Timothy slowly, painfully hauled himself to his feet. The air smelled oily and charged, and burned with the smell of fairy. It was a hard smell to describe. Horribly sweet, like a poisonous flower, mixed with honey somehow rotting. Fairies were dreadful, wretched creatures, and worse; this one knew him. Timothy gulped.
Its foul blue light stained the trail and far beyond, making Timothy glad for his dark shield. The Voltcage floated with affected laziness, right where they'd been trying to go. It had been waiting for them. The fairy was massive, bigger even than the Queens of the Wood and certainly bigger than him. He couldn’t tell what kind of fairy it had been before the Queens had twisted it. It barely even looked like a fairy anymore; now it looked like a bulbous cross between a balloon of skin drifting over the ground, and a rotting onion. It was transparent, with its light coming from a pulsing, grabbling knot of lightning that pulsed within it like hands attacking it from within. It wore a mockery of a witch's hat atop its head, woven from dead branches.Its arms were long like a dead tree's, and each ended in claws instead of fingers. Instead of legs, tentacles of the same rotten skin of its form grabbed and clawed from beneath it. It held a long staff with a crystalline head the size of a watermelon. Every now and then, faces formed in the light within, frozen in pain. Fairies, captured on the brink of death, and absorbed into it. And its face… it looked like it had been gashed in with a knife, with too-wide, triangular eyes and a grin that stretched far too far across its face. And then its mouth opened, and out cracked, "HELLO… FRIEND."
There was a pregnant pause, as smoke from burning trees began to fill the air. He could feel Meri’s eyes on the back of his head, but it was washed away in his sheer horror. Static seemed to fill his head.
“We don’t have to do this.” Timothy managed. “I have a child with me.” Even so, he put his hands up in a ready stance, and let darkness burn in them in warning. “There’s no sport here.”
The horrid thing’s smile seemed to spread like cracks in a tree, forking and splitting all over. “SHE CAN PLAY TOO! AFTER ALL, YOU TWO KNOW HOW TO MAKE SOME NOISE.”
“What IS that?” Meri’s voice squeaked. Before Timothy could answer, the twisted fairy cackled.
“I’M TIMOTHY’S BEST FRIEND!” It drifted towards them, and Timothy shot a warning burst of darkness in front of it. It didn’t slow down. “HE’S PROBABLY BEEN EXPECTING ME EVER SINCE YOU STARTED PARTYING.” Crap, crap, crap! Timothy swallowed hard. There was no way he could take the Voltcage on in a fight, especially not right now. The witch let more darkness bubble and swirl im his hands.
“Alright, then you asked for it.” He said, making himself keep his voice even. The Voltcage just grinned wider.
“YEAH! LET’S PLAY—“
Timothy slammed his palms together, and a wave of dense black smoke blew out all around him. He yanked his own shadow off his back and sent it sprinting off to the east. The fairy turned and snapped off a flurry of thin thunderbolts, blowing apart tree after tree in showers of burning splinters. That was the opening he needed. Shadow spiderlegs burst from his body once more and he took off in the opposite direction, hoping to veer south as soon as he was past the ‘cage.
“HAHAHA, YES! TAG’S MY SECOND FAVORITE!”
Meri threw her arms around his neck as he veered off left like his non-existent tail was on fire. After another flash and crack, A horrible cackle rose behind him like a dark cloud.
“Figured that wouldn’t fool him long.” Timothy gasped.
Meri’s claws dug into his chest. “What is that thing!?"
"Voltcage! Evil fairy!"
"Why is it after us!?”
The witch felt the hairs on the back of his neck lift up. Gathering as much force into his tired limbs as he could, he threw himself and Meri hard sideways, narrowly dodging another blaze of blue lightning. The trees weren't so lucky as a torrent of fairy lightning blazed through them. The lucky ones just got scorched and died instantly. The unlucky ones got scorched, and began to burn with flames that were already spreading. He landed clumsily in a shower of dirt, but he didn't let that stop him from running.
“Because it’s crazy! It’s worse than the other fairies!” Timothy all but wailed. “It kidnapped me once as a kid and I got away, and now it has it out for me!” There went all that effort to seem wise and in control earlier.
“Okay, but why is it here!?”
“The same reason the whole cursed forest is after us! We got too loud!”
"Well, what do we do!?"
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
"Duck!"
Timothy crushed himself against the earth as another bolt of lightning ripped the air apart. Meri screamed. It was so close he could feel the air ignite around him, and only a fast yank down of the heat cloak stopped poor Meri from getting flash fried. They were fireproof, but not lightningproof. This blast was far too close to the underbrush, setting it ablaze. The flames licked at Timothy and his charge painlessly, but the fire spread quickly to the trees, filling the air with even more smoke. And then the trees started falling over. Timothy yelped and lunged forward just in time to not get crushed into chunky jelly, even as the earth shook from many other impacts. The pair tumbled and rolled to a painful stop just before a tree crashed in front of them. Dizzy, in pain, and feeling his strength fading, the spiderlegs spell was too much to hold. It fizzled out painfully.
It took far, far too long to even start to haul himself up. “Timothy!” Meri cried out at him. Oh, good, his shield had kept her safe… he coughed painfully, and slowly clawed his way to his stinging, scraped knees. The forest was now well and truly burning, stinging smoke filling the air. The embers swirled in storms as more and more trees caught. He was ankle deep in burning grass and bush. The dense smoke and intense flames hid them from the Voltcage, but they couldn’t see him, either.
“W-why didn’t the trees crush him?” Meri panicked. “I saw one go right through him!”
“He… he can turn ghostly.” Timothy coughed softly. “And shield besides. Unless he’s killed in an instant, he’ll not get hit.”
“THIS TIME WHEN I CATCH YOU, I’LL KEEP YOU FOREVER!” The same horrible voice singsonged. “YOU CAN BE MY TOY! I WON’T BREAK YOU TOO MUCH!”
“He also never shuts up.” Timothy murmured.
“W-what are we gonna do?” Meri coughed from the smoke. Oh no, dragons weren’t smokeproof! Timothy threw together a wind mask spell and pressed it over her mouth and nose, before doing the same to himself. His body was starting to feel heavier and heavier. The strain of all the magic, on top of his physical exhaustion, was becoming too much. And he didn’t have an answer. He could still hear the Voltcage, even if he couldn’t see it through the wildfire and smoke. He couldn’t keep running— sooner or later, it was going to hit him. Even fresh, he would never be a match for a greater fairy, let alone one who’d eaten so many of its kin. And he was far, far from fresh.
“Every other time I’ve escaped him, it’s been luck and trickery.” Timothy rasped. “We were close to the fairy territories, and they hate him too. But now…”
“We can’t just give up!” Meri’s small fist pounded on his shoulder. “You’re a witch!”
Honestly, Timothy was trembling like a pebble about to blow off a cliff. And his mind was hazy and weak. But… one thought did rise out of the mire. It was only after him. Meri was just caught in the way. And so was everything else that was burning. He could hear cries of fear and pain from small lives ending in flames. Flames that monster started to get to him. He was a witch. He had to do something. Even if he couldn’t outright win… and he probably couldn’t. And he could feel Meri trembling on his back. Unlike him, there was someone waiting for her. A family with moms like his, who were probably looking for their daughter. Who might never see her again, if he made the wrong call. The thought made him feel even heavier.
Mom…
Timothy clenched a claw. Timothy didn’t want to fight. He didn’t want to kill. And he didn’t wanna die. But he couldn’t run any further. He just didn’t have the strength left. Even if this was all her fault, there was only one recourse. He bent the shadows around his hand into a knife. “We’re close to the forest’s edge.” His voice came out quiet, but firm with a witch’s purpose. He knew what he had to do. And he struck.
The dragoness yelped as she slid from his back onto the dirt, cut loose. “Timothy, what—“
“Hush. Listen to me.” He turned and looked her right in the eye. “That potion shoulda refreshed you. I want you to get running south. Get as many trees between you and this as you can.” He fought to still his shaking. “If you hustle, you’ll make it out of the woods.”
“What?” Meri yelped. The little dragoness looked exhausted and terrified, and he hated to see it. “W-what about you!?”
“Y’ain’t got time to worry for me.” He said softly. And he pulled himself to his feet. “That monster is after me, but its attention span isn’t that long. If it keeps this up, it’ll eventually run out of steam and go home.” He held out a hand, and when she took it, he pulled her to her feet. “I’m a good sneak, an’ fireproof besides. But I can’t sneak around with you on my back, so you gotta go.”
“But, but…” Meri sniffled. “You said yourself you’re no match for the fairies!”
Timothy smiled, for real. “Hey, you were listening!” He didn’t have the heart to tell her this was probably gonna end bad for him. Another wild cackle, and a lightning bolt flashed in the distance. Good, it really didn’t know where they were. “Doesn’t matter. We’re out of time.” He pulled the last of the shield cloak off of himself, stabilized it with a shot of energy he really couldn’t afford to lose, and gently wrapped it around Meri like his own cloak. The little dragoness seemed to feel it was very heavy, from the way she clutched it.
“Timothy, please…”
“It’ll all be fine.” He felt something weird in his heart. Like he needed to say something else, to the last being he was likely to talk to, even if he lived. But he couldn’t think of anything. Another lightning blast, this one closer. He gave her a tight hug and pointed south. Then, as soon as she began to move, he ran east, into the flames and toward the lightning. He needed to make enough of a distraction for her to get clear, and then get to ground. He knew some spells, if he could just keep his strength going long enough to cast.
But the moment she was out of sight, though, everything went wrong. …More wrong. A lightning bolt crashed just in front of him, tearing through the canopy like a dagger through flesh. The explosion of it hitting the ground knocked Timothy off his feet. He slammed onto his back hard enough to knock all the air out of his lungs, painfully. “OH, THERE YOU ARE! I SEE YOU~”
He felt it coming before he could even get on his feet. In a panic, he raised a shadow shield on his arm, but it was the wrong shape— and blockin’ lightning with darkness was about the worst call he’d made. The lightning crashed into the shield, crushing him into the blazing ground. Then it snapped, and he screamed as his arm was engulfed in searing, agonizing pain.