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Then there was Zila on the other side of the window, ramming her onyx head into the window until the enchantment, and the window, finally shattered.

Without a second thought, Peri threw her satchel out the window, before climbing carefully out it herself. Broken glass scraped against her skin. Her own blood mixed with the Morozjak’s as she crashed to the ground, her body a grotesque painting of gore.

She slumped to the ground outside the cottage, a bloody, panting heap. Slowly, she closed her eyes, as her hand found the earring in her satchel. She pressed it to her chest, letting her tears spill freely. Her other hand she buried in the hellcat’s thick fur. “You’re alright,” she whispered to herself. “You’re alright.”

A sardonic voice cut through the quiet. “When I said the theme was gold, I thought it was obvious that covering yourself in blood would be considered passé.”

She cracked an eye open. Wisteria was sat, her back leaning against the cottage, sipping from a bottle of pixie wine. With a soft, exasperated sigh, Peri closed her eyes again. “It never occurred to you to help me?”

“I’m much too drunk to help anyone,” Wisteria replied, though her voice was suspiciously clear. “You need to comfort your hellcat. Zila nearly tore the place apart trying to get to you.”

Wisteria took another drink. “Nice disguise, by the way. Next time, leave Zila at home and it’ll be a bit more foolproof.”

Peri’s voice came out rough. “Don’t you have your overly extravagant party to attend?”

Wisteria ignored her, staring straight ahead, swigging from the bottle. “So did you kill it?”

“The Morozjak?” Peri hesitated. “I hurt it enough to break the enchantment, but I’m not going to actually kill it if I don’t have to.”

“Oh, fuck off.” Wisteria pinned her with a furious glare.

Peri bristled. “You’d have me murder it?”

Wisteria’s voice softened slightly. “You think you’re the hero here?” Her gaze dropped, a brief flicker of something unreadable crossing her features. “Look, sometimes a little ruthlessness is a mercy. What you’ve done is leave a creature to suffer for days until it eventually dies. Because it will die if you’ve injured it that much. And that is the opposite of mercy.”

“All I did was stop it from killing me.” Peri’s hands clenched into fists. “I’m not a murderer.”

Wisteria shrugged. “Can’t blame it for doing its job.” She nodded at the earring clutched in Peri’s hand. “This was once my aunt’s cottage. She died long ago, but that earring... it was hers to guard. When she died, we found the fiercest thing we could to stay here and guard it.”

Peri’s chest tightened with guilt, and she shut her eyes against the rising wave of nausea.

Wisteria continued, unfazed. “You killed a creature for doing its job, Peri. You’re covered in its blood.” She leaned in, her sapphire eyes glinting maliciously. “I think that makes you the villain.”

“Why are you even here, Wisteria?” Her voice cracked. “Are you here to take the earring from me?”

“No.” Wisteria took a long, leisurely drink from the bottle. “The earring’s yours. You’ve earned it.”

Peri stood wearily, wiping away the last of her tears as she wrapped her other bloody hand around a sword. “So... just chop through that weird orb?”

Wisteria gave her a disdainful nod as she took another long drink.

Now that the enchantment was broken, the door swung limply open. Peri took a tentative step inside to find the Morozjak laying in pools of golden blood, twitching uncontrollably.

She wiped away a stray tear, her stomach turning. Straightening her shoulders, she raised the heavy sword over her head, her grip firm. There was no turning back now.

With a loud crack, she slashed into the weird plant part of the body. Up close she could see black, shrivelled roots dangling from what she assumed was the head. It took long, awful minutes of hacking away before the the creature’s knobby head rolled across the floor, lifeless.

Peri stared down at it, numb. The bloody pulp of a monster. Her own hands, stained now with more than just blood.

She didn’t know how long she stood there, staring at the grotesque creature’s lifeless form; a trophy of horror, its twisted limbs spiked in the air like a forest of death. So many times she’d promised herself that she’d do anything to find this accursed piece of jewellery, she’d just never thought that the cost would be taking a life from another.

The truth hung in the stillness, the weight of it pressing on her chest. She’d hesitated, sure. But in the end, she’d killed it all the same.

“Alright, weepy bones!” Wisteria’s voice rang out from the open doorway of the cottage. “Let’s go. You need to get cleaned up, and I’m finally drunk enough to go to my own party.”

“Fine,” Peri sighed, wiping either blood or tears from her face. “I’m coming.”

She called the blades back into her outfit, watching as they flickered and shimmered until, one by one, they merged into soft fabric once more.