FOREVER MINE
•Kingdom of Norway - 1414 A.D.•
"Hurry! We don't have much time."
I caught Matthias' hand and urged him on, leading the way through the snow-laden forest. Our footprints were easy to track on the white ground, but as long as we made it down to the docks, I would not matter. A ship was awaiting us there to give us safe passage to Denmark, where, if we were cautious and clever enough, we might elude Dahlia long enough to find a way to break her magical connection with me.
Running through the snow in a floor-length dress and eight months pregnant was no easy feat, but I forced myself to not succumb to the aching pain in my feet, and the growing obstruction to my windpipe. I could endure ten minutes of agony and would gladly pay the minor consequences later as long as I could bring my unborn son and the man I loved to safety.
Matthias came to a sudden halt behind me but did not let go of my hand. Because his physical strength outweighed my own, I was pulled back with a groan, wincing and quickly re-positioning myself to avoid damage to my shoulder.
"What is it?" I breathed, my voice escaping on a cloud of frosty smoke.
Matthias frowned at me and looked as though he was about to answer. But when his mouth opened, no words were uttered, only a feeble whimper and sudden copious amounts of blood.
"No!" I screamed, as he sunk to his knees, blood continuing to pour from his mouth, nose, eyes, and ears. I knew the cause long before she appeared. There, towering between two pine trees stood Dahlia, her eyes black with cruelty, her hand raised in a fist before her.
"Stop it! Dahlia, no!" A twinge of pain erupted in my lower abdomen, the child within me shifting in discomfort as though my distress caused him physical pain. Dahlia said nothing and did not release Matthias from her hex. He was watching me with a look of desperation, a silent plea for help I could not give him. No one could stop Dahlia. No one was powerful enough.
As my lover's body fell silent to the forest floor, my knees buckled beneath me and I was overcome with heart-wrenching sobs. The tears would not halt, and I did not try to make them. I felt Dahlia draw near, the sound of her winter cloak dragging along the powdery snow mingled with my grieving cry. No other sound could be heard. There were no animals here. They had all fled the scene when dark magic entered.
"Stop crying, child," Dahlia demanded in a calm, yet impatient voice. "He was nothing. Nothing but a means to an end." She pressed the tip of her boot to Matthias' crimson cheek, lifting his face just enough for her to examine it before she released him with a contemptuous sight. "Filth."
Angrily, I swatted her foot away, raising a tear-filled gaze that burned intensity to look upon the face of the devil herself. "How could you?" I cried, my features contorted in rage. "How could you do this to me? I loved him! He loved me!" Catching Matthias' cold face in both my hands, I cradled him to me as much as my pregnant belly would allow, crying like I had cried the day I was taken from my mother.
"Love," Dahlia mused, a dark smile igniting, "He never loved you, child. The only reason he wanted you was because I made him."
My sobs subsided. I looked at up at her in shock.
"What?"
"I cast a spell, made him seek you out. Made him think he loved you, so you would return his feelings." She paused, looking surprised by my gobsmacked reaction. "I told you, Freya, your siblings can never give me another child. That duty lies with you now." She crouched down and placed a tender hand upon my stomach, her gaze transfixed. "And I will have what is owed to me."
She was insane. I had known this for quite some time, but somehow, I had never expected her to take such drastic measures to get what she wanted. The thought that every moment with my beloved Matthias had been nothing but a lie, made my heart ache in a way I had never experienced before. I believed the pain would be less had Dahlia just ripped it from my chest. I had no words.
"Come now, child. Did you really think you would be able to escape me? You are mine. I feel you - in here," she whispered and placed a hand on her chest. "Cry for him no more. He was just another Viking descendant, brute and ignorant, like your father. He is not worthy of your tears."
She rose gracefully to her feet and caught my arms, tugging me up along with her despite my shaky legs and trembling hands. I knew there was no use in trying to make her see the error of her ways. I had tried my entire life. Dahlia would never change. I stood there, my hands limp in hers, believing myself to be all out of the powerful emotions that had through from me minutes earlier. I was drained.
"Let us go home, and I will make you an infusion of chamomile to calm your nerves. We must not harm our child." Dahlia crooned, assuming her usual pretence of a motherly figure.
Something within me broke as her words registered. Our child. Our. The bitch had taken everything from me, and she still had the audacity to assume she would have a claim on MY son. Eyes blazing with fury, I tore my hands from hers, and charged with magic I slammed them against Dahlia's bony chest, sending her flying through the trees, and into the darkness where I could no longer see her. "You will never have my son," I whispered.
Running all the way back to our cottage, fueled by anger and a determination to stop Dahlia's reign of terror, I was out of breath once I finally arrived. Pushing the animal pelts away from the doorway, I made straight for Dahlia's collection of potions, very aware I probably only had seconds before she would catch up with me. Trembling fingers finally closed about a flask of red liquid, and I brought it to my lips, draining the entire thing just as Dahlia burst inside, her eyes wide with fear as she saw what I was doing.
"I gave you everything. You dare to take what is mine!?"
I dropped the empty bottle to the floor and shot her a look of defiance, managing a triumphant smile before the poison took hold of me and pulled me under the lull of death. Victory was mine.
–––
Dahlia had told me stories of what happens to a witch when she dies. "We never truly die," she had told me one night when I was nine. "Though our earthly bodies may be broken and beyond repair, our spirits remain. We will be in the earth, in the trees of the forest, the gentle breeze that shakes the leaves, and in the ocean, as wild and unruly as we are. A witch never dies."
In the darkness, I waited. For Dahlia's words to become true. For a feeling of freedom, for the weight of past pain and trauma to release me, to be one with nature. But it never came.
My eyes shot open and I inhaled in a deep gasp. My heart beat hard and frantic within my chest, as though it was trying to find its normal rhythm and failing miserably. I looked around wildly, shock and disbelief washing over me as I was met with the sight of our little hut, Dahlia beside me on my bed of furs.
I did not know what day it was, or if time had even progressed since I was last awake. But as I sat up, I realized it must have. My clothes were changed.
"How can this be? How am I alive?" I muttered in bewilderment, voice trembling.
"The spell that sealed our magic sleep guards us against all forms of harm," Dahlia informed me casually, her eyes following me as I rose from the bed to stand. "But the spell did not protect everyone…"
Another twinge of pain attacked me, and I knew it was true before I even looked down. My round belly had disappeared, now as taut and flat as it had been before I conceived my son. As though I had never been pregnant at all…
My head spun. Heart throbbing with agony, gut-wrenching with guilt because of what I had done. Killed my own child, in a foolish attempt to secure our freedom. Once more, tears sprouted from my eyes and fell down pale cheeks in abundance. Clutching the fabric of my dress, fingers desperately searching for the unborn child that was no longer there, I fell back onto the bed, sobbing.
"My baby."
I had thought the pain of losing Matthias would be the worst one possible, but this…His death did not even compare. It was as though someone was ripping me limb from limb, over and over again, choking me, blinding me, burning my skin and peeling it off my flesh.
I barely noticed as Dahlia embraced me, her chin resting atop my head, her voice quite calm and serene.
"There, there, my child… I will forgive you for this. Eventually. But you can never forget there is no escape from me. Not. Even. Death."