Love and Other Poisons Read online

  “Yes, master.”

  Oshar glanced up at the tower, squinting. But there were no winged demons coming out of it.

  There were no demons in the morning either. Or the day after that. On the third day they spotted the witch heading out of the tower, but she had only gone to the nearby well and carried a heavy bucket away.

  Aikir sharpened his sword and waited. Nothing happened. Winter might be near, but there was still some food to be had in the surrounding forest. It was sufficient, but Oshar still complained. The squire would have been happier if they had gone inside the castle to sleep at nights. Aikir would not allow it.

  “She’ll have her minions waiting to trap us in there,” Aikir told Oshar.

  “But I’ve seen no minions,” Oshar replied. “Why aren’t there any dark knights or headless warriors roaming this place?”

  Aikir did not provide Oshar with an answer. He did not have one. Aikir could not understand why the witch had left them alone. She had not tried to kill them. No evil ghosts attempted to strangle them during the night.

  For years armies, solitary heroes and wizards braved their way in to the witch’s lair. They were all defeated and spoke about Vyro-Shana, her cruelty, and how she kept men’s souls in glass jars.

  Yet the witch did none of this. She ignored them.

  Then snow began falling and the witch did summon him. But not for the reason Aikir had expected.

  Aikir felt terribly uncomfortable when he sat in front of her and she offered him some wine. He’d come ready to slay monsters.

  “You should take refuge in the castle. Winter is bad in this place. You’ll freeze to death if you remain outside. Your boy is also looking scrawnier by the day. We’ll see about the food. My provisions are not bountiful. It was a meager year,” she explained.

  “We don’t need your assistance.”

  “I won’t poison the food,” she said, and then she smirked as she glanced at his untouched glass, “or the wine.”

  “I don’t think I should trust a witch.”

  “If I wanted you dead, wouldn’t I have killed you by now? A whispered curse, a simple potion. It is not difficult.”

  “Why haven’t you tried?”

  Vyro-Shana stood and walked to the nearest window. She rubbed her hands together as she looked outside.

  “Why are you still here?”

  “Answering a question with a question is no answer at all.”

  “Indulge me.”

  “I came to fight you. I came to rid the world of your evil witchcraft. I will not leave until that is done,” he said simply. “I must challenge you and I must win.”

  “You heroes,” she said dismissively. “You should get your squire and leave. Once winter is truly upon us you will not be able to go. The roads will be unmanageable.”

  “It is very simple. Surrender, and I shall escort you as my prisoner to the king’s court where he shall judge you fairly. Or if not, face me in combat. Fight me. Unleash your demons against me so that I may defeat your dark powers.”

  “I think I’d rather remain in my tower.”

  “Then I shall remain, too.”

  Oshar cleaned most of the cobwebs and chased away the spiders that made their home in a little room with a view of the witch’s tower.

  Aikir had Oshar dress him in his battered armor every morning and patrolled the garden. In the evening he walked the steps up to the witch’s antechamber and issued his challenge. Every night she turned him away. A routine had developed.

  For Oshar, another routine had also been born. Oshar helped the witch with some little tasks, carrying water up the tower as though he was her page and not Aikir’s squire. Aikir tried to dissuade him from this. However, the boy was stubborn.

  “Do you want to hear a story about real monsters?” the witch said as she walked through the castle, Aikir’s squire at her heels. “It happened in this very place, in this very castle.”

  “Are there knights in it?”

  “No, but there is magic.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. There was a wizard with a heart as black as coal. One night the wizard kidnapped a girl from a nearby village and took her to that very tower where he kept her caged. He planned to eat the girl once he fattened her up properly. But when he tried to behead the girl, she flung herself out the window and became a bird.”

  “That is a sad story,” Oshar said.

  “Oshar,” Aikir said, emerging from the shadows where he had been watching them. “Make yourself useful and go heat some bath water.”

  “Yes, master,” mumbled the boy, running away.

  Once they were alone, Aikir turned towards the witch.

  “Demoiselle, he should be doing his chores, not listening to nonsense.”

  It was not the first time he had caught her telling the boy stories. There was nothing wrong in the stories. They were little tales in which children got lost in the woods and met forest elves or princesses wore dresses of spun gold. But Aikir always felt incredibly uncomfortable when he heard them talking eagerly about such things.

  “It is not nonsense,” she countered. “Besides, he’s only a boy.”

  “He’s thirteen. Nearly a man.”

  “I remember when I was thirteen my older sister told me the same stories, and I used to pretend I was a princess.”

  “Your sister?”

  She ignored his question and headed down a narrow hallway.

  He had never thought her anything but a witch in the high tower.

  Heroes are trained to deal with manticores and dragons. But she was not a mythical beast, and Aikir was left staring at the wall at nights. While the boy slept soundly, he paid attention to the noises that filled the castle. He kept his eyes open for a growl, a hiss, the footsteps of some horrid monster. He wished for it. Sometimes he hoped for the lighter steps of a woman, the rustle of a gown, her long fingers falling over his shoulder.

  Nothing happened. The days faded away and as much as Aikir tried to remind himself why he had come to this place, he could no longer remember why he should remain.

  Though Aikir did not say a word to Oshar, the boy must have suspected something was amiss.

  “Aikir, you should ask her to give you a potion to make you sleep. She gave me an amulet and it keeps the ghosts away. I’m sure a sleeping potion is much easier than an amulet.”

  “She gave you what?” asked Aikir, more upset at the boy’s use of his first name than the actual offense of accepting a gift from a witch.

  “I was afraid of the ghosts,” mumbled Oshir.

  “Afraid of ghosts,” Aikir said. “You expect to be a knight like that? You are a man. Keep your sword handy, and it won’t matter if it’s a ghost or a dragon.”

  “Yes, but what if …”

  “What if, what if. Get me my sword and let’s have some fencing. You are getting lazy from sitting around all day.”

  Oshir skulked and nodded.

  One night, Aikir entered the antechamber at the appointed time. She was at the window.

  “Destroyer of empires, killer of kings. I am …,” he began.

  “Come, look,” she said, interrupting him.

  He looked outside. The moon was full. Snow blanketed the trees. It was all a glimmering, blinding white.

  “It’s beautiful,” she whispered.

  Under the light of the moon she was beautiful, too. He found it more disturbing than any demons she might have conjured. Aikir glanced away, staring instead at a worn tapestry which depicted the hunt for a unicorn.

  “Winter is the best season. No one comes near the castle. It’s all very lonely and very lovely.”

  “I cannot understand how anyone can live in this place willingly.”

  “I cannot understand how you can live out there,” she said. “Going around, chopping ogres heads and saving blushing maidens.”

  “There are scarce few ogres and even less blushing maidens. It’s mostly bandits, outlaws, and their ilk.”

  “That�
��s why it’s better here,” she said. “No bandits.”

  “But some ghosts,” he jested.

  “Ghosts?”

  “Oshar swears the castle is haunted.”

  “It’s only memories,” she said.

  Aikir was unable to stomach the situation any longer. In the end he did exactly what Oshir had suggested. He decided to ask for a potion.

  It was late, and Aikir grumbled all the way, but he made it to Vyro-Shana’s antechamber. He knocked. There was no answer.

  After much muttering to himself, Aikir finally eased his way in. The witch was not sitting in her chair, but the door to her room lay open. He knocked again.

  Aikir had never been inside her room, so when he took a hesitant step into the woman’s private chamber he could not help but look around in wonder.

  The castle was damp and unkempt, but Vyro-Shana’s room stood in sharp contrast to the rest of her surroundings. There were embroidered pillows, a tall mirror, a large chest, a table with some fine glasses upon it. The tapestries here were untouched by time. The ceiling, he realized when he glanced up, was painted with a thousand tiny stars. A curtain half-hid an ebony bed.

  “Demoiselle?” he said.

  He had not thought she slept. Yet this witch did sleep, face buried into the pillow while her hawk kept guard over her in its cage.

  He observed her for no more than a few seconds before she bolted upright, awake and alarmed. Then she recognized him and she smiled pleasantly.

  “Aikir,” she said.

  Her chamber had grown confining. The hawk stared at him. Aikir said a hasty goodnight, retreating back towards the room he shared with his squire.

  It was Oshar who was ordered to deliver the challenge on behalf of his master from then on.

  One day, sitting in the kitchen while Oshar went to fetch firewood, Aikir chopped turnips.

  The rustle of a gown made him look up. Vyro-Shana was standing at the door.

  “My lady,” he muttered.

  “I was looking for Oshar.”

  Aikir fixed his eyes on the potato he had been peeling.

  “He’s in the forest. I think it is best you head to the tower. It may be some time before he returns.”

  She was quiet, her hands smoothing the fabric of her blue dress.

  “Why do you avoid me?”

  The question was too direct. Aikir frowned, carefully setting aside the knife.

  “We have been playing a game that has gone on far too long. I came here to challenge you, but you do not accept my challenges. Instead you force me to run around in circles.”

  “I force you? I thought you would have left ages ago.”

  “I swore you would surrender to me or I would defeat you in honorable combat.”

  “Oh, such stupidity. Do you know how utterly ridiculous you sound every time you issue one of your silly challenges? Do you know how silly you look in that old armor of yours? Honorable combat. You are a blind fool.”

  Vyro-Shana rushed out of the kitchen. Aikir tossed the potato away and hurried after her.

  “Demoiselle,” he said.

  “Go,” she said without stopping to look at him. “You are right. It’s been far too long. The whole story is unraveling.”

  “What are you talking about? What story?”

  “Your story. They all come for a story and I give it to them. They say they came and met a powerful witch and it makes them happy. But you stay and it’s destroying it all. Stupid man, do you really think I am a witch?”

  They were both quiet. She was looking at the floor and he looked at her.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  These were the right words. He had spoken to her every day, but he had never spoken the right words until now.

  “I’m just someone who walked into a story.”

  “What was the story?” he asked, edging closer to her.

  She avoided his gaze.

  “You’re ruining it,” she said.

  “Tell me,” he said using the voice he had not used in a very long time. A hero’s imperious tone.

  “I … There is a girl running and she needs a place to hide. So she arrives at a ruined fortress and walks up to a room, high atop a tower. There is a witch inside and she is dying. The girl … she has nowhere to go, so she sits next to the old witch. One day the witch’s heart simply stops. Now the girl is alone. She’s all alone in the castle and it’s good because she’s been running for so long. She can rest.

  “But then people from the nearby villages come. They leave food and offerings for the old witch. The girl, she … she does not think there’s anything wrong in taking some of these things.

  “One day a man arrives and starts screaming in the courtyard. He’s a knight. Others come, too. They come and yell and hold their swords up. Heroes. Only they aren’t really heroes. You should see them run. Very few actually make it into the tower.

  “That’s the story.”

  The woman chuckled, brushing her hair away from her face.

  “They left very quickly, and didn’t bother me. But you remained … and now there is no witch and you’ve ruined it.”

  “Then the warriors and the wizards that journeyed here, they lied?”

  “They saw what they wanted to see. Everyone sees what they want to see.”

  “Master, the horses are ready.”

  Oshar was still tucking a couple of things away. An apple rolled to the floor and the boy grabbed it, dusting it off. Aikir pushed his chair from the table and grabbed his heavy coat.

  He climbed the familiar steps and walked across the empty antechamber to the small room where he knew he’d find her. She was admiring herself in front of a clouded mirror.

  “We leave soon.”

  “Good,” she said.

  She had picked a necklace from a wooden box. It sparkled against her skin, though it was only colored glass.

  “You lied to me,” Aikir said.

  “I did not.”

  “Then half-truths. Either way I believed you were something you are not.”

  “It is not my fault.”

  “If I had known … I should have gone at once. There was no need for me to remain.”

  “Well, you’ll be gone now, won’t you? There’s many ogres to trap and maidens to rescue.”

  “I’ve never seen an ogre. I’ve never seen anything magical at all. But I thought you were real. I did think so.”

  She turned towards Aikir and bowed her head very slightly.

  “You should go. Your story awaits you,” she said.

  His story, now that he thought about it, seemed so flimsy in the daylight. Nothing but some boy’s silly fancy.

  “Pray tell what happens if the story goes amiss?” he said, carefully circling her. “If all of a sudden the witch should leave the tower?”

  “It does not happen like that.”

  She slid away, towards the hawk in its pretty cage, and looked at the bird instead of him.

  “You don’t understand. She’s under a spell,” she whispered.

  “No,” he shook his head. “Not a spell. At least, not that kind of spell.”

  In a chamber of make-believe, with painted stars and unicorns dancing on the walls, a man and a woman looked at each other.

  Springtime was barely in the air, but some flowers had begun to sprout stubbornly from within the hardened soil. A young knight in a crimson cape looked around the pathway he was following and tried to make sense of the map he held between his hands.

  When he heard someone approaching he quickly stopped his musings, a hand falling on the hilt of his sword.

  But it was not an enemy heading the knight’s way. A boy rode a rather ugly looking horse while a man and a woman walked on foot, pulling behind them a tired mare.

  “You there,” he said.

  The man stopped. The plain, worn outfit he wore and the sword he carried seemed the mark of some wandering mercenary looking for employment. It was not an uncommon sight, and the man with hi
s family in tow held no menace in his eyes as he greeted the knight.

  “I am looking for the castle of the mighty witch Vyro-Shana.”

  “Then you are going in the right direction,” the man said. “Although you won’t find much there. I think the witch is gone.”

  “Gone? Gone where?”

  “They say she turned into a bird and flew away,” the woman said, brushing a strand of hair from her face.

  “Really?” asked the knight, surprised.

  “Well, that’s what they say,” the man replied, tugging at his horse.

  The trio kept walking down the pathway until they disappeared from view and the knight, dumbfounded, stood frozen, wondering what to do next.

  He left, crates filled with earth, bound for England. Left us behind, promising to send for us. We believed him. But as the days went by, I realized he’d lied.

  Live forever. Love forever.

  Anca and Ioana looked to me for guidance, as they always did. Technically, they were older than me. I was the last one to be brought to the castle. Mentally, they were younger. Frozen in their teenage years, letting me mother them and lead. I’d had five sisters and watched over them. Authority came naturally.

  My sisters and I had shared a single, cramped room. Some days, when I was tired of doing the washing and watching over the others — our mother died birthing the youngest child, our father was a strict man who filled my days with endless household tasks — I’d look out the window, towards the distant silhouette of the castle. It had no name. We simply called it “the castle.” High upon a cliff, edging towards the sky, while we lived beneath its shadow. I pictured myself going up its hundreds of steps, rushing through the hallways and dancing in rooms decorated with rich tapestries.

  When he swooped from the towers, a piece of night detaching from the sky, why would I resist?

  I had five sisters, but disease took them from us. Tiny little graves marked their passing, though I did not recall their precise location afterwards.

  My father and I sat alone at the table. He was quiet, staring at a distant point.

  We were already half-dead. The air stank, everyone rotting and melting away. So why not live forever?