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CHAPTER SEVEN
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“THERE IT IS AGAIN!” one of the grunts shouted in the line beneath the Stronghold, pointing to the large rays of fiery light bursting out the top level.
In the sea of bobbing hats and always-bored witches, Noa watched the silent spectacle with a careful eye. After all, that was what she was trained to do as a guard. The inspection line had drifted together into a blob of Mendacian blue coats staring at the top pod deck, bathed in the orange glow that pulsed in and out of life like a heartbeat while burning in place. The lightshow had turned the Stronghold’s tower into a giant sparkler stick and most of the witches couldn’t take their eyes off of it.
Where did the sun go? Noa asked herself, realizing that the air had become icy and the sky black against the light of the new star. Had it been ten minutes? An hour?
A tinge of betrayal lulled around her. She had been short with Keziah on details, but only because she was hardly aware of anything more. She knew that Mismra had been the first victim, killed around mid-nite. The rest of the River House fell to death in a ‘storm of rot’, according to the Scholar’s wire order. Ten souls lost. The squibbers brought to assess the bodies and the house had fallen to the dark with the other niads. By dawn, the cornerpiece of land where the River House was had been blocked with a forbidden membrane.
The shards of tangerine light continued their aggressive display, capturing most of the Mendacs’ attention. But Noa was disturbed. The elders had vanished along with the sun. When she thought about it, she had not seen an elder since the wire order. Were they all sick? Or hiding? Were the Mothrunners and scholars waiting out the worst of the plague like a season of dreadful wood blight? Either way, a host of a hundred-some young witches were gathered around the Stronghold without a guardian in sight. Noa felt heat bounce off her scrunched cheeks and she clenched her fists.
She eyed the entrance and started slipping her way past the grunts huddled like a posse of river trout. If there was no answer, she would find a way to punch through the membrane, cursed bone burns and all.
A warm hand slapped her bare shoulder, sending a prickle up her neck. It is not the time…
“You need to come with me. Keziah is up there.” Daire said hastily, leaning in close. “We will see her very soon.”
Noa’s breath shuddered. She had never been so angry and relieved in her life.
Keziah was safe. For now.
And despite how she felt about Daire, she knew she was safe too. For now.
. . .. . .
THE ROOT MOTHER’S DAGGER CALLED OUT to Keziah like the whispers of a caretaker she never knew. Its twisted shape and opaque obsidian-red form was an assault to the senses, like some kind of vengeful mean thought made real. The elder held the blade at arm’s distance, as though she wanted distance from her heart. The blade’s end was curved, upturned and forked at the end like a medical pincer more than a ceremonial killing knife.
Mmm. Any thought she conjured of the ancient Mendacs and the early eras made her unsteady. In the histories, it was said after the first witches crawled their way through the Muck of earthen clay, they aligned with the Root through blood and bone. Eons of bloodshed and ritual sacrifice. Communication would only being satisfied by the destruction of life. Countless humans and animals died. The earth was razed again and again. Those awful times called for new devices, and so Mendacs created the first tools, or ryup—daggers, wands, brooms. The Sacred Hollow was claimed once the brave Mendacs found the source wells, replacing blood magic with a peaceful commune with the Root. Blood magic and its powerful daggers were outlawed. And now, Keziah knew why.
“You retain much more than you think, Adams. Now sit back.” Levidia invaded, strapping Keziah’s legs to the flat stone. “You are correct. That is a ceremonial dagger.”
“From the Age of the Archs.” the Root Mother said, twisting the dagger in her hand and holding it to the lantern light as Keziah stared up at her. “A violent time.” She paused for a breath, and continued. “Symbols like this are all that remain. We keep them hidden from most Mendacs. Just holding it… calls me to something darker. But violence lays a path of harsh memory in its wake. And we can use it our advantage.”
“Otherwise, the slaughter was for nothing.” Levidia added.
Keziah felt she could contribute little, tied down and several questions still under wraps. “What does the dagger do?”
“Do you know the purpose of our wooden dowel treatis?” the Root Mother asked.
Keziah did and really loved her free days at the hot springs. Twice a year, she was the lucky winner of the weekly hat raffle, when the house elders let the girls indulge and intermingle with cakes and hapdrink until the sun rose. All the foragers would have their names written on a scrap and tossed into the dried-out ceres skin of Almanac Echni. The head of the foragers, Almanac Graves would reach into the hat with her wand and pull out a name that was often too hard to read and required three other judges to properly identify.
Thanks to the raffle, every witch at Echni got to experience the exfoliating waters of the southern hot springs at least once during the year. Some of the witches called the hot springs area the spa but Keziah did not know why. But the spa was a steamy mint-scented rockpool where water smoked up from the bottom of the earth, where the Root watched over all. Her trips ended with the wooden dowel treatis and a sponge bath, the perfect finish after days digging in soil. Over three hundred tiny wooden nails were punctured into the upper layer of skin across the back, arms, and legs—somewhat painful but cathartic with every hard slap of the hammer.
“The dowels release unnecessary toxins and cowardice from the blood, followed by an encased herbal steam bath. The pegs are very useful when it comes to surface invaders like a head cold or possession of the Incessant Whine. Together with the heat of the natural springs, those bitter creatures have no other choice than to slip out of you and drown in the springs. A dagger accomplishes the same, but it cuts deeper. These rare tools are the only way to physically pull out those deep fears and anxieties.” the Root Mother answered.
None of that sounded enticing and this certainly was not a secret spa. But the pulsing warmth that bounced off the obsidian blade led Keziah to believe that despite the cruelty of the slab’s appearance and the prickling sharpness of the Mendac tool, all of this was in her control. So she nodded. “I’m ready to begin.”
The Root Mother left the front of the slab and walked to Keziah’s side. The elder was stunning in the lantern light, like a carved goddess effigy in front of a bonfire. Her golden eyes shone so bright, searchlights into Keziah’s mind as the Root Mother wordlessly placed the dagger above her chest… and let go.
Keziah flinched. The dagger fell before stopping at her outer cloak, the blade tip bobbing as if on a watery surface. It began to turn, spinning on the hilt, ripping up tiny hairs of fabric as it started. Whoosh. Whoosh. Her mouth felt dry. The black dagger spun faster. The room darkened. Whoosh. Whoosh. The blade drifted closer, forcing her to shift around in the restraints. She wanted to call for help. But the elders were gone. Whoosh. Whoosh.
What do I do? Keziah thought to herself. She craned her head above, eyeing the dim lantern receding into a black fog. The sanctum had converted into a lightless cave, yet the dagger still gleamed in a circular swish. Maybe she was a bad witch after all. And this was her punishment. Evisceration for disobedience. Fair trade for a betrayer of her gifted art. Why would the elders be honest with her? She disregarded her sisters’ safety, all because she wanted to fly and spy new lands instead of being a good forager. Whoosh. Whoosh.
She struggled. A harsh pillar of light struck down on the altar, blinding her with a pink sunrise hue without the warmth. What was she going to? Die here? Not today. She snapped through the restraints rather easily and flopped off the slab, watching the dagger continue its hellish mockery of her doama’s grist mill. As she looked to the ceiling and all around her, it was clear. The sanctum was indeed nothing more than a void. She backed up, only for her shoulder bone to collide with the slab wall behind her, sending a jitter of pain to her teeth. The pink spotlight grew, swarming over the empty rock altar like a gentle soundless fire. The dagger kept spinning. Whoosh. Whoosh.
Then out from the other side of the altar, Keziah spotted a wiggling blue-white finger rise. A brittle-looking hand followed, curling over the scratch markings, the fingers caught and twisted in the crevices before springing forward. The sound was that of sandpaper against bark. Harsh life against harsh indifference. The body attached to the creeping hand and arm was of a small female, covered in a tattered black robe and a wiremesh of drained brown hair in a ratnest bun. The pale-blue body crawled over the altar, its limbs crunching against the weight of some bulging mass contorting out the middle of the back, the robed bunched up like an old ruined pillow. It was a nightmare without the glossy film of sleep.
Keziah squeezed herself into the slab wall, her palms grasping nothing but pumiced rock, cracking her nails. “What are you?”
“Don’t play coy when it’s the two of us!” the creature hissed. “I am thy shadow. I never leave thee in time of need. But you hate thee for speaking truth.”
“My shadow? The voice in my head?”
“Witches have more than just a voice, mine sister.” the shadow returned with a greasy-green smile.
Unable to discern reality from witch’s trick, Keziah eyed the still-spinning dagger above the altar, which the shadow creature gave famished glances toward. This was a test. Not a punishment. The shadow creature was still docile, like a doe-eyed animal who isn’t often hungry but suddenly gains a mean streak near dinner time. “Do you want this, mine sister? Past this pace, the horrendous storm of destiny nestled in us will slay the Hollow as you know it!”
“You’re trying to scare me!” Keziah argued.
The creature howled and cackled, crawling from the slab’s end like a girl-sized spider and perching on the raised rock headboard. The drooling, wild, backward-looking thing hissed at her, the breath smelling of stale blood, red wine, and ash. “Do not strike if thy heart casts lies! If thou must endure the trials… remember this! Past this pace is the dark water that drowns all hope!”
The shadow creature cackled a sickening laughter saved for the most depraved of murderous villains in Mendac lore, staring Keziah down and somehow pushing her further into the slab wall. The creature became small in its perched position, knees bent high above the shoulders until it no longer resembled human form.
Whoosh. Whoosh.
A fanged mouth appeared from the empty space its head vanished into, snapping loudly before leaping to the altar slab as a formless black mass of spider legs. The snaps echoed across the sanctum as the darkness began to retreat. The shadow screeched at Keziah, rearing back on two pincer legs that gripped the slab, lurched in a defensive position.
Keziah screamed back at the shadow with a battle cry that would scare the Banshees, snatching the dagger from the air without effort. “Enough!” She wiped sweat from her brow and with a single blow, the dagger blade slammed into the slab, down to the hilt. A thunderbolt cracked through the sanctum with the swing, the black mass dissipated, and the reddish lantern light returned. Keziah opened her eyes and saw the crying shadow creature, back in pale corpse form. The dagger was inches from the creature’s chest, Keziah’s hand still as a gargantu tree. The blade had etched a long scratch mark, before resting in a pile of shredded rock bits.
The shadow creature’s eyes were hidden under the tangled mess of hair but somehow, Keziah knew their sight had met. The creature spoke softly, without a hint of malicious playfulness. “We thank thee. Our love and thanks onto you, Keziah…”
She leaned in, confused. “Are you… me?” The creature did not respond, placing a cold hand on hers.
She let go of the dagger.
She blinked.
“Congratulations, Adams.” she heard Levidia say as the sanctum’s pillars, marble floor, and the elders came back into view.
Still strapped to the altar slab, Keziah watched the Root Mother carefully grab the slowly spinning dagger, its ends now coated with a small dip of blood. The elder held it tightly by the hilt, not removing the blood, and secured it in a leather keepcloth that was then sat on a nearby half-pillar. Levidia undid the restraints with a snap of her fingers, giving Keziah’s lungs a full burst of air and a head full of stars. The scholar came to her side quickly, two heavy weights that balanced her shaking shoulders. “Take easy breaths. The dagger’s essence has left the body but small passengers might remain. Easy breaths.”
Keziah nodded, suddenly thirsty and her head throbbing with the fading memories of the shadow creature. She wanted to scream. Cry. Rejoice. Every emotion under the sun. But before any new thoughts could take hold, the Root Mother walked toward her with grace, even her footsteps ringing the senses like pleasant vanilla ice cream. Keziah straightened her posture and the elder smiled as the scholar stood.
“You did very well.”
Keziah smiled. But it faded into concern as she saw flashes of the hissing shadow, which had just been perched and screaming on this very slab in a mirror dreamworld somewhere. Her skin prickled at the thought. “Was that creature the voice in my head?”
“In a sense.” the Root Mother leaded, picking up the end of her gown and sitting on the slab next to her. “The dagger is a dangerous ryup. Nearly all Root-blessed people will encounter this creature… at some point in their lives. The dagger bypasses the most effective and most toxic element of our reality.”
“Fear?”
“Time.”
Keziah failed to understand. The Root Mother placed a hand on her shoulder, replacing the prickles with buttery, massaged ease. “The dagger pries at your deepest self, but the expense of revealing this sliver too early is high. A child is not meant to confront their darkest desires and anxieties when they lack the experience only time provides. Knowing and understanding this part of the self is a highly meditative and laborious effort. Even for the scholars and the Mothrunners. It takes centuries, even eons. Only those with the potential of reaching high-witch can survive the process. Which means…”
“I can become a high-witch?”
The Root Mother smiled and gave a performative bow with her head, the top of her hat gesturing as well.
Keziah’s head swam once again. This was becoming the best worst day of her life.
“You are well on your way. Now, you will follow Levidia and receive your new housing orders. Until further notice from either me or one of the scholars, you are a runner-in-training, working under Yoni. Act as such.” the Root Mother said plainly before walking toward the sanctum’s tear shaped window.
“A runner? But how can I-?” Keziah began before the elder turned.
“The arts are not limiting. A witch can choose what is taken from them. Do not let me down, Keziah.”
The utterance of her name rocked Keziah to her belly. It was like the energizing jolt of a second wind after sleepless nights. “Thank you, Root Mother.” Keziah bit her lip. She felt sheepish. She wanted to say something else. But the elder was still smiling, as if she knew what was on her mind. Still, she spoke. “Can we… can we talk again soon? I have a lot of questions.”
“Soon. But I have more inspections to run, my dear. The Hollow is in danger.” The Root Mother flittered away in a beeswarm of goldmist, drifting through the sanctum’s stale air before twirling out through the teary window.
Keziah took a slow deep breath and felt at ease. Which was strange. Normally, something like this would have shaken her to her bones. But instead, she felt better than ever. Purer. But in need of a nap all of a sudden. And lots of water.
“Come, we take the stairs.” Levidia echoed through the sanctum, holding open a hidden door in the wall below the window.
The two of them walked down the narrow stairwell, warm wood creaking as the scholar directed her to a small room halfway down the Stronghold. It resembled a miniature cabin—there was a simple straw bed in the corner with a neatly folded deerskin blanket and a fungal canvas canteen of water propped against the wall. She looked at Levidia and she nodded ahead. “Take a rest. Rituals are taxing and the night is still young. And don’t be a fool, drink the water. I’ll return in an hour or so.”
Keziah walked inside under Levidia’s arm, her hat bending down with her. “I do feel a bit worn. Are you sure it’s fine?”
“I’ve already spoken with Almanac Graves. Your belongings will be transported to Wormset. You are under Mothrunner Yoni’s responsibility and house protection. Do you understand your expectations? You are now a messenger and loyal servant to the highest elder and her closest in-hands. You will cook for them, clean for them, and deliver any assortment of messages and-or parcels to the designated recipient. Is that clear?”
“Yes, scholar.”
“Good. You listen well, Adams. Why don’t you do it more?” Levidia questioned.
Keziah felt the sting of bitterness prodding her. “I try my best. I think I just needed some real guidance.”
“Or the chance to become better than everyone.”
Keziah wanted to speak. But she said nothing.
“I hope you understand that I don’t hate you. I don’t want you to foster that idea. I’m just… weary of new travelers to our realm.”
“New? I’ve lived in the Hollow my entire life!” Keziah’s voice raised, beginning to tremble.
Levidia resisted the urge to roll her eyes as the small quibble threatened to become a sob-fest. She gripped the door’s handle and made her way out, followed by a silky whisper. “Sleep.”
The door shut gently and the air inside was sealed, Keziah’s ears popped like they did during high broomflight. She embraced the sudden quietness. Nothing left besides her own heartbeat and struggling autonomous breathing. She sat on the bed, slid against the wall, and grabbed the canteen. After several fresh swigs, she realized the roof of her mouth had been crackly dry. She felt the cold stream run into the center of her body, washing through her in a buzzing, almost numb sensation. There was nothing better than sips from a rolling river. She closed her eyes and went to sleep almost instantly.
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CHAPTER EIGHT
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THE LIGHT KNOT IN THE SMALL ROOM FADED TO LIFE, hitting Keziah like the summer sun returning from a nap behind the clouds. She blinked, wetting her eyes and the showering rays filling her with a warmth like cherry rumwine. She smiled. She stretched out her arms, bare muscles rippling over her tan skin, admiring herself like an obsessive narcismia fae. She ran her hand over her arm angled in the soft light, colored like autumn itself. Her skin twinkled like stars, the tiny hairs brushed over with dirt, tiny skin-eating mites, and the smallest flecks of goldmist from the variety of the day’s events. Her entire body was the diary of her life. She didn’t need a scroll or caged echo stone. The adventure was contained within.
She shook her head, which caused the worst throb to congregate at the center, fighting her eyes for space. What kind of thought was that? No need for scrolls or writing? Her body was a map to life or something? But the colors. My goodness, the room was blasted with color. Not just from the light knot either. Reflections off the polished fungal canteen shimmered in straight lines of every color far out of her vision. They criss-cross each other, almost a patchwork design, filling the room with their presence until she looked up and the lines widened, closing into one another and becoming a neat spiderweb of bark-like transparent tunnels.
The longer she stared at the lines intersecting within the highest part of the waiting room’s ceiling, she saw some of the tunnels shift. Other vibrated out a yellow vapor that was drawn in by another wire’s vibration. She almost reached out to touch them. What were they? But it was clear. She was starting to hear the voices now.
The next wave of grain must be transported by the dawn! If it ruptures, Tele Station will collapse!
Three more dead! By the Root, what are we going to do?
If Wormhill falls, it is you who will answer the call…
All of these voices, powerful booming thoughts with intention, were the wire orders of elders transmitted across the Hollow. And somehow, Keziah could now perceive them without the aid of intense Mun training, an art she was cut off from early on. It made sense, of course. Mun was an art based around centering the mind. Every ritual or training session felt like a predetermined failure for her. Unlike Noa, who excelled in closing off her waking mind in a floating meditative state, legs crossed and hunched over, hanging in the air like the ghost of a hanged witch.
The Hollow was panicking. And the elders had not left or escaped to some safe haven, they were scrambling to carry on as normal. But it didn’t matter now. After confronting her shadow at the slab, it seemed as if a new lifepath burst forth from her mind. She only had this feeling during broomflight. It made her joyful. And tearful. She wanted to embrace herself and live in the moment forever like a daytime dream.
A sharp knock shattered the delusion. Levidia walked in shortly after, Keziah sprawled out about the straw bed, snug as a bug. “And how was your rest?”
“Refreshing.”
“Mmm. Did you drink the water like I asked?”
Keziah nodded, staring at the continuous river streams of wire orders pinging from brain to brain, soaring through the waiting room walls in the meantime. It was all amazing. It had been here the whole time. Had she simply not looked closely enough? Was House Echni full of the same spidery transmissions? Did Levidia see any of this? The Root Mother surely did. She saw it all.
“You are trailing off, grunt.” Levidia said suddenly, Keziah’s mind pounding back to her attention. “I know the visuals might be a lot to settle into. Your sight will steady within a few minutes. It’s best we get into natural light and allow the dagger to work the rest of its magic.”
Keziah turned flippantly, slowly approaching the doorframe for a brief respite. “The dagger had a dose? Of what fruit?”
“Think of the dagger as a fermented apple peel. Does that help?”
“No, not really.”
Levidia moved on, straightening her back—Keziah was learning that this meant ‘let’s get a move on’.
“The Mothrunners are eating at Wormset right now. You can eat at a table and meet some of the elders since you are now a member of the household. After, we’ll find your lodging and then you can rest for the night. Hold your breath.”
. . .. . .
SIX CRACKLY LEATHER CHESTS FILLED WITH KEZIAH’S COATS, cloaks, seventeen pairs of boots, her beloved but suffocated Moonscar, and a few dozen books clattered to the ground at the foot of the cliffsided Wormset dormatory. Keziah and Levidia arrived through goldmist travel an hour after she went to sleep in what the scholar referred to as ‘the waiting room’. The clunky explosion of Keziah’s belongings dropped from the canopy above gave them enough time to see the snarling face of Bree, Daire’s oh-so-trusted companion, before it vanished under her hood and she sped off on her broom. Out of all the messengers and package delivery experts under the Root’s wing, Bree had to be the worst. As the bully zipped into the night, pushing away the spindly branches of blood-red artery trees that bloomed around Wormset Cliff, a storm of mud spewed across Keziah’s belongings.
Keziah’s face was red with rage and rushing excitement. She stood at Wormset’s base, white-knuckled and fog-headed. A part of her did not even care about Bree’s rudeness. She was a bitter old soul and couldn’t be helped for now. Since her waking, she realized that the dagger ritual had some lasting side effects. For one, like the following days after a Retinion Trial, all the colors of the Hollow were more vibrant. For the first time, the rich reds and greens felt like they might make her chest cave in from the beauty, her breath sucked away with the breeze. She imagined this might be what an ant sees in a field, dwarfed by creatures of the soil so enormous they never even know of your existence. Every twisting vein in every redgrove leaf crackled or whished with flowing thinsap. The moonlight piercing through those leaves made noise, sounding like high-pitched raindrops against the brim of her hat. The Retinion brews could not compare to the dagger. It was a pleasure to bask in this new Hollow. She didn’t give a damn about Bree.
“Don’t let her bother you.” Levidia said, whispering a pilari spell, the chests suddenly floating at eye level in her mind’s grasp. “She’s jealous, plain and simple.”
The world’s colors began to normalize. Keziah felt annoyed. The chill at the base of her spine wasn’t the work of magic, but a harsh tone from her secret mentor. So she left the freeflowing appreciation of the Hollow behind her and walked with Levidia to the steps. “Of course Bree’s jealous. She’s been wishing for my death since we lost her baby teeth.”
“Her baby teeth?” Levidia pondered.
“We tried making a brew a few years before we had the first Retinion. I may or may not have joined her teeth with apple seeds.” Keziah replied shamefully, snatching a suitcase from the air.
The issues between her and Bree ran deeper than the tooth orchard incident. But Keziah didn’t see the point in bothering Levidia with the details. She probably knew them in that instant. The scholar changed the subject. Slightly.
“So, your roommate at Wormset. Daire, Yoni’s favorite runner. You are familiar with her?”
“Oh, yes.” Keziah tried to settle, but said it through grit teeth. “I grew up with her and I’ve always been in the sights of her cronies. I’m sure they’ll love me.”
The thought made her shudder. Why was she paired up with Daire all of people? She got queasy. But not because she didn’t want to be with Daire. It was the simple fact that Keziah had never been able to figure out why Daire was friends with her. Even moreso following her famous splinterbeast stand at Wigg’s Peake. Why did she still love her after joining with the runners, making friends of the smartest and fastest Mendacs, and excelling on the lifepath to high witch? But that was what made Daire so special. There was never a clear answer.
On many evening excursions to Birch Lake’s Pinhole Island or the old witch treehouse in the goldmist fields, Keziah found herself staring at Daire. She would be talking about her trips outside the Hollow to towns on the Eastern Coast and exploring human towns under the cover of night. She was jealous of Daire in many ways. Her long red locks always got attention, she never hunched or carried herself like a three-legged rodent, and her recent clothing style—dark brown leather and infused Mendac
Two owls hooted in the distance and a chill hit Keziah. She didn’t like Wormset or its sister hall Wormhill, just a winding path away. The sun never reached the ground, making the grass tall but sickly as it searched for rays of light that were darkened by the red leaves. She was happy to be misted around by Levidia for this was not a pleasant strolling area. She had no idea how Levidia could stand living on a haunted mountaintop. At least, she was always told it was paraded about by screaming spirits in oldworld Mendac robes, blending into t
The two walked up the flight of thirty-some steps to the giant doors of Wormset’s dorm hall. Through the cracks in the large splints of pine wood and white birch that made up the structural siding, warm firelight and the steams of mouth-watering spicy morel mash stew eeked out. Keziah’s stomach gurgled to life. She hadn’t eaten in a good bit. And that ‘good bit’ felt like an eternal longing.
“Go on ahead and eat. I’ll be waiting with Yoni at the far table.” Levidia said.
The scholar pushed the twin doors apart, freeing the evening chatter of witches wedged between wafts of simmering meals and dancing shadows. Levidia departed from Keziah’s side and shot off to the left side. The main hall was ten brooms high and the ceiling arched over like a boat flipped upside-down, casting the hundred-some witches in a calm low light. A center fire hearth, gleaming with a bed of orange coals, kept the main hall circular in fashion, with tables and pillars spread out in a spiral that prevented witches from bumping into each other. In its entirety, Wormset was twice the size of the main Echni house and Keziah felt she was shrinking with every step. She expected side-eyes from the runners slurping stew or talking amongst themselves but she felt invisible as she followed the thinning line of hungry witches waiting to be served against the far side of the hall.
Not a soul spoke to her as she gradually made her way through the food line. The mash grew more savory with every step as witch after witch took a full bowl, a spoon, two napkins, and a water ball. When her turn came, Keziah came to the wall counter with a smiling face and was smacked by the hoots and hollers from the inner kitchen. From her view, she saw several sprinting bakers and cutthands ever busy at work, with the main baker, the legendary Hoffy holding ten empty bowls stacked on a single finger while flipping deer steaks on a crowded stovetop. Hoffy’s green headband broke through her shock of white hair, signifying her status as master of knife and ladle. But Keziah didn’t understand the deer steaks and hectic attitude of the kitchen crew. If she being served morel mash stew, who was getting the good stuff?
Before she had another thought, a hot bowl slid through her cupped thinking hands, followed by a spoon and napkins stuffed under her fingers.
“Would you like an additional water ball for your stew? Since it is Hoffy’s thirty-seventh year as Point Cook, the kitchen is offering rocksalt foam or ginger garnish to top your stew.” a younger cutthand said, sweating through her green headband sectioned with white strips in the middle.
“Umm… I’ll take a water ball, please.” Keziah responded. “Ginger always makes my throat itch.”
“Me too!” the cutthand said with a smile, grabbing a swirling niad-prepared water ball from a bucket below the counter. Water trickled down the girl’s arm as she pushed the baby apple-sized ball into the rim of the bowl. It remained in place, warping against the heat of the stew.
“Can I ask you something?” Keziah asked after admiring the cutthand’s handiwork. The young cook’s apprentice leaned in, arms over the counter and still smiling, probably thrilled to see a new face.
“I’m from Echni House and steaks are a seldom sight. Is that a regular dinner here?”
The cutthand shook her head. “Not until recently and they are only for the elders. All day, we’ve been shunting food up the cliffside. We’ve been hosting more elder witches than usual. Supposedly the Root Mother grabbed some elders from other regions to help out the Hollow. Two real scary moths from East Appalachia and a scholar from High Tide. They requested deer steaks, cooked rare with an ancient grain breading—an old recipe that even Hoffy had never heard of.”
“They’re here because of… all that’s happening?”
The cutthand’s eyes got narrow. She stepped away from the counter edge and stiffened to her original position. “I shouldn’t be talking about this. I’m not entirely sure what is happening. They won’t let the kitchen staff go past the fleshgroves, even the ones that are supposed to have an off-day. And most of the witches that come back here are being told to stay put. I know something bad is approaching. We can feel it. For every witch that returns, two do not.”
Keziah wanted to pry, but figured she would get nowhere. Besides, she was holding up the rest of the stew line and getting those uneasy stares she had craved earlier. “I’m sorry. Thank you. For the extra water, of course.” She left the counter window with a fake smile and twisted on heels the other way.
A dozen wheel-shaped tables made up the spiraling center of the hall’s dining area. It was much like any Mendac eating arena. But the tone at Wormset seemed to be lapped with growing melancholy. Like the cutthand had said, and after her own eyes had settled into the low light, Keziah saw that every table seemed to be missing a vital limb. The place was two-thirds full, one or two empty seats and the same for the benches or wall chairs. But she spotted Daire standing at a far end table at the back of the room with a wall fire crackling. She made her way, hoping for humility.
Levidia was seated amongst the hooded figures with her hands in her lap, shrouded in the pipe smoke and not really paying attention to what Daire was saying. The rest of the diners were covered in half shadows, hands on their bowls of stew and nodding their heads. A few of the women were laughing like they shared a naughty joke. The two others stared at Daire, who was in the middle of some whispered fact when Keziah approached. She watched the runner’s bead-wrapped hat bend down. “But we can discuss that later, I suppose.”
She briskly walked to Keziah and grabbed her by the waist, directing her like they were at stage play rehearsals. Keziah felt like she was in trouble, like an hour earlier when she had met the Root Mother. Were these women as powerful? As graceful? Or were they confusing to the heart like Levidia?
“My olu, this is Keziah. And this is Yoni Ongrand, Mothrunner of Beliat.” Daire introduced, bowing and stepping away from the table.
The firelight seemed to part between them. Keziah’s eyes were taken by the gleaming animal-like glow of Yoni’s own. But unlike a curious cat or hungry predator, Yoni’s eyes seemed to yearn for contact. And one of them had a rather larger speck, a green sparkle out the left one’s center. Dark green eye shadow matched the speck and sparkled from the dark. Her ceres was a thick dark blue hood formed into a steeple at the forehead. The robes When Yoni held out a marble-white hand, her hood split apart like the petals of a cone flower. Thin free-flowing strands from the hood fanned out and an incredibly loving warmth spread out from the Mothrunner’s unescapable smile. “Take a seat.”
Keziah obeyed and followed Yoni’s silky hand to the rounded arcelium capseat. The Mothrunner leaned in, the hood strands grazing Keziah’s hair and sending a low thorning pulse from her shoulder to her eyelashes. “A Mendac house can never turn away a hungry witch.”
Yoni was perhaps the most beautiful elder in the Hollow. Close to the Root Mother somehow, who radiated something more than just a witch. But in the same way that her breath had been taken away before the dagger ritual, Keziah found herself gazing at Daire’s mentor in a state of unworthiness. She was much older than the Root Mother and perhaps the rest of the Mothrunners. However, her wisdom had a sincere ancientness to it, not just a clever yet bitter turn of phrase like the famous tirades of Almanac Graves at Echni.
“Come sit, Kendra.” Yoni invited. Keziah blushed and tried to ignore her mistake. Luckily, she corrected herself. “I apologize. The head gets filled with the frizzles.”
“Ah, Yoni. What a horrible first meeting!” a giggling witch in turquoise blue whisker attire said, slappinher the side of her leg.
“Ruperta… you never waste an awkward moment.” Yoni replied.
Things grew friendly right after. Keziah dined well. It was like meeting with old chums, warm and bright voices all around. Levidia helped Yoni introduce the fellow Mothrunners and their assistants. Gylnn was the silver-haired quiet visitor from High Tide near the fire, whose stronghold rested along the Great Bay hundreds of rushes from the Hollow. The raucous Ruperta was a former whisker who started the broomflight training grounds and was forced into a role as Mothrunner due to her risk-taking with young students. Next to Ruperta was Celeste, a gorgeous elder with bunned brown hair under a stone grey hat, reading intensely from a palm-fitting journal. The Moths’ young assistants were stirring their cups of bitter ale and wine with their minds, either bored beyond belief or unsure of how to proceed. Had they ever seen their elders be so carefree? Especially in the midst of a deathly crisis? Keziah couldn’t imagine Almanac Graves braying like an ass or trading cheeky jokes with anyone. It was as if the roles had switched.
But it was Mothrunner Hazel that interested her most. She had long blue-gray hair in two long braids that draped over her shoulders and a wide-brimmed hat with golden moss hanging off the edges. She was the always calm Moth who oversaw the miles of goldmist fields to the west of House Echni, an ancient hall called Silkstring. Hazel was a plumer—a powerful fire witch who harvested the goldmist-laced grain that grew from the soil of battles past. The Lowfields of Heart would become a smoky yellow dreamland in the summer months and Hazel would direct her plumers to gather the mist erupting from the rocky ground beneath the grain stalks. All those years had given her skin a bronze shine. It matched the many empty copper cups on the table. Hazel spotted Keziah’s curiosity and responded by clearing her throat.
“You have something to ask, dear?”
“No. Not really. It’s just that I’ve never seen a fire witch that wasn’t in training. You usually don’t see them around wood houses either. I’ve… I’ve heard a lot about you.” Keziah said, feeling foolish the moment she opened her mouth.
“Fire art is unstable. At its very nature. Most Mendacs have more sense.” Hazel said with a wink.
This was true. So unwieldy was the concept of ordering flames into existence that there was not even a fire arts house in the Sacred Hollow. They shared duties with the foragers and niads mostly, as the elements worked well with the right amount of creative witches. Shornstone shields, made of ancient soil from the Underbed beneath the Echni grounds, had to be forged by plumers due to the intense heat pressing. Obsidian wears could only be generated through the monotonous effort of niad-controlled river currents while the plumers blasted the rock with a fire jet that sizzled into existence on the shoreline.
It was an alien art to her. “What does it feel like to harness a fire jet? Do you feel it coming from your hands? Or your head? Whenever I summon a lightning dome, part of my head feels like it’s on the brink.”
In the Hollow, every forager had their own garden of responsibility. A witch could plant whatever she wished, no matter the volume, as long as she could care for and produce fruit each season. In House Echni, this was all but promised. On humid days in the summer, Keziah would conjure a lightning dome over her tizberry and tomato garden, the cold wisps of air swirling above the dirt before darkening in color as pressure collected at the back of her eyes like a bad cold. With every spark of electricity striking the virgin soil, the cushy insides of her head joined her eyes like all was being squeezed out of a cloth. Small, silent lighting strikes would appear over the garden as a dense layer of fog was summoned from the soil. The powerful white-hot streaks aged the fruit much faster than a human forager—sometimes, if she was lucky, she could observe a seed sprout through the dirt and bloom into a full flower in seconds. But once again, the magic made her brain feel like mush.
The plumer grinned. Nobody had asked her a direct question in some time. “The fire comes from here.” She pointed to the base of her neck with her thumbs and pushed outward. “It is much more of an internal force at work. We don’t generate fire as much as we do pure goldsteam. The untrained witch eye can’t see it. But if you had the proper skills, you would see me as a walking golden smokestack.”
Keziah’s eyes grew as wide as the empty plate below her.
“You know, your hands are the best guides to voice your desires.” Ruperta chimed in, waving her ringed hand around and snapping quickly. Flashes of blue flame spit out from her fingertips and Keziah jumped back. Ruperta laughed and withdrew a stick of rolled tobacco and mercy lichen from her inner grassgreen robe. She lit the end and passed the smoking stick to Hazel, who happily toked.
“She’s right.” Hazel said after exhaling. She put her hands up in a mock inspection, wiggling her fingers about. “Your hands can help direct the flow of magic. You have ten tools attached that spread the severity of the spellcast. It takes practice but any witch can summon a flame or conjure a blast of wind.”
“Maybe one day, then.” Keziah said with a smile. She felt full. From the food and the company. If this was to be her new life, perhaps things weren’t bad.
Just then, a gurgling rumble erupted from the floorboards and the copper cups and plates rattled across the circle table. The candle flames twitched about and something big shattered to pieces in the kitchen quarters. Keziah gripped the side of the table and looked around as the rumble stopped. The elders and other witches, besides Noa, were unfazed.
She met Noa’s face but she was staring at Daire, squeezing her hand below the table. Daire looked at them both and resisted a smile.
“What was that?” Noa asked, looking at the floor like she could find the source.
Daire turned to Yoni, calm as could be and sipping her hot tea. Yoni swallowed and slammed her cup down suddenly, like she had left a baby in its crib all day long. “Flaps must’ve found a pressured vent.”
Keziah was confused.
“Oh, you have to meet Flaps before you bed down.” Ruperta said with a smile, the smoking stick wedged between her shining white teeth.
“And what is Flaps? It doesn’t sound very appealing.” Keziah prodded.
“She’s the resident Showak. She takes dips in the arcelium chamber and talks directly with the Mun strands.” Daire said.
“And she’s still alive?”
“Of course! Most of the Hollow wouldn’t survive without her.”
“What does the chamber look like?”
“It’s very big. A golden pot thing built into the side of a cave. Lots of scary scraping sounds when the arcelium bubbles up from the earth. It’s pretty neat.” Daire lead on.
“And… what does Flaps look like after that many dips? Isn’t that stuff boiling hot?”
“Worse than that.”
Keziah perked up in her seat, her spoon clanging loudly and knocking the melting water ball into the rest of the stew.
“Ugh… let’s just take her into the steam vents already. We have things to do before I return to-.” Levidia said before Daire interrupted.
“Before you return to the library and sniff a few books?” the runner joked, poking the scholar’s armored shoulder with a dastardly wiggling finger.
Celeste let out an accidental wallop of laughter and bit down on her finger. When Hazel slapped her shoulder, Yoni broke her seal as well. Keziah braced herself for a burst of ice shards from Levidia’s eyes or perhaps her broom would slice Daire down the middle, but nothing came of the remark. The table was sent into a storm of chuckles, to which even Levidia smirked.
Did she almost laugh? What has the world come to? Keziah thought.
“Fine. Fine.” Levidia said, defeated.
“Finish that bowl and we shall go.”
____________________________________________________________________________
CHAPTER NINE
___________
THE FOUR WITCHES DUCKED OUT OF THE DINING HALL with Yoni’s permission, entering a narrow door on the other side of the waiting line. They followed Daire’s lead, skipping down stairs two at a time in a mud-carved corridor as the air got cold and tasted stale. Daire stopped near the bottom of the steps, swiftly turning to a hardened but cracked trap door seared into the rock wall. She pushed lightly on the flaky piece, pushing it up with a hand and grabbing a smooth stone lever fixed into the harder rock. She told Keziah and Noa that this was the mudstone entrance to the steam vents on the bottom level of Wormset, where the obsidian furnace churned like a sleeping giant. The coals popped and cracked inside, sending a flicker of warmth into the cave as sparks made the front opening breath fire. Levidia rubbed her gloves together before taking them off and placing them in her robe side pocket. Keziah didn’t mind the heat, but something else in the room made it hard to breathe.
“I’ll be honest, I am waiting for this all to be some horrible joke.” Noa said.
“Enough! The port is just ahead.” Daire hissed.
In the center of the very-warm gravel pit was a large heat-singed golden cauldron ten brooms high and eight wide, its golden sheen turned brass from untold years of intense heat. Bubbling pockets of red-hot arcelium popped and sizzled at the large lip of the cauldron. The cave had been an ancient air pocket, the rock was hatched with harsh black lines going downward in swirling patterns—the telltale sign of magma arcelium deposits.
“So… is Flaps inside it or something?”
“Most likely. She’s always busy. Cleaning out clogged drains and extracting material.” Daire said.
“I never liked the smell down here.” Levidia chimed in from the back.
“It doesn’t smell like anything.” Noa said.
“Exactly my point. No clues. No evidence. The Hollow is better for it. Saves us the trouble of trails left for Needlebriars or some rogue witch. But with the sickness spreading, I would rather be aware of everything occurring, especially down here.”
“What do you mean?” Keziah asked.
“Not to worry you all—but who is to say that the chamber itself isn’t affected? Brewing a geyser of death to bubble up from Wormset while you sleep.”
“And that’s why the most important of us Mendacs stay safe at Wormhill.” Daire said, patting Levidia on the back as she walked closer to the rumbling chamber. “Flaps! Are you in there? We have a special guest!”
A noise rubbed along the inside of the golden pot, like a beaver’s tail passing your canoe during the calm river months. Thick amber bubbles popped along the surface and splashed on the cave floor at Daire’s boots. She backed up as the rubbing turned into heavy clangs and scratching. Flaps was in there, crawling through the fiery-hot arcelium mixture, perhaps swimming with a long fish tail and covered with burned, rocky skin. Keziah braced herself.
With an exclamatory WOOOOT! of relief and victory, a thick-scaled two-legged creature with modified broomflight goggles and a wiretrap of slicked back dark hair poked its head from the side of the chamber. It bobbed in the arcelium as it scratched its witch-like face. It crawled out of the chamber’s top and made Keziah freeze in wonder. The impressively flexible figure was covered with arcelium burn scars of green and yellow on gray skin. It was strapped with many small satchels on the arms and legs—covered by a thin brown robe that rattled with a protection membrane’s energy, shining a bright blue. When it landed on the cave floor with a female ooompf!, Keziah realized that this must have been Flaps.
She removed the goggles and her pointed ears bounced back into place as the goggles fell to her neck. Her gear was lighter than Keziah had figured for someone swimming about in the chamber. Arcelium mix dripped off of the enchanted robe and she flicked the cooling bits onto a raised lump on the floor where many bits had condensed into a smooth formation. The enchantment began to wane, going from blue to a skin pink. She grabbed the sides of her faces and ripped the membrane from her skin, taking a deep breath and laughing. She turned to the visitors and her golden eyes brightened like snowflakes in sunlight.
“Ah, what a sweet ruby rune! The daffodil does in fact grow twice a year! I don’t believe we have met!” the creature said, her voice surprisingly smooth, besides the gurgles in between every other word. She held out a scaly hand for a shake. Keziah expected the bony thing to be covered with ooze, sludge, or any vile kind of unknowable body substance, but it was dry and warm like a broom after flight. “Caterina Eskus. Known as Flaps by the jokesters of Wormset.”
“Keziah Adams. Forager.”
“Aah-dums? That’s a name not oft spoken. From the wider world, are ya?”
“No. Born and raised in the Hollow…” Keziah said slowly, like she was repeating herself.
“Hm… interesting. Well, I’m the Hollow’s showak. If you haven’t learned by now, this is where all of your clothes and satchels spring from. That big bowl of golden elixir churns hotter than any spell you could hope to conjure. It removes the bonds between the Root and the Earth and allows talented folk like me to wittle away the loose ends and craft your heart’s desire.”
“Why is this chamber under Wormset? I thought most arcelium production was done in Mommach territory. I have a jacket from the Mistletoe share spot.” Keziah asked.
Flaps paused before giving a sparkling yellow smile. “The other tribes are very important to us. And who doesn’t love a Mistletoe camp souvenir? But every witch stronghold should be self-sustaining. This is the type of secret you don’t go around sharing. All it would take is a few drops of lilyhock or bone spur to make Wormset a crater.”
Keziah was shocked. Flaps tried to save the moment. “But that’s why I am here. I’ve kept this golden child safe and sturdy for the last five centuries. It’s not going anywhere as long as I’m here.”
“Any other witches join you?” Keziah asked, pointing to the chamber with a smile. “Even with the enchantments, I can’t imagine swimming inside there.
“How do you mean?” Flaps asked. “You’ll be taking a dip in there before too long. Nobody told you?”
The top of her slick-back hair tickled Keziah’s chin as she listened close to her stomach. The remark suddenly hit Keziah and she pushed Flaps away, nearly exploding into a sprint. But she took a wavered breath and clenched her fists. She turned to her friends, but they appeared just as shocked. “For what purpose?”
“You’re a special witch, now. A Moth’s helper cannot withstand the pressures of high magic. Cindra chose you and your friends for something special. I don’t know what it is but I know my task. We can eat mushrooms and spin daggers all the live-long day but true transformation requires change in the smallest of degrees. Down at your base potential. That is what the chamber is for.”
Flaps fiddled with one of the satchels on her upper arm, lifting the cover and somehow reaching her entire hand inside. A slip pocket, Keziah thought to herself. Flaps had access to a forbidden spell that allowed a witch to manifest a small void, about the size of the average closet. But slip pockets were usually encased within the body of a tree or something that did not move very often and whatever you placed inside the hidden space still weighed the same. Somehow Flaps was as lively as a cricket but nothing rattled or gave away the contents of her pockets. She pulled out a scratched-silver sliding telescope, snapping it to full size and closing her satchel cover.
The showak hummed to herself, sticking a golden eye through the clear lens as she performed a quick inspection. After gesturing to see Keziah’s palms and twisting the telescope’s outer dial, she pushed the lens against Keziah’s breast. She stood in place and waited, hearing her heartbeat against the telescope. Finally, Flaps clicked her tongue rapidly and returned the device to the satchel. The kind, hopeful face had been replaced by dutiful coldness.
“Oh, dear… We have to get her dipped right away. She’s been marked by the spell.” Flaps said, pulling a whistle from another pouch at her left side and blowing sharply. Like Levidia’s, the noise was absent.
“Why didn’t we know until now? The Root Mother didn’t catch it?” Daire asked.
“No disrespect to Mother, but she wouldn’t know what to look for. This spell may have just manifested itself last night, but its power has been festering for much longer. Older than any Mothrunner. No matter how we solve this, and we will solve it, we’re flying by the flint of our breadstone. Understand me, Rune?”
Keziah shook her head. Still, Flaps escorted her to the rusty metal work table melded into the arcelium chamber, planting her butt on a small warm stool. Copper pipes encrusted to the cave ceiling chugged to life. She felt worried looks from Daire and Noa as they started shifting in place, unsure what to do. “Flaps, I thought I would get a good night’s sleep before I went through another test.”
“This is not a test, rune! Perhaps I wasn’t speaking clearly. Hard to do with all this gold phlegm. You have been marked with the necrotic shred leash. I’ll show you.”
“Is that a strange poetic way of saying she’s alive and healthy?” Daire asked.
“No.” Flaps responded. “Necrotic, as in death magic, shred, as in flesh-eating and muscle-tearing, and leash, an infernal serpentine web that grips the body from inside out.”
The showak slapped the amber goggles to her face and leaped to the wall above the chamber. She dug her fingers into the crevices, knocking around the rock with a free hand and placing a pointed ear against it like a deranged cave locksmith. After a few turns, a small hand-shaped hole sunk into the wall and Flaps reached inside.
“Any idea what she’s doing?” Keziah whispered.
“Not a one. Probably something terrifying.” Levidia replied blankly.
Flaps retrieved an aged bundle of fungal canvas from the dark space, heavily inked in dread-setting Mendac sigils of old. Keziah didn’t recognize any of them. The Sacred Archives had been a wonderful experience, the only library in the Hollow where brooms were permitted because the shelves reached into their own cloud layer. But it was too overwhelming and she suddenly felt that she had been too young. The amount of writing and time taken to document the Mendacs’ struggles and victories was impressive but the overpowering smell of decaying leatherbound journals and volumes, still stenched with the wisps of Needlbriar invasion seeds, pushed her away. Flaps unrolled the canvas and slapped it against the wall, it held with a dry crackle.
There were seven sigils scribbled on the carpet sized roll. Unlike almost all of the Mendac sigils, some of these were curved. In their middle, several jagged marks cut them into sections. But the one in the middle was something she had never seen before. Flaps stepped in front of the canvas and made the witches stand back. “These are remnants of ancient new spells. From time to time, magic is challenged. Either by the forces of the Root or its detractors. Understand, rune? These breaks in the sigils represent a leash back to the source. The spells are still utterable. But now, most of their power resides with the source.”
“The Root can take power back from old spells?” Noa asked.
“That is a way to see it, fair-hair.” Flaps responded. “After my predecessor passed on, this scroll, the Gall Stretch, was left to me as a measure, in the event that other spells emerged. The fibers of the scroll are encased with the most precious of arcelium strands, scooped out from the mouth of the Earth in its deepest caverns where all magic enters our realm. The very essence of magic is baked into the scroll and so, when new spells emerge, the Gall Stretch reveals their name. Six of those I know. Two of which I dealt with personally. Horrible memories but spells we vanquished without much destruction. Now that one in the center… is something new and for the moment, we are powerless. A twisted new thing never spoken until the River House.”
Keziah peered at the sigil. It was a simple faded-on image, nothing particularly sinister about it. Except for that fact that within it, she could see a faint fiery glow. It wasn’t light from the torches and bubble pops from the chamber’s lip, no, it was the New Spell itself. And although she had never seen it before, her eyes traced along its lines, nearly sounding out the spell by simply following the starts and stops. Her mouth opened. She began saying something, but it came out as a whistle. Flaps and the rest stared at her. She cleared her throat and looked at Levidia, who walked close to the Gall Stretch and spoke.
“From what I’ve read, the spell doesn’t carry on the curse via air particles. It is bound to souls. Plain and simple. Most sicknesses, like a bad cough and such are the culprit of tiny animals seeking a home inside the body and as a result, the body defends itself. When most humans die of a bad cut or ingesting exotic plants, it is the body itself that ends the life. A germ does not start the fever, the body is starting a housefire to destroy the bee’s nest.”
“The center sigil is unnamed as of this moment. We will refer to it as the New Spell and that name only. Naming an unknowable abomination before it is rendered under your control is the first step to utter calamity. Remember that, rune.” Flaps said, pointing to Keziah as she picked up a collapsible copper stick, extending it to broom’s length with a flick.
The copper flatend of the ten-foot stick slapped hard against the panel like nails tapping on ice, making her point clear. “This is not a warning. This is a call sign of the New Spell. It is here. It has taken twenty lives in less than a day. We are, for the moment, at war.”
Not a soul moved except for Levidia, who yawned and failed to hide it with a fake nose scratch. Nothing fazed her, Keziah thought. But she didn’t know what to think. Yesterday, the Hollow had been on the same loop for years—nothing but the mundanity of gathering morels, making fruit grow faster in lightning domes, snapping stalks from rough dirt, pretending that you couldn’t just make yourself a pitcher’s worth of water on a hot day. All that wonderful humdrum. But today, after being sent through the cloud tower, the Hollow had become a symbol of weakness, something sick, on the verge of dying, threatening to take the Mendacs with it. This was worse than a nightmare. Eventually you woke up, even if you were kicking and screaming and punching your roommates.
She turned to her friends, their faces hot with worry. Noa was more anxious than Daire, crossing her arms and rubbing her thumbs incessantly. She was listening to every word from Flaps and her crown’s quartz shards shone a red deeper than the fullest tomato. The light grew in intensity as it caught the showak’s attention, stopping her speech as the shards began to hum. Noa’s eyes pointed up and she gave an embarrassed smile. “Apologies. My equipment acts up sometimes.”
“Even your crown?” Daire asked.
“No. That is no mistake.” Flap rang out. She stared at the red quartz lining and chewed on the inside of her mouth. She ran her fingers through her spiked hair once more and cracked her neck.
“Aye, you. Fair-hair. Get over here. You too, Daire.” Flaps beckoned.
“But I’m not a part of this.” Noa pointed to herself.
“Oh, of course you are! You were the first witness to the newest threat in the Hollow, were you not? And you share close bonds with the initial vessel. Why else would you be here?” Flaps said, performing the same awkward telescope-and-belly procedure on her and Daire.
As she did, she questioned Noa, whom she had not met before. “Sixteen years old. Arrived in the Hollow at what age?”
“I was five when the Lunray guards found me at the edge of East End. I was in the trees, in a deep sleep, with the golden anklet. Same as the rest of the spurs.”
A spur was the affectionate title given to the youngest Mendacs who arrived in the Hollow by the grace of the Root Itself. Since the Hollow emerged after the Age of the Archs, once or twice a year, crying or sleeping children would be found high in the trees around the boundaries of the Hollow. Spurs varied in age, from infancy to ten years old. Keziah often thought of them as pre-ordained by the Root. They were always found tightly bounded in mossy wraps and tied to tree branches, with a golden anklet that sang out to the guards. No one had ever seen a spur arrive in the Hollow—they were brought by the Root without announcement, so guards were always patrolling the boundaries of the central Hollow.
“And you remember nothing of your life before the Root saved you?” Flaps asked, flicking the dials on the telescope.
“No. Flashes of someone laughing while I’m looking at the blue sky. No clouds. That’s all I could ever recall, even after the Trials.” Noa was solemn as she spoke and her back twitched.
Flaps noticed the involuntary movement and motioned her to turn around. She scanned up and down her spine before pressing gently near the middle. Noa’s neck cracked. She didn’t move. Flaps immediately relented and clicked her tongue. “The broom grafting is not kind. You are six months past the sewing?”
Noa nodded.
“You have my gratitude. A truly awful process.” Flaps said, hovering a hand above her back in maternal fashion.
Daire’s face was red. Noa looked ashamed. Did she not know about the grafting?
When she was done with her inspection, she packed up the scope and opened the arm flap, sending the device back into the void. Truly amazing. Keziah thought to herself. Only an arcmix-dipped witch could becoming a living slip-pocket. And Flaps had dozens of tiny satchels strapped to her arms and legs. One too many arcelium baths? Ouch.
She brought Keziah to the line of two in front of the chamber, standing between Daire and Noa. Flaps snapped her fingers and a small metal tin from the Current Age zipped out of a satchel strap on her thigh. She presented to them the palm-sized tin, the green pigment of her skin pushing back into a faint pink as she pulled it open. “Each of you need to take one. Place on the tongue, swallow, hold your breath for ten paces from here to the wall and back.
Flaps shook out three tiny clay capsules and handed them to the three. Clay capsules were used for powerful medicine that risked melting your insides by their lonesome, the clay would slowly chip away in the stomach acids and expose your body to the potion gently. Also known as medcaps, they were also used for witches’ monthly cycles, which was connected to a face of the moon. Keziah’s cycle started when the moon looked like a fingernail in the sea of the Outer Space.
The witches followed Flaps’ instruction and took a capsule. Keziah placed it on her tongue and began walking. Within seconds, the chalky mixture coated her mouth and she swallowed on instinct. Noa and Daire had the same squished face as they swallowed. When the twenty paces were done, the witches were motioned to face the chamber. Without warning, Keziah felt a flutter in her throat and began to cough loudly. Gasping for air. Daire tried to reach out for her but heaved over and began coughing too. Noa was the last to join the spasms.
Tears in her eyes, Keziah gave a half-sneeze that shot out a hard glistening pebble across the floor, landing at Levidia’s boot tip. Daire and Noa soon expelled the same. Thin trails of sputum sank into the stone floor and smoked to life like water on a hot skillet. She was amazed and disgusted.
Flaps was ecstatic, leaping across the room. “As I suspected. Tonsil stone! And you each have your very own! It would be lovely if the Hollow wasn’t about to wither away.”
Then came the vomit.
After a respite from hacking and vomiting, the witches cleaned themselves with water balls given by Levidia and returned to Flaps’ desk, where she had prepared three cups of hot mint tea. Together, the five witches congregated and the girls thankfully sipped on the soothing tea.
The gross, calcified stones were arranged on the desk like the inventory of a disgraced bead-master’s workshop. The witches drank most of their tea as Flaps inspected the tonsil stones through multiple lens on her goggles. Several “hmms” and “oh mys” later, the showak returned to her presentational posture.
“The stones tell of futures where the ink has not yet dried. But as of this moment, the three of you will meet a bad end.”
Although they did not make a sound, the girls’ fear was palpable.
“Hm… however the future is ever-changing. But it does place our mission on a tipsy scale.” Flaps said, pacing about the chamber in rhythm with its chugs and thumps. She kept staring at Keziah. It was making her uneasy.
“Caterina, this has been enlightening. But Cindra said to continue the ruse. No dipping until the Root Mother herself sends the order.” Levidia braced.
Flaps froze, her goggles rattling. “Then they will die.”
Keziah watched as the showak pulled her hand down, as if she had been protecting her in the stuffy cave. She watched as Levidia’s fists clenched, crackling her leather gloves. Keziah felt like she was being squeezed inside the might of the Ruthless, unable to breath. So her destiny involved the arcelium chamber, perhaps a life like Flaps. She tried to swallow her fear but took a step back anyway. The scholar instantly spotted the tension and relaxed. But Flaps remained defensive as Levidia carried on.
“If she was in the Hollow at the emergence, then yes, she would probably be dead by now. But the seeds of the Root flow freely through the trees, the air, our lungs… I’ve been reading so many histories, accounts, and Endels’ secrets, I’ve snapped my wrist twice. Nothing in the writings suggests a worse progression until the Night of Neversleep. Which has to be preceded by a trideath of elders!”
“Aye. But the first markers have made themselves known. First: the death of an innocent vessel. Second: the banshees’ call. When was the last time you heard the banshees before this year?”
“Never.” Levidia stated under a furrowed brow.
“Aye.”
“And keeping them all here is the best course of action?”
“It is not your place to-.”
“I serve the chamber.” Flaps surrendered, putting her hands down and walking to her desk, leaving Keziah to stand alone. “There’s just one word in our vast lexicon that changes how we move on.”
“And what is that?”
“Unprecedented. That is what your science tries and often fails to account for.” Flaps muttered.
“It’s not my science, Caterina, it’s just another system of measurements. I shouldn’t have to explain myself-.”
“Then don’t utter another word! We are not scholars. We are Mendacs faced with a new threat, as happens from time to time. You can search the scrolls all you want for a missing piece but the puzzle has already aligned itself. Right here!” Flaps was frustrated and pointed to the Gall Stretch with a shaky hand. “The destiny of the New Spell has been written. Plain as mud. We cannot prevent the emergence. It has to happen for the world, the Root, all the creatures that live on this planet… it has to happen so that we can become stronger and keep the outside from drifting in. We are being challenged by the power of reality itself. But as I said, the ink has not yet dried.
“You see the New Spell as a curse. All of you do, I understand. Too many souls have been snatched to begin with. Life is happy to throw you a few miseries. But so is the life of a Mendac. Complacency is our greatest sin and we pay dearly. It happens to the best long-lived of us. We will find the answer. We will heal who we can, starting with the three of you.”
“Why are we marked?” Keziah asked, fighting the urge to inspect her hands and arms, knowing nothing would be visible of the necrotic shred leash. But her throat did feel a little swollen.
“Because of your close emotional connection to the initial vessel of the New Spell. And for Daire, I would assume it is because of your friendship with the two.” Flaps said.
“I have a really good question!” Daire claimed, raising her hand and wide-eyed. Flaps simply nodded. “Can the spell carry via the rims of cups? Or shared pipes? Or shared napkins? Because I was sharing everything with the Moths tonight.”
Flaps giggled darkly. “The New Spell is inconsistent. But since it is elemental, older than the animals of Earth itself, it operates under means we can only guess at. I wouldn’t worry about passing the spell onto the elders. New magic craves youth. Innocence. The Moths will be fine. But that is why the chamber is here. The Root gifted it to those who crave the truth. And I will find the answer.”
“The grunt must have sleep at some point, Flaps. We shall see you another day.” Levidia stood, standing up straight.
Flaps stood up straight, now taller than Keziah herself but still dwarfed by the scholar. She grabbed her goggles and placed them over her golden eyes. “Understood. I will get to work on uncovering more about the New Spell. I happened to spot a new vent entrance being created under the Well of Gut before I met you all. Maybe it will shed some answers on the New Spell.”
“Was that the commotion we all heard at dinner?” Levidia said, her strict tone softening.
“Oh, no.” Flaps said, climbing the chamber ladder and turning to the witches. “I had a spicy stew this morning.”
Levidia cracked a smile and turned on her feet. Daire gave Flaps a friendly wave and followed. Noa seemed planted in place. Keziah grabbed her clammy hand and flashed an encouraging grin. The fair-haired guard copied the smile without the emotion and started walking. She followed Noa’s lead as she waved to Flaps and said goodbye.
The showak was at the rim of the chamber, her eyes now shielded behind the tinted lenses, seemingly with something still on her mind. Keziah stopped walking and Noa was stuck in place again. “Thank you, Flaps. It seems like we will be meeting again soon.”
Flaps nodded to her and Noa. “No matter what they say, any of them, if you need help… come to me. This chamber may be your only chance to beat that spell. I’m still here after all.”
“You were cursed by a New Spell too?” Noa asked before Keziah could.
“The chamber had some hiccups. It was old and hadn’t been looked after. But I needed to save myself. And in turn, I ended up saving the Hollow. I’ll tell you all about it someday. Those that do what needs to be done are never praised, my runes. But that’s a curse even the Root can’t remedy.”
Keziah was struck. “Thank you.”
“Have a good sleep, dear.”
TO BE CONTINUED . . .