Fallen

Chapter 5: The Witch of Wolfmarsh

“Sylas.”

The prince rounded. Crwys stood in the boat, motioning to him. He marched toward her and pushed the boat into the water, hopping inside once afloat. She began to row and hummed a tune. Sylas stared at the far shore, trying to remember what had been so important a moment ago. He peered over the edge of the boat. At first the water seemed placid, save for the ripples as the boat keeled evenly over it. An urge to touch the silver liquid overcame him and he trailed a finger in the water. Voices began to moan in a haunting tune and human faces rose to the surface. They reached for him. The boat rocked as Crwys grabbed him away. “Careful!”

Sylas crab-walked to the center of the boat, wide eyed. The hackles of his neck stood on end. His skin prickled.

Crwys chuckled. “Should have warned you. They like company.”

He looked at her, unable to form the words in his mind.

“You want to know who or what they are. They are the souls of those who have passed without attaining their life’s goal. And now they are trapped. They are misery. Misery loves company.”

Sylas dared peer into the water again. At first he saw his reflection, but the water became like glass and the faces appeared. Men and women of all ages and walks of life, pale as salt, with eyes full of yearning. All of them reaching desperately for Sylas, but unable to break the water’s surface. He shuddered and leaned back on the bough. Crwys stopped rowing. The boat glided over the water a moment longer until it came to the center of the lake. The crone rose carefully and steadied herself. Her hand stretched forth over the water, and it began to bubble. Slowly a golden orb, roughly the side of a large man’s head, rose. Light glinted off its spherical edge. Sylas leaned forward, fascinated. The orb throbbed with its own pulse. Sylas could almost feel it.

Crwys remained with her hand reaching toward it. “I am the queen of this world between worlds, but I am lonely.” There was a sadness to her voice. Her fingers writhed and the ball began turning. White light glowed around it, snapping with static. She glanced over her shoulder and reached for Sylas. “Give me your hand.”

Sylas crawled toward her and crouched nervously by her side. He reached up to her. The orb spun faster and faster. Now that he was closer, he could see it was engraved with runic markings. A shock of blue lightning twisted forth from Crwys’s outstretched hand and connected with the sphere. Beads of sweat dotted Sylas’s temples.

Crwys spoke in a trance. “I control the balance between the worlds,”

She worked in silence now. Her eyes glazed over pure white, transfixed in a far-seeing gaze that penetrated the veil between the living and the dead. She willed her energy into the golden sphere, and while it turned in the Unliving World, it did her bidding in the Living one. The orb helped her maintain order between the two worlds. Those adventurous enough to seek the orb met an untimely end. Those who sought it out paid with their life force, a red energy that flowed through all mankind. Whether it be passion, malice, or greed, the orb drew it out. Often it attracted the rest of the soul’s energy as well, for what is a man without passion? When the two energies connected on the sphere, they filled in the incantations of the life cycle. Crwys’s lips moved without speaking, chanting in silence the arcane language. She knew little else in her life. While she wandered between the worlds freely, her existence was lonely, her duty inescapable. Bound to the orb like a spinner to the wheel. It lulled her into a trance with no reprieve. No hope of a successor. No opportunity to befriend or love. She had to harden her heart to the thought of it. Until Sylas had offered himself to her. And for a brief moment, her mind strayed to him. She couldn’t help it. He was young, but she saw potential. And there was something about him that drew her to him. Something about his eyes, or the way the sun had kissed his skin, had blessed his fire-red hair. Her grip tightened on his hand, and that strange surge of energy she had felt at Killeagh renewed.