Night Witch

NBR Chapter 40 Excerpt

Hi, NBRians! Welcome to my chapter!

"Nyx wanted her to be a warrior, you know. No wonder he didn't really tell me who you were." She rose to her full, short height. Karina did the same, towering over her teacher on wobbly legs she couldn't quite feel.

"I would have been a warrior. I could have been a warrior." Didn't the prospect of battle scare her, though? Wasn't she even frightened of Olga's slaps? Coward suited her better than warrior.

She felt delirious.

"You're not," Baba Yaga hissed. "Sit down, girl."

Karina didn't budge.

"You need to be safe before you can be anything else."

A voice in her head whispered something she couldn't understand. Its tone swore vengeance. She could imagine a creature saying it through closed teeth, spittle flying from twisted lips. "Do you hear it," she muttered, before shaking her head and coming back to herself. "What do you want, old woman?" she asked in a voice more like that of the monster in her head than anything else.

"For you to wait and to be silent, girl." Baba Yaga never moved, though, watching her with sharp eyes.

Wasn't that what she had always done? And what had it gotten her?

The voice in her head sounded again in a deep hiss, this time with somewhat decipherable words. Kill...monster...

Who?

The voice didn't respond, but something else did.

There was a high shriek from outside, like the keening of a thousand dying creatures. With it came a more subtle sound--the sound of wind moving in slow, steady strokes like the movement of large wings. Karina raced out the door on her quaking limbs, which creaked in protest. As soon as she was on the porch, she gripped onto the doorframe to keep balance.

The sky was darkening. Even the stars felt quiet as a shadow moved across the sky and turned the full moon into a scar.

But that was hardly the most significant thing about the surroundings.

The Forest of the Dead, once still and silent save for the movements of a few yagas and warlocks, was teeming with creatures--if all of them could even be called creatures. On one side, surrounding Karina, was a tide of darkness. Moths with ghostlike wings, owls and bats with even softer sounds than the look of the moths' wings, cats with pelts of a thousand shades, a few people, all wearing different garb that was almost as contrasting as their appearances. There was also the quick moving wave of Darkness sliding against the Forest floor that looked like fabric worn away until it was sheer.

Then--ahead of her. Creatures of gold and brilliance, songbirds that sung noisily and tunelessly, golden honeybees that droned a beat, a set of strange creatures that Karina had never seen before, a similar collection of around a dozen people. It felt less striking to Karina, though their eyes caught hers and held them with bright intensity.

A creak sounded behind her. Baba Yaga and Hans. "I hate this," Baba Yaga muttered, her expression just as bitter as her tone.

Karina glanced back up at the sky, biting back the words the voice garbled in her ear. More shadow. The moon was almost invisible now, just a sliver of silver.

Her body felt like it was dancing uncomfortably. She was still.

The armies continued to advance, slow as sunset. A familiar large bird caught her eye. "Nyx."

Nyx turned to her, despite being a good twenty meters away. "Are you here to battle?"

She said nothing but: "Why here?" The sky was ever darkening. Soon the moon would be gone. Her body convulsed yet again, the voice in her ear becoming little more than a whisper.