7. Midnightmare

Catia had to stay behind. She was too ill to join in their flight to the hospital. Felicia had to carry her all the way back to Dormas’ house, almost breaking her back, and then ran back the other way. She’d eaten far too little for this and—

When she entered the hospital tent with a fearful heart, she already knew it was too late.

Dormas was unseeing and unmoving. His healer slowly stepped back and put away her instruments. With a withering stare, she grabbed the half-full bowl of beer from the cupboard and smashed it into the dirt.

“Get out,” she said. “This bed has to be freed up for the next—”

“No,” Felicia whispered. “Maybe I can make a medicine—let me—”

She fought her way through the group to end up against Dormas’ straw bed. Her paws felt his chest. No heartbeat. She stroked his soft fur, but the body was already turning stiff and cold.

Fonza hauled her back. Had she betrayed herself? No, the anger of the fox was aimed at the healer. “Hacks! You’re useless! Even a witch would have done a better job! Don’t think we’ll pay for this treatment!”

The healer ignored it, used to such treatment. She waited impatiently until the group took Dormas away, carried on their backs and shoulders.

“What … what will happen to him?”

“We bury him somewhere in the forest,” said Fonza.

“But he was a devout member of the church. We should find a nice spot on the graveyard to—”

“We can’t pay for that, kid.” Fonza looked devastated. “God is expensive.”

Felicia was too shocked to move. This was unnecessary. Completely unnecessary. Dormas could have survived easily. And now … and now …

Would she even be allowed to stay? Her guardian angel was gone. The only reason she wasn’t dying somewhere in an alley, as ill and broken as Catia.

No, even Catia had people: her parents looking for her. Felicia had nobody. How could the proud Felix family have come to this? How could they do this to her loving parents? If they were still alive, they would surely have come back to Felicia by now …

The church bells announced midnight. A few more hours and Aria would also receive the death penalty. The Wise Owl would give Felicia a safe home, right? Without having to lie and betray under group pressure?

She ran towards the landlord’s castle. The dungeons were somewhere below ground, was all she knew. The fear of coming too late, failing another being, pushed away the tears for now.

All that mattered was today and what you were going to try next. She came from the Felix family— a family of helpers.

Along the way, she plucked flowers left and right. Many shops threw away perfectly usable goods into their waste bins, at least when you were interested in flammable material. She hadn’t exactly practiced this often, but these ingredients would combine into something like a bomb.

Of course, she also grabbed the right ingredients for the antidote, something to protect you against fire. She’d read enough accounts from The Good Chef, received because her parents were good friends with the chimpanzee, to know this. The Fishfool exploded in contact with water and would consume most of it. Its sister plant, the Firebraid, did the opposite and extinguished fire.

In case it went wrong. In case the Crows attacked her with fire, as they often did. She was a good scientist, yes, like her parents, always preparing for all outcomes.

She reached the outer walls of the castle.

Her body had burned up. So much running, so much trouble. She leaned against the wall for a while, under the full mean, before climbing a pole. At the top was a glass lantern containing a flame.

She brought her bomb near the flame.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” said a voice overhead. Crows!

The next lie was ready. The excuse formed in her head as she slowly looked up.

But it was Aria on top of the lantern—free as a bird.

“I can free myself, thank you,” the owl said. Her body held many gaps and wounds between the remaining feathers. She switched to larger glasses. “The Book of Meaning also taught me how all locks work.”

“What can you not do?”

“Be happy,” Aria answered with brutal honesty.

She took Felicia motherly into her wings. “You lose your parents in a terrible way, and still you come here to save me? You’ve done enough Felicia. It’s time somebody helps you.”

“I have done nothing right! I made them throw an innocent dog into the River! I have—”

“And all your other accomplices do not lose any sleep over it. How can I live in a world like that … and be happy?”

Felicia didn’t know. She almost fell asleep herself, as Aria took her into the cold night sky, back to Dormas’ home.

She had just one question. “Why did you lie about—”

“At least I get a court case and a chance to win it. You, Felicia, would have instantly been given a deadly Trial of Witches. No, don’t think the truth will ever matter in these times.”

“These times?”

Aria briefly paused on a slanted roof. Not to rest, but to hide from a flock of Crows passing by.

“It wasn’t always like this. Years ago, most cities around here looked much cleaner, with more wisdom, equality, everything.”

“How?”

“Everyone thinks knowledge is forever,” Aria said. “Once something is invented, well, we will be able to enjoy it for eternity!”

She continued her flight as the church bells rang 2 o’clock. “The truth is the other way around. Old civilizations knew medicine that we’ve forgotten. Old civilizations had sewage systems, we don’t. Knowledge disappears if it’s not used and maintained, every single day.”

“If only I knew how to heal Catia,” she mumbled against the warm feathers. “We need knowledge about that. Now.”

“You don’t want more knowledge,” Aria said bitterly. “It is a curse. If you had more knowledge … you’d have known weeks ago that Catia is incurable. And lost all hope then.”

“What?”

Aria landed on another roof and scoured the surroundings. No suspicious figures, no Crows flying in wait. Dead silence. Probably because Fonza was still busy bringing Dormas to his final resting place.

They climbed down—and were proven wrong.

The door was ajar, the weak lock splintered thanks to a fierce bite. The planks, covering holes in the stone wall, had been pulled off. Steam escaped through the holes. Fire? Bedroom on fire?

Felicia had left her next medicine on the fire, inside her big cauldron!

She meowed Catia! and wanted to run inside. Aria kept her away and wanted to enter first.

The hallway was dark. All candles had gone out and this house had never had enough windows to start with. The home was silent, the door to the bedroom open wide. It gave no more light than the dim flickering her cooking fire would create.

Aria dodged a part of the ceiling that had come down, until they reached the bedroom. Felicia looked inside. There was … nobody. Even Catia was gone. Grey smoke filled the room, created by the burnt potion.

But Aria still held her back. Her great owl eyes—or maybe triple glasses—saw paw prints on the floor. Dirty, muddy, full of grass and twigs.

They went into the room—they never got out.

Aria beat her wings once, to see the room from up high, and gave them away.

A fox dove out of the other corner and snatched Aria in her jaws. A pair of young dogs bumped Felicia until she rolled against the straw bed.

Fonza’s body remained invisible; the fire only lit up her face from below.

“I knew it,” she screamed. “You are a witch! And where are you now, ay, without the old dog’s protection?”

“I make Catia’s favorite soup!”

Felicia was held back by painful dog bites. Aria still flew around, turning her pursuer insane.

“Yes, that is exactly what a witch would say!”

Fonza pointed her tail to the wall. The faint light revealed symbols scratched into them. Stars with solid lines, figures as if they came from an ancient language. Felicia had not made those herself.

And Catia. Chained up and terrified. She lacked even the strength to fight her ropes.

“The Crows are coming. Admit you’re a witch, or you’ll never see your sister again.” Fonza frowned. “Or is she even your sister?”

“Why do you fear witches so much?” yelled Felicia. “What did they ever do to you?”

“They threaten our culture. Our norms and values. Our civilization!”

Felicia spit in her face. “If you call yourself civilized … then I’d rather be an uncivilized witch.”

Aria dove down and cut through Catia’s ropes with her beak. Felicia bit anything that came near, yielding just enough freedom to move.

Covered by smoke, the trio jumped out of the window.

Fonza screamed the entire River District awake. Multiple Crows had already gathered on their broken roof, made of alternating straw and roof tiles, the best Dormas could ever pay.

“Three witches! Three witches flee! Don’t let them escape!”