An Errant Witch

by E M Graham

  ‘All this was already in motion long before our fateful meeting, Dara my dearest,’ Willem continued. ‘I really have become quite fond of you, but you were never a part of this tale in the beginning. It is, as I say, all happy coincidence. Perhaps our paths were fated to intertwine?’

  ‘Cursed, more like it.’

  He laughed as if I’d meant that as a joke.

  ‘When I met you in Canada, I was merely filling in time, waiting for the steamboat to arrive to take me across the ocean.’

  ‘But the women, the money you took from them... And the creatures you created. You can’t say all that wasn’t premeditated.’

  Willem had, with my reluctant assistance, ripped away the veil between Alt and real. There was no way all of that could have been a spur of the moment lark.

  He nodded. ‘Correct,’ he agreed. ‘I’d allowed myself time in my schedule to create a little havoc against Jon de Teilhard. We go back a long way, Jon and I, and it felt good to let him know I was still alive and kicking.

  ‘But I digress. This moment in time, this is what I’ve been working towards for years, what many of us have been combining our efforts towards. This is the work of the century. And it would not have been possible without my dear friend Alexander McCloud.’

  Sandy smiled proudly.

  ‘How are you involved in all of this?’ I looked with dismay at my fellow student.

  The Scotsman cleared his throat. ‘How else do you think Willem could get past the defences of the island but with a McCloud ushering him through? The McCloud, I should add, there are no more of my line, thus I hold title to the island and the island knows this.

  ‘Scarp will never deny me access, and any who enter with me. It was a simple enough thing to take a wee boat across the strait to pick up Willem, after I’d been established here all fall.’

  ‘I don’t think anyone suspected you at all,’ Willem added with admiration.

  I did my best to ignore the Dutchman as I zeroed in on my friend.

  ‘But why, Sandy? Why would you choose to get mixed up with all this?’ Yet even as the words were leaving my mouth, I knew the answer. Old grudges die hard, and Sandy had been fed the tales by his great-grandmother from a very young age. He probably even saw himself as a modern-day Arthur, come to free his ancestral lands from the villainous Kin. ‘Do you even realize what Willem is planning?’

  ‘And high time it is! The Kin have held us down for too long, all of us,’ Sandy spit out. ‘You’ll find this rebellion will only rise in popularity once people find out what we have accomplished.’

  ‘And she thought I followed her here,’ Willem said as an aside to Sandy, giggling as he harped on the point. ‘In the face of the greatest popular movement of all time, Dara thought it was all about her.’

  ‘What is it, then? What are you hoping to do on this island far away from anywhere else?’ I asked him, fervently ignoring the Dutchman’s comments.

  Sandy leaned forward intently. ‘The Crystal Charm Stone, of course, Dara,’ he said. ‘That’s what this is all about. Whoever controls access to that, controls all of the world.’

  I finally sat on the cold stone bench opposite them, shivers rising through my spine. ‘And I suppose, you, Willem, you’re the mastermind of this revolution? The Che Guevara of the movement?’

  He barked with laughter. ‘Me? I am merely a humble foot soldier, executing my orders for the greater good.’

  At a look from Sandy, he put his head to one side and modestly reconsidered. ‘Well, perhaps an officer in the war. But no more than that. There are far more powerful beings than me behind it.’

  He smiled at me with his little teeth. ‘You should really come with us, Dara. Join the cause. We could use good witches like you.’

  He chuckled. ‘The offer will dry up soon, but right now it still stands.’

  I looked at the two of them, trying to hide my thoughts from my face and my mind, while still trying to feel what I knew.

  I’d been here before, forced to make a choice, and this time I vowed I would not be so weak as to choose the easy-for-me route, for I knew that only would lead to trouble. It should have been an easy choice to choose the right over the wrong, but it never was. This had been in the works for years, he said, and if Willem and his team could have made it so far as to infiltrate Scarp, then there were pretty good odds they could succeed in their goal. The sorcerer was telling me the truth, and he would accept me as a partner. I would learn much at his side, but at what price?

  On the other hand, the price of not going along with him? My future, my mother’s future. It was a no brainer, really. Especially if I could throw it all in the face of the Kin.

  ‘So, you have figured out Johanna’s puzzle?’

  I looked up sharply, then glanced to Sandy. What business was the Competition to the sorcerer?

  ‘The theoretical question,’ Willem continued as he got up and moved to the small stone fireplace below the open air window which drew the smoke out of the small space. ‘How could one, if one was so inclined, disrupt the flow of Scarp’s power lines, and thus take over the power which the Kin have been feeding off for untold generations?’

  ‘Did you tell him...?’ I directed my whispered question to Sandy, although the space was so small Willem could not have helped but heard.

  ‘Did Sandy tell me?’ Willem stopped and turned to face me, silently laughing hard enough to make his body shake. ‘Who do you think masterminded this quest?’

  ‘I don’t understand. What would you have to do with this?

  ‘Johanna said that I suggested it to her, a hypothetical question with the idea to cut down on the violence which has been getting out of hand,’ Sandy reminded me. ‘Well, the idea was Willem’s.’

  ‘Such an irony.’ I could hear the smile in the Dutchman’s voice as he opened a metal canister. ‘When I’ve known all along how to hack the system. They just wouldn’t give me the access.’

  ‘But we can get there,’ Sandy said. ‘And we have the power now.’

  Willem turned to me then, to hand me a mug of rough clay.

  ‘Tea?’

  I took it in my hand, but openly sniffed the brew with suspicion. He laughed again.

  ‘No, no secret spells or magic used, I promise,’ he said as he handed a similar mug to Sandy. ‘Just honest to goodness Breakfast Tea, a blend I am very partial to myself.’

  We sat then, the three of us at this mad tea party in the run down bothy.

  ‘Wait now,’ I said, finally cluing in as to what they were talking about. ‘You don’t mean you’re planning to actually divert the energies somehow? And you expect me to help?’

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Sandy had danced around that, yes, but I‘d thought it was just wishful thinking on his part, the underdog wanting to reclaim his heritage. This... this was bigger. Far bigger.

  And they expected me to play a role.

  ‘What are you trying to achieve with this action, Willem?’ I let the full extent of my disbelief show through. ‘You’re going to waltz in and take the Crystal Charm Stone? Are you nuts? I’ve seen, I’ve felt the power of that thing from a distance. It would kill anyone who went near it. It’s suicidal.’

  ‘Not me, dear heart,’ he said. ‘I won’t be in the castle or the tunnel. That’s where you come in.’

  ‘Right,’ I scoffed. ‘You expect me to go to a certain death. This is so not happening, dude. Why would I, what’s in it for me? And what’s the purpose of this nonsense?’

  ‘The answer is quite simple, I should think,’ said Willem, chiding me. ‘Even you must have figured that one out immediately. You want to find your mother. She is with the Ice King, for whatever reasons she may have, and she is unable to leave. I am the only person you know who has access to his court, who can come and go at will. Ergo, you shall earn this privilege of being my partner by working with me.’

  ‘But why? Why are you planning this?’ I really c
ouldn’t see beyond the point of the tunnel, for no one would make it out alive, for no way would the Kin allow this to happen. Walk off with the stone? Not likely.

  ‘Because the Ice King needs to reclaim what is his.’

  ‘But this will... the Kin...’ I realized what the effect would be on the Witch Kin. Losing their source of power, they would revert back to being simple witches, if there was such a thing. They would lose their seat, their source of power, their domination over the whole world, not just in Scotland or in my hometown. I couldn’t even begin to imagine the scope of their downfall.

  My father. Cate. These entitled witches in Scarp. I couldn’t help that small smile forming on my face. I could show them all.

  ‘How will you ever get it past them?’ My voice was quiet.

  ‘You’ll see.’

  MEANWHILE, the day was drawing in. I closed my eyes as the enormity of his plans washed over me. If Willem was successful, the whole world would change. Not just mine, or my future.

  And if I went along with him, which would be crazy, what would I gain? My mother’s freedom.

  Would I be an outlaw, if the Kin’s rule of law melted down and there were no longer any laws to break? If the Kin were broken, how could they punish me?

  What could my future look like?

  Willem held no power over me, this was my decision to make. Yes, he knew where my mother was, and had access to the Ice Kingdom but he couldn’t be the only one, there must be someone somewhere who would also gain me access. This was no doubt a place where it was very cold most of the year round, and presumably to the north. How large was the North Pole, or even the upper most latitudes of the globe? Not so big really, because the population in that huge area was tiny. Small enough that people being people, they knew what everyone else was up to, and would know of my Mom. Geographical boundaries, and magical borders, would not be so difficult to access once I was working with the Kin.

  Because there was no way Willem could steal the Crystal Charm Stone right from under the noses of the Kin. I was wavering on the razor’s edge here, all I had were my wits, and they were never my strongest point. However, the wisp of a plan was forming in my mind.

  Willem had burned a hole right through my consciousness, enabling him to easily crawl back in whenever I was weakened. If I could ascertain just one thing, then I could turn the tide of events and never need the sorcerer and his magic.

  The dregs in my mug had long since grown cold. I dashed them to the dirt floor beneath our feet.

  ‘What is it you expect of me?’ I broke into their conversation. ‘What is it you want me to do to help your cause?’

  The pair both peered at me through the gloom, as if they’d forgotten my existence, then Willem looked down at the wet ground by my feet with a disapproving air.

  ‘We expect nothing of you, Dara, that you would not do of your own volition,’ Willem said, his face severe. ‘You will be you, and will carry on doing what you will do, until the moment comes when you need to act. And when that moment arrives, you will know it, and you will understand what you must do.’

  This cryptic talk made no sense to me and I let him know. He laughed and spoke again, his eyes on mine all the while.

  ‘I know you Dara,’ he said, his voice soft and melodious. ‘Better than you know yourself, perhaps. I have been inside you, you must remember, and I have seen you, felt you. I love that you opened up to me and allowed me the space in your mind, that little corner that is all mine.’

  As he spoke, hypnotizing me, I could feel the first cold draft of him as he touched me inside, into that dark hidden crevice he had burned himself into that unforgettable night. And like a Tundra flower responding to the icy northern sun, that corner stirred and opened and I had to allow it else he would suspect my own plan.

  It was the hardest thing I’d ever tried to do, allowing this invasion into the depths of my mind while keeping all I didn’t want him to see away from the cold tendrils of his touch. I forced myself to breathe deeply, evenly, and to keep my heart at its steady relaxed pace; I forced myself to think thoughts of failure and despair and giving up all fight, so that was all that he would feel in me.

  I could see the bright yellow flare of his surprise that I gave in so easily, then the green of his greed as he pushed in further and further, moving around in my mind, expanding that small crevice I’d thought had healed over, stretching the scar tissue to its utmost as he settled in like a cold blooded lizard into the warmth that was me.

  I closed my lids, I couldn’t stand to have his eyes on mine any longer. I could hear him breathing quickly in the silence of the bothy.

  What is your deepest desire?

  The picture of Mom flashed to my mind without me even trying.

  I thought so. Come with me.

  And suddenly, we were there again, in the room of the ice King’s palace, a chamber of glittering ice that sparkled with prisms of color; the rainbows of hues glinted over the blue white walls, all solid ice, yet even the warm tones of yellow and red were icy. No windows allowed sunlight, if there was a sun in that cold land and no cloth furnishings softened the harsh whiteness. A fearsome figure sat on a dais, his throne made of reindeer antlers and whale bones. Frost glittered from his long beard as he drank from a goblet of crystal and talked with his council in low tones. His crown was created from the finest bones of birds, and he was clothed fully in the thickest of furs; it was hard to tell what was clothing and what was his own furry pelt. Yet a great log burned in the stone fireplace to his left, a log of proportions I’d never seen in my lifetime, and I could hear the crackling of the wood. He made a great roar at something that displeased him.

  God, I could even smell the burning of the pine sap, and the sweetness of the needles which covered the floor under his feet. I, or we, were right there in the room.

  The woman was bent over a table, preparing a meal of roasted beast of some kind, and a whole fish seared to a crisp, its eyes staring blankly out at the cavernous space. She was thinner than I remembered, worn with the weight of ages. She wearily brought her hand to her face to push a stray lock back, her blond highlights dulled to a mousy brown in this land without sun.

  Mom. I couldn’t help it, the thought leaped out of my mind.

  She gave a start, and quickly glanced toward the men, but they had noticed nothing. My mother stayed perfectly still with her head cocked to one side like a sparrow on the alert for danger.

  Mom, I’m here.

  She let out the breath I didn’t know she’d been holding, bowed her head and closed her eyes, bringing her hands before her like a prayer. And that’s when I noticed the glittering band of ice surrounding her wrist, like a bracelet. No. Get away. Don’t let him see you, don’t let him know you’re here.

  My mother was no guest to this august being. She was enslaved.

  Willem quickly withdrew us, whisking us out of this pine-scented land. But it had been enough to show me I could contact Mom through the sorcerer’s mind. I kept my smile secret. I knew what I was going to do to save my mother, and that was the most important thing. I wasn’t on the side of the Kin, and I wasn’t on Willem’s side.

  I opened my eyes and stared at Willem. ‘He, it, whatever he is, he has made her a slave, that’s why she can’t leave.’

  Willem shrugged. ‘Perhaps an enforced guest, hmm? At least you see the need to remove her from his clutches. He is temperamental, the Ice King; I don’t envy anyone whose life is at his whim.’

  ‘You mean, her life is in danger?’

  ‘Let’s just say his slaves don’t tend to have long lifespans, and Marian has lasted far longer than most.’

  ‘We have to act fast,’ Sandy said, impatient with what he saw as non-action. ‘The others know about the Crystal Charm Stone and the tunnel. They’re planning something to stop us. We need to act quickly.’

  ‘I thought you said none of them believed in it.’ Willem scowled at him. ‘We are not ready to act
yet.’

  ‘It’s now or never. Once one of them figures out the necessary charms and spells and actions and presents it to the Kin, they’ll close off the access.’

  ‘But they won’t think to take the stone themselves,’ Willem observed. ‘They’ll only present the solution as a hypothetical exercise.’

  I shook my head to clear it away of their quibbling, and walked over to the small glassless window opening. My mother was being forcibly confined by this Ice King. Willem held the key to my entry there.

  ‘You still haven’t told me what you want me to do,’ I said. ‘Explicitly. I need to know your whole plan. And I haven’t agreed to anything yet.’

  ‘I think you have agreed, Dara, only you don’t realize this, yet.’ Willem was quiet for a moment as he stared at me. ‘You will help Sandy hold back the net of spells. While he keeps it open, you shall take the Charm Stone in your hands and walk out of the castle with it, to meet me by the pier.’

  ‘I’ll get burned to a crisp the moment I lay a hand on the stone,’ I objected. ‘How is that going to help anyone, especially me?’

  ‘That’s the joy of it,’ Willem replied. ‘You will work with me.’

  ‘You’re coming down the tunnel with us?’

  He shook his head. ‘No need, my dear. Don’t you see? This is the beauty of the new and improved plan now that we have you on board. With our very special connection, I can enter your mind, and we can work together, the perfect melding of power, witch and sorcerer. Only neither of us is fully one or the other, eh?’

  Willem was watching me with what could pass for a fond smile. ‘You know, you really are quite dear to me, Dara,’ he said. ‘I have grown oh so fond of you, and it makes my heart sing to see that you have chosen me.’

  ‘I’m not choosing you, Willem,’ I replied, my voice devoid of emotion. ‘I don’t have much choice in the matter as far as I can see.’

  ‘That’s what you say,’ he noted. ‘But I think I know you better than you know yourself, dear one.’