The Familiars of the Lost Witch (ONC 2024)

23. Teen

"What do you want?", one of the villagers asked them in an unfriendly tone. He eyed them distrustfully, backed up by other villagers.

"We want to help", Cybele answered in a soft voice. Merletta, Astoria, Lunette and he were standing behind her. Asha and Kyrell were there too.

"Help, you? You were the ones that cursed us to begin with!", a man exclaimed, spitting in front of them.

He had already suspected them to believe that and be wary of them, but at least they didn't attack them right away without asking questions. That gave him hope that they could still reason with them.

"There was no curse to begin with." He stepped up and took his place next to Cybele. "You were lied to, the witches have nothing to do with the illness, but they can help you."

He didn't know if they would believe him, but he hoped. "Let them heal your animals, you have nothing left to loose, right? If they go untreated, they die and if our treatment doesn't work, it will end the same."

"How should we know that you don't just remove the curse you put on them?", a woman countered.

He felt Cybele's warm hand on his shoulder, giving him courage. "Then let me do the treatment. I'm not a witch, so I can't curse someone or remove a curse."

The villagers began to mumble amongst themselves. He didn't know if he had convinced them yet, at least they didn't protest right away.

Then he saw the smith walking through the crowd and up to him. "I believe them and the boy's right, we have nothing to loose. Our animals die either way and if there is a chance to cure them, we should take it. Who agrees?"

"Me!", the little boy, the smith's son, shouted loudly. "Please cure my dog", he pleaded with tears in his eyes. "I don't want him to die!"

After a few heartbeats the villagers seemed to have made a decision. The one that had first spoken, said: "The smith agreed with it, so you treat his dog first. If you succeed, we believe you, but if the dog dies, you will never come to this village again."

Cybele took the word again. "But what if the dog is in such critical condition that we can't treat it anymore, but we could still treat other animals?"

The man just shrugged, before saying coldly: "Then hope that he'll make it."

The villagers didn't let all of them in the village, only the boy and Merletta were allowed to follow the little boy and the smith. Asha and Kyrell followed them too, but unnoticed to make sure that nothing happened to them.

As they arrived and entered the room he had talked with the smith before, he saw a brown dog lying on a blanket on the floor. It was breathing heavily.

The little boy immediately knelt down next to the dog. "Can you help him? Oh please, help him." A tear was rolling down his little cheek, he must love the dog very much.

"We'll try, we'll do our best, I promise", Merletta tried to sooth him.

They unpacked everything they had taken along to examine the dog and the medicine Dhana had prepared. The symptoms were exactly the same as the cats.

"Since when does he have trouble breathing?", Merletta asked calmly.

The little boy stroked the side of his pet while answering. "Since this morning. Yesterday was still everything okay."

That was good. It was just a little past midday now. The chances of the cure working were very high. But he didn't only hope for that because he saw it as a means to their goal, but he really didn't want to little boy to lose his companion. For a moment the pictured Asha and Kyrell in death's grip instead and he swallowed hard.