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The girl in the alley was going to die. Her right leg and half of her torso was missing—torn off—blood flowing freely to paint her ice-blue dress a sickening red. Fractals of ice clung to her wounds, a futile attempt to stem the bleeding. The once-clear ice too had been stained red.
She glanced up as he stepped into the alley, her eyes flickering first to his crimson blazer before settling on the butterfly-shaped brooch on his tie—his soul gem. He in turn glanced at the girl on the ground, feebly propping herself up against the wall. There was a grief seed in her hand, and residual despair lingering in the alley—remnant traces of the defeated witch’s labyrinth. Despite that, her once-blue soul gem swirled with darkness. He took a step closer to the girl. S̸̛̬̗̣̪͈̞̐͜t̷̥͉̚ā̷̗̤̠̀̐̊̈́̕͝ṱ̷̲̙͈̜͍̏̆͑̊̌͊́̂ḯ̵̳̰̲̙͇̝č̵̺͕͉̲̥͎̋͜͝ built up at the back of his head, a foreboding pressure. The girl in the alley was dying. A witch was about to be born.
The girl smiled. There was blood on her lips, “Do you regret it? Your contract? This will be your fate too, one day.”
He met the girl’s eyes—blue as the sky on a winter morning, but with none of the crisp spark those bright mornings brought. Instead, her eyes were hollow and dull, devoid of hope and soul. It almost looked as if she was already dead.
His twin sister’s eyes had been just a shade darker—blue like the summer ocean. They had been filled with fear when she turned into a witch. Did his sister regret her Wish? Did this girl?
Perhaps he should regret it too, his contract with the Incubator. But he remembered looking in the mirror at a body that had too many curves. And he remembered looking in the mirror again after his Wish, and the omnipresent weight in his chest finally lifting as he set his sight on his new body, flat and angular in all the right places. A boy’s body.
His sister had Wished for prosperity for their family. A selfless Wish. His Wish had been far more selfish.
“No.” He replied, taking another step towards the girl despite the building s̵̡̛̛̰͎̤͓̯̖͉t̵̡̳̳̦̭̱̬̿̔͜a̶̺̣͐̐́̒̍̾̐t̵̛͚̭̝̃̐͂͊̓́̕i̵̜̍̿̀́͝c̶̦͈̲̻̤͕̅̈́̏̄ warning against it. “As long I can die in the body I was meant to be born in, I can never regret my Wish.”
The girl laughed, a croaking noise. “How lucky. If only I could say the same.” Her gaze fell onto the grief seed in her hand, already saturated with darkness. “That damn witch…I wish I didn’t let my guard down.”
He wondered if this girl knew the truth about soul gems and witches. Unlikely, if she wasted so much magic trying to heal her body. If that was the case, he wasn’t going to tell her the truth now. It was a blessing not to know.
He knelt down next to the girl, uncaring of the blood seeping into his suit pants. Pulling a grief seed from his pants pockets, he pressed it to the girl’s soul gem. Darkness seeped sluggishly from the girl’s pendant to the grief seed. Too slow. It was too late.
It had been too late long before he arrived.
“I don’t suppose you have healing magic?” The girl was still smiling that hollow smile of hers. “Gods, I really don’t want to die. There’s still tiramisu in the fridge.”
“I’m sorry.” He said, pocketing the ineffective grief seed. “If I got here earlier, maybe.”
He could stay here by the girl’s side, hold her hand as she took her last breath—as her soul gem cracked and a witch emerged. A newborn witch would be easy pickings, for a veteran like him. He could walk away with a new grief seed, his conscience soothed that he had remained by the poor girl’s side until her dying moment.
But his sister’s witch had swallowed her own corpse whole. The last he had seen of his twin was the fear and pain on her face. And this girl’s eyes reminded him so much of her.
Reaching out with one hand, he squeezed the girl’s blood-slicked hand. Behind his back, magic sparked in his other hand, congealing into a duandao. The girl didn’t notice.
The girl’s soul gem was a pendant on her neck. It would be easy to reach. She wouldn’t notice him shattering it—a quick and painless death. That would be more than his sister got.
“It’s okay. I’m here with you,” he told her, meaningless words of comfort, but comfort nonetheless. His grip on his dagger tightened. “And—then, I’ll make sure your body is returned home.”