden sunlight drenched the city. A playful breeze lifted Senna’s hair and sent gooseflesh down her back as she looked out over Ashfall. Her memory of her time spent with the Creators was dreamlike and distant. It was hard to imagine that she’d created self-contained orchestras of sound in so little time, that it had been four months since she’d fallen from the sky.

  She sat in the garden balcony at the center of the tree palace that rested at the top of one of the domed mountains. The Witches had connected the trees with branch bridges. Vines and flowers ran along every border. At each corner of the magnificent grove were four enormous single trees—one for each Discipline—built to honor either Plants, Water, Sunlight, or Earth.

>   Perhaps it was a poor copy of Lilette’s palace of living stone, but it was still the most beautiful this world had ever seen.

  From there, the yet-to-be-built city was divided into quarters dedicated to one of the Disciplines. Each would someday be paved with mosaics—some of sunbursts, some of trees, some of gusting winds, and some of great mountains. Even now, Guardians were laying patterns of stones to form the streets.

  Everywhere was the sound of Witch song as the Keepers grew tree houses for shops and homes. All their songs also happened to nourish the rest of the plant life.

  Trees and flowers burst to life everywhere, filling the air with their sweet fragrances.

  Senna rested at the pinnacle, in a tree that was the highest part of the city. The balcony opened to all four directions, letting the wind through as she strained to hear the slightest hint of music from the four corners of the world. But the world echoed with a resounding silence.

  “They’re here to see you. Do you wish me to show them in?”

  Senna shifted to see her mother watching her. “Yes, thank you.”

  Instead of summoning them, her mother came forward to take Senna’s hand. “Don’t look so sad.”

  Senna stared at their intertwined fingers. So much to forgive, by both of them. But they were trying, and they had something neither had felt in a long time: hope that they could begin again.

  “It’s just hard to adjust,” Senna replied. To being mortal again, to losing most of her precious connection to the music, to living in a world that was a mere shadow of the one beyond. One where, even surrounded by people, she was alone. And then there was the constant pain. It was bearable now, but the damage was permanent. She would never walk without a cane.

  Her mother’s eyes softened with understanding. “You made a great sacrifice coming back for the Witches, coming back for me.” When Senna didn’t answer, her mother whispered, “Don’t give up on him yet.”

  For four months, Senna had been left to wonder what had happened to Joshen. The price was so high that she still questioned whether it had been worth it, whether she should have stayed with the Creators. “I haven’t. Not yet.”