Page 88 of Night of the Witch
And because I refused to take the bonding potion he brought. Because I didn’t let him use my powers and bleed me dry.
He was forced to abduct Liesel, to get her to ask the flames for another way to complete his goal.
“Liesel,” I whisper, swallowing against my closing throat. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry I let him get you. I’m sorry I led him to us.” I hiccup, a gag warping my voice, and I pinch my eyes against a rush of tears. “I’m sorry for everything.”
She wriggles against me and digs her fingers into my arm, squeezing hard. But she doesn’t speak. It’s too big, I know; it’s all toomuch, this day, this week, this month.
In a flash, she shoves away from me and glares at Otto. “Butwhyis his sister in the Well?”
Otto looks at me, the same question on his face. “The Well is in the Black Forest?” he clarifies.
My tears freeze on my cheeks. He glances at them, back up at me, and I see his hands flex where they have gone lax on his knees.
I press the heel of my palm to my forehead, and on a deep breath, I explain one of the greatest secrets of my people. How the goddesses blessed a coven of witches to protect the source of all our magic and hid it deep in the Black Forest. How witches have run there over the past years to escape the hexenjägers, but the journey is perilous, to cross so much of the Empire, but some have risked it, if only for the safety it offers.
And that had been my sole focus when I’d stumbled onto Hilde’s cottage. Finding Liesel, getting us to the Well. Tosafety.
That was the spell I cast on Hilde.
Protection.
“You sent my sister to the Black Forest,” Otto says when I’ve finished.
I can’t look at him. My eyes are on the forest’s undergrowth, the flame still burning at Liesel’s feet, kept alive by her grip on the magic. It warms this small clearing, but I don’t think I’d feel any cold even if there was no fire.
“And that’s where Fritzi and I are going too,” Liesel tells him, drawing her chin up defiantly. She looks at me. “That’s where Abnoba says we’ll be safe.”
“Abnoba? You keep mentioning her,” Otto questions.
I finally meet his eyes.
There’s no blame waiting for me there. No accusation. Just concern, patience, and somehow, that’s worse, that he’s able to still see us as somehow on equal footing after everything I’ve done.
Numb, I shrug. “Abnoba, the Crone. One of our goddesses. The protector of the wilds and life. Perchta, the Mother, is the overseer of rules and traditions. Holda, the Maid, is the goddess of death and winter. Abnoba blessed Liesel—she’s been watching over her all her life.”
Otto’s brows go up. Which part is surprising—that our goddesses speak to some of us? Or that we have more than one?
Liesel tugs on my sleeve. “Dieter can’t get us in the Well. She told me to come there. Without me or a connection to the Well, he’ll never figure out how to get past the wards. They were set up by the goddesses themselves.”
“Heisconnected to magic,” Otto presses. “We saw what he can do.”
“I told you, he isn’t like me,” I say. “He’s a witch, yes; but he severed his connection from the Well. The magic he uses instead is corrupting: wild magic. There is no one who oversees it, no one who controls it, soit allows him to do anything he wants. But to access it, he has to feed it evil acts.”
Or bond with another wild magic witch, and use her like a tapped keg he can refill and drain, refill and drain.
I shiver, pushing away the image.
“Evil like burning people?” Otto guesses. “So your brother is still a powerful witch, but his magic comes from an uncontrolled source that he can only access by slaughter. And my sister is currently in a hidden sanctuary in the Black Forest controlled by goddess-blessed witches who protect your source of magic.”
Liesel puckers her lips. “He’s not as dumb as he seems.”
“But even if we’re safe in the Well,” I say, “Dieter will still be out in the world, wreaking horrors on innocents. When we reach the Well, we have to hope they’re able to help us stop him. Somehow. This is so much worse than him just being murderous.” Dread shakes through me, that there evenissomething worse than the murder of innocents.
“His magic explains why he pushed for the mass burning.” Otto rubs his wrist, works his way up his forearm, massaging the muscles stiff from rowing. “He was going to use all the deaths to charge him with enough magic to break that barrier, with Liesel’s help.”
“Magic has been wrong lately,” I say. “Because he’s attacking the Well’s barrier. But,” I twist to Liesel. “Whydid Dieter want you to get him into the Well? What does he want with it?”
Liesel brushes her palms on her soiled skirts. “He kept saying he’ll get more. That little tricks like my pyroaugury would be child’s playafter.” She looks up at me, tears brimming her eyes, and my guilt turns into a beast of teeth and claws at how exhausted she is. We haven’t rested, she’s barely touched the rations I laid out for her, and here I am, forcing her to relive what he did to her.
