The villagers cannot believe their eyes. As they creep out of their hiding places with careful steps, Indigo recognizes the glint in their glares as one that appears when they ready themselves to rid the village of traces of treason. He tries to ignore his assumptions, tries to stay in control while walking out of the fire. With his arms raised until they align with his shoulders, Indigo huffs, and turns his palms around into fists that signal for the flames to disappear. And they do.

It works.

It all worked.

I did it, he thinks, agape at the sight of embers falling down like fireflies onto the land.

Ashes and dust float around his figure. A veil of gray smoke covers his face. When Indigo finally notices a crowd has formed before him, he wonders what good the elders are trying to achieve by hiding their children’s eyes, for it isn’t as if they do not smell the warmth of human blood and flesh calling out to them.

Indigo’s father pushes the crowd aside. He rushes to the front of the lingering sea of people, who are still all too shocked to formulate any kind of response to the savior standing before them. “Indigo…” His lips are parted, shaking, and Indigo knows his father hasn’t a clue as to where to begin—or end, either. “You… You learned how to—"

“That was a forbidden spell!” cries a young woman who points at Indigo. Her features are furrowed with disgust. “My brother told me about it when he came back from the Academy last summer! Not only is that witch practicing the dark arts, but she’s also using banned techniques to get her way!”

“Hold on a minute…” Indigo’s voice trembles. The woman speaks the truth, he cannot deny this. But, he thinks, “Without this,” Indigo invites a small flame to rest in the small of his palm, “we’d all be dead,” he says. “Don’t you see that—”

“Traitor!” she screams.

“Traitor!” another echoes.

A couple of villagers start to chant the words as their fists punch the air.

“Witch!” another follows, until a dozen people are singing his betrayals.

An even bigger crowd forms. They march toward him. Without mercy. Without doubt.

Indigo’s chest tightens. It becomes hard for him to swallow, and he knows it isn’t only due to the dryness of the air. The sight before him is a familiar one. It has haunted him in his nightmares, was one of his biggest fears. It is what happens when someone breaks the village’s rules—or rather, Ilragorn’s rules.

Some of his people are still hesitant as they stay behind in the crowd. Their behavior sparks a glimmer of hope within his mind as the villagers approach. He turns to find his family and holds onto a wish he considers perhaps futile, where the hate in their gazes would be replaced by understanding, by love.

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But there is nothing of the sort—nothing to show they were ever kin at all as his family cheers along for Indigo’s demise with neighbors he once considered allies, fellow comrades and friends.

Indigo knows it could be all lies, all made-up emotions crafted to protect themselves and Lydia. Yet, even if he were to ask, the truth would never leave their mouths. They’re well aware Indigo would never hurt Lydia; that the true danger of this situation lies in betrayal, what the Council would do to them if they were caught supporting Indigo’s cause for freedom.

Indigo doesn’t blame them. They would be powerless, easy to be caught and done away with.

He thinks of his lost brothers and sisters, the fallen. It is clear to him now that he must do something. If they catch him, tear him from limb from limb and leave his body to rot against a stake—where maggots will eat his eyes and the villagers will stone his dying skin until it is only bruises—Indigo won’t be able to fend for himself.

Because they have necromancers, he remembers, and other sick tricks he doesn’t wish to think about. The menace gives cause for him to continue, courage to push away his fatigue with all his bravery as the ground blurs before him.

No, he thinks, I won’t be like them. I’ll never let them take me—even if it costs me my life, I will escape these people.

Indigo reaches into his pocket. The crowd pauses and gasps. It’ll be the first time in history where a heretic fights back in his village, and he can see the surprise spreading amongst them once they realize he’d rather face consequences worse than death over perishing here at their hands.

He grabs the diamond-shaped vial he’d kept for emergencies and throws it into the air, toward the direction where the wind blows at its mightiest. As he squints and draws his hand back against an invisible bow-string, Indigo aims for the fragile glass and unleashes an arrow of fire across the sky that smashes the bottle to pieces.

He shuts his eyes, prays to the void that his plan will work. The villagers yell obscenities. They cover themselves with their arms, distressed and fearful of the unknown showering down upon them, of the rest that might be to come.

It is a silent understanding, a strange pact between them that lets Indigo know he can blink again, breathe once more, when their presence does not reach him anymore, as they fall deep into a strange kind of slumber. His shoulders drop with relief. A part of him he considers sickening cannot help but admire the skill it has taken to get this far. To freeze a couple insects had been one thing, but stopping time for an entire village? The accomplishment is one Indigo finds a silver lining of pride in.

Crickets sing under the moon, oblivious to the events that have just transpired. Swiftly, Indigo bends over and slides his bag off his shoulders while shuffling through its depths, in search of a second potion lost among many—a remedy to being hunted in the near future. I was right, he thinks, the conditions are perfect tonight.

He pauses, glances down at Lydia’s face. It occurs to him that he’s never seen her this angry, this broken. Not even their cats being eaten by wolves—when Indigo was twelve—had managed to get such a twisted and fervent reaction from her features. But I’m glad, Indigo tells himself as he takes a step back. I’m glad you’ll all be able to start over without me.

He throws the second vial into the air.

Pink rain spreads across the village.

Indigo grabs his bag again and turns his back on the place he once called home.

The trick is done. When morning comes, they will have forgotten him and all that he is.

He takes another step forward. He doesn’t look at them from over his shoulder, not even once. Sounds of wildlife surround him, and shadows created by the moonlight above chase his lone figure. Indigo wishes he himself could also forget as he walks deeper into the forest, deeper into the greenery with trees that look like arms, and arms hanging from trees.