Hexed

the mountains.
    » Only one family in my care failed to make it out of France. I picked them up outside Pau, and we were to take the Somport Pass over the Pyrenees. The father was a kind man who doted on his children, a scientist of some kind, but I couldn’t tell you their names even if I wished. So much of the work was an anonymous business, for everyone’s safety. « I paused to take a sip of my hot chocolate, which had cooled somewhat, and Berta watched me impatiently.
    » They were a fairly young couple with three children: a boy of ten, a girl of eight, and another boy of five. The boys had little suits on—their best—and the girl had a gray wool coat buttoned over a red dress. The mother was dressed in similar fashion, with a heavy coat worn over a dress. The father carried a briefcase of papers and photos, and the family had nothing more than the clothes on their backs. The father—well, there were traces of magic in his aura that I didn’t take the trouble to examine, but now I see that he was a Kabbalist, and his wards were sufficient, as were mine, to deflect this necrotic spell of the hexen—Gewebetod, ja? «
    » Ja, « Malina nodded. » That is the word they use. «
    » Six witches ambushed us in the night before we were even halfway to the Somport Pass—one witch for each member of our party, which led me to believe we’d been betrayed somehow. The mother and three children fell immediately, clutching their chests as they landed in the leaves of autumn. I fell down too, because I had felt the strike upon my wards, and I expected a grenade or a spray of machine gun fire next. I cast camouflage on myself once I hit the ground, then crawled as quietly as I could away from where I had fallen.
    » Whatever noise I made was masked well. The father was the only one left standing, but he was screaming the names of his wife and children, then crouching over them and trying to revive them as I headed for cover. «
    » His Kabbalistic wards shielded him. « Berta narrowed her eyes and nodded knowingly.
    » Correct. But I did not know this at the time. I never heard him utter a spell, I’d never bothered to check his aura closely, and so while I suspected he must be special somehow—why else would we be singled out for such attention?—he could have just as easily been politically important, rather than magically. In any event, he was too carried away with his grief to respond to the attack. I do not know why his family had no protection—perhaps his abilities were a secret even from them; perhaps they would not have approved. I simply do not know.
    » The question of his power, however, was quickly rendered moot. Six figures leached out of the surrounding forest, darker shapes hovering in the darkness, and they poured bullets into him out of handguns fitted with silencers. He fell dead on top of his wife, and when the figures ran out of bullets, they reloaded and shot his still corpse again and again, many times in the head and in the chest, so that the body was so unsuitable, he could not possibly recover by any kind of sorcery.
    » They even stood and watched the corpse for a while, to make sure no healing began, and all that time I remained silent and unmoving, perhaps nine or ten meters away, next to a tree. There was nothing I could do for any of the family at that point. I had no defense against bullets besides the ability to heal, and these figures had already demonstrated what they would do if they suspected I could; and, beyond that, I was armed with nothing but my sword. I also had no idea who or what the assassins were, besides witches of some kind. Given the setting, I assumed they were some secret squad of Himmler’s who’d been sent after this particular man.
    » Eventually one of them noticed I wasn’t there. ‘Gab es nicht sechs von ihnen? Ich zähle nur fünf Körper,’ she said. «
    »Scheisse! « Berta cursed in German. » What did they do then? «
    » Wait a moment, Atticus, « Hal interjected. » I don’t speak German. What was that you just said? «
    » Weren’t there six of them? I count only five bodies. «
    » Oh, shit, « Hal said, and grabbed a bowl of popcorn out of Bogumila’s lap. Her visible eye widened comically, but otherwise she made no protest. » What happened next? « he asked, throwing a handful in his mouth.
    » They chose one of the witches to stay behind and watch the dead Kabbalist for miraculous healing, while the other five spread out looking for