“You heard the ladies. I can’t quite let you go after seeing this, can I?” Miss Wormwood said. She motioned at their surroundings as she grinned. “Wouldn’t be very witchy of me, mind you.”

Witchy. It all made sense now: the tomes, the cabinet, the cauldron, the cold-blooded murder of Nut—they even had the perfect front, running a house full of children no one cared about at St. Dunsany’s.

“You’re a witch,” Ben said, mouth agape. He turned to Miss Ratworth and Miss Toadwart, backing a few steps. “You all are.”

He remembered what he had just seen a couple of hours ago in Bierce Square: the serpentine scarlet light, the hooded figures that appeared out of nowhere, and the boy that vanished into thin air. “But that doesn’t explain everything going on here,” Ben stammered, curiosity taking precedence over his own safety for a moment.

The three witches cackled at him. Their ghoulish bodies were now a grayish mess of warts and creases; their noses were so crooked that they hung below their sharply protruding chins, and their fingernails had elongated into veritable razors. As for their mouths, they would not cease to drool with nauseous blue saliva.

“Keen eyes, Mr. Umber! What do you reckon we should season them with, sister Toadwart?” Miss Wormwood asked.

“Root of Hemlock digg’d in the dark,” she crooned in reply, resuming the sinister melody Miss Ratworth had been singing earlier.

“Digg’d in the dark!” Miss Ratworth joined.

Miss Wormwood brandished the knife from behind her back and lurched at him. She aimed for his throat, just as he had done with Nut. Ben, expecting it, dove and then bolted for the door. Without missing a beat, Miss Toadwart melted into her own shadow and reappeared in front of the door in an instant, barring his way. He spun—Miss Wormwood already prepared to strike again. Miss Ratworth stirred the cauldron, all the while beaming idiotically.

That makes it two, Ben thought as he watched them without so much as batting an eye. One wrong movement, and he would end up on their plates. Through the door or the window, he was getting out of there at any cost.

Miss Toadwart lunged at him first. The door it is. Instead of backing away, Ben ran forward and slammed her straight into the solar plexus, catching her off guard. She swung one of her claws as he darted past her. She slashed his shirt and grazed his back. He ignored the searing pain as adrenaline surged through his veins. He was just a few feet away from the door and his freedom. I’m going to make it!

A shadow emerged from the floor in front of him. It materialized into Miss Wormwood. “You’re not going anywhere.” She shouted in triumph as she swung the knife again. Ben was running too fast to stop his momentum. There was nothing he could do to avoid her blade.

This is not the end, Ben thought. It was a declaration, not a desperate plea. A primal instinct kicked in, a spontaneous realization. He felt a sudden surge of vigor electrify his entire body; it surged all the way to his mouth, to the tip of his tongue. He could almost taste it. Ben released this pent-up power onto his assailant.

“Get away from me!” he shouted, and an invisible force sent Miss Wormwood crashing against her desk. Ben felt immediately drained of whatever agency had possessed him.

Miss Wormwood gurgled and spat blood. Ben noticed the knife stuck to her throat—whatever had pushed her away had bent the knife’s edge against her. Miss Ratworth let out a fearsome shriek as Miss Toadwart tried to compose herself, unsure of what to do. This was the chance that he needed.

Recovered from his daze, Ben ran past the ailing Miss Wormwood, and he only stopped to pull the knife away from the jugular. He ran past the door and down the hall of St. Dunsany’s as if the very hounds of hell were behind him. For all he knew, they might as well be.

Ben did not break his pace. He sprinted tirelessly, and even when he was gasping for breath, he pushed himself further. Condensed mist clung to his mouth as the chill forced its way into his throat and into his lungs. It was so cold that it burned. And yet, he did not stop. He could hear the mad howls of the caretakers (or should he call them witches now?) as he put as much distance as he could between him and St. Dunsany’s.

⦶⦶⦶

His clothes were all muddied from the splash of the puddles that dotted Dunport-Salem like a pox in the wake of the earlier rain. Yellow moonlight reflected from them. His shirt collar was torn from where Miss Wormwood had clutched it. His left hand, white due to his tightened grasp, trembled slightly as he held the witch’s dagger. It was an unremarkable item by all accounts, though he hadn’t had the time to properly examine it.

Stolen story; please report.

Miss Wormwood. Ben pictured her monstrous aspect as she died. I killed her, he thought plainly. It surprised him that no remorse accompanied the notion. He reasoned it was due to the witches’ true, wicked nature, but deep down, he knew that wasn’t all. After years of mistreatment, he finally had the guts to strike back. He felt a pang of guilt. Then Nut’s lifeless face flashed through his mind. The feeling passed.

He rushed down Du Maurier Street’s downward slope. The sea disappeared from view to his left. Two files of honey locust trees lined up the street neatly on either side of the street. Ben slowed down as he reached the one on the right sidewalk, and keeping to the bolder shadows under them, he eased up into a sluggish pace in order to make less noise.

A sudden breeze rustled the trees’ canopies, their leaves brushing against each other. Ben couldn’t help but jump out of his skin each time they touched. He watched for any unusual movements from the corner of his eyes. Nothing. He reached the corner of Melville Road and made a turn.

Where to now, Umber? Ben thought. He could make his way to the port, for there would be pubs and eateries open there catering to the local seamen. Miss Toadwart and Miss Ratworth would not dare chase him there. But then what? He could not hope to outrun them forever in a city the size of Dunport-Salem. I have to leave this place, Ben realized.

He stopped in his tracks. He had never left Dunport-Salem in his entire life. In fact, the city was his entire life, trying to figure out what was going on behind the curtains his daily enterprise. And now that he had opened Pandora’s Box, so to speak, he wished that curiosity hadn’t gotten the better of him.

But if he hadn’t, it wouldn’t have been long before another orphan was “adopted” like Nut, so this was for the best, Ben decided. There was no going back, and this was happening whether he liked it or not. He took a deep breath, shook his head, and composed himself as best as he could. His body shivered involuntarily. What am I supposed to do about it, though?

What he needed was a safe place where he could calmly weigh his next steps. The lamp-lit path to the port was along Melville Road. That was as good as a plan as he could come up with.

A voice reached Ben from afar. An abrupt gust of wind carried a wicked, familiar cackle with it. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. The trees groaned in protest as the air buffeted them. He froze in place, paralyzed by fear.

“FOUND YOU, YOU SLIPPERY WAIF,” the voice boomed. It was Miss Toadwart’s. Ben instinctively trembled, but afraid as he was, he forced himself to snap out of it—he punched his own thighs, and for the second time that night, he broke into a fierce run.

Ben did not go far before encountering a new obstacle. The shadows of the trees in which he had sought refuge started to move with a mind of their own. The ground rattled as they made the same turn he did at Melville Road. The elongated shadow resembled that of a giant worm burrowing underground. It darted past Ben with impressive speed. It coalesced into a single point in front of him, and it threw him off balance as it swept past.

The writhing pool of shadows materialized into Miss Toadwart. She donned her human appearance. Still a lank and ugly hag, minus the claws, fangs, and saliva. Her terrorized expression was now replaced by one of wild glee.

“There you are, Mr. Umber! My, oh my, can little boys run fast,” She eyed him curiously, as if she were seeing him for the first time. Her left eye was made of glass, a malicious glint in the dark. “Didn’t think you had it in ye. Who would’ve thought? A sorcerer runt, right under our noses.”

Ben stood up from the cobblestone street, patting the dirt off his back. A sorcerer runt? He remembered how he had sent Miss Wormwood flying away at St. Dunsany’s without touching her. He hadn’t had time to properly register it. His curiosity peaked; for a brief moment, it even overwhelmed his fear. “Explain yourself,” he demanded.

Miss Toadwart spit, disgust in her face as she droned on. “And to think that we were gonna add you to the brew,” she said, ignoring his question. “You almost ruined our meal, you did. As for sister Wormwood,” a gnarled, wooden staff materialized in her hand. She started to revert back to her witch form. Bones snapped while her body contorted. “Well, let’s just say someone just moved up in the pecking order, eh little bird?”

Shadows emerged from the ground around Miss Toadwart like a mass of tentacles, instantly siccing on Ben. He knew better than to stay and find out what they were capable of. His way to the port was effectively barred, so he dashed in the opposite direction.

Ben came to a full stop. Clap. Clap. Clap. Miss Ratworth waited for him in the corner of Du Maurier and Melville. She clapped her hands with idiotic enthusiasm. She was the very antithesis of Miss Toadwart—where the latter cut a spindly figure, the former was short and plump. Where the one was astute in her cruelty, the other was almost childlike in it.

“Little bird!” Miss Ratworth echoed.

Ben spun. Miss Toadwart closed in; she laughed like a maniac. Between the two of them, caught in their pincer movement, there was no way he could flee. Dread filled every inch of his body as the witches crept ever closer. He stepped away from them without daring to turn his back, as he inched back to the façade of an abandoned building.

It would be a matter of seconds before he stumbled upon the cold bricks comprising its wall. A dead end. “Don’t make this harder on yerself, Mr. Umber.” Miss Toadwart goaded.

Ben took his last remaining step and tripped for a second time that night. Instead of the solidity he expected, he went straight through the building. He landed face-first, the minor whiplash disconcerting him. The world whirled around Ben in a cacophony of colors. He rose, rubbing his head where it hit against the floor.

He found himself in a narrow alleyway that had appeared out of nowhere. Outside the passage, he couldn’t see Melville Road, now replaced by the jutted houses located near the cemetery. He was in another part of Dunport-Salem altogether, and there was no sign of either witch.

Ben sighed in relief. That had been a close one. He knew this was far from over, but he had bought some time, at the very least. How that had happened was another matter altogether.

“Quite the entrance for an urchin, I must admit,” an unfamiliar voice said.

Ben jumped. Next to him, on the ground beside a dustbin filled with garbage, lay a destitute man in ragged clothes. He contentedly forked away at the contents of a tin soup can. He had bushy eyebrows, and his skin was bronzed like a sailor’s; he wore a deerstalker and a ragged frock coat that had seen better days. An unkempt beard speckled with streaks of gray sprouted from his face. In other words, he was a tramp.

The tramp arched an eyebrow as he examined Ben, finding amusement in the unexpected encounter. He offered some of his soup, which he refused with an awkward gesture. “That’s your loss. Anyhow, something I can help you with?”