Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

As soon as she heard those children speaking, Maven knew what they needed.

Why of course she did. How could she not? How could she not? How could she not recognize the creatures who had taken the person she loved the most from her at the mere mention of them?

So she threw them the book. Obviously, she knew exactly where it was, having red it so many times. She schooled her features to look like a welcoming smile instead of a triumphant grin like she wanted. She would finally find her! Maven though as she let the ladder slide through the rows of books.

That new girl, Hilda, she was a peculiar one. Always seemed to find a way to get herself in trouble (though Maven wasn’t actually surprised, considering what her hair meant). She was a kind person, it seemed, making friends with two of the greatest misfits in town. Maven always saw them alone, so she was pretty relieved to see they had made a new friend.

But it wouldn’t matter if Hilda was the most awful kid in Trollberg. Because tonight, she’d be helping Maven find Myra.

Tonight, she’d be helping Maven find her sister.

She kept a close eye to the trio, not daring go too far away from them. She could continue shelving books later, she thought.

Not soon after, she saw them leaving, and her heart began beating louder on her chest. After making sure there were no other patrons at the library (an depressingly growing occurrence), she changed the cape she favored while in the library for a black coat, pulling the hoodie over her face.

When she locked the establishment, she still could see the three kids turning around the corner. She quickened her pace, knowing her best chance to find her sister was following the loathsome creature the children were hopefully leading her to.

Her heart beat wildly on her chest, but her steps were as quiet as the breeze messing with her short hair. She had planned to dye it again tonight, the purple beginning to show at the roots again, but that would have to wait.

When Maven turned into Robin Street, she saw the children entering a corner house she could remember passing by during her midnight wanderings around the town. Ah, so that’s where the victim lived.

Maven took her time memorizing where she was, before running back to the library. No use in just waiting there until dusk, and she didn’t want to put her beloved job at risk.

When she arrived at the old building once more, she threw herself on the chair behind the counter, and smiled though still panting from the run.

Just a few more hours, she thought.

____________________________________

The time seemed to drag itself. Three hours had never seemed so long. With each minute, her anticipation got stronger, fidgeting her senses until she couldn’t even concentrate in her books. But finally, finally the time came. She locked the library with shaking hands, beads of sweat forming on her brow despite the chilly night, and she made her way as quickly as she could to the house.

Everything was silent when she arrived at the place, so she settled herself under a tree at the other side of the street, the best spot to see what was happening and going by unnoticed at the same time.

As the moon rose in the sky, she let her mind wander to the time when she was a teen and her sister and innocent child. The time when they’d help their mother cast spells together, the time when Maven taught her how to cleanse her crystals and the whole family would do rituals under the same moon she was under now. The time where her sister didn’t think witches were freaks, that they were weak for avoiding doing harm, that she disowned the family traditions, seeking to be more powerful than they’d ever allow her.

Before tears could begin running down Maven’s pale face, the sound of a car took her away from her thoughts. It parked in front of the house she had been watching, and she observed with interest as Johanna, a very kind and smart woman she had met at a café, got out of the vehicle not with her daughter, but with the boy she’d thought she’d been watching.

Her legs itched to get into the house and try to understand what the hell was going on, but she knew she couldn’t do that. She wasn’t agonized for long, however, as just a few minutes later, a thick green smoke flew trough the front door’s key whole.

Maven was on her feet immediately, running after the green cloud for all she was worth. She run through block after block, her breathing loud to her own ears. When finally she reached the gates to the Huldrawoods, she lifted her fingers to the lock and muttered a simple enchantment, the iron giving away to her magic smoothly.

She thanked every deity she knew of when she entered and the cloud of smoke was still visible, even in the dark of night and cover of the woods. She’d searched through every last inch of that forest, and now knew that, without being guided to one of them, she’d never find where the Marra were.

She usually tried to keep the spell using to a minimum, her mother having been very persistent in highlighting that magic always came with a price, but any price was worth finding her sister, so she muttered yet another enchantment under her breath and suddenly her steps were soundless.

A smile (albeit a nervous one) adorned her lips when a flash of green lights reached her eyes though the trees, and the closer she got, the better she could see the camping-like formation a few logs had been put around a fire, and the faces of the girls sitting on them.

“And then, the bike began riding itself! And the stupid girl couldn’t control it! Her face was hilarious when her friends rode away from her, mocking her!” A high pitched voice said, and the whole circle laughed.

Maven covered her mouth so they wouldn’t hear her gasp. As they laughed , their eyes became green, and between the sea of cruel features, she found an all too familiar face.

Her straight, light violet hair had been dyed completely black, her long fringe being partially held by a barrette. She was wearing the same denim coat with cotton in the neckline as the day she’d been abducted, the day Maven though she’d lost a piece of her heart she’d never recover again.

And she didn’t look like a prisoner. She wasn’t bound by her wrists, forced to listen to the Marra’s perverted acts against her will, or being a guinea pig for new scarring tactics .

She hadn’t been taken because she’d grown bitter and those horrid beings saw her as a perfect victim, Maven recognized, baring her teeth in anger.

She had been taken because, In her bitterness,

Her sister had become one of them.

Maven stood up abruptly, making the bush she was hiding behind shake and attacking the attention of the whole group to herself. But it wouldn’t matter if she had a bloody troll threatening her in that moment. Because in that moment, she would have a talk with her sister.

“Myra Underhill” Maven all but hissed as all of the freaky teenagers gasped at the sight of the intruder, and Myra became even more pale than usual as every gaze fell on her. “What. Are. You. Doing. Here?”

The initial shock at the appearance of her older sister washed away from her face, as she let the Marra persona dominate her once more, lifting her confidence. “I don’t go by that surname anymore. I don’t go by any surname, in fact.” She smiled mockingly.

It didn’t take a witch to feel the anger burning inside Maven. Two years. Two years she thought her sister had been abducted. Two years she thought she had failed in her promise to her father to protect her sister. One year their mother had left her for good, leaving her thinking she was alone in the world.

And Myra didn’t even care.

“That’s not how family works, sweetie” She said with a loathing in the old endearment. “You can’t just throw it away when you decide you’re too good for them.”

When Myra opened her mouth to speak, the other Marra, who had been telling the story before the interruption decided to come into the conversation. “And who would you be, exactly?” She said with mocking sympathy. “And what on Earth is up with you? You look like a witch!” She laughed in disdain.

Maven stood her ground. “I’m Myra’s sister.” She looked at the old best friend in the eye, making sure she’d feel the next sentence on her soul. “Or at least I used to be. And to your information, yes, I am a witch. And unlike that treacherous viper, I’m proud of it.”

More gasps of surprise. “You’re a witch?” The girl sitting next to Myra, one with short caramel hair and round glasses cried.

“N-no, of course I’m not! They’re pathetic! I- I mean, I was born a witch, but they are just too boring and weak, and that’s why I left them!” She tried to explain nervously.

“Well, in that case” the first girl, with two ridiculous blond piggy tails, who seemed to be the queen bee of the group got up. “You are threatening one of ours. Leave immediately-“ she stood face to face - or the closest she could get to that, being so much shorter than the librarian - to Maven, looking as scary as she could in her teenager form. “Or face the consequences.”

“I am NOT leaving without my sister!”

The infuriating girl raised one blond eyebrow. “That’s what we’ll see.”

Something hard hit Maven’s neck from behind. And as the world got darker, the floor got closer, until she could not resist to succumb into a deep sleep.

Chapter Text

She was gardening outside. The moonlight illuminated her extensive flowerbed, and for the first time since she was five and dropped an acid potion on them, her roses just wouldn’t bloom.

They lay wilted on the ground, the bushes not strong enough to support themselves. It was a truly macabre vision, especially with the putrid smell coming from the rotting plants.

But then, the bushes began to move. The twigs began to intertwine and form a figure. Maven watched horrified as her deep red roses began to melt into blood, and the plants form a four meters tall troll-like creature.

As the blood dripped down the leaves, the librarian raised her gaze to see strings attached to her once-a-rose-bush, just the way a puppet would have. At the end of the strings, controlling the troll, was her sister. Her face bigger than the Moon, her body seeming to disappear behind the trees staring down at her with angry, green eyes and a Cheshire like grin

“You failed me.” Myra hissed. “You failed me, and I’ll never forget you. You failed me and you shall DIE”

Maven’s surroundings dropped as if made of paper, like would happen if one cut the corners of a cardboard box, giving way to nothing but darkness all around her, her sister’s legs going lower than the ground, making her feel like an ant on a platform.

“Myra, I’m sorry!” Maven cried, tears streaming down her face. “Sister, please come- please c-come back!” She stuttered as she dropped to her knees before the flower monster, her tears mixing with the blood on the ground.

“NEVER” The Marra shouted, and with a movement of her hand, made the troll raise it’s hand, ready to strike the librarian.

“Madam!”

The librarian woke up with a start at the child like voice and the small hand on her shoulder. When she could focus better, the nightmare finally releasing her from its crutches, she saw a young face and long blue hair. The Hilda girl, she recognized.

“Where am I?” She asked as she tried to control her beating heart.

“Safe.” Came another voice, a more mature one. Johanna offered her a cup of coffee as she sat on the bed at Maven’s feet, and she happily accepted. “The kids found you this evening passed out near the woods. We didn’t know where you live, and we just couldn’t leave you there, so we brought you here. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Um, no, of course I don’t. Thank you. Can you tell me exactly where you found me?”

“You em were lying at the gates to the Huldrawood when we went out to get a badge. Why were you there?”

“You were crying in your sleep.” Hilda pointed at Maven’s puffy eyes and wet cheeks before she could answer the first question. “Are you okay?”

The librarian took a deep breath and looked out of the window near the bed. “If I said yes I’d be lying.”

“What happened?” Asked another kid from the other side of the room, near the girl Maven usually saw him with. So, the whole trio was there.

“That’s was none of you business, kid” Maven spatted and regretted it immediately when everyone’s faces fell. They had taken her out of the streets and welcomed her into their home. The least she could do was be grateful.

“I think I just lost the person I love the most.” It was obvious in the boy’s face he had come to regret his question.

“Can you tell us who that was?” Hilda asked gently, and Johanna glared at her.

“Hilda! That’s not polite!”

“No, that’s fine.” Maven said as she sipped her coffee. “It was my younger sister.”

“Oh.” Johanna’s face filled with sympathy for the librarian. “I’m sorry for your loss. How did she die?”

Maven twisted her nose. “Die? Who said anything about dying?”

“W-well, but if she didn’t die maybe you can still get back to her.” The girl she recognized as the biggest bookworm in town after herself spoke for the first time, and Maven sighed.

“I doubt that. She made a bad decision. And I didn’t stop her. And when it was done, I only judged her. I promised I’d always protect her. And I failed” She spit out, chocking with unshed tears.

“Hey, if you don’t try, you’ll never know!” Came yet another voice. She looked at the bedside table and gaped at what she saw.

“An elf?” Maven spat in surprise.

“You can see him?” Hilda asked, just as surprised the librarian could see Alfur as the librarian was at seeing him. “You have signed elf paperwork?”

“Why of course I have! What kind of witch doesn’t have elf paperwork!”

Maven realized those were the wrong words the moment they came out of her mouth. She just couldn’t belive her carelessness. How could she give them that information!?

“You’re a witch?!” David asked wide-eyed, and Maven stood a little straighter.

“Yes, I am.”

“Oh, that’s wonderful!” Alfur chirped. “Witches are the only kind of humans elves usually get along with. No offense.” He said looking at the other people in the room.

“Witch or not, it doesn’t matter. You need help. What can we do?” Johanna asked, and Maven sighed in relief as she realized that this friendship wouldn’t be ruined by ignorance as many others were before.

“I’m afraid there’s nothing to do. Nothing can undo what happened to my Myra.” Maven lifted her head abruptly, an old ritual coming to mind. “Unless...”

She turned her head and faced Hilda, a plan forming on her thoughts already. “Unless what?”, the child asked.

But before she could get her hopes high, Maven realized she couldn’t be selfish enough to let her wishes get in the way of a kid’s safety. “Forget it, Hildie. It’s nothing.”

A heavy atmosphere intruded the room, and silence hung heavily around them.

“Frida, David, your parents must be preoccupied. Hilda, can you walk home with them?” Johanna asked softly to her child, who looked like she would discuss before her mother lifted her eyebrows, and she realized it was not the time to question her mother’s attitudes.

“Yes, mum. I’ll take the opportunity to take twig out for a walk. Come on, guys.”

The door closed behind the children, and Johanna took her gaze from them to her guest. “There is a way to help you. You just don’t want to say it.” It was more a statement then a question, and a right one. “I’ll go get us something to eat, and then we can discuss it, okay?”

Maven nodded with her head hanging low, until Johanna put her hand on the librarian’s shoulder, making her look up at the older woman, a blush warming her neck and creeping up to her face at the proximity.

“Okay.” She whispered as her host left the room.

After a few minutes of uneasy thoughts and shifting movements from Maven’s part, Johanna was back with a bowl full of cookies. Before she could even offer the snack, the librarian began speaking, wishing to end this as soon as she could. And if there was any remote chance that she could get what she needed and have her little sister back, she was taking it.

“Who is the father?” She asked rather harshly. “Who is Hilda’s father.”

Johanna sat down at Maven’s feet again, blushing prettily, and the librarian had to admit the colour looked rather nice on her. “I- er, I don’t know.”

Maven gaped at her with her mouth open like a fish. She’d never been one to judge people, and she was a firm believer that one could do what they wanted with their body, but the sweet artist hadn’t gave the impression that she was that kind of person.

At Maven’s reaction, Johanna was quick to clasp her hands over her mouth, and the pink on her face turned to green. “What, NO! Oh Gods, it’s not what you’re thinking! Hilda- Hilda was adopted is what I mean!”

Maven’s jaw snapped shut and she cursed herself for jumping to conclusions. The poor woman looked like she was going to faint before her.

“I beg your pardon. I should have worded my doubts. So you mean you didn’t get to meet her biological parents?”

“Er, no, I didn’t.” She murmured as she fiddled with a biscuit on her hand. “I found her in the woods, actually. I had gone to my grandfather’s cabin to see if I could find some inspiration. The day I ventured farther into the forest, I heard a baby weeping. Oh, Maven, she was so young and she was alone. I couldn’t leave her there. I took her in and fell in love with her.” At the end of the explanation, Johanna was in tears.

“The two of you are perfect together. I’m glad you found each other. Does she know?”

Johanna gave her a dry little laugh. “Yeah, she does. Not like it’s easy to keep something from her, anyway.”

“And do you know why she was abandoned?” Maven quirked an eyebrow.

“Of course not! All I know is that they were monsters if they couldn’t even care for the safety of their child!” Johanna spatted and the Maven could feel all the suppressed rage beneath her skin. The mother might not know, but the witch? Oh, the witch had seen this story a thousand times.

“Let me tell you something. Surely, at this point of your life, you have already realized that some hair colours are... normal. Expected. Within the realm of possibility, let’s say. But I’ll ask you something: have you ever seen anyone other than Hilda with blue hair?”

Johanna furrowed her brow as she searched her memory for the image of someone with such unusual hair colour. “No, I can’t say I have. But I imagine it’s some kind of genetic diversion or something? The doctors could never put their fingers on it.”

Maven pinched the bridge of her nose, stressed to see the culture passed from mother to daughter amongst her kind so lost to most people. “Oh my- no, Johanna, I’m afraid it has nothing to do with genetics. Or science, even. When one is born with an unnatural hair colour, it is believed that this person has magical gifts, is, let’s say, prone to engage in witchcraft.”

She paused for a moment, letting the other woman try to wrap her head around that information. “It can be passed down to generations... or pop in suddenly on a child coming from a normal family. When it happens, the children are usually abandoned, given away, mistreated, and murdered even.” Maven knew she’d gone too far when a sob erupted from the sweet artist, and she tried to give her what she hoped was a reassuring look.

“Don’t fret. These things would happen on old times. Now this knowledge has been practically forgotten. Your Hilda just had the fortune of being born into a family of cruel magicphobes who happened to know of this.”

Another sob came from her. “How can you say she was lucky?! It was awful what happened to her! She could have been hurt!”

“Well, but instead you found her, didn’t you?”

Johanna was silent again, and she stuffed her mouth with a vanilla biscuit. “Yes, I suppose I did.” She answered when she finished chewing.

“But if it’s such an obvious sign, why don’t most people know about this? How come no one suspects?” Johanna gesticulated as she spoke, throwing crumbs around the room with her movements, and Maven scoffed.

“Why, since they created hair dye no one can tell natural from fake hair anymore. Before it existed, witches would usually hide their hair in some way. But nowadays there’s no trouble. Some of us still keep a part of our hair natural to let others know we are of their kind.” The librarian lifted her hands to her scalp, separating the hair strands so that the gaping woman in front of her could see the purple sprouting from the roots.

A few moments of uncomfortable silence went by, and it was only broken when the mother opened her mouth again. “Why did you tell me all that?”

“Because the only way to save my sister is if Hilda helps me” Maven answered after taking a deep breath.

Johanna was silent, but she nodded in a sign for her to continue. “The Marra are a society of kinds. They seek teenagers who want more power, more control, more... freedom. They twist their minds to make them believe that spending the rest of your immortal lives giving people nightmares is the best way to live. And when they convince them of such, the adolescents go through a ritual, in which they gift their soul to the goddess Niorun, acquiring, in exchange, immortality and the ability to enter people’s dreams.”

“Why would that goddess do that?”

“She doesn’t know what they use their abilities for. As the goddess of dreams, Niorun thinks that the Marra’s loyalty to her comes from the desire to give pleasant dreams to others, the way she does, and not nightmares. But the point is, my sister has joined them.”

Johanna lifted her head as if she’d been electrocuted, her jewel bright eyes as wide as the sun. “Beg pardon?” She stuttered with effort.

“You heard this correctly. My sister has joined the Marra. And that was two years ago. I- I believe that she has already performed the ritual” Maven felt the stinging of tears behind her eyes, but she refused to let them drop. “She hadn’t aged a day...” she whispered.

Johanna squares her shoulders confidently. “And what can we do?” She asked in a strong, unwavering voice. “You said you needed Hilda. I’m sure she’d have no trouble in agreeing to help.”

“You don’t understand!” Maven spat. “Not only is the spell we’d need to do dangerous, but the training Hilda would need would unlock her magic forever!”

She hugged her legs and hid her face on her knees. “And I d-don’t want that t-to happen to her...” Maven cried, unable to contain her tears any longer as she realized the depths of the situation her sister had put herself in.

She only heard the gentle padding of Johanna’s feet getting lower and then higher, right before feeling her hand on her shoulder. “Here” Johanna offered a napkin and a smile as the librarian looked up.

At that moment, Maven was painfully aware that she had broken down in front of Johanna. Wonderful, she thought.

“Calm down, and talk to me. Why do you need Hilda for that spell?”

“Because it requires the energy of two witches to work. That’s also what makes the spell so dangerous. There’s no way to get my sister’s soul back,” unless you want to fight a goddess, she added in her mind. “And so the only way to make Myra human again would be by forming a new soul for her.”

“Can... can only witches do that?”

“Yes, I’m afraid so. Witches have more energy, and more control of it. A normal person would probably die with that spell.” Maven sighed, knowing there was no way Johanna was allowing Hilda to help her now.

“And Hilda is the only witch in Trollberg?” The question was met with a nod.

“You said she’d require training... can the training make the spell... safer?” Johanna left the bed, now pacing hypnotic circles on the wooden floor.

“Certainly. The better the witch can manipulate the energy and elements, the safer the spell is.”

“Could you train her?” The answer took the librarian by surprise. A small spark of hope ignited in her chest.

“You’d let me?”

Johanna sighed. “Hilda will kill me if I don’t let her try. But if it’s been too long and we still don’t think it’s safe, I’m afraid I’ll have to put my daughter first.”

She barely had any time to process the information before she had an armful of witch. “Thank you. So much.” The librarian whispered in the crook of her neck as she hugged her, before taking a step back and drawing a sharp breath. Bloody hell, what was it with this woman that made her so soft?!

“You’re welcome” Johanna smiled shyly at Maven. At any sign of danger to her family, she would make Hilda back down immediately. But why cut down all the options before even trying?

Why not allow a witch a little happiness?

____________________________

Hilda closed the door behind her and looked around to find her mother and the librarian sitting at the table, and Twig sniffing Maven’s shoes, to where he ran as soon as the door opened.

“Hey mum.” She said as she approached the women. The walk to her friends’ houses had been a tense affair, the three of them too immersed in their own thoughts to speak. The tension in her house, however, seemed to have dissipated.

“Hey Hilda!” Johanna greeted her with a nervous yet happy smile. “Are you up for an adventure?”

Chapter Text

Both Hilda and Johanna gasped as Maven pushed one of bookshelves aside with great effort to reveal a passage to another room. The library was still closed, so there were no other patrons around to behold the sight of the librarian stepping into the grim hidden chamber.

There was a click as she pressed a light switch and the room was cast in light. It was still darker than the rest of the library, but now at least they could properly see where they were going. After tree steps down the stairs, Maven looked back and gestured for the two of them to follow her inside.

“I’m not allowed to show this room to patrons, so I’d appreciate your discretion.” The librarian asked as she hopped down the last steps and headed for the writing desk that sat at the base of the staircase, a dark wooden piece of furniture with a lamp sitting on top of it and a red armchair by its side. There were scrolls of parchment laying on it, remnants of the research she’d done few days before, that hadn’t been put away because she had planned to come back to it when she had the time. But now she had something more important to focus on.

She had time to put the desk to sorts as Hilda and her mother descended the stair very slowly, taking in every bit of the room with slacked jaws. Hilda looked outright delighted, while Maven could tell Johanna was a bit apprehensive of the whole situation.

“What is this place?” Johanna asked, taking in the walls covered from top to bottom with books and ancient tapestries with symbols and creatures she didn’t recognize.

“Why is it a secret?” Hilda added with her voice filled with awe.

“This is where we keep all books on witchcraft and magic.” Maven looked around. She’d never get tired of admiring this place. “Witches have been in Trollberg ever since it was founded, you know? The first librarian was one of us. He arranged this room for our kind to be able to store our knowledge in a safe place. Since then, the magical families in town have been passing the information about this place down the generations. It was also very common that witches would become the librarians, in order to protect this place.”

There was a beat of silence before Hilda asked, this time much closer to Maven who was running her eyes through the books in one of the shelves. She looked like she knew exactly what she was looking for. “Is this why you chose this job?”

She chuckled, though she still looked serious. “No, it was just because I’m a bookworm. Though this place is very important to me as well.”

“There are other magical families in Trollberg?” Johanna asked with her arms crossed. She didn’t think the librarian would have lied to her when she said there were no other witches in town, but she had to be sure.

Maven shrugged, looking sad as she ran her finger down the spine of a book with dark blue leather binding. “There used to be. Few, but enough that there were also other places where we used to gather. But they’re gone. Some families died out. Others reached a point where the youngest generation didn’t have a gift for magic, or decided it was too much trouble and not fit for the modern world. A few even moved out of town.”

She took the book she had been caressing out of the shelf, its name written in golden letters at the cover. “My family was the last one. But now there’s only me.”

She took her eyes from the book to her guests, cringing when she saw the look of pity on their faces. “Sorry about that. Why don’t you come here, Hilda?”

Hilda looked at her mother, who nodded her permission, and sat down on the armchair as Maven had indicated. The librarian moved around to lean against the backrest, and placed the book on Hilda’s lap. “Page one hundred and thirty nine.”

The girl opened the book on the place she had been told to. It had been written by hand, she realized. The page was the beginning of a chapter, and on the top of it ‘Becoming a Marra’ had been written in bold letters.

“This is the most complete book on the Marra we have”, the librarian said above her. Hilda skimmed through the chapter, finding herself confused as another chapter began and she still hadn’t found the ritual that the librarian had mentioned when she asked for her help.

“There’s a lot of stuff here… but nothing about turning them back.” She pointed out, raising her eyes to the librarian.

Maven brought one hand down to the book, finding the page she had been looking for with no trouble after spending so much time studying the tome as she had. There was a small envelope glued to it, and she opened it and carefully took out the old, wrinkly piece of parchment inside. “There is no specific spell for this purpose. But one of the researchers who added information to this book after the original author died believed that an already existing ritual would work.”

Hilda squinted at the note. It had very few details, but it at least informed where said ritual could be found. “The Manipulation of Mind, Soul and Body?” She asked. “Do you have this book here?”

The librarian nodded and walked to the opposite wall, looking for the book to show Hilda. This time, she took a little while longer; this wasn’t a book she needed as often as the other one. When she did find it though, she came back to Hilda’s side and found Johanna kneeling in front of her child to read the book as well.

Maven opened the book in her hands and searched the glossary for the chapter she needed, turning the pages carefully due to their age; she wasn’t certain about this particular copy, but the book itself was older than their town.

“Here.” She gave the book to the girl, who closed the blue one and returned it to the librarian. Maven kept the book on the Marra in her hands. As soon as the two of them left, she’d put it on one of the drawers on the circulation desk to remember to take it home with her that night.

“Awesome!” Hilda whispered excitedly as she read about the ritual, while Johanna frowned at the yellow ink stained paper.

“Would Hilda be able to do this? Is it even possible?” She asked with a concern that Maven couldn’t begrudge her.

“The point of this spell is to gather and manipulate energy until the witches can, through their intent, craft a new soul. The possible dangers in the process come mainly from how much energy is needed, and how much control it takes to make all that energy submit to you. This first problem is easy to take care of. If we pick a proper day and use the right components, it shouldn’t bother us.”

“Components?” Hilda interrupted her, making the librarian turn her gaze to the little girl who was her only hope.

“Yes. In this case, it would mostly be crystals and a proper wand, though candles will also help.”

She looked back at Johanna, who was beginning to look genuinely interested in what she had to say. “As for the other matter, that’s what the training is for. She’d learn how to control energy as well as the theory parts of witchcraft.”

Johanna locked her eyes with the ground, a wary look still on her face, and Maven reached out a hand to touch her shoulder. Their gazes met.

“I know we still don’t know each other well, but I need you to trust that I would only allow Hilda to help me once I was sure she was ready. I would never risk your family to try to save mine.”

“I want to help her, mum!” Hilda said, making Johanna tear her eyes away from Maven, and the librarian let her hand drop to her side.

“You have to be sure.” Maven told her as she turned to her once more. “Once your magic is unlocked, it can’t be hidden away again”

Hilda seemed to think for a few moments before she asked. “Why would I want to hide it?”

Maven sighed in a tired manner and moved to look for yet another book. “I’m afraid that is the first lesson.”

Not a minute later, Maven dropped a book with black covering and silver letters on her lap, and sighed again. “To put it shortly, most humans hate witches because they have magic. Most magical creatures hate witches because they’re humans. You’ll forever be in a limbo you can’t escape”

“The History of Witchcraft.” Hilda whispered as she read the book’s title.

“I have to open the library soon, but feel free to ask anything now and take it home, should you wish it.”

She opened it and immediately coughed because of the dust inside the tome. “This looks like it hasn’t been opened in years!”

There’s only so much reading that a person can do by herself, Maven though.

“Can you tell me something?” She asked, sensing that she would have a hard time reading such a long, heavy book. “When did witches come to Trollberg?”

“We were always here”, Maven said as she sat down on the stair. “We helped build the town. Everyone thinks that it was a bunch of men with beards and their violence that helped keep the trolls out. But it has always be us who had knowledge about nature and how to deal with it. We already lived in this place when there came group of people who wanted to build a haven safe of danger, safe of magic.”

Safe of anything interesting, Hilda mused.

“The witches helped them, but when the walls were up, it soon became clear that they were included in this group of creatures too dangerous to be around the good people of Trollberg. Luckily, the people in power were way to grateful for their help to be able to send them away.” She shrugged. “They were probably also afraid of being cursed, but that’s not the point. Witches were allowed to stay as long as we were discreet and practiced our craft in secret.”

“Have you ever seen the book with the drawing or picture of every librarian the town’s had?” They shook their heads in a negative gesture. “You’d have noticed that many of them had unusual hair colors, though normal enough not to awake suspicion. A red a little too fiery, a blond a little too bright, dark strands that shone silver with light…”

“Does your sister have hair like us?” Hilda asked suddenly, making Maven startle with the unexpected question.

“Yes… she used to have the most beautiful lavender hair. She’d keep only one strand with its true colour and die the rest black like me.” She answered even as she fought back waves of sadness and anger and bitterness.

Knowing her daughter as she did, Johanna knew that she’d probably begin asking more about Maven’s sister now that she’d gotten started, and Johanna sensed that the librarian really didn’t have the energy for that at the moment. So she made a show of looking her watch and gasping.

“Oh, I think we should go now! The library will really have to open soon.”

Maven smiled at her, thankful for the interruption. “Yes, I’m afraid so. Which days do you have available for our lessons?”

Hilda looked up in a pensive manner. “Saturday, obviously. And Wednesdays. They are okay too.”

The librarian nodded and got up, gesturing for them to climb up the stairs before her. “In this case, I’ll see you next Wednesday.”

_#_#_#_

Not for the first time in two years, Maven felt too sick in her own room to sleep there.

She didn’t need to bring anything with her. She still kept her parent’s room tidy, the bed made for any occasions like this. Today was just one of these days when she couldn’t stand to look at Myra’s empty bed, at the clothes still in her side of the wardrobe, at the picture of their family she’d torn on her last day with them.

It was too painful to remember it all over again.

But as she walked to her parent’s old room that night, already clad in her purple and grey pajamas with her dear catowl perched on her shoulder, she couldn’t help but remember.

Myra has been so upset that night. Both Maven and Amaris were already home and getting dinner started when she stormed into the house, crying and shaking from the rain outside, her clothes dirty with mud. She let herself fall in front of the fireplace, which they had lit because of the cold night, and both her sister and her mother ran to her and began asking her questions.

When she controlled her sobs and looked up, there was no sadness in her gaze. There was only anger. Maven had few to no memories of the teenage drama she’d been trough in her own teenage years, much less of Myra’s, so even though she could describe every second of what had happened that night at their house, she had to admit she probably couldn’t do the same with her sister’s story. She could remember that the same group of mean people that had been bothering Myra for a while had been the cause of her anger and also the state of her clothes. She could remember that her sister’s humiliation had been heightened by the fact that she’d been with a new girl who she was trying to befriend when the incident happened. But looking back, she could see that that had not been the day Myra had snapped; that had happened long before. That had only been the day she had made a decision. A terrible decision.

Maven sat down on the edge of her parents’ bed, letting Freya leave her shoulder in favor of her lap. She caressed the soft fur-like plumes in its head and ears, moving down to gently run her fingers through the dark feathers or her wings. Freya’s tail tried to curl around her legs in a gesture of affection, and the librarian smiled despite her inner turmoil.

She remembered how she had tried to hug her sister, only to have the girl tense up like she was being approached by a snake. When Maven drew back, Myra met her eyes.

“Do something.” She said, and then turned to their mother. “Why don’t you ever do anything? Why do you just let this happen to me?”

Amaris and Maven shared a look. They had had that conversation before, many times. They knew what she was talking about, but they pretended not to.

“We have already talked to the headmaster, Myra. Many times.”

“And with the teachers too.” Maven added. “But I’m sure they’ll do something now, sweetie. We have proof of physical assault.”

As Maven gestured to her sister’s clothes, the girl’s eyes darkened and her voice became a whisper. “You know what I’m talking about, and I know you can use your magic to help me.”

“As we have said before, we can.” Their mother explained with all the patience she had, bless her soul. “We can put a glamour on you so that you’ll go unnoticed by them. Or try a charm to make them sweeter people.”

“We could make you an amulet with enchantments for protection.” Maven suggested, gently grasping Myra’s coat and trying to take it off of her so she wouldn’t be wearing wet clothes, but failing when Myra didn’t move a muscle.

“This is not what I want!” She insisted, shrugging her sister away from her. “I know you can hex them! Then they’d leave me alone. You just don’t want to!”

This made Amaris sigh, and rest her hands in her knees. “My dear, you know why we can’t do that. Do what ye will, harm ye none, remember?”

“But they are harming me!”

“And it will come back to them, eventually!” Her sister assured her. “And it’s not like we’re not doing anything, Myra! We’ve already talked to the school and their parents. We’ll talk to the headmaster once more, and if it still doesn’t work…”

Maven spread her hands in front of herself, not really knowing what to say.

“Then we can have you change schools, if that’s what you want.” Their mother suggested, but it seemed to be the wrong answer, as Myra screeched in frustration and got up.

“I don’t want to change schools!” She shouted. “I want them to feel like I feel! I want to make them scared! I want them to know what it is like to feel cornered!”

“And we don’t blame you for that.” Maven got up and crossed her arms, upset with her sister’s outburst. “But we will not use our craft for revenge purposes!”

“We will do whatever we can to help you, but witches are guardians of the earth, my dear.” Amaris said in a peaceful tone of voice. “We are not punishers.”

Myra stomped her foot on the floor. “I hate this!”

Her shout made both mother and sister take a step back. “I hate this useless power that we can’t use to help us! I hate all the rules and guidelines, and I hate that you two value your precious craft more than you value me!”

They gasped. Amaris was quick to put a reassuring hand on Myra’s shoulder, but it was shrugged off as soon as it reached her. “Darling, that’s not…”

“Shut up!” She screamed, and stomped off to their room. “I hate all of you.”

She locked the door behind her, but Maven followed her and knocked hard on it. “How dare you speak to our mother this way? Apologize to her now, Myra!”

There was no reply from inside, so the librarian huffed in annoyance and turned to her mother, who was clearly beginning to cry.

“Have we truly neglected her, Maven?” She whispered into her older daughter’s neck, her frail frame shaking slightly in the librarian’s arms.

“I- I don’t think so, mother.” Maven answered though she didn’t sound sure at all. Ever since their father died, Myra’s rages against their culture had been a somewhat common occurrence that they had to deal with. But it was never this bad. She never said such cruel things about them, which made Maven wonder if maybe they truly were putting their craft above their family.

With those disturbing thoughts, they went back to their cooking. Maven set out the table really slowly, trying to postpone the inevitable, but eventually there was nothing else left to do but call her sister to come eat dinner.

She knocked on the room’s door, gently this time.

“Sweetie, come eat. You can grab your plate and come back to your room, if you want.”

There was no answer.

“Myra, please. Open the door.”

She tried opening it but it was still locked. “It’s just dinner. You don’t even need to look at our faces if you don’t want to.”

Maven tried opening it a few more times, and then began getting nervous. “Myra? Myra, please!”

Hearing her daughter’s distress, Amaris went to the room the two of them shared as well.

“It’s locked.” Maven said when she arrived. “And it won’t open. She’s not replying either.”

Amaris leaned the side of her head against the door, straining to hear anything at all, but no sound came from the inside. “Myra, were coming in.”

With a simple enchantment, Amaris unlocked the door and Maven ran inside, her heart nearly beating out of her body when she found no one in the room. Their mother ran to check the adjoining bathroom, but one look at Myra’s bedside table and Maven knew it was hopeless.

Her sister kept a photo of the tree of them on a frame. The picture was now ripped to shreds, and surrounding it, there was a circle of vivid green smoke.

Maven’s knees gave out under her, bringing her to the ground. She closed her mouth with her hand to stop a desperate sob from coming forth, but she couldn’t stop the tears forming in her eyes. When she came into the bedroom again, their mother noticed it too. She rummaged through the room, looking for any sign that her daughter was still there, hiding at some corner, while chanting “no, no, no.”

Eventually she too had to admit defeat. She knew just as well as her daughter that this left over magic was a tell tale sign of the Marra. She dropped to the ground near Maven and they cried for hours, until they found strength to get up and look for any information about the Marra they could get their hands on.

On multiple occasions, they had tried to summon the Marra for one of them to lead them back to Myra; but it never worked. The Marra very rarely scared adults, as it was much harder to truly frighten them. They had tried every trick and every spell they could think of to retrieve their Myra, but it had always been fruitless.

And of course it had been fruitless, Maven now thought bitterly as she tucked herself into what used to be her mother’s side of the bed. They had thought that the poor girl must have been captured when the Marra sensed she was weak, and an easy target. It had been known to happen. It wouldn’t be the first time the Nightmare Spirits would have captured an innocent person to experiment and train their scaring on, letting them go when they had no use for said person anymore.

Being under the Marta’s thumb usually had life long consequences; those victims were known to never come back to who they were before after such traumatizing experiences. Maven had had more than one nightmare about her little sister, the one she had sworn to protect, wandering around the woods, her eyes bloodshot and her body weak, rambling about monsters and devils and jumping at the slightest of sounds.

But they had been wrong. Their love for Myra had made them blind to the fact that the girl had apparently knowingly, willingly joined them. So of course it hadn’t worked.

And what was agonizing Maven the most was, it probably wouldn’t work now either. She could train a thousand witches, could make them the most powerful spell casters the world had ever seen, and it still would be pointless if she couldn’t convince her sister to accept the help she was offering.

She lied on her side and looked at the night sky outside; she was used to letting the curtains open when she went to sleep, so as to wake up with the sun. She wondered where her sister was, at that moment. If she was scaring someone, if she was around that freaky campfire. Unfortunately, the only place Maven knew Myra was not was at the room in the end of the corridor.

“Oh, Myra.” She whispered tiredly as Freya settled herself by her feet. “What have you done?”

Chapter Text

She hadn’t had anyone outside her family in her house for over an year. She hadn’t given this much thought before, but as her guests entered her house for the evening, it became stark clear to her that she had not properly prepared her home to receive outsiders.

Not that there was anything dirty or smelly - Maven made sure to keep her house in good conditions, as her mother had taught her. It helped her keep a clear mind. But she could tell that she should probably had put some things away before Johanna arrived that evening, bringing with her the elf that apparently lived with them and her very new apprentice.

She eyed warily the books piles on the living room’s shelves, frowning at titles such as “Advanced Spirit Work: Protections” and “Introduction to Blood Magick”. The elf, taking the place in from his spot at the woman’s ear, hurriedly jotted down notes as he tried to distinguish all the different sorts of ingredients on their glass jars by the room’s windowsill. While Hilda… Hilda looked like she was having the time of her life.

“Your house is so cool!” She told Maven when the librarian gestured for her guests to sit down on the sofa. “Does no one suspect that you’re a witch with all this stuff around, though?”

Maven shrugged, leaning her hip against the big table where she used to take her meals with her family, once upon a time. “Not many people come here. Mostly few cousins, but they know about witchcraft, even though their branch of the family lost the gift.”

“Will you teach me how to cast a spell today?” Hilda asked, looking up at her with shining, excited eyes, and Maven noticed out of the corner of her own eyes that Johanna didn’t look at all very happy with that prospect.

“There’s still much for you to learn before I can teach you how to cast a spell.” Maven sighed. “But first, did you read the book? What did you think of it?”

The girl bit her lip and tried to look less guilty, failing and giving it away that she had barely reached its half. “I found it very informative.”

“Well, it was quite a heavy book, anyway. I don’t blame you for not thinking it a page turner. Would you lot like some tea?”

Hilda and Johanna exchanged looks. “Not now, but thank you. Could you explain us what you’ll be doing today?”

The librarian nodded at Johanna’s words, and pulled a chair from the table for herself. “Of course. We’ll be looking at the basics of energy work today.”

In a few minutes, Maven tried to put the most important concepts of energy work in the easiest way to understand she could think of- she talked about how every being had energy, and about how some of them were energy, like the faeries. She talked about how witches could wield this universal energy to do their wish, and that this was how spells worked. She talked about grounding and visualization and energy raising, and she was happy to notice that Johanna seemed to grow less suspicious with the explanations. The elf had been writing down everything she said, even going as far as asking her a few questions along the way.

“When you’re ready, I’d like to try a grounding exercise with you.” She told Hilda, who promptly stood up and declared herself ready to go.

Maven asked Johanna to remain inside the house. This was a very simple and safe exercise, and it would be better for Hilda to be alone so she could properly concentrate. Then she brought the girl to her kitchen, where a door led to a simple garden at the back of the house.

“Sit down.” She instructed as the sun dipped lower, the sky getting ready for dusk. She set down herself on the grass, cross legged in front of her student.

“Grounding is an exercise to rid yourself of unwanted energy. It will stabilize you. Close your eyes.”

The girl did as she was told, but looked none too happy about it. The librarian figured she probably expected something more magical on her first class, but it would do them no good to skip the essentials.

“When you exhale, imagine all bad energy leaving your body. When you inhale, imagine pure one entering it.”

Hilda broke the exercise, opening her eyes. “How am I supposed to imagine energy?”

Maven sighed, but she supposed it was a valid question. “I like to imagine negative ones as clouds of smoke or dirt. I usually see the new ones as golden, but what really matters is that it feels right to you. Trying to visualize it is important in order to make you feel it, there’s no wrong way to do it.”

Though she looked confused, she nodded and closed her eyes again. After a few minutes had gone by, and Maven could feel her apprentice more balanced, more in tune with the nature around her, she spoke up again.

“Imagine a tree root coming out of your backbone.” She was pleased when Hilda startled slightly at her voice, a clear indication that she had been concentrating at the exercise. “Imagine it growing all the way down to the earth. If there’s still leftover energy that you wish to let go, let it flow through your roots and let the earth absorb it.”

Attuned as she was to all the different energies around her, Maven could feel all the negative, chaotic energy leaving Hilda, even more so than with the breathing exercise. This was good. It was important for each witch to learn what worked best for them.

“Now feel the roots growing even deeper, to earth’s core. Can you imagine it? Glowing with harmonic energy?”

“Yes.” Hilda whispered.

“Let the roots absorb this energy and bring it to you, filling you up with it. Keep up this switch of energies, just like you were doing before.”

Slowly, silently, Maven got to her feet and went back inside, to find that Johanna had been watching them through the window.

“She’s doing very well.” She informed the mother, who looked somewhat proud at that. “Let’s leave her at it for a few minutes. Your girl has a lot of pent up energy, she could do with some meditating.”

Johanna chuckled, agreeing with the librarian and thinking that the woman must truly be a powerful witch, to be able to get Hilda to calm down and reflect, or whatever it was that the two of them had been doing.

“Miss Underhill!” Came a small voice in the middle of their chat. “Would you mind if I took a look at your books? They seem impressive!”

Maven tilted her head at the elf, who was now at her kitchen’s counter trying to organize the many notes he had taken that evening. “Of course. Do you want me to take you to the shelves, or…”

“No need!” He chirped as he jumped from the counter. Though her parents had made sure she had signed elf paperwork at a very young age, she had had few opportunities to actually see them, since there were very few in Trollberg, so she was quite impressed to find they could jump from so high.

“Yeah, it surprised me at first too.” Johanna spoke, as if she had been reading her thoughts, and smiled when Maven felt her cheeks heat up a little.

“Tell me, how did you happen to come across an elf? He is not from Trollberg, is he?” The elves Maven had found inside the city walls were all somewhat wild. She didn’t think this one fit among them.

“No, he’s not.” Johanna chuckled. “Hilda brought Alfur over from the wilderness. His tribe had attacked us.”

The woman seemed amused at the librarian’s lack of response. She had thought that apart from the Lost Clan, elves were supposed to be peaceful. She’d definitely ask the two of them for more of that story later.

“I see. Would you like that tea now?”

Johanna thought it over, raising her eyes to the ceiling, from which she noticed hung twigs of dried herbs and branches. “I don’t want to impose… besides, I should probably give Hilda dinner soon.”

She rubbed her left hand against her right arm, looking out at the window to try to get a glimpse of Hilda. She didn’t really want to go, but she didn’t know how Hilda would feel once her training was over for the day. Maybe she’d want to go straight home.

“It’s fine if you’d rather not, but you’re definitely not imposing, Johanna.”

Oh well, she thought, not really wanting to resist anymore, there was no trouble with a cup of tea.

She accepted and watched with wonder how carefully the librarian prepared the brew. It was not from a sachet, like it often was at her own home, but rather from herbs and flowers that Johanna suspected Maven had dried, and maybe even planted, herself.

When she was done, there were three cups of tea on the counter. “I, uh, don’t think I have anything fit for the elf.”

Johanna chuckled. “I’m sure he’ll understand. Will you call Hilda now?”

“Yes. She’s been at it for long enough.” Maven nodded before excusing herself to go outside. The sky was beginning to turn purple and blue with the night setting in, and the sounds of insects all around them was getting louder.

The librarian sat in front of her student. A more experienced witch would have been able to sense Maven’s presence, but as it was Hilda remained unaware of it. Carefully so as not to startle her, Maven touched her fingertips to the back of the girl’s hand, resting on her knees.

“Feel those roots shortening… coming towards you… shrinking into you once more.” She whispered. “When you’re ready, open your eyes.”

She did so few seconds later, a smile slowly spreading over her face. “That’s… not what I had been expecting, but I feel so well! Like I’m focused and awake but… calm?”

“That’s exactly the point.” Maven chuckled. “If you could do that everyday before you go to sleep, that would be good. It would even help you sleep better.”

Maven rocked herself on her heels and got up, offering a hand for Hilda to take. “All of it?”

“No need, just try the part with the roots. I just asked you to try both because I wanted to see which you’d respond the best to.”

Inside, Hilda wasted no time in rushing to her mother to describe how she felt. Maven smiled with some measure of satisfaction at Johanna’s happiness as she saw her daughter’s interest on the lessons. The woman truly wanted to help Maven, but she would never ask her daughter to do something she didn’t want to.

Leaving Hilda to her tea, Maven walked over to where Alfur was studiously inspecting a tome on the different ways to use crystals in witchcraft. Amused at his interest, she didn’t bother him as she looked for a book in specific. It took her a while before she realized that it wasn’t there.

Sighing, she moved to her room, hoping her disappearance wouldn’t be noticed. She tip toed past where Freya was sleeping on her bed, and her shoulders slumped when she saw where the book was, even though she had already reached this conclusion.

The book she wanted was sitting on Myra’s shelf, mocking her with the reminder of how badly she’d failed her sister, and how her sister had failed them in return. But there was no time to wallow in past mistakes, she thought as she took “Basics of Witchcraft for Children” from its place. This was all about fixing the past, not being choked by it.

This had probably been the first book she’d read without her mother’s help. It was nearly a tradition that this book would be passed down from parents to children in their family. There were notes, written in childish, immature handwriting by many of their family members: her mother, her uncle, her grandmother, and even a few people she didn’t get to meet. Myra had also read it, and the book remained with her, waiting for one of the sisters to have children of their own or for someone with magical gifts to be born to the other branches of their family, to be passed down and read and scribbled on once again.

Well, her sister’s fate was terribly uncertain, and it was extremely unlikely that Maven would have a child herself, so there was no harm in giving it to Hilda for the time being. She was sure the girl would appreciate the direct and concise way the author wrote.

She went back to the kitchen and finished her tea with her guests. They were joined by Alfur not much longer.

“I have to make up for the tea someday.” Johanna quipped, a lovely smile adorning her face.

Maven lifted her eyebrows, amused. “You really don’t.”

“You should come by our house someday, I could make you dinner!”

“I wouldn’t want to impose.” The librarian kicked back at her, making the woman roll her eyes. “And dinner in return for tea? That doesn’t sound very balanced.”

Johanna helped Maven put the cups in the sink, filling them with water. “Well, then you could make up to me later. In some way.”

Hilda and Alfur exchanged a look at their banter, the two of them already waiting by the door where the two women couldn’t see them. “I’m sure I can think of something.” Maven said as she walked Johanna to the exit.

They said their goodbyes, and Hilda thanked her once again for the lesson and for the book, assuring her that she’d read this one. They scheduled their next meeting for the next Saturday; they would once again meet in her house.

As Maven watched the trio go away, the moon shining its light on them, she mused that even if this didn’t work, a thought that greatly pained her heart, she had at least got to know good people. Whatever the outcome, she’d already won something.

Chapter Text

Hilda blinked at all the shiny little stones that the librarian had spread on the table in front of her. They were already there when she arrived just a few minutes before. Alfur had stayed home that day; apparently Raven had promised to show him something, so she was alone except for her mother, who had taken a seat at the couch nearby.

“So, did you begin the book I lent you?” Maven asked, sitting across from her. She was wearing a loose dark blue sweater and leggings, and Hilda thought it was quite strange to see her without her work clothes. Last time they were at her house, she hadn’t been wearing her cape, but the rest was still there. Hilda supposed she’d get used to it if they kept meeting twice a week, eventually.

“Yes, I did!” She answered, proud to have done what had been asked of her. She had been grounding before going to sleep, too. Though it was a good thing that she practiced the exercise on her bed, sometimes she fell asleep while doing it.

“Did you get to the chapter on crystals already?”

“I… no. Not yet.”

The librarian nodded, telling her that there was no problem, even though she looked slightly annoyed. Maven had barely slept a wink the night before, re-reading an advanced book on crystals to prepare for this class. She couldn’t say she was in the best mood. “Well, I‘ll explain the basics before we start, then. The crystals we use for magic are semi precious stones created in the earth by forces of nature.”

“Forces of nature? Like spirits?” Hilda cut in, excitedly imagining magical creatures in caves deep below the ground crafting the shining stones with their powers.

“No, Hilda. Like volcanic activity.” Maven sighed. She’d always thought it safer for one to learn as much theory as they could before they moved on to practicing. Her sister hadn’t liked that philosophy. As soon as she became old enough that their parents decided to introduce her to the craft, she’d wanted to learn how to cast spells and make potions with little interest to their individual components, and it was beginning to look like Hilda might be the same. The thought was unsettling.

“Each type of crystal has a different meaning and different uses. Their structure is geometrically perfect, which allows them to hold steady levels of energy, creating those effects.”

Hilda tilted her head to the side. “I’m sorry, what?”

Maven put her elbow on the table, resting her chin on her hand. “Which part didn’t you get?”

“The geometry?” Her tone of voice told Maven that she wasn’t even sure about what had confused her, and she took a deep breath.

“What I need you to understand is, remember how everything has energy? Crystals do too, but because of how they are formed, their energy doesn’t sway or change, and witches are able to work with them to accomplish many things.”

“Like spells, right?” Hilda asked her, though she was looking everywhere but her, seemingly very interested in her living room even though she’d already been there just some days before.

“Not only. They are very helpful in meditation, protection… many things, really. If you want an example, amethyst under your pillow helps you sleep more peacefully.”

Hilda’s eyes widened, and she turned back to her mentor. “Amethyst?”

Maven picked one of the crystals she had payed out on the table, one with a deep purple colour, shaped like a pyramid. “Yes. This one.”

She let Hilda hold it, and the girl looked at it from every angle, putting the stone against the light and watching the weak purple beams that came through. “It is one of the most important crystals for a witch to have. It is a protective stone, and clears the mind of negative thoughts. It also assists in clairvoyance and intuition.”

“You mean if I use it, I’ll see the future?!” Hilda exclaimed, gleeful at the prospect. That could help her so much when she had a test in school! “Can I try it now?”

Maven bit back a groan. The girl meant well, but she was really beginning to get on her nerves. “We will have time to practice divination. But you must learn other things first.”

Hilda sat back on her chair. Before Maven could attempt to speak again, she pointed at the necklace the librarian was using.

“Is that a crystal?”

The librarian looked down at it. The necklace, made of very thin black rope did indeed hold a crystal. “Yes. It is a moonstone.”

Maven took it out of her neck and let Hilda hold the milky stone. She had been planning on talking about Moonstone later, after they had seen the basic crystals, but she supposed there was no problem about showing it to her now.

“It channels the energy of the moon. Very good for dreamwork and calming the mind. It helps connect with feminine energy.”

Her apprentice didn’t look at all very excited with this stone. She handed it back to her. “What about the others?”

Maven braced herself and began going through the other stones. Clear quartz, Aquamarine, Rose quartz, Tiger’s Eye, Selenite… Hilda looked like she was doing her best to focus and absorb the information. Jasper, Citrine, Sodalite, Black Tourmaline… Hilda was beginning to loose her resolution. Sometimes Maven would realize she was daydreaming and stop speaking until she came back to herself, apologizing when she did so. By the time they got to Onix Maven wanted to give up.

She was about to call the girl out on her lack of attention, and ask her if maybe she wanted coffee and a small break, when she gasped.

“What is that?” Hilda asked with wide, happy eyes, pointing behind the librarian. Maven turned to see what the fuss was about, and found herself looking at Freya, who had apparently decided to leave her room. She was hunching forward slightly, like she did when she walked in her two feet, her tail swishing behind her.

Maven heard Johanna gasp, the first sound she’d made ever since the lesson had begun, and Freya opened her wings and flew to Maven’s shoulder, knowing that her owner would protect her if those strangers were dangerous.

“This” Maven began, sighing. “Is Freya. She’s a catowl. She’s a hybrid, like your deerfox.”

“Can I see her?” Hilda asked, already lifting her hand towards the animal.

“She doesn’t really like people touching her.”

“Oh.” She let her hand drop to her side, looking disappointed.

“Why don’t we take a break?” Maven suggested. “If she’s awake so early, it must be because she’s hungry. You can rest while I feed her.”

Hilda rested her hand on her hand as Maven got up, disappointed to not be able to interact more with the animal. She was sure that if the librarian let her play with it a bit, they’d be friends in no time! There was no creature she couldn’t befriend.

The witch was back shortly, and offered them both a cup of coffee, which they declined. Neither mother nor daughter really liked the bitter taste of it.

As Maven tried to continue, however, her patience began to wear thin. Hilda would not pay attention to what she was saying, even when she began talking about more powerful crystals, and it was making her less than happy. More often than not, she’d be watching Freya eat from the bowl of food which was set in the floor by the entrance door.

When Hilda didn’t even answer when Maven asked if she had any doubts about the crystal she was holding, interested as she seemed to be in anything that wasn’t her lesson, Maven felt her patience snap. This girl was her only hope?!

“Hilda.” She said sharply as she get her hands fall to the table, finally getting the girl to look at her. “I don’t see the point of any of this if you’re not even going to try to learn.”

The girl looked stricken. “But I am trying to learn!”

“No, you’re not!” Maven snapped. “You’re just ignoring all the things that don’t interest you, no matter how important they are! I need you to be able to do this, Hilda, can’t you see you’re being selfish?”

The girl looked at her slack jawed, sadness written in the tightness of her brow. But what made Maven truly realize she was being irrational and impolite was the sound of feet hitting the floor as a Johanna lifted herself from the sofa with haste.

“That’s enough, Maven.” She said, coming to her daughter’s side and putting a hand on her shoulder. She looked at the librarian with barely hidden disappointment and now it was Maven who became slack jawed, realizing what she had done.

“If you can’t appreciate her help, then you don’t deserve it. Come, Hilda, let’s go home.”

Hilda got up from her chair and followed her mother to the door, which the woman had opened for her. Maven had never seen the little girl look like this. Her eyes were looking down and her shoulders were hunched. It seemed impossible, but the cheerful girl looked sad.

“Wait! I- I’m sorry!” Maven said as soon as she came back to herself, getting up from her chair. But Hilda had already crossed the door. Instead, It was Johanna who turned to her.

“Yeah, I bet you are.” She said before slamming the door shut again.

Maven spent a few seconds in stunned silence before falling down on her chair again. Tears began to sting at her eyes. It was over. Just like that, it was over. Because of her temper, she’d lost the only chance to bring Myra back, and now her sister would forever be a Marra.

She had deserved it. Myra hadn’t.

_#_#_#_

Maven was lying on her bed when her phone rang. She had been trying to read, willing her attention to focus on the new book on the Aztec people that had arrived at the library weeks before and had caught her attention, but she had given up after having to re-read the same paragraph three times. So she contended herself with listening to the rain outside as she stared at the ceiling. She didn’t think she had the energy to do anything else.

And that was the state she found herself in when her cell phone began to buzz from inside her pocket. She huffed with annoyance, and considered letting it go to postal. But she decided to check it, lest it be something important. And it was.

She gasped when she saw Johanna’s name in her screen, bringing the phone to her ear immediately. After she uttered a confused ‘hello’, the woman’s voice reached her from the other end of the line, steely and determined.

“I need to talk to you.” She didn’t sound at all happy, but at least she didn’t sound like she wanted to bury the librarian alive anymore, which was something, at least.

“Okay.” Johanna was not a cruel woman, and it would be very cruel if she called just to confirm that their arrangement had come to an end. So Maven held on to hope that maybe this was good news.

“Hilda decided she still wants to help.” There was a beat of silence as the information hit the librarian, and then she put a hand over her mouth to stifle a gasp of relief.

“Really?”

“Yes. She doesn’t seem to be blaming you for what happened. But if you want to continue teaching her, it will be under two conditions.”

Maven nodded, even though she knew Johanna couldn’t see. In that moment, she thought she’d agree to nearly anything if it could help her sister.

“The first is, either tonight or tomorrow, you’ll come to our house and give her a proper apology.”

“Got it.” That sounded very reasonable, really, even though she was pretty much terrible with expressing her feelings. She’d probably make a fool of herself trying, but she supposed Hilda deserved that.

“And the second is, this can’t happen ever again. I get that you’re very stressed with the whole situation, but Hilda is helping you out of kindness, and I don’t ever want to see you make her feel bad again, understood?”

Maven flinched at her harsh tone of voice, but she supposed she deserved it. She thought for a moment that maybe if she and her mother had been a bit more like Johanna, her family wouldn’t be in the state it was now.

“Yes. I won’t, I promise.”

Johanna sighed. “Okay, then. Goodbye, Maven.”

Chapter Text

Trolberg’s Municipal Garden was a lovely place, in Maven’s opinion. It was a beautiful park, with a variety of well kept plants; it was more than that, though. It was committed to the conservation of native species (not only of plants, but of the insects which were connected to them), and it also gave the visitors the chance to take home potted seedlings of the species that weren’t poisonous. It sounded like the perfect place to try a different approach to Hilda’s lessons.

She had arranged for the girl and her mother to meet her there at ten in the morning - they had decided to cancel their Wednesday meetings, so as not to disturb Hilda’s studies, so their classes would only be on Saturdays, when they had more time. She had arrived a little earlier, and she was already waiting by the gate when they arrived, holding a straw basket with food for them inside.

Hilda grinned widely when she saw her, which made Maven release a breath she hadn’t realized she had been holding. True, she had done as Johanna had asked and apologized to her face to face; Hilda had forgiven her, but it was good to see she had somewhat forgotten about it as well.

Johanna wasn’t as excited. She managed a smile and a nod of acknowledgment for Maven, but the librarian could see that she’d have to earn her trust back. She walked a step behind her child and looked at the Garden with interest.

“Hi, Maven!” Hilda said when she got closer. “How are you?”

“Fine, thank you for asking. What about you?”

She followed her mother’s gaze to the infinity of green beyond the entrance gate. “Curious, to be honest. What is this place?”

“This is the Municipal Garden.” She said, stepping beyond the gate. It seemed like a completely different world inside. The first thing they saw were trees, beautiful giants that reached for the sky and clashed with the city outside. Though visitors could wander among them at will, there was a main trail which led past the trees and into an area full of neat, well kept flower beds with all sorts of species. Beyond it lay a park-like area where flowers grew mostly at random and visitors could lay around as they pleased.

“You grew up in Trolberg, didn’t you, Johanna?”

Johanna, who had been looking at the top of the trees with an awe-struck gaze, was startled out of whatever train of thought she’d been having and nodded.

Maven stopped walking and turned to her. “Have you ever been here?”

“Yes, a few times. I was a small child, though. Can’t say I remember much.” She chuckled.

“Are you going to teach me about the trees?” Hilda asked as she stepped out of the main trail to walk amidst the closest trees.

“No, not today. We are heading.” She stopped, pointing ahead to the flower beds. “Over there.”

Hilda went back to her mother’s side in order to see what Maven was pointing at. As they got closer, she tried to recognize the species on each flower bed.

“Are those spices?” She asked, noticing that the air in that area had a different aroma to it. Maven snorted.

“Well, that’s one was to look at it. Not all of the herbs here are fit for cooking, though.”

“Oh!” Hilda gasped, remembering what she had read just a few days before in Maven’s book. “Herbs! I know some things about them!”

Maven smiled, but before she could ask the girl to elaborate, Johanna cleared her throat. “Would you two mind if I stayed in one of those benches over there?”

She pointed at one of the two benches in the herb area, and Maven shrugged. “No, it’s fine. Can you take this for me?”

Johanna crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow when Maven tried to hand her her basket. “What is this?”

Maven smiled, and Johanna took it, a little wary that there might be something inside that was related to magic that she wasn’t fit to handle in the slightest. “It’s for later.”

“Well, okay then.” It didn’t feel very heavy, and Johanna figured that the librarian probably wouldn’t hand her anything that could bring her or Hilda harm. “I’ll be right over there if you need me.”

When Hilda nodded, Johanna walked away, turning her head to them every few steps until she was far enough that she couldn’t hear them anymore.

“So.” Maven began. “What do you know about herbs in the craft?”

“They’re kind of like crystals, aren’t they?” Hilda asked, stepping closer to the little fence which protected the flower bed closest to her. “In their usage, I mean. They’re usually used as spell components.”

Maven nodded. “Yes, that’s right. But unlike crystals, you can use herbs to make potions.”

“Really?” She asked, her hands on the fence in front of her but her eyes on her mentor. “Which ones can you use?”

Maven’s hand went to her chin, and she raised her eyes as she thought. “Any of them, as long as they aren’t poisonous. Unless you’re trying to make poison, that is.”

“I… don’t think I will.” Hilda chuckled, and fixed her stare on the plants in front of her. They had a strong green colour, and the leafs seemed to have a sort of relief to it. “What is this one?”

The librarian snorted. “You’ve probably seen this one before. It’s basil.”

“Oh!” The girl breathed deeply, taking the herb’s scent into her lungs. “Yeah, mum cooks with this.”

“It is very useful in spells and potions. I mostly like to use it for rituals related to love or luck, but many witches use it for wealth and protection as well.”

Hilda nodded. “I see.”

She was just about to move to another flower bed when Maven spoke up again.

“How would you use it in a spell?”

Hilda looked at her with a confused, albeit excited gaze. “Me?”

Maven nodded. She had planned to teach Hilda the different components of witchcraft separately, and teach her how to put the together when she knew them. That’s how she had learned, that’s what had worked for her, because she liked to think of magic as a machine that needed each piece to be working perfectly to function. But Hilda wasn’t like this. Maven could feel her magic by standing near her, could read the energy imprint in the things she touched, and Hilda’s magic was so much more organic. It was more like a tree: it had parts, but rather than each needing to be flawless, each part needed to be there for it to work. The components, the energy, the knowledge needed to twist around each other and grow together in her mind in order for her to learn.

Maven only hoped she was fit to teach someone so different from herself.

“Yes. Don’t worry, you don’t need to think of anything too big. Let’s try to begin small. What meaning do you give to basil? I told you the most common ones, but if another feels more right to you, that’s probably the one you should pick.”

Hilda narrowed her eyes at the small sea of green leaves in front of her, and Maven was happy to see the genuine interest in her face. “Good luck sounds about right. Should it be a spell for good luck, then?”

“It is usually good to be precise about your intent when making a spell.” Maven said as she lowered herself down in one knee to breathe in the scent as well. “What would you want to have good luck with?”

“School. She answered after a while. “Good luck in school sounds like a good call.”

“Well then.” Maven smiled, thinking that if Johanna could hear them, she’d probably call Hilda our on her choice. “There are different sorts of spell to be done. The basic ones are usually based on either fire, earth, water or air.”

“What about the advanced ones?” Hilda interrupted her, but this time Maven wasn’t annoyed. This was a sign of enthusiasm, which was precisely what she wanted.

“When a witch can control energy well enough, they don’t need to base their spell on anything but themselves. Don’t think this means all spells of this sort are grand, though. The one to open locks is in this category.”

Hilda giggled, an image forming in her mind of her mentor using this spell to rob a bank, but allowed Maven to continue her explanation. “Basil is associated with fire, so it could be argued that a fire spell would be more effective. But you could choose any type of spell, really.”

She tilted her head to the side, her lips pursing in thought. “How do you make a fire spell?”

“You burn something.” Maven deadpanned, and Hilda burst into laughter. The librarian cracked her serious expression, snorting and then laughing along with her, not being able to hold back.

Amidst their fit of giggles, their gazes fell on Johanna, who was looking at them like they had been possessed and she should run. It only made them laugh even more. At some point, they even forgot what they were laughing about, but the image of the other, panting and red, was enough to keep them giggling.

When Hilda caught her breath, she tried to come back to the exercise. “You mean, using a candle?”

Maven cleared her throat. “Yes, it could be. What sort of candle would you use?”

Hilda thought this through. This exercise was being extremely enjoyable; it was like a trivia, but with no wrong answers, allowing her to explore different possibilities and decide what felt best for her. Like wandering through a forest and finding the little wonders in each path, and finding the trail that worked best for her.

“I read something about colours in witchcraft. It said that blue is connected to intellect, so since it is supposed to help me in school, maybe a blue candle would be the best.”

Maven seemed pleased with her answer. “And how would you incorporate it into the spell?”

Hilda now felt like she had been caught in a hunter’s trap amidst her wanderings in the forest. She tried to think of a way to put the candle and the basil in the spell, but none felt right. She looked up at Maven. She didn’t want to disappoint her, but somehow, she looked like she already knew the conclusion to which she would come.

“Maven, I-“ The librarian nodded, encouraging her to finish her line of thought. “I don’t think I should use a candle for this spell. I would direct my energy to it instead of the basil, and that’s not what I want to do. The basil should be in the center of this spell.”

When she’d begun speaking, Maven had looked encouraging and pleased with her, but by the time Hilda finished, her face had twisted into something that looked more like utter shock.

“Wow.” She said, blinking a few times. “You’re really good at this. Most witches take much longer to be able to feel what should be done in a spell. I’m impressed.”

Hilda smiled at the compliment, feeling her cheeks heat slightly. “So it is better not to use the candle?”

“The candle could work.” Maven answered. “But each new component adds a layer of complexity to the spell. It is important to focus on each component and how it comes together with the rest. Also, it is a spell with a simple goal; it should be simple as well.”

“Okay.” Hilda nodded. “So can I burn the basil?”

“You can. But I would recommend doing something to make the magic understand its goal. Something to make it specific.”

“Like?”

Maven shrugged. “You could chant as you burn it. Or write down your intent in a piece of paper and burn it along with the leaf.”

“Hey!” Hilda got up on her toes as an idea stroke her. “What if I write it in the leaf?”

The librarian smiled as the girl fell back on her heels again, looking pleased with herself. “That sounds very good. In which language would you like to write it?”

Hilda raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“There are witches who believe some languages work better in spells than others. Latin and Gaelic are popular ones, but the witch dialect is usually preferred.”

“Will I learn this dialect?” She twisted her head to the side, thinking of all the obscure symbols she had seen on the tapestries of the hidden library. They looked extremely difficult to understand.

“Only if you want to.”

She thought about it for a second. Maybe one day she’d be more interested in it, but for now it seemed like there was so much more she should be learning first! “Can I write it in English?”

“Sure.” Maven chuckled. “But if you ever need a translation done, do tell me.”

They discussed the finer aspects of the spell after that, like how the sentence would be written (which made Hilda decide on a blue pen. She really did want to incorporate blue into the spell), whether only one leaf would be burnt or many, if she’d make it a general spell or cast it on her school material. There were still other things that would need to be decided, like the best phase of the moon, time of the day and day of the week to cast the spell, but those weren’t so important for the time being: there would be time for them to study that later, when Hilda had better control and could cast the spell safely. The point of the exercise was to make the girl understand how the herb they were studying could come together in a spell, and Maven thought it had been a shining success.

The librarian excused herself for a moment, walking to Johanna and leaving the girl to wonder what was the herb in the next flower bed. Johanna broke into a smile when she saw her coming. She’d probably been watching them the whole time, Maven realized.

“How are things going?”

“Really well.” She smiled back, happy to see that the woman didn’t seem so reluctant now. “I just need to get something here…”

She opened the basket after making sure that the woman wasn’t peaking, and took a small (yet thick) journal from the inside, the cover made of synthetic leather dyed cyan, with a dried flower glued to the center of the front, protected by a cover of clear resin on top of it.

At Johanna’s confused look, Maven only smirked and walked back to her apprentice. She thought she’d made a great job at picking a suitable journal for Hilda. It had personality just like her, and was brighter than the traditional brown leather covers with ancient symbols written in gold. It was natural and unpretentious, just like the girl’s magic.

When she approached, she could see Hilda trying to look at the journal, which was partially hid by Maven’s arm because of the way she held it.

“Thought you shouldn’t cast anything just yet, you have designed a very interesting spell.” She said, and then extended the journal for her to take it. “I think you should write it down. I got you this journal for you to use as your book of spells, if that’s okay.”

Hilda gasped, taking it into her hands and caressing the glass looking plastic that seemed to hold the dry carnation inside of it. She opened it, her eyes hungrily taking the little book in. The pages were simple, white with thin black stripes. She looked up at the librarian.

“Thank you so much! I love it!”

Although she’d never admit it to anyone, Maven blushed. “I’m glad to hear you like it-“

Catching her by surprise, Hilda’s arms slipped around her waist and she squeezed. Her breath seemed to leave her as the strong girl hugged her, both because it had been unexpected and because the embrace was a little too tight. Her hands fluttered uselessly around her, and in the end she managed to run her hand through the girl’s hair in a caressing gesture. Gods, how long had it been since she’d been hugged? A year, at least. Though she still had her extended family, they weren’t very tactile, at least not with her, and Maven was caught by the realization that she wasn’t used to affection anymore.

Before she could let her mind wander further down that particular path, let it remind her how similar Hilda’s touch was to her sister’s, once familiar but now just a distanced memory, she cleared her throat, and the girl drew back.

“Here.” She said, taking a pen from her skirt’s pocket. “Skip two pages, I’ll help you write the spell down.”

They spent quite some time repeating the process. Maven would go over the basic uses of one herb and guide Hilda in her process of understanding it, and then they’d write it down, always skipping one page from one spell to the next as Maven told her to. Once she did begin casting those spells, it would be useful for her to write down the results and anything that had diverged from what was written for future reference.

At last, the sun hit its peak when they had gone over half of herbs in the Garden, and Maven called for a break. They went over to Johanna again, who seemed to have been leisurely drawing something on a sketchbook. Maven picked up her basket and extended her hand for Johanna to take.

“Would you two join me in a picnic?” Maven asked, using her hand that was holding the basket to gesture to the park area just a few meters away.

“That’s what the basket was for?” Johanna asked as she got up. She didn’t take her hand from Maven’s when she was at up on her feet.

“Yes. I’m not such a great cook, though. I only brought sandwiches, I hope that’s okay.”

“That’s perfect, Maven.” Hilda assured her as they followed the main trail until they were surrounded by grass and wildflowers.

“You really must let me cook for you now.” Johanna said, squeezing Maven’s hand, which made her realize that she was still holding on to it.

“Oh!” She gasped as she released it. “Sorry.”

“No matter.” Maven answered. She really wouldn’t complain if Johanna had kept holding her hand for longer.

They found a spot that suited them and settled down, talking happily about their weeks as they ate. Once they were finished Johanna lied down on the grass, and Hilda began pointing out species of wildflowers that she recognized from growing up in the wilderness, asking Maven to explain her how flowers could be used for magic.

After the two of them had discussed all the flowers they could see, they left for the herb flower beds again, leaving Johanna to sketch near some Meadow Buttercups. Maven asked Hilda to try to guess the magical meanings of the herbs they hadn’t gone over yet, using her intuition and a few general tricks: plants that reach for the sun can be associated to healing and joy, poisonous plants are good for cursing, plants with thorns could be used for protective magic, and so on.

By the end of their lesson, Maven was torn between two feelings. It was incredibly satisfactory to see that Hilda was not only learning magic, but also learning to enjoy it. Learning that it is everywhere, in the smallest things, and finding it beautiful. But it was also tearing her heart apart to think that maybe, if she’d tried to understand her sister’s magic better, if she’d tried to teach her like she was teaching Hilda, with patience and willingness to change and adapt, she could have stopped Myra from turning against this part of herself.

She wanted so badly to be angry at her sister, to be able to think of her and see a traitor that had left her alone for so long due to her quest for more, but she really couldn’t. When her sister came to mind, all Maven could remember was a little girl, not understanding the point of all this because the words in the books were two complicated, because she couldn’t see how everything was connected and no one was able to make her understand either. A little girl who began thinking their craft was weak because no one had shown her its full strength.

And every time she looked at Hilda, she saw that little girl. She saw what could have been, if only they had been more patient, more open.

She’d never been given a second chance with Myra; she didn’t even know she needed it until few weeks before. But Hilda was still there, still willing to try, and maybe that would be enough. Maybe with time, effort, and a lot of luck, she’d even be able to talk to her sister again. Not some dark version of her, not a shell of what she had been, but truly her.

And if that happened, she’d give her the tightest damn hug she could manage.

_#_#_#_

The forest was dark, and getting darker still at this time of the day, with the last rays of sun disappearing behind the trees. She had wanted to come earlier- witch or not, it wasn’t quite a good idea to walk in the forest at night, even if this wasn’t a particularly dangerous one, if you had the luck to not meet any aggressive trolls. However, the person (or better yet, the creature) which she wanted to meet lived outside the city walls, a small road trip away from Trolberg, and she’d relied on her cousin driving her there to arrive. Which meant she’d relied on his time schedule as well, which now had her entering a forest on her own after dark, leaving him to wait for her by the roadside.

She’d whispered a chant of protection as she made her way among the trees. She didn’t have any hopes of finding him, not when all she had was a flashlight and a vague memory of where he lived. Whenever they met, she was walking through this part of the forest and he would show up, usually inviting her for tea at his house before asking for her to bring him a book from the library.

That meant, unfortunately, that she didn’t know for certain where he lived, and that she had no better plan than to walk around and hope he would appear. Her mother had known where his house was, and he had had a deep respect for her (which was something big, considering he respected practically no one), but this regard had never really extended to Maven.

Which probably made it even more depressing that he was one of the few people Maven considered her friends.

“I didn’t think I’d see you again.” He spoke suddenly from behind her, making her jump and turn around, her flashlight pointed at him like a weapon. No matter how many times she saw him, he still creeped her out. Though it was hardly her fault for thinking him weird. Very few people were made of wood, after all.

“Woodman.” She said, her chest heaving from the fright. “You thought that refusing to pay your library fine would keep me away?”

He didn’t blink, or smile, or frown. Of course he didn’t. Maven wasn’t sure he even could do any of these things. “I thought you were angry with me.”

“Well, obviously.” She huffed. “You have to understand that asking me to bring you a book from the library and not returning it is, quite literally, theft.”

“If you must put it like that.”

He turned his body away from her, beginning to walk away even as his head still stared at her direction. She doubted she’d ever get used to that.

“No, wait!” Maven called after him, stepping in beside him. “I came because I wanted to ask you for a favor.”

“But you’ve already taken the book back. Quite rudely, I might add.”

“No, it’s not about that.” She rolled her eyes, even when what she really wanted to do was slap her forehead in frustration. “I’m training a girl. Teaching her magic, I mean.”

“I’m listening.” He said, even as he didn’t stop walking. At least his head was facing the same direction as his body now.

“She has an affinity with green magic, and I wanted you to teach her about trees. My mother always said she didn’t know anyone who knew as much about the magic in trees as you do.”

He stopped abruptly. “Flattery will get you nowhere-“

“It’s not flattery. Trust me, it hurts to admit this.” She interrupted through gritted teeth.”

“- but telling me more about it might. Why are you training this girl, again?”

“Myra.” She answered simply, waving her hand in front of her face to make the mosquitos that were gathering go away.

“Ah. The prodigal daughter. I assume you don’t want to talk about it. Will you want to build this apprentice of yours a wand?”

She nodded. “That’s the reason I wanted her to have this lesson with you as soon as possible. If it’s not too much to ask, I’d like for you to decide which sort of wood would work better for her.”

“I will do that” He began, making Maven hold her breath. “If you bring me Leela Ashington’s new CD from the city.”

The librarian groaned. “Really, Woodman?”

“I really don’t think it’s a big price at all.”

“Okay, deal.” She gave her hand for him to shake it, swallowing at the feel of the rough, cold bark he had for a skin.

He followed her out of the woods, stopping at the line where the trees ended, just out of her cousin’s sight.

“One more thing.” He said. “How did you find this girl?”

“Oh, she moved into Trolberg a while ago.” Maven said, cleaning her clothes of the leaves and small sticks that had stuck to it during her short stroll through the woods. “Blue hair, wasn’t too hard to tell.”

She looked up from her clothes abruptly when he made a sound that could be interpreted as a small laugh. “That’s what I thought.”

“What is it?” She asked, suspicious that he may be causing mayhem. “What did you think?”

“That it will be fun.” He answered. “Nothing more.”

Chapter Text

Hilda had her nose all but glued on the window of her mother’s car, a happy smile on her face as she recognized the road they were taking. Not fourty minutes before, she and her mum had met the librarian at a restaurant, so they could have lunch together before taking the short road trip Maven had said they’d need for the day’s class. Now, Maven sat by her mother’s side, with Hilda in the back seat of the little yellow car.

“Are you sure this is the way?” Johanna asked, not missing the fact that this was the road which led to their old home. Or at least, to the place where their old home used to be.

“Yes, quite. Don’t worry, not much longer now.” The librarian answered cooly.

“What are you going to teach me today?” Hilda piped up, squirming excitedly on her seat at the possibility of visiting the forest she grew up in again.

“This lesson will be somewhat of a continuation from our previous one. You’ll learn about trees. Lore, uses in witchcraft, spirits and such.”

“Spirits?!” Both of them spoke up, though Hilda sounded thrilled while Johanna didn’t seem too happy about it.

“Yes, each tree has a spirit. Not only do they have a soul, but they have a guardian spirit which protects each one of them. But I won’t tell you too much yet, that’s for today’s teacher to discuss with you.”

Frowning, Johanna asked while Hilda tilted her head in curiosity.

“You mean there will be another teacher today?”

“Don’t worry.” Maven said as she turned to her. “He’s someone I trust. Well, I trust him not to harm Hilda, at least. And he’s the most knowledgeable person on this subject there is. I thought Hilda would benefit from a lesson with him.”

Johanna simply nodded and returned her full attention to the road ahead of her.

_#_#_#_

Hilda had been ecstatic to find out that they were, indeed, going to the forest she’d grown up in. She rejoiced at noticing how nothing had changed in her short absence. The ground still felt the same beneath her feet, the rustling sound of the leaves a familiar tune. She hadn’t noticed, however, a small contradiction. There supposedly was a witch in a place where they knew no one lived.

Johanna had picked up on that, and decided to mention it while Maven guided them through the trees. The librarian didn’t quite know where the Woodman lived, that’s true, but she’d had the presence of mind to pay him another visit during the week to arrange a meeting place. She hadn’t wanted to risk not finding him for the lesson.

“Maven, I’m not sure we are in the right place. You see, Hilda and I used to live nearby, and there was no other person around for miles! Is this teacher from someplace else?”

Maven shrugged, lifting a branch to open way for them.

“I never said he was a person.”

Both of them turned to the librarian, Johanna with surprise and Hilda with excitement. The girl rocked on the balls of her feet.

“You mean I’ll have a lesson with a creature? What’s he like?”

“Well, if you lived nearby, I imagine you already know him.” She said as shooed a bug away from her jacket. “He doesn’t really keep to himself. I mean, he does, but actually not. Oh, you’ll understand.”

“You don’t do me justice.” The monotone voice came from behind Hilda, and she gasped in happiness as she turned to her old neighbor.

“Woodman!” Hilda said and Johanna groaned, and Maven put her hands on her hips.

“I thought we had agreed to meet by the waterfall.”

“You are complaining that I saved you from having to walk all the way to the waterfall?”

Taking a deep breath, Maven let her hands drop. “You know what, never mind.”

“He is the teacher?” Johanna asked incredulously, looking at the Woodman in a way that left Maven with no doubt that they had met before.

“Yes, I am.” He answered, turning his head to Hilda. “Finally discovered you’re a witch, did you?”

“You knew?” Hilda got closer to him, and the librarian noticed that she didn’t look scared of him at all. Maybe they were even more familiar with each other than she had thought.

The jerk, she thought. He knew she was the one I was going to bring.

“It is hard to miss, you know.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me?” Hilda asked, at the same time that Johanna stepped closer to the librarian.

“You never asked.”

When Hilda began to playfully argue with him, her mother whispered to Maven.

“Are you sure this is a good idea? He has never seemed much of a sage to me.”

Looking into her eyes, Maven could see that her concern was born more out of disbelief than worry, and it made her want to know exactly how their relationship had been like when they lived there. She could bet there were some amazing stories.

“Don’t worry.” Instinctively, Maven closed her hands around one of Johanna’s. “If there’s one thing I can promise you, it’s that there’s more to him than meets the eye.”

_#_#_#_

“Sit here. I’ll just get a book and then we can begin.” The Woodman instructed Hilda as soon as they arrived in his house. The girl smiled, and went to his table as she was told, happy to be there again, but Maven and Johanna struggled with the low ceiling. After hitting her head for the third time, Johanna decided to sit on her knees on the floor.

“Hilda, it it okay if we wait outside?” Maven asked, noticing the other woman’s discomfort. “We won’t be too far away, so you two just shout if you need us.”

“Sure!” Hilda chirped, while Woodman turned his head from the bookshelf to her.

“Won’t you stay for the lesson, little Maven? I thought ‘no one knew as much about the magic in trees as I do’?”

Maven scoffed. “I hardly think that at this you could teach me anything significant to my practice that I don’t know already, Woodman.”

“Fair enough.”

Extending her hand, she silently invited Johanna to come along with her. The woman briefly looked past Maven’s shoulder to the spot where Hilda had sat down and was excitingly waiting for her lesson to begin, drumming her fingers on the table. When she realized her mother was still inside, though, Hilda turned to her and smiled.

“Mum.” She said, seemingly knowing what was going on in her mother’s mind. “It’s okay. I’ll be alright.”

Exhaling deeply, Johanna nodded and took Maven’s hand, getting up from her knees even as she still needed to walk with her back bend to the door. Once they were both out and Maven had closed the door behind them, she brought her arms up in a stretch.

“You don’t need to worry about her.” Maven said. “I wouldn’t have Hilda getting near someone dangerous.”

Bringing her hands down to her side again, Johanna but her lip as she realized the lack of trust that her wariness must have conveyed to the librarian.

“Oh, I know!” She was quick to assure. “Woodman… he kind of gives me the creeps, that’s all. But I know he’s not dangerous.”

Maven snorted. “Well, I can hardly blame you. He is very difficult to get used to.”

She looked around, taking the forest in. What a thriving place it was, so full of colour and life, bursting with creatures, magical or otherwise. It hit Maven then, that for someone whose culture was centered around nature, she spent awfully little time among it. Ever since she’d lost her sister, she’d spent more time looking for magic inside the safety of the library’s walls than in places like this, where magic truly lived. Maybe it was time to change that.

“They probably won’t be needing us for a while.” Maven said. “What do you say we take a stroll? We don’t need to go too far, of course.”

Johanna smiled and clasped her hand around Maven’s again, surprising her. It was beginning to dawn on her that both mother and daughter were quite tactile. Not that she had any complaints about it.

“I’d like that.” Johanna said, instinctively taking a step forward.

The librarian followed her as she wandered around the trees; considering Johanna had lived around the place for so long, she trusted the woman to know where she was going. They went in silence for a while, pointing out the different insects and birds they saw along the way.

“What is he?” Johanna asked eventually, when they had stopped to count the rings on the trunk of a fallen tree. “Woodman, I mean. Are there, you know, others of him?”

Maven looked up from the stump to see Johanna looking at her with genuine curiosity in her face.

“I’m not sure.” She admitted. “He will tell a different story to anyone who asks. If he says anything at all, that is. I suppose the most trustworthy version is the one he told my mother; he was fond of her.”

Maven’s eyes had gained a glassy quality, making it seem like she had gotten lost in a memory, so Johanna was reluctant to say anything and break whatever line of thought she was having. She didn’t have to say anything, though. Maven began to tell the story without further prompting.

“It is said that every tree has a spirit in them. They are not like the types of creature who protect or live on the tree, like faeries. It’s more like a soul, you could say. They can’t leave their tree or do anything, so it’s quite a lonely life; however, there are still people who try to bond with those spirits through taking care of and spending time near the tree, and the more a spirit is connected to someone, the less connected it is to its tree. If by the time the physical part of the tree dies, the spirit is completely in tune with someone, they will be able to make another physical form for themselves, in order to continue life with their friend. My mother told me Woodman is this kind of spirit. His tree was struck by lightning, but he had already completely bonded with someone by the time it happened.”

Blinking, Johanna wrapped her hands around her torso, taking that story in as her hair swayed with the cool wind that ran through the forest.

“Oh, wow.” She whispered. “I didn’t know it was so complex.”

Maven smiled shyly at Johanna, just a small lift of the corners of her lips. “Mum thought the person who befriended him was from our family. It would explain why he seems not to mind us.”

“And would there happen to be an explanation as to why he will just…” She made an exasperated gesture with her hands. “Walks into people’s houses?”

Maven chuckled, imagining a frustrated Johanna having her house invaded by her friend. At least Hilda seemed to like him.

“Nah.” She said as she stepped away from the stump, silently inviting the other woman to continue their stroll. “He’s just a jerk.”

_#_#_#_

The lesson lasted for the most part of the afternoon, stretching itself until the beginning of the evening, being interrupted only once when the Woodman called Maven and Johanna to his house so they could all have a snack break together. Luckily, Maven had remembered to bring some food. The kind that Woodman ate was positively freaky.

The librarian had barely noticed the time flying, entertained as she was by Johanna and her stories about the time when she’d lived nearby. Hilda seemed to have had a similar experience. By the time the Woodman declared the lesson was over, she was shining with fascination over all the new knowledge, and as she and Johanna walked to the car, she told her mother about all her favourite moments of the lesson.

Maven had stayed behind, and asked for them to wait for her in the car. There was still one last thing she had to talk to him about.

“She’s a gifted witch.” The Woodman said as he appeared behind her when she was watching mother and daughter go back to the car. “But are you sure she’s enough to help you?”

“She’s still raw.” The librarian turned to him, squaring her shoulders. “A little immature. But she’s the only hope I have.”

“Best of luck, then.” The two of them looked at each other’s eyes for moments before Maven realized that she was not going to be invited in.

“So?” She pressed. “What did you think of her?”

“I told you. She’s gifted.”

Maven sighed deeply, asking her ancestors to give her patience. “I was hoping you’d give me some information more helpful than that.”

The Woodman seemed to think for a while. “Well, she’s definitely a green witch like you suspected. That’s something you should explore. Oh, and poplar.”

The librarian perked up. “What was that?”

“Poplar. You wanted to know which wood would make a good wand for her. She’d do well with poplar.”

The librarian rubbed her chin, trying to remember where she had put the address of the wand maker from Oslo. The last one her family had ordered from him had been Myra’s, a thin object made from holly wood, with a single feather tied by a string to it and a piece of fluorite at the bottom. It had been so long that Maven would probably have some trouble finding his contact information again.

She was so engrossed in thinking about what she’d ask for in her apprentice’s wand that she almost startled when the Woodman called her name.

“Maven.” He said, and she blinked and focused on him. “I hope this ends well for you. Truly, I do.”

She exhaled, a small smile blooming on her face. Those small moments were always significant, moments when someone who always acted like they didn’t care showed that they actually did, and she always treasured them.

“Thank you, Woodman. You are a very good friend when you want to be.”

“Don’t get used to it. I don’t care for the effort it requires.” And just like that he retreated back into his house and closed his door, leaving Maven to roll her eyes and and walk away from the forest, taking the last beams of daylight with her.

Chapter Text

The day was sunny with a light breeze, the kind of weather that made people joyous, more likely to do things to please others. That served Frida perfectly: the happier people were, the more inclined they were to buy her cookies.

She stopped in front of a yellow door, taking the time to straighten her uniform before knocking. As soon as the door was open, she began her speech with a smile on her lips.

“Good morning! My name is Frida, and I’m here in the name of the Sparrow Scouts. Would you be interested in-”

As soon as she looked up to make eye contact with her potential buyer, the carefully rehearsed words got stuck on her throat. With a look of disdain on her face, the marra who had tormented David stood at the doorway. Frida recognized her, and she knew the marra had recognized her too.

“Get on with it.” She said, her voice the same emotionless sound that Frida remembered it to be. Struck as she was by the shock, she briefly considered asking one of the other Sparrow Scouts who were accompanying her that day to speak for her, but none of them felt as comfortable doing the talking. Besides, Frida didn’t want to let her think she’d scared her.

As soon as that sale was done, though (and who would have thought that nightmare spirits enjoyed scout cookies?), Frida did excuse herself, telling the other scouts that she wasn’t feeling all too well and that she’d better go home for the day. In reality, she ran as fast as her legs would take her to Hilda’s house.

Hilda hadn’t said much about what was going on between her and the librarian. She and David did know that she was being trained in witchcraft, but when they asked her what that had to do with the Marra, and why the librarian was interested in her becoming a witch, she’d always say that it wasn’t her secret to tell. The two friends respected that. They knew Hilda trusted them and wanted to tell them, but if she felt like she couldn’t, then they’d
respect it.

But as little as she knew about the matter, she was sure she’d just found out relevant information: where the Marra lived.

_#_#_#_

As soon as she’d seen Frida out of the house, Hilda turned to her mum. Johanna had silently heard the conversation between the two girls, looking at the ground while Frida told them what she had seen. Before she even closed the door, Johanna knew what Hilda wanted, and Hilda knew just as well that her mother was aware of it.

“Mum.” She said, walking closer with Twig at her heels. “I need your help.”

Sighing, Johanna let herself fall to the couch, her torso leaning forward as she supported her forearms on her tights. Even though she knew she wouldn’t be able to deny Hilda her aid, she still felt like she should try to talk some sense into her.

“Hilda… it’s dangerous.” She argued. “Besides, I can’t just break in.”

“But I’m not asking you to!” Sitting down next to her mum, she touched her back in an attempt to ease Johanna into agreeing with her. “You could just knock and… ask if they have sugar!”

Johanna lifted an eyebrow, skeptical. “Sugar?”

“Yeah! Just go over there with an excuse to talk. You could go during school hours. Even the marra needs to go to school.” Hilda rubbed her chin. “Or at least I think they do.”

Sighing, Johanna leaned back against the back of the couch, evaluating her situation. She had no experience with magic except for that which she got from Hilda’s adventurers. If there was anything dangerous in the house, she would not be able to deal with it. And for the same reason, she might not even be able to discern what would be useful for them or not.

While she was thinking about the matter, with Hilda looking expectantly at her, she felt something tickle her ear. Turning her gaze to her right to see what it was, she realized that the two of them hadn’t been alone in the living room.

“I could go with you” Alfur said, his hand still resting on her earlobe, where he’d touched her to call for her attention. “With the marra away, it shouldn’t be too hard to look around for information”

Hilda took the cue to clasp her hands in front of her heart in a pleading gesture, leaning towards her mother. “Please, mum. You two could really find something useful there. Just think about how happy Maven will if you bring her something about the marra that she doesn’t know yet…”

Sighing audibly, Johanna let her shoulders drop. “Fine. I’ll go tomorrow, while you are at school.”

“Thank you so much!” Hilda threw herself on her mother’s lap and hugged her, feeling Johanna wrap her arms around her and return the embrace. “You’re the best.”

_#_#_#_

Johanna shifted her weight anxiously from foot to foot, trying to squash the second thoughts she was having. She needed to do this for Hilda. If they could find anything that would make the spell easier, or maybe safer, then she had to take it.

“Ready?” She asked Alfur, who was holding to the neck of her sweater. When he gave her a nod, she raised her hand and knocked three times on the yellow door. Just when she was beginning to think there was no one home, a dark haired woman answered.

“Good morning!” She said with a smile. It put Johanna more at ease - at least the woman didn’t look like she was going to attack her or morph into a nightmare spirit herself. “May I help you?”

“Yes, actually! I’m new to the neighborhood, and I was wondering if we could get to know each other a little better.” She went through her memorized speech, which she’d been repeating to herself all over the walk to the house. Technically, it wasn’t a lie, and she felt happy about how natural she had sounded.

“How lovely!” The woman exclaimed while she moved away from the door frame to allow Johanna in. “Of course, my dear, of course. i was just about to have some tea, so why don’t you seat down while I put the kettle on?”

As soon as she had turned her back to her, Johanna furtively looked around for a place to drop Alfur at. He pointed to a coat hanger, from where she imagined he could slide all the way down to the floor or hop onto some other furniture. They had already agreed that if Alfur finished his search while Johanna was still in the house, he would come right back to her: but if not, Johanna would be waiting for him outside, by the corner of the block.

With this matter settled, Johanna soon was sitting down with the woman in a small table out on the back garden, where she kept cages of domestic birds. She was amazed at first by the vibrant colours of the animals, certain that many of them weren’t from their country, but then amazement gave way to distraughtness when they began singing at the top of their lungs. It sounded more like a cry for help than a melody, and Johanna had to stop herself from opening the cages of her hostess’s pets.

While the tea was being made, the woman, who had introduced herself as Loren Holt, asked her basic questions about how long she’d been living in Trolberg and what had been the reason for her coming to the town. She’d had to think fast to come up with an answer other than “house smashed by giants”, but overall it had been pleasant enough conversation.

Finally, as they sat down with steaming cups of mint tea, Johanna felt like she could begin digging for clues. It was very easy to find out the Loren was married and with a kid, who were both away at the moment. She could only imagine that it had been the daughter who opened the door to Frida, so she used the excuse of being a mother as well to show an interest in her.

Jade was a lovely girl, Loren said. She had many friends and was always ready to help people. She did well in school and still found time for family. As her mother described her, Johanna began to wonder if that was really the person she was looking for. A girl like that couldn’t possibly be a nightmare spirit, could she?

“She sounds delightful. You must be really proud.”

“I am” Loren nodded with a smile on her face.

“If that’s okay, could I see a picture of her?”

“Of course!” She said, getting up and asking for Johanna to wait for a second. Walking inside the house, she soon returned with a portrait on her hands.

“Here it is.” Johanna took the frame from her hands, its intricate metal pattern feeling cold under her fingertips. “It’s a recent family portrait.”

The girl in the middle, standing between two adults, looked exactly like Hilda had described. Blond pigtails, pale skin, and a frown on her face. Jade didn’t look at all happy to be there, and she seemed obviously misplaced; both her parents had shining smiles on their faces. Loren’s husband was a tall man with brown skin and dark hair, and dimples that appeared with his smile.

Johanna frowned. Jade looked nothing like them. She could have inherited her skin colour from her mother, but her hair colour was still completely different from what one would expect from the child of that couple. Not only that, but also her facial characteristics weren’t present on her parents either. She supposed she could have inherited her father’s lips, but the resemblance ended there.

“Forgive me, I don’t mean to be rude, but is Jade adopted?” Johanna asked, trying her best to sound curious and not suspicious. “My Hilda is adopted too.”

“Adopted?” Loren chuckled. “Oh, no! She’s our very blood.”

Biting her bottom lip, Johanna ran her fingers gently across the thin glass that protected the picture. “Are her grandparents blond, then?”

Loren laughter again, amused at the thought. “They’re most certainly not.”

It didn’t make much sense. Jade could have dyed her hair, but if that was the case, then certainly her mother would have mentioned it upon noticing Johanna’s confusion, and it still didn’t explain why they didn’t look alike. Johanna’s swallows back a sigh. This was proving to be trickier than she’d thought it would be. Besides, she realized she was being very indelicate to Loren.

“I’m sorry for all those questions, Mrs. Holt.” She apologized, giving the woman the picture back. “I was just… under the impression that she didn’t look much like you.”

Before Johanna could add that now she could see the resemblance, Loren fixed her stare on her, hard and unyielding, unlike the softness her eyes had carried throughout their meeting until that point. To Johanna’s horror, a strand of steam began to rise from her head.

“Well, you can’t have taken a good look.” Her voice was an octave lower than usual, and she spoke in a monotone. “She looks exactly like us.”

Then, the smoke suddenly stopped rising and she blinked a few times, looking like her normal self when she opened her eyes again.

“Oh, look at that!” She squeaked. “I didn’t even bring any scones!”

Johanna watched Loren walk back into her house, pressing herself against the back of her chair and breathing heavily due to the fright. Whatever was happening in this house, it was worse than she’d imagined.

_#_#_#_

“Smoke you say? That’s a typical sign of enchantment, you know.”

“Enchantment?” Hilda squealed as she sat in the couch next to Alfur.

In the end, the elf had finished his search sooner than Johanna, who’d stayed and made small talk with mrs. Holt for a long while, even if she was not fully recovered from what had happened. When she noticed Alfur climbing the table, she politely excused herself, thanking Loren for the time and saying she had a meeting to get to.

Now that Hilda was back from school, she had asked Johanna to tell her everything that happened. She’d said about the portrait, the girl’s unhappiness, the nonexistent resemblance between them, and she’d finally gotten to Loren’s reaction when she pointed that out. Alfur had been trying to get a word since Johanna had began her story, and now that he had a chance to speak, he took it.

“It’s what I’ve been trying to say!” He exclaimed. “The girl’s room is packed with information on magic. Sheets and more sheets of paper with spells, and most of them on manipulation! I would bet my favorite pen, and do realize that I do not sniff at my favorite pen, that this marra put a spell on that couple to convince them that she is their daughter!”

Hilda gasped quietly while Johanna frowned, astonished at the possibility. It was such an evil thing to do that she couldn’t bring herself to believe that a teenager would do it. Still, it made sense. There had been no pictures of Jade in the house in which she didn’t have the same age as she did now. Besides, it would explain why Loren had such a positive view of her when everything indicated she wasn’t that outstanding at all.

“But where would her actual parents be, then?” Johanna asked, pacing around the kitchen while she thought. “Why wouldn’t she be with them? If she can make someone believe she’s their daughter, surely she could get away with the marra activity.”

“Maybe she didn’t want to do this to them. Enchantment can have harmful consequences to the bespelled.” Alfur suggested.

“Maybe she ran away!” Said Hilda. “Like Myra. Maven told me once that her sister left them because of ‘opposing ideas’, whatever that means. Maybe it was the same with Jade.”

Johanna stopped her pacing suddenly, her back perfectly straight as she realized how important this information could be.

“Maven.” She said, walking to the small wooden table near the sofa, where their telephone was. “She needs to know.”

_#_#_#_

Maven had been checking out books when her cellphone rang. It took her some time to pick up, as she couldn’t simply drop the task and leave the patron in front of her waiting for his books, but she sped her pace up when she saw who was calling.

As soon as the young boy was gone with his books, leaving her alone in the circulation desk, she took the phone to her ears with anticipation and a small smile pulling on her lips. She’d barely had time to say hello before Johanna spoke, in a secretive and worried voice.

“Maven, there’s something you need to know.”

Chapter Text

Johanna’s call with Maven had ended rather abruptly. As soon as she’d explained what happened, Maven had announced she was on her way to their house and hung up on her. Johanna wasn’t upset, though. The librarian had sounded awfully unsettled, and she knew she hadn’t meant to be rude.

She arrived barely half an hour later, panting and carrying a bag with her.

“Sorry for taking so long.” She said, not even bothering to greet her apprentice and her mother. “I had to make sure I didn’t forget to bring anything over. But I think we can begin now, and right away.”

“Begin what?” Hilda exclaimed, coming over to the table where Maven had dropped her bag at. “What are all these things? What’s happening?”

Realizing she might be scaring the two of them, the librarian took a deep breath and willed herself to calm down. No sense in making them worried as well.

“I realize that we were not supposed to have a lesson today, but I do consider this to be urgent. I’m going to teach you about warding.”

Hilda reached for the things the librarian had brought. On her first glance, she found books and crystals. Looking more closely, she could see bundles of herbs as well. “And what’s that?”

“Exactly what it sounds like.” The librarian said as she unclasped her cape from around her shoulders and carefully folded it, putting it inside her bag. “Protecting yourself from malicious magic and bad energy.”

From amidst the books, Maven pulled a thin iron chain, delicate enough that you wouldn’t be able to tell that it was not silver if you didn’t look closely. Connected to it was a pendant about the size of a paper clip, a transparent stone with slashes of black inside. She extended her hand to Johanna, who only looked at it with a confused frown.

“Take it.” Maven clarified. “I won’t be able to teach you to cast a ward over yourself, but this will protect you.”

“Protect me?” Johanna gasped, putting a hand on the librarian’s arm. “Maven, what’s going on?”

Maven sighed, using her free hand to gently detach Johanna’s fingers from her arm, and holding the woman’s palm up so she could drop the necklace on it. On her haste, she had failed to notice that the two of them might have not interpreted the situation like she had.

“May I sit down?” She asked, and with Johanna’s nod she pulled herself a chair from the table, being followed by both Hilda and Johanna.

“Look.” She began. “What you told me is very worrying. I believed that the marra’s powers didn’t go beyond that which we had already seen. Nightmares, floating, incorporeal travel… but now it seems it goes much deeper. If they can cast the sort of spell needed to convince a couple that one is their daughter, their magic is very, very strong.”

“But I’ve seen some books on manipulation at the library! Witches can cast this sort of spell too, can’t we?” Hilda asked, though her eyes were locked on the bag. She was clearly itching to see what was inside.

Maven rubbed her temples, already feeling a headache forming. “It’s not so much that the enchantment is difficult, or rare. But the marra firmly believe that witches are weak, you see.”

The sentence was left hanging, and Maven’s eyes gained a glassy quality. Hilda wanted to ask her to continue, but the librarian looked miserable suddenly. She looked lost somewhere in her mind.

“So if the marra think witches are weak.” Johanna said as softly as she could, not missing the fact that there was something happening inside Maven’s head. “That might mean that they have stronger magic.”

Maven shook her head, snapping herself out of it. “Yes, exactly. Thus the need to protect you. If they ever find out about you trying to help me, the two of you will need to be safe.”

The librarian gestured with her head towards Johanna. “Put it on. It’s tourmalized quartz. The black tourmaline protects you, and the clear quartz intensifies the tourmaline’s effects. The chain is iron. It’s effective against faeries, but I’m not certain about the marra.”

Turning her gaze to Hilda, she made sure the girl was looking at her in the eyes before speaking. “I’m going to teach you how to cast an energy ward over yourself. If that’s okay with you, please go to your room - or to wherever we can have our lesson today - and ground. I’ll cleanse your house to make sure there’s no dark magic already inside while you do it.”

Hilda nodded and went quickly to her room, leaving Maven searching for something inside her bag.

“Would you mind opening the windows?” She asked Johanna, who, she realized, was now wearing the necklace. “I’m going to need to burn some herbs.”

Johanna moved to the kitchen and living room windows, and Maven took a bundle of sweetgrass and rosemary from her bag. To Johanna’s surprise, the librarian instantly lit a flame on the top of her finger, floating just above her fingertip, looking like it wasn’t burning her at all. If Maven could do that and was still considered weak by the marra, then Johanna could understand why she dreaded to think about what the nightmare spirits were capable of.

As she brought the flame to the bundle, sweet smelling smoke began to rise from it. Johanna took a deep breath, letting the purifying scent fill her lungs.

“You may want to sit down, or go to your room.” Maven said. “This may take a while.”

_#_#_#_

The librarian waved the bundle through every room of the house, paying attention to all the nooks and crannies, where she knew dark energy could go to hide if she didn’t cleanse them, all the while repeating a cleansing chant in witches’s language. When she was finished, the air felt much lighter, even though she hadn’t found any signs of evil magic in the house.

She asked Johanna for a plastic bag to put the burnt remains of her herbs, planning on burying them on her garden when she went back home, and then joined Hilda. The girl was sitting cross legged on the floor of her bedroom, her hands on her tights.

Looking around, Maven could see that the room had a lot of personality. Trinkets and toys filled her shelves, as well as some books. She had drawings and pictures of the wilderness hanging from her wall and her cork board, and the room was filled with natural light. Lightly tapping on the door, so as to not be rude nor startle her, Maven stepped inside when Hilda answered with a brief “come in.”

Maven sat down on the beige carpet in front of her, happy to see she looked extremely concentrated, and only opened her eyes when her teacher was also on the floor.

“Right now we’re going to learn how to raise a ward over yourself. Can you feel the energy that is around you?”

Hilda frowned, checking in with her surroundings, before nodding.

“What we need to do is bring some of this energy over you to make a wall. Visualize it. Some people like to imagine a bubble surrounding themselves. Others like to imagine some sort of physical barrier. Find what works for you.”

While her apprentice concentrated on her task, Maven worked on her own wards. Her mother had taught her how to put them up when she was very young and had just began working with magic. Ever since then, she’d checked in with them every night and every morning, searching for weaknesses and cracks, and always strengthening it again when she found them.

She visualized her wards as a beam of light that sprouted from her crown, almost an extension of her spine, and then fell over her like a veil. She made sure that it covered all of her, front, back, and even under her feet, focusing most of her energy on the places where her barrier felt more delicate.

A soft sigh of frustration broke through Maven’s concentration, making her blink her eyes open. Hilda was staring at her hands, looking disgruntled.

“It’s not working.” She said when she realized Maven was looking at her. “What am I doing wrong?”

“You’re probably not doing anything wrong.” Maven assured her as she put her hand inside her skirt’s pocket, feeling the smooth, cold rock inside. “Like all spellwork, warding takes practice. Trial and error.”

Following her teacher’s hand with her eyes, Hilda watched as a dark stone came out of her pocket. Maven raised it near Hilda’s eyes, and the girl squinted at it. It was no bigger than the palm of her hand, and completely black, like a deep ocean at midnight. If she didn’t know any better, she would have thought it to be a simple pebble.

“This” Maven said. “Is Onix. It’s a protective stone. You might find it easier if you simply redirect its energy towards your wards.”

Hilda took the crystal into her own hands, feeling it hum under her touch. A month ago she would have been scared by it, but as she learned more and became more sensitive, the world around her seemed to talk to her at all times. She only hoped this stone would help her with the task at hand.

It took her a few more minutes, but finally Maven felt wards forming around her apprentice. With her mind’s eye, Maven saw ribbons sprouting from her hands and from the onix, surrounding her and locking her inside their protection.

“Did I make it?” Hilda asked excitedly, feeling that she’d succeeded.

The librarian nodded. “It’s a very good start. Now we need to work on the weaknesses.”

Tilting her head to the side, Hilda frowned. “Weaknesses?”

“You forgot to extend the protection over your head, and possibly under yourself as well. Try to check for spots where there is less strength in your energy.”

As Hilda did as she was instructed, the invisible ribbons intertwined over her head, and tightened where she thought they needed to. Maven let her work on it for as long as she needed, but she didn’t take very long. Soon the girl stopped squinting at the stone and looked up at the librarian.

“What about now?”

“Seems good enough.” Maven said, gathering a ball of energy on her hands. She made sure to put enough power into it that it gained a smoky white colour, no longer invisible like most of the work they’d done had been. It made Hilda gasp.

“May I test your wards?” When Hilda nodded, still looking at the ball of magic on Maven’s hands, she threw it on her shield. The young witch startled as her invisible barrier absorbed the attack, leaving her unscathed.

“Wow!” She cried out, her eyes wide with amazement. “That’s so cool!”

“It will be very useful.” Maven explained with pride at her apprentice’s success making her heart feel a little warmer than usual. “It can absorb curses and hexes, not to mention psychic attacks. A strong ward can also protect you from a variety of spirits. But i do think I should warn you that it does nothing against physical harm.”

Hilda sighed and deflated a little. “Well, there goes my hopes for mum finally allowing me to learn how to launch fireworks.”

_#_#_#_

Over the course of the evening, Hilda watched Maven use more magic than she had in all their other lessons combined. Their classes normally revolved around theory and energy work, so there hadn’t been many opportunities to watch the witch at her specialty. But that day, Hilda was thrilled to see how naturally magic came to her mentor, how masterfully she tamed it and shaped it to her will. Even if she’d done so in a somewhat frazzled state.

After the two of them had become satisfied with their wards, Maven pulled a white chalk from her bag, and to Hilda and Johanna’s amazement, a wand from her pocket. It was a straight piece of lilac wood with a tip of selenite, and runes carved into it. She’d read about witches’s wands before, but never having seen them in real life, she had to hold herself back not to touch it while Maven was concentrating on spellwork.

With the chalk, she drew symbols (protective sigils, as she’d called them) on the floor of every doorway and every windowsill of their apartment. As she finished drawing them, she’d stand up and point her wand to the sigils, repeating the motion as if drawing them again on the air. As she did so, the sigils lit up with purple light and promptly disappeared, leaving nothing but a sight aura of magic behind.

When she was done, she walked back to the table and pulled more crystals from inside her bag. She gave them to Johanna, who found herself looking at eight small pieces of stone. Half of them were white with silvery streaks, and the other half was black.

“These are howlites and onixes. Put one of each in the corners of the house.” Maven said. “They will protect you from some forms of attack.”

While Johanna was still inspecting the crystals, the librarian began closing her bag, getting ready to go. “The two of you should be safe like this. Remember, if any of your house plants die, tell me. They might have absorbed a curse for you.”

Mother and daughter exchanged a look as they watched Maven put the strap on her shoulder and head to the door. Neither of them wanted to let her go away to her house, alone, while she looked so tense.

“Is there anything else I can do for you?” She asked them, her hand already close to the doorknob.

“Actually, yes.” Johanna rubbed the back of her neck, proceeding when Hilda smiled at her. “Why don’t you stay for dinner?”

Maven’s eyes widened almost comically, her arm dropping to her side. “You don’t need to…”

“Oh, please stay!” Hilda chirped. “Mum is a great cook. You’ll love it!”

“I don’t doubt it.” Maven was quick to assure, and Johanna would have laughed at the panic on her face if she didn’t know that the librarian truly was afraid of having offended her. “I just mean I don’t want to overstay my welcome.”

Johanna shook her head fondly, taking a few steps towards the witch. “You are not overstaying your welcome. Come on, I’ll make you some dinner. I owed you a meal, anyway.”

The corners of Maven’s mouth lifted only slightly, in a way that if they had blinked they might have missed it, but she couldn’t hide the rosy blush that took over her cheeks.

“Only if you allow me to do the dishes.”

Chapter Text

“I’m just saying it’s really weird that they call it ‘The Hundred Years’ War’ if it didn’t really last a hundred years.”

Frida sighed, walking straight to the history session of the library. The three of them still had their bags and their school uniforms, having decided to study at Trolberg’s public library right after they left school.

“Because ‘The Hundred and Sixteen Years’ War’ is kind of a mouthful, don’t you think?” She answered without looking at her friend. “Besides, we’re not even studying that. Where’d you get that from?”

“I saw it on TV yesterday.” Hilda shrugged, and David nodded along with her.

“It’s a misleading name.”

“Anyway.” Frida tried to bring their attention back to the matter at hand before they could go back to that subject. “I don’t know about you, but I want to take as many notes as I can today. There’s this amazing book on the era we’re studying, but we can’t take it home, unfortunately.”

“You could make a copy?” David suggested.

“I might if I don’t finish in time. So let’s get started right away.” She sat down at one of the library’s long tables, putting her backpack on the seat beside her. Her friends joined her and soon they were all studiously getting ready for their exam.

Hilda had picked a relatively new textbook and had set out to answering as many questions as she could, searching through the pages when she didn’t know how to do the exercise and occasionally asking Frida when that also didn’t work.

She was already beginning to get tired and considering suggesting a little break when the librarian walked by their table, pushing the library cart in front of her. Her shoulders were hunched forwards and she didn’t pay much attention to her surroundings, something Hilda realized when the librarian didn’t notice she was there.

“Maven!” She called, low enough for it to be acceptable in a library but loud enough that she was heard. “Good afternoon! How are you doing?”

Maven stopped walking and turned to her, giving her a small, tired looking smile.

“Hey there, Hilda.” The other two kids stopped their studying when they realized who Hilda was talking to. She had grey circles under her eyes, which combined with her pale skin gave her a somewhat ghostly appearance. “I’m… fine.”

Hilda frowned. “You don’t look like it.”

Maven grimaced. She felt like collapsing to the floor at any instant, but she’d hoped the girl wouldn’t notice. She felt that she should have known that her apprentice was smarter than that.

“Can I talk to you in my office? I promise I won’t keep you for long.”

Hilda first looked at her friends for a sign that it was okay for her to go. David shrugged, and Frida nodded in a solemn manner. She got up then, not bothering to close the textbook since she planned on studying more once she came back. After smiling reassuringly at the librarian, she followed her into the office.

It was a small room on the first floor of the library, near the circulation desk. Having left the book trolley behind, Maven opened the door to allow Hilda in. She had a desk with paperwork neatly stacked on it, and a water filter in one of the corners. Hanging on the wall, there was a magnetic board filled with what looked to be reminders written by herself and fliers of activities the library had or would host. It was overall a emotionless place, and the only personal touches Hilda noticed were a picture of Freyja on the desk and a pot with violets by the window sill of the office’s tiny window.

“Sorry for taking you away from your studying.” She said when they were inside, closing the door behind them. She poured herself a glass of water from the filter, and wordlessly offered it to Hilda. When the girl declined, shaking her head, she took a sip.

“Don’t worry about it. So there is something bothering you?” The question was superfluous. Of course there was something bothering her, there had been ever since her sister had left and had only gotten worse recently. The true question to be asked was ‘why do you look like a wreck?’, but Hilda was far too polite to say that.

Maven sighed, and then swallowed what was left of her water.

“I’ve been staying up all night recently.” She said, and Hilda could all but feel the exhaustion on her voice. “I’ve been pushing my magic as far as I can to find where Myra is staying. She has got to be living somewhere in Trolberg. If only I could find her…”

“You would be able to talk to her.” Hilda finished, coming to understand the situation. “It would make things easier.”

“It might.” Truth be told, it didn’t matter if it helped them or not. Maven just wanted to be able to see her sister and know that she was being taken care of. Thus why she was using her abilities to magically search into every house, looking for signs of her sister’s energy imprint. It was a tiresome process, and many times she’d been led the wrong way by clues of Myra’s presence in houses she had haunted. It was hard to say when she would manage to finish, and with the luck she was having, Myra would probably be at the last house she would check.

“But you really shouldn’t be doing this to yourself, you know.” The librarian blinked, surprised at her words. Hilda continued speaking. “It’s really not healthy to you. Truly, you’d benefit from getting some regular sleep. And I bet using too much magic is not helping you out either.”

“I’m not that tired.” Maven lied stubbornly, even as her bones ached with fatigue. “I’ll be okay. At least until I find her.”

“Well, you won’t find her if you work yourself to death!”

The librarian was tempted to be angry at her apprentice. She was an adult, and perfectly able to take care of herself without a little girl telling her what to do. But the warning seemed to come from a place of such genuine concern that she couldn’t bring herself to be mad. Though she had to admit that it was amusing to receive this advice from the girl who had accepted to be tormented by the marra solely to help a friend.

“We’ll discover a way.” Hilda said gently. “It will be fine, I promise. Just take care, okay?”

Surprisingly, Maven found herself nodding. “Okay.”

“Maybe I could try to help you with whatever spell you’ve been doing to track her down?” She suggested. “Two witches have got to work better than one.”

The librarian smiled at her eagerness, but denied. “It’s not the type of thing you should be doing just yet. I don’t you to pressure your magic into something it’s not ready for. Still, thank you for offering.”

“That’s what friends are for.” She reached out to touch Maven’s shoulder, and this time Maven didn’t startle. She found she was getting quite used to Hilda’s tactile nature. “I guess I’ll get back to my studying, then. See you Saturday?”

“Yes, I'll stop by your house on our usual time.” When Hilda had let her hand fall to her side again, Maven opened the door for the girl. “Send my regards to your mother.”

“I will! And you take care of yourself, Mave!”

The librarian scrunched her nose at the nickname, but before she could say anything, Hilda was already out of sight, probably hidden by one of the gigantic bookshelves. She chuckled and locked the office’s door again, ready to get back to her tasks.

“What a funny little girl.”

_#_#_#_

“I’m very worried for her, Alfur. I’m not so sure that she will stop looking.” Hilda admitted, looking at the ceiling. The lights in her room were already off, and she was lying on her bed, snuggling under the blankets as she talked to her friend.

“That could cause a problem.” Alfur, who was listening to her from the shelf, answered. “There’s only so much magic a witch can do before running out of strength. If that happens, she’ll be vulnerable for quite some time. And it will only be worse if she’s not taking care of her physical body.”

Hilda sighed, turning into her side. She’d been able to keep her worries at bay during the day, even going so far as telling her mother that the librarian was fine when she asked. But now, left alone with her thoughts, she was beginning to get nervous again. So she’d called Alfur to talk to her. His solutions weren’t always the best, but he never failed to make her feel better. He made her feel that he had her back.

“I want to help, but I don’t know how.” She said, her mind going back to Maven’s red eyes and slumped posture.

“You’ve already done enough, I’m sure she appreciated having you to talk to. But tell me again, what does this Myra look like?”

“Not very tall. Long dark hair, but Maven says it was lilac once. She was wearing a fur lined jacket and a skirt when I saw her in the marra’s camp. Why the question?”

Alfur scratched his chin, the cogs in his brain turning as he contemplated something that might just work.

“Just wanted to know. Now you should get some rest yourself.” Before mum hears us talking and comes here to tell you to sleep, he thought. Hilda seemed to accept the suggestion, and soon the elf heard her breathing deepen.

He ran back inside the clock which he used as his room and put a sheet of paper in front of him. As soon as he was finished, he’d leave the house to find the closest elf post station, and hopefully he’d be back before Hilda was awake.

Knowing there was no time to lose, he picked a pen up and began his letter.

“Dear Great Raven,

Hilda needs your help.”

Chapter Text

Maven walked serenely with Hilda at her side. A feeling of lighthearted contentment washed over her, turning her steps light and her breathing easy. They’d gotten lucky with the weather - it had been sunny with a gentle breeze since early morning, and it was getting warmer by the minute. Although Maven generally prefered colder weathers, that day it fit her perfectly, in a way that she didn’t even resent having to forgo her comfortable pants and sweaters. Instead, she was wearing a purple summer dress that reached just past her knees and grey flats that she was reasonably sure hadn’t gotten out of her house for a whole year. A black wide-brimmed hat and a layer of sunscreen protected her from the sun. Summer was definitely here.

On top of that, her good mood was also due to her being very nearly alone with Hilda. When Maven showed up at her house, Johanna had confessed that she had a meeting with a client to attend, and asked her if there was any problem in leaving her to take care of Hilda by herself. It was a shame not to have Johanna’s company, but she would be lying if she said she wasn't happy that the woman finally trusted her enough to know she wouldn’t let harm come to her daughter. Their one other companion was Alfur, who seemed to have shown interest in that day’s lesson, probably because of the location.

Hilda was also wearing more appropriate clothing herself. When her mentor told her that they would be going to the beach that day (or at least to the closest thing Trolberg had to a beach), she’d ran into her room and come back in shorts and sandals. Maven hoped she wouldn’t be too disappointed by their lesson not involving any traditional beach activities.

It took longer than the librarian had thought it would for Hilda to speak up. They had left her house a full block behind before the girl’s curiosity got the best of her.

“So, what are we doing today?” She asked. Never having been to the beach, except when she passed by it on her way to find the rat king in the sewers, it was hard for her not to be excited. And it also made her feel better that Maven seemed to be in a light mood, a far cry from her zombie-like appearance from a few days before.

“We are going to study about the five elements.” The librarian declared. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see her apprentice frowning. A smile began to play at her lips.

Fire, water, earth, air. Hilda went over them on her head. But that’s only four. She was on the verge of wondering if those were not the elements that Maven was talking about when she noticed the amused glint on her eyes. She realized, then, that she wasn’t expected to know the answer.

“Well, which is the fifth?” She asked finally.

Maven kept her gaze straight forward as she walked. “The elements are what makes up everything. They’re the essence of the universe.”

“Really?”

“Well, I mean-” she shrugged. “Now we know about the atoms. But for witchcraft purposes it remains the same. You probably remember the most well known elements, but doesn’t something feel off to you? Much of the work we’ve done doesn’t involve any of the four.”

Hilda thought about it, and the more she did, the more it made sense. On their first real lesson, the librarian had taught her the most basic things in witchcraft, and although the earth had played an important role in the lesson, it hadn't been the main element of the practice.

“Energy?” She guessed, pleased when Maven nodded approvingly.

“Perfect thinking. We call it Spirit, but you got the idea.”

Hilda was silent for some time, which Maven took as a sign that she had sated her curiosity for now. Soon, they could already hear the soft crash of waves on the shore, and the cool wind that came from the sea was even stronger on their faces. The two of them walked to the area closest to the water, past the pebbles that covered the outside part of the beach, and into the warm sand. From the bag she was carrying, Maven took a towel and spread it out on the floor.

“Where is it?” Hilda asked while she sat down. “Spirit, I mean. I can see all the other elements, I know where to find them. But where is spirit?”

Maven shook her head fondly, letting herself get used to the fresh beach air. “Hilda, you’ve learned this already. Spirit is everywhere.”

_#_#_#_

They spent some time grounding. While they did so, Alfur sneakily got down from Hilda’s ear and hopped to the sand. He seemed to be trying to build himself a table out of the sand, but the witches tried not to let themselves be distracted by that.

After that stage was done, the librarian had Hilda do something different; instead of attuning herself to the world around her as a whole, Maven wanted her to connect with the four physical elements, one at a time.

Hilda chose to begin with fire. Under the librarian’s guidance, she closed her eyes and focused on the feeling of the sun on her skin. It seemed simple enough, and she was about to ask what she was supposed to do next when the instructions came.

“Now I want you to summon the strongest memory with this element that you have.” Maven said. “It doesn’t have to be good, or bad, it just has to be strong. Put it in the forefront of your mind.”

She didn’t have to think for long to remember an episode. She still could remember the day very clearly. Wanting to learn how to light a fire, she’d stacked some sticks on the outside of her house, and stolen a match from the kitchen, since she had been very young and her mother didn’t allow her to use them back then. Her mother must have been very focused on her work that day, because when her fire didn’t catch, she had gone back inside and found some cooking oil inside the pantry.

When she had poured what she’d thought to be a reasonable amount of it on the sticks, she must have spilled some on the grass around them as well. Dropping the match to her pile, Hilda had watched in amazement, and then in horror, as the fire caught and spread to the grass around it. She’d been paralyzed, able to do nothing but watch it slowly take over its surroundings.

Luckily, her mother had showed up with a bucket of water and skillfully put the fire out. She still didn’t know how her mum had showed up so fast, without even needing to be called. Maybe the light of the fire had been visible through one of the windows, but regardless of how it happened Hilda was grateful to this day for Johanna’s quick reaction.

“Visualize it the best you can.” Maven whispered, doing the exercise herself. “The scent, the warmth… feel it as if it was happening right now.”

Surprised at how real it felt, Hilda brought back the smell of smoke to her nostrils, the impossibly bright light standing against the darkness of the wilderness’ night. She didn’t know if it was only a placebo or of the sun was getting stronger, but she could swear she felt her hands getting warmer.

“How, would you say, is there magic in it?” Hilda almost startled when the librarian asked. “Fire is used in many rituals. But which spells go with it?”

“Curses.” Hilda said immediately, thinking about the fear her young self had felt when faced with the fire’s ability to consume everything near it. “Or anything related to strength.”

Her mentor didn’t push her for more, and so she didn’t say anything else. It felt good to bask in that warmth, that memory of raw power. Soon, however, she found she was feeling quite lost in the exercise. Her skin felt like it was on fire, but not in an unpleasant way; instead, it felt like she was bathing in power, but she wasn’t sure if that was all she was supposed to be doing.

Slowly, she opened her eyes, and had to stifle a gasp when she looked at Maven. She was kneeling on the ground, sitting on her feet, and her hands were cupped on top of her tights. Flickering on her palm, there was a strong flame, easily recognizable as magical because of the flashes of colour that shone inside of it every once in a while.

Had Maven not looked so calm, Hilda would have been worried for her burning herself. But as it was, the witch looked completely in charge of her work. She may have sensed that Hilda was staring at her, hypnotized by her magic, because she almost immediately opened her eyes.

“Is everything okay?” She asked when she noticed how startled Hilda looked. As she continued watching the fire, an excited smile took over her face.

“That’s so cool!” She exclaimed. “Was I supposed to do that?”

After taking a deep breath, Maven let her flame fade away.

“No,don’t worry about it. I don’t expect you to be able to summon the elements yet, it’s quite tricky.”

Yet, Hilda thought. With time and training, she’d be able to do things just like that. The idea made her exhilarated.

“Hold on.” She said when something occurred her, dropping her voice to a whisper. “Can’t people see what you’re doing?”

Before Hilda could look around them, anxiously checking for anyone that might have noticed the magic, Maven pointed to a symbol on the sand by the top of the towel.

“I already took care of that. Outsiders won’t see anything out of the ordinary when they look at us.”

A quick check told Hilda that Maven had drawn the sigil on each side of the towel, and she admired the intelligence of it. She thought she should probably memorize that sigil, it could be useful in many a situation.

They continued with the same exercises, and they made Hilda realize the reason why Maven had brought her to that place for the lesson. When they moved on to earth, the librarian gently guided her to burying her hands in the sand, feeling it pulse with energy under her. While she attuned herself to air, she noticed just how unyielding the wind was on that part of the town, and as she brought her focus to a lovely memory of dancing under the pouring rain with her mum, the sound of waves made it all more real. The elements were more intense in that place.

Something felt different about connecting to water. The feeling of cool raindrops falling on her skin felt too real, and she wondered if that was the objective of this dynamic.

“Which sort of spell goes with it?” Maven asked like she had for each element, but her voice sounded very distant to Hilda. Almost as if she was underwater and someone was talking to her from the outside.

“Intuition.” The words left her mouth without her even thinking about them, but they felt right, so she didn’t take them back. “Healing and emotions.”

“Hilda.” Her mentor said gently. “Open your eyes.”

Slowly, she blinked them open. She didn’t know when she’d done that, but during the exercise she’d raised her hands approximately to shoulder height, and now a thin stream of water was dripping from them. Her eyes widened, and as she lost her concentration, the stream dried out. Bringing her gaze to the librarian, Hilda saw that she was also wearing a smile.

“Very good, Hilda.” She said as they both looked at the wet spot in the towel where the water had fallen. “That’s very hard to get on the first try. You should be very proud of yourself.”

She was reminded that Alfur was with them when he clapped his hands for her, cheering at her success. She was admittedly quite stunned by what had happened, and she realized that it had been the first tangible piece of magic that she’d ever done. The sensation was thrilling, like she was finally on her way to being a real witch.

“I think this is enough practical training for today.” Maven said, using the same stick which she’d found on the floor and drawn the sigils to mix the sand and make them disappear. “Besides, the sun is getting too strong.”

Hilda extended her hand, still slightly wet, to Alfur, so that he could hop onto it and move back to her hair. Then, she got to her feet to allow the librarian to pick the towel up, waving it to get rid of the bulk of sand and storing it in her bag again.

“Just one last thing.” The librarian picked up the stick once more and brought the tip to the sand. She began making a drawing that looked like a star, but then she surrounded it by a circle. “Do you know this symbol?”

Hilda nodded. “Some kid doodled it on their desk, Ms. Hallgrim was livid. She says it’s evil and we should not go around drawing it.”

The girl was crestfallen when Maven pursed her lips and sighed in disappointment. She thought she’d been doing very well on that lesson, but that was not a positive reaction.

“Did I get it wrong?” She asked, holding herself back from fidgeting.

“Yes, but it’s not your fault.” Maven said gently, making Hilda drop her shoulders with relief. Her eyes were locked on the pentacle. “Many aspects of our culture were twisted to convince others that witches are vile. That’s the information most people have.”

“Look.” She used the stick to point to one of the tips. “Water.”

Hilda frowned as she too looked at the pentacle. There was no water in it, so she didn’t understand what her mentor was trying to say. Maven continued on, however, pointing at each tip at a time.

“Fire, earth, air.” She finally pointed to the tip at the top, the one she had drawn leading to the sea. “And spirit.”

“Oh.” Hilda sighed as she finally caught on to what she meant. The librarian then gestured to the circle that linked each tip.

“And the universe connecting them all. Do you see?”

Turning to the librarian to realize that Maven was already looking at her, Hilda grinned. “I do!”

Maven smiled shortly and dropped the stick to the ground. “It’s a lovely symbol. There are many meanings, but I like to use it for protection. It’s a shame it has such a bad reputation.”

Hilda had no chance to say anything before Maven began walking away. She took a few strides to catch up with her, and realized that she was still speaking.

“Does it sound good to you to grab some take out and go eat lunch at my house? I want to work through some theory with you but we really should eat.”

Hilda nodded, thinking about the perfect place to suggest. “That sounds just perfect, Maven.”

_#_#_#_

“Why do you think it only worked once?” Hilda asked. “The training, I mean. Why did it only work with water?”

The three of them were sitting on a couch in Maven’s leaving room. After lunch, they had spent some time going over the theory of elemental magic. Hilda wrote down information on her book of spells, which the librarian had asked her to bring over before they left her house for the beach, and Alfur quickly jotted down every word that left Maven’s mouth. He seemed to want to write a report on that particular area of magic.

It had been pleasant. She’d particularly enjoyed it when the librarian explained how the elements were incorporated in spells and the reasons behind them being included, which turned out to be the reason why she’d asked Hilda to say which spells she thought should use them. It turned out that, in the meditative state of connection she’d been, she’d gotten very close most of the time. Hilda had even asked which elements would be used in the Soul Spell (mostly Spirit, but also Fire for purification and healing, and Earth would be present in the form of the crystals they’d use). As nice as it had been though, she was glad for the little break that they were currently having.

“Just because you weren’t able to materialize the elements, doesn’t mean it didn’t work.” She answered. “You got in tune with them, and that was the point. But it is usually easier for a witch to do summon the element they lean towards the most.”

“So that would be water for me?”

Maven took a sip from her tea. She’d made some for the three of them, even going as far as putting some drops on a tiny cup that had belonged to her sister’s doll house for Alfur. “I’ve been noticing that you’re more of an Earth witch, actually. But Earth, just like Fire, are harder to get a hang of. There’s water in the air and, well, air in the air. So what the witch does is manipulate that which is already around them. With Fire and Earth, you actually need to create the element. Water is probably the second you relate to the most.”

“Oh, I see.” Hilda had barely finished speaking when the heard a thud from the outside. They looked in time to see something grey falling to the floor, but it was nothing recognizable.

“I’ll go see what that was!” Alfur said immediately as he put his cup down on the table. He was reasonably sure he knew what the source of the sound had been, and she didn’t want any of them to see him before he did.

“Are you sure?” Hilda asked. “It might be dangerous.”

“Don’t worry about me!” Before either of them could say anything else, the elf was already running towards the door which led to the back garden.

He didn’t even need to open the door, the gap under it was small enough for him to get through. Once he was out in the garden, he found exactly what he thought he would. A grey bird had his wing pressed to his head after having hit it in the window.

“Raven!” He exclaimed, striding to him, and he looked up to the elf. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll be fine.” He brushed it off. “I got your letter, but I didn’t want to send the reply by mail. Who knows who handles those letters.”

Alfur blinked, somewhere between startled and impressed. “You did it already?! It’s only been a few days! The librarian was looking for longer and she managed to find nothing!”

It was true that Raven had an advantage with his point of view from above, but Maven was nothing if not skilled in her craft, and looking into each house couldn’t be that much quicker with wings than it was with magic. He sighed, rubbing his head again, and Alfur thought that he should probably offer something for the pain as soon as he could.

“No wonder she didn’t!” Raven said, gesticulating with his wings. “I only found her by chance, when I was flying over the woods.”

“The woods?”

“Yes! If you give me a map I can show you exactly where I saw her.”

Alfur looked to the the door and then back to Raven, analyzing the situation. He decided, eventually, that it was only fair for the girls to be there when his friend revealed Myra’s location.

“Come inside.” He said then. “You should show it to them first. And we could probably get some ice for your head as well.”

He was about to lead him inside when he realized Raven wouldn’t fit the gap. Luckily, he saw the problem and opened his wings, flying just high enough to land on the handle. It opened easily under his weight, and the door swung open to allow them inside.

As Raven hopped back down to Alfur’s side, they saw Maven’s eyebrows fly towards her hairline at the unexpected situation, at the same time that Hilda gasped Raven’s name.

“You know it?” Maven asked upon noticing Hilda’s reaction.

“Oh, Hilda and I are friends, ma’am.” At the answer, Maven smiled with amusement. She was beginning to see a pattern in her apprentice’s friends.

“I take it you’re a Thunderbird?”

“There’s no time for introductions at this moment!” Alfur interrupted, though his words were more anxious than rude. “Miss Maven, Raven knows where your sister is!”

Chapter Text

Biting wind turned her cheeks pink, the sun quickly dying out as Maven stood under the trees of the Huldrawoods. Aside from draping her cape over her shoulders, she hadn’t changed the clothes she’d worn all day. There hadn’t been any time. As soon as Alfur had declared that the Thunderbird knew where her sister lived, she’d hurried to fetch him a map so that he could point out exactly where he’d seen her.

It felt like she’d been moving in a haze. She was certain that she’d told Hilda to stay safely in her house, but everything else she’d done in the last few minutes seemed like a dream from which she’d only waken up when she arrived at the spot the Thunderbird had circled. Now, as she looked at the ramshackle tend that had been built between two tall pines, she felt her clouded mind becoming clearer, making her cringe at her own impulsivity. In her haste, she hadn’t even brought anything to protect herself with. Now, however, she was too close to back away.

Her hands clutched her cape tighter around herself as she walked closer. As warm as the day had been, dusk was bringing about an unexpected chill, which combined with the fear and anticipation running up and down her spine, did not result in a pleasant sensation at all.

The tent was livable, but only barely. It leaned against one of the trees, and wooden stakes helped keep it upright. One single cutting of cloth made the ceiling and the walls. Whichever magic the marra had, it was no use in construction, it seemed. This tent was only a little better than the ones she and her sister would build as children.

Maven couldn’t sense her sister inside, so she found the area where the cloth had been cut to allow passage and allowed herself in. Once inside, the first thing she noticed was the abrupt change in temperature. In contrast with the cold outside, the tent could easily have had modern heating, and she attributed that to the oil lamp which hang from one of the stakes. Though judging from the green fire that burned inside, it was more likely that the lamp ran on magic rather than oil.

The shelter was very clearly Myra’s. The makeshift pallet bed wasn’t made the usual way. Instead, the blanket has been folded and put on top of the pillow, like her sister liked to do. The hairbrush that seemed to have been thrown on the floor without a care had no strands of hair in it, and Maven remembered how insistent Myra was in cleaning her hairbrush after every use.

Emboldened by these discoveries, Maven set out to look for more signs of Myra’s presence. She did find enough reasons to be certain that she lived there, but was also concerned by the lack of basic necessities in the tent. She could find no food at all, even though she knew her sister to snack a lot during the day, and the complete absence of clothes reminded her of how Myra had been wearing the same clothes as years ago when Maven last saw her.

Those things could probably be due to the marra’s magical nature. Though they looked like everyone else, Maven thought she would do well not to forget that they weren’t human, and thus probably didn’t have the same necessities as them.

It was when Maven was going over a notebook she’d found, apparently filled with descriptions of nightmares her sister had inflicted on people, that she heard a gasp from the entrance of the tent. Startled, she dropped the notebook and turned around to find Myra herself staring at her with shock on her features.

Both of them were paralyzed for long moments, doing nothing but staring at each other in incredulity until Myra shook her head like she was trying to wake up from a dream.

“What are you doing here?!” She shouted. Remembering that she shouldn’t consider herself safe just because this was her sister, Maven took a deep breath, gathering magic on her fingertips in case she needed to defend herself.

It took her long to find an answer. She hadn’t even thought about what she would accomplish by going after her immediately, she’d just been driven by the urge to see with her own eyes that Myra had somewhere to stay. That she was alive and well.

“I came to find you.” She said eventually, debating whether or not to raise her hand to her sister. She wanted to touch her, find proof that she was really there, really in front of her, but she knew it wouldn’t be welcomed. Myra continued looking skeptically at her, her body locked with tension.

“I wanted, I want to bring you home. You don’t need to stay here, Myra. Come back with me. I can forgive everything.”

Maven could pinpoint the exact moment when her sister went from mistrustful to furious. Green shone in the depths of her eyes and her fists balled as she bared her teeth.

“You can forgive everything?! Nothing about you changed, Maven. You really do still think that everything is about you.”

Before Maven could think up a spell to summon, Myra sent out tendrils of green magic in her direction. They seized her arms and legs, leaving a burning sensation in the spots where they curled around her limbs. When the marra made a sharp gesture with her hand, the tendrils send Maven flying out of the tent, hitting the ground outside painfully.

Groaning because of the impact, Maven tried to sit up as Myra chuckled at her.

“How pathetic. Why would I want to go back to being this meek?”

“Myra… this isn’t you. They have twisted your mind, haven't they? Please, sweetie, our parents-”

“Can’t you get this?!” The marra interrupted her, her magic feeding off of her anger and making her levitate inches above the ground as she spoke, in a way that soon she was leaning over Maven menacingly “I don’t care about mum, dad, or you! You are all weak, and I’m over you!”

“If you’re really over us, why haven’t you cursed some poor widower to take you in? Convinced a couple that you’re their child?” Maven said with as much strength as she could. Some time ago, she’d be mad to hear those words coming from her sister’s mouth. She’d seethe and cry out her hypocrisy, but it felt like something had changed in her. She’d come so close to failing Hilda that she could now see all the ways in which she’d failed her her sister. Not in not being able to stop her from becoming a nightmare spirit, but way before that.

The only effect her words seemed to have was to make Myra more angry, and she growled in a way that Maven was sure no human could. Nevertheless, Maven continued.

“Why live like someone who’s lost their home if you say we weren’t yours?”

“I should kill you!” She shouted, but Maven knew her too well. Those were nothing but empty words, and she didn’t believe the Marra even had enough power to murder someone. Not a trained witch, at least. Surely enough, when Myra realized that Maven was neither going to press her further nor plead for mercy, her fury deflated enough that her sister could see the reluctance in her eyes.

“But I’ll give you this chance to run. Go away and never come for me again!”

Maven shook her head.

“I can’t do that. I can’t leave you alone.”

Rolling her eyes, Myra sent out a burst of magic at Maven’s head. It made her vision spin and her mind feel hazy, and she collapsed against the floor once more.

“It wasn’t a question, idiot.”

_#_#_#_

“Maven!” Her eyes began to open as she felt someone shaking her shoulders. Everything was dark, and the first thing she was able to see was a head of blue hair.

“Oh dear, is she alright?” Another voice squeaked. She knew that voice, but her mind was so clouded she couldn’t link it to anyone.

“That was a really nasty spell. She might take a few minutes to regain consciousness.”

“‘M fine.” She drawled, trying to make sense of the situation. “Hilda? Is that you?”

The girl nodded and smiled nervously.

“Yes! Don’t worry, we’ll help you.”

The girl spent a few minutes trying to aid Maven to her feet, aided by a bird who the librarian soon remembered to be Hilda’s friend. The elf was also with them, unable to help but watching the scene from Hilda’s hair.

“Well, you seem to be recovering quickly.” The Thunderbird said when they began walking away from the Huldrawoods. Maven realized she’d woken up at the same spot she’d been before, but Myra was no longer there. “You are made of tough stuff, I’ll give it to you.”

“My own magic must have protected me. But I was lucky you were around to help me. ” She said, wishing that the magic would have protected her from heartbreak as well.

Maven stopped walking abruptly, turning to Hilda with crossed arms.

“And why were you around? I told you to stay at the house.”

“I couldn’t let you go alone.” To her credit, Hilda did at least look ashamed, fidgeting with her feet. “But I did stay hidden.”

Sighing, the librarian continued walking. “As long as you don’t tell this to your mother.”

“I promise.” She assured, content not to be lectured about safety and following orders. “She should be home by now. Why don’t you come over and drink something? You must need it.”

She raised her gaze to the night sky, now completely dark. The trees got on her way, making it so she wasn’t even able to take comfort in the calming sight of the moon. When she lowered her eyes again, she noticed Hilda shivering as she looked at her. The girl was still wearing the same clothing they’d worn to the beach.

Raising her hands to her neck, Maven unclasped her cape and draped it over her, hoping it was warm enough that she wouldn’t be cold anymore. When Hilda sent the librarian a questioning stare, she only shuddered and made a fireball appear on her hand, a source of both warmth and light to guide them.

“I have no better plan.”

Chapter Text

Being greeted with a smile usually had the effect of brightening someone’s mood considerably. In her current state, though, not even that could distract Maven from the sinking feeling of hopelessness in her heart. When Johanna opened the door to allow them in, anxious to hear about how their day had been, Hilda’s attempt at a smile became a grimace, which immediately gave away that something was wrong. That Maven didn’t even manage to try to return Johanna’s happy greeting was only confirmation.

“What happened?” She asked as she stepped aside so that they could enter. Maven noticed curiously that the woman didn’t even blink at the Thunderbird having returned with them. She was probably used to it at that point.

Hilda and Maven exchanged a look, wordlessly asking each other who should be the one to tell her.

“We found my sister.” The librarian said eventually. At Johanna’s gasp, she sighed and rubbed her temples.

“Your friend found her, actually. He told us where he’d seen her and I went looking for her.”

A pounding was beginning to form in her head. Feeling the sudden need to sit, Maven looked around her for a chair lest her knees gave out under her. Even stunned as she was, Johanna noticed it and guided Maven to the couch, and soon all of them were in the living room.

“Are you okay, miss?” Raven asked, sitting on the couch near her.

“Yeah.” She said and then flinched. The pain was growing quickly, and even speaking made it worse. “I just shouldn’t have gotten up so quickly or used magic after that blow. I think I’m suffering the effects of her spell now.”

Curled in on herself as she was, Maven didn’t see Johanna frown in confusion and worry, but her daughter did.

“Her sister wasn’t too happy about seeing her.” Hilda explained. “She shot some very strong magic at Maven to get her to go away.”

“Oh.” Trying not to make too much noise, Johanna walked up to the librarian and put a hand on her shoulder. When she raised her head to look at her, squinting at the light, for a moment she looked so fragile that Johanna had to hold herself back not to kneel down and hug her.

Johanna was about to offer her help, but Maven spoke first.

“I promise Hilda didn’t get hurt.” She said. She couldn’t lie and say that Hilda had stayed home, but this was something she could assure her without it weighting on her conscience.

Smiling sympathetically, Johanna crossed her arms. She could see clear as the day that her child wasn’t hurt. Her worries at that moment were others.

“I’m glad to hear this, but I was actually going to ask if I can help you in any way.”

It was written in Maven’s face that she hadn’t expected that question. Clearing her throat, she tried to hide her surprise.

“If I could have a cup of tea, that would already be of much help.”

Giving her a thumbs up, Johanna walked to the kitchen to get it ready, and Hilda sat down on the couch’s arm next to Maven.

“Do you want some aspirin for your head?” She asked, making the librarian chuckle even though her skull felt like it could explode at the smallest laughter.

“My head will be fine when I have some tea and cast a counterspell.” She whispered as she rubbed her forehead. “But I’ll accept it, otherwise my back will kill me.”

Hilda grimaced as the image of Maven being thrown out of the tent and to the wood’s ground crossed her mind, making her realize that the librarian must be really good at hiding her pain. Until they arrived at her house, anyone who looked at her would have thought her perfectly well. It made Hilda wonder if her magic protected her from any sort of pain or if she was simply too stubborn to show any weakness.

It was easy to find a pill in the first aid kit her mother kept in her bathroom, and Hilda went back to the living room just in time to see Johanna handing Maven a steaming cup of tea. There were two more cups by the coffee table, all exhalating the sharp aroma of mint. Mother and daughter picked them up and blew on them, watching as Maven murmured something and then took a sip.

“Sorry, I didn’t catch that.” Hilda said as the librarian gulped down the tea in a way that made her genuinely concerned. The drink was, after all, very hot.

Maybe she was also part dragon on top of being a witch.

When the whole cup was gone, Maven sighed in relief and sat back against the couch, as opposed to holding her head near her tights like she’d been doing before.

“Sorry for my manners.” She avoided making eye contact with her mother as she spoke, Hilda noticed. “I cast a small enchantment on my tea to make it cure my headache.”

“Oh!” Johanna exclaimed, and by her side Hilda tried to contain her wonder at the glimpse of magic she’d just seen, even if she hadn’t known it was magic. “You could have told me you were doing that, I would have hurried up making the tea.”

“I didn’t want to rush you, and enchantments always stick better to tea than any other beverages.”

Suddenly remembering about the aspirin, Hilda extended her hand to the librarian, who took the pill gladly. After thanking her, Maven swallowed it down without as much as a glass of water.

Soon, Alfur retired in order to get the day’s paperwork in order and Raven flied away, leaving the three of them sitting around the living room, their minds clouded with thoughts.

“How close am I to being able to help you?” Hilda asked, deciding that beating around the bush would serve her for nothing. She’d been excited to learn magic and be a witch, but that evening she’d seen exactly why what Maven was trying to do was so important. And she’d seen how bad things could get if they failed.

Even with two pairs of eyes on her, Maven couldn’t help but recoiling into herself, looking out the window. During all the walk to her apprentice’s house, she had tried to avoid asking herself one crucial question: what use would helping Myra be if she didn’t want to be helped? The Soul Spell would create what they needed, but it wouldn’t certify Myra’s humanity once more.

It was no use giving a gift to someone who refused it.

They could keep this up for as long as it was necessary, but in the end it might as well have been futile. And most important of all, she was submitting Hilda to a path of mystery and danger - because as much as she would like to, she couldn’t deny that being a witch was dangerous, and her current situation was proof - while it could be useless. And it would be incredibly selfish of her to endanger a child for the chance to save her sister, a chance that she could now see was small.

“I’m not so sure you should help me, Hilda.” She said after hesitating for a long while. “I need to be honest with you. And the truth is, Myra won’t come back if she doesn’t choose to herself. You might go through all the training, face all the hardships of becoming a witch only to find out your effort resulted in nothing. And I can’t let you do that. So if you want an advice, go back to your normal life. You’re safer that way.”

Stunned silence took over the room, until they heard the sound of one of the cups being put forcefully on the table.

“No.” Johanna said decidedly, making Maven startle and look at the woman. Though she expected some resistance from Hilda, Johanna was the last person she’d thought would speak up.

“I know at the beginning, this was all about helping your sister.” She continued with her hands set confidently on her waistline. “And I know that is still your final goal. But… that’s not all there is to it anymore. I’ve seen how much Hilda loves magic, and how clearly it is a part of her. I understand you’re trying to protect her. I want her to be safe too. But we can’t deny her a part of herself, just like we can’t exclude the possibility that this whole thing might work in the end.”

There was a mixture of confusion and hope in the librarian’s eyes as she looked at Johanna. It felt like they’d had this conversation so many times before. So many times, one of them had had second thoughts about the path they were following, only to decide that it was the right one. And Hilda wasn’t about to allow this time to be any different.

“I’m not Myra.” She said, seeing surprise become even more evident in Maven’s features. “I know you love her, but you don’t have to worry about the same thing happening to me. I won’t hate you if you make a mistake. I won’t hate myself if I’m not enough. I’m not fragile, Maven.”

It was hard to tell since the librarian looked away from Hilda for a breath, but the girl was quite certain she’d seen tears gathering on her eyes. They were gone when she looked back, a timid smile on her face instead.

“I know, kid. I know you are. But is this really the choice you’ll make? Do you really want to continue?”

Johanna and Hilda exchanged a look, and she smiled encouragingly at her daughter.

“I do. I can protect myself, and even if I can’t, I know you will.”

Reaching behind Hilda to get to Maven, Johanna squeezed Maven’s arm and smiled affectionately.

“Hilda couldn’t have wished for a better master, and nor I for a better friend.”

That night, Maven was once again invited to have dinner with them. For that time, they allowed themselves to forget about demons and curses and danger, sharing light-hearted stories about their friends and jobs. Everything was peaceful as they bid the librarian good night and later when Johanna sent Hilda off to sleep. And it was only when she knew for sure that her daughter was sleeping soundly that Johanna tip-toed inside her daughter’s room and knocked on the clock she kept on her shelf.

“Alfur, do you still remember where Maven’s sister was?” She whispered when the elf opened the clock’s face and came out, sleepily rubbing his eyes.

“I do. Why do you ask?”

Johanna hesitated for just a second before taking a deep breath.

“I’m going to need you to help me.”

_#_#_#_#_

Living in the city, Johanna didn’t get many opportunities to use the skills she’d learned as a child with the Sparrow Scouts. That night, however, as she climbed the walls that surrounded the Huldrawoods and marked the threes she passed by with chalk, so as not to get lost, she needed all the skills she could remember.

Her belly fluttered with fear as Alfur whispered her the way from his spot on her ear. If Maven had been left in such a miserable state after her encounter with Myra, what chance did Johanna have against her? With no magic or weapons, her only protection was the Tourmalated Quartz necklace the librarian had given her, which she’d taken from her bedside table before leaving.

Luckily, picking a fight with the nightmare spirit was not what she was planning on doing. She’d always believed that dialogue was the best way to solve things, and judging by how her daughter managed to gain the trust of magical creatures time and time again, she was certain she was right. Now, even though she knew that her results would hardly be meaningful, she hoped that dialogue would serve her for something.

“There it is.” Alfur said nervously when they saw a tent. From its inside came a green light, almost blinding in the gloom of the moonlit forest, and a girly voice.

“My goddess, My Niorun...” The voice said, making Johanna catch her breat. She knew that name. Niorun, she remembered, was who Maven had told her the Marra got their powers from. What she was hearing was a prayer, one that continued.

“As I rise up to do my duty by you tonight, may the gifts you awarded me remain, may the people of this town slumber so that my sisters and I may be able to bring your blessings to them. My goddess, as my soul is always at your side, may your blessings be by mine until moonfall.”

With each word, the light from inside became stronger, until Johanna was squinting to look at the tent. Suddenly, the girl emerged, not looking like a girl at all. Her feet didn’t touch the ground, her pupils were green, and almost imperceptible sparks surrounded her. Either by some use of magic or just plain perceptiveness, she immediately noticed Johanna’s presence.

At that point, it would be useless to jump behind a tree to hide herself, so she tried to make it clear that she wasn’t there to cause any harm by putting her hands in front of her chest, where the marra could see them. After an initial moment of shock, which she hasted to hide, Myra crossed her arms and raised a single eyebrow in cocky askance.

“I, uh, good night!” Johanna said clumsily. “I was wondering if I could talk to you.”

She ran her eyes up and down Johanna, sizing her up. It gave her the uncomfortable feeling of being once again a teenager trying to gain the acceptance of the girls in her class, but she tried to ignore it.

“What the hell are you doing here?” She asked in a monotone, sounding bored even though this was clearly not an usual occurrence for her.

Deciding on taking the most direct path, Johanna made herself stand taller, resisting the urge to clutch at the stone of her necklace to assure herself that she had something protecting her.

“I’m here because of your sister.”

The statement made Myra bare her teeth immediately, and her eyes shined even greener. Before she had a chance to attack, though, Johanna spoke again to try and fix her mistake.

“She didn’t send me! I didn’t come here to hurt you, I just want to understand.”

Lowering her guard enough to tranquilize Johanna, Myra huffed.

“There’s nothing for you to understand, human. Just don’t stay between my sister and I, it’s better for you.”

When the marra began to float away, Johanna hopped in front her, successfully blocking her path. For that moment, it was enough to keep her in place.

“Please, I just want to know why you’re resisting your sister so much! She’s only trying to help!”

Maven had told them some of the reasons that had made Myra turn away from her family, but nothing in depth, and they hadn’t wanted to ask either as it seemed to bring her so much pain. But Johanna couldn’t honestly say she saw what was so appealing in a Marra’s life that kept her so stubbornly in that road.

“The witch” She hissed, anger returning to her and making her voice pitch higher. “Doesn’t want to help me, never has. She wants to keep me in a cage. She wants me to be just like her and live and die by some stupid rules made up by some idiots in pointy hats who thought they were better than everyone!”

Johanna took a step back, surprised at the outburst. She didn’t believe what she heard. She now knew too much about Maven to think she’d ever force her sister to be anything at all, but she did know enough to recognize that Maven could easily be misinterpreted, withdrawn and apathetic as she could seem.

“Your sister doesn’t want you to be a witch! She just wants you to be you!” Johanna said, feeling a wave of courage wash over her. Suddenly, ropes of green light tied her wrists and forcefully pulled her closer to the girl, their faces close together. With the short distance, Johanna was forced to stare into her eyes, a shiver running down her spine as she did so.

The eyes were the window to the soul. As she looked in the girl’s inhuman pupils, Johanna could find none.

“This is my last warning.” She said, seeming to be trembling with rage. “If you, or Maven, or anyone else shows up, I will not show them as much kindness. Now go back to her and be grateful I spared you.”

The woman was released as Myra turned into a cloud of green smoke and ran away into the trees, ready to begin her haunting. Having to admit defeat, Johanna followed the chalked trees back to the gates. When they arrived home, Alfur was already asleep on her hair, and she left him on the couch so as not to risk wakening Hilda up by leaving him on her room.

As she got ready to lie down, the last thing she did was taking off her necklace. She realized with some wonder that a few of the spikes of tourmaline seemed to have become thinner, and came to understand what happened when she saw specks of green on them. The crystal had absorbed some of the magic Myra had used to tie her.

It took her long to fall asleep that night. Only one thing was certain at this point: if this problem was to be solved, Maven was right to believe that nothing but magic would do it.

Chapter Text

“It’s… a seed?”

“It’s a burnt seed.” Maven corrected, but Hilda couldn’t see how that was any better. When her mentor had told her that she was ready for her first spell, ecstatic didn't even begin to describe how happy she’d been. After so long studying mostly theory and basic exercises, she definitely felt ready for something more advanced, and it was heartening to know that Maven thought so too. So when during their lesson she broke the news that she’d be doing a spell, Hilda hadn’t even wanted to wait until the next week to do it.

They’d met in the library after Hilda left school, and went to the hidden section to choose a spellbook. Surrounded by so many possibilities, Hilda hadn’t had a clue of which one to pick, but luckily Maven seemed to know exactly what would be good for her apprentice. The librarian chose a small yet thick book with an earthy scent to it. The title was written in runes, but Maven assured her that they meant the book was one of green magic. Apparently, Maven had had it all planned, because when they arrived at Hilda’s home the girl found out that she’d already left a plastic pot and a small bag of soil there during the day.

Though Hilda had wanted to begin right away and see what the chosen spell was all about, Johanna insisted that the two witches ate something first, and Maven had agreed with her with the explanation that a spell would require energy from Hilda. All the while she had eaten, expectation had built on her as possibilities crammed her mind. She’d thought maybe she’d be presented with a magical plant, known to no one but witches, or learn to make one speak, so being presented with a seed, completely ordinary and burnt, even, was quite a shock.

“What am i supposed to do with it?” She asked as Maven put the small seed on her hand. It looked as if it was a sunflower’s, and Hilda squinted to try to find anything special about it.

“Plant it.” Maven said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. Though noticing Hilda’s confusion, she picked up the book they’d checked out and began to look for the spell.

“But anyone can plant a seed.” She raised herself on her toes to try and see the pages that Maven was scrolling through. “I thought we were going to do something magical.”

Finding the right page, the librarian put the book down on the table and watched closely for Hilda’s reaction. The girl all but jumped on the book, tracing her fingertip through the paper.

“Speed and life spell so your greenery will excel.” She whispered, reading the inscription that had been written in bold words under the witch runes on top of the page, which she assumed indicated the name of the spell.

“Anyone can plant a healthy seed.” Maven rectified, delighted at how Hilda ran her eyes through the spell avidly. “And anyone can wait for months for it to grow. But that’s not what we’ll be doing.”

“Amazing!” Suddenly overcome with excitement, Hilda jumped up and down. Hearing the commotion, Johanna looked at them from her seat at her drawing table, where she’d gone to after making sure that the two of them had eaten. She smiled and shook her head fondly, then returned her attention to her work.

Maven sat down at the table, inviting Hilda to do the same. Before anything else, it was crucial that they studied the spell they were about to cast. As they wouldn’t be inviting any spirit or manipulating anyone’s energy, they wouldn’t need to cast a protection circle for the ritual, but as should be done before any sort of energy work, Hilda would need to ground herself. She didn’t look very happy at the prospect of taking the time to ground, wanting to jump to the spell right away, but she seemed to know better than to question Maven’s competence about this.

The spell looked a lot less complex than others she’d seen and heard about before. Other than a sigil, the spellcaster needed only their own energy to complete it, and Hilda asked Maven about it’s simplicity.

“Spell ingredients lend their energy to the spells, according to their correspondences.” She explained. “But for this you won’t need anything to strengthen your own energy, because you’re not going to be the activating party of the spell.”

Hilda frowned and wondered if she’d misunderstood the librarian. She thought she would do this spell on her own, but if Maven was going to activate it, it just wouldn’t be the same thing.

“Who is it going to be, then? What’s even left for me to do?!”

Making a gesture for Hilda to stay calm, the librarian pointed at a round doodle in the paper, one that had once been painted yellow but was now faded. It was only recognizable because of the stars surrounding it. Under the full moon, there was a paragraph that the girl hadn’t yet noticed.

“We are going to let the pot sit outside for the night after you’re done with your part. The moon will be the one to charge the spell, but you will still have to create a pathway for this energy to manifest itself the way you want. That’s why you will only be using a sigil and your own visualization. Does this make sense to you?”

“It does!”

“In that case, let’s get started.”

_#_#_#_

Johanna hadn’t seen much of what had happened the night before. After the witches had finished analyzing the spell, they had picked the book, the pot and the bag of soil and headed to Hilda’s room. There hadn’t been any lights that she could see or any explosions that she could hear. All was silent until some time later, when Maven asked for a broom to clean the floor of remnants of dirt and Hilda came right behind her holding the pot, now filled to the brim and looking perfectly normal.

The pot was left in one of the window sills in the living room, where they had agreed more moonlight would reach it, and after Maven was gone and Hilda had retreated to her room again in order to study, Johanna had spent some time trying to figure out what had been done. Though she hadn’t dared to touch the pot, she was sure that if it had eyes, it would have been scared by how intensely she squinted at it.

In her mind, magic was grand and intimidating, nothing like the quiet spell and unassuming green pot, so she’d really feared it hadn’t worked. During the night, thoughts of how disappointed Hilda would be plagued her mind before she fell asleep, and she had all but already planned the speech about persevering when things went wrong she’d give to her daughter.

But that’s not what had happened.

Used to rising early to make Hilda breakfast, Johanna was up only after the sun. As usual, she was going to open up the kitchen and living room windows, so that the cool, pure morning air could come in before the weather warmed up. Something was different, though, and it took her a while to notice in the sleepy state she’d been. It became obvious when she headed to open the window where the pot had been placed: a radiant sunflower grew all the way to the ceiling.

She’d run out of the kitchen and woken Hilda up, euphorically telling her that her spell had worked. The girl had barely been able to contain a scream of joy, and Johanna could do nothing but be proud of her daughter for what she’d managed to do.

Now, with Hilda already at school, Johanna rushed to the library to let Maven know about the spell’s success. When she arrived, the librarian was behind the circulation desk, turning on the computer to get the system running for the day. As she heard the door opening, she looked up with a surprised glint on her eyes, not having expected to have any patrons that early. After seeing who it was though, her face softened and she smiled in greeting.

“Good morning, Johanna.” She said when the woman had approached the desk. Given the satisfaction on her face, she had probably already worked out the reason behind Johanna’s visit.

“It worked!” Johanna felt some embarrassment when she realized that she’d forgotten to return her good morning, but she was sure Maven understood. This was a special occasion. “The spell, it worked! This huge sunflower grew overnight!”

The look of satisfaction did not go away as the librarian nodded calmly.

“Hilda is very skilled. She must be over the moon with it.”

“She is. Very happy, I mean. But Maven, don’t you see it?” She instinctively put her hands on top of the librarian’s where they lied atop of the desk, making a blush spread over the librarian’s cheeks.

“I… I’m sorry, see what?”

“This is proof that Hilda is good at this. It means that you can’t give up hope with your sister.”

Maven sighed, looking down at their hands.

“Whether or not my sister can be saved unfortunately doesn’t depend on Hilda. But if you are so confident, then I will take a vow of trust and not lose faith.”

“That’s the spirit!” Johanna grinned, earning an answering smile from the librarian when she looked up at her again. There was still something infinitely sad in her eyes, however, and Johanna frowned when she realized it.

For a few moments, the library was in complete silence as they stared into each other’s eyes. In the stillness of the early morning, only their breathing could be heard.

“I miss having a family.” Maven said then, making Johanna surprised that she hadn’t even needed prompting to share her worries. That was a big evolution from how closed off she usually was, and some happiness came from knowing that the librarian seemed to trust her more now.

“I miss it so much...”

Feeling her heart break for the woman in front of her, Johanna took hold of Maven’s hands and brought them to her heart, noticing how surprised she looked at the gesture of affection.

“When we bring Myra back, you’ll have a sister. But you’re already part of a family, Maven.” Seeing her lips part in surprise, Johanna squeezed her hands tighter.

“And we’ll never leave you behind.”

Chapter Text

The girls enjoyed varying their meeting place often. Though they had one spot in the Huldrawoods that they called theirs, it wasn’t uncommon that in the colder months they’d do their gatherings in one of their houses. When that wasn’t the case, though, sometimes they still liked sitting around Myra’s tend. A change of scenery helps us get creative with the nightmares, Jade always said.

That night was one of those occasions. Neither she nor Jade had gone out haunting, staying at the woods instead. They were trying to get everything ready for when the girls came back with more stories, lighting up their fire and putting logs around it for them to sit on.

Jade had been acting off that evening, Myra noticed. At random moments, she’d stop what she was doing and look around suspiciously, or take a deep breath with her brows together in a frown. She tried to ignore it, but Myra had been with the Marra long enough to know that she was sensing something she didn’t like, and she knew that it would fall to her to give an explanation.

Eventually, when Myra was about to sit down to wait for the group, Jade grasped her shoulders and made her look into her eyes. Myra tensed you instinctively; it was never good when Jade got angry.

“There’s something off here.” She said, staring at her face intensely so as to be able to catch any sign of deception. “Myra, was a human here?”

Myra held her breath and forced herself to not look away. Many weeks had passed since that happened, she’d hoped that the girls wouldn’t be able to pick up their energy traces. And she was quite sure the others wouldn’t be able to, but being the oldest member of the Marra, she should have expected Jade’s senses to be sharper.

“My sister came here.” She admitted. “But I sent her away.”

Strengthening her grip on Myra, Jade narrowed her eyes.

“Only your sister?”

Myra took a deep breath. It would be easy for her to lie, but if Jade was pressing for more information, then she could have already picked up the energy imprint of two different humans. And Myra definitely did not want to face the consequences for lying to her.

“I sensed someone else when she came, but I didn’t even get to see them. And later a friend of hers came-”

“A friend? A witch too?”

“No, I don’t think so.” Her breathing was hard though she did her best to hide it, and she measured her words carefully to make sure nothing she said could be interpreted as untruthfulness.

“And you let her go?!” Myra couldn’t help but flinch at the harshness in her voice, but at least Jade let her go, taking a step back and stomping her foot on the ground. “Myra, what the hell? We could have kept her! How long has it been since we had a decent practice target?”

“But she was an adult!”

“That would be even better! Don’t tell me we wouldn’t have tons of fun scaring a grown up. It’s much better than those scaredy-cat kids that we usually go for.”

Myra crossed her arms over herself as Jade paced around the campfire. The way she looked at her when she was angry always left her with a chill inside.

“We never go for adults for a reason. Their fears are much harder to recreate, you told me so yourself.” She argued. Myra still remembered vividly how she’d wanted to haunt her teachers and her headmaster when she first became a marra, to give them a taste of how she felt going to school. To give them a taste of how she felt every day and they did nothing about it. She’d been advised against it, though. All the other girls warned her that she did not want to discover the pain that trying to recreate existential crises in nightmares was.

“Exactly! If we had a guinea pig, we would be able to get better at that! But you just let her go. You know how rare is it for adults to be in a place where they’re vulnerable for us to catch them?”

Not knowing how to defend herself, Myra only lowered her head and accepted the mocking that Jade kept throwing at her. Even when the girls arrived, the first thing that she did was tell them all about Myra’s shortcomings, making her the laughingstock for the night.

They’re just messing around, she told herself that night, when they were all gone and she was free to stare at the night sky undisturbed. The moon was in waxing crescent, she realized. The time to set intentions to work on and get ready to take action. The moon’s first step towards fullness.

She sighed, curling herself into a ball in front of her tent. It used to be her favorite phase when she was a child. It reminded her of the Cheshire Cat from Alice In Wonderland, and every other month when the crescent moon came around, she’d ask her sister and mother to read her the book. She would giggle as they made different voices for the characters and imagine that the moon was the cat smiling down at her.

But that time was long gone. She could do magic much more powerful than the prosperity spells that occasionally would be cast on times of waxing crescent, and she could do it in any moon phase. She didn’t need her mother to read her stories, or the silly beliefs her family held about a rock in the sky. She was infinitely stronger now.

But if she was so much stronger, why did she feel like she was about to cry?

_#_#_#_

Everything had to be perfect.

Well, things didn’t have to be perfect. Her apprentice had never expected flawlessness, or complained when she took her through ways that weren’t as interesting as the traditional practice. But this? She wanted this to be as close to a proper witch’s ceremony as she could, because she knew that Hilda would love it.

The Inaugural was one of the most important marks in a witch’s path. It was when a young practitioner stopped being an initiate to finally earn the title of apprentice witch. it was when the practitioner could say that they were no longer glimpsing into the path of witchcraft to decide whether or not it was for them, but in the beginning of their own path. And, aside from all the symbolism, it was when the young witch was given their wand.

Maven vividly remembered her Inaugural. She remembered her mother in ceremonial vests leading them to the forest, her father carrying her baby sister behind her. The utter joy she’d felt when her mother had given her her wand and declared her a witch had left a warm mark on her heart, and looking back she pinpointed that moment as the one when she realized how deep her love for magic went. Because that was the moment she realized it was not about power, it was about connection.

Originally, she wasn’t going to organize an Inaugural for Hilda. She’d planned on simply giving her her wand when she was ready and continuing her training. But in the months they’d trained together, their relationship had clearly changed, and Maven had long stopped pretending that she wasn’t as invested in the girl’s happiness as she was in her magic. Now, she wanted to give her a ceremony as close to tradition as she could.

All the members of a magic community showed up to this event, to greet their newest member into their circle and honour them. However, there were no magical communities in Trolberg, no covens to speak of anymore, which did take some of the shine away from the experience. For her own Inaugural, her mother had invited a few great aunts and uncles which she didn’t think she’d ever seen again, even when they looked for other witches to help them in their research on the Marra. Hilda, however, didn’t even have that, so Maven had to make do with what she had.

The beach had been the chosen spot for the ceremony, for having been the place where Hilda managed an important turning point in her practice, and now her two best friends whispered to themselves by the shoreline. Not too far away were Alfur, who had made a point of helping Maven in the organization of the Inaugural, and Raven. Johanna wasn’t there yet, as she was the one responsible for bringing Hilda to the chosen spot.

With each passing day, the nights were getting longer and colder, a sign of how Autumn was upon them, and Maven breathed the cool air into her lungs as she looked up at the sky. Luckily, it was a cloudless night, allowing them to perfectly see the stars and the waxing crescent moon. Inaugurals were always done in this phase: it was believed to strengthen the witch in the path they had ahead of them.

The beach was just as bright as the sky. A path of torches had been made from where the sand began to where Maven awaited for Hilda by the water, wearing her mother’s old ceremonial garments: a deep blue robe, to signify her wisdom and insightfulness as an older witch, and the iconic witch’s hat, synbolizing her connection to the universe.

Even though she had taken all the steps to certify that they would not be seen, Maven still felt tense every time a car drove by them. She didn’t have much time to worry, however, because soon Johanna’s car parked by the sidewalk. Hilda got out first, wearing the white cape that Maven had asked Johanna to have her wear to the ceremony.

She imagined it must have been an interesting conversation. After all, all Hilda knew was that she was going to go through a rite of passage. It was part of tradition for the witch to not know exactly what would happen, and Maven had found the surprise so delightful in her Inaugural that she hadn’t wanted to spoil it for Hilda.

After the torches, which had called her attention immediately because of their brightness, Hilda’s gaze fell on her best friends. Just as Maven had asked of her, Hilda hadn’t told them much other than that she was being trained to be a witch, so she understood her apprentice’s shock at seeing them there. She just hadn’t been able to leave people who mattered so much to Hilda out of the ceremony.

She walked towards the beach, taking everything in with wonder in her eyes. Though Maven thought she would have rathered talked to her friends first, as soon as she saw her mentor standing at the end of the torches in her solemn attire, she headed in her direction. When Hilda locked her gaze on her, they both smiled at each other.

There was no right way to do this, Maven discovered when she did her research in order to be able to be the head of this ceremony. There were no special words that needed to be said. To welcome your apprentice into the community as best as one could was already enough.

“Good evening, Hilda.” She said when the girl was close enough. “Sorry for the suspense, but it’s a part of the Inaugural.”

Hilda looked around her, seeing all her friends watching her with pride in their eyes. She could even swear she saw tears on her mother’s.

“Good evening!” Confused as she was, she couldn’t help but be excited. Not knowing exactly what would happen made her even more so, in fact. “What are we doing today?”

“Today marks the day when you truly become a witch.”

Open jawed, Hilda felt her heart pick up pace. As she watched Maven kneel down to her level, she pictured herself doing all the fantastic things she’d seen the librarian do, using her magic to help people and keep the balance nature.

“Now is when you truly choose the craft. We do not ask you for undying devotion. We do not request that you never change your mind.”

Maven stopped suddenly, and Hilda could see her lower lip tremble for a moment, her gaze turning dark for the quickest second, even though she tried not to let her abrupt turmoil show.

This was a happy occasion. It was not one to remember the one witch who changed her mind. It was not one to remember her sister. She took a deep breath and picked up where she had left off.

“But you’ll never stop being a witch. Your power was already unlocked and can never again be hidden. But now, you set free your soul as well. Should you accept, there will be no hiding your nature or cutting ties with your responsibility. It’s your path and you must walk it with selflessness and wisdom. Is that what you chose?”

Maven was not afraid of a negative answer, and nor was she surprised when Hilda answered with a strong “yes”. But it didn’t stop her from feeling glad and so incredibly proud.

She got up then, and reached for her robe’s long, thin pocket, one that was made under measure for only one type of object, and arguably the most important in a witch’s craft.

Hilda’s wand had come in the mail earlier that month. She’d known what it was instantly, since the package was not only from Oslo, the master wandmaker’s town, but also because the cardboard box was marked with many unobtrusive safety sigils. Inside, protected by another box, was the wand. Maven noticed easily that the wandmaker had taken her requests and made them better.

In the handle, simple yet delicate images of flowers and leaves had been carved into the poplar wood, and there were small pieces of green jasper scattered around the shaft like stars in a sky. At the base of the wand, there were two carved triangles facing the same direction, one of them with a line crossing its tip. They represented water and earth, the two elements that empowered Hilda the most.

It had taken Maven no more than a look to decide that Hilda would love it.

As she pulled the wand out of her pocket, the librarian watched Hilda’s expression closely, happy to see the utter amazement that seemed to wash over her.

“Then this belongs to you now.”

Picking up the wand from Maven’s hand, Hilda ran eyes through it, feeling the texture of the carvings and gemstones. She could not believe her eyes, and even though Raven and Alfur clapped excitedly at her, the only thing she could do was look up at her mentor.

“Thank you so much.” She said with emotion. She was about to take a step forward to hug Maven when the librarian took another wand from her robes. This one Hilda had already seen before many times: it belonged to Maven herself.

“You don’t need to thank me, Hilda. You did everything yourself. But we’re not finished yet.”

The librarian took a step back and pointed to the sand.

“Can you draw a pentacle?”

“Oh.” It was a simple enough request, and Hilda kneeled down to comply. As she used the tip of her wand to draw on the sand, she knew that Maven’s wand was pointed at her, even though she couldn’t see it.

“By water, earth, fire and air.” She said as Hilda drew her five point star. “And by the universe that unites us all, you are now, forever and truly, a witch.”

The last words were said as Hilda finished the circle connecting the points, and as soon as she did a blue light the same colour as her hair arose from the pentacle. They all stared in
awe as Maven waved her wand, making the light rise up and form a ball in the air, and then guided it to Hilda’s wand, where the light was absorbed by the wood.

As soon as that magic was inside her wand, Hilda could feel it buzzing with familiar energy: her own. There was a little piece of her inside the wand now. And she sensed there was a piece of the universe inside it as well.

Being the least startled among them, Maven spoke first.

“Congratulations, Hilda. That was a very big step.” She said as the others walked closer to them to congratulate the girl. The first person to get a hug, however, was Maven herself. Hilda all but lept at her as soon as she stopped talking, and surprising even herself, Maven was able to catch her.

Her surprise must have shown on her face as she held the girl, because when Johanna came to them, she giggled as soon as she looked at the librarian. Instead of easing her, however, Johanna added to her shock by joining in on the hug, squeezing Hilda between the two of them.

Soon, all of Hilda’s friends, human or otherwise, had joined in on the hug as well. It was an awkward situation for Maven, but not at all unpleasant. These were all good people, and it was good to know Hilda was surrounded by so much support.

“This calls for a celebration!” Johanna chirped when she drew back. “What do you say we go out for some pizza?”

David and Frida agreed eagerly, and Hilda fist pumped the air when Maven put her down. Only Raven decided to stay out of it, knowing that he probably would not be allowed inside a restaurant. Of course, that didn’t stop him from making Hilda promise she’d save him some for him to eat at her house.

As they all headed to the car, Maven shook her head fondly, telling them that she’d meet them at the restaurant as soon as she put the torches away and changed out of her clothes. She’d attract some very judgemental stares if she walked in dressed like a monk in a pointy hat, after all.

But truly, the main reason she’d stayed behind was to examine Hilda’s pentacle. Even after the energizing of her wand, a weak glow still came from it, and not only was this unusual, but it was very telling too.

With her wand, she guided the salty water to form a stream, moving forward and over the pentacle, and twirled her wand to make the water repeat the movement. When at last it erased the pentacle, in a way that the remaining glow seemed like specks of shining dust in the water, she made the water slide back to the sea. As if diluted by the large body of water, the remains of Hilda’s magic could then no longer be seen.

She’d never heard of that happening before. The wand was supposed to have been able to absorb all of the magic. As far as she knew, there would be no side effects for that, but it did mean something curious.

Hilda was far more powerful than she seemed.

Chapter Text

Five months later

The air of the woods hummed with their magic.

The birds had all flown away as soon as they began their practice, except for a handful of owls and ravens, who looked at them as though they knew perfectly what they were doing. Other than their hushed incantations and the crackle of their spells, silence filled the forest. Even the bugs sat still to watch the witches.

Dueling was a great way to improve her control and strengthen her, Hilda had found. So every other Saturday, instead of an usual lesson, the librarian would take her all the way to the forest for them to practice. After all, it was way more recluse than any park in Trolberg, and they couldn’t very well duel inside the library or Maven’s house. Besides, Woodman liked to come and watch them sometimes.

“Be more conscious of how the blow is going to hit me!” Maven advised after the spell that her apprentice had shot at her was quickly absorbed by her wards. “But you’re doing very good in the pronunciation! Your spells are coming out great.”

Hilda smiled and nodded. Getting ready for the spell that the librarian would cast, she squinted at the book which she held on her left hand. Though her mentor was experienced enough that she didn’t need to say the words out loud for spells like these, let alone consult a spell book, Hilda was still working with verbal incantations. With her other hand, she held her wand, which she used to strengthen her shield shield in case she couldn’t cast the counter spell in time.

Purple sparks flew off of the librarian’s wand like fireworks, and in response Hilda repeated one of her favorite incantations, gronn barriere beskytter meg, which made a gigantic flower appear in front of her like a floating barrier. The sparks completely destroyed it, but they didn’t reach Hilda’s shield.

“That worked.” Maven said as she walked closer. “But the spell I shot you was easily redirectable. Your magic would have been better used if you had channeled the spell and shot it back at me. This way, you just spent your energy in a barrier that can’t serve you anymore.”

When she was close enough, she looked for a specific page in Hilda’s book, reaching the beginning of another section of spells.

“Any of these would have been good. Do you want us to study them next?”

“Yes, that sounds good!”

“Great.” Returning to her position a few meters in front of her student, the librarian came back to defence stance. “Oh, and since it was a fire spell, it would have gone even better if you returned it with a water one. You are doing amazing with earth spells, and it’s perfect that you’re developing your strengths, but I don’t want you to get too dependent on one element, okay?”

Hilda could not help but look down at her bare feet. For their duels, she always chose to be leave her boots at the side. It helped her feel grounded at all times, as well as draw energy from the earth, but she knew that she had to learn how to be ready to cast on any circumstances. Maven allowed her to be barefoot, but she made sure Hilda understood that she should not continue like that when she got more skilled.

They had been dueling for some time, sending spells back and forth between each other since the sun had been high in the sky, so Hilda knew this would probably be one of the last times she’d cast before they called Johanna’s to give them a ride back home. As such, she wanted to finish off with something more elaborate. There was this one spell that she’d been itching to try, especially since she suspected that Maven would love it, so she decided to cast it.

“Falske udode angrep.” She pronounced the words carefully, paying attention to how they felt in her mouth; the feeling you got from things was very important in witchcraft. As she did so, she motioned her wand to make a coffin shape in the air, and in each of the six points where two lines met a glow of spectral light gathered.

“Falske udode angrep.” Hilda repeated, and felt herself surrendering to the spell. She was swaying almost imperceptibly from side to side as her magic worked to turn the balls of light into skulls, and her eyes were closed in both peace and concentration.

As she kept chanting the incantation, the skulls advanced towards the librarian, who gasped and twirled her wand. A golden fox rose from it, gleaming from the magic it was made of. Ferociously, it attacked the skulls as they came, but it wasn’t quick enough to stop all of them. Maven then resorted to throwing strong blasts of fire at the attackers, however she found that they were way too strong to be taken down that way, being continuously fed by Hilda’s magic.

Two of them were already working on destroying her personal shield when she realized, feeling both stunned and proud, that she’d have to use an advanced spell to beat off the energy creatures that Hilda had cast. Lifting her wand high above her head, its tip pointing at the sky, she stomped her foot and proclaimed the incantation loudly.

“Livets bolger beskytter denne manebundne sjelen!”

As soon as she said the last word, purple waves began flowing from her wand, reminiscent of the movement in a pond after a rock was thrown in it. The skulls that had remained emitted a piercing screech as they died out, turning into thick, black goo that was absorbed by the ground, and the waves made even the branches of the trees around them shake.

Maven took a deep breath, closing her eyes for a moment to collect herself. She’d never even used that spell outside of training battles with her mother, and it used up a lot of her energy. Not only that, but her wards were also damaged from Hilda’s attack. She’d have to put them up again later.

She was still panting, completely stupefied by the strength of the spell Hilda had managed to cast, when she realized that the girl must be feeling its effects too, especially since Maven had thrown another powerful charm at her. Running to her student, the librarian tuned in into her energy and realized that her wards were marred as well.

“Hilda, how are you feeling?” She asked urgently, kneeling down in front of the girl and putting her hands on her shoulders.

“Whoa! I feel… kind of surprised, to be honest. I didn’t know that would work so well!”

“You are okay, then?”

“Yes, of course. Kind of tired, actually, like I’ve just run a lot, but I’m fine.” When she came to think of it, her heart was beating madly, and she felt like she could fall asleep any time, but it was nothing that justified the look of shocked wonder that the librarian had on her eyes. After a moment, during which Maven seemed to be deep in thought, she stood up without taking her hands from Hilda’s shoulders.

“That was a very advanced spell.” She said, her breathing already beginning to return to its normal rhythm. “How did you learn it?”

Hilda shrugged, and though that wasn’t what she was trying to do, it dislodged Maven’s hands from her. The witch crossed her arms and hugged herself, avoiding eye contact, a small gesture that in the months they’d spent together Hilda had come to recognize as nervousness.

“I saw it in the book yesterday and thought I’d try it. Why? Did it come out wrong?”

“No, you’ve cast it almost perfectly.”

“But you don’t look happy at all.”

After being called out on that, Maven met her student’s eyes and made herself smile.

“Sorry for being rude, Hildie. You did amazing and I’m very proud of you for that. I have something on my mind, that’s all.”

She sighed and squatted down on the ground, not at all surprised when Hilda did the same by her side, looking concerned for her. The girl’s power had been building as they trained, and Maven was aware of each step she accomplished in her path. Still, it had been easy to pretend that there was no end objective to this, that there wasn’t a goal they were trying to reach, and just as easy to tell herself that if the moment finally came, than it would be only in a very long time, in a way that kept Maven’s hopes alive without her having to face the looming possibility of failure or any harm coming to Hilda. But after this, it would be stupid to deny it that her apprentice was already capable of helping her.

“What sort of ‘something’?” She asked, and Maven felt a pang of guilt at the worry in her voice. Hilda was the child and the student in their relationship, she shouldn’t have to worry about her.

This was the moment she’d been waiting for. The reason she’d began training the girl in the first place. The chance to finally save her sister. And yet, she hesitated for some reason. Maybe it was the fear of failure, or the resentment over knowing that even though she loved her sister, Myra didn’t deserve a second chance when going away was her choice and so was refusing her help for the first times. That was, however, not her decision to make.

“You are ready.” She revealed after deliberation. “You are apt to help me perform the Soul Spell.”

Hilda’s eyes widened, and she jumped up to her feet. There was no fear on her face, only amazement as she considered what that meant.

She’d done it. After all those months, she was ready.

“That’s amazing!” She chirped, but frowned when the librarian still didn’t get up. “It is good, isn’t it? Is there any problem?”

“No, not really. I suppose I’m just a bit overwhelmed. But with that being said… Hilda, will you help me perform the ritual?”

Squaring her shoulders, Hilda felt herself standing taller. Maven was by far the most powerful person she knew, and one of her best friends. She’d done so much for her, and now Hilda had the chance to be the one to come to her aid and show the librarian that her hard work training her had paid off.

“Without the shadow of a doubt!”

_#_#_#_

It took Maven little time to realize that she was the most nervous between them all.

After they called Johanna to pick them up, the two witches spent some time grounding, to return the chaotic energy that they had gathered during the duel back to the earth and warding, since both of their shields had been damaged. When the woman arrived, Hilda was excited to tell her about how she was ready for the Soul Spell, and though there was a flash of concern in her eyes so quick that Maven nearly missed it, she looked way more proud of her child than worried. And if Johanna wasn’t worried, Maven told herself, she shouldn’t be either. The worst case scenario was getting worked up for nothing if her sister did not cooperate.

They would need a whole day to properly prepare themselves to cast the spell, and the next day was as good as any. Hilda said she didn’t have any pressing schoolwork to be done that weekend, so it was settled that she would spend the night over at Maven’s so that they could begin as early as needed. Their first stop after Johanna picked them up in the forest was at Hilda’s house, so she could pack the things she’d need for the night and tell Alfur where she’d be. Next, all three of them went to Maven’s place, where the witches sprawled themselves on the couches, still resting from the energy they’d spent on the duel. It didn’t escape Maven’s notice that Johanna had seemed amused by that.

For quite some time, they didn’t do much, just chatted and rested as the sun lowered down into the horizon. Maven ordered food and they all ate together, arranging the last details with Johanna. After the spell was cast, she’d still need to call Myra forth so she could take the help, and Maven insisted that Hilda wasn’t present for that second part. However much the girl protested, eventually her mother and mentor made her understand that it could be dangerous, and so it was arranged for Johanna to be on Maven’s street just after sunset, so she could be with Hilda when she went home after the spell.

“Good luck, and be safe.” Johanna said as she brought her daughter into a tight embrace when the time came for her to leave. “Call me if you need anything, okay?”

“I will, mum. Good night.”

After releasing Hilda, Johanna hugged Maven as well, making her blush at the show of affection and tentatively return it.

“You too, Mave. I believe in you.”

And then she was gone, leaving mentor and apprentice alone with their duty.

_#_#_#_

“So… what’s the schedule for tomorrow?” Hilda asked when she entered the room. Maven was going through the uncomfortable process of getting her sister’s bed ready for the first time in years, and she’d asked her apprentice to put their wands in the backyard, near the rosemaries. It was beneficial for wands to soak in moonlight every once in a while, and it was especially important considering their plan for the next day. Besides, she’d wanted to be alone when she put away the picture of her family that was in a frame at Myra’s bedside table.

Even though now it was clear that her sister had ripped it herself, at the time she and her mother had though that one of the Marra had torn it to pieces, and they had glued it back together. It didn’t hurt so much to look at it anymore, but it would feel too vulnerable to let Hilda see it.

“Well, first off will be grounding. I’m afraid we’ll do a lot of meditating tomorrow. It is crucial for us to be in our most connected state of mind possible, it will help us be clear minded at the time of the ritual.”

“Makes sense.” After noticing Freya rubbing her tail on her legs, Hilda picked the catowl up and scratched her ears. She had quite warmed up to Hilda over the time, and the girl was happy to have her nearby. There was nothing like a fluffy animal to ease her nerves, which did exist due to the importance of their situation.

“After breakfast we’ll see to the spell components. We need to cleanse and charge every crystal and carve sigils onto candles. Obviously we’ll also study the ritual during the afternoon. It should be cast at moonrise.”

Nodding, Hilda sat down on her bed, and the librarian sat down on hers, picking up her comforter and bringing it to cover her legs.

“Just a warning-“ She said as she lied down. “Freya is looking awfully comfy in your arms, she’ll probably want to sleep in your bed.”

Lying down herself, Hilda noticed that Freya did indeed make herself comfortable by her pillow and she chuckled.

“It’s okay.”

“In that case, we should go to sleep. We begin at dawn.”

Maven pressed the light switch and cast the room in darkness. Though the curtains were open, Maven didn’t live near many other houses, so the only light that came through was that of the moon and the stars. Hilda shifted on her bed as little as she could, so as not to disturb Freya, but it didn’t stop Maven from being aware that minutes later she still hadn’t fallen asleep. She tuned into her energy, and felt her unease.

“Is something bothering you?” Maven asked quietly so as not to startle her, and the little light that came through the window was enough for her to see Hilda turning to face her. So many nights she’d talked to Myra like this, both of them exhausted on their beds but still with their heads too filled by thoughts to go to sleep without sharing them. Seemed ironic to have this experience with the one who would help save her.

“It’s just normal anxiety, I suppose.” When she began this journey, she’d been nothing but excited for this day to come. But she was much wiser and more experienced now, and she knew the importance of the ritual they’d do. She knew that if they weren’t careful, it might go wrong no matter how well intentioned she was. “You are a bit too, aren’t you? I noticed you’ve been tense. Is it because you’re also worried I won’t be able to make it?”

Maven stiffened when she said that. She’d rarely known Hilda to be anything but confident. If she was offended by the possibility of her mentor worrying about her, however, it didn’t show on her voice. It sounded like she was only pointing out a fact, and that even though she hoped it would work and knew her teacher believed in her, she’d accepted that failure was a possible outcome for every situation in life. Maven supposed it did show how much she’d grown, but it had caught her by surprise.

“I wouldn't have said you were ready if I didn’t think you were, Hildie.”

“I know.” She could practically hear the girl smile. “But that’s not what I asked. You can be ready for something and still not be able to make it in the end.”

Maven shook her head, although she didn’t know if Hilda could see her in the gloom.

“You are right. But… that’s not the reason why I’ve been on edge today.”

“Then what is it?”

“Let’s just say” She sighed. “That you’ve never been the one I was worried about.”

Turning onto her right arm to face the wall, Maven hugged her pillow and let herself ignore the rest of the world. A calm feeling washed over her like waves, and soon both witches were sinking into a deep slumber.

Chapter Text

Time seemed to flow very differently when you found yourself attuned to the world around you. Ever since they woke up, Maven tried to make it so they remained in a meditative state even while they went about with preparations, and Hilda was quite sure it had worked. Her heightened senses and concentration remained with her even after they finished their first grounding, right after they got up, and remained with her for surprisingly long.

After they ate their breakfast, they began working on the spell components. A ridiculous amount of crystals would be used, and they had to cleanse and charge every single one to make sure there was no chaotic or malicious energy in them. Hilda was responsible for doing so by giving them some time in a jar with salt water, but there were a couple of them that, due to their physical composition, could not come in contact with water or salt. Likewise, there were some gems that couldn’t be left in the sun to charge with its energy, and in both situations Maven used her own energy to cleanse and charge the gems.

Whether it was usual for witches to just have them lying about in their homes, Hilda didn’t know, but the fact was that Maven had four tall, thick white candles that they would also need for the ritual. They didn’t need to be cleansed, because energy didn’t stick to most objects like it did to crystals, but they anointed them with an oil that Hilda concocted while her teacher had been tending to the crystals. It had a base of sesame oil, with shredded ginger, ground cinnamon and ghost pepper in it, and had a strong, fiery scent to it. After carving the necessary sigils onto the candles, they used their hands to rub the oil on them, from the top to the middle and then from the bottom to the middle, as was effective to be done when a witch was trying to manifest something.

By the time this was done, Hilda was surprised to notice that the morning was already over. It had gone by in the blink of an eye to her. But the work was not yet done. After another half an hour meditating when they were done eating, Maven set out to explaining her all the details and nuances of the Soul Spell. It was easily one of the most complex rituals she’d ever come across, the librarian explained, and definitely the most convoluted she’d ever cast. Energy work played an important role in it, but the girl was surprised when she was told that spirit work did too. She’d been worried about that, for a moment. Her knowledge of spirit work was scarce at best and she had even less experience than she did information, but Maven assured her that she’d handle the most of it. Both of them memorized all the steps and chantings, and considered all the things that could go wrong and how to solve them if those problems arose. The tasks were delegated between the two of them and soon Hilda was feeling less clueless about what would be happening. They were preparing themselves the best they could, and that was already something.

Assembling their components in the place the ritual would be performed was next. Though they would have more privacy in the forests outside Trolberg, Maven pointed out that the chances of unfamiliar spirits interrupting them would be greater, so it was decided that they would simply cast it on her backyard. In order to build a ward around their casting circle, they surrounded the space by a mixture of eggshell powder and juniper leaves, and worked together to bring up the shield, building it from the ground up.

Hilda helped Maven use a compass to place each of the four candles in a cardinal direction, and they carefully arranged the crystals according to the picture in the spellbook. It was annoyingly intricate, and Hilda took longer than she would have liked to manage to interpret it, even with the librarian’s help.

“These look mathematical, almost.” She said, frowning at the wrinkled pages.

“That’s because they are.” Maven answered. “There are mathematical patterns to everything in the universe, including magic. But recognizing and interpreting them is very advanced stuff, you don’t have to worry about it yet.”

Connecting the candles and forming a circle just slightly less wide than that made by the powder were a couple of desert roses, which Maven had been gathering since she began training Hilda for this occasion. Amethysts, selenites and labradorites, along with other pieces of gemstones so small that the girl couldn’t even recognize, went inside the circle to make the geometrical patterns that she had trouble to even understand. They finished off by placing a small glass jar in the very centre of it all.

Hilda took a deep breath, looking at all they’d done. But the sun was not going to set yet, so she turned to Maven, who seemed to be evaluating their work as well.

“What now?”

“Are you warm?” She asked, and Hilda nodded. She’d stitched a warmth sigil to her jacket at the beginning of winter, and had also remembered to put pieces of paper with the same sigil inside each of her boots. “In that case, we should stay here. Connect well enough to our set up that we’ll be able to control the spell and sense what is happening during the ritual.”

Sitting down cross legged with their backs to one another, they focused on their surroundings. During her training Hilda had learned to attune herself to the world around her better, and even though she was still not as good at this as her mentor, she found herself having ease to do so at that moment. It could be because they’d worked to be in that state since the second they woke up, or due to the magic in the carefully constructed area they’d just set up, or a result of both, but she felt like she could tell every little thing that was happening inside the circle.

It was only when Maven gently touched her arm, some time later, that she opened her eyes again. Were it not for noticing the sunlight getting dimmer, Hilda would not have been able to tell how much time had gone by.

“It’s time.” Maven whispered, in such a low voice that the girl felt like it had been spoken inside her mind. Wordlessly, they got to their feet and took a deep breath. In perfect sync, they lit up flames on top of their fingertips and used them to light up the candles, making the situation feel even more real, their warmth replacing that of the sun as it began to set.

They then stood side by side in the middle of their circle, holding hands to connect their energy. With her free hand, Maven picked up her wand and pointed it to the sky, concentrating harder than she ever had on her life.

“Mine forfedre, kom frem, jeg ber deg! Blodet ditt trenger din hjelp i denne verden!”

She felt the earth humming beneath her feet, the wind rushing around her, the veil of this world stretching under her command. And then, she felt them coming. She pressed Hilda’s hand harder for a moment to signal her, but she had felt them coming too and had already begun working on her task. As soon as they were close enough, the girl opened a rift in their ward, just big enough for them to come through, keeping her focus on allowing in the spirits that wished them well and halting any malicious energy that seeked to take advantage of Maven’s calling.

When Maven lowered her wand, the last of them inside, Hilda mended the ward and opened her eyes again, even though she couldn’t remember ever closing them. They were all with them. Maven’s ancestors.

She had explained to her that the spirits of your ancestors weren’t quite like the ghosts that could be brought back in a cemetery. Spirits had been dead for much longer, so long that no one and nothing that they had loved existed anymore. They had no leftover ties to this world, and didn’t have the power to haunt anymore, only being able to come back when they were called forth by a witch.Though she knew this, she was still surprised when she could not see them. Feeling their energy was easy, and she could tell that each one of them was floating above one desert rose, but they had no noticeable corporeal form whatsoever. The best she could see when she focused were flashes of aura looking clouds.

The witches moved, this time standing in front of each other with enough space between them for the jar that was on the ground. That was it, the most crucial moment of the ritual. Hilda extended her arms, palms facing up, while Maven held out her hands in front of herself as if she was about to receive something.

As she took a deep breath, Hilda visualized all the energy around her, from the crystals, the spirits, herself and even Maven’s, swirling and gathering, being pulled towards her. It would be impossible, and not at all her goal, to use up the energy of all of them. That would completely destroy the spirits and she couldn’t even imagine what would happen to herself and her mentor in that scenario. But she did manage to gather a great deal of it, enough for it to be visible as streams of silver light, feeling it assemble on her hands and run up and down her skin like electricity. As she did so, a part of her concentration went to channeling this energy to Maven’s hands.

For her part, Maven frowned as she took to the intrinsicate work of setting intention to this energy, imbuing it with her will so it knew what it was meant to become. Then, she manipulated it so it would fall into the geometrical patterns formed by the gemstones, the crystals guiding the energy to its purpose both because of their own properties and because of the time the two witches had spent with them, so they too had the magic to aid the ritual. It was a painstaking task, and she felt her heart beat faster with the effort of guiding the magic through such a meticulous path.

She didn’t dare open her eyes, but she could tell it was working, and it kept her going. She felt the energy, twisted and unrecognizable from its original state pooling on the jar at her feet as it finished the track. It was a continuous flow at that point, she’d receive the raw energy from Hilda and refine it into their end goal. In a few minutes, they were both panting from the strain of keeping the ritual going. Eventually, Hilda broke the chain, ceasing her building up of energy. Maven had to keep going to distill the magic that had already entered the cycle.

“I’m sorry.” Hilda groaned, leaning forward with her hands now against her tights so she could catch her breath. “This was all I could take without hurting us.”

“Thank the spirits.” Maven murmured, grinding down her teeth. If performing the ritual was hard, doing so while speaking was even more. “You know what to do.”

Trusting Hilda to know how to let out her ancestors gracefully, she concentrated all of her strength in getting the refining done perfectly, even as her power weakened. A deep sigh left her lips when the last bit of it was done, and she couldn’t help but let herself fall to the ground in a squat. Hilda was quick to put a cork on the jar; Maven had made sure that the two of them would have one in their pockets, so whoever was less affected by the spell at the end of it could close the jar with haste.

When her head stopped spinning, the first thing Maven noticed was darkness. The sun was completely set now, and the candles had no fire. If everything had gone according to theory, they had been put out by the spirits when they left. Hilda had an amazed smile on her face, staring at the jar on her hands. There was a faded blue cloud in it.

It was done. They had created a new soul.

_#_#_#_

“Are you sure you don’t want me to stay?” Hilda asked one more time, handing Maven the glass of water she had asked for.

The librarian was still sitting on the ground, the same place she’d been after completing the ritual. She was cradling the jar in her hands, still stunned that it was real and that it truly had worked.

“I am.” She said. “You’ve already helped me more than I can thank you for, but this is something I need to face myself. Your mother is probably already waiting for you in the street. Go home, ground properly, and rest. I’ll try and come by your house to let you know how it went.”

Making her nearly drop the glass, Hilda kneeled down and leaned forward to hug her tight.

“Good luck, Mave. Take care.”

“Thank you, Hildie. I will.”

With one last look at her mentor, Hilda went back inside the house to get her bag and leave.

Maven put the jar on her lap and gulped down the water. She was exhausted, but she needed to keep going. The Soul Spell was not a very well known one, and understandably so since there weren’t many occasions in which one would need to craft a brand new soul, save for enchantments gone awfully wrong. Because of that, the amount of information she had about it was not large, and she was not sure how that trapped soul should be treated. She didn’t know how long it would last without a host, or where she should store it. It was simply safer to do it all that night. She had a feeling that this second part would be even more tiring than the ritual.

Luckily, earlier that day she’d had the mental clarity to leave everything she’d need for a simple summoning spell by the door. It was weird how long ago that felt. After a few more moments of just breathing and gathering her strength, she got up to go get them.

The same casting circle would be used for this spell. She didn’t really have the energy for dismantling this one and building it anew. Kneeling in front of the candle that faced south, she lit it up again and began chanting.

“Kom na, kom na, kom til meg…”

Putting the tip of her bundle of thyme to the flame to let it smoke, she waved it in the air in circles above her head.

“Ikke vaer sjenert, kom na, du vet at jeg ringer etter deg.”

The smoke rose up in a grey column. Slowly, she removed her fingers from the bundle, her magic making it float without her holding it. This was a spell she was quite familiar with, decidedly the most popular one when it came to summoning dark entities. She and her mother had become very acquainted with it during their time looking for ways to save Myra, before they even knew that she had joined the Marra. they had attempted many times to summon any of the nightmare spirits, hoping that they’d lead them to where Myra was being kept, but they did not have the most important component: a taglock.

Taglocks were generally used in curses or blessings. They directed the spell towards a certain person by using something that belonged to them. Knowing that it was her sister that she had to summon, though, Maven had had a number of possible taglocks to choose from, eventually picking an antique mother pearl comb that their father had given Myra when she was a child. She had loved it a lot and taken good care of it. It meant a lot to her, and so was the perfect taglock.

“Ikke late som om du ikke vet at jeg snakker med deg. Er dette ikke ditt, kom na til meg.” She completed the incantation. The candle’s flame rose up high and strong, and she brought the comb to it. The magical fire did nothing to the comb but complete the spell, and after a heartbeat, the thyme stopped burning even though she didn’t command it to and all three other candles lit up.

When she turned around to look at them, their fire was green.

Chapter Text

“What do you want this time?”

Maven heard the angry hiss before she even saw her, standing at the edge of the bushes that delimited her back garden. Myra’s fists were clenched, and she looked like she was ready to attack her at any moment, which was probably true. It didn’t matter that she didn’t want to be there, though. The summoning spell also bound her to stay with the summoner for a few minutes, Maven only had to win her attention in that time so she wouldn’t run away. She just had no idea of how to do that

“I…” Maven stared at her, struggling to find words. She’d imagined this moment many times before, but the conversations she’d made up in her mind never felt quite right. Truth was, she wasn’t sure what would feel right. She’d never been taught what to do in a situation like this, and to her exhausted brain the thought of a confrontation felt even more out of her lane. “I’m not really sure, sweetie. I’ve done a lot to try to save you. But it’s all the same to you, isn’t it?”

Myra frowned. Her sister didn’t sound angry, just tired and resigned. She could not bring a single memory to mind where Maven hadn’t tried her greatest to be in control of the situation.

“Very complicated spell setup you have here.” She said, avoiding the question in favor of looking at the casting circle, colourful with all the crystals. “What are you trying to do?”

Leaving Myra’s old comb on the ground and picking up the jar instead, Maven lifted it for her to see. Her sister’s eyes widened as she realized what it was. The puff of smoke inside the jar was exactly like the one she saw leave her body the night she sealed her deal with the Marra. It was clear to her, then, why she had been summoned, and her breath caught on her throat though she didn’t let it show.

Myra knew no spell capable of doing that, but she remembered enough about witchcraft to know it could only have been possible if Maven had had the aid of a powerful witch. Her hands went to her waist as she looked around.

“You can’t possibly have done this on your own. So, where’s mum?”

Maven was hit by her question like a train, and she inhaled sharply at the realization that Myra didn’t know. She’d assumed her sister had taken a look at them often enough for her to know what had happened, but it seemed she really was clueless. Not missing the shock that overtook Maven’s face, Myra crossed her arms in front of herself.

Patting the ground beside her, Maven silently invited her sister to sit down with her but was not at all surprised when it only made Myra stare at her harder. She sighed and looked up at the sky.

“Mum is gone, Myra. She died more than an year ago.”

After a beat of silence, she could feel her sister walk closer and finally kneel by her side , even though her eyes were focused on the stars.

“How did she go?” Her voice was small and her words tentative. When Maven looked at her again, her heart squeezed with pain. That was already a healed wound for her, but she could only imagine the impact it was having on her sister. She found that she prefered Myra’s confrontational tone which she had been using seconds before to this sudden melancholy.

“Peacefully.” Maven lied. She knew a great part of her mother’s health complications had been aggravated by the stress and worry of thinking her youngest daughter had been in danger, and she took that agony to her grave. But Myra didn’t need to know that. Maven was not trying to guilt trip her into accepting her help.

“Myra, I am going to be straightforward with you.” She said when her sister remained in silence. “Mother and I have been trying to find you ever since you left, and ever since I found out what had happened to you, I’ve been working to be able to get you this.”

Her sister lifted her eyes briefly to look at the jar, but returned her gaze down immediately after. She was avoiding looking at her face, Maven noticed.

“Up to this point, you’ve refused my help and made it very clear you didn’t want me in your life anymore. But when it comes to this.” She lifted the jar. “I am no longer asking. I am begging you. If you want to take this and join the circus or the mafia, I won't care. If you want to take this and look for a vampire to bite you or a faerie to abduct you, it’s okay. I’ve already accepted that I can’t make you be something you don’t want to. But please, even if you don’t want to be a human, let me help you not be a puppet.”

For seconds, there was no answer, until Myra’s shoulders started shaking and Maven realized that she was sobbing. Figuring her affection wouldn’t be well received, Maven kept her hands to herself, even as she felt helpless to comfort her sister.

“I never wanted to become this.” Myra wined, making Maven sit up straighter. “I didn’t want to become one of these creatures.”

She hadn’t expected much more than a fight with her sister, so to find her explaining anything at all was a surprise. A very pleasant one, even if the moment was too tense for her to register any joy. Having decided to push her luck, Maven scooted closer to her.

“Then why did you do it?” She asked, monitoring her voice so that it wouldn’t come across as accusing. “And don’t even think about bringing up those kids who gave you a hard time. They were awful and you know we recognize how terrible your situation was. You know we did our best, and you also know that suffering isn’t an excuse to hurt people. So why did you it?”

“You’re right. That whole situation at school is just not what made me lose it. It was what I told myself when I questioned what I was doing. But it’s.. deeper than that. You wouldn’t understand.”

They let the words hang in the air, carving a rift between them even though they were only centimeters apart. But Maven was determined not to lose her again without a fight.

“No, I don’t think I would have understood either. But it’s been a long time, sweetie. I’ve grown.”

Tears still streaming down her eyes, Myra looked at her in askance as she took the necklace she was wearing over her head and then opened the pendant, revealing it to be a locker. Inside it, Myra saw a small picture of her sister standing next to a blue haired girl, who was smiling brightly. By her side, there was an enormous sunflower.

“This is my apprentice, Hilda, and that was the first spell she cast on her own. She made that flower grow overnight after just few months of training, can you believe it?”

Myra’s curiosity was piqued at the knowledge that her sister had taken a student. It didn’t sound like Maven at all to spend her time with a protégée, especially one so young. But what really called her attention was the plant.

“A hastened growth spell? You think those are-“

“A waste of magic on something that nature would already provide with, a disrespect for the spirit of the plant and a trick used by inpatient and sloppy witches to achieve their ends.” Maven completed. “Yes, I used to think all that. But Hilda… nothing matters as much to her as taking care of things. She never misses the opportunity of helping someone… grow. And she’s a green witch, on top of that. I knew she would love that spell. And she did.”

Staring at the girl’s grin in the photography, Myra tried to wrap her mind around the change that seemed to have overcome her sister. She didn’t sound like she only beared that her student’s first big accomplishment in magic was something she used to frown upon. She sounded genuinely proud.

“So I know where you’re coming from, Myra. I’ve had many chances to realize how I come short as a person. I’m trying every day to be a better mentor, and if you just give me another chance I promise I’ll do all I can to be a better sister. Please, sweetie, try to make me understand.”

Myra fixed her gaze on her like she’d grown a second head. Though she was looking at her sister, before her eyes was a person different than that she’d known. Or perhaps, she wondered, this Maven always been there but she’d been too caught in her mental image of her to notice.

It took her a lot of strength to speak again, but once she did the words flew easily. Her heart had become tired of storing so much bitterness inside of itself.

“I’ve always felt so weak.” She revealed, still with teary eyes and low voice. “We were raised as we were born. Like witches. And I grew up seeing all of you being so strong and confident about your powers, but… I’ve never felt that way. I do recognize that magic is powerful, sister. But it has never felt like my power. I never found comfort and beauty in it like you and our mother, and I spent so long thinking that… that I was broken. I think the Marra have felt this in me since I was a child, but they will usually wait until a person is older to attack. Children usually have too much compassion to take on their offer, you see. And when they did come for me, I accepted. Letting go of witchcraft and of being human gave me a chance to believe that it was you that were broken, not me, and to finally feel like I wasn’t weak. To finally feel like I wasn’t nothing.”

Myra’s voice weakened and became thinner with each word, the tears threatening to choke her. Maven wrapped her arms around herself and her bottom lip trembled at her confession. Never, in a thousand years, had they meant to make her feel that way. It made everything worse to know the part she’d played in her sister’s decision.

“Why did you need to feel powerful, Myra?” She whispered, knowing their only chance at evolving was communicating like they should have done long before. “You had a family that did all they could to protect you, you knew that bullying situation would eventually get solved with all the pressure we were doing, didn’t you? You had love. Why wasn’t it enough?”

“I don’t know! It used to make sense in my head. And I need you to try and see my point, too. You were doing your best to protect me, but your best just wasn’t enough!”

Maven took a deep breath and nodded. It was reasonable.

“I do see your point. But what changed you? You don’t sound that certain on the choice you made anymore.”

“I’m not.” As she admitted it, her shoulders relaxed like a heavy burden had been lifted off of them. “I used to think I needed power. But now I have power, and I lost everything else. I feel hollow with the Marra, Mavey. There’s nothing left to me but this magic and this wish to harm people that I know wasn’t here before. And you know what’s worse? I don’t think it’s the Marra that are responsible for this second part. I think I did this to myself.”

Before she could think much about it, Maven closed her arms around her sister, just in time for Myra to begin sobbing again into her neck.

“It’s not just your fault.” She said. “We didn’t look at you enough to see how you were different. But I promise you, we never meant to make you feel like you had to change, or like you had to accept the hurtful things people did to you. Can you forgive us?”

Myra nodded, the movement limited since her head was in the crook of Maven’s neck. “Only if you can forgive me.”

They held each other for long moments, until the librarian realized that not all was solved yet. She drew back from the hug and reached for her right side, where the jar still was.

“You need to take this, if you’re going to stay.” She said, handing it to her sister. “It will make you human again.”

Her heart beat was loud on her ears as her younger sister picked the jar from her hands carefully, staring at it with an unreadable expression.

“The choice must be yours.”

Then, Myra unscrewed the cork and the cloud that had been inside went flying to her, entering through her nostrils, her mouth, her ears and her eyes. It was a terrifying sight to watch, and for a moment Maven was scared as the soul entered the body completely, leaving Myra breathing deeply with her eyes closed.

But the fear only lasted until her sister opened her eyes again. There was a new light in them, and she smiled and hugged her sister again, free at last.

_#_#_#_

Myra stood awkwardly by her side, shifting her weight between her feet, as she waited for either Hilda or Johanna to open the door for her. Maven had had to pay them a visit to let them know how things turned out, but she couldn’t even consider the thought of leaving her sister alone at their house after everything that had happened. Luckily, Myra seemed to think that she owned it to Maven to at least accompany her.

The door opened just enough for Johanna to peek through, and when she saw who it was she opened it wider.

“Maven!” She exclaimed, and then gasped upon noticing the teenager by her side.

“It’s okay! She’s with us, it worked.”

“Oh.” Johanna moved out of the way so they could come in. “That’s lovely news!”

She recognized the woman. It was the same that had come to her in her tent to defend her sister. As she watched with avid curiosity, the woman hugged Maven and said how happy she was for her. Embarrassed as she felt standing by the door of someone that not only she didn’t know, but also who was aware of what she had been just minutes before, she couldn’t help want to laugh when she realized that her sister was blushing.

“Hilda’s resting in her room. You should go there, she’s worried sick for you.”

There was no need to go anywhere, however, because Hilda heard them coming in and ran out of her room to meet them. She stopped when she noticed Myra, staring wide eyed at her, and then looked up at Maven.

“It worked?”

Maven nodded, smiling. “Thanks to you it did.”

As Maven kneeled down to Hilda’s height, the girl swung her arms around her neck and chuckled.

“I only helped you cast a spell, Mave.”

“You did a lot more than that.”

Hilda was about to ask her what she meant when she remembered that Myra was listening. She took a step back.

“So, ugh, how are you feeling?” It was as good a thing to say as any. The teenager was clearly not very comfortable with the situation, but she managed to open a small smile.

“Better than I have in a long time. I suppose I should thank you as well. Sorry for the trouble.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Hilda said. The girl looked tired, but truly happy for her. Myra had forgotten how uplifting the innocence of a child could be, having spent so long only seeing it as the weakness that the Marra exploited. “So, you’ll be a witch again?”

It wasn’t an accusation, just a genuine question, and Myra kept that in mind as she tried not to feel like she had to defend herself. She rubbed her neck, looking at the ground.

“No, I don’t think i will. Just not what I want, I guess. Plus, I don’t think my sister will have much time to spare teaching me since she already has a dedicated apprentice.”

She threw the words hoping that they’d lighten the atmosphere, but doubted whether or not she should have said them when Hilda gasped and turned to her sister.

“You’ll keep teaching me magic?” There was amazement in her voice, and Myra wondered if perhaps Maven had just trained the girl to help her with this one particular ritual. But instead of saying so, Maven held Hilda’s hands on her own and squeezed gently.

“I’d be honored to. We can learn many new things together.”

Hilda looked like she wanted to hug her mentor again, but instead she just smiled at her as Maven got up again. Johanna touched Maven on her shoulder to catch her attention.

“Would the two of you like anything? I had just given Hilda some cocoa when you arrived.”

“Thank you, but I think we’re fine.” Maven answered after looking at her sister to make sure she didn’t feel like taking up the invitation either. “Hilda needs to sleep and honestly, I do too. But thank you for the offer.”

“Not for that. Sleep well and tell us if you need anything. I’ll try to pay you a visit at the library during the week, if that’s okay.”

Seemingly without her realizing it, Johanna’s hand slid down from Maven’s shoulder to hold her hand. The librarian tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear.

“I’d love that. Good night for the two of you.”

_#_#_#_

“Why are you smiling like that?” Maven asked as soon as they stepped out into the street, holding her coat tighter around herself to shield her skin from the cold.

“I’ve just been reunited with my beloved sister and met her darling friends, why wouldn’t I be smiling?” She let the corners of her mouth lift up higher, delighting in the knowledge she now had.

“You know what I mean. You’ve got your evil plotting smile on.”

“Well… I need to admit I am having fun.”

Maven squinted at her sister with suspicion. Nightmare spirit or not, she’d always been mischievous, and Maven could remember quite a few pranks she’d pulled. Never mind that Maven herself had admittedly been complicit in some of them.

“Fun with what?”

“You like that woman, don’t you, Mavey?”

For a moment the librarian thought she’d fall, tripping almost imperceptibly. She hoped Myra wouldn’t have realized it, and that she would brush off the sudden blush on her cheeks as due to the cold, but judging from the look of satisfaction on her face it was clear that Maven had had no such luck.

“Of course I don’t! Johanna is just a friend.”

“Aha!” Myra pointed at her older sister accusingly. “I never said what kind of ‘like’ I meant!”

“Myra, that is stupid!”

“Oh man, I just have to get the two of you together!” She clasped her hands in front of herself, giggling as Maven tried to look angry to hide her embarrassment.

“You’ll do no such thing, you hear me?”

“Mavey, please! I have nearly three years of bothering you to catch up with, I can’t just let this opportunity go!”

Maven groaned, but they both knew it was fake. As they continued their way home, she couldn’t help but wear a smile. Her sister was finally home, safe and willing to work to mend their relationship, and she had even more people who cared for her.

She had never thought it would happen, but she had even more family than she knew what to do with, now. And she would do everything in her reach to not let any of those ties break ever again.