I started, staring at her as she retrieved her weapons and sheathed them. “You would aid me?”
“Yes. I saw the bounty on the boy appear in Ambrosia’s mirror. It likely went out to many others, so Ambrosia isn’t the only witch who will respond to the summons.”
“But who sent it out?”
“Any number of ambitious witches. Many have grown mad over the years, or desperate. But someone like that doesn’t stay in the shadows for long.” She straightened. “If you fight as terribly as you appear to, you’ll need me to help keep your enemies at bay.”
I couldn’t argue with her there. But could I trust her? “I’m Callum.”
“Freya,” she said. “And no, I’m not known as The Butcher of Wayward Souls. She was bluffing.” She tilted her head. “Although, it’s a rather intimidating title. I could adopt it.” Her face melted into a grimace. “But that would be giving her too much credit. As good as I am with a sword, I’d rather not be referred to as a butcher, when there are clearly much worse things out there than me.” She hesitated. “I rather need the extra arms to give me an advantage.”
“It’s quite the advantage,” I noted.
She nodded stiffly.
“Well, it’s nice to make your acquaintance, Freya. I appreciate your offer of aid. This is proving to be a much more … troublesome task than I was led to believe.”
Freya frowned. “You don’t say. Well, I for one am glad it brought you this way. If not for your intervention, I would still be in her power.”
We walked slowly to Ambrosia’s prone form and stared down at her. One of the foxes was so rotted through that half its skull was showing. A mound of dead flies filled her open mouth.
“Shall I kill her, or would you like that honor?” I asked Freya.
Freya’s head jerked up in alarm. “Kill her?! Gods, no, you can’t do that. She controls the dead. If you destroy her physical body, who knows if she will have an even greater reach as a spirit?”
I considered. Ambrosia’s powers seemed to have dissipated with her consciousness. It stood to reason that they would die completely with her body. However, what if those powers were tied to her soul? Would she be able to control the dead without the limitations of the physical world? Necromancers had died before. There had to be a way to safely dispose of them if their physical deaths didn’t mean their ultimate end, or the world would be in their control. Perhaps that was a problem for the Council of Witches. Their job was to maintain a balance to the magical world, after all. Surely they had a way to control creatures like Ambrosia and had safety measures in place, should a necromancer die and try to overreach.
“Very well,” I said, tearing my eyes from Ambrosia. “You have more cause to see her dead than me.”
Freya inclined her head in acknowledgment.
I turned my attention to the pile of bones at Ambrosia’s back that had once been a horse, my eyes searching out Auggie amid the ribs and femurs and vertebrae. He lay peacefully, looking as if asleep, hair tousled adorably. His ankle worried me though. It wasn’t bleeding any longer, but black oozed from the wound yet, like tar, like some decay Ambrosia had poisoned him with.
“He suffered a blow to the back of the head,” Freya supplied, sounding apologetic. “He’ll likely be out for another few hours yet.”
A muscle twitched in my jaw, despite myself. I had dragged hundreds of souls to Hell, but I couldn’t even protect a single boy. I could remember and recite, but the one time I didn’t have a full pod’s worth of energy left, I couldn’t think of a single spell efficient enough to cast. My magic was useless if I couldn’t use it to save my own life. If only I had my parents’ heads for it, Auggie wouldn’t have been touched by that foul witch. “Enough time to see him to safety, I hope. I know someone who can assess his injuries as well, if it comes to that.” I glanced uneasily at Ambrosia. “Of course, we have no idea how long she will be out.”
“Oh, we’ll be long gone before she awakens,” Freya assured me, offering the first genuine smile I’d seen from her. It brightened her green, and potentially rotting, face significantly. “Ambrosia could use my body and wield me like a weapon, but she couldn’t force me to use my powers. I was more like a marionette in her hands.”
“Ah. And just what are your powers?”
“I am a rune master,” Freya announced proudly. “I use the ancient language to command matter. Give me but a moment, and I’ll teleport us well out of this horrid witch’s reach.”
I perked up. “Oh? Can you teleport us to America?”
Freya hesitated. “I’m afraid not. I have to have been to the place. The closest I could get you is Greenland. I need to picture it as I open the portal. It’s not like the permanent runes you have in your potion shop for teleportation.”
“You’ve heard of my shop?”
Freya grinned. “Of course I have. Best potion shop east of London. I was going there for years before Ambrosia got her hands on me.”
I smirked down at Narcissa, who had weaved her way between my legs. “You hear that? Best potion shop east of London.”
Narcissa mewed, the sound somehow conveying disbelief. But even my unpleasable familiar wasn’t going to dampen my spirits. I liked this Freya.
“How about Bristol then?” I asked. “We were headed there to secure passage on a ship, and there’s a healer I trust just north of town.”
“A ship,” Freya’s face twisted in a grimace. “How quaint.”
