“Liesel!” I shout for my cousin. It gets swallowed in the battle cries that have pitched into outright screams. “Liesel—”
She shrieks in terror as the kommandant grabs her from the hexenjäger and throws her into the prison wagon himself. He says something to her, something that makes her tiny body cower back, a wraith of blond hair and pale eyes, and then he slams the door on her.
My focus widens so suddenly, so aggressively, that I teeter in the shift.
I thought we could wrest victory from this battle—I thought Mama’s fear had been misplaced—
But I see now what she did, what she knew: we are lost.
Between my window and Liesel, the town square is a massacre. Blood coats the ground. Bodies lie in piles, the few remaining witches getting cut down in harsh, thrusting blows from jägers lost in their hunger for war.
So many are fallen.
Too many.
I drop to my knees in the cellar, clinging to the freed iron bar, and vomit on the dirt floor.
Maid, Mother, and Crone, forgive me, forgive me, please, forgive me—
The prayer comes easily, but I feel its uselessness. The Three won’t hear me.
It’s too late. Anything I do—it’s too late.
The iron bar drops from my fingers, thuds against the cellar’s floor under my knees. Powerlessness seizes my muscles so unrelentingly that I start shaking, vibrations I can’t stop, terror I can’t control.
You know how to help.
Sweet and jarring all at once, the voice slithers up the back of my neck, pounds on my head, equal parts seduction and sting.
I knot my arms around myself, eyes squished shut, ears deafened to the screaming outside, the primal, guttural cries that go beyond pain.
You know how to help, Fritzi.
No. No, I don’t.
Without needing herbs. Without needing a conduit at all.
STOP!
Just say the spell. You know the words. You remember them.
My mouth opens. I hate the part of me that does that, the part of me that always leans in to listen to the darkness whispering its saccharine promises, temptation brushing my cheek like it isn’t responsible for one of the greatest traumas of my life before this one.
Muscles shaking in terror now tremble with tension from the way I hold myself against the voice, the promises of wild magic always lingering, always waiting to pull me over the edge. The cellar is dark, shadows creeping in, night coming fast and cold in winter—those shadows loop around my quaking body, and I am all fear and weakness.
Everyone is dying out there. Liesel is in a prison wagon.
What can I do?
“Do all witches hear the voice, Mama?” I asked years ago. I been about ten. “The one asking them to try wild magic? Is that a goddess talking to me like Perchta talks to you?”
The goddess Perchta, the Mother, long ago chose my mother as one of her favored witches. It means nothing more than Mama has her ear, is blessed and guided by the Mother Goddess—but to be chosen by a goddess! For a young witch, the idea had been all I wanted.
But my mother’s face. Save me, I’ll never forget that look on her face, a flinch of disgust that she smothered with a too-wide smile. “The goddesses do speak to us, but they would never tell us to use wild magic. Don’t think on it, mein Schatz. Think only on how you will resist its pull. Tell me now, what are you?”
My heart sank. A goddess hadn’t chosen me? Not even Holda, the Maid, young and fierce and bright? Surely I was worthy of Holda’s blessing!
“I’m a good witch, Mama,” I said, and smiled. “A green witch!”
