At her best, a witch is the kindest of all Talented; devoid of mind or reason she is the worst.

- Andanian Chronicles

“That’s the royal princess, isn’t it?” Captain Fafnir questioned uncertainly. The most elite members of the Vaishyan royal guard muttered among themselves as they arrayed cautiously around the blood-soaked beast who was gorging upon a heap of broken corpses. From their bloodied remains, it was clear that she had been indiscriminate in her slaughter throughout the city. Both the young and old, from poverty stricken peasants to wealthy nobles, and even well-armed members of the city guard had fallen before her rampage. The girl hissed with irritation as she eyed the approaching troop of soldiers, even as she tore the entrails from a screaming boy and thrust them eagerly into her mouth.

“The princess is long dead. What you see before you is just a hollow shell, possessed by a demonic spirit.” Archdiviner Zinnridi warned, “If you let your guard down for even the slightest moment, you will certainly become yet another victim in this growing magical disaster. We must destroy this threat immediately to ensure Calcutta’s security.”

“We should wait for orders from the royal family,” Captain Fafnir demurred, “Prince Aryan might be able to restore her to her senses.”

But the weasel simply smiled slyly in response as the growling beast pounced towards them, “You are certainly free to do as you wish Captain, but I doubt that the demon will simply wait for him to appear.”

“Ready men, prepare the steel nets! Diviners, slow her down with binding magic! We will restrain the princess until Prince Aryan arrives.” The captain commanded bravely. The well-trained contingent of royal guards sprang swiftly into action as their target bounded towards them. The princess’s movements were immediately slowed as the ground dissolved into a viscous muck beneath her feet and the guards pinned her forcefully to the ground with a combination of magic and weighty netting. After several long minutes, the combined strength of five dozen of the nation’s finest Diviners and soldiers finally managed to fight the struggling princess to a precarious standstill. Devoid of her Talent, the princess’s furious cry of frustration echoed throughout the otherwise deserted city streets.

“We did it! Our prince will be pleased.” The royal guards cheered among themselves.

“Hey! What is she doing?” A sharp-eyed Diviner’s cry stole the mirth from their lips. The princess had begun to bleed profusely as she pushed recklessly against the metal bindings as if she could squeeze her body through the miniscule holes in the netting.

“More suppressive magic! We need to stop her from harming herself!” The closest guard shouted with concern as he stepped forward to prod her backwards with the blunt end of his spear.

But it was the worst mistake of his life. As the princess continued to struggle mindlessly, blood sprayed out from her self-inflicted wounds and several tiny specks of red splattered onto the approaching soldier. He did not even have the opportunity to scream. The moment her blood touched his flesh, her body blurred like a wraith through both physical and magical barriers and sped like lightning towards the him, and the man’s corpse exploded as she tore through his armor as if it was scrap paper. The remaining soldiers stared in horrified silence at the growling beast before them as they were all showered with the resulting rain of blood.

And then the famished princess pounced towards her freshly marked victims and the screaming began.

…

“Aryan, oh Aryan!” Mirror flung open the window and bounded excitedly into the prince’s darkened chamber.

“Oh, it’s you again.” The hollow-eyed prince sighed softly as he slumped listlessly in his bed.

“Nyan! This is terrible, how can you stand being like this all the time? Even the evil witch must be disappointed in you!” Mirror pouted unhappily as she illuminated the room brightly with her magic.

“Ugh… too bright. Please leave me alone Mirror. I’m tired, just let me sleep.” The prince sobbed sadly.

“But you have already been sleeping for two whole weeks! It isn’t healthy and you definitely need some exercise. So why don’t we go and dig up that evil witch right now. Here I even managed to get you a shovel.” Mirror replied eagerly as she tossed the solid metal tool at the sullen boy.

“Is this some kind of joke?” The tiniest flash of anger flickered from beneath Aryan’s heavy mask of sorrow. “Laura sacrificed her life to save us all, how dare you even suggest that I violate her grave? And she’s not evil, I forbid you from always referring to her as an ‘evil witch’!”

“Dead? Who’s dead?” The kitten scoffed. “Let’s stop dilly dallying and dig her out, then we can go for some happy fishes together! She must be really famished after you trapped her underground and starved her for two entire weeks.”

“Laura’s not dead?” Aryan frowned with growing befuddlement, “This isn’t funny, Mirror. Go play your childish tricks on… Oww!” The prince yelled as Mirror dug her teeth painfully into his thigh.

“Grr… I’m a growing kitten, not some immature child!” Mirror growled, “And didn’t she already spell out the conditions for her death clearly enough? Did you ever stab her through the heart with a blade of silver?”

“Of course not, why would I ever…”

“And then, did you behead her?” Mirror ignored the prince’s frustrated protest and continued her barrage of questions.

“No!!”

“Well then that evil witch isn’t dead, she was just hibernating to recover from her wounds! Surely you have the intelligence to figure out something simple like this?” Mirror concluded smugly with a satisfied meow.

“What!? That just isn’t possible, there’s no way she could have survived after sustaining those hideous injuries. I had the nation’s best doctors and diviners examine her body and they could not detect the faintest sign of life!” Aryan protested incredulously.

“Your doctors and diviners are fools; didn’t they conclude that I was also ‘dead’? Thanks be to god Dagon, you would certainly have buried me with the evil witch if he hadn’t intervened to save me!” Mirror shuddered. “The witch isn’t human either, so why would you judge her by your dumb human standards? A creature of evil like her won’t be vanquished so easily.”

“If what you say is true, why didn’t you say anything during her funeral!?”

“Fun­-eral?” Mirror frowned thoughtfully as she cocked her head sideways, “Oh right, that’s your bad human prank where you all have fun by burying someone sneakily in a random distant location after you catch them unawares? Grr… what a horrid human custom. I’m really good finding safely hidden nap spots, but how do the rest of you ever manage to sleep in peace?” Mirror questioned curiously.

“LAURA IS ALIVE!?” Aryan exclaimed loudly as his sorrow was swiftly replaced by an ecstatic expression of hope as he grasped her tightly by her shoulders.

Mirror rolled her eyes in annoyance, “Grr… so loud, stop stating the obvious. And why can’t you be happy like this whenever you see me?” She pouted, “It’s always Laura this, Laura that with you. I really don’t get it, we look exactly the same, so why are you only infatuated with that evil witch?”

“Guards!” Aryan yelled as he leapt to his feet and dashed down the corridor, “Saddle the horses immediately, we will ride for the royal cemetery this very instant!”

“This will be worth it. Fishes, many happy fishes are waiting for loyal little Mirror…” Mirror whispered under her breath to encourage herself as she trailed reluctantly behind the departing escorts and into the chilly night.

…

“Aiieee!” A hardened criminal shuddered madly as he stared at the approaching witch.

“Huaaa!” A vicious mass murderer screamed in horror as he lost control of his bowels.

The third prisoner was so panicked that he bashed his head against a wall and knocked himself out cold.

“Dearest apprentice, they all seem quite unwell. I wonder if I can help them feel a little better?” Lily mused as they passed through the packed dungeons. The witch curled her lips into a friendly smile as she turned to wave at a row of occupied prison cells, “Hi everyone! Need help?”

A third of the convicts immediately collapsed from stressed induced heart failure, a third shrieked madly as they fought like rodents to cower in the darkest corner of their cells, and a third were so terrified that their bodies were frozen in place.

“Oh no! This can’t be good… I detect clear signs of a spreading epidemic! We need to heal them immediately before...” Lily exclaimed worriedly as she strode swiftly towards the trapped inmates.

“Monster…” One of the least affected prisoners squeaked reflexively.

“Monster? Where’s the monster?” Lily inquired curiously. The deforming metal bars of the prison cell screeched loudly as she shoved them aside effortlessly with her bare hands, “Don’t worry mister, I’m here to help. I’ll catch all the big bad monsters and keep you safe.”

“Stay away! Helppp…” The wide-eyed man shrieked with absolute horror.

“Hey about this monster, what does it look like? Do you know where it is?” Lily questioned kindly.

The man’s teeth chattered wildly as speech failed him. He pressed his back against the far wall like a cornered rat and his mouth foamed with blood.

“Ugh… all these Saadians. Is it a common disability? Why is it so hard to communicate mundanely with any of them?” The witch sighed as she turned to glance ruefully at the grey skinned zombie-like trio of imperial truth-finders shambling up silently from behind her. “I know that I wasn’t very successful with them, but maybe you’ll be able to talk better after a few tiny upgrades!” Lily suggested hopefully as she rested one hand comfortingly on his shoulder even as she dug through her stack of talismans with the other.

Her touch was the final straw that shattered his already fragile mind. The man’s eyes dilated further as his gaze flickered towards the lifeless husks of what had been the empire’s most hardened torturers, stumbling through the corridor towards him. And his mouth opened and closed repeatedly in a vain attempt to scream, but his fear devoured mind had already lost the ability to operate the rest of his body. Then his muscles twitched uncontrollably as he fell to the ground and convulsed violently in the dirt as blood gushed freely from his orifices.

“Dead… he’s really dead! I couldn’t save him!” Lily sobbed sadly as she backed away from the bloody corpse. “Why does everyone always die and leave me alone?” She wept bitterly as she wrapped Naomi in a tight embrace, “Dearest apprentice! I’ve put my bestest magics in you, so you won’t ever die and leave me alone like all the others, will you?” She mumbled sorrowfully.

“Of course not, cross my heart and hope to die.” The pale-faced child pacified the witch quickly with barely veiled sarcasm before she could reach for her talismans.

Lily sniffed sadly as she wiped away the tears trailing down her cheeks, “It definitely wasn’t my fault, I would never hurt anyone willingly! It was just an unfortunate coincidence that he died when I touched him.” The witch forced a smile back onto her lips as she turned to address the surviving prisoners, “Don’t worry everyone! I’ll be sure to get the bad scary monsters soon, I just need to search all your rooms for it!” The witch explained reassuringly as she turned towards the cell with the loudest screams.

An immediate deathly silence fell upon the entire dungeon as the surviving prisoners shoved their hands into their mouths in a desperate attempt to suppress their uncontrollable cries of horror.

“Huh? Why did the screaming stop?” Lily blinked with surprise, “Whatever happened to the monsters? If I can’t sense them, it must mean that they are really good at hiding their auras!” She frowned as she stared at the silently shivering prisoners but failed to elicit any response from them. The frustrated witch pouted, “Naomi! Why isn’t anyone talking to me? Do they all have defective throats?” She complained as she stomped her feet with exasperation.

“The monsters must have fled when they sensed your presence.” Naomi fibbed in a hopeful attempt to rescue the trapped prisoners.

“Naomi…” The witch’s eyes narrowed dangerously as she clamped her hands tightly on Naomi’s pale slender shoulders. “Never lie to me again, or else…”

“Ahh!” Naomi’s mind raced for an escape, “You were just mistaken, there are no monsters!” She cried out desperately, “Just leave them alone and they will all be better-off!”

“No monsters? Really!?” Lily scrunched up her face with effort as she amplified her senses to the maximum. “You don’t seem to be lying about the humans either…” She admitted reluctantly as she stared into her apprentice’s tearful cobalt tinted eyes. “Oh well.” She shrugged absently, “I must be tired, mistakes do happen I guess? Now that we have resolved this incident, why don’t we leave this gloomy residence and get some sun? I’m famished after all that spellcasting, I wonder if they still have any pudding in the kitchens?” The witch hummed a wordless melody as she skipped nonchalantly towards the exit, “Com’on, stop dilly dallying over there Naomi!” She began shouting impatiently before pausing as a new thought slipped into her mind. “Oh! Why do all these Saadians want to live in those cold dirty cubicles anyway? It can’t be very healthy! You know… maybe I should be more responsible and help them by changing their minds…” The witch concluded happily as she turned back towards the dungeons.

“Nooo!” Naomi bounded forward desperately before the witch could return to the prisoners, “You don’t have to help them with anything! Let’s just forget about the prisoners and get some lunch!” She insisted hurriedly.

“They are prisoners? What are prisoners?” Lily inquired curiously.

“Huh? Don’t you have prisoners in Andania too?” Naomi replied hesitantly, “So how do you stop people from committing crimes in your nation?”

“Crim-es?” Lily smiled with growing interest, “What are these crim-ies? Are they tasty? Like a special sort of cream pies?”

“Okay?” Naomi questioned nervously, “So, how do you stop people from doing bad things in Andania?”

“Bad things?” The witch clapped her hands excitedly, “We don’t get to meet many naughty people because the maze my sister made swallows anyone with hostile intentions! But… Father lent me some really naughty friends once and I convinced them to play a game of hide and seek with me! Teehee… it was so much fun!” Lily’s gleeful expression faded quickly into an unhappy pout, “But I never understood why Father refused to lend me any more people after that one and only time!”

“What did you do to them… just what is this game of hide and seek about?” Naomi’s voice quivered with extreme fear and foreboding.

“Nothing, I would never dream of harming anyone! Dearest Naomi, surely you must believe me by now!” The witch nodded confidently, “It was just an unfortunate coincidence that they broke! But I managed put them back together so they were even better than new!”

“They broke…” Naomi stammered in terror, “What do you mean by that? Did they become like those truth-finders over there?” She gulped nervously as she stared the hollowed-out husks of the former imperial torturers.

“Naw… They are just a little overwhelmed by their enlightenments.” Lily replied reassuringly waved brightly at the pallid men. The utterly shattered humans responded by raising their hands robotically and waving back reflexively. “See? They responded. They are all are perfectly fine.” She concluded cheerfully.

“It was much worse than that?” Naomi blurted out incredulously.

“Aww you are beginning to overexaggerate things like elder sister.” Lily giggled dismissively, “It was only an itsy bitsy bad thing that happened because they were all too weak.” The witch sighed with pity, “The poor, poor naughty people in Andania… elder sister is in charge of dealing with them now. She’s merciless. The naughtiest ones are executed immediately while the remainder are turned into puppies! Hurting them just because they happened to do a bad thing or two, isn’t that just too inhumane? Doesn’t everyone deserve a second chance?”

“Urp… she’s completely unhinged… someone please save me…” Naomi moaned under her breath as she backed away surreptitiously from the wistfully pondering witch.

“Oh! I get it now!” Lily shouted excitably as she rebounded from her melancholy mood, “Prison sounds like… prisun-ers! Doesn’t that old French word mean, people who have been seized? And aren’t people usually seized because they are naughty people that need to be punished?” The witch chortled ecstatically, “Oh, oh, oh! This must be my lucky day, let’s all have a hide and seek marathon right now!”

“NOOO!” Naomi screamed as she attempted to avert yet another impending disaster. “I mean… they aren’t naughty people! Erm… It’s just their job!” She explained hurriedly, “See, it’s their duty to stay inside those dirty cubicles and act as deterrents to the real naughty people. So, we mustn’t interfere with their important mission!”

“Humph spoilsport.” Lily pouted, “Surely it must be horrible for them to live in such a boring dingy space like that, don’t you feel that a tiny little change in pace is in order here?”

“No! Please stop disturbing these honest hardworking citizens! Nobody has the time to play with you.” Naomi blustered desperately.

“Aww… a little fun never hurt anyone! Just five minutes, five minutes of hide a seek is all I ask…” The witch smiled hopefully as she fluttered her luscious eyelashes entreatingly at the horrified child.

The witch’s apprentice mustered up all the courage in her heart and clamped her hands tightly around Lily’s wrist before she could race back towards the terrified convicts. “Teacher Lily. Didn’t you promise to teach me more about magic? And didn’t you say that you would care for me? So why are you neglecting your duties when your poor staving student is in dire need of attention?”

“Oh right, you still have to eat like all the other humans.” Lily noted apologetically, “It can’t be helped since your transformation wasn’t perfect. Well what are we waiting for? Off to the kitchens then! I’m sure the cooks will spare us a tasty treat or two. Maybe they will be able to prepare something to satisfy Krall too!” She added as she skipped blithely towards the nearest exit with her newfound apprentice in tow.