Page 39 of Beyond the Cottage (After the Fairytale #1)

Chapter 39

A s Ansel rushed inside, Gretta opened another grimy window. A sharp breeze tousled her hair and billowed her cloak, cooling the flush on her skin. She faced him, holding back a dopey grin.

“So?” He eyed the witch writhing on the floor. “Did it work?”

“Anse… Your repellent is incredible .”

His mouth slowly spread into a grin. Gretta skirted a pool of blood and threw her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek to his chest. He embraced her back.

The witch groaned, her impressive bosom straining with each breath. Her hands covered the wet gash in her stomach.

Ansel and Gretta released each other and stood over the soon-to-be corpse.

“Watch this,” Gretta said. She crouched beside the witch, out of arm’s reach. “Damn, lady! You reek worse than your hovel. Are you the type who saves their piss in jars?”

The witch snarled. She thrust her hand, blasting Gretta with mystical energy. It barely ruffled her ponytail.

Gretta grinned at Ansel.

Expression thoughtful, he came closer and crouched beside her, hovering his palm above the witch. “I can’t even feel her magic.”

“I know, right? When you’re done with her, I need you to go through her junk. I’m pretty sure we’re looking for a jewelry box.”

Ansel studied the witch, jotting in the notepad he’d borrowed from Gretta. He mostly kept his distance, but he poked her once with his pencil, provoking another magic blast.

He looked down at himself and waved his palm above her. Then jotted some more. When he finished, he snapped the notebook shut and started searching through the junk piled around them.

Gretta sank into a musty armchair and kicked her feet up on an ottoman. She got to interrogate a second witch in one week.

“I hear you’ve been a busy little minx,” she said to the writhing mass on the floor.

“Fuck—” wheeze “—you.” The witch’s labored breathing distorted the words, but her voice was beautiful, musical.

Gretta reached down and ripped a pendant off her neck. “Say that one more time.”

“Fuck you!” The bitch’s real voice would make bullfrogs cringe.

Gretta held the pendant up to the weak sunlight. It was made of clear, hollow glass with yellow vapor swirling inside. When she brought it closer, the vapor brightened, casting a glow on Gretta’s face. A mournful, wordless melody played in her mind.

She put down the necklace and leaned forward. She hadn’t found Heron’s sister in the cottage, and there wasn’t much chance the witch would volunteer intel, but Gretta had to try. “I’m looking for the nereid you snatched. Her name’s Cattail. Blue hair and skin, tall, pretty.”

The witch cracked a smile that became a grimace.

Gretta flashed her knife. “Ring any bells?”

No answer, but she didn’t really need one. Her gut already knew.

She settled her forearms on her thighs, dangling the knife between her knees. “So how does this all work, anyway? Do witches have some kind of overlord, or are you freelance evil?”

“I bow. To no one.”

“Then how did you get like this? Is your species born corrupt?”

Groaning, the witch tried to sit. She collapsed, clutching her stomach.

“Actually,” Gretta said, “let’s start with the basics. Were you born at all?”

“Of course…I was born…you ignorant…sow.”

“Where?”

“Far away.”

The same useless answer Isobel had given. They may not have an overlord, but they’d gotten the same memo.

Gretta flashed her knife again. “If you tell me where you come from, I’ll end your suffering. I hear gut wounds are a bitch.”

The hag’s mouth twisted in a blood-stained sneer.

Gretta sighed. Did the answer really matter? Whether witches came from another country or another planet, they existed. And now they were a disease with preventable symptoms, thanks to Ansel’s repellent.

“Alright, you’re off the hook.” Gretta raised her knife, ready to finish it. Then hesitated. “Real quick—do you have aunties?”

Ansel approached with a gilded box. “Is this for jewelry? It’s locked.”

The witch screeched. She hobbled to her knees and launched at Ansel, grabbing something off a table on her way.

“ Mine !” she screamed, wildly slashing. He got her around the neck, but the momentum crashed him against a bookshelf.

Gretta flew across the room but not in time.

“ Fuck !” Ansel cried. Blood dribbled from his bicep, and a serrated seashell clattered to the floor.

With a vicious snarl, Gretta clutched a handful of gray-white hair, yanking, and sliced her knife across the witch’s throat.

A warm spray, a wet gurgle. The body dropped with a fleshy thud.

“Are you okay?” Gretta panted.

“Fine.” He glanced at his arm. “It’s a scratch.”

“Ansel, I can see muscle!” She stepped over the corpse and took his arm, frantically inspecting the wound. It needed about five stitches.

Though it could have been worse—his throat instead of his arm—guilt churned her guts. She should have ended it when they realized the repellent worked, not hung around for a pointless chat. She’d promised not to be stupid, but she’d almost gotten Ansel killed.

She brushed her fingertips over his arm. “I’m sorry.”

“It looks worse than it feels.”

“I don’t care, we’re taking care of this immediately.” She dragged him to a tattered couch and pushed him to sit. “Take off your shirt.”

He shrugged out of the shirt, once again displaying his bare chest. Too anxious for lechery, Gretta ripped the hem into strips, leaving enough shirt for him to wear back. She doused one in rum from her flask and gently dabbed his wound.

“This is the second time you’ve saved me from a witch,” he said, wiping blood off his face with his shoulder. “I fear my manhood is more damaged than my arm.”

“I’m pretty sure we’ve established there’s nothing wrong with your manhood.” The comment slipped out on its own, but she brazened through with a sheepish smile. “Keep this here.”

He held the cloth in place, and his eyes followed her as she rummaged through the clutter.

When she found a sewing box and matches, she set them beside his thigh and sat. “This is my fault. I should’ve listened when you told me not to fuck around.”

“We were both careless. Considering what we learned today, I’d say it was worth it.”

She gingerly took his bicep, drawing it closer. “You need stitches.” She looked up, chewing her lip. “Will you let me take care of you?”

Ansel’s pulse leapt at the idea of her tending to him. Still, he eyed the sewing box with skepticism. “Have you done this before?”

“Once or twice. Embroidery floss isn’t an ideal suture, but it’ll work for now.”

“Alright,” he sighed.

He settled in to enjoy her fussing but didn’t allow himself to fixate on her comment about his manhood. It was friendly banter. She’d always been fond of teasing. In fact, he’d missed that about her. The evidence that they were truly friends again continued mounting.

Gretta found someplace to wash her hands. She cleaned his wound and residual blood spatter before scorching the needle with a match and soaking the thread in rum.

“Ready?” she asked.

“Ready.”

The needle entered his skin, and Gretta winced harder than he did. “This okay?”

“Fine,” he said tightly. The mending hurt worse than the damage, but he’d had stitches before, and her movements were gentle and efficient. Jaw clenched, he stared at a grimy wall.

“So, the repellent,” she said, clearly trying to distract him. “It’s unbelievable. Nat will be impressed.”

“You think so?”

“For sure. I’m going to set up a meeting for you as soon as we get to the capital.”

Rather than exciting him, it brought a jolt of anxiety. The capital was where their proximity ended.

After the meeting, what kind of friendship would they realistically maintain? She traveled a lot. He didn’t know where he’d be living next week. And she likely had better things to do than squire him about the city.

“When do you think we’ll arrive?” he asked.

“It’s early still. If Lil flies us to the closest station, we should be able to make the afternoon train.”

With a subdued nod, he went silent, and she tied off a final knot.

He twisted to inspect her handiwork. “You did a good job. Thank you.”

“It’ll scar, but not bad.” She tossed her supplies on a table and collected the box he’d dropped in the scuffle. The lock popped off with a flick of her knife, and inside, they found more glass pendants strung on delicate chains.

Gretta held one up, and it bathed them in a yellow glow. A haunting, feminine voice sang in Ansel’s head. She lifted another then another, and each held a different, beautiful voice.

When she lifted a fourth, a masculine groan clanged between Ansel’s ears.

Gretta stuffed that one in her pocket and looped the rest over her palm. “I guess we better check the yard.”

They left the cottage and tromped through untended grass and overgrown blackberry bushes. Out back, they found a fire pit ringed with stones.

A familiar stench carried on the breeze—burnt bones. The hair on Ansel’s arms stood, and Gretta wrapped her arms around her waist.

“I can check it out,” he said. The smell churned up dark memories, threatening to bring the shadows, but she’d already seen enough horror for one day.

“It’s my job,” she said.

“Fuck that. I owe you.”

“We’ll go together?”

He hesitated and nodded, and she slipped her hand into his. As they approached the fire pit, the smell grew stronger.

Gretta closed her eyes. Ansel stared, wide-eyed.

Though the bones in the pit had mostly burned to charcoal, white parts remained. A jawbone with three intact teeth, a half-charred femur. The breeze stirred a clump of scorched hair.

Blue hair.

Ansel kicked a wooden bucket, sending up a puff of ash. The witch had likely used it to dump remains over the cliff.

“This isn’t the worst I’ve seen,” Gretta said quietly.

“Indeed. Eyeballs in jars, was it?” He shook his head. “How do you stand it?”

“I guess I’m desensitized. I don’t know what this says about me, but the stuff before a hunt is worse than the stuff after.”

He turned to her. “I hate your job, Gret. The killing, the atrocities. They’ll leave their mark.”

She squeezed his hand before approaching the cliff, necklaces swinging. She flung the trapped voices into the waves, and Ansel swore a fading harmony drifted on the wind.

“There’s nothing we can do for them now,” Gretta said. “But someday your invention will stop this from happening to other people.”

That day couldn’t come soon enough. The stench reminded Ansel they had a mission, one they couldn’t delay further. Even if it meant the end of their time together.

They finished their lap around the yard and hiked back. Lil and the crane appeared around a bend.

Gretta stumbled to a stop. “My braid! I forgot to collect it.”

“Do you want to go back?”

Gnawing her lip, she checked her pocket watch. “…I guess not. I just can’t believe I forgot.”

A part of Ansel oddly took it as a good sign. Of what, he wasn’t sure.

They reached Lil and relayed the morning’s events. Lil insisted on being the one to tell the others about their friend’s fate, and neither Ansel nor Gretta argued.

A cluster of nereids waited on their bluff, shuffling about like family members outside a sickroom. Heron rushed forward, and Lil stopped him, pulling him aside.

“Did you get her?” Tadpole asked Gretta.

“I got her. And she suffered.”

He clapped her on the shoulder.

Gretta pulled the necklace from her pocket and approached Heron. The man’s anguished eyes made Ansel feel like a prick for his jealousy the night before.

“I’m so sorry about your sister,” she said.

Heron wrote something Ansel couldn’t see. It brought a grim smile to her lips.

“I found this, at least.” She held up the necklace. “I hope it makes you feel a little better.”

Gretta dropped the pendant on the stony ground and smashed it under her heel. Yellow vapor swirled from the broken glass, undulating like a ribbon in a current. It coiled around Heron’s neck, his face, searching. Heron’s lips parted. The vapor reared as though preparing to strike, then dove down his throat.

Heron’s body jerked. He breathed deep, then a quiet groan escaped him.

“My—” he coughed, hand to his throat. “My voice .”

The others let out gasps and cries. They swarmed Heron and Gretta, congratulating him and thanking her, bringing a bright flush to her cheeks.

As Lil hoisted her in a bear hug, Gretta rasped, “ It’s my job .”

“You’re the best, munchkin.”

“You better come back and visit us!” Tadpole said. “Next time, we’ll have a real party.”

River came forward. She kissed Gretta’s cheek, then Ansel’s.

They both smiled, though Ansel thought Gretta’s looked somewhat tepid.

After considering a moment, he produced a bottle from his case and offered it to Lil. “It’s spell repellent. Take it with my compliments.”

Lil gave him his own bear hug, though she didn’t manage to lift him off his feet.

“So, it’s been great,” Gretta said. “But we should probably get our stuff and head out. We have a train to catch.”