‘Daoine truaillithe!’ the witch shouted. ‘Daoine briste! Fir-iarainn-rugadh. Comhroinn mo bhéile …’
The witch’s mouth opened wide as an inhumanly long tongue snaked out and licked one of Crag’s bulging eyes. She drew her lips back further, a gaping maw of gigantic proportions, and lowered Crag’s ashen face to her mouth.
Annev tore his gaze away from the witch and glimpsed the white bone fragment lying on the forest floor. His instincts taking over, Annev dashed forward, rolled, and snatched the fallen artifact from the soil. He was back on his feet as the witch turned to look at him, mouth agape.
With the relic clutched tightly in his hand, Annev skirted Crag’s dangling legs and leapt behind the old woman. He slapped the bone fragment to the crone’s throat and pulled tight on the talisman’s cord, strangling her with an improvised garrotte. She hissed, her head swivelling at an unnatural angle, and then the witch’s maw snapped shut around his wrist.
Agony.
Annev screamed, trying to pull his hand free, but it was too late. The witch’s teeth tore through his black glove, shredding the skin beneath. A grey ichor dripped from his veins, coating her lips. The crone’s eyes flashed, dark and angry, her once-white orbs now coal black, the pupils an angry red.
Annev’s arm seethed with pain as the grey ichor began to bubble out of his wound, turning black. He screamed for Crag, for Sodar, his head spinning …
But he refused to let go. Instead, he gave a mighty shout and forced his arm further into the witch’s mouth. She choked, and with his increased leverage Annev tightened the garrotte. The crone gasped and Crag fell from her hands, dropping to the earth.
‘Crag!’ Annev screamed, tears streaming down his cheeks. ‘Help me!’
The merchant looked up. ‘Talisman?’ he croaked, gasping for air.
‘Her neck!’
Crag pulled himself to his feet, the colour returning to his cheeks, and snatched his staff from the ground. He held the stick between himself and the witch and, with his other hand, made the sign of Odar. ‘O luaith go luaith!’ he shouted, bringing the staff down in front of him.
A searing beam of light burst from the bone fragment tied to the witch’s neck and her throat exploded with fire and blood. Annev fell backward as his improvised garrotte disintegrated and his arm tore free from the witch’s mouth.
The crone clutched at the gaping hole in her neck and tried to scream, but the sound morphed into a burbling cough as bile gushed from her ragged wound.
Crag took a cautious step forward, his staff held at the ready, but the witch stumbled back, her hands still clutching her throat, and then she toppled over the edge of the pit, crunching into the boulders that lay at the bottom.
Dazed, but with his pain subsiding, Annev rose to his feet and together he and Crag peered down into the hole. The sight below chilled him: the old woman’s body had fallen into the gap between the two boulders, folding her in half. Her skull had crashed against the stone’s surface, scattering dark grey matter across the pit.
‘She’s dead now, right?’
Crag held up a finger, placed his staff on the ground, and untied a small sack from his belt. He poured a dash of salt into his hand, rubbing it between his fingers. ‘O chre go cre,’ he muttered, then scattered it atop her remains.
‘It’s done,’ Crag said, picking up his staff. ‘We can go.’ He turned and began to walk towards the ridge.
‘Wait,’ Annev said, clutching his injured arm. Using his other hand – his true hand – he pulled back the tattered black glove covering his prosthetic, exposing the naked flesh beneath.
Unlike the last time he’d injured his arm, the magic prosthetic had somehow survived with its faux skin colour intact. But this time Annev had not escaped unscathed: dark black rents in his flesh marked where the witch’s fangs had sunk deep. He brushed the wounds with his right hand, and his fingers came away sticky with black blood.
Not red, he thought. Black blood. Grey at first, and then black and boiling.
Annev flexed his hand, testing its strength. Despite the severity of the injury it seemed to be working until, as Annev rotated his wrist, he felt an audible pop and a spurt of black blood shot between his fingers, splashing his cheek. The pain flared up again, as if his arm was on fire, and the dark blood pulsed anew. Annev screamed and reflexively clutched the wound, wrapping the fingers of his right hand around the injury, attempting to stem the flow of grey-black ichor.
‘Gods!’ Annev fell to his knees, curling around his arm with the pain. ‘It’s burning!’
‘Let go, you fool boy!’ Crag’s words came as if from a distance, yet Annev felt the man prising his fingers away, pulling his hand from the wound. As it bled faster Annev started to black out from the pain, falling backward, his eyes glazed, until he was claimed by merciful darkness.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Annev lay on a pad of blankets, a fire crackled somewhere nearby, and the sky above was black and full of stars.
With an effort, he eased himself into a sitting position. The campfire burned merrily beside him and a small stack of dry branches lay a few feet away. On the other side of the flames stood the pedlar’s pushcart, its draw-bar resting on the ground. Annev squinted, peering into the shadows, but Crag was nowhere to be seen.
‘Ah,’ came a soft voice somewhere high to his left. ‘You’re awake then.’ Annev turned, looking up into the brown boughs of a buttonwood tree. Crag sat there, chewing on his pipe. He pulled it from his lips and expelled a long grey ring of smoke. ‘How are you feeling?’
Annev’s eyes dropped to his left arm. The black glove had been removed and in its stead was a criss-crossing patchwork of white bandages. Annev prodded them with his right hand, testing the flesh beneath. His skin stung like a bad sunburn, but it wasn’t unbearable. He flexed his left fingers and swivelled his wrist, testing his grip.
‘It barely hurts,’ Annev said, astonished. ‘What did you do?’
‘Truthfully, not much. You conked out and your arm started bleedin’ black witch-bile. Came streamin’ out, like your body was anxious to get rid of the stuff.’
‘How did I get here?’ Annev asked.
‘How do you think?’ Crag said, blowing another smoke ring. ‘I carried you and your stinkin’, drippin’ arm here. Couldn’t make it stop while the taint of the witch was on you.’ He pulled the pipe out of his mouth and pointed at Annev’s bandaged limb. ‘I did what I could, but I wasn’t sure you’d heal till I’d cast down that damnable altar. So I smashed it, and I buried ol’ Cenif.’ Crag’s voice trailed off, going soft. ‘Buried what was left of her … what I could find. When I came back, your arm was healin’ proper.’