The Mantis Corruption - Book Three - 6. Chapter 6 - Tisa & the Witch, Part Two

In the hut beside Liovia’s hollow, Tisa awoke with a start. She sat bolt upright and listened. The forest was silent. She did not know what she heard, but something had made a brief horrible noise.

Tisa pulled on her trousers and a fresh shirt, and she headed outside. Not a sound came from anything around her. Even the breeze seemed to have vanished.

“Liovia?” Tisa called out to the witch. “Did you hear something?” Tisa was half-asleep, and she yawned and stretched. There was no reply, and she stuck her head in the muddy hole beneath the tree, but the witch was not inside.

“Liovia!” Tisa called, but in the silence of the forest, she restrained her voice from being too loud.

Again, she received no answer. Tisa thought she was going to need to search the nearby woods, but the witch was just on the other side of her tree.

She was in a state that Tisa had never witnessed.

Liovia was in a seated position, but she was floating above the ground. Her wings were spread wide, although they did not seem to have anything to do with her levitation. The witch was in a trance, and her hair was waving in all directions as if she was underwater. There was still no breeze, yet her locks continued to flow.

“Liovia?” Tisa whispered. She stepped closer to the witch, and the woman spoke in syllables that Tisa could not decipher.

“Imalu akaa mu sooli om cala.”

“I don’t know what that means,” Tisa replied when the witch stopped speaking.

Liovia then repeated herself with only a slight variation.

“Imalu akaa mu sooli om alau.”

“What are you saying?”

Tisa was used to the witch’s tendency to talk about the future as if it were happening in the moment, but she never heard her speak in another language, and the hovering was new.

“Ommu sha triilii ah oh um.”

Tisa was at a loss. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do,” she said, more to herself than the witch.

“Mistal ooi,” Liovia concluded. Her seated position lowered and returned to the earth. She opened her eyes, and the witch told Tisa, “We must hurry.”

“What was all that? I’ve never seen you do that, and hurry where? Liovia!”

The witch stood, turned, and headed south along the river. “It was a protective premonition,” she said as Tisa followed. “I don’t often need to look into my own future, because it is always clear to me. Only in moments that lack clarity, does it necessitate me tapping into a deeper region of my sight,” she explained.

Then the witch declared, “We need to find the girl, and we need to find the boy. A monster is approaching. It is not far.”

Tisa paused. “Is that what you were saying? What boy and what girl?”

“The four of us need to leave now,” the witch replied.

“Four?” Tisa asked.

Liovia stopped, stared at Tisa, and she said, “Four of us, four days, we need supplies. We leave as soon as I return.”

Tisa was confused. “You want me to pack?”

The witch left her standing among the trees.

“Alright,” Tisa said to herself, “four days’ worth of supplies for four people.” She did not know what the witch knew, but she did know to take the witch’s words seriously, even when they did not make much sense.

Less than an hour later, Liovia returned with two young teenagers. The boy and the girl looked confused and afraid.

Tisa approached them the way she did on the rare occasion when someone came seeking knowledge of their future from the witch. “Welcome to the hollow,” she said in a bright voice. Only adults ever came to visit the witch, and the youths were the youngest people Tisa had seen in years. “Do you two need some advice?” she asked.

“We need to leave,” Liovia stated.

“It’s after us,” the girl said.

“I don’t want it to get us,” added the boy.

Tisa furrowed her brow. “What is going on?!”

“An eater of spirits is coming.”

Tisa’s blood went cold. “I didn’t think that was what you meant. Coming here? There hasn’t been one in years!”

“It wants us,” Liovia replied, “or the children.”

“Let’s go then,” Tisa said, unsure where they were headed.

As the witch led them away, Tisa asked her, “How did you convince the children to come with you? Do their parents know?”

“Their parents’ knowledge is inconsequential,” Liovia replied. “I showed the children, let them see their future if they chose not to follow me.”

“What do you mean? I thought you just informed people of their future. You can actually show them?”

Liovia sighed and took a deep breath. “I learned in the beginning that showing the future always negated it for the viewer. However, if I tell vague possibilities about a future, it remains possible.”

Tisa was amazed at all she was learning that day about the woman with whom she had spent so much of her life. The witch was always a mystery, but this revelation was astounding to Tisa; Liovia was so much more than a fortuneteller.

“How are we going to keep the monster from finding us?” Tisa asked.

“It will search the village for a single day,” Liovia replied, “and then it will travel south until it finds what it seeks.”

“So, we only have to stay away until it’s gone?”

“It will leave the village unsatisfied.”

“Good,” Tisa replied, “well, then, lead the way, I guess.”

The four began to head into the thicker forest that grew on the foothills of the northern mountains, and through that rugged terrain, they hiked for three long days.

On their third evening, the witch informed Tisa and the two youths, “It has begun to travel south. We must remain another day, and then we can return.”

They ceased their seemingly aimless hiking and rested for the entire following day. On the fifth morning, the group of four made their way out of the forest and back down to Kestapoli, but the villagers were in an uproar before they arrived.

Three people were dead✪