#and try (and fail) to write the HoM cast as actual characters

[maideninorange]

The witch gave her a sad smile from her towering makeshift throne, "And who exactly can fault them for that? I crossed the boundary between human and inhuman. Mortal and immortal. Mage and witch. It wasn't my decision, sure, but it was my decision to throw my lot in with the fairies responsible, now wasn't it?"

Sophia took a step back. The little monsters with vines for skin and flowers for hair follow her every move. As if waiting for the moment their queen ordered them to strike her down. The worn, dusty leather bound journal in her hands shook like a leaf, and not just from the awe of being before a witch, and a powerful one at that.

She shuddered under their gaze for the knowledge of this witch and the old journal she held being one and the same.

The witch's gaze trailed downward, eyeing the book in her hands, "Ah, so that's where that one went. You were the one I found it, I take it?"

Sophia couldn't do anything but nod, her teeth clenched to the point it hurt. What else could she do? She had assumed the owner was a dead human. An odd human who commanded flower fairies against all the warnings within against interacting with Creatures, sure, but a human all the sames. Not this Creature in a human shape, vines wrapping all around pale skin and a flower blooming from her throat like a mended wound.

"Did you get to the section on witches?" She asked like Sophia hadn't taken it upon herself to read every word even when mocked for it. It was why she survived to be granted sanctuary into the witch's domain, whereas Sherry and Jackson quite literally fell prey to the monsters that lurk throughout this endless labyrinth of a forest, and why she knew better than to trust any guide that isn't the Creature at the center to guide her out unlike Mac.

"Then you'd know that witches, despite being born from humans, are not actually human themselves. There is no such thing as a human purview, and believe me I checked!" A forced laugh, more like the mocking of a child self than at anything resembling a joke, "The moment my fairies decided to pour all their magic into my dying body, I had stopped being human. I am just as much a Creature as those in that book you hold."

The witch stood up then, stalking lower, closer, until Sophia could see her face beneath the hood of that cloak she wears. She couldn't find it in herself to run away or look away, despite no flower covered vines rooting her into place.

Even though her eyes were fiery flicks instead of the deep hazel in the photographs within the journal, even through her hair was messy and long in its ponytail as opposed to the short, neatly kept bob as in the photos, it was all still the same face she grew to understand, and perhaps, care about in her oen strange way.

She held the same posture, had the same curious glint in her eyes despite how smothered it became. The witch before her is the one and only Danielle Cargen.

She reaches a green tinged hand out to Sophia, beckoning her, "And I can tell you are on the same cusp. Pondering the same questions I did when I first became what I am now centuries back. I am a cruel witch, but I am also not merciless like my fairies are."

Sophia stares longingly at her hand, blood frozen in her veins. Danielle gives her a small smile, more geniune, "Come, take my hand and follow in my footsteps. I'll teach you everything I know, wish I knew, when I first lost my humanity. Or turn back, and let my fairies guide you out with no guarantee you will even stay human."

"...No catch?" Sophia choked out hoarsely.

"No catch. Consider it my treat for making it this far. And for finding my book."

It was an offer of apprenticeship. To become a familiar, and with that something inhuman yet powerful.

Sophia wanted to say no. All common sense begged her to say no, to walk away now while she still could. To become a witch herself meant to never see home again.

But then again, what exactly did she have to look forward to back home? She didn't have many kind thoughts for either parent of hers, and it's not like her boss was much better even if he didn't die early on since being brought to this realm. What did she have to lose? Perhaps she was crazy, but she wanted what Danielle was offering.

She wanted to only be a slave to her own desires, not anyone else's. Why bother being human? Nothing good ever came out of it anyway.

So against every thread of sanity still holding her psyche together, Sofia took the witch's hand. She tried not to wince as the vines dug into her palm, her pitiful fate sealed.

"I trust you."

Prompt #2839

“But you’re human-”

“Am I? How novel. No one has treated me like a human in a long, long time.”