The Vampire & Her Witch-Chapter 1294: Pushing The Limits (Part One)
As soon as they entered the copse of trees, Loghlan knew that something was deeply, fundamentally wrong.
The trees themselves seemed sick, dying before his eyes in a way that no natural illness could explain. The evergreens that should have been green and vibrant even in winter were dropping needles in steady streams, creating brown carpets on the forest floor. As their horses moved forward, the sound of snapping twigs was unnaturally loud, and when Loghlan’s mount accidentally brushed against a low-hanging branch, the entire limb broke off with a dry crack.
He caught the fallen branch before it hit the ground and examined it with growing alarm. The outside bark looked normal enough, but where the branch had broken, the interior was nothing but powdery sawdust, as if the tree had been dead and desiccated for years, but if that was the case, it would have fallen to a strong storm long ago.
"My lord," Sir Bedwyr said, his voice trembling slightly as his eyes darted around. "What’s happening to the trees?"
Before Loghlan could answer, a sound cut through the forest that made all three of them freeze; a deep, anguished cry of pain that seemed to come from the very depths of a human soul. It was raw and primal and full of such suffering that Loghlan felt his chest tighten just hearing it.
And then, immediately following, came a child’s fearful wail, high and piercing and desperate.
"That’s Dalwyn," Sir Gavin said, his face going pale. "Sir Cynwrig’s son. My lord, we should hurry, but please, promise that you’ll stay behind me," he said, lowering his hand to the hilt of his sword and scanning the trees around them before he turned to look at Lord Loghlan.
"Agreed, on both counts," Loghlan said simply. He was already pressing things by coming out here, but he knew very well that he’d only cause problems if he insisted on leading the way.
They quickly dismounted and tied their horses to a tree, or tried to, at least. The tree they chose crumbled under the rope’s weight, forcing them to find another, and then another, before they gave up and made do with a heavy stone. Once the horses were secured, they hurried deeper into the woods on foot, following the sounds of distress.
What they found when they broke through the last line of trees made Baron Loghlan stop in his tracks, his mind struggling to process the scene before him.
In the center of a small clearing, a stream rushed past with surprising force, swollen with recent floodwaters. Standing waist-deep in that frigid water was Sir Ollie, bare-chested and shaking from the cold, with the intricate mark clearly visible across his torso, which Loghlan assumed was the fabled ’mark of the witch,’ though he’d never read an account of one that was so large or looked so intricate.
Next to him stood one of the Eldritch, a man with a wide, flat tail and prominent buck teeth, his body covered in short fur that glistened with droplets of water.
Between them, floating on the surface of the stream, was Lady Cerys.
Even from a distance, Loghlan could see the extent of her injuries. Her left arm hung at an unnatural angle, the white gleam of bone visible through torn skin. Her torso was a mass of bruises, and her breathing was shallow and labored. But even as he watched, those injuries were fading, healing before his eyes as a faint jade-green radiance emanated from the water around Sir Ollie and flowed over Cerys’s broken body.
The light was beautiful and eerie at the same time. It didn’t just come from the water, Loghlan realized, he could see hundreds of thin streams of the same jade-green energy flowing down the trunks of the nearby trees, winding their way over the frozen ground like luminous serpents, and merging with the glowing water where Ollie stood.
"No wonder the trees felt so brittle," Sir Gavin whispered as he took in the sight of Sir Ollie’s witchcraft stretching out to nearly every tree in the copse. "Last night, he said he had to be careful to just take a little bit from each of the trees in order to restore himself. He said that if he took too much, it would harm the trees. This... this must be what he was trying to avoid doing last night."
The trees were giving their lives to fuel Ollie’s witchcraft, providing the strength he needed to perform the greatest miracle they’d ever witnessed, pulling Lady Cerys back from the brink of death after suffering what should have been a fatal fall from her horse.
The cost of that power was written on Ollie’s face. His features were twisted with pain, his teeth gritted so hard that Loghlan could see the muscles of his jaw standing out like cords. Tears streamed down his cheeks, mixing with the water that splashed against his chest, and his whole body shook with the effort of maintaining the magic.
Another anguished cry tore itself from Ollie’s throat, and Loghlan saw him sway dangerously, nearly losing his footing in the current. But the Eldritch warrior beside him, Milo, Loghlan remembered Sir Gavin calling him, immediately steadied him, taking more of Lady Cerys’s weight and using his broad tail to brace them both against the pull of the stream. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮
On the shore, Sir Cynwrig knelt with his son Dalwyn clutched against his chest. The boy was sobbing uncontrollably, his small face buried in his father’s shoulder, and Cynwrig looked like a man watching his entire world hang in the balance. His eyes never left his wife, and his lips moved in what might have been a prayer or simply a desperate plea for a miracle, even if that miracle came from a source the Church would consider heretical.
Standing a few paces away was another Eldritch warrior, this one with curved horns and cloven hooves that Sir Gavin had called Harrod. The horned warrior looked like he was ready to charge into the water to join Sir Ollie, and only his short stature had kept him on the shore until now.
It was Harrod who noticed the new arrivals first. His wide-set eyes, adapted for peripheral vision, caught the movement as Loghlan and his knights emerged from the treeline. He tensed immediately, his hand moving toward the mace at his belt, but then he seemed to recognize Sir Gavin, and he relaxed slightly, though he didn’t take his eyes off the newcomers.
"Sir Gavin," Harrod called out quietly, his voice pitched low so as not to disturb Sir Ollie’s concentration. "You’ve brought company..."
