By Monica Goertzen Hertlein

Meta paused in the knee-high scrub brush and stinkweed, beyond the firelight in front of the bandits’ cave. Three of them stood around their campfire, hands stretched to its warmth. They would be night blind if they turned to face the moonless dark of the surrounding badlands, though she would still be foolish to move too quickly. Even these with their slurred cursing and drunken laughter would hear if she startled a fox or stumbled and fell as she approached.

She tugged her well-mended cloak tighter around her shoulders with calloused hands, making certain no cleavage showed. She was old enough to be a mother to most of the cutthroats, but men like these had few scruples.

Usually she avoided such customers, but it had been another severe winter, another cold, rainy summer. Half the crop would go to next year’s seed, with barely enough to eat. They had been forced to sell the cow last spring.

Once, her magic had been in high demand with powerful nobles, even royalty. Her special skill had been a vanishing spell. Perfumed ladies and gentlemen with powdered wigs and fur collars had gasped and applauded. Those who thought themselves clever tried to discover her talisman. Rival witches tried to emulate the spell. Back then she performed magic for people who — for the most part — bargained in good faith and paid well. She could expect a hearty meal and good wine in addition to money as payment. Her children had been healthy.

Now, her daughter’s milk had dried up and the baby would starve. No one paid to see an old witch vanish. Younger, more beautiful witches performed spells with music and glitter and fire. Not even dockside taverns paid Meta for her magic displays.

She was forced to sell enchantments to those who passed by on the weedy footpaths around her farm because she was too old to walk to the town market. And passers-by in this arid wasteland had reason to avoid busy roads. Instead of charms, they wanted curses. And as often as not paid you with cold steel and an unmarked grave instead of the promised coin.

The leader of this gang had offered Meta a bag of silver in exchange for her enchantment. A difficult enchantment, and she was not so strong anymore. Her stomach had cramped with bile as she conjured it. Her fingers had near frozen holding it. A copy of the talisman that made her invisible. Or rather, unnoticed. The bearer would pass unremarked at any time of day, in any place. What these men chose to use such an enchantment for, well, that was not her concern.

***

“And then the dirty whore has the nerve to demand payment, as if I’m going to pay for a fuck that lousy.” Lem had left the bitch bruised and bleeding.

His second-in-command chuckled. “Bet you showed her.”

“Damn right.” Lem leaned over from his seat on the upturned barrel to pick up a flagon teetering on the rocky sand. He downed a deep swallow, coughed at the burn, and wiped his bristly chin with the sleeve of his woollen tunic.

He passed the flagon to Balin and was about to continue his tale when he noticed a woman standing at the entrance, face ghostly in the rushlight that illuminated the cave. He nearly jumped. She had not been there a moment ago. None of the fools standing sentry at the campfire had raised an alarm.

His gaze slid sideways, making sure his second-in-command had not seen him startle.

Balin must have noticed, though, because his head swivelled toward the old woman, one hand dropping to the knife hidden beneath his tunic. He looked from her to Lem.

“What do you want?” asked Lem, good and loud to prove this old woman had not unnerved him with her sudden appearance.

“I’m here to deliver my wares. I trust you have the agreed payment?”

Lem smiled and invited the sorceress further into the cave with a wave of his hand. “Of course. Join us.” Once he had that enchantment, Balin would provide payment in steel. With the blade of his knife.

The old woman remained where she was. “Payment first.”

Lem’s welcoming smile faded. Stubborn old cunt. “The money’s in this bag.” He pointed to a leather pouch atop a chest beside him. “But where are the goods?”

“Right there, of course.” The woman nodded her chin toward his boots.

A multi-coloured stone lay on the sand at Lem’s feet, its edges frosted though it was warm inside the cave. Had the stone been there earlier?

“Have you ever thought,” said the woman, “how easy it is to overlook things? A stranger you pass in the street and forget. An object that is in the same place every day so you stop noticing it. This talisman will not make you invisible. It merely suggests to others there is nothing to see, and to forget they saw anything at all.”

The bandit leader nodded in understanding and then Lem smiled. He clapped his lieutenant on the shoulder and said, “give her the payment.”

But when Balin withdrew his knife, the woman and bag of money were gone.

About the Author