Rose was already moving before the leader of the foreign witches drew her massive greatsword. With the practiced grace of hundreds of years of study, as though the whole thing were merely rehearsed, she slid past the lead witch’s barely formulated guard. And though she could have run the woman through, Rose instead opted for a swift strike of her pommel aimed at a gap in the woman’s armor on the side of her belly. Such a blow surely would have stunned someone like Ivy, but the massive warrior witch only grunted and swung her own weapon—but to kill. The woman’s strength was enormous, but her movements were sluggish, as though she hadn’t slept in several days. Whatever Camellia’s demon had done had taken its toll on the witch.

Ivy watched as Rose effortlessly dodged the swing, ducking under the wild horizontal swing aimed to separate Rose’s head from her body. The ancient witch once again went to pacify the great warrior in front of her with a disarming tactic aimed at the large woman’s wrist, but the Iadaian witch shrugged Rose off, flinging her down against the deck. The waves began to rise around the ship, and one of the other foreign witches began to conjure…something around one of her hands. Maybe Rose wasn’t as invincible as Ivy thought…

She started to move but felt a sharp gust of wind zip by her cheek. A moment after, a grunt from one of the sailors reached her ears. Her eyes found the man, just beyond the witches, an arrow embedded in his chest.

Ivy's so far distant overview of the brewing battle transformed into an icy rage in an instant. That shot had almost killed her. What the hell was she doing just standing here? Her confidence in Rose had blinded her to what she had always known. Just like the witches in Rhune, these new ones couldn’t be allies either. It was just that with Raenin—who still had yet to process the scene in front of him—and Rose, Ivy figured things would be handled. How wrong that had been. Maybe Ivy was just getting slow these days. Too much booze. She should start cutting back on that. Probably.

In any case, she called out to the witch world, and it answered. The first thing she saw was a bright string of witch power headed directly for her. Without thinking, she ripped her dagger from its place at her hip and slashed. Her power drained from the deep well of her core and snaked up along her shoulder, down her arm to the edge of Serathil. The other witch's magic shattered into a thousand shards of scintillating glass before vanishing amongst the muted grays of the witch world.

She heard an inhuman wail break through the rest of the chaotic sounds around her and ignored it all. With that, perhaps she could worry less about the fight in her immediate vicinity, trusting Rose and possibly Camellia to diffuse the other two witches. Having already disabled one, her main concern was catching a stray arrow from the idiots on the foreign ship.

Though she had used a majority of her power, cutting off the unknown attack against her, she had enough to step along a twisting path to the other ship. Within seconds Serathil cut through the throats of two archers, their drawn bows misfiring as they began to collapse, not quite understanding they were already dead. Before they fell, she moved again. One more down. Two others after that.

At that point, the men on the ship understood they were under attack, and turned their weapons on her. As they fired, she fell back into the witch world again, only to reappear in front of another archer, Serathil plunged deep into his chest. Everyone on board froze at the blatant display of witchcraft. The man's hands nearest to her trembled around the shaft of his longbow, and he slowly lowered it. Oh. Good. Apparently living around the other three witches had instilled in them a…respect for her kind.

"Stop it," she said, and then used her still heavily depleted power to hop back to Virian’s ship.

Turned out she had been wrong about…well everything in her earlier prediction. The situation aboard Virian's vessel couldn't have been worse. Camellia lay in a crumpled heap in the same position Ivy had last seen her, no shadowy demon in sight. Rose stood enveloped in a sphere of perfectly still water up to and including her mouth, leaving only a small space for her to breathe through her nose. The rest of those on deck were facing one of the other Iadaian witches, though making no move against her. Above one of her hands, a small cyclone twirled, inundated with hundreds of razor-sharp bits of steel.

Ivy glanced at Rose, who managed to barely give Ivy a shake of her head. Letting out a long breath, Ivy brought her attention back to the leader of the Iadaians.

"Release them," Ivy said, her voice coming out in demonic again.

"Why would I do that?" The woman asked, not bothering to mirror the difficult language.

"Your ship is neutralized," Ivy said.

"No. They are trained well not to fight us. But one word from me and—"

"Oh?" Ivy glanced down at their fallen companion. It must be the witch whose power Ivy had cut off at the start of this whole thing. She flashed a smile at the other woman. "Will you get a word out, before…" She waved a hand at the downed witch.

The huge witch snarled, her knuckles tightening around the blade that was longer than Ivy's whole body.

"What did you do to her?"

"Or maybe I'll just finish off the rest of your crew. Then your word means nothing."

The threat was empty, but they didn't know that. Ivy was lucky to have been able to get back and forth between the boats. The first time she had used this newfound power, it had nearly drained her completely. She had enough for a couple of quick jumps, and if it came down to it, she could probably just kill the remaining two. Though she’d never hear the end of it from Rose.

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Hopefully it wouldn’t get to that point. By the looks of it, she might be able to bluff her way to some kind of standstill. The lead witch was covered in sweat, her jaw clenched tight against the strain of holding onto her power. Her demon's…death? Banishment? Whatever happened to him seemed to be weighing more and more upon the woman. Although the other still appeared to be in top form, and Ivy would prefer not to have to fight her.

Yet the huge woman merely grunted, taking one hand from the hilt of her blade, and raising it high. Tendrils of water rose up from below the deck and shot toward her, wrapping around the greatsword.

"Wait," Ivy said. She let out a breath when the other witch actually hesitated. Ivy dared to glance away, centering a seething glare at Raenin. What could he possibly be waiting for? He just stood there, completely stunned like an idiot. She jerked her head over in the foreign witch’s direction. His…mother’s direction. “Raenin, come on!” He didn’t move, and Ivy turned back to her opponent, now wearing an even darker expression. “Just a sec, your son is being difficult.”

At those words, the water-controlling witch resumed the gathering of her power, and Ivy readied herself, more mentally than anything. If she was forced to end his mother, Raenin would never be the same. Neither would she, probably. The man was one of the few people she had ever made friends with, and she’d probably have to kill him right after, or she’d always be looking over her shoulder. Things like this were why she preferred a bottle in her hands as opposed to her dagger lately.

But then what she had been waiting for all along finally came. A single word uttered almost as a whisper, behind a choking breath. Yet all aboard heard it.

“Mom?”

The warrior-witch’s head snapped in Raenin’s direction, and for a moment, nothing changed. Her power still swirled around her, the waves churning against her unnatural theft of their strength. Come on. Come on. Please. Ivy just needed to see that first spark of recognition blossom in the other woman’s face. She didn’t doubt Rose’s read of the foreign witch, but it had been decades since mother and son had seen each other. Hell, it took Raenin how long to process it?

Finally, the huge woman faltered, taking a step back. The cold determination in her face started to crack.

“Kalmia,” her companion said, “what are you doing?”

The leader of the Iadaian witches—Kalmia, apparently—tensed, pointing her greatsword churning with raging waters directly at Ivy.

“Get out of my head or I kill your friend!” The sphere of water surrounding Rose shifted, covering her head completely. “Dispel this illusion! Now!”

Oh, damn. Ivy gripped the hilt of her dagger tight. Despite all their problems, if she had to choose between Rose and…Kalmia, it would be Rose.

“Mom, stop!” Raenin said, moving forward and triggering the other Iadaian witch to spring into action. She moved to meet him, and a shard from her miniature whirlwind broke away, slicing his left cheek. A dribble of blood welled up and fell to splash against the deck, disappearing amongst the water-soaked boards caused by Kalmia’s power.

“Shut up!” Kalmia shouted. “You won’t fool me. My son is dead!”

Ivy spared a glance toward the drowning Rose, who appeared as calm as ever, once again shaking her head once. Really? Even now? What was she supposed to do? Kalmia was being ridiculous. How could Ivy even…huh. Maybe that would work. Rose then gave the tiniest of nods. Right.

“Hey,” Ivy said, returning her attention to Kalmia, “are you an idiot?”

“What?”

“What do you think is happening here? That I somehow read your mind, got a—probably hazy—memory of what Raenin looked like as a kid from twenty years ago, aged him up in my head, and then reproduced him for you to see? You’ve already seen me disappear and reappear. So, what’s more likely, that I have several witch powers? Something I’m pretty sure is impossible? And that I am able to reconstruct a man’s face based on a bad, old, memory into something you actually recognize? Or maybe that he’s just actually here?”

Ivy ignored the fact that she had demonstrated multiple witch powers if they counted her severing their friend’s first attack. But both were technically all part of what she could do in the witch world, and the severing thing required Serathil. So, it didn’t count. It was just one power.

For a second time, Kalmia appeared to lose her edge. Her gaze shifted between Ivy and Raenin a half dozen times.

“I…”

Ivy—no, Rose—didn’t have time for Kalmia’s internal debate.

“Make a decision. Release Rose, or I attack,” Ivy said, “you have ten seconds.”

“Mom, please!” Raenin pushed forward again, braving the wind-witch’s storm of blades and earning a few more cuts on his raised forearms. “Ivy will kill you. Don’t make me watch that. Not again.”

Something in those last two words finally broke through Kalmia’s shell. Her sword arm drooped until it fell to her side, the blade of her massive sword clanging against the deck. Her fingers loosened, and the six-foot-long blade clattered to the planks, along with all of the water under her influence. The great sphere of water engulfing Rose crashed down with a splash that covered nearly the whole deck, soaking Ivy from the waist down.

“Ack! Cold!”

Ivy jumped back, yet Rose simply touched down on both feet, not even taking a big breath in or anything. If not for her matted hair and saturated clothing, the unflappable ancient witch could have been mistaken for just arriving from below deck.

“Kalmia!” the other witch had yet to dispel her own magic, her gaze darting around the deck as though anyone might lash out at any second.

“Stand down, Lucerne.” Kalmia’s head was bowed, as though she were afraid to look back up and find her son gone.

“Good job, Ivy,” Rose said, “for once you didn’t kill anyone.”

Ivy thought back to the archers on the other ship.

“Uhm…”

“No one important.”

Ivy sighed. Sure, Rose. But would Virian agree? No, of course not. She glanced over at him as he went to check on his sister. Ivy couldn’t see his face, but her chest felt tight knowing the disapproval she would no doubt see if his back wasn’t turned. Every now and then, she still saw glimpses of the fear and horror he had shown at her slaughter of the church.

Ugh. Like always the short but sweet battle had invigorated her, but now she just felt like crap, wanting more wine. Was she supposed to feel this way? They attacked her. They had it coming. Anyone would have done the same. Not sure her or Rose or Armond or...whatever.

Yet somewhere far away in Iadai, someone would grieve over the men she had killed today. Why didn't they matter? Would the Iadaian witches care? Reunited with her son, Kalmia probably wouldn’t even notice. Damnit. This is why everyone hated witches. Why the church put so much fear into the people. Why she was so screwed in the head—

She had to smack the side of her head to pull herself out of whatever spiral that had been. Had she just sympathized with the church? She hit herself again before realizing Rose watching her with a raised eyebrow.

“Did you know what would happen?” Ivy asked.

“I can never be sure with you,” Rose said, “you know that.”

Sounded like code for, “yes” to Ivy. She rolled her eyes and made to go check on the collapsed form of Camellia. Virian had already reached her side, moving as soon as Lucerne had dispelled her deadly whirlwind. Before Ivy could take a step, however, she heard Kalmia speak again.

“Rae, is it really you?”

“It is, mom. It is.”