Seren’s voice comes out a croak. “I thought I was born to a family who hated me because I was a woman. But I was born to a mother who gave me up, instead…” she trails off.
A heartbeat goes by.
Another.
One more.
“I’m not sure what’s worse—being wanted and hated, or being unwanted and discarded.”
She’s never said the words aloud. Never acknowledged the ugly truth buried beneath her skin, trapped in the scar tissue. And they feel exactly how she thought they would:heartbreaking.
Lara takes another step forward, eyes fixed on Seren like two hanging jewels. There’s nothing soft in them, nothing vulnerable. Nothing sympathetic or compassionate. Nothing but resolve and a ferocity forged by force.
“For hundreds of years, witches were hunted by Inquisitors, Seren. Long before we made The Perils home. Our mothers, and their mothers, and their mothers before them, were hunted. They were not taught toraisechildren. They were taught tosavethem—hide them.” Lara’s voice is cold, but not cruel. Factual.
Seren’s mind spins. Reality folding in on itself. The truth rearranging itself in her mind.
She wasn’t discarded?
“You may have been raised by a bastard, but he’s no man. Men who see only a woman’s body have never truly seen a woman at all. Flesh is the least of what we are. It is women who decide what the world becomes. Even kings would agree that the world is made up only of mothers and their children,” she says, the words hanging on the ocean breeze like a truth that begs repeating. “And men know it to their core—that’s why they’d do anything to make us forget our power. Why they fear women who remember themselves.”
A cruel, wicked smile twists Lara’s lips, softness vanishing before Seren’s eyes. “And when you see him again, I hear you make a lovely noose of golden threads.”
She huffs a small laugh under her breath, and spins on the heel of her boot. Her tattered skirts trail after her, and in a fraction of a heartbeat, Lara is the High Witch of The Dreaded once more.
The rare insight into Lara, her past, who she is, where she comes from, all gone in a single moment.
“The Harrows await, little witch,” Lara murmurs seductively over her shoulder.
And for the first time, Seren smiles at the thought.
The Dreaded movein a practiced rhythm as they fan out around The Widow’s Waters, candles guttering as they stir the air moving past.
The other witches do not engage with Seren. They don’t look at her. Not really. They are aware of her presence, but they don’t respond to her.
But Seren noticesthem.There’s something about the routine way they move that tells her an unnerving truth—they do this a lot.
Witches arrive and succumb to The Perils, or The Harrows, or The Widow’s Waters themselves.
The evidence is right in front of her—the Silent Choir. The warning to anyone who dares to enter.
But Seren is not afraid. No, for the first time in her sheltered, lonely existence, she feelsready.
A hush settles over the coven, and Lara strides through the cave’s opening like a general assessing soldiers for war.
Her violet eyes drag across her coven, analyzing, noticing. Each one of them adjusts their posture, their demeanor, something, under the scrutiny of her gaze. Unsettled by the weight of her very presence.
Good. It’s not just her.
“Every witch fears something,” Lara says quietly.
Her violet gaze settles on Seren.
“And you, little witch… you fear not belonging.”
The words land with the quiet certainty of a blade placed exactly where it was meant to fall.
Lara gestures toward The Widow’s Waters.
