27. Is Adeline Dead?

****

Adeline was lying on the ground and not breathing,

At the time they were to cast fire on Adeline, they began to burn into smoke one after another since they were nothing but an illusion created by the witch in the hut.

More so, the witch had not intended to let Adeline die such a quick and meaningless death. She had a purpose for her and she had only deviated from the situation so Adeline would not know the path that led to her hut.

At this moment, Adeline even though not breathing had been made to vanish by the magic of the witch and also reappeared inside of the hut with her.

Without the use of the spell, the witch called Adeline's name and she gasped into life again. When she did, she was scared because she thought she was still in her former situation and the monsters were still hitting her in the face.

The witch's laugh called her back to total consciousness because she could now hear her laughing up close and verily not as in a whisper as it was before.

She suddenly jumped up.

"Where am I?" She asked.

"Where are you?" The witch questioned her back.

This did not mean that the witch kept mute after this, she was yelling her horrible laughter that Adeline's ear began to hurt.

It was obvious that everywhere that was bleeding on Adeline had healed but not by Adeline's regeneration. It was because of the magic of the witch. But now, Adeline's eyes and her ear began to bleed again because of the loud noise the witch was making.

When she became silent, the eyes and her ears were quickly healed.

Adeline could not capture the real look of the witch as the whole hut was filled with thick smoke that obstructed her view.

All that she could see was that the hut was the tiniest room and the wall was built with pear-shaped dried mud bricks and the flooring was a surface of laterite sprinkled with gravel and disturbed by water.

She also could see this big black pot filled with coloured water and a fire underneath which was cooking the pot.

"What do you look at?" The witch said but this time with a different voice.

This called Adeline's attention to stop looking around because the voice she heard before was different to this voice and when she shot her gaze upon the witch, the witch was now a girl.

Adeline was now walking towards the girl. She wanted to behold her face closely and then maybe touch her face. The witch had been a little girl all along.

As the time Adeline was getting closer, the girl disappeared and reappeared on the other end of the hut.

This time, it had not been the little girl but a middle-aged lady on the other side of the hut.

"Do not be deceived, Adeline." The witch said in multiple voices.

This time, the smoke was completely gone and the pot and the fire were nowhere to be found.

Each time the witch had disappeared to reappear at another side of the hut, she would reappear with another face and speak with another voice.

But this time, the witch had worn the face of Cora.

"Do you know why you cannot drink the human's blood?" The witch asked.

But even before Adeline could guess an answer, the witch had expressed herself in the widest laugh.

"That's just who I ...."

"Wrong!" The witch interrupted and then disappeared.

This time she was yet to reappear but her words still conquered the sudden quietness.

"I made you so" The witch declared.

"Where is the book?" The witch requested.

But when Adeline had not handed her the book, the book already vanished from underneath her dress and reappeared before the witch. This did not mean the witch held it by the hand, it only meant that the witch suspended the book in the air.

"From the days of the beginning." The witch began and the book began to glow all over the hut and the water in the pot began to reveal vision.

"Your grandfather and his family came to me to help them and while I did, your grandmother returned hoping to feed on me. But I caught this and blessed them with a curse for the sun shall be their enemy and hatred shall live among them until they shall all perish like they never existed."

"You are their curse Adeline and you are beginning of the end." The witch narrated.

"But I didn't ask for any of these," Adeline complained.

This time, the witch had reappeared closely behind her and she spoke with Adeline's voice.

"It is not your choice to make." The witch countered as she exploded in a wicked laugh.

When Adeline turned back immediately as she heard the voice, the witch had already disappeared and reappeared at another end of the hut.

"You are my creation just like the monters who attacked you. And I shall make you powerful and dangerous and bring you into an alliance with what they so much hated and together all shall be in place and the end shall begin." The witch said in multiple voices and the whole of the hut was shaking as if it was going to fall.

At this moment, the witch began to glow and her glow was shrinking her into a smoke which festered from her feet.

"And I will be with you. And my thought will be your thought, my power will be your power and you will be a bad omen upon your kind and until you avenge my death, you will know no rest." The witch declared.

When she was done talking, she began to expand in her laughter.

Also, she was still glowing and each of these glows began to transfer into Adeline's skin and Adeline had fallen to the ground and became unconscious until the process was complete.

While Adeline became unconscious, the witch had also completely turned into a cloud of smoke and the smoke travelled into the pot and the pot now completely disappeared.

That was not all, the hut also disappeared because the hut was the witch and the witch was the hut.