#leta is 14

Leta had heard one of the guards complaining about witches attacking the farms and houses outside the town wall. Was this witch here because of that? Was she part of a group infiltrating the town? Were they going to- to-

Leta didn’t even know what they might do. There were just too many ways this could go horribly, horribly wrong. 

The witch turned her focus on Leta’s cell door. She did… something. Pulled something out of a pocket somewhere, and held it against the door. The lock whirred and clicked open.

These cells were supposed to keep townsfolk safe from mages. That was why Leta was locked in here in the first place. What good were they if a witch could just stroll in and open any door she pleased?

The witch pushed the door open and walked inside. The flames in her hand lit the cell with a flickering glow. Somehow it looked even worse in the firelight than it ever did when lit by a guard’s lantern.

She didn’t stop. She just kept coming, and there was nowhere for Leta to go. She was already pressed as far into the cell wall as she could physically go, the stone leeching precious heat from her body as it dug painfully into her. Leta couldn’t help but make a high, pathetic noise as the witch kept coming closer. 

She was shivering. She had thought herself too cold to muster the energy for such movement any longer. Apparently the witch with her handful of flames sparked something in Leta, uncovered some reserve of energy that the cold hadn’t yet stolen from her.

The witch crouched down when she was barely more than an arm’s length away. She tilted her head to one side, eyes raking up and down Leta’s form.

“Hello,” she said. Her voice was low and comforting, like the crackle of a hearth-fire. “My name is Velissa. What’s yours?”

Leta shook her head, eyes never leaving the witch’s—Velissa’s—face. 

“How long have you been in here?” Velissa asked.

Leta just shook her head again. She honestly didn’t know. Everything was so hard to keep track of, down in the dark, in the cold. 

Velissa sighed softly, and Leta tried not to flinch. She failed. The witch massaged her forehead with the knuckles of the hand not occupied by fire.

“Do you want to get out of here?” she asked. 

Leta had to bite her lip at that. She did; she wanted that more than almost anything. But with a witch?

Go, something deep in her chest urged her. It was the same place that had always held a certain warmth before the cell. Trust, and go. 

The near-numb emptiness she’d grown used to feeling there was gone, replaced by a shivery, tentative warmth. It was nothing like what had been there before. Before, it had felt like the warmth of sitting near a fire on a cold night: comforting and safe. Now? It felt more like a tiny candle flame on a dark and stormy night: one last hope in the face of all the odds.

Was that her magic? If it was, could she even trust it? Magic was dangerous. Everyone knew that. It was dangerous and wild and anyone who used it was likely to get eaten alive by it. If this connection that she felt, this impossible urge to agree with the witch, was from her magic, then surely it couldn’t be trusted. 

“Come on,” Velissa said, voice more urgent now. “You have to know what they’re going to do to you if you stay put. Do you really want that? Are you really going to turn down a chance at safety? At freedom?”

Leta bit her lip hard, trying to stay silent even as tears welled up in her eyes. She couldn’t. There was no way the witch was really going to save her. Not a town-girl like her. Why would she bother? This had to be a trick, a trap, something other than what it seemed. 

But if she didn’t… 

Leta knew the options that awaited her if she stayed. All of them ended with her death; the only differences were in the method, and how long she would suffer before the end came. Was that really better? 

Which should she choose: the certainty, or the unknown?

If she were a stronger person, she would stay. Would do as she knew she should, and not put her trust in a witch.

But Leta wasn’t strong. Leta was tired, and scared, and so very cold. 

“Please,” she said, voice weak and rough from disuse. 

“Please get me out.”

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