His Divine Queen

Witches

“Oh!”

A startled cry came from a young, brunette woman frozen in the doorway. Alaric observed her with curiosity in his eyes, taking in her figure and the medical supplies in her hands. His panic from only moments before had subsided now that he saw who it was. This girl looked like she couldn’t hurt a fly, her round face etched with a look of alarm.

He decided to break the silence first.

“What were you going to do with those?” He asked.

“Um,” the young Witch paused, cheeks blushing a pale red as she looked away from him nervously. Her accent was thick as she replied, “I was… Coming to fix you.”

“Fix me?”

“Well,” she paused again, gulping before starting over, “not fix you, that was the wrong word. I was coming to help you.”

Alaric paused, mulling her words over in his head. Deciding that she could do no harm to him, he nodded, and took a seat on the low bed at the young Witch’s direction. She took a tentative step forward and settled down next to him, red cheeks yet to fade even as she examined his face for injuries.

The room was mostly silent as she worked, checking the bandages on his body that he hadn’t noticed until now. The only sound that permeated the air were the quiet hisses and groans of pain that escaped his lips if she pressed a little too hard on a bruise.

“Sorry,” she muttered, her hand disappearing to rummage through her supplies for something. Her hand returned moments later with a small, see-through jar in its grasp, its contents shining an odd iridescent green in the flickering candlelit room. A soft click echoed in the room as she twisted the lid off, and Alaric recoiled in disgust as he smelled the strange odour emanating from the jar.

“What the Goddess is that?” He asked with a shudder, shifting away from the foul substance.

“It’s a medicine I’ve created,” she answered proudly, “it’ll help with the bruising, I promise.”

Alaric frowned, the nauseating smell radiating off the thick liquid did not seem like it could help him, rather that it would make him feel sicker. He moved his gaze from the jar to her face, roaming over her soft planes and sweeping edges.

She must have felt his gaze on her, as her eyes looked up to lock onto his properly for the first time. That was when he felt it. A shift. A sharp aching in his heart, a jolt that settled again almost as soon as it had arrived.

“I promise,” she repeated softly, her accent barely discernible from his own.

A battle raged in his mind at her earnest expression. He wanted to believe her; he really did. But previous experience had taught him not to trust anyone, not even himself.

Nevertheless, he forced his head into a quick nod to signal her continuation. Although he couldn’t stop the churning in his stomach as he let her get close to him. He couldn’t stop the thoughts that ran through his head, that her touch would only bring him pain.

He knew it was stupid to think that way. She was helping him, tending to his injuries. So then, why was he so nervous?

She wasn’t Lissandra. She wasn’t Arabella. She couldn’t hurt him.

Except, maybe she could.

He was so distracted with his thoughts that he jumped when he felt her cool fingers on his cheek. Her languid movements were focused, touching only the places that ached. Her touch was soft, her hands soft, everything about her was so soft. He liked it, though, because it reminded him of a better time.

Her ministrations were over quickly, the job done with his bruises tended to, yet Alaric almost wished that he had more of them. So that she could carry on.

“There…” the Witch whispered, her hands drawing away from him as she stood up, “all done.”

The former Prince looked up at her, eyes roaming her form once again to take her in as she gathered her supplies into her arms. The stories he had read about the Witches did not match up with her. She didn’t seem violent, murderous or evil. She just seemed… normal. Kind.

“Thank you,” he muttered quietly. “for all this, really. But I would love if you could answer some questions for me. Please?”

The Witch paused in her strides to the door, half turning back to face Alaric. She eyed him for a moment, probably taking in his pale complexion and bruised skin, he thought, before she replied, “I’ll get the dux magorum for you. She’ll be able to answer any questions you may have better than I could.”

Alaric frowned as her accent thickened at the words. Dux magorum? He had never heard that term before. But if this woman could give him answers, he was all up for meeting her.

A whining creak echoed as the door swung on its hinges, and Alaric refocused in time to see the female Witch exiting the room.

“Wait!” He stood up abruptly, ignoring the black spots that flashed across his vision. “What’s your name?”

The Witch smiled nervously, the action causing small crinkles to form at the edge of her bright eyes. A breath caught in his throat at the sight.

“Abi. Call me Abi.”

- - -

The dux magorum was an imposing lady. Intense and sharp, nothing seemed to escape her notice. She was more like the stories that Alaric had grown up with. Alaric wondered what her name was, if it was something majestic, something mysterious, or maybe even something completely normal, like… Jane.

She sat on an unassuming chair in the corner of a dark room, a blue-tinged fire glowing softly next to her and illuminating the sharp crinkles and folds that signified her age. Abi stood silently by the wall behind her, half caught in the shadows beside two other Witches. One stood out with a mane of hair that shone like burnt sand in the blue light, whilst the other had a fierce look in her eyes that put even Kylia to shame.

“Welcome Alaric,” the woman said with the same drawl as Abi, breaking the quiet reprieve that the dark room had provided. He nodded in response, but he had long since learned not to interrupt people like her, people like Lisandra. For the best, apparently, as the woman continued regardless, “I hope that your stay so far has been pleasant?”

He didn’t know if this was a trap, if she was trying to get him to lower his guard before she would attack him. The young Witch who had tended to him, Abi, had seemed nice; but the same couldn’t be assumed of her leader in front of him. He had to be careful.

Alaric cleared his throat of the nerves before he responded, “Quite well, thank you.” He clasped his shaking hands behind his back, ignoring their tremors and instead focusing on the muddy wall just above the older Witch’s head. It was all he could do to hide the anxiety that her drilling stare instilled in him. He attempted to dispel the fear, focusing instead on the questions that made him seek her out in the first place, “Who are you? And what do you want with me?”

“I see we’re jumping straight into things,” the Witch sighed dramatically, “I prefer small talk first, but I will answer your questions regardless. As I’m sure Abigaille has already told you, I am the dux magorum of this clan. I am the superior Witch, and I am the reason you were saved from the Lamia.”

“Lamia?” He asked tentatively, knowing that he was mispronouncing it.

“Your kind may call it… ah,” the Witch paused, clicking her fingers absentmindedly as her stare finally moved away from Alaric’s face to glance over her shoulder, “Sofia, Abigaille, help me out here.”

The Witch with the orange hair stepped forward – Sofia, Alaric assumed - and bowed so her mouth drew level with the older lady, “Vorvolakas, or vampires.”

“Ah, yes. Vampire! That was the word. Thank you, puella.”

Alaric felt a piece slot into place in his mind, the mystery of the dark figures the night he had escaped finally revealed. It had been the Witches. His earlier trepidations faded away to only gratitude, “it was you that saved me that night? Thank you.”

“It’s my pleasure, and you can repay your debt to us in time, I hope. We would have retrieved you earlier, of course, but we thought it best to-“

“Wait,” Alaric interrupted, eyebrows pulling downwards in his disbelief, “you knew I was there before you helped me escape? You knew I was trapped there with them?”

Alaric couldn’t believe what he was hearing, how long had they known he was there? Had they been watching him for months, watching him suffer and bleed out under the terrifying control of Lisandra?

“Now, now, don’t be like that. You were completely safe the whole time, puer regem.”

“The whole time?” Alaric exploded in anger, “What about when they turned me into one of them?! Was I safe then?”

The old Witch paused, muttering something nondescript in her own strange language, before she responded. “That was a minor setback, I admit.” She hesitated again, waving her hand to the blue flames that burst back into life a mere second later, “but you’re safe now. And we need your help.”

The former Prince frowned again, wondering how he, a disgraced Were, could even attempt to help the Witches that had been terrorising his people for centuries. He wouldn’t do it, not even if it were his last day - he just couldn’t betray his people again. After a quick breath to gather his thoughts, Alaric asked perversely, “What if I don’t want to help you?”

“Well, then you’re free to go.”

“What?” He asked sceptically, “I can leave? Just like that?”

“Yes, of course. You’re no prisoner here.”

Alaric paused, completely bewildered by the sudden change in the Witch. “So, I can just walk out of here?”

“Yes,” she replied simply, her stern face splitting into a mischievous smile, “but good luck finding your way back to Epineio now. You’re just a little further in the desert than your kind has ever been before.”

Her laughter filled the air, mocking Alaric as he stood in front of her with his teeth clenched tightly. She was making fun of him! He was angry, frustrated even, but as he stood there in front of the four Witches, he finally felt a strange anger that he hadn’t felt in months, and that he didn’t think he’d ever feel again. Animalistic, and not completely him. Finally, he thought, relieved elation quickly replacing his anger at the knowledge that not all had been lost during his hybrid change.

“Now,” the dux magorum’s voice filtered through again, her laughter now contained. “Abigaille can show you out and back to your chambers, where I’m sure you’ll find everything you need. But if you’ll excuse me, I have some Lamia to destroy.”

Definitely not a Jane.

She was too scary to be a Jane.