Mama Grizelda's Arc

Chapter 8 of 11

Grizelda climbed. The vine's leaves brushed her arms as she pulled herself up, hand over hand. Jack scrambled beside her, dagger clenched in his teeth. Above them the cabin sat crooked on its perch. The witch had gone from her window. That was worse than watching. Grizelda did not know what waited on that high floor. One wrong step here, and the witch would strike first. She reached the wooden platform and stopped. Her skin, hard as bark, prickled with warning. The door hung open. Inside, jars lined the walls. Charmed threads swayed from the ceiling with no wind to move them. Every one of them was a snare she couldn't read. "Wait," Grizelda whispered. She grabbed Jack's collar before he stepped through. "She wants us inside." Then she saw the girl. A child crouched in the far corner, small, with long black pigtails. A bloodied rag covered her mouth. Rope bound her wrists to a floor ring. Her dark eyes went wide at the sight of them. The witch's servant. The witch kept her like a dog on a chain. The girl shook her head hard. She jerked her chin toward the doorframe above their heads. A warning. Grizelda looked up. A charmed vial hung there, red light swirling, wired to a beam. Step under it, and the whole ceiling of hooks would fall. The same trap that nearly killed Jack, set again at the door. The girl had just saved their lives. "There," Grizelda breathed. "Cut it." Jack rose on his toes and sliced the wire. The vial dropped into his palm without a sound. The beam stayed still. Grizelda stepped over the threshold, safe now, and knelt fast by the bound girl. She sawed through the ropes with Jack's dagger. "Where is she?" Grizelda asked. The girl pulled the rag from her mouth and pointed at a low door in the back wall. "Cellar," she rasped. Her voice cracked from long silence. "She's building a new pouch. Bigger. She sent me up to trip you." She met Grizelda's eyes. "I didn't." Grizelda's chest tightened. Another child pulled into her fight. She pressed the freed girl behind her, the way she'd pressed Jack behind her at the vine. "Then you come with us," Grizelda said. "Both of you. Down and out. Now." But a scrape came from the cellar door. It swung wide. Purple skin filled the dark opening. The witch climbed into her own kitchen, a new pouch already fat at her belt, staff raised. She saw the cut wire, the freed girl, the empty ring. "You turned my servant," the witch said. Her smile was gone. "That was the last thing you'll take from me." Grizelda stood. She held the girl and Jack behind her, salt heavy in her sleeve. The witch's home no longer hid its teeth. Now the fight was hers to start.