Work Text:
It’s difficult pushing the cart through the forest without a clear path. Otto has to force the cart over uneven ground, roots, and the ever-prevalent leaf clutter. Awsten is going ahead to guide them on the easiest and smoothest path. Geoff is walking right beside Otto and helping him push.
Living as deep as they do in the forest is great for working their craft and avoiding people, but it’s not so great when they have to make a journey to the village for supplies. Unfortunately, they have to do that every couple of weeks. They can provide a lot for themselves, but there are some things that they just can’t make or gather from the forest.
Finally, Awsten leads them to a narrow path that eventually connects with the main path through the forest. Otto breathes a sigh of relief. It’s much smoother going from here on.
Once they reach the main path, it’s only a matter of time before the trees start to noticeably thin. Soon, they can hear noises from the people and farm animals at the edge of the forest.
The village is large, although nowhere near as large as the city a few days’ ride from here. Its marketplace is enough for what Geoff and Otto need. And it’s small enough that any gossip tends to stay within the village. Especially gossip about them, which is best kept to a minimum.
Otto starts to push the cart in the familiar direction of the marketplace. First, they need to sell their things; mostly wood crafts that Otto makes and medicines that Geoff makes. Awsten’s contributions are usually too magical to share with normal people.
“I’m leaving,” Awsten says, promptly before doing exactly that and disappearing into the thin crowd of people. Otto stops pushing the cart to frown disapprovingly.
“Well that was more warning than usual,” he says dryly.
Geoff shrugs. “He’ll be back later.”
“Yeah,” Otto says. His eyes scan the crowd, but he can’t catch sight of Awsten among the villagers. He should expect this, but it never ceases to be a nuisance.
Then again, while Awsten likes them and lives with them, he’s still a will-o’-wisp. Those things aren’t exactly known for doing what people want them to do. At least Otto and Geoff have convinced him to stop setting so many fires and leading travelers to their deaths in the forest.
“Come on, let’s get started,” Geoff says, clapping a hand on Otto’s shoulder.
They stop at Jawn’s shop first. Jawn waves at them when he sees them coming. Otto still isn’t sure whether Jawn suspects they’re witches or not. He’s never asked about that, and he pays a fair amount for their goods, so it’s best not to push him. Best to keep things as normal as possible.
“No Awsten today?” Jawn says, looking around for the missing third member of their party.
“No,” Otto says, starting to unload their things from the cart. “He’s somewhere around.”
“He’d better come by and say hi,” Jawn says cheerfully. Then his expression turns serious and he adds, “Hope he doesn’t run into any trouble. We don’t need any more of that this week.”
Geoff stops moving, with several bottles of medicines in his hands. “What’s been going on?” he asks.
Jawn grimaces. “It’s nothing too bad but… The past couple days, there’s been these two travelers going around the village and bothering people. First they were just asking questions. But last night, they stayed too long at the tavern and started a fight with one of the farmers. Throwing accusations, and threatening him. It settled down, but this morning, they started at it again.”
Otto glances at Geoff, who looks nervous at this news. “Awsten will probably…” Otto starts, but he can’t finish it.
Would Awsten start a fight with people who are already itching to start a fight? Yes. Hopefully that won’t happen. On the very likely chance that it does happen, hopefully no fire is involved.
Instead of thinking about the likelihood of Awsten exposing them, Otto turns his thoughts to the travelers. Jawn really hasn’t said much about them. “Have they come to talk with you yet?” he asks Jawn.
Jawn nods. “They were trying to be subtle when they came by two days ago, but I think…” his voice lowers to a hushed whisper, “They’re trying to track down any hints of magic or witchcraft.”
Otto struggles to keep his face neutral. Shit. This has just complicated things.
Geoff goes back to unloading the contents of their cart. “So… what, they’re trying to trick people into acting suspicious?” he asks. “And nobody’s driven them out yet?”
“No,” Jawn says, his voice tinged with annoyance. “Not for lack of complaints, though. I’d be careful if I were you. I heard they’re not as friendly today as they were before.”
“We’ll just finish up our business here as quickly as we can,” Geoff assures him.
The rest of the transaction is smooth. Jawn asks Geoff about the properties of each of the medicines. Then he hands over the money to pay for their goods. Otto takes the payment and together, he and Geoff push the now-empty cart away from Jawn’s shop.
When they’re a safe enough distance from the shop, Otto stops to look at Geoff. “I don’t like leaving Awsten alone when there’s… people like that around,” he says. “Do you want to take care of getting this stuff?”
Geoff crosses his arms. “If… if these people are looking for witches, then I don’t want to stay here longer than we have to. I think you and I should stick together, so we’re not all split up. Awsten will be fine on his own.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” Otto says. “Do you trust him not to fight with them as soon as he finds out what they’re here for?” He can’t help but think about the only other time they’d encountered witch-killers. It was years ago, but the memory was still vivid in Otto’s mind. Awsten had set an entire field on fire.
Geoff sighs and grabs the handle of the cart. “I’ll get our things as fast as I can. You just—”
“I’ll be careful,” Otto promises.
Geoff nods. “I’ll meet you at the chicken farm at the edge of the village when I’m done.”
Good. Otto leaves Geoff and sets off into the village.
It shouldn’t be that hard to find Awsten. Awsten always manages to stand out, in his own supernatural way. Sometimes he’s got a magnetically enticing aura and sometimes he feels unnerving and unsettling.
Otto moves quickly through the marketplace, making sure to check all the little corners where Awsten might be lurking. But he’s nowhere to be found. Not in the open and not in the shadows. Otto doesn’t see the glow of Awsten’s blue-green light either, which is definitely for the best. That wouldn’t just alert the witch-killers—it’d also send the village into a panic.
Otto sets off into the rest of the village, mentally checking off places where he doesn’t think he’ll find Awsten. Probably not the tavern, since Awsten doesn’t care for drunk humans. Although, if the local bards are playing music over there, it might be worth checking. Otto walks around until he hears music, and then quickly tracks down where it’s coming from.
That turns out to be fruitless too. Otto keeps moving, breaking into a run and trying not to bump into anyone as he looks everywhere. Still no Awsten.
Otto is just about to head back to the marketplace to check there again when someone suddenly and roughly grabs his arm.
“What the hell!” Otto says, turning to pull out of the person’s firm grasp.
He comes face to face with a tall bearded man who has a dark scowl on his face.
“Witch,” the man hisses. “I can feel it on you.”
A chill runs through Otto’s body. Oh no.
“What?” Otto says, fighting much harder to get away from the guy. But then someone else grabs his other arm. The two drag Otto roughly away, towards the edge of the village. He has to split his concentration between staying on his feet and continuing to fight the men’s hold on his arms.
“What are you doing!” Otto yells, trying to get someone to pay attention. A few people glance his way, but when they see the people he’s with, they turn quickly away. Fuck. Otto tries to thrash harder, but they just walk faster, practically dragging him along the ground.
At last, after what feels like a minute or two of stumbling to keep up with their brutal pace, the two men stop at the very edge of the village. They shove Otto roughly to the ground, face-first. Otto barely has time to roll himself over when he’s met with a sword point to the face.
“I can feel your magic, you abomination,” the man holding the sword growls. “Don’t even try to deny it.”
The other man, shorter and a bit smaller, strings a bow and draws an arrow out of his quiver. He’s standing behind and to the side of the man with the sword, a cold look on his face.
Otto swallows and stays where he is on the ground. Shit. He’s just outside of the village, near the edge of the forest. Nobody is around to help him. Or to see what’s going on.
“We knew this village was hiding witches,” the man with the sword says. “I knew it was only a matter of time until we found you.” He shakes his sword angrily at Otto “You! You killed Andrew, didn’t you?”
“What?” Otto says. The man pushes the point of the sword closer, poking against the skin of Otto’s neck.
The witch-killer glares down at him. “Andrew!” he yells. “He hunted your kind for years. We know that he heard of two witches living in these parts. We know he journeyed out to find them. Now...” the man narrows his eyes. “Did he kill the other witch, or is that one still alive like you?”
“Uh…” Otto grits his teeth for a second. What the hell? How did a bunch of witch-killers find out about him and Geoff? When did they find out? Clearly someone killed one of them, so these other two are out for revenge. Fuck, there is way too much happening all at once, but Otto needs to try and get some control over this situation.
“I’m sorry about your friend,” Otto says, hoping to calm the witch-killer down, “But I didn’t do anything to him! I didn’t even know—”
“Lies!” the witch-killer shouts, cutting Otto off. “Andrew was powerful! He was one of the best! I would love to know how a witch finally defeated him, but…” he trails off and glares down at Otto. “It was the other witch, wasn’t it? Not you… You’re too weak and pathetic to have killed him.”
Otto looks from the man with the sword to the man with the bow. Neither seem like they’re interested in hearing anything he has to say. The one with the sword lifts his weapon, probably preparing to swing it down on Otto.
Otto flinches and reaches up to cover his head.
“Wait,” the man with the bow says.
Otto glances at him with a shred of hope. But that hope instantly dies when he sees the archer drawing his bow and aiming the arrow at Otto’s face. Otto’s eyes grow wide with fear.
An arrow flies from the bow, and the thud of it landing is loud in Otto’s ears. He freezes in panic. Oh fuck, where— He slowly and carefully tests all his limbs, which all work. Okay, he’s either in shock or…
Otto glances to the side. The arrow is embedded in the ground a few inches from his head. Oh thank fuck. Still terrifying, but at least he’s not hurt. Yet, he reminds himself with a lurch in his stomach.
The swordsman walks away from Otto to talk to his witch-killer companion. They both still have a watchful eye on Otto, but for the moment they seem to have dismissed him as an immediate threat.
“We should kill him now,” the man with the sword says.
“We should use him as bait for the other witch,” the second man says.
“He doesn’t have to be alive for that,” the first man says waving his sword dangerously beside him.
Very slowly, so the two witch-killers don’t notice, Otto starts reaching for the pouch at his hip. He’s got something he always keeps on him, and if he can just get to it...
“If we kill him now, the other one might escape,” the man with the bow says. “Keep this one alive and the other will come to us.”
“That may have worked before, but that was when we had more support,” the first one. shoots back. “This whole village dislikes us. I don’t trust any of them to help with this. Better to kill this one now and hunt down the other later.”
Otto finds what he’s looking for: a small bag of acorns, all of them imbued with a special ritual. He takes a careful breath, and throws the bag at the ground in between the two witch-killers. They startle, but instinctively look first at what’s been thrown.
Otto only has a few seconds before they turn on him. He grabs a knife from his belt and stabs it firmly into the ground.
The knife is made of a unicorn bone, or so Awsten claimed when he gave it to Otto. Thankfully, it seems he wasn’t making that up, because the magic starts the moment the knife makes contact with the ground. In seconds, the acorns sprout and grow into thickening saplings. The saplings trap the two witch-killers, twining around them like bars on a prison cell. The wood keeps growing rapidly, fed by the power in the knife. The witch-killers thrash around and try to break the fresh growth, but they can’t keep up with the rate the trees are growing.
“Damn you!” the first of the witch-killers shouts. “I knew we should have killed him right away! Shoot him!”
“I—” the other witch-killer chokes as thick branches twist around his chest and throat.
The magic in the unicorn knife suddenly starts tugging at Otto’s own energy. He winces but holds onto the knife, feeding his own power into the magic ritual. The trees continue growing at unnatural speed. The witch-killers aren’t yelling at Otto anymore, but they’re still struggling to move. And even those struggles end as the two are swallowed from view by a tight cluster of new oak trees.
Otto finally lets go of the knife. It turns to powdery white ash as he takes his hand away. Shakily, Otto tries to get up off the ground but a wave of exhaustion overwhelms him and he passes out.
~~~~~
Otto wakes up to someone shaking him gently. Geoff. Otto blinks and gradually takes in what’s around him.
Geoff is kneeling above him with a concerned expression. Awsten is pacing around behind him. Above them, the sky looks like the same color blue as before, so not much time has passed. And Otto is still feeling completely drained.
“What happened?” Geoff says. “There was this intense wave of your magic just now. Awsten says you were using too much of your energy for something.”
“Anyone with magic sensitivity could feel it,” Awsten chimes in. “Even Geoff felt it.”
“Is…” Geoff glances behind him. Otto follows his gaze.
There is a huge mass of five oak trees a short distance away from them. The trunks of the trees are twisted and fused together. Otto can see the tip of a sword just barely poking out from between two trunks.
“You did that, didn’t you?” Geoff says.
“Yeah,” Otto says.
“You used up the unicorn knife!” Awsten says indignantly. “Do you have any idea how hard it was to get that!”
Otto sits up, with some help from Geoff. “Witch-killers found me,” he says. “I, uh, I didn’t have a lot of options.”
“Witch-killers?” Awsten mutters. “More of those?”
Geoff and Otto both turn to him.
“What do you mean ‘more’?” Geoff says.
Otto feels a headache coming on. “Oh my god, of course,” he says, grumbling. “Awsten, when you said you saved our lives last week and just danced around the details, was it because… fuck, was that a witch-killer? Did you kill one of those?”
“Yeah,” Awsten says, shrugging. “If I knew there were more, I would have gone after the others too.”
Geoff sighs heavily. “You didn’t think you should tell us?”
“I don’t have to tell you two everything!” Awsten says, his eyes flashing with blue-green light. Then the lights fades and he turns away with a huff. “Whatever, fine, next time I find someone that wants to kill you, I’ll tell you all about it.”
Geoff helps Otto to his feet. “Come on, let’s head back home before someone finds this tree of yours.”
Otto leans on Geoff and they start to head back home. Awsten takes the cart and complains loudly about the weight of it until they’re in the forest. Then he turns into his will-o’-wisp form, taking the cart with him into his magical storage space. He stays with them, a few feet in front of them at all times, until they make it back home.