Page 3

Chapter 3

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

GERRIT

S tanding before us is a wild-eyed woman barely older than me. She’s beautiful and shouldn’t be out here. It briefly crosses my mind that she could be in trouble and need help, but when my eyes track behind her to the house that looks just like a cake you’d see at a wedding celebration, my steps falter.

I throw my arm across my stepbrother’s chest, halting him from approaching her. His honey-brown eyes meet mine, full of confusion, and I jerk my eyes toward the house. He takes it in with a deep inhale, then turns his gaze on the woman standing a handful of lengths from us.

Her hair is the color of flowers, nearly matching the frosted ones on her home. It’s long, wrapping around her waist, and unruly. She’s wearing a dress that is barely staying on, the curves of her small breasts threatening to spill from the top. She’s slender, breakable, and barefoot. If I didn’t know any better, I would think she’d been lost in the woods for a long time.

“Hello, travelers,” she croons in a voice husky from disuse. She clears her throat awkwardly and hits her fist on her chest twice before speaking again. “Come in, you look weary.” She motions to the house as she takes another step towards us.

My body tenses, ready to defend us if need be. I’ve heard the stories. I know how this is going to end.

She’ll lure us into her home, trap us there, and eat us. If the stories were right about the house, they’re probably right about that part, too.

Hans thought it was stupid to believe, but I knew better. And here’s the sweets house to prove it.

I’d be smug and give him shit if we weren’t in so much danger.

“No fucking way, witch,” I holler towards her. Her thick bottom lip forms a pout, and she rests her fists on those bony hips. The action makes the straps from her dress fall down her arms, and I catch a glimpse of the milky skin of her breasts.

Just a little movement, and I’d be able to see…

“Gerrit,” Hans hisses. I turn to look at him, my eyes catching on the thorned vine he has tattooed on the side of his skull. He never takes his eyes off the witch. “What was that plan you said you had again?”

I cough, and he turns to face me fully. I nearly melt under the strength of his gaze. “Wing it.”

He gapes openly at me. “I’m sorry, I think I had a little bit of a stroke there and thought you said we should wing it. But that can’t be right.”

“I did say wing it. How are we supposed to know how to win her to our side when all we know are the myths told to unruly children,” I say out of the corner of my mouth.

Hans groans, his hand ruffling the longer side of his hair. With a sharp inhale, he steels himself and takes a small step forward. The witch’s eyes light up, and her mouth breaks into a grin that takes up half of her face.

“Witch, what is your name?” Hans calls across the clearing, his voice firm and commanding.

“Briar,” she responds, surprisingly. I didn’t know witches just gave up their names like that. Couldn’t we trick her or trap her with it? Is that a different legend?

Also, Briar is a very human name for a ferocious witch.

“Witch Briar,” Hans begins again.

“Just Briar!” she interrupts.

Hans rubs the skin between his eyebrows. “Briar, my brother and I are here to seek your help.”

Confusion flicks across her face. “You came here on purpose?”

Just before Hans can reply, she stomps her foot. “Well, that just takes all the fun out of it then! Fine, fine, come inside, we’ll chat.” She stalks off towards the house.

We’re frozen for a moment, unsure how to process what just happened.

“Do we go?” I ask, turning towards my brother. He likes to say I have brains in the form of strategy, but this isn’t about strategy. This is about magic. And I am not the one of us blessed with it.

Hans rolls his shoulders back, stretching the linen shirt he wears, it’s collar unlaced and gaping, tight across his rich brown skin. I tend towards more practical clothing, but Hans has always been a bit flashier.

Maybe that will help us today. She is a female witch, after all.

Casting a gaze to Flint, who ducks his big furry head in a nod, Hans turns to me. “We need her help. I think we must go.” He steps forward and winces before bringing his other foot to join him. “Wait, was that…”

I don’t give him a chance to finish what he was going to say because I’m stepping as well, and I feel like I’m pushing through water. When both feet are firmly on the ground again, I look at Hans. “What the fuck was that?”

He kneels and pushes back some branches of a bush, revealing small rocks placed side by side. “That, my dear brother, was a fairy circle.”

The words sound familiar. “What does that mean?”

“It means we’re trapped.”

* * *

I pace outside the steps to the witch’s porch, grumbling. I’m hanging on by a thread, and Hans can tell. He’s leaning against the railing above me, enjoying every bit of my frustration. After learning we were trapped, he decided we needed to embrace it and was ready to waltz into the witch’s home.

So much for being the Brain. He may as well stuff an apple in his mouth and lay out on a silver platter.

“Gerrit,” he implores, “this is what we came here for. We need the witch’s help. We’re stuck here. We may as well talk to her.”

I shake my head, unable to articulate how much panic is rising in my chest. I could never tell my stepbrother about my fear of this witch. Seeing the confectionary house awakened all those stories my mother told me to force me to behave and I can’t get them out of my head. I turn and look at the door, arms crossed firmly over my broad chest.

“Hans, going in there is death. She will eat us.”

“Only if you ask me to!” comes the witch’s voice from inside the home.

Hans chokes out a laugh.

“That is not fucking funny,” I grumble.

He steps off the porch to stand beside me, resting his hands on my shoulders. “Gerrit, we have to go in. If she were going to kill us, she probably already would have.”

“I would’ve!”

I groan again. Not only do we have a people-eating witch on our hands, but she thinks she’s funny, too.

“We’re coming in!” Hans shouts, moving behind me to push against my lower back. I walk up the steps like I’m swimming through molasses, my brain revolting against my body’s motions. Still, I make it to the door, and it creeps open slowly in front of me.

Up close, the witch is prettier than I expected. Her eyes are the color of rust, with heavy lids that make her look seconds away from falling asleep. Her lips are pouty and soft, and I briefly wonder what capturing them between my teeth would feel like.

She tracks my line of sight and licks her lips, giving me a glimpse of two very sharp teeth hiding in her mouth. My stomach drops with fear, and I attempt to flee back down the stairs. Hans catches me and pushes me through the doorway.

He’s strong for a little guy.

Well, not little in the everyday use of the word, but compared to me.

The witch steps to the side and crosses to a table, where she sits expectantly. “Sit, sit.” She flaps her hands at the other chairs. “You said you had a favor you needed from me?”

“Well, we didn’t quite say that,” Hans replies.

“You whispered to each other that you need me to help you. That’s the same thing as a favor.” She taps her finger on her earlobe. “Superior hearing.” I look sideways at Hans as he slides into the chair across from her. I opt to stand as close to the door as possible and remain part of the conversation.

From my position, I notice how she wrings her long, bony fingers in her lap. I spot the purple bags under her eyes. But the thing that gives me the most pause is the trembling all over her body. I can see the effort she is putting into fighting it.

Is she afraid of us?

What could she have to be afraid of? We’re not the people-eating witches here. That’s her.

“We do need help,” Hans begins. “And I think you may be the only one who can. I’m Hans, and this is my stepbrother Gerrit. Our father, the Duke of Greenbell, is dying. We believe he was cursed. My stepmother, Gerrit’s mother, is behind it.”

The witch’s eyes are glassy as if she is not listening to a word Hans is saying. Before I can call her out on it, she slumps and falls from the chair to the floor.