The Unmarked Witch

by Miranda Lyn

I rolled my eyes. “What would you know about the higher road?” “Oh, nothing. But I've heard great things.”

“We have known each other for a long time. We were friends. Good friends. But ever since this,” I gestured between us, “became more than that, you've been overstepping. I'm not sure when I made it okay for you to treat me the way you have been, but I'm done. I can't even listen to you speak. I don't want this anymore, Nik.”

“I thought I might love you. I thought we'd marry one day.” I scoffed. “My parents definitely thought so. But I have to go be my own person. I have to do this. And if you can't stand beside me, then get out of my way.”

“Never mistake someone's humanity for weakness. Did you see Raven lift that body with her magic and save her? Did you stop to think she could have done the opposite? Dropping your scrawny ass over the edge with merely a thought? Every second you breathe, remember she decided you were worthy of it.” I loved her. Her fire, her spirit, her unwavering faith in me as a person.

Remember who the enemy is.

I'd lived. Survived two trials. Not gracefully. Not with poise. But I'd made it. And that was enough for me.

I was brave in my soul, but on the outside, clearly, I was still a coward.

Something in the way he'd said ‘witch’ ignited that rebellion inside of me. The one that sent fear right out the window, wholly replacing it with stupid.

“Better a villain by truth than a hero by lies. I'll be the devil in your story if that's what you need, but I will not apologize for what I choose to protect.” He looked at me then. His eyes lit with passion and anger and a thousand other things I couldn't define. “That includes you.”

“You can be mad at me for what you saw. You can choose to never speak to me again, but you will not tell me you're my friend and then use that as a weapon against me. You haven't given me a chance to explain, but now I won't bother.”

Letting myself love the king would be an uphill battle and I was not a warrior.

I don't want to live without her memory around me, but I also don't want to drown in it.”

But just because I bore the weight of death did not mean I had an ethical right to that magic, just like my memory spell.