Magic Tales: Sea and Snow

(From Witch to Lady)

It was a spine chilling, teeth clenching, mind numbing grinding sound. And it was coming from the ground. Spider-web-like cracks appeared all around Amy and the boy. The ground rippled and rolled like it was a humongous blanket that a giant was shaking all the dirt out of.

"What's happening?!!" The boy squeaked in a terified. Just managing to stay upright on the uneven, shifting ground.

"It must be an earthquake!" Amy shouted in a scared voice. She was having an equally hard time keeping her balance on the unstable forest floor.

But the ever quick to assume stuff boy, came to his own conclusion. "It must be magic! Very powerful, very dark magic!" 

"At least he's not blaming me for this." Amy thought, just slightly relieved. I mean you wouldn't expect her to fully relax with an earthquake going on.

And then just as suddenly as the earthquake had started it stopped.

It was completely silent once the terrible grinding sound stopped. Not even a bird chirped. Everything stood still, like the world was in shock. No leaf moved, no wind whispered. It was so quiet and still that for a moment Amy thought she had dreamed up the whole thing.

"Maybe I had just dozed off while reading my book and just imagined going into the fairy tale world. Maybe the rude boy and frightening earthquake were just figments of my imagination." Amy half hoped for this to be true.

But no, the ground was still cracked and the boy was sprawled on his back. Apparently he had dropped his knife sometime between when the world started to split at its seams and tear into a million pieces, and when it stopped. For it was lying several feet in front of where he was laying. The knife's normal looking metal blade was stabbed deep into the hard heat baked ground.

Amy carefully picked her way through the debris and towards the now standing boy. She stopped only to grab the handle of the hunting knife. She tugged it out with a grunt, it was sunk into the ground farther than she had first thought. 

Amy was surprised at how beautifully the weapon was crafted. It had an elegant vine and leaf pattern etched into the blade. And it felt perfectly balanced in her untrained hand.

"I wonder if a dwarf made it." She mused. "From what I've read they are very skillful in metal work."

Her thoughts were interrupted when her foot slipped into a crack, making her stumble. Amy lurched forward trying to regain her balance. But she was unable to!

She would have landed very painfully... on her face. If not for a certain kid in shining. (It was actually very dusty and dirty.) Armor (again actually hunting garb.)

Amy was so surprised that he was helping her that she followed along behind him like a cow or some other dumb farm animal when he led her over to a fallen tree. They plopped down on the log with enough space for a car to pass between them.

The two dusty children sat there for a few moments in awkward silence before Amy decided to speak. "So, do you still think I'm a witch?"

The boy's face went supernova when he answered. "No, I do not."

"Why not?" Amy asked, genuinely curious.

"Well, in the first place why would a witch disguise herself as a young girl?" He answered, face still red.

Amy gave him a look that said a thousand words. A few of them being, "Why in the world did you not think of these things BEFORE pointing a knife at me."

He either didn't see her look, or pretended not to. "And then I thought that if you really were a witch you would be able to strike me dead no matter what I did." (If you didn't know, most witches are evil. And if you meet one they will most likely either kill you, curse you, or eat you.)