The Witch of Storn

Chapter 29

The weeks rolled by slowly, not fast enough for Rey. Living with Zaria wasn’t the worst but she knew when she had outstayed her welcome. She did help with the chores and did anything Zaria asked of her, but she was mostly useless. If she had been able to cast spells like Rhaenar should have after two years at Cardinalis plus some private tutoring she would probably feel more useful. Instead she was just a freeloader and Rey detested having to rely on people if she knew there was no way she would be able to pay them back. It wounded her already battered pride to have to throw herself at someone’s mercy and hope that they would be good to her. Fortunately Zaria hadn’t said anything about it besides the occasional; grumbling about expenses.

So the news about Stormness brought joy to Rey. Unfortunately it would take quite a while, since the boat that went from Narial to Sylla had already made its bi-weekly trip and wouldn’t be back until the next two weeks. Zaria had explained after a lot of groaning and whining on Rey’s part that the inhabitants of Narial were self-sufficient and didn’t need to visit the mainland a lot, so anyone who wanted to go to the mainland had to wait. Unless it was an emergency, in which case they would have to find their own means of transport or hire a fishing boat. So they had to wait, but the wait was killing Rey.

The first week had been pure hell. Rey was in a constant state of motion, unable to sit still for more than a minute. She wandered all over the house constantly, walking through every room in the house and then repeating the cycle over and over. Zaria finally got irritated after ten circuits and threatened to place a curse on her if she kept on wandering aimlessly; a curse to make her dance forever since she couldn’t keep still. Rey had paused at that, asking if it could really be done. Zaria grudgingly admitted that the spell would take a month to cast and complete, being a curse and not a hex. Rey let out a sigh in relief; even so she stopped, begging Zaria for something to do in the second week. Anything at all would be fine, she said.

‘Anything?’ Zaria had echoed, a smile creeping onto her lips.

Rey had nodded, watching with confusion as Zaria’s smile blossomed into a full-blown grin, but she had dismissed it as Zaria being happy to have some help.

So here they were, in the main room, where Zaria had approached the bored girl who was seated on one of the many stools in the room, her cheek supported by a hand, staring out the window into the distance. Rey looked away from the window at the sound of nearing footsteps, watching with interest as Zaria drew closer. The woman held a fairly large rectangular tray in her hands, on which sat a bowl. Rey had no idea what it held; she wasn’t able to look into it from where she sat. Zaria held it out to her when she finally reached her and Rey accepted it, and then she looked into the bowl. It was half filled with tiny round brown things that looked like seeds. She looked to the smiling Zaria.

“Err, what am I supposed to do with these?” she shook the bowl as she spoke. The seeds in the bowl made a sound not unlike that of a baby’s rattle as she shook them.

Zaria’s smile widened again. This time, Rey saw the signs of danger and grew concerned, like she should have been all along.

“Z-Zaria?”

“It’s really easy actually. All you have to do is apply a little pressure to the shell, like this –“ she took out a seed with one hand, pinching it between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand and pressing it in between her left thumb and forefinger. The brown cracked and Zaria peeled it away to reveal an inner yellow ball, smaller than the brown shell. She tossed the shell onto the tray and the actual seed into the bowl.

“—that’s how you do it. It’s easy, isn’t it?” she finished with a smile fit for a beauty pageant.

She had conveniently forgotten to mention that Rey would get a slight shock if she wasn’t prepared, the fruits being magical, or that the amount of pressure needed to open just one fruit wasn’t little. In just thirty minutes Rey’s hands were rubbed raw and she now had hair that stood up straight instead of lying flat on her scalp. Zaria stepped into the room once to check on Rey’s progress and nearly died of laughter when she saw the state that Rey was in.

Rey glared at her. “It’s not funny,” she said, “my hands hurt! And you should have told me these things shock!”

Zaria held onto the door jamb, standing in the doorway of the kitchen. Her body shook with repressed giggles and finally she calmed down enough to say, “Sorry –“ before bursting into full blown laughter again. Rey sighed and got up with the tray still in her hands. She put it down on the stool she had been seated on and marched up to her room, bumping shoulders with Zaria when she passed her. It startled Zaria enough to stop he r laughter, but as Rey stomped up the stairs she could hear the giggling begin again. Sometimes she wanted to strangle her host. Times like now, for instance. Then she remembered that Zaria was her only hope of survival right now, so she just sucked it up and waited for her time to come.

Zaria had come to her room in the evening, announcing her presence with a soft knock. Rey looked up from her book as she entered then looked back to it. It was a cold night, having rained earlier in the day, so the windows were firmly shut and the lights were on, bathing the room in a soft warm glow. Zaria held a tray in her hands, this time filed with covered dishes. Rey could smell the spicy pies from where she sat, blanket covering her lower body, but she refused to acknowledge Zaria’s presence.

“Giving me the silent treatment?”

She got no reply. Rey pretended she wasn’t starving and carried on with her book like she was actually paying attention to it. In her peripheral vision she saw Zaria shrug and turn to leave the room. Rey watched her leave but everything cam e to a halt when a loud, rumbling noise echoed in the room, dying out as quickly as it had sounded.

Rey groaned over the sound of Zaria’s laughter. She admitted defeat.

“Fine, you can stay!”

Zaria, always one to be petty, said, “Oh?” she had turned around again, facing Rey once more but she didn’t move. Rey rolled her eyes at the woman and closed the book, placing it beside her pillow. Then she uncovered the rest of her body and got off the bed, walking to Zaria and grabbing the tray f food from her. She went back to her bed after acquiring her dinner, rolling her eyes again when Zaria’s words reached her.

“Oh? No thank you? What happened to highborn etiquette?”

Rey was back in bed at this point and she said a reluctant thank you, to which Zaria nodded and stepped into the room properly. She pulled up a chair, the one that sat opposite the bed and seated herself on it, watching Rey eat.

“I’m not going to apologize for giving you work to do –“ Rey didn’t even bother with her, fully focused on scarfing down her food, “ – after all, I helped you stay busy –“

“Busy?” Rey dropped her spoon to glare at Zaria, “I didn’t ask you to keep me busy –“

“You did actually, but I forgive you for not recalling.”

Rey rolled her eyes again, going back to her food. It was no use arguing with Zaria if she was being obstinate. Rey preferred to save her energy and spend it on something worthwhile, like eating.

“But I do apologize for not warning you about the seeds,” Zaria went on, “I have no excuses for it actually, but if it helps you don’t have to do them anymore.”

Rey snorted and eyed her. “I wasn’t planning to. What happened to your hands?”

Zaria’s hands were reddened and the skin around her thumb seemed to be peeling. Zaria looked at Rey askance.

“You can see from that far?”

Rey nodded, sending a confused look Zaria’s way. It wasn’t that big of a deal, maybe Zaria was going blind in her old age?

“I’m not going blind, “ Zaria grumbled, narrowing her eyes as if she knew what Rey was thinking, “I have perfect vision – I’ve checked – and even I can’t see the runes on the wall so clearly from here. There’s obviously something going on with you but I digress. These?”

She held up her hands.

“It’s nothing really. Doing that many seeds takes time and affects everyone the same, giving them raw hands at the end.”

“Does it shock you too?” Rey asked pointedly.

Zaria didn’t flinch, to her credit. “It doesn’t, but that is because I know it does and I am prepared for it. I’ve explained this to you before; magical items give off certain sensations if you’re not ready for them. Once you’ve prepared yourself they don’t hurt you anymore.”

“And was I told they were magical?”

“No,” Zaria said with absolutely zero guilt, “but after the first shock you should have known.”

It was true, and Rey had no answer to give, unfortunately, so she settled for eating while sending Zaria a death glare. Not that it bothered the witch. All she said was:

“Eat slower, Rhaenar. You don’t want to choke. And whatever happened to manners?”

Rey ignored her. Manners were for people who weren’t going to faint in the next few seconds if they didn’t get any food before then.

“what will you do when you get to Sylla?”

Rey placed her cutlery onto her now wmpty plate and shrugged.

“look for my aunt? I’m supposed to live with her or something – I don’t really know the details.”

Zaria lifted an eyebrow. “and how are you going to find this aunt of yours?”

Rey opened her mouth to answer and then shut it as she thought of something. How indeed was she supposed to contact her aunt? Rhaenaar’s gather – her father, actually – had said something about going to Stormness and makng arrangements for her schooking but hadn’t bothered to fill her in on the details. They had all assumed things would go according to plan. Right now no one knew where she was or if she was even alive, so definitely goiign to Fort Fiore was out of the question. Adding to the dilemma, the only things Rey knew about Rhaenar’s aunt was that she was called Tilia Verna, il Tsaen before hr marriage to a Stormne noble, that she was the Duke’s half-sister and that Rhaenar  had dislked her immensely. Rey wondered why, trying in cain to hold on tho the memories of the brown haired woman as they floated out of her reach. To be fair, Rhaenar had only met her a few times before her marriage and that was when Rhaenar was still a chid. Tilia hadn’t been back to Storn since then.

Zaria sighed – she had been doing that a lot lately – breaking Rey out of her musings.

“well, it can’t be helped. I’ll have to go with you and see if I can help.”

Rey’s eyes widened. “really?”

Zaria sent a disgruntled look her way. “don’t look so happy about it, it just means more work for me –“

“thankyouthankyouthankyou!”

Rey leaped out of her bed and pounced on Zaria, smothering the struggling woman in a tight hug. Rey grinned as Zaria attempted to push her off, not minding the woman’s growls. She finally let go when Zaria elbowed her in the abdomen, bending over with her body folded in half and cradling her stomach.

“ouch! What was that for?” rey whined.

Zaria sniffed and brushed off her clothes, smoothing out creases here and there.

“you know very well what it was for. Now come, the day is still relatively young and threr is a lot I wuld like to get done before bedtime.”

She got up and left the room, muttering to herself. Rey grinned at herback. She still didn’t want to rely on external sources of help, but this was certainly something she needed help for, so it made her relieved to know that Zaria would be with her. Zaria might be prickly and mean and a bit sadistic in her interactions with Rey, but the girl felt safe around her, the most comfortable she had been in a ling while. Nothing was going how she would have wanted, but somehow she was assured that things would work out fine.

Rey got out of bed properly this time, gathering up the tray of dishes in her hfand and left the room.The weeks rolled by slowly, not fast enough for Rey. Living with Zaria wasn’t the worst but she knew when she had outstayed her welcome. She did help with the chores and did anything Zaria asked of her, but she was mostly useless. If she had been able to cast spells like Rhaenar should have after two years at Cardinalis plus some private tutoring she would probably feel more useful. Instead she was just a freeloader and Rey detested having to rely on people if she knew there was no way she would be able to pay them back. It wounded her already battered pride to have to throw herself at someone’s mercy and hope that they would be good to her. Fortunately Zaria hadn’t said anything about it besides the occasional; grumbling about expenses.

So the news about Stormness brought joy to Rey. Unfortunately it would take quite a while, since the boat that went from Narial to Sylla had already made its bi-weekly trip and wouldn’t be back until the next two weeks. Zaria had explained after a lot of groaning and whining on Rey’s part that the inhabitants of Narial were self-sufficient and didn’t need to visit the mainland a lot, so anyone who wanted to go to the mainland had to wait. Unless it was an emergency, in which case they would have to find their own means of transport or hire a fishing boat. So they had to wait, but the wait was killing Rey.

The first week had been pure hell. Rey was in a constant state of motion, unable to sit still for more than a minute. She wandered all over the house constantly, walking through every room in the house and then repeating the cycle over and over. Zaria finally got irritated after ten circuits and threatened to place a curse on her if she kept on wandering aimlessly; a curse to make her dance forever since she couldn’t keep still. Rey had paused at that, asking if it could really be done. Zaria grudgingly admitted that the spell would take a month to cast and complete, being a curse and not a hex. Rey let out a sigh in relief; even so she stopped, begging Zaria for something to do in the second week. Anything at all would be fine, she said.

‘Anything?’ Zaria had echoed, a smile creeping onto her lips.

Rey had nodded, watching with confusion as Zaria’s smile blossomed into a full-blown grin, but she had dismissed it as Zaria being happy to have some help.

So here they were, in the main room, where Zaria had approached the bored girl who was seated on one of the many stools in the room, her cheek supported by a hand, staring out the window into the distance. Rey looked away from the window at the sound of nearing footsteps, watching with interest as Zaria drew closer. The woman held a fairly large rectangular tray in her hands, on which sat a bowl. Rey had no idea what it held; she wasn’t able to look into it from where she sat. Zaria held it out to her when she finally reached her and Rey accepted it, and then she looked into the bowl. It was half filled with tiny round brown things that looked like seeds. She looked to the smiling Zaria.

“Err, what am I supposed to do with these?” she shook the bowl as she spoke. The seeds in the bowl made a sound not unlike that of a baby’s rattle as she shook them.

Zaria’s smile widened again. This time, Rey saw the signs of danger and grew concerned, like she should have been all along.

“Z-Zaria?”

“It’s really easy actually. All you have to do is apply a little pressure to the shell, like this –“ she took out a seed with one hand, pinching it between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand and pressing it in between her left thumb and forefinger. The brown cracked and Zaria peeled it away to reveal an inner yellow ball, smaller than the brown shell. She tossed the shell onto the tray and the actual seed into the bowl.

“—that’s how you do it. It’s easy, isn’t it?” she finished with a smile fit for a beauty pageant.

She had conveniently forgotten to mention that Rey would get a slight shock if she wasn’t prepared, the fruits being magical, or that the amount of pressure needed to open just one fruit wasn’t little. In just thirty minutes Rey’s hands were rubbed raw and she now had hair that stood up straight instead of lying flat on her scalp. Zaria stepped into the room once to check on Rey’s progress and nearly died of laughter when she saw the state that Rey was in.

Rey glared at her. “It’s not funny,” she said, “my hands hurt! And you should have told me these things shock!”

Zaria held onto the door jamb, standing in the doorway of the kitchen. Her body shook with repressed giggles and finally she calmed down enough to say, “Sorry –“ before bursting into full blown laughter again. Rey sighed and got up with the tray still in her hands. She put it down on the stool she had been seated on and marched up to her room, bumping shoulders with Zaria when she passed her. It startled Zaria enough to stop he r laughter, but as Rey stomped up the stairs she could hear the giggling begin again. Sometimes she wanted to strangle her host. Times like now, for instance. Then she remembered that Zaria was her only hope of survival right now, so she just sucked it up and waited for her time to come.

Zaria had come to her room in the evening, announcing her presence with a soft knock. Rey looked up from her book as she entered then looked back to it. It was a cold night, having rained earlier in the day, so the windows were firmly shut and the lights were on, bathing the room in a soft warm glow. Zaria held a tray in her hands, this time filed with covered dishes. Rey could smell the spicy pies from where she sat, blanket covering her lower body, but she refused to acknowledge Zaria’s presence.

“Giving me the silent treatment?”

She got no reply. Rey pretended she wasn’t starving and carried on with her book like she was actually paying attention to it. In her peripheral vision she saw Zaria shrug and turn to leave the room. Rey watched her leave but everything cam e to a halt when a loud, rumbling noise echoed in the room, dying out as quickly as it had sounded.

Rey groaned over the sound of Zaria’s laughter. She admitted defeat.

“Fine, you can stay!”

Zaria, always one to be petty, said, “Oh?” she had turned around again, facing Rey once more but she didn’t move. Rey rolled her eyes at the woman and closed the book, placing it beside her pillow. Then she uncovered the rest of her body and got off the bed, walking to Zaria and grabbing the tray f food from her. She went back to her bed after acquiring her dinner, rolling her eyes again when Zaria’s words reached her.

“Oh? No thank you? What happened to highborn etiquette?”

Rey was back in bed at this point and she said a reluctant thank you, to which Zaria nodded and stepped into the room properly. She pulled up a chair, the one that sat opposite the bed and seated herself on it, watching Rey eat.

“I’m not going to apologize for giving you work to do –“ Rey didn’t even bother with her, fully focused on scarfing down her food, “ – after all, I helped you stay busy –“

“Busy?” Rey dropped her spoon to glare at Zaria, “I didn’t ask you to keep me busy –“

“You did actually, but I forgive you for not recalling.”

Rey rolled her eyes again, going back to her food. It was no use arguing with Zaria if she was being obstinate. Rey preferred to save her energy and spend it on something worthwhile, like eating.

“But I do apologize for not warning you about the seeds,” Zaria went on, “I have no excuses for it actually, but if it helps you don’t have to do them anymore.”

Rey snorted and eyed her. “I wasn’t planning to. What happened to your hands?”

Zaria’s hands were reddened and the skin around her thumb seemed to be peeling. Zaria looked at Rey askance.

“You can see from that far?”

Rey nodded, sending a confused look Zaria’s way. It wasn’t that big of a deal, maybe Zaria was going blind in her old age?

“I’m not going blind, “ Zaria grumbled, narrowing her eyes as if she knew what Rey was thinking, “I have perfect vision – I’ve checked – and even I can’t see the runes on the wall so clearly from here. There’s obviously something going on with you but I digress. These?”

She held up her hands.

“It’s nothing really. Doing that many seeds takes time and affects everyone the same, giving them raw hands at the end.”

“Does it shock you too?” Rey asked pointedly.

Zaria didn’t flinch, to her credit. “It doesn’t, but that is because I know it does and I am prepared for it. I’ve explained this to you before; magical items give off certain sensations if you’re not ready for them. Once you’ve prepared yourself they don’t hurt you anymore.”

“And was I told they were magical?”

“No,” Zaria said with absolutely zero guilt, “but after the first shock you should have known.”

It was true, and Rey had no answer to give, unfortunately, so she settled for eating while sending Zaria a death glare. Not that it bothered the witch. All she said was:

“Eat slower, Rhaenar. You don’t want to choke. And whatever happened to manners?”

Rey ignored her. Manners were for people who weren’t going to faint in the next few seconds if they didn’t get any food before then.

“What will you do when you get to Sylla?”

Rey placed her cutlery onto her now empty plate and shrugged.

“Look for my aunt? I’m supposed to live with her or something – I don’t really know the details.”

Zaria lifted an eyebrow. “And how are you going to find this aunt of yours?”

Rey opened her mouth to answer and then shut it as she thought of something. How indeed was she supposed to contact her aunt? Rhaenar’s gather – her father, actually – had said something about going to Stormness and making arrangements for her schooling but hadn’t bothered to fill her in on the details. They had all assumed things would go according to plan. Right now no one knew where she was or if she was even alive, so definitely going to Fort Fiore was out of the question. Adding to the dilemma, the only things Rey knew about Rhaenar’s aunt was that she was called Tilia Verna, il Tsaen before her marriage to a Stormne noble, that she was the Duke’s half-sister and that Rhaenar had disliked her immensely. Rey wondered why, trying in vain to hold on to the memories of the brown haired woman as they floated out of her reach. To be fair, Rhaenar had only met her a few times before her marriage and that was when Rhaenar was still a child. Tilia hadn’t been back to Storn since then.

Zaria sighed – she had been doing that a lot lately – breaking Rey out of her musings.

“Well, it can’t be helped. I’ll have to go with you and see if I can help.”

Rey’s eyes widened. “Really?”

Zaria sent a disgruntled look her way. “Don’t look so happy about it, it just means more work for me –“

“Thankyouthankyouthankyou!”

Rey leaped out of her bed and pounced on Zaria, smothering the struggling woman in a tight hug. Rey grinned as Zaria attempted to push her off, not minding the woman’s growls. She finally let go when Zaria elbowed her in the abdomen, bending over with her body folded in half and cradling her stomach.

“Ouch! What was that for?” Rey whined.

Zaria sniffed and brushed off her clothes, smoothing out creases here and there.

“You know very well what it was for. Now come, the day is still relatively young and there is a lot I would like to get done before bedtime.”

She got up and left the room, muttering to herself. Rey grinned at her back. She still didn’t want to rely on external sources of help, but this was certainly something she needed help for, so it made her relieved to know that Zaria would be with her. Zaria might be prickly and mean and a bit sadistic in her interactions with Rey, but the girl felt safe around her, the most comfortable she had been in a long while. Nothing was going how she would have wanted, but somehow she was assured that things would work out fine.

Rey got out of bed properly this time, gathering up the tray of dishes in her hand and left the room.