by Jeff Gunhus
Daniel, the monster hunter who was three years older than the rest of us, would have enjoyed piling the insults on me before he became a werewolf. But our run-in with the Lord of the Werewolves in the Black Forest in Germany had made him more brooding. He just sniffed at me and said, “No way can you handle her by yourself. Terrible idea.” As if the reason I wanted to go by myself was for some sort of glory. Nothing could be further from the truth. Only Xavier seemed to understand.
The youngest hunter, the brains and inventor of useful gizmos in our group, didn’t even look up from the contraption he was tinkering with on his lap. “Makes perfect sense to me, Jack. You made the deal with her. She’s bound to you and no one else. You’ll have safe passage in and out. The rest of us there just complicate things.”
The rest of the group booed his addition to the conversation, but he was oblivious to this, lost in the details of his invention.
I shrugged. “I’ll sleep on it. Nobody’s going anywhere in this storm anyway.” Technically, I kept my promise, going to sleep with the others shortly after midnight. Then halfway through the night, I woke in a sweat. The rain had stopped. Xavier was right, and whether they wanted to admit it or not, I thought the others knew it too. So I carefully got up, snuck out of the barn, and made my way down the country lane at a slow jog.
But now there I was, looking at the witch’s cottage, obscured by the swirl of morning fog settled in the meadow around it. I found the place a lot creepier than I remembered. Only two weeks earlier, the cottage had appeared well-kept, freshly painted with bright colors. A vegetable garden organized in smart rows had stood next to a chicken pen with birds softly clucking as they pecked the soft earth.
Things had changed. The garden was smashed down as if trampled under the feet of an army. The chicken pen was twisted and ripped open. The only sign of the birds were dirty feathers trapped in the gnarled metal fencing. The cottage looked as if it’d aged dozens of years since I saw it last. Now the forest was reclaiming the ramshackle building. Paint flaked off the dried and cracked boards. Creeping vines crawled up the walls, forcing apart the clapboard siding, causing it to warp and bend. The windows were black holes without shutters, filled with shards of broken glass that looked like teeth in gaping jaws. Part of the roof had caved in near the stone chimney, making it lean precariously toward the center of the house.
A cold chill sent shivers down my spine as I wondered what might have befallen the place to make it look that way. At that moment, I kind of wished I’d given in to my friends and had them come along. Honestly, I didn’t feel very brave, and it would have been nice to know there were five strong hunters backing me up.
Too late for that now. I drew in a deep breath, gripped the sword at my side, and made my way down the path to the cottage’s front door.
The last time I was here, the witch’s odd army of Talib had kept watch over the place. They had small bodies, almost childlike, and identical heads. It was only later that we learned the terrible truth about the Talib, that they were the witch’s attempt to regrow a version of her son. The boy had been slain by Creach marauders seeking to punish her for her husband’s exploits as a hunter for the Black Guard. They’d killed the boy but hadn’t counted on the woman to be a witch practiced in the art of the Auld Magic. She’d pushed magic out of her life for many years, but it’d all come back to her with a blinding fury on that day. And the decades had done nothing to ease her pain. If anything, they’d only made it worse.
But there was no sign of the Talib on this visit. The forest was eerily calm not a single bird trilled its song at the rising sun. No insects buzzed in the air or drank the early morning dew off the tall grasses. Even the wind seemed to have died down to a bare whisper as if it too feared to blow around the cottage. And whatever was inside.
“Hello?” I called. The last thing I wanted to do was surprise her. Or whatever had caused all the destruction. I felt a rising sense of panic. Maybe the Jerusalem Stone had been stolen. If so, my quest to put a stop to Ren Lucre’s Creach war would come to nothing.
“Anyone there? Bella?” I called, using the name she’d called herself last time. “It’s Jack. Jack Templar. Are you there?”
A sound came from inside the cottage. A dull thud like something heavy falling over. A clatter followed right after, as if several small things had been sent scattering. I imagined it was from a small animal hiding in the cottage.
“Bella? Are you there?” I called again.
Slowly, the door to the cottage opened. As it did, air whooshed out as if the cottage had been holding its breath a long time. The air carried the same foul smell I remembered from before. Mold. Rancid meat. Decay and death.
The air also carried a sound. The unmistakable rasp of the witch’s voice.
“Jack Templaaaaar,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for yooooou.”
2
I pushed on the heavy wood door that hung awkwardly on its hinges, creaking back and forth as if drawn in and out by some great beast inside the cottage. As it had been the first time I’d visited, it was dark and dingy inside, lit only by a few candles and the glowing embers of a dying fire in the hearth.
The walls were still covered by Creach trophy heads; trolls, ogres, blinderspits, werewolves; all killed by the witch over her many decades avenging the death of her son, Talib. The low, flickering light of the candles cast bizarre shadows about the room, making the heads seem somehow alive. But the witch had plucked the eyes out from each mount and tied the eyelids shut with thick string, ensuring they were dead. I touched my fingers to my own eyes, imagining my head on the wall. I swallowed hard but found my throat completely dry.
“Bella of the Woods,” I called. “You and I had an agreement. I am here to honor it. I expect you will do the same.”
A scratching sound came from the right side of the chimney where the stonework jutted several feet from the wall, creating a corner of dark shadow. It took me a few seconds to realize the sound was actually a low, rasping laugh.
“Honor?” the voice said. “How dare you speak that word in my house? What honor has a hunter? What honor has a Creach?”
I slowly pulled my sword from my side. Against her magic, I didn’t suppose it would do much good, but it sure made me feel better to have the cold steel in my hand.
“You call me both a hunter and Creach, so you know what I am,” I said, addressing the black shadow where the witch’s voice seemed to come from. “But you made the bargain with me nonetheless.”
“You come with the Jerusalem Stone from the Demon Lord himself?” the witch asked.
“I do.”
“Show me.”
I reached into my front pocket and pulled out the smooth stone, so plain that it could have been any stone on the edge of a road or under the flowing waters of a mountain stream. And yet so many had fought and died over the centuries to possess the five of them. My own ancestor, Jacques de Molay, the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, had been the last monster hunter to hold all five – and he had been burned at the stake as a heretic by those who wanted the Stones for themselves .
“Where’s the other?” the witch said.
“You have it,” I replied.
“No, you said you would return here with two stones.” A shadow moved from the black hole next to the chimney, somehow darker than what was around her. The witch’s voice rose higher, laced with bitter anger. “One from the Lord of the Demons and the other from the Lord of the Vampires. You promised to bring two.”
“I didn’t have–”
“YOU PROMISED!” she shouted, the inside of the cottage whipping up in a whirlwind all around me. Debris flew through the air. Dust shook from the collapsed part of the roof, and the walls creaked as if bending to the will of a great storm. The wind kicked up flames from the embers in the fireplace. The log roared to life, casting light on to the witch now standing in front of me.
Gone was the young, beautiful woman who had stood in front of me only two week
s earlier. Her hair, which had been so long that it dragged on the floor, was gone. There were cuts and scabs across her scalp as if her hair had been roughly scraped off with a knife. Her face looked pinched, lips pressed together tight, cheeks caved in as if she was in pain. Eyes that had burned into me before now stared at me dully, lifeless and covered with phlegm.
“What happened to you?” I asked, the words out of my mouth before I could stop them.
The old hag, because that’s what she was now, laughed in a low chugging sound that rattled around in her chest. She held out a clenched fist. Slowly, she opened it with her palm up. Resting in her hand was the Jerusalem Stone I’d left her.
“You tried to use it,” I said. “You promised you wouldn’t.”
“And I lied,” the witch hissed. “What? Did you think only the Black Guard could tell lies? That only hunters were allowed to break their vows?”
The fire in the hearth blazed higher as if it were feeding off her bitterness and anger. In the light I saw that the hand holding the Stone was curled into a claw. Worse, it was blackened. No, worse than blackened. It was charred, like the Stone had caught fire but she’d refused to let it go.
“What did you try to make it do?” I asked. In my heart, I knew the answer, yet I had to ask. Everything that had happened since walking into the cottage somehow felt out of my control. Like I was on a path I couldn’t get off. And I had a bad feeling the path was leading me somewhere I didn’t want to go.
“Why is it that I’m made to suffer?” she asked, ignoring my question. She took a hobbling step closer. “I was the one who was wronged. You see that, don’t you? Anyone can see that.”
I remembered the dozens of Talib, the small-bodied creatures that had been everywhere the last time we were here. Each one with an identical head grown in the witch’s cauldron. All of them made to look like her murdered son.
“Where are the Talib?” I asked.
She clutched the Jerusalem Stone in her hand, and smoke rose from her fist. The air reeked with a burning smell. “I just wanted… I wanted…,” she whimpered. “I just wanted to take back what those monsters stole from me.”
As she said the words, I looked past her to the wall where the firewood was stacked from floor to ceiling. Only now I realized it wasn’t firewood at all. It was all the heads of the Talib, rows and rows of bodiless heads, piled up ten or twelve high across the length of the wall, their eyes all open and staring at me.
She noticed the direction of my gaze, and turned toward the heads.
“I tried to bring him back,” she said. “You can see how hard I tried. But the Stone refused to work for me. I knew I should wait until I had three, but I was impatient. I thought one Stone might do it. I thought that one might be enough.”
My body tensed. What she was saying wasn’t far off from my own thoughts. I hoped the reunited Jerusalem Stones would be enough to turn both Eva and Daniel back into their human forms. Shakra, the Lord of the Vampires, had told me it could be done, that she knew for certain the Stones had performed this transformation before. But bringing someone back from the dead? That was entirely different.
“But what happened? Why are they all…all…”
“Why are all my children without bodies?” the witch asked. “Because the second I tried to use the Stone, somehow all the magic I’d used to bring them alive was gone. The heads just rolled off. The bodies, the ones I’d spent so many years gathering, all fell to the ground. Worthless.” She turned as she spoke and stared into the fire, losing herself in the flames. “I should have waited,” she mumbled. “Should have waited to have the other Stones.”
Her hand with the Jerusalem Stone in it fell open again. That terrible smoke stopped. Somehow, I had to get that Stone and get out of there. I was starting to regret coming by myself. “Bella,” I said. “You and I made a pact. You swore on your son’s name that you would return that Stone to me if I was able to get the Stone from the Lord of the Demons. I’m going to unite the five and defeat Ren Lucre for good. Give it to me so that I can continue my quest and make him finally pay for what he did to your son.”
She continued to stare into the fire, but she must have heard me because she answered in a whisper. “But you’ll fail. Just like your father before you. Just like your mother. Traitors, the both of them. In their own way.”
I took a step forward, fighting down an impulse to use my sword. “Why do you say that? What do you know about them?” The Lord of the Demons had said something similar to me. Said I was a pawn in a game I didn’t even know I was playing. Even Aquinas had hinted there was part of the story about my parents that I didn’t know. I was starting to get a little tired of it all. I wanted answers.
But the witch only smiled, pleased that I was upset. “A trade, perhaps? The other Jerusalem Stone for the truth about your parents. About Aquinas. About this fool’s quest you’re on. Give me the Stone and I’ll tell you everything.”
“Whatever you tell me will be lies,” I said.
She lunged toward me, moving faster than I imagined she could. One second she was by the fire, the next she was right in front of me, her face a grotesque sneer. “I might be the only one willing to tell you the truth,” she rasped. “Give me the Stone. Give it to me now.”
I took a quick step back and pulled my sword. “No, you give me the one I left with you,” I said. “Look at the way it’s burned your hand. Look at what trying to use it has done to you. It won’t bring your son back. I’m sorry.”
She jerked back sharply as if I’d slapped her. “You’re sorry?” she asked. “Did you say you’re sorry?”
“Give me the Stone. Please,” I said. “I don’t want to fight you.”
“You don’t have to fight me, Jack,” the witch said, clenching the Stone in her fist again. Black smoke rose from it immediately. She raised both hands over her head as if she was about to throw something at me. “All you have to do is die.”
3
Before the witch could move, a shadow crashed through the hole in the collapsed roof, snarling and growling. Simultaneously, the cottage door flew open, nearly ripping from its hinges, and something ran into the room, moving faster than I could track it. A second later, a person flew in from a side window, landing on the floor with a grunt, rolling and then popping up into a fighting stance.
This last addition was Will, sword pulled, ready for a fight. The other two took me a second to identify because my mind still wasn’t used to their appearance. Daniel had dropped in from the roof, but he was in his werewolf form. Up on his hind legs, he clawed the air in front of him, lines of saliva dripping from his elongated snout. The shadow that had rushed in from the door was Eva. She stood near the fire, but even in the glow of the flames her skin appeared pure white, almost translucent. Her posture was perfect, her back slightly arched, chin out, eyes staring down the witch as if challenging her to one-on-one combat.
“What took you guys so long?” I asked.
“Oh, I don’t know. You sneaking out without telling anyone. And then trying to cover your tracks,” Will said. “You’re a real bonehead. You know that, right?”
“He knows,” Eva said. “Everyone knows.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I kind of liked it better when it was just me and Bella.”
“Really, looked to me like she was about to let you have it. If you want, we could just leave and–”
“Enough,” the witch yelled, sending the flames higher in the fireplace. “This changes nothing. You think you are any match for me?”
“I don’t know,” Eva said. “You’re looking pretty beat up to me. I feel like I might be able to get a little payback for last time.”
Daniel snarled, chomping the air with his teeth like he agreed with her. The last time we’d had a run-in with Bella of the Woods, she’d mopped the floor with Eva and Daniel pretty easily. I wondered if her ragged appearance meant she was less powerful now – or just more desperate and dangerous.
“We don’t have to do
this,” I said. “We all want the same thing.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Templar,” the witch said. “You want to save your friends. Save your father. Save the world by stopping Ren Lucre’s mad plan to start an open war against humans all over the world. All I want is to have my son back.”
I lowered my sword, hoping to buy more time. “You can’t get him back,” I said softly. “I think you must know that by now, even if you don’t want to admit it. Look at all of your attempts,” I said, pointing to the stack of Talib heads against the wall. They all stared, wide-eyed, their mouths opening and closing like they were fish out of water gasping for air. “That’s not your son. Not really. And you know it never will be.”
The witch hunched over slowly as if each word I said made her chest ache more. I decided to make my final appeal.
“I said this to you last time I was here. If you can’t bring your son back, at least let me take my best shot at avenging his death. Let me have the Jerusalem Stone back so I can continue my quest to defeat Ren Lucre once and for all.”
The witch’s head twitched to the side as if she heard a new noise. Her lips curled into a cruel grin. “Sorry, Jack. That’s not what I had in mind.”
With a high-pitched scream, she pointed her hands at Eva and Daniel. The two of them blew backward as though a battering ram had run into them. The instant that happened, Will was on the move. He was in the air as the witch turned to him, but he’d been just fast enough. He landed both feet on the witch’s chest, kicking her backward.
The dozens of Talib heads opened their mouths and their screams joined the witch’s. I lunged forward, ducking as the witch spun around, the hand with the Jerusalem Stone stretched toward me. I felt a surge of energy pass over my head like a solid thing. No doubt, if I hadn’t ducked, it would have taken my head clean off my shoulders.
I rolled onto the ground and used my momentum to crash into the witch’s legs. It wasn’t the most graceful move, but it worked well enough. The witch tumbled over, her hand with the Jerusalem Stone smashing into the stone hearth. The Stone rolled out of her hand and into the fireplace.