Collection of One-Shots

》black magic

The night was dark. Trees whispered to one another in the wind, a full moon's light was shrouded by thin, blackish clouds. The flicker of flames from the camp's fire could hardly be seen any longer for the thick underbrush and low lying branches. Something pale and flittering caught the man's eye and with sword drawn he ventured further into the bowels of the wood.

It passed before him again, fleeting and terrible. Around the hilt of the sword, his knuckles were white. There was only him, standing alone in the dark. His heavy breaths condensed in the cold air as soon as they left cracked and parted lips. A branch snapped underfoot and out of impulse, he swung the blade, cutting through nothing before he could realize it was his own heavy footfalls that had made the sound.

Feminine laughter surrounded him. Out of the corner of his eyes, he could see a pale figure, disappearing and reappearing with shining silver hair. Unease seized him and would not let go. "Show yourself, witch!" He shouted. The accursed forest swallowed his voice, though. She appeared before him without a sound and no sign of shock at the steel that bit into her neck. Delicate and smooth hands gripped onto the two-sided blade, but there was no blood, no indication of pain. "Who are you?" He breathed.

"A god-fearing person like yourself," her voice was nothing less than self-effacing. The witch released his sword and stepped back, holding her hands up to reveal palms that had gone unscathed. "Only we do not share the same God." She circled around him, noticing his careless lack of proper armor and how his scabbard belt was sloppily tied off. He followed her gaze and could not help but be drawn to the diaphanous shift that laid beneath a rugged cloak. "Did you expect me to be something else?" He could not meet her icy stare for fear that he would be cursed.

"This village, how?" It had been the reason that he had been sent away, to discover how they had endured without sickness, and to see for himself if there was indeed a necromancer.

She stood calm and unmoving, knowing what he meant by the partial question, "I have done nothing for or to these people. What keeps them from the plague is isolation, yet they no longer have that on their side. You and your men are the harbingers of death." She swayed in the wind and looked over her unexpected guest. In the poor light it was hard to tell if his hair was brown or blond, a mixture of both maybe, the scruff on his face undoubtedly matching. Age had begun to take its toll on his face, but it was not enough to make him horrid to look upon.

"They are heathens," he gritted out.

Indifference surrounded her, she had little care for those villages, especially the woman who had grasped control, pretending to be a witch when in truth she was only a mediocre herbalist. "Perhaps. Their remedies can keep infections at bay and heal cuts in good time, but they do not know the workings of the supernatural or divine, nor are they agents of those powers."

"But you are," he concluded.

She spun about and the gossamer material of the ragged gown followed her movements, "Yes, but I cannot control death or disease. I am only a humble servant."

He raised his sword and pressed the point into the skin above where her heart lay, if she had one. "Will you kill me?" She asked, the impish nature of her voice was absurd. She stepped toward him and drove the point of the blade further into her skin. "Burn me at the stake? Tie stones around my feet and cast me into the water?" A single drop of blackish blood welled up and streaked down her breast.

"Why did you lure me out here?" The man spat brusquely. There was no gentleness in his voice, only brute force, and anger.

The witch laughed and knocked away his sword, "I did not lure you out here. It was your own will and desire that led you to search for me."