She turned on her heel and stalked out the door, still seething. Rather than go in the direction of her flat, she headed straight for the path to the mountains. While her visions of rattling Herr Lindworm around like a naughty puppy were mere happy fantasy, if nothing else she needed to speak to him sooner rather than later. His explanation was bound to be enlightening, and she hoped more useful than the two conversations she’d had thus far.
Her route took her through the main town square, where she found most of the townsfolk gathered for the double funeral. She slowed in her stalk, however, when she heard the shouting. Observing the expressions and behavior of the crowd, she saw they had more in common with a mob than those attended a solemn ceremony. The faces around her were angry, and the man who she had first thought was presiding was in fact waving a fist and yelling at the crowd, who were roaring back.
Slowing even more to try to catch what was being said, she realized there was a reason the bergermeister and his wife were hiding in their home rather than attending with the rest of the town. They featured as prominently as the monster as targets for the crowd’s anger.
This scene featured prominently in a hedgewitch’s worst nightmare; the terrors of the witch hunts of previous centuries had been passed down to every young generation in vivid detail in order to exhort the hearers to maintain the secret of their powers at all costs.
Knowing she was not the target of the mob’s wrath did little to help Frau Beck’s peace of mind. But it did bolster her determination to find Herr Lindworm as fast as she could, before this crowd did whatever it was they were working themselves up to do. To that end, she cast a spell of invisibility on herself and made for the mountain path at a mile-eating trot. Running would just tire her out, much as her nerves screamed at her to go faster, and she had no idea how far she needed to go.
She was less than an hour outside of town when her eye was caught by a flicker of unusual movement off the main path. She paused, and saw that another path, much more overgrown, led away from her feet and around a thick copse of pine trees. Some instinct told her to go investigate, and since she didn’t know what direction she should go, she decided it was better than nothing. She wished she’d thought to take something of Herr Lindworm’s—a scale, a claw clipping, something, because with it she could have used her magic to track him down. As it was, she was about as blind as anyone else searching the vast mountains.
The overgrown path led to the hollowed-out corpse of a stone cottage. The roof was gone, saplings reached to the sun from inside the walls, and green-brown moss stained the northern side, but it was large for a cottage so far removed from other people.
Frau Beck lifted her pack down from her back, set it down, and began rummaging through it until she found her small bag of predator-deterrent herb mixture. She hadn’t thought she would need it while she traveled to Bern, but images of a train breakdown had encouraged her to carry at least a little of it in case of emergencies. Shouldering her pack again, she started towards the cottage, the bag of herbs held loosely in one hand.
This time she was sure of the flicker of movement, glimpsed through the gaping, empty windows of the cottage, though Frau Beck couldn’t tell whether the cause was inside the cottage or behind it.
“Is anyone there?” she ventured, as loudly as she dared. If it was an ordinary animal, then her voice would probably cause it to take flight into the woods and she could continue her search elsewhere.
An enormous head peered around the cottage. “Wilhelmina? Is that you?”
“Herr Lindworm!” She sprinted forward, checking her first, irrational impulse, which was to fling her arms around him as far as they would go. Then she had to also check her second impulse of punching him on the nose. Her anger with him dissipated somewhat at how miserable he looked. Every part of his body language spoke sadness and defeat.
She stopped in front of him, reached forward and gently touched his snout midway between the nostrils. “Tell me what happened, from the beginning. I’ve heard from the townsfolk, and the bergermeister and his wife, and everything I hear has been…less than satisfactory. To say the least. I didn’t want to believe it. What did you do?”
She felt a dull ache begin in her chest as he explained how he had come into contact with the humans while waiting for her, his decision to demand a bride. As Frau Beck had suspected, the bergermeister had responded by dragging Kristina bodily to the meadow. Herr Lindworm had heard her screams and pleas for mercy long before they had come into sight.
“And then she took one look at me, and collapsed in a swoon. Nothing the bergermeister did could rouse her. Is she…dead?”
“Yes. She was already sick, and the exertion and the fright overcame her and likely stopped her heart. Her grandmother has also died; she was also frail and watching her granddaughter dragged away would have been too much.” Frau Beck wiped away the few tears that trickled down her cheeks. “Poor souls. I always did what I could for them, but they needed more help than I could give or that they were willing to accept from anyone.”
He shuddered under her hand. “I never meant…I didn’t mean…”
“I know.” And now she knew that he was well aware he had made a grievous, costly mistake. All of her practice pushing aside grief came to aid her now, though she knew that she, too, would feel some responsibility for the deaths for the rest of her life and that she would sorrow over them when there was time. She cleared her throat. “What we need now is a course of action. The townsfolk were getting ready to come hunting you as I left. I’m so glad I got here first.”
“What is there to be done?” he asked. “Did you find anything of use in Bern?”
“Nothing that came to hand immediately, though I might find something once I have a chance to go over everything that I copied.”
He drooped, if possible, even further. “Then I cannot leave, not if I want to be able to learn if you do discover anything. If I were to make my home far from here, you would have no means of contacting me again.”
“But you can’t stay! They’ll kill you. Perhaps I could make you invisible until this crisis has passed…” She trailed off.
“How long does your invisibility spell last?”
“I’d have to renew it every few hours.”
“You cannot. If you disappear into the mountains now, they might suspect you sympathize with the monster and come after you as well.”
“Then we have a conundrum.” Frau Beck slumped against the stone wall of the cottage. She took off her pack, and, at a loss for what else to do, began rummaging through it. Her fingers contacted the edge of her notebook, and she drew it out. Idly, she riffled through the pages. All of those days sneaking into the library, frantically taking notes, with so little to show for it.
She came to the last page with writing on it and her eyes scanned the strange spell without really seeing it. Then she read it again, more closely.
No. That is the worst idea you’ve had yet, and you’ve had some bad ideas in your time, she thought. Then she winced internally. But you’re out of good options. All that’s left are bad ones. And this. It’s risky, but if it worked—
“What is it?” Herr Lindworm had been watching her.
“I wouldn’t even consider offering this as a possibility if I had anything else. But this is the best I have. I’ll warn you right now that I have no idea if this will work. Even attempting it will be painful, and…”
“And?” he prompted when she was silent too long.
“And you’d have to trust me. You’d be wholly, completely in my power. No turning back. Knowing even I don’t know exactly what would happen.”
He eyed her warily. “Trust. No one has ever asked that of me before.”
“I’m sorry. If there were any other way, if there was anything else I thought could save you, I would urge that without hesitation. And the choice must be yours alone.”
“What, exactly, is this spell you speak of?”
“We’d hide you in plain sigh
t. And if it works, in the long run, you might be freer than you’ve ever been.” She explained the transformation spell. “It would give you another form, that you could take on whenever you needed to.”
-0-0-0-
Trust her.
What she offers is tempting. To have the form of another animal, one possibly not so large, that he could change into at will—she was right about the freedom it might give. He wouldn’t always have to fear human discovery, if he could become something other than a fifty-foot lizard in the blink of an eye.
And Wilhelmina is honest about the risks. The spell she described was designed so that it was impossible to know beforehand what kind of animal he might become. That alone is unnerving just to consider the sheer range of possibilities, from worm to whale, and the difficulties those might pose. He might also lose his ability to reason while in animal form. He might lose himself, and never be able to get back.
It might not work at all. She has never tried this spell, let alone performed it under such pressure. She claimed it was nothing like the spells she knew or had been taught, that it contained components she wasn’t sure were necessary for the spell’s success but dared not alter on the first attempt.
And if he is honest with himself, he still harbors a seed of doubt about her abilities. He has never seen her skills demonstrated, and the similarity to what he had smelled just moments after his birth was so fleeting he isn’t certain he can trust it. After all, the one spell she tried on him had not worked, and short of attempting something else innocuous there was no way to know whether hedgewitch magic would even affect a lindworm.
“How long will this spell of yours take?” he hears himself asking, even as his mind still whirls.
“All night, by the looks of it. There are several steps, and I will have to go back to my flat to fetch some of the required elements.” She glances down at the book in her hand again.
“And what is to prevent the townsfolk from discovering us in the meantime?”
“I can keep them away,” she asserts, her shrug evidence of an easy confidence he does not share. “I can create a barrier circle around this place, and they won’t be able to get in, nor see what goes on inside. It’s temporary, and I certainly couldn’t cast it over the whole of the Alps, which is why I didn’t suggest it earlier. It isn’t a long-term solution to keeping you safe. But one night, and in a contained space like this, I can do without question.”
“What about you going back to town?”
“Invisibility.” Again that shrug. “No one will know I was there.”
Trust. That is what it comes down to, isn’t it?
He looks at her, this sturdy, tiny human woman with graying hair, watching him anxiously. Waiting for his decision. She won’t force him, he senses. If he chooses to take his chances and disappear into the mountains, she will abide by it.
He hadn’t trusted her to do as she said she would. She went to Bern to do research on his behalf, had stayed away as long as she needed to be thorough, and his impatience got them into this.
This is bigger than when he had asked her to let him carry her to someplace unknown on his back, or to go straight up a cliff face, but it is the same kind of leap of faith. And while a few months ago he would have sworn he’d never trust a human with his life, he feels that with this human it might be possible.
“Draw your circle,” he says. He sucks in a deep breath, blows it out, and adds, “And do what you must. Cast the spell on me, tonight.”
Chapter 11
As Frau Beck had feared, Brig was nearly deserted when she arrived, though she passed no one on the path down from the mountains. The townsfolk were already spread throughout the hills, searching for the monster threatening them. Her invisibility spell was hardly necessary, but she felt better with it in place nonetheless. She only dropped it once entering her own still flat.
The quiet kept itching at her nerves, however. She had to make herself take several deep, calming breaths before laying her notebook out on the table with the page on which the spell was copied open. Then she began bustling around collecting everything the spell required. There would be quite a large load to be lugged back to the old cottage; Frau Beck was glad she spent so much of her time on her feet and working or she would have doubted her ability to carry it all.
The sun was just sinking behind the mountains when she left the outskirts of town, and the sky had darkened to pinkish-mauve when she reached the cottage again. The barrier she had set up to circle the cottage by about thirty yards meant that at first she didn’t see Herr Lindworm, but once she passed through the barrier (set so that only she could enter) he winked into existence, curled around the house so only his front and back ends were exposed. Only once she was inside did she drop the invisibility spell on herself. She was taking no chances.
Herr Lindworm raised his head sharply when he saw her. He blinked a few times, and then seemed to relax. “Do you have everything that you need?” he asked.
“I’m absolutely sure. I checked at least three times before I left the flat.” She set her pack down and began to remove everything, setting it all in a careful line in front of the cottage’s gaping, doorless entrance. “I would have preferred to do this inside the walls just for some wind protection, but you won’t fit.”
A grumble of thunder made them both look up. Dark clouds were indeed rolling in, just visible as the last of the daylight faded.
“Perfect,” grumbled Frau Beck. “Just what we needed: atmosphere. I might as well conjure up a cauldron and start chanting over it.”
Herr Lindworm actually laughed his huffing not-quite-human laugh at this.
“That reminds me, I need to build a fire.” She set about collecting deadwood and stoking up a good blaze. “It may not last once it starts to rain, but until then I’ll be glad of it.”
“I, too,” said Herr Lindworm, moving his head in close. “Is there anything I may to do to help?”
“No, but thank you. Now hush, I need to concentrate.” Going line by line, she started the spell. First she had to create a salve, which was rubbed all over seven thin, flexible birch branches. Then she began heating a metal wash bucket full of water mixed with ashes and more herbs. Jokes about witches and cauldrons aside, this was the largest implement she thought she could carry that could be used to hold liquid. She hoped it would be enough.
At first she was aware of the growing chilliness and strength of the breeze, of the oncoming clouds, the grumbles of thunder, and Herr Lindworm’s quiet regard. But eventually all of these things dropped away and her concentration focused only on flicking back and forth between what she was doing, and reading the page in her notebook. She barely felt the first drop of rain, though she did feel a distant gratitude when Herr Lindworm moved his big head over the book so it wouldn’t get wet and the ink wouldn’t run.
As she worked, she felt power begin to gather around her. This was normal for a complicated spell that took more than a few seconds to set up, though in her years as a hedgewitch she had noticed that no one other than a fellow hedgewitch could feel it. At least, she hoped the hum of energy in the air was the spell and not a gathering lightning strike. Since Herr Lindworm didn’t appear concerned, she did her best to ignore it.
The rain came down harder, and the booms of thunder more frequent. The fire hissed and spat and shrank, but protected under the wash bucket it did not go out.
It must have been nearly midnight, and the wind had started to howl. The pine trees at the bend in the path were whipping into each other with angry hisses when Frau Beck came to the end of her preparations. She stood, one of the birch branches in hand and dripping with salve, and looked up at him.
“One final time: do you trust me?”
He hesitated, and then said, just so that she could hear over the wind: “Yes.”
“Then hold still. This is going to hurt.”
And she started hitting him with the branch as hard as she could.
Since she had explained thi
s was part of the spell when she told him what was in store, he was not surprised. Nor did he seem to be in much pain—at first. But the branch functioned effectively as a whip, and as she continued, cuts began to open up in his hide, sluggishly oozing blood mixing with the salve on the branches. When one branch finally broke, she picked up another and continued. All up and down his length from the end of his nose to the tip of his tail, all four legs, his belly and back she whipped until the blood ran. He winced, and whined painfully deep in his throat a few times, but never drew away. And all the time the feeling of power grew until it covered his enormous body completely like an invisible cloud.
When the seventh branch had broken, Frau Beck set the pieces down and reached for the now-boiling bucket of water, ash and steeped herbs. Realizing that she had brought nothing with which to handle the hot bucket, she stripped off her dress and bodice and used them to wrap her hands firmly before grasping and lifting the heavy bucket.
The thunderstorm was really upon them now, with almost no pauses between lightning and thunder. The power of the storm mingled with the power in her spell, and she could feel both, almost see the air vibrating with tension ready to break.
“Ready?” she mouthed, knowing she couldn’t be heard above the noise around them. He nodded, his eyes nervously on the bucket.
She bent her knees, heaved, and flung the water over as much of his head and neck as she could reach, willing the spell to complete and seal as she did so. There was an odd implosion, a rush of air that had nothing to do with the storm, and a powerful smell of the fresh edelweiss blossom mixed with bitter ash.
At the same time, a huge clap of thunder roared. Lightning arced down and struck behind Frau Beck somewhere, possibly one of the pine trees in the copse. She could feel every single one of her hairs standing straight out, her wet braids struggling against the pins that held them to her head. The entire scene lit up eerily white, with stark, black shadows stretching out behind everything. Her own shadow stood out so big and black it concealed Herr Lindworm’s whole face. Or, no—what was that form where Herr Lindworm’s face had been? It was smaller, and differently shaped, and she couldn’t make it out. Had the spell worked? Or were her dazzled eyes just playing tricks on her?
The Dragon & the Alpine Star Page 11