The Witch's Reward

by Liz McCraine

  She turned to Lucien. Always she had abhorred this man’s eel-like personality. There had been a few occasions during her youth when he had tried to catch her in a dark corner or alone in the garden. Once he had even succeeded in kissing her. His wet, slobbering lips had repulsed her and she had slapped him hard across the cheek before running away, seeking safety in Steffan’s presence. As it had happened before she and Steffan had married, she’d gone to her father with the complaint, not wanting to upset Steffan with the truth about his friend. The ambassador had given Lucien a thorough tongue-lashing and it hadn’t happened again. Ever since her marriage, Lucien had acted with the utmost propriety, so she’d never had a reason to complain about him to her husband, except to say that she couldn’t abide the man.

  She’d always sensed that Lucien had a dark side, but she’d never seen firsthand how evil he truly was—until now.

  Bracing herself against the horror of what she was witnessing, she faced the graceful, slender, well-dressed man who had worked beside her husband for so many years. He stared back with grief-stricken eyes, as though her catching him here had been a fate worse than death.

  “Lissa,” he whispered, beseechingly.

  She looked down, following his arm to the long, steel weapon in his hands, the end tipped with a hook sharp enough to slice through metal. Just beyond him, lying on the ground was a whip that looked like it had been well-used. She cringed. The sight before her was so horrifying, so grotesque, that her stomach threatened to revolt. No witnesses were needed to tell her what had happened; the scene spoke for itself.

  “Lissa, please, it’s not what you think,” he pleaded.

  “Silence,” she ordered. There could be no good excuse for what he had done. “Leave my sight immediately. I will deal with you later.”

  “But—”

  “Leave!” she shouted. She would make sure Christoff heard what had transpired here, but not until she cared for the girl. She prayed Larra Stoneworth of Farr was still alive, because if not, then her husband’s fate was doomed. Her motherly instincts took over and she focused on the task before her. Stepping hastily forward, she went to the girl’s side and felt for a pulse. After determining that she was still breathing, Lissa surveyed the rack and quickly considered how to get her down. She was so focused on her tasks that she did not hear the door close behind Lucien.

  Lissa used her shoulder as a support for the girl’s dead weight, sinking to the ground with her as soon as the straps around her wrists and ankles had been removed. She struggled to balance the girl on her side, trying to keep the wounds from touching the ground while at the same time being able to look her in the face. Crouching beside her, she lightly slapped the girl’s cheeks and was relieved when she heard a light groan.

  Larra’s eyes cracked open just enough to see the lady kneeling before her. Her body felt as though it had been burned alive, and she wondered if her execution had already occurred and this was some sort of hell. This much pain wouldn’t follow her into heaven, that was for sure.

  “Wake up, child,” insisted the woman. Larra forced her eyes open further, noting that the woman was middle-aged and pretty. She was dressed in a heavy cloak, and her hair was curled and arranged artfully. She was obviously a woman of means, and Larra wondered if she was some sort of dark angel sent to guide Larra through the afterlife.

  “Larra of Farr, you must wake up immediately,” the woman persisted, gently removing sweat dampened tendrils of hair from Larra’s face and tucking them behind her ears. Though her words were crisp and insistent, her actions were oddly motherly.

  Larra couldn’t quite remember what had happened; her mind was foggy with pain.

  “Young woman, you must heed me. I am Queen Lissa of Aggadorn, wife of King Steffan. And despite the terrible ordeal that you have been through tonight, you must gather enough strength to get up. I know you are in terrible pain, but you have to find the will to rise and come with me.”

  With a snap, Larra’s memory returned. She lifted her head, recognizing the chamber and the racks that lined the wall. She saw the bloodied whip lying just beyond the woman, and with a desperation born of immense fear, looked around the chamber for the man who had hurt her.

  “He is not here, and I promise he won’t hurt you again,” reassured the woman, guessing the reason for her sudden anxiety. “You are said to have the ability to heal,” she continued. “Is this true?”

  Her earnestness brought Larra back from her fear and she remembered that this woman had said she was the queen. Gathering what strength she could, she tremblingly brought her hands beneath her and slowly tried to rise. But the pain was too intense and she fell back down with a cry. Tears filled her eyes.

  “Can you heal yourself?”

  “I think so, but I’m forbidden to use my magic.”

  “As your queen, I give you permission. You must heal yourself and come with me, quickly. My husband needs your help.”

  “To heal him? Why should I?” Larra spat, bitter at being asked when everyone wanted her dead.

  “You’re right. Perhaps you shouldn’t help him, but let me explain something. My husband is a good man who is tied to the laws of this land—the very same laws that require witches to be executed. He could have had you brought her to be burned at the stake without so much as a trial. Instead, he has given you the benefit of the doubt, believing that by allowing you time for a trial, he would have a chance to find a way around the law. He has given you hope of a life, where under his father’s rule—or any other man’s rule—there would be none. He is your chance at freedom.”

  Larra thought on that for a brief moment. “I believe you, but it doesn’t matter. I don’t care, anymore. Not to heal myself, or anyone. Not when there are people like your son. People who pretend to love me, only to break my heard and discard me.”

  Even through the mist of pain, Larra could see that the queen was taken aback by her announcement. The woman seemed to reflect over this startling news for a moment, before the motherly look on her face was replaced with a stringent mask of determination.

  “Larra,” she said brusquely. “Surely you aren’t going to let a silly boy determine whether or not you should live? I don’t know who raised you, or how, but I do know that every person must find their own strength to live in this life. Boys,” she snorted. “They come and they go like the leaves on the trees. Whatever went on between you and my son, it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t determine who you are and what you do. You are responsible for your life and what you make of it. Not some fickle young man, even if he is my son. You must be stronger than that.

  “Your life has a purpose, it has value. You must find the strength within yourself to continue—a strength that you alone hold and that no man can take away. Please, Larra, find that strength. Because there are people worth living for in the world, even if they aren’t the ones we think they are. And there are people that you and only you can help. You have a unique gift and can make a positive difference in the lives around you if you will just try. Please, Larra, find the will to try.”

  For a moment Larra digested those words of inspiration and insight. The queen was right. She’d fallen in love with Christoff, but she shouldn’t allow the loss of that love to influence who she was and what she did. Her life was worth fighting for.

  She decided that she would live and use the time given her to plead her case with the king. And when she was freed from execution, she would use her gift to bless others, even if she had to be alone to do it. Even if she had to do it without Christoff by her side.

  For the first time in a long while, Larra began to feel hope. As that hope brightened, the pain in her body seemed to ease just a little.

  “We have to hurry,” urged the queen, and her desperation, along with her promises, gave Larra the willpower that she needed. Turning onto her stomach, Larra tenderly, tremblingly raised herself to her hands and knees. Bowing her head and closing her eyes, she searched within herself for that small seed of magic t
hat seemed to have disappeared, praying that it hadn’t been destroyed completely.

  Chapter 23

  Lucien rushed back to his private study, where he let out a bellow of rage. That witch, that stupid witch! She had been nothing but a stone in his shoe since he first heard about her powers to heal.

  He had been in love with Lissa since the first time he had seen her walking with Steffan in the garden when she was just a girl. Lucien had been confined by his mentor to the garden to study, a chore he hadn’t minded doing until he saw his best friend with the most beautiful girl he had ever set sight on. He had tried to befriend her, but she’d pushed him away. He had even tried stealing a kiss or two when he’d found her alone to convince her of the feelings he had for her, but she’d gone running to her beloved Steffan, instead.

  Steffan. Just the thought of that wretched man filled Lucien with a rage so intense he felt he would explode. Steffan, the perfect man. He had lived in privilege his entire life, not wanting for anything while Lucien had to exist on the mercy of others. Lucien knew, even when he was a boy, that the only way he would ever have security in his life was if he became Steffan’s friend. He knew that a friendship with the future king of Aggadorn would ensure him a good job, wealth, and security. But for Steffan to get the girl, the one thing Lucien wanted above all else, was too much to be borne.

  He had been planning for years to get rid of Steffan, looking for a way to eliminate him that wouldn’t look like murder. With Steffan dead, Lucien would be able to comfort Lissa, offer solace in her time of need, and finally, when she could go on with her life, make her his own wife. He would wed the queen and rule by her side, happy to have her for his own until the day he died. She was his true obsession. Wanting her was far more powerful than his desire for magic, and the only thing that kept him willing to abide by some measure of humanity, however small.

  But that stupid witch! Her existence was fatal to his dreams because he knew she could heal Steffan if she was allowed near him. Now, if Lissa managed to revive the witch and could convince her to heal Steffan, all would be lost. He hadn’t meant for Lissa to find him torturing the girl. Hadn’t even considered that she would approach the witch. But Lissa had always been very independent and headstrong. He should have foreseen the possibility that she would seek out the witch when her husband was so close to death.

  He had underestimated the girl, as well. Not only had she been far more stubborn than he’d anticipated, but stronger as well. A lesser woman would have given up her magic after a single strike of the whip. But the girl had refused. Even when her back was ripped and bloody, she refused to share the magic with him, preferring to be tortured and killed than to give him what he wanted. Lucien didn’t know how to deal with that. All he wanted was for Steffan and the witch to die, and for Lissa to finally accept his love.

  Thinking on how best to proceed, Lucien quickly opened the window. The sky was just beginning to lighten, but many of the halls would still be dark enough to slip through unnoticed. He hoped that Lissa was still trying to revive the witch. He didn’t know how much time had passed since he’d left the dungeon—he had been so wrapped up in his bitter emotions that time had evaded him. But if he was going to act, he needed to do it now. He just hoped he wasn’t too late.

  After quickly changing his clothes, he left his stone on the desk and approached the nearest wall where several sharp weapons were hung like decorations. Selecting a small but deadly blade, he attached it to his belt and exited the room. There was really only one thing left that he could do.

  Chapter 24

  The magic hadn’t been lost. Larra saw the amazement on the queen’s face as the fluid power moved within her, stretching itself to every open cut, slash and wound on her body. Like it had when she’d faced the lumbar, the magic glowed with a brilliance that defied all description, wrapping around her like a gentle blanket and warming her until all the pain and agony faded away and the skin of her back healed and became supple once again. She stood up, carefully gauging the queen’s reaction, wondering if she would be horrified by the transformation. But upon seeing the older woman’s sudden smile, Larra relaxed.

  The queen untied her velvet cloak and wrapped it around Larra. With Larra’s clothing hanging in tatters about her, the cloak offered both protection and disguise in the dark as the queen hurried her from the chamber and through a hidden door at the back of the dungeon, presumably only used by royalty. They rushed through the night, aware that the first glow of the dawning sun was beginning to paint the edges of the horizon. Stress lined the queen’s face as they passed through a rose garden and into a hidden tunnel which led them up a dark flight of stairs and to a paneled, swinging door. The door was in actuality a large, tapestry-covered entrance into the king and queen’s own bedchamber, and it was on the threshold of that hidden panel that Larra paused, staring into the dimly lit chamber at the bedridden ghost of a man lying only a few feet away.

  Larra saw that the man had once been strong and healthy; but now there was a lifelessness to his body, a stillness of death that was belied only by the barely discernible rise and fall of his chest beneath the heavy blankets. He was obviously very sick, and Larra wondered what could have occurred between the time he had sent his captain to arrest her and now. There were no wounds that she could see and imagined the sickness was internal.

  Staring down at the prone figure, she began to have second thoughts. Awake, this man would determine whether she would live or die.

  The soft touch of a feminine hand was felt through the velvet sleeves of the cloak and Larra’s attention was drawn away from the still man to the woman at her side. She saw a type of desperation in the woman’s eyes that could only belong to one who was on the brink of a great loss. It was the kind of desperation that came when someone was about to lose one whom he or she loved deeply.

  “Please.”

  The word was but a whisper, soft, yet so strong that it overcame the temptation Larra had to let the man die. Magic or no, she had been raised to be a healer by a woman who loved her, and she would not deny this man her ability, regardless of the fact that he held her fate in his hands.

  She nodded in agreement and withdrew her arm from the queen’s touch to walk to the bed. Sitting next to the king on the plush mattress, Larra could feel his cold, waxy skin beneath her fingertips. He was clearly on the edge of death, and if Larra had been merely a healer, without the use of an incredible power, she would not have been able to save him. But the queen was right. She was unique, and she had a gift unlike any other. By her own free will and power she had the ability to help and heal those in need—something so special and vital to this world that she couldn’t just give up without a fight. And she hadn’t. She wouldn’t. She had healed herself and now she had the privilege to heal this man. Friend or enemy, she had a responsibility.

  Closing her eyes, Larra concentrated on the king. Finding that golden flow of magic within her, she called it up, willing it to be released. As she concentrated, her fingers began to glow and to an observer it looked as though she was literally transferring a sparkling, vivid energy to the sick man. It rippled through her fingertips, flowing over the king’s forehead and face, masking him in a soft ray of light.

  The glow continued to spread over his face and down his throat. For a moment it seemed to disappear as it stretched beneath the heavy bedcovers before suddenly erupting in an all-encompassing cloud of light that encircled the bed and the two people on it. It burst forth in a brilliant spectacle, blinding any observer who was blessed to see such an incredible event. Then, as suddenly as it had flared, it retracted, and the magic drew away beneath the covers and up over the king’s neck and face and forehead until, finally, it seemed to withdraw into the very fingertips that had so spectacularly sent it in the first place.

  Larra slumped over in exhaustion. The events of the night had drained her and it was all she could do to drag her hand away from the man she had just healed. Her eyes were shut, her head bowed. She
was barely aware of the queen rushing to the king’s side to see if the magic had worked.

  Larra didn’t have to see if it worked; she knew that it had. She’d felt it in every fiber of her body. She vaguely heard the queen murmuring in a low voice to her beloved husband, but Larra continued to just sit there, mentally, physically and emotionally depleted of energy. She was too numb to even hear the key turning in the lock, or to recognize that the man quietly entering the chamber had a knife in his hand.

  The faint scratching of his parents’ secret panel being opened awoke Christoff. He knew about the secret door, had played hide and seek in the tunnel with his sister when he was a lad. So it was not a complete surprise when his mother entered through that panel. But when a dark, cloaked figure followed her into the room, all senses went on alert.

  Hidden by shadows cast from the fire, Christoff slowly and quietly sat up and pulled on his boots. He knew his mother would never hurt his father, but after years of training, he couldn’t help but be on guard because of the secrecy of it all. It wasn’t until a slender arm reached out from behind the cloak and placed a feminine hand upon his father’s forehead that Christoff began to suspect, incredibly, what his mother had done. The glow that proceeded forth was magnificent. It extended over his father’s whole body, lighting up the room in a symbol of what Christoff understood to be hope. He knew without a doubt that the cloaked figure was Larra and that she was using her magic to heal his father, her judge and potential executioner.

  It was in that moment that Christoff knew for sure that Lucien had lied to him. Larra never intended to kill his father, and was, as he had been convinced before, innocent of any evil doing. Otherwise she would not have healed the very man who had the power to take her life.