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The witch waved her hands and suddenly Daphne wasn’t outside the cottage with its polluted yard, but back in time before the roads and buildings, before women wore trousers and people bathed regularly.
She stood outside and observed a young dryad with silvery hair listening to the frightened townsfolk talking about a witch cursing their crops and poisoning their wells because they’d refused to pay a tithe. Daphne had been so cocky. Strutting about without a care. After all, the Mother chose her to be her champion. Someone to help those who couldn’t help themselves.
Future Daphne trailed herself as she strode boldly for the witch’s tower, a tall stone affair with a surprisingly lush garden outside. A garden fed by bodies, as it turned out. Their legs stuck out from the soil and acted as braces for the tomato plants.
The witch had been killing all those who trespassed. But her real crime was the poisoning of the village lands and water supply because they refused to give in to her blackmail. Outside the garden, fields lay fallow, trees lost their leaves, dead fish floated to the shore of the river.
The Mother didn’t tolerate that kind of abuse.
At the base of the tower with no door, Daphne shouted, “Come out and face the Earth Mother’s judgement.”
A woman peered from the topmost window and smirked. “I’ve done no wrong.”
“You’ve harmed the land of your neighbors.”
“Did I?”
“I am not here to play games. Come down at once.”
“Make me,” came the taunted reply.
Daphne, the undefeated champion, eyed the tower and chose to climb, her rooting fingers digging into the mortar and stone.
The witch disappeared from sight, most likely in fear.
An assumption that cost Daphne.
The slick oil that poured down didn’t hurt until the torch that fell from above ignited it.
A screaming Daphne, covered head to toe in flames, lost her grip, falling to the ground and rolling to extinguish the inferno. Gravely injured, she staggered from the witch’s property, aiming for the forest, but not quite making it. The pain sent her to the ground, sobbing. The Mother reacted by causing the Earth to heave and buckle, a rift opening in the ground to swallow her whole—the quake rippling outwards and tumbling the witch’s tower.
The Mother wrapped Daphne in a healing cocoon from which a tree sprouted. As it drank in sunshine, air, and water, it fed Daphne, soothing her injuries. In that dreamlike state, she watched the world above. The villagers came with their pitchforks to stab through the tower’s rubble, finding no body.
Is she dead?
The Mother replied, No.
Indeed, the witch hadn’t just survived, she was angry at losing her home and blamed Daphne.
One night, as the world slept, with the Mother absent, since she followed the sun, the witch came to stand in front of Daphne’s little sapling. Hands laced in front of her, the witch named Circe spat, “Because of you, I must leave and start over.”
Daphne’s consciousness rustled the branches and leaves, the message being, Flee wherever, I will find you.
“Only if you survive!” The witch flung a fireball at the tree, but the Mother had protected it against fire and so it extinguished rather than burned.
Circe tried lightning next.
It failed to split the slender trunk.
Even hacking at the bole with a blade had no effect. The Mother had protected the tree from harm.
The boughs swayed in mockery at Circe’s attempt. But the witch wasn’t done.
Daphne had never seen the dark kind of magic she called upon next, a magic that didn’t harm the tree. On the contrary, the witch cast a spell of life, a life fed by a ley line diverted to run directly through its roots.
At the time, Daphne hadn’t understood why the witch chuckled and said, “Enjoy eternity.”
But as time passed and Daphne’s wounds healed, she realized she could not escape. Her seed remained tucked within the aging tree. A tree that went through the seasons, and years, more than was normal for its type. The ley line kept it alive even as nature took its course. Bugs infested. Dry rot settled within. The poor tree cried out in pain. But no one heard.
