The Princess and the Warlock

Chapitre Dix-Huit

My world fell dark for several moments, but it wasn't as long as I'd expected. I opened my eyes to find the porch of Gossington still in view, though now a touch further away. "Now, now, Princess," a voice hissed in my ear, sounding both soft and harsh at the same time. "We can't have you falling asleep just yet."

I was staring at the grass underneath my lax feet, trying to blink the world into staying still. I tried to take stock of the situation, but my mind was having trouble processing anything beyond the funny feeling underneath my skin. The pain that darkened my vision felt vacant now, almost strangely so. My wrist still hung at an odd angle and there was a wet feeling along my back, but the pain was absent. No, instead, replacing that feeling was a jolt of electricity, making me feel numb.

I sank my teeth in my bottom lip to keep a bubble of a laugh at bay.

The creatures hauled me backward, faltering in their steps and their grip tightening. The one who was bearing most of my weight prickled her spine. "You should keep better track of your toys," one of them crooned to him, hunching forward to throw her voice. The cloths that were hanging from her body swung in the wind, a weird stench coming from them. She'd stuffed the music box into a satchel at her back, and now pointed a clawed finger forward to Gossington. "You set her aside for others to play with, you cannot be surprised of the outcome."

Was she speaking to me? If so, she was crazy. I lifted my head, the trees dancing in the darkness, Gossington faltering as the earth shook.

I could see the door, and could now see a figure on the cobblestones.

My blood was rushing so loudly in my ear that that I didn't hear what the figure said when he spoke, my vision so blurry that I couldn't see who it was.

The pad of my foot caught on something in the ground, and the three of us were jerked to a halt. "Don't think for one second that I'm not aware of what you've done," the figure replied, and my pulse jumped again, chest aching in a way that nearly had me gasping in a breath of chilly night air. "I'm no fool, my sisters."

When the cold air kissed my teeth, I realized I was smiling. Wildly. Like a lunatic.

"Kaius of the Wildwood," Not-Anna murmured, but her appearance was now fading into the creature like the other, sallow and ratty. Her grip on me never waned in its strength. "Never a fool, but always an outcast."

"How pitiful," the other hissed, tightening her grip on my upper arm. Shivers broke across my skin as her claws clacked together. "You've no proof of our actions, warlock, no cause."

Kaius finally stepped close enough that my eyes could adjust to his figure. He was wearing all black—black trousers, black shirt untucked, wrinkled. The shocking show of white hair was startling in the dim light, but it wasn't pushed back. Loose in his face were his waves, and as he stepped underneath the moonlight, it seemed to glow.

His boots were on the surface of the cobblestones, the very ones I'd been standing on moments before, though he took up more space. Never had I thought of Kaius as large but seeing him filling up the walkway, stance wide, he was definitely a force to be reckoned with.

But there was one thing off about him, though my dizzy, disjointed thoughts wouldn't place it. I was too far to see it clearly. We were separated by twenty feet, the tree line just mere steps away from the creatures who had my trapped by their sharp grips.

"Cause, cause," Kaius echoed calmly, but he was blinking rapidly, like he couldn't see us very well. "I don't need cause to detach your heads from your necks. And if you were to look at your feet, sisters, you'd find them planted firmly on my property, giving me more than enough power to snuff the life from your repulsive bodies."