It was extremely late when the knock came.
After our presentations before the Cauldron, our keep seemed to grow quieter and warier. Most of the witches decided to retrieve to their rooms and didn’t come out. I was one of many that did the same.
I couldn’t find the correct words to calm everyone. Nor myself. Sleep came in flashes, and once it started to deepen I was taken out of it by someone at the door.
Kronak. Was she here to demand her favor from me?
My stomach churned as I greatly considered not opening the door. But that quickly changed when the knocks were multiplied by tens in merely seconds.
Kronak didn’t let herself be perceived as desperate. Unless…
With trembling hands, I reached for the door, keeping some distance from it and bracing myself as I pulled it open.
My eyes met an older version of Evvy, for they shared the same color of hair - the lightest tone of grey, even though they were not sisters. My heart ached at the similarity, and even more after taking in the witch’s expression.
“Lyria, I don’t have much… time. Death awaits me, and it grows… impatient”, said Hynee, between quiet sobs.
My heartbeat quickened. I had hoped for a coincidental tragedy, not the first of many. My foolish hope that tried to believe the curses were not back was diminishing.
I reached for her hand to lead her inside.
“ No”, she resisted. “I’m not coming inside. You are the one that’s coming with me. To my Joining.”
Oh no.
One part of me has mourned the loss of magic alongside the witches. It had once transformed the lives of those that came before us. It made us fearful, our keep a fortress and our ego…indestructible. The curses took it all and left scraps of it: its remnants in the potions and in the Joining as well.
The latter was responsible for the other part inside of me - the one that despised magic.
Hynee walked before me with an unsettling sense of confidence, her tears had dried and her chin was held high. I wondered if what was about to happen would ruin all of this newfound composure, effortfully crafted with each step we took from the keep to the depths of the forest.
“Turn left”, I whispered in the dark, the moment I saw her angling the candle to a path to the right.
“Lunai told me there would be three rights and two lefts”, Hynee stood still but kept gazing forward, as if she was not willing to take any suggestions.
“Well, the choice is yours. Lunai has done it twice. With me. And I have done it a dozen more times with others apart from her.
She hesitated for a moment, before handing the candle over to me.
“Lead the way Lyria, just make it quick”
“You’ll realize you cannot rush this very soon, no matter how much you want to”
We walked silently, watching our steps and circling trees… until there weren’t any in sight anymore. A small clearing with a rock stood before us, illuminated by the moon glow.
“Here, this will be your place. Sit.”, I motioned toward the rock and felt Hynee’s confidence waver for the first time tonight.
“Let us begin”.
I collected some small rocks nearby and formed a full circle around the rock while Hynee fidgeted with the buttons of her cloak, sitting on top of the rock.
“Since you talked to her, I imagine Lunai has told you what to bring”, I extended an open hand in her direction and she handed me two pieces of cloth. My eyes widened at the sight of one of them - warm and rich fabric of clothing, not the kind we wear amongst the coven.
I lit both of them on fire and set them on the ground. We both watched the cloths disappear before our eyes before my hands reached for Hynee’s hair.
“Allow me”, she stopped my hands from reaching her. “I need something to do with my hands… my thoughts are unruled at this moment”
I hesitated. I was always the one to braid my hair and the other witch’s hair together. Unite both of them in a single braid and cement our connection.
“I promise I’ll be as gentle as Lunai told me you were.”
“Just this once.”
As she braided her hair using mine, I tried to distract myself by looking around the forest, instead of pressing her for questions.
How did you know you were going to die before I knew it?
“Ly…I don’t want you to tell the others about this.”
“There is another thing someone cannot omit from others, Hynee. Especially not from your sister and mother.”
The silence was heavy and the forest seemed to grow darker, more observant around us. She only spoke after the braid was done and I could look into her dark eyes once more.
“I understood why you didn’t tell Sansa about Evvy, even though you were the first to know. But destiny has something different stored for me, I didn’t need you to tell me I was going to die, the Cauldron showed me. I came to know of it first, the choice is mine to tell others.”, Hynee seemed so much older than twenty four, her words carrying a certainty few her age possessed.
“The choice is yours. And the suffering is ours.”, I said, taking her hands in mine. “Let’s try to stop it, Hynee. Try something different than what I tried with Evvy.”
“And what do you think I am attempting to do right now?”, she asked me as if I were a youngling witch learning to take my fist steps. “Do what you must do to cement the Joining.”
With braids united, I palmed my hands on the ground, feeling the ashes of the two cloths previously burning on it.
“First phrase he said to you”, I demanded.
“I’ll burn you until there is only grey hair on the scorched floor.”, Hynee uttered the words carefully, looking for my reaction.
“Hynee… are you certain-“
“You don’t know him. You’ll see.”
There was no use in trying to convince her. So I continued.
“Last words he said to you.”
I heard her take a steadying breath. “I’d steal the moon for you, every night, until my last.”
I looked up at her and saw something dangerous in her expression. Devotion. Her eyes became multiple eyes in my mind, they were different, they belonged to different witches of the coven. But they were similar, they were on the faces of the ones sitting on this same rock, with their hair braided in mine, possessing the same hope and devotion for a man that many times did not share the same for them. I hoped Hynee’s would be up for the fight.
I reached in the pocket of my cloak and pulled a page of the oracle’s book out. I started whispering the words in the language of the ancient, calling forth the remnants of magic responsible for the Joining about to unfurl.
Once the words were said, I felt the connection between Hynee and I deepen, and I finally saw him. Blond hair reaching the shoulders, rich fabric adorning his body, drink in hand and surrounded by many like him. The king ’s puppets. A soldier.
Hynee must have strayed too far from the keep to come to face him.
And then I saw them. Despising this part of the magic, I felt like an intruder peering in at them. Seeing their gazes, their words, their touches. Stop. Move on. Let me get a hold at him.
There.
Once you feel it, it’s impossible to ignore. It is here. His trial that will determine if they shall be together.
The only problem… is that to make sure he goes through the trial, it first has to materialize - through me. By me living through it before he does.
I become a stranger to my own body to give space for the magic to install. I become a vessel that serves the coven, not rules it. My hands have a mind of their own and I barely recognize my voice when it says…
“Stay here, Hynee. The trial is about to start.”
And then the magic possesses my feet and drags me rapidly though the forest. I fight the urge to scream at the discomfort that I haven’t gotten used to yet. Seven witches. Fourteen men. Fourteen trials and I still wish it didn’t involve me at all.
But these thoughts leave my mind abruptly when I reach a lake in the middle of the forest. It is illuminated by the moonlight and surrounded by gigantic trees that curve themselves toward the water.
It is closer. Facing me. Inviting me in. And I have no more chances to repel against my duty as heir. The trial of Hynee’s chosen starts the moment that my feet take a step back and then two quick steps forward - throwing me head first into the cold and dark waters of the lake.