Chapter 11
The first time I rouse, I see nothing but a smoke-filled sky, and it hurts to breathe. I’m lying next to a body that folds around mine, warm and comforting, and for a heartbeat, I think it’s my mother.
But a little death thrums against my chest, nestled away in a deep corner of my heart. It isn’t hers, and that thought brings overwhelming sadness that sweeps me back into darkness. At least the stolen death feels like it’s exactly where it belongs.
Inside me.
A deep voice meets my ears. “Come, little beauty,” it whispers, and I’m dimly aware of being carried away, the crumbling cinders of my village fading from sight.
The second time I open my eyes, a long, black cloak sweeps over me like a blanket.
The world no longer burns, and I think I’m in the vale, the pale light of morning breaking through the clouds.
I’m atop a horse, strong arms cradling me, hands holding fast to the reins.
I hear the chink chink clink of a bridle, the soft thud of hooves, and I notice an unmistakable sway rocking me back to sleep.
Before I succumb, I look at the bearded face of the man who holds me, and he meets my stare. My head rests on his shoulder, his mouth so close that the warmth of his breath drifts over my lips.
“It’s all right. Rest.”
My heart pounds, something inside me screaming, get away, while another part of me wants to be closer. I shouldn’t be with him, but I am, and I’m too tired to question where we’re going. My eyes close—I’ve no command over them—and I drift, curling against the Witch Collector’s heat.
The soft murmur of the stream flowing along the outskirts of our village wakes me for the third time.
I lie on a bed of crushed, tall grass beneath the canopy of a great oak tree.
Its leaves flutter and rustle overhead. I’m folded in a dark cloak that smells like spices and sandalwood, and maybe juniper.
The fabric also carries the scent of smoke and a thousand deaths, a scent that rattles my brain fully awake.
I bolt upright and flinch, bracing my breastbone with my hand. My chest aches like a god pounded it with their fist.
Wary, I take in my surroundings. A warhorse—black as a moonless night—drinks from the stream that moves on lazily as ever, as though the rest of the world has no notion of the devastation that transpired at Silver Hollow last night.
And at the water’s edge squats the Witch Collector.
His jet hair—damp and untied—hangs down his back in waves. He wears fitted leather breeches, cracked with age, and a loose white linen tunic marked by ragged tears and bloodstains at the sides and sleeve.
He’s a contradiction—that’s the thought fluttering through my mind.
A towering, intimidating Collector—hard, unstoppable, and unyielding.
Yet here in the valley, he kneels, wide shoulders soft, hair lifted just so by a breeze.
That dark head bows in reverence, and in his hand rests a bundle of plucked stardrops.
I think of the way Finn touched me with one of the flowers Mother braided in my hair and lift my hand to feel for them. They’re gone now.
One by one, the Witch Collector casts petals into the unhurried current where hundreds of blossoms float away to the river. “A stardrop for every soul,” he says, whispering the words like a prayer.
It isn’t lost on me that he’s performing a ritual of my people. In Silver Hollow, Littledenn, Penrith, and Hampstead Loch, it’s customary to say a prayer to the Ancient Ones for the newly dead and provide a simple offering of the valley’s most beloved bloom.
He turns to look at me, and a charge sparks the air between us again. A shiver dances across my skin. I want to dismiss it as disgust, but that would be a lie.
It’s his eyes. Something about them makes me want to look closer, like I might see a whole universe if I peer hard enough. But it’s just the color. I didn’t think it could be any bolder, any more penetrating. Yet here in the vale, with daylight rising, his eyes shine like emeralds.
“How do you feel?” His voice is soft and kind and calm, unlike the way it sounded when he shouted his warning through the village.
I don’t know how to answer. I feel like I’m floating in a dream.
Any second, someone will shake me awake.
It will be the morning after Collecting Day, and my shattered world will piece itself back together again.
But my throat is raw and dry from soot, and my blue gown is now the color of a stormy sky with brown splotches covering the skirt and bodice.
And my hands…They’re trembling, and they’re caked in ash and old blood. Blood that belongs to the warriors I killed. Blood that belongs to my mother. Blood that belongs to a vile prince.
The Witch Collector exchanges the stardrops for a half-scorched wooden bowl filled with stream water and reaches me in three long strides.
I quake harder. Mother used to say that grief always strikes when we least expect it, and that we rarely realize how those we love inhabit even the most seemingly inconsequential parts of our lives.
It’s in those moments that the pain of their absence strikes so much deeper, because the time we took for granted suddenly shines in sharp relief.
Like right now, as I stare at Mother’s dish.
The Witch Collector, not realizing what he possesses, sets the vessel in the grass and unsheathes a knife from his boot.
Through my tears, I watch as he cuts a strip of his tunic from the hem, returns the knife to its hiding place, and after a dip of the cloth in the water, washes my face with the tenderest touch.
“Shhh. There now, don’t weep. It’s over. You’re safe.” His voice is still so warm, so gentle. It’s the kind of voice a woman could find solace in, a voice that could conquer even the strongest will.
I should pull away from him—from his touch, his aid, his nearness—but my tears flow fiercely, uncontrollably, and the shaking…
I killed so many people.
The Witch Collector strokes my hair away from my face and stares deep into my eyes, anchoring me. “Come to the water with me. We can clean your hands.”
Numb, I nod, and he helps me toward the stream, his arm tucked around my waist, where we kneel next to his abandoned flowers. Already clean, his skin smells crisp and earthy. He must’ve bathed while I slept.
“You exhausted yourself with magick,” he tells me, scrubbing my hands in the lapping waves. “It requires much strength to save a life from the brink of death. I woke at dawn, and you lay collapsed beside me.”
Of all the people to learn my secret, it had to be him. This seemingly kind-natured man that my mind can’t even comprehend is here—alive—much less because of my doing.
Those green, soul-searching eyes, rimmed in the darkest lashes, flick up and hold my gaze. “Thank you for what you did. I owe you my life.” He turns back to the stream, still gently washing my hands, but the blood and soot don’t seem to leave.
In a daze, I pull away from the water and stare at my skin.
I blink. And blink again. Silver swirls etched with hints of crimson, violet, and gold vine along the backs of my hands, from wrists to fingertips.
The sleeves of my dress are tight, but I push them up as much as I can, only to find more intricate details vining up my arms. Startled, I sit back and yank up my skirts.
Gods above and below. My legs are covered, too.
Witch’s marks—that I’ve never had before.
Vaguely, I recall noticing them when the Prince of the East came after me. Gold for life magick, red for healing magick, silver for common magick—like the protective magick we build at the wood’s boundary. The violet must be for Sight.
All I can do is stare, disbelieving.
“It was your mother,” the Witch Collector says.
“She was far more powerful than anyone knew. She hid your marks, as well as her own, but…” He pauses, and compassion fills his eyes as he takes my cold hand, folding it inside his warmer one.
“When she passed, the magick fell apart, and your marks became visible. I watched them appear on the green, Raina.”
My body is so heavy and my mind so sluggish, like my thinking needs to catch up to the moment. Nothing he said makes sense. He called my entire life a lie, my mother the master of deception, and me a fool.
But also…
I yank my hands away. The Witch Collector knows family names, but even those must be difficult to recall. The Owyns. The Bloodgoods. The Foleys. There are hundreds of surnames across the vale. But first names? Of a woman forever overlooked?
How do you know my name? I mimic the words with my mouth as best I can and force the question into an expression as I touch my throat and lips, shaking my head, making sure he understands that I cannot speak.
Did he hear my mother call to me? He must have.
He studies my face before doing the strangest thing: he moves his hands and fingers in the way Mother taught me.
“I have known your name for many years,” he signs.
I scramble to my feet and stumble backward, finally steadying myself against the oak tree. The Witch Collector rises as well, though slowly, hands lifted in placation.
“It’s all right,” he says and switches back to speaking with his hands. “You have no reason to trust me. You may even hate me. But please do not run. There is nowhere to go anymore.”
My spine goes rigid, and a long moment passes before I can make my hands work. “How…How do you know this language?”
The answer creeps into my mind before he replies. He’s collected dozens of Witch Walkers from our valley over the years, but there’s only one who could’ve taught him how to speak with me so adeptly. Still, I watch fervently as his right hand spells the word.
N-E-P-H-E-L-E.
My thoughts rage, as does the rest of me. The word liar screams in my mind. I charge him, shove at his chest, but he doesn’t falter. It feels like I’ve run into a wall. He just looks down at me, one black eyebrow raised like a silent scold.