26 Fritzi

26

Fritzi

The Well is a battlefield. Swords clash, enemies scream; it is a bloodbath, but I walk through it, limbs stiff with Liesel wrapped in my arms. I walk, and walk, and I think I'm humming, some lilting lullaby Mama always sang to Dieter.

Or, no, it isn't a lullaby—

"Three stones and one spark." Singing, singing. "Water, air, earth. And fire in the heart."

"Fritzi," Liesel whimpers into my neck. "Fritzi, you're scaring me. Stop, please."

"Three stones and one spark. Water, air, earth—"

"Fritzi." She sobs and clings to me. "Fritzi—this is Dieter , he has you—let me go, please."

But she doesn't struggle. She holds on to me, an eleven-year-old's tense grip, as I walk us through the battlefield. No one dives at us, no one attacks.

Up ahead, I see my brother, standing beneath an archway of trees. He beams at me, that smile that is the sun, and I walk, keep walking, even as Liesel shivers in my arms. The weight of her presses against a wound on my chest, but the pain is far away. There, but on the horizon. It doesn't matter.

Something tugs at the base of my spine. Revulsion? No, it is smothered in the wash of pride that my brother's smile gives me.

"Good work, sister," Dieter says and looks at Liesel. He reaches a hand out, strokes her hair. "Hello again, cousin."

She glares at him, her jaw set, eyes flashing orange. "Don't touch me."

He clicks his tongue and drops his hand. "Oh, but I don't need to, do I? This way."

I follow.

The sounds of battle fade behind us as we step into a glen. Hexenj?gers encircle the space, and as soon as Dieter enters, he nods behind him, and they file out, leaving us alone in a copse of trees that sway in a gentle wind, a small pond undisturbed and peaceful—and the Origin Tree looming over us all.

Its massive roots and reaching branches dominate the glen, leaves clinking against one another, its sheer presence loud even as this space is quiet in reverence.

Memories fight through. This is the place where Otto and I—

Pain lances in my head, and I stumble, almost dropping Liesel. She cries out and tries to scurry out of my arms, but I clamp tighter, regaining my footing.

Dieter frowns at me.

"Three stones and one spark," I hear myself sing. "Water, air, earth. And fire in the heart."

Stop , something says, deep in me; something screams it.

He nods. "Good."

He pours the stones out of the satchel, dumping them into his hand.

Behind us, there is a shout. Metal scraping metal.

Dieter glares at the opening to this glen, glares enough that I start to turn, but I can't. I don't.

He says nothing, but when he starts to climb the Tree's massive arching roots, I follow with Liesel in my arms.

She bucks against me. "Let me go ! This isn't you, Fritzi! Let me go! "

Mama, Dieter, and I were so happy. We laughed all the time. We crowded in our small cottage and gorged ourselves on Mama's cooking—something with plums, with cherries, because I remember looking up and Dieter's face was streaked with sticky red, his mouth and teeth—

I hold Liesel. I hold her, and my face is wet, wetness that drips down on her, on my arms around her. She puts her hands on my cheeks, but I am looking up at Dieter, who reaches the Tree's trunk.

There are grooves in the trunk. Three of them. Perfect little circles for perfect little stones.

"Three stones and one spark," I whisper, throat swelling, tears coming stronger.

Dieter places one stone in each hole. The last one clicks into place, and I can feel the Tree vibrating beneath and all around us, a sensation that rocks me where I stand on its roots, but I keep my balance, clinging to Liesel.

Part of me expects the Tree to reach its mighty branches down, for it to feel the presence of the stones and react, to fight us off. But it just vibrates still, that hum of life and magic and power, and being this close, the hum is consuming . It is enticing, a hum that promises strength and life.

Dieter's eyes are brilliant with need. He hears the hum too. He's always heard it. Maybe that's why he's been the way he is, because there has always been this vibration in his head, begging. And he's here now, one palm flat against the trunk, his face stretching in a giddy grin.

"Now, Liesel," Dieter coos, stroking the bark.

"No," she says into my neck, half whimper, half fury.

Dieter sighs. He glances behind us again.

Swords clash, closer now. Someone shouts.

"Fritzi!"

I want to look over my shoulder. I want to look—

I want to—

I want—

"Little Liesel," Dieter says, but the exasperation in his tone is marred with the slightest swell of anxiety. He faces us, one hand still on the Tree. "You will burn this Tree for me."

"No!" she snaps.

"Yes, you will."

He pulls on me, and I shove Liesel at Dieter. He grabs her arm, and she cries out, shock more than anything, but he holds her strong, and I'm standing free on the Tree's roots, balancing on one arch.

"Fritzi!" the voice shouts again, a frenzy of panic.

There's a knife in my hand. Where did it come from?

"Light the Tree on fire, little Liesel," Dieter tells her. "Darling Fritzichen needs you to light the Tree on fire."

The tip of the knife appears in front of my eye. My vision switches from Dieter and Liesel, at the base of the Tree, to the edge of the blade, back and forth, far then close.

"Burn the Tree!" Dieter demands.

Why won't she listen? He needs us. He needs us.

The edge of the blade comes closer to my eye. I can feel my eyelashes flutter against it with each blink.

Tears start to gather as the blade in my hand moves closer, closer.

Dieter needs me to do this. Dieter needs me. My brother needs me.

He needs me.

He needs—

I want—

I have—

The sting of pain. The tip of the blade catches my eyelid, and I flinch so it slides up, cutting through my brow.

Instinct overwhelms need and want in a sudden surge of No, no, don't do this—

Liesel screams. "Fritzi, stop !"

"You can stop it," Dieter tells her, cooing into her hair, his arms wrapped around her. "Light the fire. Burn it all down, little Liesel. Witch fire in the heart."

I draw the knife back, and it resets in front of my eye, and I'm shaking now, shaking with holding it back, with needing to gouge out my own eye—Dieter needs me, he needs Liesel, he needs—

He had me in a room in Baden-Baden, chained up. There was no blood then. Only burning, the smell of rendered flesh, his eyes glittering then like they are now.

He left marks on me. He left brands on me there and there and there.

He had me in the library. He pulled me apart in front of Otto.

And again, after Perchta's tomb.

Over and over. His marks everywhere, proof that he is stronger than me, that he will always be more than me, that I will always be his.

My brother needs me to do this.

I want—I want —

I see the blood dripping off the tip of the knife that hovers just beyond my eye.

I follow it, looking down. And there is the brand he made, the edge just visible beneath the ruined collar of my chemise and kirtle, and the jagged carving of the Tree still unhealed and roughly bandaged.

I remember the other brands. The other scars.

My body is not mine. My magic is not mine. I belong to him; I am his, and these marks are proof that he dominates me.

No .

Stop.

NO.

That is all I think. Have been thinking for months. No. Stop. He did this. He has me. He marked me.

Him, him—

But I am still here.

I am still here . Standing.

And these scars.

These scars are mine .

These marks are proof that I escaped him. That each time he overtook me, I came through.

These scars are badges of survival, and as I look down at them, I scream.

The noise wells from the pit of my stomach, bursting up and through me in a tidal wave of magic and burning, cacophonous rage.

Rage in its purest form, rage stripped to nothing more than single- minded drive and terror.

Rage and reclaiming and banishing, all of it coalescing until that scream shatters every flicker of my brother in my body.

This is my body. This is my magic.

I belong to me.

I drop backward, rocked off balance on a precarious root, and fall, knife toppling from my fingers, body sinking, weightless—

Arms catch me.

I look up, and Otto's blood-streaked face stares down at me.

"Fritzi?" He cradles my cheek in one warm hand.

I nod, and manage a smile, and something in my eyes must silence his worry, because he smiles back.

Dieter's bellow of anger echoes across the glen.

From Otto's arms, I see Cornelia and Alois fighting off hexenj?gers in front of the Tree, the battle beginning to trickle over into this peaceful sanctuary. Brigitta is here too, and at her side—Hilde? Brigitta must have been training her, because she wields dual knives with determination.

"Light the Tree!" Dieter shouts, and I spin in Otto's arms, scrambling to my feet on the mossy forest floor as my brother shakes Liesel in a panic. "Light it now !"

Liesel's sobs turn to a stone-faced look of fury when she sees me standing, sees the clarity in my eyes.

She twists to glare up at Dieter.

"I won't burn this Tree," she tells him. "But I will burn you ."

And she puts her hands on his chest and sends him up in flames.

His whole body immediately wreaths in fire, orange and red and deepest blue that snap and pop off his clothes, lick at his hair. Liesel dives away, clambering over the Tree roots until she hurls herself into Otto's arms. He scoops her up, one hand still steadying me, and the three of us watch Dieter burn.

His skin begins to darken and crackle. The smell of burning flesh triggers me back into that room in Baden-Baden—

Then he laughs.

Dieter throws his head back and laughs to the Tree's high branches. It is a tearing, jarring sound, half-mad with pain.

He's still near the Tree. Standing on the roots, close enough to reach out and touch the trunk.

I see it happening slowly, time stretching thin. His hand, shrouded in witch fire, reaching for the bark.

I'm in motion before I can think of a way to stop this. Next to me, Otto shoves Liesel to relative safety and follows me, the two of us climbing, fighting our way up to reach Dieter and stop him before he ignites the Tree. We are close—

Not close enough.

Dieter's hand slams against the trunk of the Tree, right next to the three stones, just as I trip and fall against a root and my bloodied hand slaps to the base of the trunk. Otto's grip on my other arm doesn't budge.

The vibrations in the Tree go silent.

There's a pause.

Like a breath.

Like stillness before a thunderclap.

Then the fire launches across the Tree's bark in a wave of scalding blue and white that ripples down the roots, across the branches, and consumes the entire glen in a flash of incandescent light.