THE WITCH

THE WITCH

VI

Quintin rode as if the world had narrowed to the rhythm of his horse’s hooves. The Night Wood closed around him — a corridor of black trunks and skeletal branches stitched with frost. Snow fell thin and deliberate, each flake a silver pin in the air, catching in his hair until his dark curls wore a cold, glittering crown. He hugged the reins, the leather biting into his palms, the scroll heavy and secret against his chest inside its long leather pouch.

Yield or suffer the consequences.

The words burned like a brand beneath his mail. Above the trees the sky was a bruised blue, low and leaden with weather. His stallion pushed forward, breath steaming in the cold; the animal’s hooves struck a dull drum on compacted snow. Quintin rubbed numb fingers into his palms, blew hot air over them, and forced his shoulders against the cold that wanted to pry him open like a cracked stone.

He found shelter at last — a lone cabin crouched in a clearing, its chimney like a crooked finger. A crucifix hung above the hearth, a gaunt promise of protection. Quintin took it as a sign. He made a small fire from damp twigs and boiled a mug of bitter herbal elixir. His armor clinked when he moved; he slept half upright, steel and wool welded to his skin against frostbite.

The night came like a closing fist. He woke to a howl so near it seemed threaded into the timbers. The cabin breathed around him, wind dragging snow through the doorway. A low creak, then another — something moving above.

Quintin’s hand closed on the hilt of his sword. He crept down the stairs, every muscle coiled, senses raw. The foyer lay open to the night; a blast of cold threw salt-white drifts into the room and scattered the few pots on the counters. He slammed the door shut and braced the bar with a forearm.

Then the air shifted — a sound like a thousand wings or insects taking flight. A dark mist spilled from the center of the room, a living cloud of black flies that clawed at the light. Pain flared where they found skin; the swarm chewed at his hands and face, and Quintin slashed blindly with the small axe at his belt. The insects parted like smoke around steel and reformed.

A voice coiled through the dark — soft, hissing, and threaded with laughter. “We have suffered at the hands of man for too long,” it said.

The words turned his stomach to stone. He steadied himself, blade raised. “I mean no harm,” he called, voice raw. “I am an emissary of the Knight’s Council. I bear a message for the Red Queen.”

Silence pressed in, thick and impossible. Then a woman stepped from the edge of the firelight: skin like milk left too long in the sun, hair the color of midnight, a ragged black dress that whispered with each movement. Her eyes were the dull, patient things of predators.

Above them, on the cabin’s rafters, a shape unfurled — a spider the size of a cartwheel, its legs knotted with frost, mandibles as dark as old iron. It watched.

Quintin’s fingers tightened on his sword. The creature leapt. He met it with steel; the blade struck home with a metallic scream and the monster convulsed, showering wood and splinters. He planted his shield and drove the point again, then again — iron meeting chitin.

The woman drifted closer. Her smile was a fracture. Without warning she struck, fangs flashing hungry and cold. Pain exploded along Quintin’s neck; blood warmed the air. He staggered back, every breath a serrated thing. He clawed for the pouch, for the scroll he had carried through nights and battles, but the woman was quicker. Her fingers were feather-light and merciless as she unfastened the leather, drew the scroll free, and held it up to the firelight.

“The emissary,” she murmured, tasting the word like a verdict. She set the parchment in her palm and motioned with a delicate flick. The spider, as if commanded, fell upon him. Quintin’s last sight was the flash of those articulate legs, the iron of his sword, the red bloom of his life on the snow. The witch laughed — high and reeking of victory — and left him to the dark.

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Moonlight pooled in the cave deeper inside the forest. Witches gathered like a black tide around a shallow pit, voices threading the air in a language older than the trees. Candles guttered; bones and iron lay scattered like offerings. When the chant subsided, Meryl stepped forward, breath shallow in the cave chill.

“My queen,” she said, and inclined her head toward Clarice.

Clarice von Dyke rose from the shadowed central stone, a figure carved of hunger and ancient patience. Her fingers were long, stained, and precise as she took the small parchment. She unrolled it with a ritual slowness, eyes skimming the scratch of human ink until the letters resolved into a single line: Death to all witches. Man will rise. Surrender.

For a moment the cave held its breath. The words sat between them like a dropped blade.

“What shall we do?” Meryl asked. Fear sharpened her voice into a blade. “They have declared war. We must strike first.”

Clarice’s lips pressed thin. “No,” she said, and her voice carried like a bell through the chamber. “Nobody leaves our home. We will negotiate.”

A ripple of outrage crashed across the gathered faces. “Negotiate?” another witch spat. “They burn us, they hunt our kin — and you would sunder the web?”

“Do you question my judgment?” Clarice’s smile was a small, cruel thing. Her hand tightened on the parchment as if cherishing a map to something far more dangerous than paper. Around her, the witches simmered — anger, betrayal, and fear braided together.

Meryl’s mouth worked. Her eyes narrowed until they were knives. She smelled justice and iron: a promise she could not let go. Her jaw clenched, a vow forming like frost on the tongue.

I will put an end to this, she thought, watching her queen fold the scroll and lay it like a gauntlet at her feet. I will bring justice.