1.1

By the gods, her breath smelled bad.

As though she had made a meal of a dirty street rat and now bits and pieces were left wedged within the interdental spaces, slowly decaying to bring torture to whoever came just a tad bit too close. Perchance it was some kind of devious strategy. Scorpios had their venomous sting to paralyze their victims and this particular witch had the foul reek of her breath, occupying her victims with fulsome gagging so none of them would ever see the deadly blade coming.

A sigh fell from Rhyah’s lips as she shifted her feet.

Keeping her weight off her arms was getting harder with every passing heartbeat. Being tied to the ceiling of a witch’s hut was indeed not much fun at all. It was comical how often she had landed herself in this exact position. Though this witch was unlike the others she had encountered. She was ancient. Not her usual target that was for certain. When Rhyah had spotted the old hag excitement had thrummed through her so steadily, she hadn’t considered the hardships of such a bargain. It had soon shown the witch couldn’t be persuaded by shiny—stolen—jewelry in exchange for Rhyah’s requested potion and she was fairly convinced there was no getting out of this with mere scratches.

Cockiness had straightened her shoulders, had settled far into the depths of her stomach; the aftermath of having been on a lucky streak with the young White Witches. That overconfidence was now replaced with crippling anticipation and a raging tension in her shoulders. She cursed old age for all eternity. It was the natural aging process of a wrinkling face, shrinking bones, loss of muscle strength, and that godsdamned graying hair that had led her to believe she had offered her bargain to a White Witch.