by Caledonia Krieger
in Issue 119, December 2021
“There it is.”
Arawa’s eyes, keen though they were, could make out nothing, but as she drew nearer she could distinguish the unnaturally smooth curve of the dome and the faint straight lines of the doorway beneath overhanging vines that marked the mound of earth as the thing they were searching for. Hesper pointed to a piece of wood protruding from the tangled vegetation hanging over what she assumed was the entrance.
“See how the end is smooth. Someone carved this.” She reached out her hand to grasp the piece.
“Wait!” cautioned Arawa. “We do not know what magical defenses the witch may have placed here.”
“You are correct, we do not, but neither do we have any means of finding out. We shall just have to hope that the witch expected her location and camouflage to be sufficient, and that she is not so wary of intruders as you people in the cities.” Arawa tensed as Hesper pulled on the wood; the hanging plants rustled slightly, but the door did not open.
“We shall have to search for another way in,” said Arawa, already walking to circle the mound. Without Hesper and her knowledge of woodcraft, she knew she never would have marked this as anything but another small hillock in the forest, covered in fallen leaves, small shrubs, and with even a thin sapling poking its way through the debris.
“There.” Arawa looked to see Hesper pointing to the top of the hill. “That stump was placed there. I suppose it contains a chimney of some sort.”
Arawa nimbly bounded up the side of the slope, digging her toes into the soft layer covering the earth. “There is a pipe, but it is small. There is no way I could fit through it.”
“Well then,” Hesper completed a circuit of the mound and once more stood in front of the doorway, “this must be the way, as I see no other openings of any kind.” Arawa leapt to the ground, landing softly beside Hesper, who was unbuckling her axe from her belt. “I shall hack the thing down.”
She swung the heavy axe with both muscled arms, striking just to the side of the piece of wood that served as a doorknob. Arawa stood back, watching Hesper as she withdrew her axe and struck again, hitting in nearly the exact same place. After a few more chops, the doorknob cracked sideways, and Hesper lay down her axe, wiping the sweat from her forehead. She braced her legs and reached into the hole left where the doorknob had been, straining as she pulled.
Part of the hillside seemed to swing open, and they could see that the hanging vines and plants they had thought covered the door from above were actually growing right out of it. A musty smell escaped from the hill as the door swung wider and revealed a gaping black doorway. Arawa took a torch from her pack and lit it with a spark from her flint and steel, then led the way into the earth.
The inside of the hill was damp and chill. Mosses and ferns clung to the rounded walls, among which scuttled large spiders and long-legged crickets. A circle of fire-blackened stones was at the center of the room; above it hung a rack of herbs and meat, which had presumably been in the process of smoking, and higher on the ceiling, Arawa could make out a small black hole where the smoke would be carried up to emerge through the rotting stump on the hill above.
“Remind me, what are we searching for?” Arawa did not know why, but she whispered as if the hill itself might hear her and choose to swallow them both in darkness.
“Any item of value. To tell the truth, I know as little as you do.” Hesper spoke softly.
They had been passing through the small village of Sycamore earlier in the morning and learned that just the previous day a witch was burned in the town square. A pile of ashes still remained, slowly dispersing as the wind carried flecks away. With a little bit of probing, Hesper, who was used to the mistrust of small village folk and knew how to get them talking, gleaned the location of the witch’s lair. The villagers’ fear of the witch kept them from the general area, and Hesper convinced Arawa that investigating the place could yield valuable magical ingredients that could be sold at a great profit in the next city they came to. Arawa had been doubtful that they would find the witch’s lair, as they were given vague and unspecific directions, yet Hesper’s keen wood sense had led them to it.
Now, as she looked around the witch’s room, she was overwhelmed by the clutter. On the outer edge of the wall, a shelf ran around the room at waist height. On it, countless vials of different substances, some viscous and dark, some colorful and thick; bunches of herbs and sticks; bowls of powders; bits of roots and what appeared to be animal hides; bones; and carving knives all jumbled together in a chaotic mess. Beneath the shelf larger barrels and jars were stored, moss and mold clinging to their damp exteriors. The roof sloped upwards to the top of the dome, and though Arawa could stand upright, Hesper was forced to duck her head while near the walls, which were hung with dangling strands of herbs, pots and cauldrons, and odd charms made of bits of twine, feathers, rocks, and bones.
Arawa rifled through the items on the shelf curiously, but, knowing nothing about magic or herbs, she was ignorant of what she was looking at or its possible value. She glanced at a jar filled with a grayish substance, then recoiled; the jar was full of seething grubs pressing themselves against the glass and seeming to writhe frantically in pain or frenzied excitement.
The two women made their way around the room in opposite directions. Hesper moved slowly, carefully examining the jars and powders, so Arawa was the first to reach the hairy carpet that covered the ground between the fire circle and the shelf on the opposite side of the room from the entrance. She picked it up aimlessly, surprised at its weight. It stunk of smoke.
“Hesper, I have found something more promising than those herbs.” Hesper approached and stood next to Arawa, both looking at the wooden door set into the earthen floor.
“Indeed you have,” Hesper said. She drew a torch from her bag and touched it to Arawa’s so that it caught in a flare of light and a hiss of burning pitch. Arawa cast aside the heavy carpet and took Hesper’s torch so she could place both hands on the metal ring of the door and pull.
The door opened with the sound of creaking wood. Arawa peered down and saw a ladder leading into the gloom, the bottom of which she could not make out. She began to descend, and immediately she felt the temperature drop and the air become still and wet. She could smell the earthy scent of fungus and moss and heard a faint dripping of water. The ladder was short, and she soon reached another chamber, slightly larger than the one above.
“It is safe to descend,” she called up and heard the thump of Hesper’s boot on the first rung. She turned and gazed around the room. It was rock-walled and dirt-floored but contained no shelves or fire pit. A large mushroom sprouted next to the base of the ladder, its fleshy top speckled with green and black protrusions. The only item in the room was an iron chest set against the far wall, rust flaking from its sides and creating an orange pile of dust around it. Arawa coughed as Hesper reached the room.
“This is not what I was expecting from a witch’s cave,” Hesper held her torch up to inspect the ceiling, which was covered in a wet carpet of moss. “I suppose we should examine that chest.”
They both approached slowly, their footsteps echoing in the empty chamber. The trickle of water running down the wall and plinking gently as it rolled off of rocky outcroppings was strangely loud, magnified by the close quarters. Arawa tugged at the chest’s lid; as she had expected it did not open. She bent to examine the lock, holding her torch close and probing the keyhole gently with a thin bar of metal from a pouch on her belt.
“The lock’s rusted shut. You must try to break it off.”
Hesper and Arawa wedged their torches against the wall. The flickering light of the flames cast wavering shadows about the room and illuminated the lower halves of their faces. Arawa positioned a pointed piece of metal in the keyhole, then handed a hammer to Hesper, who swung it forcefully against the chisel. Rust flecks fell from the lock like autumn leaves as Hesper drove the chisel farther into the hole. Finally, they heard something break. Arawa removed the chisel, wiped it on a small cloth, and returned it to her pack.
“You do the honors,” said Hesper, and they exchanged a glance. Arawa pulled the lid of the chest open; it was heavy and very solid. She caught just a glimpse of a confusion of twisted glass tubes and bulb-like bottles filled with a luminous purple substance, gaseous and swirling in places, dripping in others, pulsing entrancingly with a hypnotic rhythm, before she was thrown backward and pressed against the stone of the chamber wall by some powerful and unknown force.
She could not move a muscle, could barely breathe, but, by the light of the dancing flames, she could see that Hesper too was stuck motionless to the wall across from her, held prisoner by the same unnatural force.
The light in the room seemed to flinch away from the ladder’s base, and a deep darkness hid any glint of sunlight from the hole above. Somehow, within the blackness, an even darker shape was becoming visible, shooting upwards from the ground and growing into a human outline. The moss on the ceiling began to glow with a phosphorescent greenish light, illuminating the figure that stood before them.
The witch wore a thick brown dress covered in stains of earth and smears of plant matter. Her hair hung in many thin braids down her back and from her ears dangled earrings of bone and feathers and twisted wire. Arawa could not determine her age. Her gaze was drawn to the witch’s eyes, which were ringed with swirling black and blue lines tattooed into her flesh.
The witch thrust forward her hand and the lid of the chest fell shut with a heavy thump. Then, she turned to face Arawa, baring her teeth in a joyless grin like a cat who has caught a mouse and kept it alive to torment.
Arawa’s eyes widened as she felt the witch’s presence invade her mind, stripping bare her secrets and desires. She could only endure the pain, could not scream or thrash or turn away. The sensation of complete and utter vulnerability and powerlessness lasted just an instant before the witch pivoted and sent her probing gaze towards Hester. Arawa closed her eyes, trying to recover from the feeling of nakedness, and so did not see the emotions of terror and helplessness flashing across Hester’s eyes as the witch penetrated her mind.
Then the force that had pinned her to the wall like a scientist’s specimen vanished and she fell, gasping, to the earthen floor. She and Hesper crawled towards each other, leaning on each other’s shoulders for support as the witch stood, tall, lean, and impassive, watching them. When Arawa had caught her breath, she looked towards the other woman, whose dark eyes and face revealed none of her thoughts.
“You two meddlers have interrupted me in my doings, but that is your only crime. I did not think any would be fool enough to enter my home while I worked, but that makes me the fool for forgetting that there are great fools indeed in the world.” Her voice was deep and hoarse as if she had not spoken for a long time.
“I am going to let you two go free. Do not think this is a mercy on my part, for you are ignorant of what is coming to the world. All shall endure in their own way, and there may come a time when you wished I had killed you and spared your sanity.”
She took a step towards them; both women flinched instinctively as her bare foot struck the earth. The light of the moss was gone, and by the still-burning torches Arawa could only make out the witch’s feet and calves. Then the torches went out, and pure black seared across her vision for an instant before it was replaced by blinding white.
Arawa opened her eyes to find herself lying on the forest floor, Hesper beside her, in a place she did not recognize. Afternoon light slanted through the canopy, tinting the forest floor with gold. Both rose and looked around. Neither spoke of the witch, what she had done to them, nor her words. They did not meet each other’s eyes, neither wanting to share their emotions. Hesper set off in the direction that the trees seemed thinnest, and Arawa followed, her back pulsing with pain where she had struck the wall.
Soon they reached the road, and they continued walking quickly until they were out of breath and forced to slow. At last, when the sun had passed below the horizon and the light was beginning to fade, they stopped by the side of the road. Still unspeaking, Hesper gathered wood and kindled a fire, while Arawa unpacked the food and cider. Both ate quickly and held their aching tenderness to themselves, and only when they were done did Arawa speak.
“Here,” she said, handing a skin of cider to Hesper. Both drank and drank, draining all the skins they had with them until the world blurred and sleep dragged them into darkness, hoping that when the sun rose they would remember nothing of their meeting with the witch.
©December 2021, Caledonia Krieger
Caledonia Krieger has been published previously in Friday Flash Fiction. This is her first appearance in Swords & Sorcery.