The Witch Hunter (The Witch Hunter #1)(50)

Damned bigmouthed idiots! I should have taken them out when I had the chance. Well, it’s too late now. Nicholas won’t be happy that Fifer found out about me, and neither will George. Where is he, anyway? I’m going to need his help managing Fifer when she snaps out of this daze she’s in. She’s still staring blankly through the hedge. I slide out from under the hedge to look for George. The second I do, she pounces.

“You’re a witch hunter!” She shoves me to the ground and jumps on top of me. “A goddamned witch hunter!”

“Fifer! Stop!” She’s hitting me now, punching my arms, my stomach, my face. I can’t fight back, not really. I’ll just hurt her. Or worse, I’ll kill her. I grab her wrists to try to stop her, but she yanks away and slaps my face and rakes her fingernails down my cheek.

“I could kill you! I will kill you! You—” She lets out a string of obscenities so blistering and outrageous I actually start to laugh. Until she grabs a hank of my hair and pulls. Hard.

I let out a yelp, and for a moment I forget I’m not supposed to fight her. I grab her shoulders and fling her off me. She tumbles into the grass, but she’s up in a flash, cuffing me across the head so hard my ears ring. I jump on top of her, and we start rolling around on the ground, both of us slapping and pulling hair and screaming.

There’s a streak of movement in the distance, and suddenly George is there, standing over us with a horrified expression.

“Oi!” He hops around us, dodging our flailing bodies. “What the hell is going on?”

We keep fighting.

“Would you two quit? Quit it, I say!” George takes me by the waist and pulls me off Fifer. She jumps up and flies at me, her hands spread like claws. I catch her wrists, and the three of us stagger around, reeling like drunkards in a brawl before tumbling headlong into the hedge.

“Peace, for God’s sake!” George shouts, prying us apart. “What the hell is going on?”

Fifer scrambles to her feet. “She’s a witch hunter!” She lunges for me again, her hands tightened into fists.

George grabs her before she can get to me.

“What are you doing?” she shrieks. “Go get John! We’ve got to kill her. Right now! He can, or you can. Or I’ll do it myself!” She pulls out her witch’s ladder.

“You can’t kill her,” George says.

“Yes, I can!” Her fingers fumble around a knot. “I’ll curse her into a thousand pieces—”

George yanks it out of her hands. “D’you want Nicholas to die?”

“What?” Fifer looks horrified. “No!”

“That’s what will happen if you kill her. She’s the only one who can find that tablet. You know that. So it shouldn’t matter to you what she is. Witch hunter, demon, she could be the devil for all you care.”

“She is. She is the devil.” Fifer seethes. “And you.” She rounds on George, jabbing her finger at him. “You’re awfully calm about this. So help me, if you knew she was a witch hunter and didn’t tell us…”

George and I exchange a rapid glance.

“You knew,” Fifer whispers. “You knew and you didn’t tell me. Why? How could you do that to me? Or John?” Her eyes go wide. “Nicholas—”

George holds up a hand. “He knows. Of course he knows. I didn’t tell you because he told me not to. Didn’t see any reason for you to know.”

“No reason?” Fifer screeches. “No reason to tell us she’s a vile, lying, barbaric bi—”

“Fifer.” George raises his eyebrows.

“You don’t really believe she’s going to help us, do you?” Fifer says. “She means to run us in circles long enough for Nicholas to die, then turn us over to her friends!”

“I’m not going to do that,” I say.

“She’s not going to do that,” George repeats.

“I don’t believe you,” Fifer says. “I don’t believe her. I don’t believe any of this.” She’s pacing back and forth, shaking her head. Finally, she stops. “I’m telling John.” She turns and heads for the road.

“No.” George grabs her sleeve. “We keep this among us.”

“No!” Fifer says. “He needs to know. Do you know what he’ll do if he finds out?”

“Aye. I do know. Which is why he can’t.” Fifer opens her mouth to argue, but George shakes his head. “The main thing is finding the tablet. You know that. Right now, we can’t afford it to be about anything else. If we tell him, that’s exactly what will happen.”

Fifer doesn’t reply.

“Look, when we get to Humbert’s, you can write to Nicholas,” George continues. “Ask him yourself. He’ll tell you the same thing.”

“Why would he keep this from us?”

“He has his reasons.” George holds the witch’s ladder in front of her. “Do we have a deal?”

Fifer lunges for the ladder, but George yanks it away.

“Fine,” she rages. “It’s a deal.”

“Good. Now wipe that murderous look off your face. Here comes John.”

I look over the hedge and see him coming toward us in a slow run. He’s completely coated in mud.