The Good Witch of Hawthorne

Summary: Marigold is a good witch. However, when her dark past rises, her reputation is put at risk.

Marigold Fletcher is a good witch.

“No, not a good witch,” she tries to explain to the knight on her doorstep. She pinches the bridge of her nose. “I mean good in the sense that I excel in my craft. Morally, I’m more gray.”

“Oh, good,” the man says. He puts the hat he’d been wringing in his hands back on his head. The leather pops back into shape and the desperation he’d been wearing like a cloak melts away. He looks ten years younger when he smiles. “I can drop the act then.”

Marigold gapes. “You were lying? To a witch?”

“I’m a knight,” the man says with a shrug. “We aren’t known for being smart.” He nods towards her living room. “Do you mind if I come in, or…?”

Wordlessly, Marigold lets him duck past her. He finds his way into her living room with prompting and sighs when he sits on her couch.

“Sorry,” he says, tipping his head back against the backrest. “It was tough getting here. I had to climb three separate mountains and fight off at least a dozen griffins. And you were the easiest witch to find, believe it or not.”

Marigold believes it. Most witches are nomadic. Those who put down roots, like her, usually do so in the most inhospitable places. Marigold is lazier than her brethren. She doesn’t live too deep in a forest, though she does live so high on her mountain that the air is a little too thin for most human’s comfort.

“You didn’t give me your name,” she says. She shuts her door and picks a seat in an armchair across from the knight, right by the fireplace. If this turns out to be an elaborate plan to dig out her heart, she’ll throw him into the flames head first. “Awfully rude of a guest.”

“Alas,” the man says gallantly, “I can not give you my name.” He winks at her. “But you may call me Jax.”

Rather than be charmed, Marigold is irritated. “I’m not fae, idiot. I can’t take your name even if you said you were giving it to me.”

Jax continues smiling at her and says nothing.

Marigold pinches the bridge of her nose again. “What do you want? If it’s not my blessing for you to save the princess or whatever your story was?”

“A fair blessing to ease my travels on the way to save the princess from the dragon,” Jax recites. He waves a hand in the air. “For the good of the kingdom, peace of mind of the people, saving a grieving father and rescuing the damsel in distress…yada yada yada.”

“Right,” Marigold says flatly.

“I did come here in hopes of receiving your blessing,” Jax says. He scratches the back of his neck. “Just not to save the princess. I’m here on behalf of the princess, actually.”

Marigold frowns. “Is she not kidnapped by a dragon right now?”

“Technically not,” Jax hedges. He sighs when Marigold glares. “Look, I’m trying to ease you into this, okay? We really do need your help and you won’t want to help if I shock you.”

“Try me.”

“The dragon is the princess’ girlfriend,” Jax says, leaning forward.  “Yes, the thirty foot tall dragon is the princess’ girlfriend, yes, the dragon is sentient, yes, the princess is sure. They’d very much appreciate your help turning the dragon into a human so they can run away from the princess’ tyrannical father and live happily ever after.”

The silence that follows after his outburst is very, very loud.

Jax pulls a flask out of his coat. “Take your time processing. Gods know I needed it.” He takes a swig.

Marigold opens her mouth. Closes it. Opens it again. “No, I, uh, that’s…” She clears her throat. “A princess and a dragon? Really?”

“Thank you!” Jax points at Marigold. “That’s the right reaction to have! You know what the prince said? He said ‘As long as my sister is happy.’ And the Queen? She named the dragon! As her new daughter-in-law she was aggrieved that it didn’t have a name so she named. The. Dragon.”

Marigold stares. “Dragons don’t have names.”

“Her name is Elisa,” Jax says. He presses a hand to his cheek and bats his eyelashes. “To rhyme with Princess Alicia. Elisa and Alicia.”

“Oh,” Marigold says faintly. She’s never heard of a dragon accepting a name before. While she herself isn’t fae, the line is a little blurry between fae and dragon. “Oh my.”

“I know it’s my fault,” Jax says. He looks mournfully at his flask and then takes another little sip. “It really is. I was supposed to be guarding the princess. If she hadn’t gotten kidnapped by the dragon, she wouldn’t have fallen in love with it.”

“Her,” Marigold corrects automatically.

Jax blinks at her. “What?”

“The dragon is a her,” Marigold says. She feels a headache coming on. “Yes, it’s unusual, but if she’s accepted a name…”

“You’re right,” Jax says. He laughs. “Well, she’s hiding in the woods behind the castle, but that’ll only last for so long. The knights train back there once the snow melts.”

Marigold looks outside her window. The sky is unseasonably clear and she can see the approximate area of the castle over the treetops. “The snow is melting.”

Jax nods. “Very quickly. Princess Alicia wanted to ask you to make the snow last longer. It was the dragon-- sorry, Lady Elisa’s suggestion that she be turned into a human instead.”

“Has Lady Elisa been human before? Or has she always been a dragon?”

Jax slowly screws the top back on his flask. “As far as I’m aware, she’s always been a dragon. An immortal one at that. She’s known as the Golden Calamity in our kingdom.”

Ah. Marigold clears her throat and shifts in her seat. “Does Lady Elisa know that you’re here to seek my help?”

“She’s the reason I knew where to find you,” Jax says. He studies Marigold’s rapidly paling face. “You know her?”

“No,” Marigold squeaks. She fans herself. “Is it hot in here? I’ll open a window, hold on a moment.” She lurches to her feet and staggers to the window, throwing it open in one go. Icy wind whips through the living room. She sags against the windowsill. “Just out of curiosity, did Lady Elisa say how she knew where I was?”

Jax is watching her with something like alarm. “Are you sure you’re warm? You’re shivering.”

Actually, she’s shaking. She waves away his concern. “I’m fine. It’s probably a magic thing you know nothing about. Like too much magic in my core or something.”

“Or something,” Jax echoes dubiously. “As to your question, she said she always knows where to find the Good Witch of Hawthorne.”

“AH!” Marigold cuts off her scream by coughing furiously. She holds out one finger when Jax starts to get up. “I’m fine! I’m fine! Just something in my throat!” She forces herself to breathe.“She always knows? She said those exact words? Always knows?”

“I’m sorry,” Jax says, “you said you didn’t know her but it really sounds like you do.”

“I don’t!” Marigold never had a full conversation with her anyway. After her sneak attack failed, Marigold was too busy running away to talk. “Not really. She wants to be human? I can do that. Absolutely. No problem. It will just take one spell.”

“Really?” Jax lunges to his feet. “That’s wonderful news! She needs to be here for you to perform it, right? I can go get her right away--!”

“NO!”

Jax freezes halfway to the door. “No?”

Marigold scrambles. “I-it’s too difficult to get here for a dragon! The air is so thin, I doubt she’ll be comfortable making the trip. I can make a potion for her--” Wait, would that even work? “--or maybe I can write down the spell for another witch to perform. So she doesn’t have to travel.”

“Maybe you should come with me now,” Jax says. He extends a hand. “That will solve the issue, right? And if a potion is needed, you’ll need ingredients. The princess guarantees the castle’s laboratory.”

“You want me to be in the same room as the Golden Calamity?” Marigold squeaks.

“You definitely know her,” Jax says. He crosses his arms. “Out with it.”

“It wasn’t personal!” Marigold blurts out. She collapses back into her armchair. “I can’t be held accountable after all these years. It wasn’t even my idea. It’s a rite of passage for young witches. O-of a kind. Maybe something more like hazing? My mentor told me I needed a scale from a dragon for my final exam.”

“Exam?” Jax asks incredulously. “Like a school for witches?”

Marigold ignores him. She buries her head in her hands. “Young witches aren’t even supposed to be able to breach the dragon’s outermost ward! But I’ve always been too good! I was just too damn good.” A single tear slips down her cheek.

“Oh no,” Jax says. He takes out his flask and offers it to her. “Here.”

Marigold snatches the container and gulps down two shots worth of the worst liquor she’s ever tasted. “Thanks.” She sniffles. “I caught her unawares, or so I thought. She was sleeping on top of a pile of treasures, belly up. I was on my broom and thought it’d be easy to pluck one from the underside of her chin.”

“You don’t have to tell me,” Jax says. He’s kneeling by her side now. He pats her on the shoulder. “We’ve all been beaten by stronger opponents before.”

Marigold laughs humorlessly. “Beaten? Ha! I wouldn’t be like this if I was just beaten. I was so confident and she toyed with me. She chased me for three days and three nights through the woods. I thought I was going to die! And then, at the end, when I collapsed on the ground out of exhaustion, you know what she said to me?”

“I can imagine. She told me I should quit being a knight when I tried to rescue Alicia,” Jax says glumly. “Said I’d make a better sloth with how slow I moved.”

“She told me I should work on my stamina,” Marigold cried. “I ran for three days! Three nights! That’s pretty good, right?”

“It’s excellent,” Jax consoles. “I couldn’t ask more of trained knights.”

“Then she said I’d have to run faster if I wanted to avoid being killed by her,” Marigold says. She remembers the way Lady Elisa’s claws dug into the ground. Marigold, parlayzed by fear, had only been able to watch as the razor sharp tips dragged through the earth towards her. “She said dragons hold grudges for a long, long time.”

“If it’s any comfort,” Jax says hesitantly, “she didn’t sound angry when she mentioned you.”

Marigold shakes her head in disgust. “I haven’t even gotten to the worst part yet.”

“There’s more than her threatening your life?”

“If it was just that, I wouldn’t be like this!” She’s been threatened by so many people, she’s lost track. What the dragon did was much worse.  Marigold points above the fireplace. “See that?”

Jax twists on his knee, keeping one hand on her shoulder. “The dinner plate on your mantle?”

“It’s not a dinner plate,” Marigold says. Her cheeks burn. “It’s her scale. She said she pitied me to the point she gave me one! For free!”

“Uh.” Jax takes his hand away. “What?”

“I know!” Marigold can’t believe she’s revealing this to some knight after years of pretending it never happened. “I’ve never been so humiliated in my life.”

“I’m confused,” Jax says. “Are you scared of Lady Elisa or not?”

“I’m terrified of her, obviously,” Marigold snaps. She holds out her hands. “Look, I’m shaking! After that day, I promised no one would ever play with me like that ever again. And they haven’t! Because I moved to a place nobody knew that she’d pity-gifted me a scale. Now you’re telling me she’s known where I was this whole time?”

Jax squints at Marigold and then at the scale. “Can’t dragons track their scales?”

“They can what?” Marigold swoons in her seat. It’s only through a careful application of magic and Jax’ quick hands that she doesn’t fall out of her chair. “I didn’t know that. How could I not know that?”

“I don’t know. It seems like a witch should know that,” Jax says. When he’s sure that she won’t collapse again, he sits back on his heels. “Look, I’m not trying to dismiss your feelings, but it seems like you’re the only one holding onto that day. Don’t you think it’s time to let it go?”

“How can I?” Marigold presses the back of her hand to her forehead. “So you see, I can’t go see Lady Elisa. She’ll just make fun of me. I can’t handle that level of ridicule ever again.”

Jax stares at her. “Are you serious right now?”

“Deadly,” Marigold says. She peeks at Jax through her eyelashes. “I’d rather she kill me than see her again.”

Jax looks up at the ceiling as if praying for patience. He breathes in deeply through his nose and then out through his mouth. Finally, he says, “I think you might be overreacting a little bit.”

“You weren’t there,” Marigold moans. “You weren’t there. I wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat remembering my hubris.”

“But isn’t she the one asking you for help now?” Jax asks. When Marigold stills, he presses the advantage. “Maybe she was stronger than you back then, but is that the case now? After all, she can’t turn herself into a human. Only you can do that.”

Marigold shifts her weight. “I am very good.”

“And if you do this for her, won’t she owe you?” Jax gestures to the scale on the mantle. “She’ll owe you more than that scale.”

Marigold sits upright. “She’ll owe me her silence!” She leaps out of her chair and bustles into the kitchen. “Eureka, I’m a genius! If I help Lady Elisa become a human, she’ll be indebted to me! She won’t be able to tell people about my humiliation because she’ll owe me!”

Jax frowns as he watches Marigold start to throw spices and pots onto the table. “Isn’t that what I said?”

“I said it better.” Marigold rummages in the pantry and comes out with a burlap sack. She murmurs a spell under her breath that makes the bag glow for a brief moment. When she starts piling her chosen items into it, it stays remarkably flat. “Turning a dragon into a human is child’s play if it means reclaiming my honor.”

Jax watches a whole bushel of wheat go into the bag. “Did you just make a magic-storage device with one spell?”

“Of course, I’m very good,” Marigold says. She pauses in the act of putting an entire loom into her expanding bag. An eerie smile creeps across her face. “Once I settle this, I might even be the best.”

“Only if you manage to turn Lady Elisa into a human,” Jax says.

Marigold shrugs, throwing her near-empty burlap sack over her shoulder. “They just want to be together right? If the human thing fails, I can just turn the princess into a dragon. There’s already a spell for that.”

Jax splutters as he follows Marigold to the door. “That is not allowed!”

“Ha,” Marigold says. “We’ll see.”

“No, we won’t!”

They set off down the mountain.