Makkedah glared at the townspeople, but no one made a move or sound. Yasmina hoped that if no one made a fuss that he would assume she left already, but Makkedah didn’t look dissuaded. As he craned his head in their direction, Aidan and Ardeshir stood in front of her protectively. Although Makkedah didn’t identify anyone, he marched towards them and seethed, “Show yourself, witch! Don’t protect her or you will receive what’s intended for her!”
Yasmina couldn’t stand the idea of an innocent person getting hurt, so she stepped out and brandished her wand. “Leave them alone!”
Makkedah leered victoriously when he saw that he had made the correct assumption. He inquired, “Who are you?”
“My name is Saphra,” Yasmina fibbed.
“Liar!” Makkedah called her out. “Who are you really?”
Yasmina didn’t know how he knew she had lied, but she had no intention of giving him any more information than she had to. She raised her wand and told him, “None of your business!”
“Careful who you wave that wand at!” Makkedah sneered.
“Or what?” Yasmina challenged him. “Are you a soothsayer or are you a warlock?”
“I can be more than one thing!” He slowly pulled out his own wand, and the villagers gasped as they learned the truth about a figure in their town. “Give me the money you made from doling out a cure to these mortals!”
“I didn’t charge them anything,” Yasmina informed him. “I didn’t even consider it. I saw people in trouble and I helped them, end of story.”
“You simpleton!” Makkedah raged. “I’ve waited for dozens of days for them to scrape together the money for my services and now I lost out on part of my salary just because you’re a softy!”
“Wait,” Yasmina asserted, “You’ve known all along what the cure is and you held back just to make a little money? These people were starving, but you were willing to watch them die for your own superficial needs? How could you?”
Others agreed with her, but he ignored their outcries. “Why do you care? Mortals have never given our kind a lot of respect, and Daeva is eventually going to make sure we outnumber them, so why would you stand in the way of progress?” He paused as he realized, “You’re trying to usurp her, aren’t you?” Yasmina didn’t say anything, but he could tell from her expression that he was right. “Well, we can’t have that, can we?”
He raised his wand and shot some energy towards her, which she narrowly avoided. She hadn’t mentally prepared herself to duel with anyone until she confronted Daeva, and she felt terrified that she didn’t get enough practice to fight an experienced warlock! She raised her wand, but he struck again before she could hex him. She continued to dodge him, but her evasions made it hard to concentrate, so she didn’t execute very strong incantations back. Makkedah picked up on this and dashed out spells faster and faster. She tried to think fast but found it pretty impossible!
All of a sudden, from Makkedah’s side, a basket flew to his head. Makkedah curiously turned his head, and he saw Aidan brandishing his sword. “Leave her alone!”
“Foolish mortal! You dare challenge me!” Makkedah rumbled.
As Makkedah threatened Aidan, Yasmina noticed that the basket he threw was similar to the one she knocked over, which gave her a brilliant idea! While Makkedah was distracted, she pointed her wand at a Comeheistear corpse and made it zip right into Makkedah’s mouth! The villagers gasped, and one of them exclaimed, “You swallowed a Comeheistear!”
Yasmina smugly told him, “I guess there’s no point in killing me since you’re going to starve to death anyways!”
“Don’t be so naive!” Makkedah snickered. “I brought the antidote, remember?” Yasmina pretended to feel disappointed as he pulled a vial of dark green potion out of his pocket, and she watched with rapt anticipation as he brought the bottle to his lips. To her relief, he swallowed a bit of it! He raised his wand to her and leered, “Where were we?”
“Why didn’t it come out?” a child in the crowd loudly asked. “It did when we took the poison!”
Makkedah scoured the ground around him to no avail. “No!” He searched inwardly, and he didn’t feel anything coming up, so he repeated louder, “No!” His eyes blazing, he pointed his wand at Yasmina, who calmly watched him as his insides began to churl. He growled and moaned before falling to the floor. He twitched and wailed more and more frantically, and then, all of a sudden, he stopped. His stance mimicked the dead Comeheistears, and everyone knew he was gone!
The villagers all cheered, and as Aidan and Ardeshir approached, she rejoiced, “I did it! I won!”
“Congratulations!” Aidan grinned.
A villager shouted joyfully, “You saved us twice! Ever since he arrived, Baile Daonna has struggled. You set us free!”
Yasmina humbly responded, “I couldn’t have done it without these two guys! They were the ones who taught me about the Comeheistears. I needed the distraction Aidan risked his life to make, and Ardeshir helped me hone my magic skills! Thank you both so much!”
“The cat taught you magic?” a town person probed. Yasmina forgot that as far as they knew, he was an ordinary cat, and she wondered if she had just ruined all of the good that they just did by that comment. Thankfully, the villager followed up with, “Cool! Is he magical too?”
With the receptive look on everyone’s face, Ardeshir felt it was safe to say,. “Yes I am!”
The crowd cheered in excitement, and after a moment, Yasmina addressed them, “Listen, we would love to stay and celebrate with you, but we have to get going. We need to get to the grand sorceress Daeva so that no other village will continue to suffer what you had to endure!”
“Say no more,” a villager replied. “Just know we have a deep appreciation for what you’ve all done! You’re always back in Baile Daonna!” The others agreed and cheered for them. Two people gave them new cloaks, and a couple of them gave them food to take with them on the way. After a few well-wishers expressed their sentiments, the three of them entered the pathway that led back to the Shadow Path.
Kadera and the other two witches stared into the cauldron with looks of shock and appall. Daeva popped into the room and inquired, “What’s happening?” The three witches hesitated, silently debating who would get the unpleasant task of telling her unwanted news. Daeva grew impatient and snapped, “I’m waiting!”
Kadera reluctantly revealed, “Makkedah is dead.”
Daeva’s face fell, but in a fit of denial, she projected a bit of optimism. “Of natural causes?” The other three hung their heads to avoid her eye contact, which gave her the answer to her question. She groaned, “So, she killed him!”
“Sort of,” one witch remarked. “She tricked him into taking poison.”
“She got lucky!” the other witch added. “Her magic is still very clumsy and inept. She’s no match for you!”
Daeva bellowed, “Idiots! Sometimes cleverness is far more dangerous than skill! Perhaps we should try a different approach…”
Yasmina, Aidan, and Ardeshir walked through the dark woods with a spring in their steps. “It’s sort of sad,” Yasmina commented, “Makkedah made himself so detested in that town that they’re actually celebrating his death! Do you think he had family?”
“We all had family at some point,” Aidan mused, “However, when you dedicate your life to your own self interests, you tend to sever any loving relationships you might have had. When you love, sometimes you put someone else’s needs before your own. I can’t see any of Daeva’s crones going home to their families to talk about their day!”
Ardeshir imitated Makkedah, “I’m home, honey! Boy, what a long day! It is so tiring haunting an entire town to the point of insanity!”
The three of them laughed, and Yasmina realized, “Makkedah made himself into an intregal figure in this town under the same title that Kadera used back in Neodrach. Do you think Daeva does to every mortal town?”
“That would make sense!” Aidan nodded. “Too bad we…”
Before Aidan could finish his sentence, they heard a branch break in the distance. They stood still and listened to assess the situation. The sound was too far away to know for sure, but to Yasmina, it sounded like hooves. The sound stopped, but in no way did they assume the danger was over. Yasmina and Aidan brandished their weapons and waited. For a moment, nothing happened. Soon, they heard rustling on the right. They watched the bushes in that direction, but then from behind them, they heard more movement. Yasmina and Aidan stood back to back knowing that whatever it was, they were now surrounded! They were mentally prepared to fight a fearsome creature, so they were thrown off completely when a dozen knights jumped onto the path! They encircled the three of them, and one of the knights told them, “You’re all under arrest!”
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