The Daughter of Death- *RAYOR*

Chapter 7: The Year of the Dead

We arrived, unspeaking, at Enid's maybe half an hour later. It wasn't the ramshackle witch's haven I'd imagined, just a copy of the other houses, but maybe a little more run-down. Foxgloves grew in a flowerbox. I reached out towards them.

"Don't!" blurted out Willow.

"You know your plants," I said. "Digitalis. Poison." I dropped my hand. "Of course, it had never affected me, when I picked them before..." I let the sentence trail off.

Willow knocked. There were a few short seconds before the door opened. The woman standing there wasn't like any other I'd ever seen; freckly skin, short silvery hair, and her eyes. They were the bluest I'd ever seen. She seemed familiar somehow. Though her hair was silver, she looked younger than forty. She also didn't look surprised to see me.

She closed her eyes, touching her hand to her neck where I saw a pendant, a magnifying glass. "Come in," she said.

Willow and I walked in. She led us to a room with two windows, both rather large, with silken curtains drawn, staining the light yellow. It was enough for the light to pass through, not enough to let anyone look inside.

She sat down, indicating that Willow and I should as well. She lifted the magnifying glass pendant, which hung from the chain by the handle and looked through it at me. I gasped. Her eye wasn't visible through it despite the fact that the lens seemed to be glass. She started talking, but not in a language that I understood. Sometimes harsh and grating, sometimes feather-soft, a language that I recognised.

"Blakely," said Enid.

I nodded. "It's just Blake. You're talking in the language of the souls."

She smiled. "You understand?" her accent was lilting, twisting her words into song.

"No," I said. I sensed something about this woman, something that I recognised as well. "What happened to you?"

Her smile vanished. "Bad thing." She looked at Willow, recognising him instantaneously. "Willow?"

He nodded. "Yes. This girl- she lost her powers. Can you help her get them back?"

Enid held out a hand. Willow dug in his pocket for money, but I held out the coins first. I didn't like Willow, still. We had a common goal, but I didn't like him.

"No, I will," said Willow, obviously feeling guilty about hitting me earlier. I gave him a hard look. Yes, he'd hit me. But he'd lost his own dignity. Not mine.

Enid took them, oblivious to the mind battle that was happening in my head. I wanted to forgive him. But I wasn't a mortal, at least not in that sense. I am Blakely.

"Tell me where to go, what to do," I said. "Please," I added, as an afterthought. The word felt bitter. I wasn't used to saying it.

Enid stood up- and collapsed.

I leapt back. "Ma'am!" I rushed over to her. Was she hurt? Had she been sabotaged by people who were determined to keep my powers out of reach? Had she died? Why was I thinking these empathetic thoughts?

Willow grabbed my arm and pulled me back. "Don't."

I shook my hand out of his grasp. "Don't," I snarled. I still hadn't forgiven him. "What's happening?"

"She's having a vision."

"She can summon them at will? Like, if I pay her?"

"No. Her subjects trigger a vision of what will be, what could be... if you took the right course of action."

"You know a lot."

Willow snorted and glanced around. "I've come a lot."

I was about to ask why when Enid suddenly sat up. Her eyes were completely white, as white as her hair, and blank, so bright that they seemed to illuminate her surroundings. She started talking very fast, in the language of the souls, so fast that I couldn't decipher it.