Gretel comes with me when I head back for more pieces of the house. She grabs my arm as the fire catches and slips through the grate.
“Hansel,” she says, her voice gentle. “Maybe we shouldn’t?—”
“We’re going,” I snap, then take a deep breath and look her in the eyes. “We’re going, Gretel. I’m burning this place to the ground, and then we’re leaving.”
“That’s not going to be enough.”
I stop dead in the middle of the rug, my arms full of panels from the walls. The cottage is old enough, and it’s been sitting here long enough, that pieces are coming away in my hands almost as easily as the shutters.
“What do you mean, it’s not going to be enough? This place won’t exist. We—we replaced her. We replaced what happened with what we did. There’s nothing left but to get rid of it. The memories though… what she did to you… what she did to you was?—”
“Me?” Gretel has tears in her eyes. Her chin, which she’d stuck out so bravely, wobbles. “I can’t stand to see what she did to you.”
“Gretel.” I bend down and kiss her temple, then her cheek. “The worst part about that night was seeing you cry. I would have survived anything she threw at me to be able to take you home, and it was—God. You screaming for me like that—nothing could be worse. Do you understand? Nothing. I can’t let her do that to you again.”
“She tortured you,” Gretel argues, her voice breathless. She clears her throat. The fire rages behind her in the bedroom. Our time is running out. “She tortured you, Hansel. Why do you think I’m willing to let her live? I’m not going to let her—let her taunt me. She can’t spend the rest of her life trying to scare me into anything. We have to kill her. Or I have to kill her. She has to be dead. That witch can’t exist in the same world as us anymore. I can’t take it.”
“I love you, Gret. I always have.”
Shock shows in her widened eyes and for a moment it’s like I cut her deep. Or like I kissed her for the first time. The sound is so packed with emotion that I can’t decide what it means.
Gretel wouldn’t have let me touch her if she didn’t feel just as strongly. If she didn’t trust me with every part of her.
She cares about me so much that she wants me out of here, just so being within these walls doesn’t cause me any more pain. The fire cracks in the other room and it catches both of our attention.
“If we’re going to leave, then we should leave now.”
It’s not enough though. Not enough to burn every last scrap in this nightmare. I stalk past Gretel and drop the next pile onto the flames.
There’s still no sign of the witch and I’m convinced as I toss the dishes in the flames that it is the house. This cottage is damned with baneful magic.
I wasn’t strong enough when I was younger. I’m strong enough now. I’ve pushed all my anger deep down inside and saved it up so it could become strength.
“We can pretend,” she insists. “We don’t have to think about this place anymore, whether its here or not. When we go back home?—”
“I’m not going back home while this cottage is still standing.”
Gretel’s huge eyes follow me as I go for another round. “Hansel, please. We can go right now. We can—we can talk. We can regroup. We need to make a plan to find her and kill her, and then?—”
“This first.”
“She could be coming for us right now.”
“And?” Ripping the house apart feels like it’s meant to be. Like I have to do it. It’s a release I didn’t know I needed until it was happening. “She could have come for us any time, if that’s true.”
“You really think she’s dead?” she questions and I do. In the depths of my soul I know we banished her from existence. Whatever this is, this magic, it’s something else.
“I know she’s dead! I killed her. We killed her. We put her in the oven and burned the body. I know she’s dead. I know she’s gone. And now her house will be gone, too.”
Gretel presses her lips together, silencing her protest and hurries for the table. She stacks the remaining plates and bowls into her arms and carries them into the bedroom, then dumps it all on the fire.
“Thought you said we had to leave,” I say as she rushes back across the cottage.
“I’m not leaving without you. And if you really mean it?—”
“I do really mean it. God, Gret, why else would I have come here? I want you to stop thinking about that night. It’s never coming back.”
“If you mean it,” Gretel says, louder. “Then I’m helping you, because I don’t think we have time.”
