Page 3 of The Witch and His Crow

The song of chaos continued.

I could hear my mother, calling out with a voice that oozed power and control. ‘I call upon the elements, air, earth, fire?—.’

I gagged on my cry as her song was silenced. My hearing stretched out, desperate to hear her say something else…to prove that she was ok. I preferred the sound of her struggling to the silence.

Noise proved she still lived.

It could have been minutes the struggle went on, or hours. All the while I was forced to listen to my parent’s struggle, blinded by a shadow beast that held me in place. When that dreaded silence finally came, I wept harder than I had before. I waited for mother to come and get me, for father to reach into the shadows and pull me out.

No one came.

‘It is not a common sight to see a witch kneel.’ The voice that spoke was strange to me. Not as deep as my fathers, slightly huskier as though smoke filled his lungs or stones his throat. ‘Take it in, my son. Do you see the monster?’

I know the person was not speaking to me. No one knew I was here, lurking in the darkness. If only I could see beyond the shadows, if only I could make out who the person was and who he spoke to.

‘Yes, father.’

My ears pricked at the sound of the lighter voice. It was higher in pitch, like mine. I conjured the image of a child not much older than me, someone I could have played alongside at school or in the park. Except they sounded…sad.

I knew the feeling. I shared it with them.

‘Here, take it and prove yourself useful.’ The older voice said. ‘Show me you can do your duty.’

‘But… but it won’t kill her.’

Killher. Mother. The child had to be talking about my mother.

‘No, my son, but it will hurt. It will cause the demon pain. Agony. Torment. It will award her a fraction of the evil that her kind has given us. Look at her, see into her eyes.’

‘I’m looking, father.’

‘And what do you see?’

A pause, broken only by a slight sniffle. ‘A monster.’

‘And what do we do to monsters, my boy?’

‘Hunt them.’

‘Yes, we do. Hunters by blood. Now…’ The voice grew quieter for a moment, as though the adult was leaning down and whispering into the younger child’s ear. ‘Punish her for existing in our world, for tainting it with the monster she harbours. Then we shall burn her, cleanse her body and soul, and free her back to the pits of hell she came from.’

My heart lodged in my throat, far enough up that I couldn’t breathe between it and the feathers suffocating me. I clawed at them, prying them free, wishing for just a chance to see my mother, to prove that they were speaking of another person instead, and not her.

‘Kill me,’ my mother snapped. Relief that she still lived was followed by the horror that her life was endangered. ‘But you will not have access to what you desire, Tomin.’

Footsteps were followed by a gasp from my mother. I couldn’t see what the man was doing to her, but the pain in her voice was clear as day. ‘If you didn’t poison yourself, you would be able to stop us. Give it to me, and I will spare you.’

‘No,’ came my mother’s defiant cry. It cut over the room, silencing Tomin.

‘Then you are of no use to me.’

What followed was a final command. ‘Do it. Kill her.’

That froze me. I clapped my hands over my ears, longing to block out the sounds. But what I heard next was loud and demanding. Over and over, the thudding of metal against flesh.Thud. Thud. Thud.I could hear a child crying, and I knew it wasn’t me. The thudding didn’t stop until long after my mother ceased making sounds. When it did, the child’s crying continued. It wasn’t me, although tears were streaking down my face. It came from beyond the shadows, deep in the belly of my living room, with its rich navy-painted walls and polished dark-oak floors.

A floor likely puddled with blood.

‘Well done, my son.’ The deeper voice worked into me, burying deep into my bones. Tomin. That was what my mother had called him. Only repeating that name over and over in my mind could cut through thethud,thud,thudof metal biting into flesh.

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