Jamal Kunis POV
Was it just me or was my head getting clearer and clearer? I tried my best not to believe that there was some sort of hangover from the curse the Dark Witch had placed on me that lived on till this day but as the days went by, I was having a feeling that I was wrapped around more dark magic than I knew or cared to realize. The way back from the cave we had fought to the palace of the wolf world was not as treacherous as the going. Unlike the going where I had tailed the White Witch, we came back in unison and it was easier to keep an eye out for danger.
The outcast settlement I had noticed before was now gone and according to the White Witch, there was a perfect explanation to that. The souls of the dead in the Outback often times needed to feed on the souls of others to keep them attached to the mortal world. As such, the souls of mortals were easy targets and raiding settlements was one way to make sure that they had excess souls to keep them locked on earth.
“Why do they need to stay here?” I asked. “If dead why not just go to what lays beyond?”
“What lays beyond, Jamal?” the White Witch asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Exactly,” she affirmed.
“So they do not want to leave because they are scared of what comes after?”
“Maybe. Who I’m I to say? Even the most knowledgeable of magi have little to no knowledge on the topic. If one must know what comes after death, one must die first.”
The discussion sparked my curiosity and unveiled some questions that I had since I was a kid. “What other reasons do dead men lurk in the Outcast?”
“Some say they search for a greater purpose; others say they have unfinished assignments.”
“And what does the White Witch say?” I asked, stopping and staring at her.
She looked back into my eyeballs and smiled. “The White Witch says that the Outback is no place for two people to stand around discussing the perils of it.”
“Nice one.” I laughed and we continued walking, though, the matter did not fade swiftly from my mind.
After our two days in the Outback, we finally came to the wolf kingdom without any encounter thanks to the White Witch who knew a peril-free path down a hill on the side.
In the palace, I sat in my room, pondering on something I could not place my fingers on. I heard a knock shortly after and in came Conrad, my Beta.
“Conrad,” I called. “How are you?”
“I should be asking you,” he replied. “You look like you have drank poison straight out of the Dark Witch’s cunt.”
“Not now, Conrad.”
“Come on. Tell me. Did you see her? The Dark Witch.”
“I did.”
“And?”
“She escaped.”
“How is that?”
I got up to my feet and walked over to Conrad placing a hand on his shoulder and drawing him closer till I was only inches away. Then I whispered as if we were in a crowded place when we were just in my room alone. “That’s not what matters.”
“Yeah? What matters now?”
“Something happened during the confrontation.”
Conrad levels his eye with mine as he tries to guess in his mind what it must have been. “What is it?”
“The White Witch broker her staff.”
Conrad took a step back. of course, if there was anyone in the world who was going to forget the Dark Witch’s staff, it definitely was not Conrad. During the Great Mutiny of the Dark Witch, he had once faced the Dark Witch one on one. It did not end in his favour unsurprisingly. She struck him once on the face and the other on the leg with the staff and Conrad went temporarily blind and lame. He has since been weary of her enchanted spell.
“How?” he asked, astonished.
“Just like the Dark Witch, the White Witch too is a witch, she must know a way.”
“And was there any effect? What are the implications of this now? Surely, this has to be a good thing.”
“I don’t know but-“ I looked around, trying to mentally fix the words together first before saying it out loud. “I’m beginning to feel different.”
“How?”
“I don’t know. Like a weight have been lifted from me. A weight I did not know I carried.”
“I suggest you summon the White Witch,” Conrad said. “She always has the answers, doesn’t she?”
“Yeah. I’ll do that at once.”
I tapped Conrad on the shoulder and walked out of the room.
“Daddy, daddy, I look what I found!” a girl of no more than twelve years of age came running down towards me. She nearly bumped into me as she tried to decelerate.
“What is that?” I asked, not particularly paying attention.
“Look!” she yelped in glee holding up a dead fish with its head hanging limply by a few sinews of muscle. Blood was dripping everywhere. “I caught it from the ocean.”
I just stared. I did not know if I should scold her or praise her on her first catch or correct her that the swimming pool was meant for training pups on fish catching so it was not an ocean.
“Congratulations.” I chose to praise first, then correct. “But you are spilling blood everywhere, Summer.”
“I caught it with my mouth!” she continued on. “I dived into the ocean and fought the fishes. They all fled at the sight of me in wolf form. My teacher said I was terrifying to the fishes.”
She submerged herself in the water just to catch one fish. It was now that I realized that Summer was not just stained with drops of fish blood but was also wet and a wet trail was forming behind her as she walked and a tiny pool underneath her as she stood.
“Where is your brother?” I asked.