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“Don’t look at me like that!” Gothel was hurt. She felt her sister’s revulsion, but there was nothing she could say to make her sister comprehend why Gothel understood what her mother was doing. And no way to explain why Gothel would do the same thing in her mother’s place.
“What’s gotten into you, Gothel? How are you okay with any of this?”
Gothel couldn’t answer.
But Primrose thought she knew. She could feel Gothel’s emotions, which were swirling around inside her like a tempest of anticipation. “You want Mother’s power!” Primrose exclaimed. “Don’t you?”
Gothel considered it for a moment and said, “Yes, that’s part of it. But I’m not being selfish, Prim. I want her power so I can protect you and Hazel! Mother won’t be here forever, and someone has to keep us safe here. What if something happens to her? What if the villagers revolt and attack us? How would I be able to protect you without Mother’s magic?”
Primrose stood her ground. “Earlier you said you wanted to see the world outside the thicket, Gothel. You said you didn’t want to be trapped here forever, and now you’re considering taking on a responsibility that will have you tethered here your entire lifetime!” Primrose seemed to be looking into Gothel’s soul, considering an aspect she hadn’t seen in her sister before. “Something within you has changed! Is it because Mother said she will finally share her magic with you? Do you really believe her?”
Gothel wished her sister understood why she wanted to do this. “Of course I believe her! She’s our mother!”
Primrose scoffed. “What the Hades is wrong with you? She’s having everyone in that village killed! Are you actually telling me that doesn’t bother you? In what universe is that not insane?”
Quite a few, actually, Gothel thought. She didn’t want to upset her sister with the truth, but really there was no way of avoiding it. “It’s always been done this way, Prim. Always. Long before Mother, and long before Grandmother! Mother just hasn’t had to do it in our lifetime, and she probably won’t have to do it again for another hundred years. I’m sure the villagers will learn their lesson and stick to the pact their ancestors made with our ancestors.” Gothel paused, then continued. “And if they don’t, we’ll be forced to do it again until they learn. We have to make it clear we won’t allow them to break the pact, that we aren’t weak and we can’t be taken advantage of.” Gothel could tell Primrose was getting angrier with every word Gothel spoke, but she continued. “Tonight will work in our favor, Prim. Some of our horde is starting to crumble, our ranks are thinning. We could use more dead should we ever need them again.”
Primrose was thunderstruck by Gothel’s words. “Need them again? To do what? Kill innocent people because they don’t want to give us their dead? Oh, that’s right, I’m talking to Gothel! Always the logical one! The pragmatic sister! The smartest in the lot! Well, you don’t sound intelligent, Gothel! You sound like a sociopath! You sound like Mother!”
Gothel gave her sister a sad smile. “Prim, read our history! This is how it’s always been, for more generations than you can fathom!”
“So what if our great-great-great-grandmothers were killing innocent people! That doesn’t mean we have to! We can leave here, we can refuse! This doesn’t have to be our life, Gothel! Please, let’s just go the way we talked about earlier today. We can leave Mother here to do what she wishes, but I don’t want any part of it!”
“We can’t go, Prim. Not now. We have to stay! Hazel, tell her we can’t go!” said Gothel to the silent Hazel, who was standing at her side.
“Gothel, are you really going to do this? Please tell me you’re not really going to do this!” Primrose pleaded while Hazel watched her sisters argue, as she often did, waiting to find the proper moment to share her feelings.
“I am, Prim, and when Mother offers me her blood, I want you and Hazel to take it with me.”
“Are you insane?”
“Clearly you think I am! But I think if we all take Mother’s blood tomorrow, we’ll be able to share our thoughts. Think about it, Prim, I will always know if either of you need me! We will be able to protect each other.”
Primrose wrinkled up her face in disgust again. “You mean you want to control us, the way Mother is controlling you now!” she spat, hurting Gothel’s feelings.
“No! That’s not it at all! Also, she’s not controlling me!”
“Then what was that all about earlier, then? You looked bewitched!”
“I was just dizzy! I was overwhelmed by what Mother is offering us, and what all of this really means.”
“You mean what Mother was offering you! You’ve always been her favorite, and you can lie to yourself about what that means, but you can’t hide your heart from me! Listen to me, Gothel, if you do this, if you take Mother’s blood, I will never forgive you. I will leave this place forever and you will never see me again, do you understand?” Primrose was in tears, but she looked entirely serious.
“Prim! I love you, I love you so much! But you don’t understand what you’re saying! We have no idea how old Mother really is. She won’t be with us forever!”
“She can live as long as she wants! She doesn’t have to die if she doesn’t want to! You heard her, it would be her choice to go into the mists!” said Primrose.
“What if something happens to her before she’s ready to move on? How would I heal her without knowing her magic? Besides, you know one day she will be too tired to stay in this world. She will want to move on just like her mother before her, and her mother before her, and like every other witch of our blood before them. It’s our duty to take her place, to make sure our family’s magic lives on after she passes into the mists. We have to stay here and protect our forest and uphold our traditions. You’ve always known this!”
Primrose shook her head. “Not this way, Gothel! I won’t be part of killing innocent people! I will never be okay with killing children! And I will never forgive you if you do this!”
Gothel felt as if her heart was being ripped out. Her mother had finally agreed to share her magic with her, and her sister was forcing her to make an impossible choice. She sighed and said, “You know you mean more to me than Mother’s magic! Please don’t make me choose!”
Primrose said nothing.
She just stared at her sister with tears sliding down her face.
Gothel tightened her fists, squeezing them so hard her nails were piercing her palms, making them bleed. “Fine. I won’t do it! You know I can’t lose you, Prim! I can’t! If you really don’t want me to do this, then I won’t. We can leave here together tomorrow before the sun sets if that’s really what you want. But I want you to understand what that decision means.”
