sehnsucht: the marsh

[yubishines]

[More tabletop stuff. Rana's mentor and her godmother sit down to have a talk. Set the night after the first adventure.]

It was very late. The only ones awake in the village were the guards pulling a double shift at the watchtower, after the curious disappearance of the watchman and the even more curious happenings recently. Whatever ruckus and confusion there had been that afternoon, now, all was quiet.

The southern marsh was a riot in comparison, full of bird calls and insect trill and toad song. At any rate, the marsh was a forty-minute walk away and only considered part of the village by a technicality.

The hagwitch stepped out of her cabin, a bottle in one hand and two ceramic mugs in the other. She lifted her head, sniffed, then stumped down the dirt path that led to the village, across the creek that marked the border between the marsh and the settlement. There was a small bridge spanning the creek, and the hagwitch stopped at the center of it and sat down, her boots dangling over the waters.

"Ilma," she said to the night air. "I know you're out there. Busybody like you won't be happy making one cryptic appearance and buggering off. Come on out. And none of your special effects, if you please."

There was a huff of disapproval and a swirl of air. Rana's fairy godmother stood beside the hagwitch, a round-faced woman in a dress with full skirts and bell sleeves. She did not actually have a bonnet and little fluttery wings, but to look at her was to mentally add them to her wardrobe.

"Old Molly," she said as she swept her skirts aside to sit down, swinging her legs over the edge like a girl. "It's been a while, hasn't it?"

"Five years," the hagwitch said.

"Closer to six, you'll find."

"That was a bad winter."

The fairy godmother -- Ilma -- coughed delicately.

Old Molly gave a dismissive nod in the direction of the cabin, as she uncorked the bottle and poured a slug of whiskey into each mug. "The girl's asleep. She knows well enough not to try it on me any more, but she's not listening in."

"You sent her to bed early?" Ilma accepted a mug and took a sip. "Nice earthenware."

"You hang around a pack of chufflebrained animals all day and see how long blown glass survives in your house. No, what do you think I did? I set her to mucking out the stables until she was falling off her feet. If she's up any time before noon I'll be surprised."

Though she owned no horses (horses were for farmers or rich men), there was a stables of a sort behind the hagwitch's cabin. It was situated on a drier stretch of ground and only housed the injured or infirm or expecting, usually brought to the hagwitch by villagers. Most of her beasts roamed wild around the marsh and surrounding forest. This was one of the reasons why it was a bad, bad idea to enter the marsh uninvited.

"I wouldn't have pegged you for a slave-driver," Ilma remarked to the night.

The hagwitch made a derisive noise. "Shows how well you know your goddaughter. She'd be tossing and turning half the night and good for nothing the next day. Now, she'll be a trifle slow tomorrow, but she won't have been stewing until sunrise and she won't skulk around looking like a dog waitin' for a kick."

"She's had a terribly long day, you know."

"Of course I bloody well know," Old Molly growled. "I don't have anythin' to do with those woods if I don't have to, and I know. I know this isn't going to be the end of it! I'm going to wring that fool priest's neck and cut him up for fishfood, and if that babyfaced whatshisname at the hunter's lodge has anything to say about it, he's next."

Once cornered, the girl Rana had stammered and fidgeted when she reported the forest escapade to the hagwitch, but word by word the story came out. Not the whole story, as Old Molly knew that children had to have their inscrutable little secrets, but enough. She also knew that the girl's nervousness hadn't all been from fear of impending punishment. Rana had been angry, in the jittery way of someone who doesn't know what to do with anger and it comes out as a faltering mess.

The hagwitch could understand. It had to've been a shock to find that fairy tales were real, not only real but tangible enough to reach into the village and steal people out of their homes. Even harder to swallow was the idea that your mentor hadn't been there to stand between them and danger.

Old Molly had been angry at herself for that. The girl and her little friends had done... better than expected, but it shouldn't have been them. And yet -- well, the forest was the forest (even forests that rose out of the ground as vast stone golems), and beasts were beasts, but fae had the most influence over human hearts and minds. Just as the fae didn't have great power over her, so she didn't have power over them. There were gaps in the world that adults couldn't pass and children could. That was all there was to it.

One of the most difficult things for a witch to learn, Old Molly knew, was not to try and hold back the tide. Sometimes all you can do is reserve your strength, and pick up the pieces after.

"That was a cruel trick you played on her," Old Molly added.

"It was a gift," Ilma said. "To explore and do with as she wished. It certainly helped smooth their way. Your protégé needs to see the world as it is, Molly. Isn't that why you chose her?"

"She's too damn young. And too damn soft."

"Your soft youngster shot two men and burned a third eye into an ogre this afternoon."

"So I'm protective." Old Molly threw back her whiskey, feeling it burn down her throat. "I'm no use at future-telling. My sister's not much better, whatever she says. Still, even we can figure there's something going on with those children. Signs, portents, whatever. Worst case of destiny I've ever seen." She sighed. "Even so, you can't build a life on a portent. You need a better foundation than that. I intend to teach the girl to be as good a beast-witch as she can be. If destiny comes knockin', let it; if not, she'll have a life of her own and a village to guard."

Ilma gestured at the creek with her mug, where the shores still echoed with grunts and blorts and various mating calls. "Frogs will spawn and grow up in these waters, generation after generation. They're happy enough. It's a good life. But if one wants to strike out for new horizons, shouldn't you let it go?"

"Not if it dries out on the way 'cos it's never been that far."

"Ah, but if it rains --"

"I swear to all the little gods, if you're gonna say 'a storm is coming' I will break this bottle over your head."

"I meant to say," Ilma said with dignity, "that what you call destiny might pull her from the village, Molly, but circumstance and her own personality will do it first. And she might not even have to leave. You need to know this: The children of the village have been marked by... something, something I don't know enough to name yet. Only Rana and the young noble --"

Old Molly snorted explosively, which seemed to encompass her opinion of the local lord and his heir.

"-- have gone untouched. Who knows why. The... something is long gone now, but if it comes back -- and it could at any time -- Rana won't thank you if you don't give her the tools to protect her friends." Ilma paused. "On that note, the blessing on her eyes will wear off within the week. You have my promise on that."

"Yeah, somehow I doubt not bein' able to see things you know are there now is so comforting," the hagwitch murmured. When Ilma made a disapproving noise, she relented. "Fine. Warning received. I'll have a talk with her about where she wants to go next in the learning. But she'll need a few days to settle down. Get back to regular life. That's fine, right?"

The fairy godmother nodded. The future was looming ahead, but it could wait a little while. Just a little while.

The hagwitch refilled their mugs, and they sat in companionable silence as the moon crawled across the sky.