Page 19 of Beyond the Cottage (After the Fairytale #1)

Chapter 19

W hy is magic so damn itchy? Gretta scratched under the bracelet for the hundredth time.

She sat in Ansel’s canoe as it sliced through lily pads and glowing algae. They’d been traveling for an hour, heading deep into the swamp, and the space between the luminescent plants barely accommodated the boat.

The canopy only let in speckles of sunlight, but the swamp’s pale green glow lit their way. Humidity hung in the air like fog, smelling both rotten and green, and insects shrieked from every direction. The canoe occasionally passed alligators basking on patches of land, and shimmery snakes hung from trees.

Gretta breathed through her mouth and kept her arms wrapped around her body. The creepy environment wasn’t helping her nerves. Despite the pep talk she’d given herself before they left, she grew more unsettled the deeper they went.

She wasn’t used to confronting her quarry via the front door, especially while unable to protect herself. Once again, Ansel would be the only thing standing between Gretta and a witch.

She’d considered bringing up her concerns but didn’t want to talk to him after what happened that morning. He didn’t remember any of it, she was sure of that, but she feared jinxing it.

Bored with staring at plants, Gretta relented. “Tell me how you met her.”

“Isobel?”

“Yes. I can’t wrap my head around it.”

He switched his oar to the other side of the canoe as they made a turn. “Like I said, she helped me. Saved my life, actually.”

“How?”

“Before I started the dust farm, I was less careful about who I did business with. When a deal with some people went bad, they left me for dead in the swamp. Isobel found me and brought me to her cabin.”

Gretta shelved questions about his shady past for the time being. “What did she do to you?”

“Patched me up, kept an eye on my injuries. Gave me someplace safe to rest for a couple weeks.”

“You can’t possibly be that naive.” If he spent weeks semi-conscious in a witch’s house, she either fucked him or fed off him.

“I understand why you find that hard to believe, but Isobel is nothing like the Eater.”

“I thought you were intelligent.”

He shrugged. “You’ll see soon enough. We’re here.”

Ansel dug his oar into the muck, and the boat sloshed onto mushy dirt. Gretta didn’t see a house or a structure of any kind, just a crude path made of rotting, slimy wood.

He got out and tied off the boat before offering her his hand. She let him haul her onto land, groaning as her boots squelched in mud. The swamp was no place for quality leather.

Once she hopped onto the spongy boards, Ansel blocked her way. “Gretta… Please try to give her a chance?”

“I’ll treat her with all the respect she deserves.” So not much.

Still, there wasn’t any reason to turn this visit into a scene. Gretta had been surreptitiously drawing a map of their route in her notepad, plotting the approximate distances between landmarks. Eventually, she’d come back on her own.

“Stay close,” he said, leading her up the path. “There are worse things than reptiles this deep in the swamp.”

They climbed the slight incline side by side. As they got to higher ground, singing drifted toward them, feminine and hauntingly beautiful.

Gretta stopped and clutched Ansel’s arm.

He looked at her with concern. “Her voice holds no power.”

Gretta didn’t feel magic’s sickening pull, but her feet wouldn’t move. She’d been to so many witch hovels, had seen more atrocities than she wanted to remember, but hearing one sing after fourteen years turned the air in her lungs to concrete.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

She turned her back on him, hiding her eyes. Their stinging made her want to claw them out. There was always a pang of fear when she reached the confrontation stage of a hunt, but this was something else. She felt out of depth. Vulnerable. Not only from the bracelet, but from reliving it all. Another cottage, another witch she couldn’t fight. Ansel himself. One stupid song, and she was reduced to a frightened, sniveling child again.

“Gretta, you can do this.”

“What if I can’t?” She detested the crack in her voice.

“You can. But if you don’t want to, we’ll go.”

Inhaling shakily, she dug the heel of her hand into her chest.

Did she want to go? This was the closest she’d come to achieving her goal, and it wasn’t just about her, it was about Nat. Would she throw away his best chance of recovery over her deep-seated, childhood bullshit? Was she that big a baby ?

Apparently so, because her legs still refused to move.

Ansel came around to face her. “You know I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”

“How can you expect me to believe that?”

“Gretta, listen to me. I’m not asking you to trust my sense of morality or my character as a man, but be honest with yourself and recognize that I will never put you in danger again. I would give my life to protect you.”

She’d rather not examine what his words did to her stomach. She couldn’t handle his intensity, especially after that morning, so she stared at a squirrel jumping between branches.

Ansel sighed. “Ultimately, that doesn’t matter because I know you.”

“I suppose you think I’ll slink back to the boat just to thwart you.”

“Quite the opposite. I think no matter what I say, you’re going to walk up this path because you’re brave and stubborn as fuck.”

Well, damned if she did and damned if she didn’t. If she pressed on, she’d prove him right. If she turned back, she’d disappoint herself.

Either way, she wasn’t a child anymore. May as well make the choice that preserved her self-respect.

“Fine.” She took a deep breath and literally faced the music. “I’m okay. Let’s meet the broad.”

Gretta continued up the path, concentrating on the birds and bugs chirping, rather than the song. Ansel followed close behind.

After a short hike, the canopy opened, flooding a clearing with hazy sunshine. A ramshackle cabin sat in the center with two trees abutting it, almost growing out of the walls. Smoke curled from the chimney, and a tidy garden took up the side yard.

It looked quaint, charming even. But then, so had the cottage.

When they reached the cabin, they climbed the weathered porch steps, and Ansel reached over Gretta’s shoulder to knock.

The singing stopped. A chain lock jangled, the door creaked open, and a pair of green eyes peered out. They landed on Ansel, and the door flew open, revealing a grinning crone.

She was ninety if she was a day. Her hair, more silver than copper, lay piled in a nest of brittle curls with wisps framing her creped face. Gnarled hands dried themselves on the dish towel draped over her shoulder as she jauntily trotted onto the porch.

“Ansel, love! What a marvelous surprise.” The witch’s fragile-looking fingers laced with his, giving them an aggressive squeeze.

By sight alone, Gretta would have expected her voice to be sandpaper and whiskey, but it tinkled as prettily as her song. Though she didn’t seem hostile yet, Gretta immediately sensed something off about her.

The oddest thing was how little magic she emitted. It was barely a flicker, too small to determine her caste. The bracelet gave off more energy.

Was she damaged somehow? Mystically bound?

Ansel dropped a kiss on the witch’s crinkled cheek. “Hi, Izz. Did you fare well through the storm?”

“Eh, not bad. Lost a bit of my roof but nothing like last time.” The witch let go of Ansel and turned her shrewd eyes on Gretta. “And who’s this little nibble of shortbread? My, she’s a pretty thing.”

Gretta’s fists began to ball. The bracelet hummed, forcing her hands to relax. “Ansel, you didn’t tell me she was senile. Will she even be of use to me?”

He gave her a look, and the witch cackled.

“Isobel,” he said, “this is Gretta. She’s come to ask you some questions.”

The witch’s eyes darted to him. Her amusement vanished. “… Your Gretta?”

He nodded.

Isobel clutched her chest, and her faded green eyes grew filmy. “Oh, Ansel, honey.” She beamed at him, covering her mouth as though she didn’t know what to say.

Great. The old bag’s bit was sentimentality.

Without warning, Isobel approached Gretta and took her hands. Gretta gasped. She yanked her hands away, stumbling into Ansel. He steadied her with an arm around the waist as she drove him backward down the porch steps.

“Don’t touch me!” she screamed at the witch.

Still holding her, Ansel spun, using his body as a shield.

Gretta’s throat constricted. She started panting. The air was too thick, and it wouldn’t reach her lungs. She coughed and choked at the same time.

“Breathe,” Ansel said at her ear. “In and out, slow. Remember what we used to do?”

Hunched over his arm gasping, she clumsily nodded and started counting backward. She vaguely registered Ansel fumbling at her wrist, then the bracelet sailed into the yard. His thumb rubbed firm circles on her scarred inner forearm.

A million years passed. Gretta breathed in and out, slow. When she finished counting, the spots in her vision had receded and the air had gone back to normal.

She straightened, hitting his chest with her back.

“We have to go, Izz,” he said over his shoulder. “I’ll try to come back tomorrow.”

“No,” Gretta croaked. “I can’t leave yet.” Her heartbeat remained quick, but her head had cleared. She broke from his grasp and faced him on reasonably steady legs.

“Forget it,” he said. “This was a shit idea, I shouldn’t have pushed you.”

“I want to be here, I just… I guess I didn’t expect my reaction. I haven’t been touched by one of them since the Eater.”

He moved closer. “Your reaction is fucking fine, but there’s no way in hell I’m putting you through that again.”

Gretta covered her forehead with a palm. As her chest loosened further, humiliation seeped in. Hyperventilating in a witch’s front yard wasn’t her finest moment.

“I look like an idiot,” she said.

“You don’t, I’m the idiot. I forgot I’ve had more time to process being familiar with one of them.”

“Okay, but I don’t want to go yet. Seriously, I’m better now.”

His jaw worked. He put two fingers against the pulse in her neck and tipped her chin up to study her pupils. Appearing satisfied with what he saw, he let her go and pensively looked at the cabin.

“Ansel, I’m sure about this. You have no idea how hard I worked to get here.”

“I don’t know if it’s a good idea. For you or Isobel. I’m not putting the bracelet back on you, which means—”

“I won’t harm her. I just want to ask questions.”

His indecision grated, but she supposed she couldn’t blame him. Maybe she shouldn’t have mentioned her profession?

“Listen,” she said. “I get it. But if I’m going to trust the things you said before, you have to trust me, too. If nothing else, believe I wouldn’t want to deal with you after I assaulted your friend.”

He snorted. To drive the point home, Gretta sent a half-hearted wave to Isobel, who fretfully watched from the porch.

“Okay,” he said. “I’m going to trust you.”

“Lovely.” Gretta straightened her ponytail and marched to the cabin. Her emotional breakdown must have worked something out of her system because she felt much pluckier than before.

As Gretta climbed the stairs with Ansel at her heels, Isobel’s knobby hand flattened on her heart. “Is everything alright, honey?”

“Fine,” Gretta said.

“Give her space, Izz. She’s mistrustful of your kind.”

Isobel’s eyes briefly closed. “Yes, of course . I’m a thoughtless old fool, forgive me. I can’t imagine what business you have with me, Gretta, but you can ask any questions you like. Please, won’t you both come inside?” She held the door open, giving them a wide berth.

Still embarrassed and bristling at their concern, Gretta lifted her chin and entered the cabin.