Witch Hunters

A few days later, Maeve was working in the garden behind her and her grandmother’s cottage. She had just finished harvesting some belladonna when her grandmother came out the back door. She had done all she asked in those few days, including staying out of the woods but she could feel the call of her magic burning inside of her and knew she would have to sneak out again soon despite the stern glances she often received. “Maeve, come.”

“What is it?”

“Another meeting.”

Maeve stood up and grabbed her basket, furrowing her brow. “Another?”

“Yes. Come on. We’ll tend the garden later.”

Maeve followed her grandmother into town trying to think of what could be more urgent than an evil witch in their midst. Something was definitely off if there was already another meeting called together. She didn’t like the sound of it … Surely, there wasn’t another one. She would have sensed that much evil if there was. That wasn’t something any witch could overlook. But, upon entering the hall she saw three people she had never seen before standing alongside their sheriff and knew something else was going on.

Her eyes caught the man in the middle as he stood tall with an ax on his shoulder, surveying the crowd. There weren’t any men in her village who would give her the time of day simply because they were suspicious of her nature, but this one didn’t know her or her family’s secrets and he was also incredibly handsome – possibly the most attractive man she’d ever laid eyes on. But her dreams were squished by the first sentence out of the sheriff’s mouth.

“Meet the village’s newest visitors – the witch hunters.”

Maeve gulped. The first newcomers to her village and of course they were the kind that would kill her if they ever knew her true nature. His eyes caught her staring causing her to flush and immediately look away to see her grandmother sending her a glare. “Do not even think about it.”

“I – I wasn’t.”

“My men will be accompanying them into the forest today and we ask that everyone remain in the village while we hunt out this wickedness.” The sheriff continued, but Maeve watched the man to the side as he leaned over and spoke to the other man in the group with a smirk. She vaguely wondered if the beautiful girl in the group was the girlfriend of one of them. That would be the most proper thing, she thought.

She tuned out the rest of Sheriff Malik’s speech until they were all excused. She only caught one more glimpse of the handsome man before her grandmother was all but pushing her out the door. She could have sworn she saw him looking for her, too, but she couldn’t be absolutely sure. Her mind continued to think on him even after they got back to her cabin. She was told to hurry and grab firewood before the hunters went into the wood and she thought it might be the perfect chance to use just a little magic before she completely lost her mind.

She found herself back at her spot and began small incantations under her breath to stir the leaves on the ground. As though her body could sense an intruder the leaves began to drop one by one despite her encouragement to continue. As soon as the last leaf dropped to the ground, she heard a twig snap and turned to look upon who was coming towards her. She sensed no evil or magic, so she assumed it was simply a villager or maybe one of the sheriff’s men. Much to her surprise, she saw the boy whose eyes she met during the town meeting coming through the brush.

“Oh. Hello there.” He was clearly surprised to find her in the woods when everyone was supposed to go straight home.

“Hello, sir.”

“Liam.” He corrected, taking another step forward. “And you are?”

“Maeve.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Maeve. You know … it’s quite dangerous out in the wood right now. You really mustn’t come out by yourself until we locate the witch.”

“I was gathering some firewood.”

“Let me help you.” He offered almost immediately, and awkwardly scratched his neck. “Just to make sure you get back safely, of course.”

Maeve watched as he put down his ax and began gathering some logs. She was a little confused, and shocked, because the men of the village wouldn’t have even made the offer to stand and watch while she collected wood much less actually help her gather some. She couldn’t fight the stirring of feelings she felt for Liam – he was kind to her and she thought she might live a life where no boys ever spared her a glance. She began to gather some logs herself and then turned to see Liam gathering up his ax to split some of the wood that he had gathered.

Usually, Maeve never gathered any logs that weren’t small enough to fit into their fireplace. She wasn’t nearly strong enough to manually split wood (she could magically split it, of course) so she stuck to smaller ones. She tilted her head as she watched him swing it expertly and with such brute force he split the log straight down the center so two pieces fell to the side of the stump he was using as a pedestal. She wasn’t very familiar with the feelings she was experiencing but she knew, for the first time in her whole life, she wanted someone. She wanted Liam.

When he finished splitting the wood, he dropped the pile into her second basket and carried the overflow that wouldn’t fit. He gave her a kind smile. “Lead the way.”

“You don’t have to …”

“It’s part of my job to make sure that this witch claims no more victims. Keeping you safe and escorting you home is a priority right now.”

She flushed and nodded, picking up her baskets. Liam had to admit he was impressed – she was rather petite but she could haul those baskets full of firewood with almost no problem whatsoever. She turned and led him through the brush towards her cabin. Most of the brisk walk was silent save for a question Liam would ask her about the village or the witch. Knowing that she shouldn’t really have a lot of answers about the witch, she brushed most of those off. She actually didn’t know much, save for the amount of power she was sensing in the area and knew that it was coming from the witch. And the direction from whence it was coming, but she really couldn’t tell him that she knew that.

“This is home.” She said, motioning to the stone cottage with a brown fence surrounding its perimeter. It was quaint and from the smoke billowing out the chimney, you could tell a small fire had already been started to combat the chilly night air. “You can leave those here at the gate.”

“I can walk you up.”

“No need. Thank you for seeing me home.” She was worried her grandmother could come out at any moment and catch her talking to the boy she swore to stay away from so she tried to hurry away. She left one basket at the gate where she told Liam to put his and darted inside with the other. As she braced against the door and caught her breath, she felt her grandmother’s eyes on her. “There’s more out front.” She said, dropping the basket by the fireplace and trudging up the ladder to her room above the kitchen.

Liam stayed for a moment outside of the cottage. Something about the girl told him that she knew more than she let on. He could use that as his reason to try to find her again tomorrow in the woods, but he knew it was something more than that. She was beautiful, that much was obvious, and intriguing and he simply needed to see her again.