CW: This chapter contains references to assassination. 

In the Witch's Town

It took a bit of time to get herself medicated and bandaged to the Witch's liking, with Doren helping and glowering at her the entire time. By then, Valla had cleared her mind and fully remembered the moments after Doren and the Witch had arrived.

"The Town Hall," she said, then stopped, head empty of words. It seemed she still wasn't fully coherent. But the Witch understood well enough.

"They need time before I arrive. I need them to be ready to hear what I have to say. I've been gone too long for them to understand without thinking it through themselves before I remind them of our covenant."

Valla nodded. She was so tired. But it was time to leave. She looked around for Doren, only to see him leaving the room. "Where are you going?"

He stopped and turned around, looking at her pointedly. She laughed, trying to cover her embarrassment at her own lack of focus. Was she truly this weak? Or was she just so comfortable in the Witch's protection that she had relaxed too much? "Ah, right. You need shoes. And clothes."

Doren smiled and turned back up the stairs, startling her slightly. It was the first smile she'd seen on him, albeit a small and sarcastic one.

"The game you are playing will be painful, Child." The Witch spoke casually, sitting heavily beside Valla. "Your enemy will easily destroy you both. Binding him in an oath will not change things."

Valla sighed. "You misunderstand." She took another breath to explain but found she did not know how. It had been such a liberating plan, but to speak of it to the Witch, who had once pieced her broken body and soul back together, it felt foolish and embarrassing. The Witch was quiet, waiting.

"I have chosen vengeance, yes. But he won't fight with me." Valla swallowed. "He will kill me if I fail."

Silence except for the sounds of some stragglers being herded toward the Hall outside.

"And if you don't fail?"

"Then you know as well as I do that I'll be dead soon after. My injury is worsening, and even you can’t stop it." Valla felt a rush of defiance. "This is how I've chosen to fight. I cannot stay here and fade away when I don't know what was taken from me, or who took it. And you know I will almost certainly fail. So I hired him as an assassin. Doren has sworn to kill me before my enemy can."

The Witch was still. "You could live and take your honor in that. In living when your enemy meant to kill you." A heavy pause. "Even if it is not here."

"I tried. I can't." Valla felt, for the first time she could remember, as though she would cry. Rejecting the Witch's kindness felt like blasphemy, and yet the Witch still met her rejection with gentle council. "I am fading, and I don't know why. I don't know who I might have lost. I don't know who or what I was fighting before I forgot everything. How can I call this living?"

As she spoke, the air chilled. The Witch was not happy. Valla wanted desperately to explain, to make her friend and savior understand why she had to abandon the haven she'd been offered. But she knew it was futile. The Witch was bound to the valley in her soul, lived in peace in obscurity, and fought for freedom by maintaining the security of her home. Retreat from the world was her victory. This was not uncommon for Witches, and many had lost in their battles for safety and peace, finding themselves bound to human lords and cities against their preference. Those who chose to fight usually did so because they had no option for peace. Valla's friend was not one to fight to the death when there was still life to be preserved. She was no coward. She simply did not understand why any moment of life and peace should be wasted. And Valla could no longer bear to remain stagnant. There could be no true peace for her here, and she had realized that with absolute clarity when the assassin sat across from her in this tavern the night before. There could be no understanding between her and her old friend now. Their paths were diverging.

The Witch looked at her then, her face blank, devoid of the kindness Valla had known from her. "Then go." It was clear that there would be no returning.

Valla met her eyes steadily, then bowed her head in respect. "Thank you for my name and for offering me a home." The ice that had fallen over the tavern hall did not ease, but it ceased worsening. It was a devastating thought that she could have lost her memories of this place, and of the Witch's care, and not just because it would leave Valla with nothing. They were something very precious. As they sat, Valla noticed the pain recede somewhat. A last gift from her friend.

They sat in silence then, until Doren returned dressed as he had been the previous evening. Valla was faintly surprised when he didn't hesitate to walk in despite the magic-laced tension in the room. She knew he could sense it as well as she could – probably better, considering the state of her at the moment. Brave soul to walk into a room with an unhappy Witch. He stopped in front of them, then bowed to the Witch, who relaxed somewhat and nodded once, sharply.

"I give you both my blessing. You will not forget your time here when you leave. Never speak of this place, and do not return." With that, the tavern warmed, and the Witch stood and left without a backward glance. Valla let out a soft, shuddering sigh.

Looking at Valla, Doren hesitated a moment. She smiled at him radiantly. "Time to go, new friend!" This earned her a dubious stare.

"Are you able? And where are your things?"

"Ah, right! Best we stop at my room before we leave, then," Valla chirped, ignoring the strangely shiny quality of the light now streaming in through the windows and the blurriness in her peripheral vision and heaving herself off the bench. Proud not to stumble outright, she started quickly, if a bit less gracefully than she usually would have, for the stairs. Gritting her teeth, she strode up them, striving to keep her momentum. She forgot this goal in a rush of panic. "Wait!" She stopped halfway up the stairwell, Doren barely avoiding a collision by stepping back onto the step behind him as she whirled around. "Do you want a contract? Written? Or should we agree on an oath?" She felt somehow both too hot and too cold, the lights and shadows swirling together oddly as she focused on his face.

"I already swore. I accept your terms: payment first. A two year limit, and my job is to kill you before your enemy can if that is needed. I won't be your bodyguard, but I will follow you for that time." Hearing the terms she'd so recklessly thrown together herself, Valla felt a bit hollow. It really was a foolish plan. It had made much more sense before.  It was bizarre that Doren was agreeing at all, although at least her mental and physical weakness - humiliating as it was - was likely convincing him that she wasn't some powerful trickster. Probably seemed like a good deal, now, since she had proven she was just as likely to rush headfirst into a pointless death as anything else. Doren most likely didn't even have to worry about who her enemy might be since it would be frankly miraculous for Valla to even come close to discovering and confronting them. She noticed then that he was staring at her a bit too intently, as though waiting for something. She stared back for a few moments before she realized she had been silent for too long, and that it would make a good deal of sense for her to respond with words of some kind. None came to mind, her thoughts oddly floaty and thin.

"Yes, alright then. Good. Payment first." Doren's hand was suddenly clasped around her more uninjured shoulder. "What?" Valla asked, a bit belligerently, forgetting to be cheerful. Then she looked down and realized she was leaning quite far forward, enough that she had been about to topple over onto him. "Oh."