There was a burning feel to hear knees, a heat radiating as she landed flush against the hard floor. The pulse of pain ebbed and flowed soon after the initial shock. Pushing against the threshold of her tolerance, she fought against the rush of tears begging to slide down the apples of her cheeks. “Ow…” She groaned. Mia had never been one to internalize pain and suffering. Try as she might, old habits die hard. “Geh! Fuck… Heh. Luke… Ah! Ha…” Panting in pain between every word, there was a call to her partner - a subconscious remembrance of the promise made moments ago, that she would remain unharmed. Mia clung to that hope.

How pathetic, he thought to himself. Luke found the idea of breaking any promise undesirable, let alone one made without conviction and without a sense of duty to uphold it. To have broken it so soon was a sign of his own weakness. Now, he stood for what? Redemption in the face of failure? Watching the woman, mist like coils wrapped around Mia, holding her in place. What could he do against that?

Still, he acted on instinct. Luke stepped forward along the creaking floor boards. One sunk under his weight, the heel of his shoe landing awkwardly on the loose board. A stumble, but not a fall as he continued. Three steps in, and he was upon them, readying the overhand right he had trained through bloody and broken knuckles to perfect. Bearing down on his supernatural enemy, he swung.

The sound of impact never came. Fist raised, tense muscles flexed against an invisible force. Neck free to move, he turned to the side where he his blow had been halted. There, manifesting out of thin air, chains of mist bound him as they did Mia. Following them, they drew a line around him and back to the black-horned woman, her mask facing him. There was anger, born from frustration, carved into his face. Perhaps he was childish, but against an opponent on fair terms, Luke fancied himself above anyone. That was his pride, the ego of a champion - or soon to be, he had once hoped. Against this, however, what could any man or woman do when faced with the likes only imagined in storybooks and theater. But it wasn’t the futility of his efforts to defeat his opponent that angered him and chipped heavily away at his composure. It was guilt. It was the foolhardy idea that he could protect her against an unknown force. It was the fear that she would think him a no-good liar.

Mia, hearing his heavy foot steps approach, had built up enough courage to tilt her head up at the commotion. Easy at appeared, there was little she had ever done more difficult than that - staring death in the face… or the knees in this case. She placed the jades of her eyes upon Luke, his muscled form shaking visibly by the tiresome effort he displayed in defiance of the mist coiled around him. Tens of different strands of mist emanated from the ageless woman’s skin and bound him, tight against his body as they held him back and in place. Compared to the few holding her down, Mia couldn’t imagine his strength. But she could, however, match his desire.

The blond reached out her hand, intending to grip at the woman’s leg like she had done to Luke’s forearm. Pulling at the coiled mist around her wrist, she moved no more than an inch before her arm was yanked back and behind her. Her other arm followed suit, meeting behind her back. She expected now to slump face first into the old wooden floor beneath her, but instead found her self bound around the chest and shoulders, brought up into a sitting position atop her knees and held firmly there.

“Hey! Let her go!” He yelled out, a booming voice, husk with rage. Luke’s attention had shifted to Mia before darting back to the ageless woman, her form more youthful in the second he’d taken his eyes off of her. In that distraction, he had relaxed himself, both arms pulled behind and tied at the wrists. “Fuck!” He was done. Flexing in an attempt to break free, he quickly learned his efforts were in vain. All the training in the world wouldn’t give him the strength to snap his bindings.

“What do you want!” Mia cried. The woman turned to her, masked face peering back at the tied up girl. “W-we’ve done nothing to you! We… We just want to go home… Why?” She couldn’t help it anymore. Not with the aura of death ringing in her ears, a low drum that shook her from within and gripped at her heart - threatening without a moment’s notice to crush it. Tears streamed down her smooth skin to her dainty chin and dripping to the grimy floor. She hated it, viscerally. She feared no person, no creature. But death itself, it terrified her. And here she had met death incarnate, or so it appeared.

Mia felt her body lifted and pull along according to the woman’s will, the ropes of mist maneuvering her body into an ultimately more comfortable sitting position, her knees splintered from the weight of her body pressing them down into the rotten floor boards. They were scraped and bloody, though worse visually than they felt with adrenaline coursing through her veins. Flying towards her, a jar was placed in front of her containing a mysterious substance, oily and smooth. She felt one of her hands free, immediately grabbing the jar and chucking it at the silver-haired woman.

“Wait!” Luke yelled. The jar was caught mid-flight by coils of mist, and set back down in front of the girl. The masked woman pointed at the dark-haired man and then back at Mia.

“Tell her.” It was unexpected for dark-horned woman to speak, catching the duo off guard. Her voice changed with her age, mature or youthful depending on her appearance visually.

Shacking himself from the oddity, Luke complied. “That’s mine. She must have pulled it out of my bag with those… things.” He eyed the tendrils around her, keeping her in place. “Rub some over your cuts. It’s medicinal.” He turned to the blue-skinned woman. “It’ll be better if she wraps them with bandages after to keep the ointment from coming off. There should be some clean ones in my bag as well. In one of the outside pouches.” He wasn’t sure what the woman was up to, but if she was allowing Mia to take care of her wounds, maybe she could be reasoned with. Luke felt his bag rustle, a role of bandages removed and carried over to the younger girl.

“Am I supposed to do this with one hand?” She knew it didn’t matter if she were tied up or free, she stood no chance against this magic. Still, any advantage Mia could get, even if only to be less of a burden to Luke should they attempt to escape, was worth trying. The mist vanished from her, feeling her body move now on her own will and without restraint. The woman drew her attention, pointing behind her toward the window and outside.

“It is dangerous. Don’t run. Heal.”

Mia turned to Luke, searching for direction, unsure if she should heed the woman’s commands or defy them, dealing with whatever consequences either choice might bring upon them. He caught her gaze, breaking it to glance at the jar and bandages then back at the worried green eyes of his fair-skinned acquaintance. He nodded at her, affirming that she do as the woman told her. Tied up, he was useless. More than ever, Luke needed to stay calm and do whatever he could to make sure Mia was safe, at least until he was free of his bindings.

The girl picked up the jar. Sitting on the ground, she raised her knees up together, sliding her boots along the ground and close to her bottom. She winced as she bent her knees, the skin pulling tighter, a stinging pain. Opening it, unsure of how much to use, she dipped a finger into the cool, oily substance and began applying it to her cuts, feeling it cool and tingle where she rubbed it into her wounds.

“Don’t worry about excess. Just make sure you cover all the cut and bruised areas. The bandages will keep the ointment from coming off. It’s not the kind of stuff that needs to breathe so make sure you wrap them tightly,” Luke instructed her, the girl looking up at him and nodding.

“OK…”

The masked woman stepped back, sitting on the table and keeping a watch on her captives.

“So you’re responsible for the fog?” Luke figured he may as well get some answers while they were here.

The mask turned to him, her skin aged and worn, and then soft and smooth from instant to instant. “The mist is because it is. I only watch for those within it.”

“How so? By tying them up?” He nodded down to his own bindings. “Then what?”

“Your’s are not the souls I normally look after, child.” Her head turned to Mia, the mask pointing down at the girl, now rolling bandages over somewhat sticky knees.

“Then what do you want with us? Who are you? …What are you?” Luke didn’t understand most of what the woman was saying. After chasing them down, now she claimed that she wasn’t looking for them? Then why tie them up? If she truly meant them no harm, how was it that Luke and Mia were meant to trust her while being attacked and bound by the same fog from which they were placed into these circumstances to begin with. That same fog that had abducted him and brought him to a place of unnatural horrors.

The woman continued to stare down at Mia, as the girl tied the last of the bandages under themselves so that they wouldn’t fall off, answering Luke’s question in rhythm. “Down the road, when turns to soul, they chime to take you yonder.” She answered with a slow, metered pace. Then, continuing along her usual speech, turned again toward Luke, releasing him from the mist that bound him as they faded into nothing. “I desire nothing of you, but to ensure that you do not meet an end unintended by the fates.”

Luke dashed passed the woman, placing himself between Mia and what he perceived to still be the most immediate threat - the ever-changing woman.

From beneath him, a wide-eyed Mia grabbed Luke’s hand, pulling herself up as Luke quickly turned to help her to her feet. The girl stepped passed him, though Luke stuck right behind her.

“On the fringe of pearly gates, a tour guide of clouded border…” The blond haired girl cleared the cumbersome bangs that hung over and blocked a portion of her vision. Now, she appraised the woman once more. Still, there was an aura of death and the low drum that signified an imminent end. Of course, it would be terrifying. And to a girl that had always feared the Great Veil, whose questioning mind had only enhanced that fear with the little she knew of the afterlife, there was no way she wouldn’t be terrified. Yet, here she stood. Not with what she had believed to be death incarnate, but with something for more benevolent and unobtrusive.

“Careful, Mia. We don’t know what she’s planning—”

“You’re a Spirit Witch!” The blond took another step forward, now directly in front of the woman. Her father and uncle had written a song about them. Spirit witches where folklore, incarnations of the idea that death was not the end, but a transition into something else. Perhaps a heaven, beside the home of the gods, or a journey into the next life. Priests and priestesses spoke often of the afterlife, of the gift the gods gave to mortals of great honor and kindness, and the punishments for those who disobeyed their will. But folk tales spoke of the in-between, the Great Veil. Here, spirits wondered amid the winds of fate, carried along the Great Veil until they were called by the Spirit Witches and guided to their ultimate destination, whatever that may be. She was as familiar with the story as any, but faced with the reality of this place, it had not even crossed her mind - understanding that the Great Veil was something met only in death.

Mia’s face grew grim. Luke was unaware of the machinations turning within the young girl’s mind, calculations of cause and effect that produced only one possible result. “No… Then that means I’m…” She looked up at Luke, the befuddled man clearly not following along with her. “Luke… We’re—”

“Alive.” The woman spoke up behind her painted mask. Mia’s head darted in her direction, hope renewed, but confused.

“What? But how? That’s not possible. If we’re here, with you, then…”

“You’re safe.” She reassured Mia. The woman turned to Luke. “You’re both safe. Something has interfered with the Veil, halting it’s natural course along the Winds of Fate. It will be solved. Fate cannot be delayed for long. For now, worry only for your—”

Crack! A thunderous bang came from against the closed wooden door, swinging it halfway open before the witch manifested mist against it and shut it, covering the doorway in a thin layer of fog. Two more bangs along the door shook the cabin, dust and small debris rattling along the ceiling and falling down upon them. Luke shielded Mia with his arms, fragments of rotting dark oak clattering against his skin, but hurting him no more than with a few superficial scratches.

“Ah! …Luke, are you OK?!”

“Yeah… I’m fine. You?”

“Keh! Same.” She coughed, dust heavy in the air as the cabin settled. “What was that?”

“Mistwalkers,” the witch replied, Luke and Mia unaware as to what she referred to. “I sense many approaching in the fog. They’ll break through soon. Stand back.”