The Wolf & The Witch

Lestat felt the blade slip into his skin, past muscle and between two ribs; he grimaced and fell forward, and then he felt the blade cut on the way out the same as it had going in.

Claire spilled out of his arms and rolled to the end of the strip of cotton fabric tying their wrists together. He was nearly twice her height as a werewolf but she stepped to his side, reached up and froze the wound on his back as she passed, running ice up his back. Lestat did not move, or react to the ice, but grimaced, and breathed slowly, and heavily, as if more tired, and more injured, than he actually was. Claire stepped around in front of him, and glared at the priestess, shielding him. “So you finally decide to show your whore face, huh? I have to ask- what do you actually look like? Are you some old hag who makes herself look young with magic? Dried up pussy and all? What’s your actual name?” Claire looked at the priestess as if she were a dead horse with a braided mane, or a peeling white forest in the snow, or clicking ghosts in the trees: creepy-ass woman.

Beverly was going to so enjoy dismembering this bitch. She scowled, and she frowned- scowled at the wolf and the witch, and frowned at the loss of Adra; she frowned at the loss of Josh, and she frowned at her dead husband lying in the dirt. There was a reason Beverly was James’ favorite wife, and now that reason no longer mattered- he was dead. Love had not existed between them in the last fifteen years, but mutual respect, and amazing sex, and ambition, cohesion, forward thinking... the loss of those traits in a man with power like his was painful. It was so rare in this life to find a wolf that was cooperative, and protective, and intelligent. “You will never know the effort required to simply coexist in this world,” Beverly said, more to herself than Claire. She looked from James, to Em and Emma, dead in a heap with moss spilling from their lips, to Olive, dead with her eyes wide open looking at the columns of smoke, to Soph, her eyes boiled out of her skull.

She looked at Claire- this witch, and this wolf, killed her husband and the other wives? Impossible. “You are the weakest, the most hateful, and the most uncooperative witch in this coven, and you certainly have to know it. Why join my coven and refuse to take a familiar? Man after man, turned away, when you know we need dowries. Why join us to fuss and fight with the other witches?” Beverly looked down at Claire- of all the witches to survive, to achieve, to thrive- her? Poisons and potions? It was impressive that Claire knew elemental magic, but barely, and no witch can cast magic for long without a familiar. She actually could be a very strong witch. If she bothered trying. “You pathetic fucking useless bitch of a witch, and you worthless, piece of shit, pain in the ass wolf.” These two were fated to die the moment she left them in the cell- they should’ve frozen to death from the drugs alone- not woke, found fire, clothes, food, water…

Beverly changed her appearance- her hair turned red, and the shadows of her face shifted to those of Rin; she shifted again to one of the dead twins, and again to Soph, her front teeth overhanging her lower lip, and then to Claire, and cringed- the least pleasant. She was James’ favorite for a reason.

Beverly followed the light- shimmering orange and glowing under piles of paper ash, embers flitting through the black and white air, the ash of life and the color of death- and instantly appeared beside Claire, the knife an inch away from her neck.

Lestat sensed the change in shadows and jerked Claire back, and Beverly disappeared and reappeared in the air and swiped the steel blade across his scalp; the metal edge flayed four inches of skin and gouged his skull in a straight line that just missed his ear and knocked them down into the ashes. He shifted back to a man, preserving energy, preserving life, appearing weak. He thought about what Claire had done in the land of apples: push them to run hard, and far, and fast, and he felt bad for questioning that strategy. He had no idea how to fight this woman. Lestat pulled Claire against him, and held her, and scooted away; blood ran down the side of his head, down his ear and onto his shoulder. A large flap of skin hung off his head, above his right ear, and he could feel embers light on the exposed bone of his skull.

And then the priestess disappeared again and reappeared behind the wolf and the witch and brought a boulder down on their backs.

Claire felt the magic coming, and brought seven stone pillars up and blocked the boulder. The pillars shattered and the boulder rolled off Lestat’s back, driving him down. Claire’s vision faded white for a second from using that much magic. She forced his hand open and wrote- broken jar. Claire coughed, and hacked; they needed to move this fight about twenty feet towards Olive. “Who… who is Josh?”

Beverly wondered how this idiot witch could’ve made it this far and not know that. The only way that could be possible is if the vast majority of all the witches in her coven avoided her, and never spoke to her. How else? Pathetic.

“Josh is her son,” Eliz said, coming out of the trees, past a scorched house, past a dead wolf. Her boots were tall, and black, and her pants, and shirt, black leather, and she had an axe on her hip. “The only way possible you don’t know that is because-“

“Because she doesn’t have time to waste on whores and addicts and lying bitches. One more step, bitch, and I’ll take your goddamn head off.” For some reason this witch Eliz reminded Lestat of his mother; he shifted- fur like black silk ran down his body, and his muscles thickened, and hardened- his bones hardened; he scooped Claire up and pinned her to his side, shielding her with his right arm. Blood ran into his eye and he ignored it. Eliz took another step- ash kicked up from her boot, and Lestat spun and ran straight at her.

Beverly watched- Eliz pulled her hand up and fired two icicles at Lestat- one gouged his shoulder and the other pierced his bicep and hit bone- bone, but not Claire. Eliz pulled a wall of ice up from the baking ground, and the wolf lowered his shoulder and charged straight through, shattering the ice. Beverly watched as surprise filled her eyes- surprise at his speed, and strength- she watched her witch step back, and fire magic wildly, and the wolf grabbed her by the skull, lifted her into the air, and slammed her into the ground. Beverly sighed, and shot through the light, pulled Eliz from his hands, and sliced his forearm open as she passed.

Lestat slammed an empty hand into the earth and white ashes puffed into the wavering air. Blood ran down his arm as he stood, and turned, facing Beverly. His shirt was shredded off his body, and the right side of his leather pants torn, and his boots ripped apart. He had lost his sword in his fight with James- it was lost in embers in the burned husk of a house.

Ashes landed on him like snow, specks of white on the black wolf fur, silent, as compassion is silent, and white, as snow, and frost, and dust, and paper trees, and these goddamn witches, were white.

Claire squeezed out of his arm just enough to look at Beverly. “I want to know something- before we kill you.”

Beverly grinned, and disappeared; Lestat spun, positive she was behind them. But she wasn’t. She was at his back and she slid the knife calmly forward into his thigh, and then was gone, from ember, to ember.

Lestat staggered forward, hobbling towards Olive. Claire growled. She watched Beverly’s boots, and saw them disappear again- Claire ran magic down her arms and brought up ten sharp stalagmites around them, like granite needles.

And as Beverly disappeared, and reappeared in the embers, to drive the knife into Lestat’s back, the rock needles sprung up and sliced the skin off her ankle and gouged her leg open, and Claire went weak in his arm- white curtains hung in her vision- that was a lot of magic. Lestat swung at Beverly with all the speed and strength he had and swiped air. She was forty feet away, against a house.

Beverly had underestimated these two. She had seen them kill Deth and Bethany, and they had somehow killed her mate. But how? Luck and resilience? “I’m truly impressed,” Beverly said, and meant it- Claire would be a formidable witch if she would take a familiar. Who was the last witch that had actually touched her, let alone drew blood? Beverly looked at Lestat- blood ran down the right side of his face, and over his ear, blood in his chest, blood staining the ash at his feet, blood dripped black from his clinched fist. Blood as black as obituary ink. “What do you want to know, witch?”

Claire pulled a shirt from her pack and wrapped Lestat’s head with the sleeves, so that his right eye was covered. She took a skin and poured water on his back and froze it solid, freezing wounds, and wobbled from the effort.

Beverly smiled.

“We want to know how you intended to rule this land with Josh and Adra. Maybe you weren’t paying attention, but we killed the three other couples, and we would’ve killed them, too.”

“I doubt that,” Bev said, but then wondered- Josh and Adra certainly hadn’t made it very far. She looked at the wolf and the witch, and saw an ember float past, and disappeared.

Claire ran magic down her arm and brought sharp stones up from the burnt forest floor a second time, except this time Beverly did not appear on the ground- she appeared in the air, the knife aimed at Claire’s face. Lestat turned and his skin opened to the bone on the back of his right arm, but this time, instead of moving away from the blade, he moved into it, and elbowed Beverly in the stomach as hard as he could. She went flying back into the rubble of a burning house and two witches rushed to help her.

The wind picked up, and Lestat heard rain in the distance, and he stumbled to his knee and dropped Claire out of his right arm- his hand tingled, and throbbed and it felt like his arm had no strength- he made a fist and his fingers only half closed. He shifted back to man. Claire pulled the cotton strip from their tied hands and tied it around his upper arm; she put her hands on his legs and froze two more of his wounds solid, and stepped to his left side and pulled her bow free. She notched an arrow and laid her eye along the shaft, straight at Beverly’s heart, then spun at the last second and fired it at Eliz. The arrow shattered two ribs and threw her to the ground. Claire notched another, and fired at Eliz again, and hit her in the back of her head. She slumped in the ashes. She notched another arrow and aimed at the handful of witches watching.

The priestess disappeared, and reappeared at Claire’s side- dirty, covered in ash, and drove the knife at her temple.

Lestat only saw the shadow, and nothing else. He jerked Claire to the side, and she ran magic down her arm and more stone pillars came up around them, and again another hit- this one straight into the center of Bev’s foot, breaking bone.

Bev grimaced, and went to her knee, and shifted with the embers, behind them, and watched life leave the witch, and watched life leave the wolf, drop by drop.

Claire passed out- white curtains covered her vision and she slumped against Lestat- he caught her, and grimaced from the effort. He hit the ground, and had no other choice, no other way, but to hold her over his shoulder. He hefted her limp body over his left shoulder, and her hands and feet hung down, lifeless. Her ankle, with the knife strapped to it, dangled at his left hand.

Beverly tried to move her toes and pain ran up her leg in white waves. She grimaced, and shook her head- unbelievable that she would have to work this hard to kill these two. Roaches. They were an infestation. Goddamnit all. But now they were defenseless. The pathetic witch passed out from a little magic, and her stupid, crying wolf bleeding to death with a useless right arm. Embers whipped in the wind- the storm was coming, rain was coming, and the white flakes of trees kicked up into the air, and the smoke rolled across the land. Beverly wondered how long it would take this wolf to bleed to death? He looked like he was getting weaker by the minute- what an appropriate way to go- then his idiot witch would wake to her dead wolf- even better. She motioned for her remaining witches to gather. “Josh and Adra would’ve entered this land with the backing, and the force, of James and Edward; they would’ve sided with the coven, and slaughtered the packs.”

Lestat’s vision was blurry- heat and blood loss and smoke and lingering aggression. “I doubt a wolf like Edward would’ve backed Josh and Adra and attack the packs of another land.”

“He would when he thought this competition was a fair solution to a decades-long problem. He would when he thought the packs of Itthon were in agreement with the solution. The strongest two couples fight, and the winner rules. Edward was in full favor of this plan. And obviously the packs would prefer Deth and Bethany to win, and obviously, when they didn’t, they would’ve rebelled. And, at that point, Edward and James would’ve stepped in and slaughtered them.” All Josh had to do was cross a few borders- that was it; everything else had been put in place. Blood pooled at Lestat’s feet, running out of his boots, blackening the glowing embers- his blood ran down the limp arm of the witch, and plopped black off her lifeless fingertips. “Problem solved.”

Problem solved. What problem? Coexisting? Lestat didn’t like the packs, but he didn’t sit around thinking of ways to kill all of them. He knew he was violent; he had no problem killing when killing was necessary. Or occasionally fun. Lestat knew- we either do the killing, pay someone else to do the killing, or we die. There were no other options. This world was dying, and neither man, nor woman, nor wolf, nor witch, were any different. And killing, as Este had said, was the first step to dying. It wasn’t just wolves and witches- the forests shrank, the winters were worse, and worse, every year- death, like the white blanket that covers the feet of old people, was slowly being pulled across the land.

Perhaps coexistence had disappeared between wolves and witches when wolves decided to stop protecting, and defending, and witches decided to stop healing, and protecting- as it was originally intended. Perhaps that’s when the world decided to dig its own grave. Lestat collapsed to his knees, kicking ash into the air. Claire’s limp hands hung in the ashes and embers, her lifeless knuckle touching pieces of broken glass.

The world was black and white- black fire and white night, ash and smoke and carbon fines- witches gathered in a circle, and brought their white hands up, and flowed magic down their white arms and the priestess followed the path of a glowing ember, the knife black in her hand.