Sightwitch (The Witchlands 0.5)

Still nothing happened.

Three paces from the door, I shoved all my strength and terror into my gait. I slammed against the wood.

It didn’t move.

Harder I pushed, but to no avail. The bells were not working, and now the monsters had reached me.

I whipped around, back pressed to the door. It was so much worse than I’d feared. Skull-Face leaned down. Its skin writhed as if worms crawled underneath, and its smiling mouth parted to show …

Nothing. Nothing at all but darkness.

Slithering beneath the beast’s belly were the Death Maidens, their arms raised and claws grasping.

“Ryber, Ryber, Ryber.”

I dropped the bell. Knife, knife—at least if I had my knife gripped tight, I might be able to do a some damage to these monsters before I left the world forever.

Right as my fingers gripped the hilt, a sound carved through the chaos: a squawk and the flapping of wings.

The Rook shot down, an arrow aimed for Skull-Face’s eyes.

The monster roared, then reared back, one hand leaving the ground to swat at the Rook.

But the bird had already looped aside and now flew for the Maidens—who no longer sang, nor laughed, nor reached for me. Instead, they heaved at the Rook and screamed with voices too high-pitched to fully hear.

I had one breath, maybe two, while the monsters were distracted.

I would not waste this gift.

Whirling about, I grabbed the bell and started clanging once more. Meanwhile, my eyes—my Sight-less, pall-covered eyes—swept over the door. Up, down, side to side. There had to be a way to get through.

Skull-Face’s hand crashed down to the earth beside me. The world shook and I finally saw what I needed. Just as I’d thought before, this door wasn’t going to open without some kind of key.

A key like I currently held: my Sightwitch Sister knife.

In a clumsy thrust of speed, I slid the blade into a thin slot. Blue light flashed and the amber on the hilt flared gold. Then a squeal like metal on metal erupted, and with it came the groan of ancient, unwilling wood.

The door creaked wide; only darkness waited beyond.

I didn’t care. I didn’t think. I simply sprang forward, shouting for the Rook to come on.

Then I was through, spinning around while the Death Maidens hurled toward me. Skull-Face no longer smiled but only screamed and screamed and screamed.

When there was nothing but a sliver of light shining through the closing door, the Rook darted through. A flap of wings, a gust of familiar must to briefly erase the stench of rot.

Half a beat later, the door rattled shut. Darkness and silence took hold.

I was finally inside the mountain.





Y2786 D302





MEMORIES


It has been six months since Lisbet and Cora became my wards, and six times we have gone to the Sorrow to meet their father. We had to bundle up today, for the air was brittle and sharp. Sister Xandra says first snow will come tonight.

He was bundled up as well, his black soldier’s tunic layered over wool. Otherwise, he looked as he always did, and he acted as he always did. Except … something about him was different today.

Or perhaps I am the one who has changed. Certainly I grow weary from the war, from the rebellion.

All I know is that when our eyes met over Lisbet’s head today, as he embraced her tight, I felt the winds shift. Like the click when my key opens the workshop door, something moved inside me.

He smiled then—an expression I’ve never seen him wear. And though it was a sad smile, for grief still weighs heavy and likely always will, it was a smile all the same. One that eased the tired lines creasing around his eyes.

Beautiful eyes. Brown in some lights, bright green in others.

How have I not noticed before?

Then he said, “I have missed you.”

I know he spoke to Lisbet at his waist and to Cora, who danced circles around him. Of course he spoke to his girls.

Yet he looked at me as he uttered those words, and fool that I am, I did not look away.

Instead, I dared to pretend, for half a heartbeat, that the words were meant for me.

Even now, hours later, I cannot forget them.

And I cannot forget his eyes.





LATER—8 hours left to find Tanzi



Thank the Sleeper I did not lose my lantern. Without it, I would be lost.

Though fans of luminescent foxfire glow at each intersection, the roughly hewn tunnels beyond are darker than I ever knew possible. Even on a moonless night, there are at least stars to guide you. The Bat, the Hound, the Iris—as reliable as Thread-family. But here, there is nothing. No Firewitched sconces, nor even a basic torch.

It is so quiet I can hear my own heartbeat. I can hear my own blood, a rushing sound that pulses and booms. At first I found it unsettling; now I find it a strange sort of comfort. The topsy-turvy world of the mountain might make no sense, but at least my body has not betrayed me.

Yet.

The only other sound is the drip-drip of the hourglass and the Rook’s pattering wings whenever he leaves his roost upon my shoulder.

Twice, I have hit cave-ins that block the way and have been forced to turn back. Thrice, the Rook has taken flight off my shoulder to sweep down some blackened hole, only to croak mere moments later in a way that says, “No passage here.”

And once, a tremor rattled through the mountain, shaking loose so much dust and scree I was certain the tunnel was collapsing around me.

But it wasn’t, and the quake passed in an instant.

I am so grateful the Rook is with me. Without him, I would be lost.

Perhaps I might even be dead.

I don’t know.

I have prodded and poked at my memories of the lower Crypts. Illusions—surely they were all illusions. It is the only way that having the Sight might allow one to pass. Seeing and recognizing that something is not really there.

Or maybe it was all real, and those beasts are simply guardians of the Crypts, ready to attack any Sister who does not belong.

When I ask the Rook—in soft whispers, for everything in this place demands quiet, he only purrs and nudges his beak against my face.





LATER — 7 hours left to find Tanzi

The mountain has changed. No more slinking tunnels but a proper passage. Square and with a familiar motif running along the walls at shoulder height.



It’s the same design sewn along the sleeves of a clear-eyed Sister’s silver tunic. It’s the same design carved along the fountain of the Supplicant’s Sorrow, on the dolmen in the Grove, and around the rim of the scrying pool too.

I’ve seen it my whole life and read thousands of Memory Records, yet I still don’t know what this motif means or where it comes from.

As I walked, I ran my fingers along the grooves etched into the stone, and so preoccupied was I by the sudden structure, the clear marks of humanity, that I didn’t notice the gradually growing roar not until I felt it trembling through the rock.

Water. A lot of it.