The Vampire & Her Witch-Chapter 1261: I Am Your Enemy

Ollie felt the weight of everyone’s eyes falling on him as Baron Loghlan asked him about his time living among the Eldritch. For a moment, he wanted nothing more than to tell them that it was just as Liam had said, that everyone who followed Lady Ashlynn would rather approach their enemies with kindness and hopes for a brighter future instead of resorting to violence and bloodshed.

But that wasn’t true... not even within Lady Ashlynn’s coven, or within his own heart.

"I can’t give you a simple answer to your question, Lord Loghlan," Ollie said, briefly placing the tips of his fingers over his heart in a distinctly Eldritch gesture as he struggled against the torrent of feelings that welled up within him when he tried to find the right words to answer the baron’s question.

It had become harder, he realized, to hold back his feelings when they grew stronger. At first, he thought it was because the events of his life in the past few months had become more intense than anything he’d ever known before. Of course, he felt deeper sorrow than at any other moment in his life when he saw the ruins of the Heartwood Clan’s village in the aftermath of Owain’s savage raid.

But that wasn’t the whole of it. Ever since he’d received his seed of witchcraft, he felt more deeply than he’d felt anything before. If he was happy, then the joy that filled him brought light and warmth into his heart and the world around him. Everything seemed brighter. And when he wept, he felt like the world wept with him, the trees bowed their crowns, and the air grew cold.

"You may not understand this, and I don’t know if I can explain it properly," Ollie said as he gave Liam a look that held the weight of a hundred arrows and dozens of sharpened axes. "But my greatest enemy this summer was you, Lord Liam. You and the people of Dunn Barony," he said, sweeping that intense, heavy gaze across the knights and ladies gathered at the table.

"It didn’t start with you," Ollie continued when he saw a few hands twitch toward the daggers littering the table, only to freeze mid-motion. "It started with Owain Lothian’s destruction of a single village, which had nothing to do with Lady Ashlynn and my escape from the Summer Villa or the deaths of Sir Kaefin and Sir Broll. But Owain Lothian needed to make a show of strength, so he burned an innocent village to the ground to do it..."

Ollie’s voice was heavy with unshed tears as memories of burned-out burrows and the ashes of treasured carvings danced through his eyes. He remembered Old Nan lying in bed, having lost all of her treasured memories of her parents and grandparents, and the long lines of defeated-looking people whose tails hung low while their fur grew rough with self-neglect...

"This summer, I went from village to village, warning the people who lived beyond the protection of the Vale’s walls that the wilderness wouldn’t be able to protect them this year," Ollie said slowly. "Some listened, others didn’t. Many waited until they saw the army led by Lord Liam and Loman Lothian. When those people abandoned their homes and villages, they came to my village in the Vale of Mists." 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

"It started as a small village for the Heartwood clan," Ollie said. "They had nowhere to return to, and they lost some of their best defenders in the battle against Owain Lothian and the Inquisition. But soon, we were building homes for the Nightweavers and the Clan of Painted Masks and so many others who were in Lord Liam’s path."

"So, when I say that I am your enemy, and there is blood and fire between us," Ollie said as he gave the baron a piercing, cold look. "Please understand what you have done to the people I’ve been working hard just to keep them fed, clothed, and housed before this winter arrived. Imagine how you would feel if it had been my soldiers burning down your hamlets and villages and leaving you without homes to call your own."

As he spoke, the air in the tent grew chill, as if the frost covering the walls had combined with Ollie’s sorrows, frustrations, and all of his hurts to finally overcome the fear that had made the tent so stifling.

"Sir Ollie," Lady Rhiannon said softly, glancing between the heartbroken witch and her son, Cadeyrn, who was only a few years younger than the flame-haired knight. She couldn’t imagine what it had been like for the young knight, but the thought of her son having to face such a burden was overwhelming.

"I don’t want to be your enemy," Ollie continued as he forced himself to push down the pain and sorrow by remembering the joyful moments like Daithi’s children playing with children from all of the clans in the village, inventing new games and exploring the ever-changing landscape around the village as Ollie’s people slowly transformed the village from a collection of houses into a place they could call home.

"There are people from half a dozen different Eldritch clans in my village," Ollie said, returning to one of Loghlan’s earlier questions about how the people lived. "There are several human families as well. One of Sir Broll’s soldiers, Daithi, has become our Constable. We’re all learning how to put aside the old hurts so we can live together in the world that Lady Ashlynn wants to build."

"In the Vale of Mists, there are no bondsmen," Ollie continued. "My villagers all own their land and their homes, and we work together to take care of each other, because we have to. Because it’s too hard just getting by when you have to rebuild everything to worry about who owes what to whom."

"But that’s changing now that Lady Ashlynn and Lady Nyrielle returned from the far side of the mountains with their armies," Ollie said, sending another ripple of shock around the table. "Because they didn’t just recruit warriors from the Eldritch cities beyond the High Pass. They brought merchants and engineers, architects and artificers."

"If you want to know how we live in the Vale of Mists," Ollie said, looking at Liam to confirm his words. "Then I’d say we live better lives than it was possible for most men to live in Lothian March. The humans who have settled in my village all believe that it’s so. But we live better because we’re all working hard, together, to build something better."

"We don’t live in a world that’s free of hurt for things people did to us, and our loved ones before," Ollie said solemnly. "But even I have seen enough of war and fighting," he said as memories from his trial flickered behind his eyes. Memories of Milo, Harrod, and Old Nan, even himself, falling to the swords and spears of the Lothians or the terrifying sorcery of the Church and the Inquisition.

"So, even though I’m your enemy, I don’t want to be," Ollie said firmly. "I want to find a way to be friends instead. Whatever that takes."