Chapter Three: Witch

Neureleine woke, gasping at the ache in her midsection, when she felt water wash over her face. She tried to sit up but found she was bound with her arms at her sides, her long hair blowing freely around her face.

"Kill the witch!"

Neureleine glanced around quickly, trying to find the cause of the outburst. Looking around her, she saw a mixture of fear, concern and fury. With a jolt, she realized they were all watching her.

"Who's a witch?" The crowd parted as Mallanora of the Dahme woodland faeries looked around the circle, indignant. "Neureleine Sithael! I told you to be home an hour ago! What have you gotten yourself into?"

Neureliene tried to explain but found she was gagged, something she had not noticed after her awakening when she tried to regain her senses.

She squirmed, trying to test her bonds and not be noticed. But before she had moved an inch, however, a long and sharp hunting spear was leveled at her throat. Following the path of the staff to its bearer's face, she saw with mixed feelings of humor and anger that she was looking into the face of the boy who watched the dairy stall.

She laid her head back down, praying to the gods to let her live. I suppose, Trickster, that you're having a good laugh right now-but spare me the humor and let me go!

Mally took in the situation with steady, level eyes and brought herself up to her full height of five feet. The animal noises seemed to stop and the wood became eerily silent.

One brave hunter yelled, "Kill the witch before she kills us all!" Mally turned her head in the speaker's direction and glared directly into his eyes, causing him to shift nervously from foot to foot.

Overhead the trees swayed, threatening to break at their trunks, and shower the spectators with splinters of wood.

"Is there something my foster daughter has done that I need to be informed of?" Mally watched the villagers' gazes shift, deadly calm in her voice.

Having finally collected himself into a sitting position, Jesabh was the first to answer. "She's bewitched us, that's wha' she did! We was standin' here mindin' our own business an' she came an' bashed us on th' back o' our heads with the trees!"

This answer was followed by a short pause while the town sat in stunned silence.

"What d'ya mean hit ya with the trees?"

"Well ya saw her! She made the trees catch 'er from fallin' off 'at cliff!"

"He's right Mally. T'was strange. A tree lashed out an' caught her like it 'ada mind o' its own. It was downright wrong! Trees 'ave no business comin' alive an' catchin' people, it's unnatural!"

This last accusation brought tears of anger and frustration to Neureleine's eyes. Her cheeks burned crimson as the first flash of lightening brightened the surrounding area to an almost daylight brightness. The village people looked up in amazement, fright visible on most faces. The resulting peel of thunder boomed across the clearing, bringing villagers to their knees.

"Gods be blest!"

"Quick! Let 'er go before the gods bring the forest down aroun' our ears!"

A villager Neureleine didn't know jumped forward to cut her bonds. Jacob jumped from his crouched position on the ground, a hunting knife appearing in his hand. Jacob made for her, a deadly gleam glowing in his eyes.

"Nobody touch 'er!" he whacked away the hands of the man attempting to free her. "She witched my son! She's mine!"

Just at the point when Jacob's knife connected with her neck, a rumble inside the earth resulted in a deep trench at Neureleine's feet where Jacob was standing. With a scream he tumbled down the side of the rocky pit to land, crumpled at the bottom, ten feet down.

Neureleine stared at him in shock, unable to contemplate what had happened during the last few minutes. With her pounding headache getting steadily worse and worse, she took in the scene around her with wide eyes: the townspeople; people she had known all her life, were staring at her, terrified. Granted, they may not have liked me, but some accepted me in their own special ways, and now they're scared of me!

This last thought was one Neureleine couldn't take. With a last shudder of horror, she passed out.

When Neureleine finally woke, she heard two voices conversing in low tones from above her. Curiosity getting the better of her, she made out to be still asleep.

"I would like to take her with me, to Tortall."

"But-"

"Mally, there is nothing for her here. She can't stay, they wouldn't let her, not after what happened today. She's not safe. Even if she did, she would live in isolation, everyone being too afraid of her to talk."

"I can't just-" the voice pleaded, a note of heartbreak tempting to overcome her resolve.

"Mally, she has no future here." The second, unfamiliar voice said gently but firmly.

"Okay."

Her wits fully applicable even after her long absence from the world around her, Neureleine's mind worked furiously. Mally was just going to let some stranger take her away? What would happen when he learned the truth? Would he scorn her for being different or accept her for who she was? And, most importantly, who was he, that Mally gave in to his authority and why did he care what happened to her?

Still trying to weasel the answers to these impossible questions out of her brain, Neureleine found the man at her side, lifting her shoulders to prop them against him.

Waiting until he settled her against himself, she grabbed his right wrist and flipped him on his back with one swift jerk. Turning the man's wrist in her hand, she gripped it in a steady, viselike hold, ready to squeeze pressure points if need be.

When the man landed, he gave a small gasp of surprise and said, "I don't know how your teaching is here, but where I come from, attacking your healer is not considered the best of manners."

Neureleine gave one last push on his wrist before letting him up, but stayed ready in case she needed to incapacitate him again.

The man got to his feet with cat-like grace, leaned against the wall and watched her with surprised amusement in his eyes.

The stranger stood as if waiting for something but, finally deciding it wasn't going to happen, shifted his weight to his left foot. He said, "As you are no doubt wondering but-I am sure too polite to ask," He said with not just a trace of sarcasm and amusement, "I am a merchant from Tortall here on-business."

Neureleine waited for him to continue but, seeing he wasn't, asked, "Name?"

Looking her straight in her eye with a mischievous twinkle in his own, he said, "I wondered what you would ask first. Judging by your greeting that is not the one I would have expected."

Blushing slightly with embarrassment, Neureleine decided to ignore such a circuitous remark. Why will he not just answer? What does he have to hide?

"I am sorry Master merchant that my question surprises you but as I did ask it and it is reasonable enough, it needs to be answered."

Up until them, Mally had been silently watching in apparent discomfort and embarrassment. At the last, she squeaked with indignation at her foster-daughter's rude manner and, finally gathering composure, started to lecture the girl on the offending mannerism.

Saving Mally a great deal of distress, the stranger just tilted his head and laughed, merriment shining in his eyes. At the sound, Mally stopped her scolding and just watched him with a look of mild interest that confused Neureleine.

"Thamas, at your service, milady-depending on how you intend to use it, of course."

"Naturally," the girl replied, and glancing at Mally's contemplating visage, turned back to the stranger and asked, "Now, what's your real name?"

He watched her with a calculating look for a moment. Finally, he grinned. "Loki. And now I'm not sure whether I want to give you my service or not. I doubt you'd put it to good use."