Chapter 8

Approved for Human Testing

Witch

Oh this was going to be good. I could practically taste the slowly building resentment that I would instill in that boy! By the time I would tell him never to come back he would be so sick of me he wouldn't come into my forest at all for fear of seeing me! I laughed aloud at my own genius. Yea, I'd have to put up with the nuisance for a few weeks, but I'd get my use out of him in the meantime. I'd always needed a guinea pig for new spells, after all.

The whole idea had come to me in a stroke of true genius, if I may say so myself. After I'd practically dragged him into my house and set him up, on the couch, head lolling, I'd set to work figuring out what was wrong with him. He was still knocked out cold. I looked him up and down, taking note of his ripped jeans and the torn off sleeves of his T-shirt. I still recalled when jeans had become the preferred clothing – terribly confining and scratchy things in my opinion and how he'd managed to climb a tree in a tight pair like that was beyond me. It struck me again that he was really rather handsome though, with high cheekbones and a straight nose. He was wearing a little bandage across the bridge of his nose and I wondered absently what it was for as I cast several divining spells over his body. Luckily no bones were broken, repairs weren't exactly my specialty, and there didn't seem to be any significant internal damage aside from what would definitely turn into a bruise where the magic forcefully stopped him. His sleep was partially from that force and partially from a layer of magic that still laid on him. Easy enough to fix.

I set to work at my cauldron, mixing up a simple fix that would remove the enchantment on him. Ingredients poured into the simmering water at a steady pace as I reached blindly across my shelves to where I knew things were almost more from muscle memory than actually recalling location. As I worked I contemplated what I would tell him when he broke up. Oh sorry, I just scared you out of your tree, knocked you out, and dragged you back to my house! Definitely not. Not that I owed him an explanation! But I couldn't just wake him up in my house and tell him to get out – he would come back! And since my goal, ultimately, was to get him to stop coming into my realm and distracting me I had to do something more… permanent. Then it hit me, I just had to make him actually fear me or hate me! My threat at the beginning hadn't worked but maybe if I kept it up, tested magic on him and made myself generally insufferable then he would be begging me to let him go! Somewhere in the back of my mind my centuries of experience were warning me not to get too close to this kid, that social experiments could very easily go wrong. But I ignored it. The last thing I needed to be thinking of while I dealt with this bug buzzing in my ear was friendship or anything of the sort. No. It had been far too long since my last friendship and I simply didn't know how to be a friend any longer. I nodded to myself in determination. I would keep this boy around for my own amusement and run him off so he would stop bothering while I was at it. And that was that.

After a few minutes had passed there was one ingredient left: a piece of his hair. Some potions require a piece of the person they're intended for so that the effect is clearly written into the concoction itself. I was a firm believer that hair was the easiest way to manage this, although I'd definitely used more… unorthodox ingredients in the past. I leaned over him and he stirred slightly as my hands moved over his head, almost causing me to jump in alarm, but he didn't wake. Allowing a moment to pass before continuing, I fingered through his bangs to his scalp so I could pull a hair that was still attached at the scalp. I noticed that he really wasn't so grimy as I had assumed at first; his hair was clean aside from the sweat of just the single day and had a smell something like pine, not altogether unpleasant really. I plucked the hair swiftly from his head and he grunted slightly in his sleep but nothing else. The cauldron smoked and sizzled when I dropped the hair into it and then the whole concoction turned a light, semitransparent blue. Perfect. I decanted the liquid into a small bowl then dumped it over the boy's head before retreating back into my kitchen to await the results.

A few seconds passed. I wondered if the potion was even going to work. I had made it right, hadn't I? Then he burst up from the couch, reflexively pulling his axe from his belt. I let out a little squeak at that and pulling my hands up in front of myself defensively; when he caught sight of me he brandished it. His eyes were panicked and his wet hair was all plastered down on his face. I yelled at him to put the stupid thing down. I had never really been comfortable with weapons, the people who carried them could be far too volatile. I told him what had happened at the tree and gave him a little threat. His yellow eyes flickered to my cauldron and opened wide, his face paling. "You're not… You're not going to eat me… are you?..." He said in a tiny voice. I nearly retched at the thought. Was my house made of gingerbread? Honestly. He relaxed at the sound.

"Certainly not, don't be ridiculous. You fell out of your tree when I tried to reprimand you. My magic knocked you out when I caught you and now here we are. Well? How do you feel?" I quirked up my brow and waited for his response. Hopefully my potion had worked well and I hadn't messed up anything worse than I had initially thought. But who knows, I could have accidentally tampered with his memories and I would never know. Whatever.

"Like I tackled a tree running full speed." He said frankly, making various faces as he looked himself over. "Oh, and my mouth tastes like barf." I smiled. Reversal potions had a way of doing that.

"Not so bad then!" I chirped and turned away from the boy. I started stirring what remained in the cauldron slowly, murmuring some magic words to make the residue evaporate out. "Well… You'll have to pay a price, seeing as I saved your life. And you were trespassing again after all… Hmm…" I paused, placing my hand on my chin and turning slowly to look at him again from across the room. I was making a bit of a show of telling him what his punishment was. What can I say, it's exciting to have a new experiment! "You'll have to… Visit me every day!" I grinned widely. Oh yea, this would definitely be exactly what I was wishing for. This boy would be out of my hair in no time.

"That's it?" He asked, his mouth dropping open a little bit. It took all I had to stifle my maniacal giggling!

"Yup! Every day until I tell you to stop!" I flipped my hair and smiled again before turning back to my cauldron. I'd had enough for the day honestly, and I was tired. "I'm not feeling talkative this evening so you're free to go. But I'll expect you back here sometime tomorrow."

"Oh, well ok then. See you later then, Princess." My skin prickled a little at the endearing nickname but he was out the door before I came up with anything to spit back at him. Ugh.

"Princess my ass." I muttered acidly. Honestly modern curses really were much better than most older ones. It did kind of sting to be called Princess though, it brought up a lot of negative emotions. It's what he called me, when we were young, before we foolishly decided to trade true names. I shook it off, it wasn't a good time to be getting lost in memories of heterochromatic eyes and the Wizard's stupidly beautiful tan skin. No, I had more important things to be planning – like how to get rid of pests.

Early the next morning there was a knock on my door. I'd been up for hours so I was alert – immortals don't really need too much sleep. Not that I stayed up for multiple days like the Wizard, he'd turned into quite the madman with the advent of coffee, but I subsisted on just a couple hours a night. I walked over to the door and snapped it open, a slight smile on my face at the new man. It was nice not to just be intruded on by him this time. He was really rather intriguing. Unlike Luke, he went about his business and then left. It was definitely preferable to the obnoxious effect Luke's more constant presence had been on occasion.

"I'm feeling talkative today, you can come in." I said smoothly to Kasey before turning on my heel and walking back over to the bubbling mess that was my kitchen. I was working on something new. If I was lucky it would give one the energy to stay up for a few days without getting tired and oh I would definitely be hanging it over the Wizard's head for a couple years before he figured it out himself or I decided to give it to him. I'd been through a few different trials of the potion, always with a ready-made reversal on hand, and had… mixed results. But this was different! I could smell it, this brew was getting close to what I was aiming for.

"What has you in such a good mood?" Kasey asked with a smile, coming in and settling down at the little table in my living room. He hadn't visited since I'd given him the bell.

"Oh nothing!" I practically sang, giving him a little wink and continuing with the methodical stirring of my potion – three turns counterclockwise, two turns clockwise, and repeat. "Just that I'm working on some particularly interesting experiments these days. So how did everything go with that bell." I was little bit curious and I assumed that was why he was in my house anyway.

"Oh they went perfectly, thank you! When I took the bell back to the windmill, the Goddess's sprite rang it and now the wind is back to normal. Thank you again, I couldn't have done it without you." He sounded happy, I was glad. It was good that someone like him had come to help the Harvest Goddess; someone had to do it and I was far too impatient. "There's just one bell left but I'm a little nervous about it. I have to make friends but I feel like I hardly know anyone really since I've just been running around asking favors to get these bells rung since I got here." I could hear the frown in his voice.

I scoffed. "Humans are simple, just talk to them every day and bring them gifts and they'll be falling for you in no time." I flicked my wrist dismissively. Mortal lives were different than immortal ones, their trust was easier gained because they only had so long to make connections. I'd made the mistake of bowing to my emotions too many times in the past. It wasn't the same for immortals, you were still here when everyone else was gone. I was more careful now. That's why I was in the woods alone, anyway.

"I don't even know what anyone likes." He sighed and the chair creaked as he slumped back.

"Ask the Wizard." I said tartly before I even realized what I was doing. Giving Gale business! Ugh I must be really out of it today to go and refer someone to him for magic when we were still in the middle of our debate about fortune telling, for the Goddess's sake!

"Oh. … Oh ok I think I will. Thank you!" Kasey said slowly, then stood from the table and excused himself. He really did seem to just come and go in the interest of working towards his ultimate goal. He didn't really take much time to converse. He had just kept the conversation going until he'd gotten useful information from me. No wonder he hadn't really made friends. I tilted my head towards the door and thought on that for a moment before a foul smell rose to my nose.

I frowned. The potion wasn't bubbling blue-purple anymore but had turned a sickly brown-green. Too many stirs clockwise. Back to step one.

Author's Note: Hey look, things happened in this chapter too! This will be the mechanism for continued encounters between the Witch and Luke, and next week will reveal their super fun first meeting; I can't wait! Please review! Sharing your thoughts might even sway the direction of the story a bit!