When I say witches, I’m not referring to Pagens or Wiccans- though some of us are those, too. I’m referring to dancing-around-a-bonfire-naked-for-a-ritual witches. Witches like me and my family. We’re a genetic offshoot of humans, things tweaked ever so slightly to leave us capable of dragging things out from the abyss.
I didn’t mean for it to go this far. I honestly didn’t. And I’m so very sorry it has.
His name was David. When we met, it was sparks. I always believed in soulmates because of my upbringing, and when I met David, I felt it deep in my gut. That we were meant to be. It was a college party, and I’d had a bit too much to drink. I was on my way out with my roommate Jane when we crossed paths just outside of the building.
He was leant against the brick wall, smoking a cigarette in that leather jacket of his. It was like something out of a movie, and the second I saw him, I felt his energy fill me- twist around my ribcage and throughout my veins. The very scent of him was home. That’s the best way I can describe it.
I walked up to him, in my drunken stupor, and asked for a cigarette. I didn’t smoke, and it was painfully obvious with the way I nearly hacked up a lung.
“You a vaper?” He’d asked in a gravely voice, those green eyes pinched in amusement.
“Guilty as charged.” I remember myself saying, my fingertips splaying across my chest.
The rest was history. Within the year, we were moved in together. And each day, I fell for him more and more. His tan and freckled skin, like stars scattered across his body- stars I loved to trace constellations over with the tips of my fingertips as we lay in bed. His black hair, shaggy and unkempt in just the right way. His mother constantly got on him about cutting it, but I loved it. The way, when he entered our brand new home, he brought the smell of cigarettes and ash and rain with him.
He filled me. He was my everything. You have to understand that. I would wake up in the morning and roll over, tracing lines into his skin until he awoke and his lips curled into a smile at the sight of me. I would go to bed with his arms wrapped around me. I felt small. Protected.
But I always kept what I was a secret from him. After all, I lived a (mostly) normal life. Sure, I prayed to my gods and goddesses, and sure, my cat was 24 years old. As old as me, and showed no signs of aging. But how was I supposed to tell him the truth? That my childhood was filled with not only love, but magic- something so very dear to me. But magic comes at a price.
Mittens, like I said, was 24. I got him when I was born. He was bonded to me immediately as my Familiar. When he was hit by a car at 13, I was devastated. So I did the only thing I could do- I brought him back. Everything has a price. A life for a life. I can never have children, and the neighborhood dog went missing that same day. And one animal every year after.
He was still in his pajamas when he caught me, in the backwoods behind our lovely little home. The blood stained my hands and pants, and the carcass in front of me had been carved into. I tried to explain to him. Really, I did. I tried everything I could. But I couldn’t stand that look of horror and utter disgust on my soulmates face.
“We’ll be fine, David. I promise you.” I cupped his warm face with my bloody hands as he shook in front of me. I pressed a kiss to his forehead, gentle and filled with the love I felt so deeply for him.
And then the bastard told me he had cheated on me. In hindsight, maybe not the best thing to tell your girlfriend who had just murdered a raccoon to keep her farmiliar alive. But I simply brushed the hair from his eyes as my heart broke in my chest. I told him I forgave him.
I loved him so much. You have to understand that what I did was out of love. It was a simple spell. It was dark magic, magic that would leave me fatigued and plauge him until It came to take him. But I reassured myself that it would all be worth it, because soon, we would be together forever. No more cheating. Guaranteed.
He told me he saw things in the shadows of the house. I told him he hadn’t gotten enough sleep. I began putting the herbs into his eggs, serving him breakfast in bed every morning. He grew more and more paranoid. I grew more and more fatigued. Floorboards began to creak at night, and lightbulbs would flicker. I promised him that if he just rested, everything would be fine.
It was two days before Christmas that It came, it’s shadowy and elongated silhouette visible between the trees behind our home. I let it in. I thanked it. I fed it. David screamed when he saw the creature, it’s long arms dragging along the floor and it’s eyes boring into him. It took him that night, and returned him the next day.
I found David outside on our porch, still in his pajamas, standing in the bitter cold and holding a wooden box in his hands. I was exhausted. I wrapped a blanket around him, and pulled him up the stairs and into bed with me, gently tucking him in. He was silent, a far away look in his eyes. I pressed a kiss to his forehead as tears streamed down his face. I traced my fingertips over his bare chest and the stars there, a long scar where his heart once was.
“I love you.” I breathed, cupping his face in my hands.
He opened his mouth to reply, but all that came out was a groan. The stub of his now-gone tongue moved around in his mouth. I hushed him quietly, and slipped a ring onto his finger.
Once he had finally fallen asleep, I opened the chest he brought home. There, his heart beat, as it always would, in synch with mine. His heart would forever remain mine, and mine his. Our lives are tethered together now in a way humans could only dream of. We live and breathe in tune with each other. A symbiotic relationship.
Now he can never leave me.
I know it’ll take him a while to adjust. But I’ll teach him sign language, and learn for him. I’ll feed him and care for him until both of our strengths are up. I love him so very much.
After all. We are soulmates.