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She lifts her hand towards the stove, and the same thing happens again.
“What the fuck?” she whispers, looking from her hands and back to the stove.
“What’s going on?” I ask, feeling impatient.
“I tried to light the stove with my magic, like I always do. But I don’t know… It’s not working.”
“So that sound, and you flying back, that was because you tried to light a fire?”
“Yes. I don’t understand. I’ve never been the strongest, but I’ve always at least been able to light a fire with my magic. This doesn’t make any sense.”
“Here, try again on some wood,” I say, leading her out into the living room where a fireplace sits unlit.
She does, and the same thing happens. Tears begin falling down her face. I pull her into my arms, but she dodges me, running outside. I follow her, watching as she puts her hands up. She flies back once more, and this time I catch her.
“What did you do?”
“I tried to summon some wind to move the leaves. I’ve always been able to do that. Every witch has that ability.”
“Let’s go back inside,” I say, my thoughts spinning. “Sit down. Just let me think for a minute.”
I pace back and forth for a while before sitting down in front of her, putting my hands on her arms, and closing my eyes. After a moment, I open them, my eyes widening.
“I can sense something on you. I don’t know what it is, but it feels… dark. Evil. Like when I come across an evil soul.”
“What are you saying? I’m evil now?”
“No, no. It doesn’t work like that. But that doesn’t mean something evil isn’t inside of you. I –” I stop talking. Stop breathing.
“What? Rukh, what is it?”
“The witch. She must’ve put a curse on you when we came in here that day. Before she died.”
“Before she died… oh, gods,” she says, covering her mouth. “Before she died, she said ‘you’ll regret this.’ Do you think this is what she meant?”
“Maybe.” I nod.
“What do we do? How do we get rid of it?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never had to do something like this before. This magic I’m sensing, it’s unfamiliar to me.”
Annette begins sobbing, and I pull myself out of my thoughts to comfort her.
“It’s going to be okay. We’ll find a way to get rid of it. I’m sure the witch has some grimoires around here. For now, we’ll look through them and see if we can find anything in them.”
She nods, sniffling and wiping her tears away.
“You’re right. And if we can’t find anything here, then we’ll go track down some more, or ask another witch to help.”
She stands up, heading to the bookshelf that the witch had tried to throw at us that day.
“I’ll start looking through these books,” she says, grabbing a thick one that looks pretty beat up. “This one looks old, I’m sure it has something.”
Three hours later, and we’ve found nothing. But there are still more books to look through, and I’m definitely not giving up. I’ll tear Protheka apart to find a cure for this if I have to.
Annette has barely said a word since we started researching, and I’m starting to worry for her. I put the book I’ve been scouring off to the side and stand up, walking over to her where she sits in one of the chairs.
“Why don’t we take a break? You never did eat breakfast. Do you want me to get you some cheese or something? You can’t just run on kaffo all day.”
