A Nameless Witch

19

Our first triat behind us, and none of us being in traveling condition, we camped beside the chimera corpses. Only Newt had escaped injury, and that was only because he'd missed the battle. This annoyed him. He would have rather taken part and been killed than lose an opportunity to fight. He sulked as the rest of us tended our wounds.

My injuries were the least pressing. I'd stitched myself together and within a few hours, I was restored. I liked the way the thick thread felt around my neck, and I imagined I looked quite horrible. But such was my curse that my flesh rejected the intrusive stitching. I was disappointed when it fell out.

Gwurm wasn't hurt much either, but after he'd been reassembled, we'd discovered some missing parts. An ear and a finger were nowhere to be found. He was fortunate enough to have a surplus of fingers in his pouch, but there was no replacement ear. He accepted the loss with his usual good nature, noting that while two ears were better, one would do fine.

Both Penelope and Wyst of the West required my attentions. My broom was very much a living thing now, and her handle would mend itself in time, providing she got enough dust to eat. I merely bound her with some torn cloth so she would heal straight.

Wyst's wound was the most serious. He'd suffered a deep slash to his side by the chimera's tusks. If I'd been able to use magic, it would have been easily treated. But my magics slid off the White Knight, and I had to rely on mundane methods. I wrapped the wound in a poultice to prevent infection. That he had to remove his shirt for treatment proved less distracting than I'd expected. Ghastly Edna had trained me well. Wyst was not a man. He was a patient. Touching his firm flesh, running my fingers across his lean, muscled body meant nothing to me.

Well, perhaps it meant something. But I concentrated on the wound and finished the task without surrendering to carnal impulses. Only after, did I realize the heat built up within me, especially warm in my lips, breast, loins, and, oddly, ears. I limped to the other side of our small camp to clear my head, pretending to study the dead chimera.

Death had merely slowed their shape-shifting pace. The corpses assumed various deceased forms every ten minutes or so, each smaller than the last. I expected them to eventually become dead bugs, then things too small to be seen, then nothing altogether. It seemed a perfectly natural state of decay for such creatures. Presently, the corpses were that of a hare, a wolf with antlers, and a three-armed man.

Newt beheaded the hare with a kick. "They weren't so dangerous. None of you were killed."

"We're all very hard to kill," I replied.

There was truth to Newt's observation. The chimera, terrible monsters in their own right, had never been a serious threat. The sorcerer who'd sent them must have known that. Their purpose had been to delay us, perhaps even kill one of us with some luck, and to take our measure.

"How did they know where to find you anyway?" Newt asked.

"No doubt, the sorcerer told them."

"How did he know?"

"Most likely, the magic told him. Just as it tells me where to find him."

"I thought the magic was on our side."

"Magic doesn't take sides. It mostly watches and waits for something interesting to happen and sometimes, especially when witches and sorcerers find themselves at cross-purposes, it encourages the most interesting things."

"Sounds as if the magic should find itself a hobby."

"Perhaps that is what we are."

Dusk approached. Gwurm went gathering wood, and Newt went hunting for dinner. Though Wyst and I had been gradually drawing closer over our quest, I sat far from him this evening for reasons I couldn't fathom. I often acted in ways I didn't understand when it came to Wyst. I suspected this was normal, and a good witch doesn't need to understand everything. Nor does she expect to.

Wyst squirmed. His pain was obvious, try as he might to hide it. Every shallow breath carried a soft wheeze. Few would have noticed, but I knew Wyst as few did. His pain distressed me more than even being eaten alive by goblings.

Silence crept between us. For the first time in a long while, I felt uneasy with Wyst.

He pressed his fingers to his wound and winced.

"Don't do that," I said.

"It itches."

"It's supposed to."

His hand hovered over the bandage.

"Leave it alone."

He sneered.

It was nice to see the boy beneath the man beneath the White Knight. I smiled for reasons yet again not entirely clear to me.

Wyst scowled. "We can't all be fortunate enough to be ac­cursed."

"Fortune can be fickle," I agreed. "Much like a White Knight's legendary invulnerability."

"A popular exaggeration," he said.

"So I gathered."

It was then that Wyst shared the limits of his enchanted invincibility. I was honored to be entrusted with the secret, but we'd shared many secrets. Our physical vulnerabilities seemed almost trivial beside secret desires and mortal admissions.

White Knights could be harmed in four ways: magic, drowning, honorable combat, and corruption. None of these were particularly easy. Greater magic can always overcome lesser magic, but magic greater than Wyst's enchantment was a very rare thing. While Wyst could suffocate, his enchantment allowed him to hold his breath for an hour. Honorable combat was a more general weakness. Even Wyst admitted he couldn't know what was honorable and what wasn't until he was actually harmed. Apparently, the chimera had met the magic's qualifications.

The idea of corruption was of special interest to me. A White Knight's virtue fueled his enchantment. When robbed of it, they were as vulnerable as any man. When captured, a White Knight was usually thrown into a dungeon for a month or a year or however long it took for him to fall to a moment of weakness. Even the most chaste soul would succumb to a piece of fresh fruit or a beautiful virgin's kiss. Then it was off to the chopping block or gallows. This method was far from fool proof. Often as not, the Knight lasted long enough to be rescued or escape.

"Wouldn't drowning be easier?" I asked.

"It would, but most assume that if you haven't drowned in ten minutes that you aren't going to." He lay on his back and breathed as little as possible. "And how exactly do undead witches meet death? Or do they?"

"I'm ageless. Not immortal."

I knew of four certain ways I might perish only through Ghastly Edna and her conversations with the magic. First, there was magic itself, but magic greater than my curse came only once every century or so. Fire, as both servant of life and death, could kill me. Except that as a witch, fire and I were very good friends. Only the most enraged flame posed any sort of danger. Being hacked into three or four pieces was perhaps the most effective, providing steps were taken to keep my parts from rejoining for long enough.

"How long?" asked Wyst.

"That largely depends on how many pieces, but a good month at the very least."

He squirmed uncomfortably. "And the last method?"

I hesitated to tell Wyst this. I'd always thought it impossible. Impossible is a concept embraced by mortals to keep their world safe. Yet some things are so unlikely that impossibility is not much of an exaggeration. But I trusted Wyst with my life. And my death.

"To have my heart pierced by someone I love."

There was another brief silence between us. Before either could end it, Gwurm came stomping into camp. He carried an impressive load of branches. Newt returned with a half-dozen squirrels for dinner. Wyst and I said nothing else to each other that evening. And when everyone had finally gone to sleep, I crept away and sat in the comforting dark just outside the campfire's light.

I watched Wyst from the shadows. His sleep was uneasy. His pain was minor, mere discomfort, but his every troublesome breath put a stitch in my side. I wanted to make him feel better. I also wanted to devour him one succulent morsel at a time. Only after he'd taken me in his arms, and I'd tasted his kiss and felt his warm skin against my own.

"You love him."

I was so intent on Wyst I hadn't even noticed Gwurm was awake. The troll sat beside me.

"I don't know," I said. "What is love?"

Gwurm chuckled. "Nobody really knows. It defies explanation in its complex simplicity. Like magic, I think."

The comparison made it easier to understand. Magic didn't require explanation, merely the understanding to know that it was there. So it was with countless other things in this world and beyond.

"I love him."

The admission was easier in the dark. And as Ghastly Edna had been my mother, Gwurm had become my brother. He took my slight hand in his own immense fingers.

I hadn't noticed Newt was awake too. "If the mistress could hear you now." He took a seat at my feet. "Witches and love, it's unnatural."

I ignored him, as I often did. Demons couldn't love. They didn't have the capacity to care about anyone but themselves. And I pitied him, and all demons, for it.

"You should kill him," Newt said. "If you do really love him."

It was typical demon reasoning to destroy a weakness be fore it destroys you. But I didn't want to kill Wyst of the West. He didn't frighten me. Neither did sorcerers. Or even love. Only one thing did.

My curse. And what it might make me do.

Wyst stirred on the edge of wakefulness. Deep inside, other things stirred in response. Especially my stomach.