Nasty Little Witchling

“This is all your fault,” Darine muttered through chattering teeth.

I folded my arms tightly around my chest, trying to keep the warmth from escaping. We’d been left alone for the better part of the afternoon, the ghouls not remembering we were up here. However, they hadn’t dispersed, leaving us little option but to wait them out.

They lingered in the streets and strayed into our house, keeping us from resting comfortably, always expecting to be discovered.

“Explain?” Andria asked, her eyes closed. “We saved you from almost falling if I remember correctly.”

Maisie had already fallen asleep despite the sun still in our eyes, her occasional snores disrupting our sparse conversation. That shouldn’t have been too surprising since she was also the most comfortable of us all, using Andria’s arm as a pillow and a source of warmth.

Darine scoffed. “If you had just done your task, I wouldn’t have had to take over.”

“You decided to take over,”

“We’re expected back by lunch. The elders will ask questions otherwise, especially when Patela is with us.”

“So? We lie. Who’s there but us to say what’s the truth? You’re supposed to be on our side, not theirs.”

“There are no sides,” Darine snapped, the chattering getting in the way of her sounding at all menacing.

Andria paused while Maisie shifted. “There is, and if you don’t see that, you’re on the wrong one.”

I ignored the rest of their discussion, gazing up at the clouds, letting time slip past. It wasn’t the sun or close calls with wandering ghouls keeping me from resting. The screaming had continued long after the building collapsed, and I’d withdrawn from every aspect of their torturous shouts into the depths of my mind.

After every exhale, I was scared I’d forget how to breathe. My mouth moved on its own to answer any questions while my eyes tracked the clouds trailing across the multicoloured sky.

There was a single question on my mind. How does one go about razing a city as big as this to the ground? Because after listening to the most incoherent of them, that was the only sane decision I could make.

Fire seemed the most logical option as it excelled in complete destruction. However, igniting each row of buildings in the hope of a complete burn didn't seem feasible, and I doubted its impact on the ghouls in the street. They didn't appear susceptible to smoke, and the absence of rooftops to traverse would hinder any future advances.

How much dragon’s breath would it take to wipe the city off the map? An idea that was more intriguing than practical.

And if clawing their throats out one ghoul at a time was the only option, when—if ever—would I be finished?

Better alchemists had attempted to cure them over the decades, and I didn’t have any delusions I could come close to their expertise. Besides, there was nothing left to save; even if there was, I was confident they wouldn’t want to be.

…

I was too fatigued to dream of something interesting, so I was still lying on the roof, star-gazing at inaccurate constellations. Even though I was the creator of the landscape, I was unnerved to find myself alone.

Maisie’s pipe balanced between my fingers as my dream self puffed on the end for ages without effect. Slowly, my chest tightened, and I couldn’t stop from taking another inhale of smoke, further constricting my airways.

Despite pleading to wake up, I took forever to jolt back to reality. It hadn’t only been in my dreams. My chest stayed constricted, and I found it difficult to breathe. For a moment, I was back at the riverside with Daral, and the doll was moving farther away from us.

Yet, it wasn’t the curse; I almost wished it was.

A pair of yellow saucers looked down at me from the creature on my chest, weighing far more than it looked. The small mongoose blinked at me, and I blinked back in a stupor before shifting to buck it off.

It felt like a boulder pinned me to the rooftop as the animal stood on its hind legs. I swiped at it instead, making the mongoose duck and scurry away past my feet. It retreated to the roof's edge while I stood and gulped down lungfuls of fresh air.

By the time I turned to watch for its next move, it had disappeared. The ambient mana over the edge of the tiles shifted around an area with its own current. That disturbance moved silently to the corner of the roof and up to the ridge.

I glanced back to find the three girls still sound asleep. Maisie had further wrapped herself around Andria while Darine had her arms folded and brow furrowed even in slumber.

“Pst,” I hissed so as not to attract ghouls. “Hey.”

Normally, I wouldn’t bother waking them for a small critter disturbing my sleep. But there were too many abnormalities not to be concerned. For one, I couldn’t tell what it was thinking, not the faintest emotions. Their mana was bizarre for a generally maneless creature, and I was confident I hadn’t imagined their excessive weight.

The mongoose moved up, and I spun back around to see it place hairy, human-like hands on the tile and slowly lift its eyes above the roof surface. They were a different shade of yellow and widened when it noticed I was already watching them.

We stood motionless, scrutinising each other. Had it always been a mandrill? I searched my memories and decided I was delusional, having recently woken up and lacking air. It must have always been a mandrill…despite it now having distinctive blue and red facial markings.

There was a spark of intelligence behind their gaze and the sneaking around. It was all intentional, and I didn’t feel like dealing with it on my own. Without breaking eye contact, I crouched to shake Andria’s shoulder.

I froze as my fingers brushed her robe, a hair-raising chill running down my spine. The mandrill smiled at me, showing off the pair of curved canines longer than my finger. It was clearly a grin by the twinkle in its eyes, and sent my heart racing.

“A shame to involve them in our dealings,” it said in a deep, crisp voice, unbefitting the animal. He climbed onto the ridge and walked across it, not taking his eyes off me. The tiles creaked at his passing, and I averted my eyes from their bright bright blue behind, which distinguished them from other primates.

I extended my steel claws, the slight reassurance they offered overshadowed by the unnatural stretch of their grin. He sat and observed his hands, morphing them into clawed feet. Before my eyes, the mandrill's form shifted into a haze of mana before reforming as a crowned eagle. Brown fur had transitioned to black and grey feathers that fanned out around his new face.

Their sinister grin vanished into a hooked beak, a welcome change despite its unnatural cause. While mana was undoubtedly to blame for the strange skill, I couldn’t fully understand how.

“See,” they said, stretching out the word and curling their sharper talons at me. “Same, same.”

I stayed in my crouch, thinking better of attacking them outright. It wasn’t only because of the talons. But because there were streaks of lightning running through their crown of feathers, marking them as the storm variety.

“I see,” I croaked, unable to find my voice.

“Good, good,” he chirped, putting his foot down and cracking the tile with his grip. “Why don’t you move away from the little ones?”

I stood to look the large bird of prey in the eyes, which were still yellowish. It likely was a mongoose I first saw, and I apologise to my past self for thinking them delusional. “You weigh more than you look.”

“Sometimes,” he said, tilting his head. “Little tricks. Little traps.”

“And why trick me?” I asked, holding my hands behind my back.

“More so trap. Everyone flees from Alp. The big ones don’t like it when Alp talks. Little ones are more understanding…when given time.”

Alp didn’t seem disappointed that people were scared of him. Instead, he delighted in it.

“Maybe if you didn’t try to crush me, I’d be more understanding.”

They flapped their impressive wings and attempted to fold them back, seeming unpracticed in tucking them in properly. “The big ones die too soon. The little ones are too weak to try. Straying too far from their purpose.”

I wanted to snap at him for ignoring my comment about almost crushing me, but while the creature spoke, I didn’t think he was entirely reasonable. “And what’s that?”

“My headdress.”

I blinked at him, forgetting my fear for a moment at the absurdity of an animal with a headdress on. That was until a more worrying notion came to mind. Could this thing turn into a person? “Okay…I’m guessing it’s quite special.”

“Retrieve it,” Alp said, ignoring me again and pointing a wing towards the inner wall. “It is there.”

I flapped my hands to mimic their wings, irritation taking over fear. “Why don’t you use those to go get it yourself?”

“Too many, too far, too dangerous.” Alp tucked his head under an outstretched wing to peck at a feather, with sparks of lightning still jumping across them.

“Why would I go then?”

He froze before being able to pluck the feather that annoyed him and slowly craned his neck back to me. “Your purpose. A little one with the strength of a big one. Much better at hiding, even from Alp.”

I’d been patient, not hitting him with magic when he was a mongoose crushing me. I’d been frozen in fear when he was a mandrill, crawling out and over the rooftop with a nasty grin. After he spoke, I believed the matter was resolved since I could reason with something that talked.

There was no reasoning with this Alp. Something was fundamentally wrong with the way he thought of us. I shivered at the idea of denying his request and knew I wouldn’t sleep at all with him still stalking the city.

I could have come up with excuses like he’d sent people to their deaths in search of his headdress or killed them himself. But I didn’t. I was doing this out of fear. When he went back for the feather, I lifted my claws towards him—but halted a heartbeat later, also out of fear.

“I’ll look for it,” I said, my speech stilted. “But it will take time.”

Alp regarded me for a long moment with his eerie yellow eyes. Then he nodded and evaporated into a haze of mana, reforming into a mongoose in the blink of an eye. He spun and scurried down the opposite side.

I hurried after him, almost losing my footing in the rush and crested the rooftop as his tail vanished. His mana signature bolted across the street and disappeared as well.

I sighed, trying to get rid of the tension in my muscles, worse than when I spent the night in the Red Forest.

A cloud moved to cover the moon and shrouded us in darkness. I checked on the girls, who were still fast asleep despite the activity. I’d struggled to wake up with the crushing weight of Alp, and I wouldn’t be surprised to learn if he was influencing their sleep as well.

The frosty air seeped into my tired bones, and I sat down to tuck my legs into the robe. I imagined flipping through the pages of the bestiaries I’d read and couldn’t find any mention of an animal that could change species. There were shifters galore, but those leaned towards modifications rather than changing species.

I fell back and hit my head against the tiles. I’d got too used to talking to animals and considered it normal, but nothing in known existence spoke out loud. Evie had a better grasp of speech, yet they still didn’t talk.

And she didn’t send shivers down my spine at her inelegant wording that sounded like—and probably were—threats.

I didn’t think going back to sleep was an option, with my heart thumping and a crazed…Alp running around. It was slightly comforting that I could sense him if I tried, but that wasn’t a surefire way.

Without a better idea and needing to do anything but sit up on the roof until dawn, I stood and shuffled over to the edge. I looked back at the girls, and regardless of our day of shared fighting and comradery, they weren’t my responsibility to look after. I convinced myself Alp didn’t care for them and the ghouls wouldn’t make it up anytime soon.

The stone walls were malleable and shifted to form a foothold for me to climb down. The faint shuffling inside the collapsed building was from ghouls trapped under the rubble, protruding limbs feebly waving.

I wasn’t about to start digging through rubble to find trouble, so I danced over the chunks of wood and stone to the street beyond. Despite the ghoul's reportedly poor senses, I kept to the shadows and prevented the wind from carrying off my scent as best I could while using as little mana as possible.

I half-heartedly searched for ghouls but wasn’t set on fighting yet. They liked to travel in groups, and even with my conviction that they should die, I wasn’t keen to go against so many at once.

Along the path we’d taken on the rooftops were motionless ghouls that had fallen off and died for one reason or another. Except some still moved. I stood over the body of a ghoul as it crawled away with a bone jutting out of its leg. The flesh around the wound had healed, but the bone hadn’t been set properly, something I was unfortunately familiar with.

It was easy to talk about killing the pitiful creatures, but I hesitated when I was in the perfect position to do just that.

Disappointed in my decisiveness, I took a steadying breath and drove my claws into its neck. They were not as sharp as I would like, and it took more strength than I thought to pierce the skin. It twitched as I hit its nervous system, and I was curious if that still worked as it should.

Gargled gasps were the last sound it made before stilling. I yanked out the claws. Black blood dripped off the ends, and I waited for the torrent of emotions to hit me.

When nothing happened, I searched my soul for any semblance of sorrow and found none. All evidence pointed to what I’d done being a good thing. One less ghoul to torment people and perhaps one less tortured soul forced to be a passenger in their body. Was there any need to overcomplicate that?

I moved on to the next wounded creature and repeated the action all the way down our path. Most had broken bones after their fall or hadn’t died from Darine’s stab to the eye like the scaler.

When all the easy pickings were gone, I searched for the first group to take on. The worst the wounded creatures had done was swipe and gnaw at my ankles, but the packs all around me would fight back with more ferocity.

A shiver ran down my spine, and the worries I was trying to keep away reared their ugly head. Somewhere along this street or in the sky, a pair of yellow eyes followed me. Alp was watching. I regretted not attacking when I had the chance, but at the same time, I doubted he survived the capital purely by hiding.

Not knowing if he was reasonable enough to understand I wasn’t shirking off my commitment to find his headdress, I turned towards the interior. I faced forward, pushing down my want to search for where he was. He didn’t need to know that I could tell he was there.

The feeling faded when I passed the lone house and crossed the street.

I spent considerable time and took long detours to avoid the larger packs of ghouls, reasoning I couldn’t take them. Those excuses continued until I stopped outside a pub with a faded metal sign shaped like an antlered buck. Inside were no more than five ghouls, most in separate rooms.

I thought of several excuses to walk past, but truthfully, I wouldn't be able to find a better situation.

The double doors had broken long ago, and only rusted hinges remained. The floorboards protested at my intrusion, and a breeze blew through the broken building. Enough of the interior remained to imagine the place being full of life, with barkeeps laden with trays moving between the tables.

Bottles still sat behind the bar, waiting for someone to pour them out into stained glasses. Those made with clear glass still held dark amber liquid. I’d heard the duke and Yanla discuss the age of bottles before and wondered if these would be considered foul or valuable.

If circumstances allowed, I would bring him back a bottle with a few strings attached to it.

The first set of ghouls were behind the counter in the kitchen area. They couldn’t have smelled anything appetising in there after all these years, but they still banged around for some reason.

I stopped at the door and waited for their aimless rampage to turn them away from me. Their mana usage was enough to mistake them for what mages saw me as when I wore my necklace. But they didn’t look special. No spikes or sporangia, no sharp bones for limbs or snouts.

I shuffled over to my first target, letting the centre countertop act as a barricade between me and the second ghoul. Claws weren’t the most practical weapon when I wasn’t planning to use mana, but I’d make do.

However, why couldn’t I use mana when I was alone and could hide easily?

With the ghoul turning around and no good answer, I lifted the wood beneath its feet. The board was nailed down but budged enough to put the ghoul off balance. I struck out, burying my claws into its throat, black blood streaming back down my arm.

I expected furry in its eyes, yet found nothing of the sort. It lashed out with its longer arms while its partner snarled. My claws got stuck as I tried to get out of reach, so I raised my other hand to blast it into the far wall. The second ghoul climbed over the countertop, choosing the shortest rather than the easiest path.

The stone counter warped to trap its hand at my command. It lurched forward, and I slammed my fist into the back of its head. Even the rebound off the stone counter didn’t daze the creature, so I repeated the action until there was a crack, and it stilled.

The remaining ghouls upstairs came thundering into the pub. They had some difficulty finding the right door, and the first to manage it was rewarded with a blade of air to the throat.

The next four quickly found the entrance after that. I threw out a set of blades for each while retreating further into the kitchen as they clambered over my latest victim. The force from the blades sent them stumbling back with lines of black blood across their bodies. Those I was lucky enough to hit in the neck collapsed to the ground, floundering in the way of the rest.

I drank in the ambient mana each time I threw out an attack and was emboldened by its abundance.

The strongest of the group was at the rear and leapt over its final companions. I hit its chest with a blast, but it was too weighty and carried too much momentum, merely stumbling briefly.

I fled out of the kitchen, jumping over my first victim, who still feebly reached for me. The back exit led to an overgrown garden surrounded by a fence, and I spun around to face the creature, more confident in the new environment.

It staggered at the blades I threw out when it appeared in the doorway. However, it remained upright and, unlike those behind, growled in irritation. It stepped over the pitfalls I made in the ground and shrugged off another set of blades.

I dove out the way as it lunged for me. It continued into the hedges behind me, and I rolled over with a groan, having landed awkwardly.

My attacks amounted to shallow cuts crisscrossing the entirety of its body but had no other visible effect. It didn’t have the visible armour plates that signalled a knight, but maybe it was a lesser variant. It rounded on me, still lying on my back. I hadn’t wanted to subject my mind or its to this, but my magic wasn’t working as well as it had on the others.

I mentally screamed, and we both flinched.

Let me goooo. Let meeee go. Let. Me. Go.

Neither of us was worse off than the other, and it stumbled upon me, clutching its head. The bony knee to my stomach and elbow to the temple didn’t seem deliberate but hurt all the same.

I dug my claws into its face, black ichor falling onto me. Its damaged eyes opened as the human screams continued. I tried to get out from under it, but for the second time that night, the creature atop me was too heavy to shift off.

The claws reaching for my torso were purposeful and had me gritting my teeth as I moved to block them. After only a few blows, my arms and hands dripped with red blood. Unlike the tiles, the ground beneath belonged to me, and I flipped it to exchange positions. Loose soil showered us, and I plunged my claws into its chest, twisting them until it ceased clawing at my robe.

I stood back from the gory body and staggered to the side. My clawed arm was cramped from using all the mana but was otherwise okay. The real problem was my stamina. Battling with the fear of death was more exhausting than performing precise movements during training, and the ambient mana only partly compensated.

Ghouls on the opposite side of the fence came to investigate the noise, and I retreated inside to hide upstairs, up to the rooftop only if necessary.