The Dark Witch's Insignia

Chapter 25

<< FON CARLSON >>

It is the perfect night to start their travel to the North. There is a gentle breeze in the air and enough moonlight to light their way.

Fon, Madame Rose, and her two guards are preparing the carriage when suddenly, Fon feels it. Something changed in the air. It is a chill that has nothing to do with the night air. It is too subtle that she almost didn't notice it.

"Something dark happened," Fon informs Madame Rose.

She frowns at her, her face tense and drawn. "What do you mean?"

"Give me a few minutes. I need to check this out."

Fon is about to return inside the Academy Halls when Madame Rose groans, "I hope this is not your strategy to delay our departure any further!"

Fon ignores her. Instead, she quickly walks back to the Academy rooms. This is one of the rare times that her heart is pounding. It's hard to pinpoint, but she knows that the darkness is there. Something is wrong. Very wrong.

When she reaches the infirmary, she finds it in chaos. Students are either running, shouting, crying, or petrified. Fon presses herself against the walls as she watches the crowd.

Annoyed, she catches the arm of one passerby. He looks at her, frightened, but not at her. In a whisper, the male student whispers, "Prim."

Fon frowns at the same time that she lets him go. This time, she strengthened her magick and let it trickle out of her so students would make way for her.

She walks towards the door of the infirmary. Her steps pound on the marble floor, and the students look at her. Same as the male student that she stopped earlier, they are all scared. This time, she is not the cause.

When Fon enters the infirmary, her breathing stops at realizing what happened.

Prim is dead. She was killed. Murdered in cold blood within the walls of Freya Academy.

Fon's stomach lurches. She looks into the body of Prim on the floor of the infirmary. Her face is pale and still.

Fon never liked Prim and yet, taking her life away is nothing but a pointless act of violence. Her issue with Utente is done. Why is there a need to kill her?

And so, Fon kneels before her, looking for any clues about how she was murdered. Darkness still swirls around her like wisps of air that surround her corpse. Her body is badly broken and bends at unnatural angles. A pool of blood is around her corpse, and a stake protrudes where her heart should be.

"This is terrible," someone sniffs close to her.

'Yes, it is,' she thinks.

It doesn't take long before Fon discovers something. A small shimmering object sits in Prim's hand. It is a silver ball that Fon recognizes as a magick memory. As its name suggests, it stores magick specific to the person who stores the magick in. It can also mimic the magick of that person.

The magic tool is hidden by glamour and will only be seen by the person who the dead bestow it to. Fon quickly retrieves it and hides it inside her coat pocket. She will take a look at it once she is in the North.

Then Alexander pushes himself into the crowd. Fon looks up at his deathly face. It is an uncommon look on his good-natured personality. As if being brought back to reality, he flinches and shoos the apprentices away from the infirmary.

<< PHILOMENA >>

Philomena walks into the library with a heavy heart. The sight of the bloody corpse of Prim hits her like a ton of bricks. Despite Prim's wrong upbringing, she is still a talented witch. She didn't deserve a violent death.