Chapter Text
Wednesday didn’t mind death. In fact, she found it fascinating.
Death was the ultimate mystery; someday, each and every one of them would solve it, but as best as she’d found (and she’d devoted not small amount of time to her studies on the subject), there had never been someone to scientifically and undoubtedly answer the mystery of death in time to share the information with anyone.
Nonetheless, she was in no particular hurry to find the answer out today. There was always going to be another opportunity to die, and she had other things to do first. Like finish her novel in time to beat Mary Shelly’s record.
Most importantly, in this particular case, dying meant losing.
Her stab wound still hurt. The bleeding was gone and the skin patched, but a gentle fire still radiated from the spot. That was okay; Wednesday could work through pain. She had trained herself for years for a situation like this. Her pain tolerance was finally being put to the test. Wednesday could find some satisfaction in that.
Flames licked around her, mercifully unable to reach the brittle wood where it could spread to the rest of the school. The quad was burning, but the damage was easily fixable so far. She just needed to stop it before it went further.
It wouldn’t be as hard this time; she knew her opponent’s weapon. She wouldn’t be caught off guard again. She could fix this, could overcome the prophecy.
Right?
“Howdy, pilgrim,” she called.
Wednesday was self-aware enough to admit, as the mottled corpse turned his disgusting face toward her, that she was scared. Not something to admit aloud, but she could admit it to herself. Fear was good. Fear kept her steady, focused. So did the phantom pains, spasming in her abdomen.
She took a deep breath and readied her fighting stance, doing everything in her power to hold her sword steady and her pain in check.
She’d already beat death once today. It hadn’t been a pleasant experience and she had no desire to repeat it. Crackstone had played dirty. He had the audacity to call her a witch as he held her in place with his own magic, then twisted the knife in her intestines like they were noodles.
Now, that particular get out of jail free card had been played. Goodie wasn’t coming to save her this time, and one misstep would give Crackstone the opening he needed to finish her off. Wednesday lowered her chin, mustering all the training and concentration she’d developed over the past ten years of fencing.
“Get away from her!” A voice echoed across the quad, shattering her concentration.
For an instant, her heart lept. Enid. Her voice felt, to Wednesday’s strung out emotions, like a midnight’s rain, or the silk of a spiderweb.
Then, her head caught up to her heart. Enid’s here, it screamed. Enid’s in danger.
Wednesday wanted to scream. Wanted to yell to Enid, tell her to run, get away. But, as they always seemed to when her emotions ran high, her words deserted her. Her mouth opened and closed like a fish, silent as Enid knocked her bow - where had she even gotten a bow?
Enid loosed the arrow.
For half a second, as it flew toward Crackstone, Wednesday thought she could work with this.
Sure, it would go wide - had Enid ever even shot an arrow? Wednesday would need to teach her if they got out of this intact - but it could be a hint of a distraction, enough for Wednesday to make her advance.
Instead, the arrow stopped in midair, and Wednesday’s heart dropped even further.
When she saw the arrow turn toward Enid, she didn’t hesitate. She flung her sword at him like a javelin, a dark Hail Mary.
The sword pierced his thigh, loosing fire from his skin, but at best it would slow him. Nothing could kill him but a hit to the coal fire where his heart should be.
It didn’t stop his fingers from uncurling.
As Crackstone flicked his fingers toward Enid, sending the arrow flying back her way, Wednesday didn’t hesitate.
It didn’t feel like the stabbing had. It hit with such force that she was spun around, like some unstoppable object had bumped into her. One moment she was standing, and the next she was on the ground, the sky dark and starlit above her. She’d seen the arrow fly, had jumped in front of it, but still her brain struggled to catch up.
Then stabbing pain of the wound came, as she tried to catch her breath, its epicenter just to the left of her sternum.
If she’d been thinking straight, she would have posited it had gone through her upper abdomen, some probably vital organs and a few blood vessels, and punctured her lung and that was why she couldn’t catch her breath.
But she couldn’t think; the pain consumed the rest of the world in its firey inferno. Gone were thoughts of battle or mysteries, or even of the quad or the swords. There was only fire and sky: fire in her chest and sky in her head. Fire around her, sky overhead.
And then the sky was gone, blocked by a girl’s head, and everything came rushing back, in jumbled, incomprehensible chunks. Enid, Enid wasn’t supposed to be here. She needed Enid gone. Something to do with a sword, or maybe a fight. There was a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach; a deeply rooted need to get Enid out of here, because something bad was happening.
Enid was speaking, but the sounds were jumbled. Her tone was urgent, panicked, and Wednesday nodded. Enid understood, Wednesday thought, that she needed to go, that bad things were happening her - unfun bad things.
But when Wednesday finally pushed through the blood loss and oxygen deprivation to unscramble her words, it was “-you got shot!” that finally sunk in.
Wednesday would have sighed if she could.
Leave it to Enid to be worried about the wrong thing.
“I’m okay” she muttered, her lips moving soundlessly. It wasn’t a convincing
Wednesday heard the sword clatter to the ground. It wouldn’t be long before Crackstone was upon them.
“I’m fine. Get out of here.” Enid didn’t move. Across the quad, Crackstone grinned. Or, Wednesday imagined he did. It felt like he was probably grinning. Her vision was blurry, making it hard to tell.
Goody had said that she would be alone. She had never explained how hard that would be to get there.
“What were you thinking!” Enid shouted, and Wednesday’s head pounded with each stressed syllable. Whether it was blood loss or residual pain from the shovel, or - had she hit her head just now? She couldn’t remember; everything hurt.
Enid reached toward her, and then pulled away, afraid to touch her. Wednesday would never admit it, but she wanted that touch.
“Go. I’ll be fine.” Wednesday said.
“You have an arrow in your chest! I’m not going anywhere.”
In truth, Wednesday wanted to lay there until someone else fixed everything. She wanted the responsibility to fall on someone else's shoulders for a change. She wanted Enid to fuss over her and tell her everything was going to be okay until it was. She wanted Enid’s cool hand back on her forehead, even if the thought of it burned just a bit.
But even with her vision fading in and out, Wednesday could still hear Crackstones steps shuffle across the quad. There wasn't another option. She needed to get Enid out of there or Crackstone would kill them both. So, with every bone in her body screaming against her, Wednesday forced her eyes into as much of a focus as she could, grabbed the arrow by its shaft, and wiggled it out of her chest. Screams bubbled in her throat, but she swallowed them all. If she didn't convince Enid that she was fine, all of this would be for nothing.
With a final sigh, she wrenched the arrow free. Medically speaking, she knew it was a bad idea, and the fresh trickle of blood down her stomach confirmed it. But it was done, and it would accomplish what it needed to accomplish. Her ears rang; when had the symptoms of blood loss become so familiar?
“There, now there’s not an arrow in my chest.” Enid looked on, still. Hesitant. “Now go. They need your help.” Wednesday nodded at the students huddled in a terrified mass across the quad.
Wednesday couldn't have cared less at that moment about the strangers on the other side of the quad. But if Enid took them to safety then Enid was safe too, and that was all that mattered.
“Go!” Wednesday called, and with one final regretful glance, Enid did as she was told.
Wednesday forced herself to her elbows, and then over to her hands and knees. One bit at a time, she told herself. Just a step forward, and then another. She could hear Enid scrambling behind her. Footsteps, fading away until finally there was silence, just the crackle of embers and the shuffle of Crackstones footsteps.
It was time to finish this.