The goblins squealed, but their screams were cut off when they died, pinned down by the large trees.
A few moments passed, and the only noise was the choked sobs of the little girl.
Angelique relaxed and suppressed her magic, then focused on the victims. “Hello? Don’t be afraid.”
Trunks and logs littered around the villagers, but she could still see them as she hopped on top of one of the trunks and picked her way closer to them. “I’m an enchantress-in-training. Are you injured?”
“We’re okay.”
Angelique veered around a branch that poked up from the trunk just in time to see the man lift up the boy and put him on a trunk. He did the same to the little girl, too, then scooped up a dark green cloak.
He appeared to be roughly thirty, and going by the lack of travel packs, he must be from a nearby village—his shirt was a simple weave, but his cloak had some embroidery of little white sheep around the throat.
The children were dressed in similar sturdy but warm and well-made clothes.
“Thank you for your help.” He smoothed the little girl’s hair—she was still crying, but in startled little gasps. “I don’t know what we would have done if you hadn’t arrived, mage…” He finally shifted his gaze to Angelique, and his words seemed to die in his throat.
The children had no such reactions.
When Angelique extended her hand, the little boy latched on. She smiled at him and gently squeezed his hand, but she could feel the way his fingers shook in hers as she helped him through the jumble of trees.
Once he hopped onto the ground, Angelique came back for the little girl since the villager was still occupied with gaping at her.
The gaping wasn’t unusual—mages were relatively rare, and enchantresses, even ones in training, were even more so. But the way he studied her held more scrutiny than usual, as well as a good dose of shock. (Maybe he was light-headed from his shoulder injury?)
She scooped up the little girl and made a soothing noise as she picked her way across the trunk and set her down next to the little boy on the ground.
Angelique turned back, wondering if she’d have to fish the villager out of the fallen trees as well, but she heard a scuffle behind her as he dismounted a flattened log. “Lady Enchantress Angelique?” he asked.
She paused, surprised he knew her. “…yes?” Her eyes dropped to his shoulder—he had put on the cloak so she couldn’t see how much blood he was leaking, but she should patch him up before sending him out.
The man laughed and a generous smile relaxed his pleasant face. “Thank you for saving me again—and for saving my children.” He bowed deeply, then picked up his little girl, a friendliness Angelique wasn’t used to seeping into his posture.
She watched him as he took the boy’s hand. “You’re welcome. It’s my honor to help. But…again?”
“Oh.” The man shook his head. “Of course you wouldn’t recognize me—I was a child when we met!” His smile returned, this time with an edge of sass evident in its slight crookedness. “I’m Wybert, from the village of Boyne.”
It took a few moments for the man’s name and village to sink into her mind before she finally recalled meeting him. “Wybert? Is it really you?” Her voice went high pitched with her surprise.
Her first assignment as an enchantress-in-training had been to offer guidance to a shepherd boy who had a penchant for lying and calling out that wolves were attacking the flock just so he could laugh at the villagers when they came to fight the nonexistent wolf.
Angelique had…helped him to see the truth—or more correctly, she had traumatized him onto the path of righteousness by setting four illusionary wolves on him while his village ignored his terrified shouts.
It had been a long time ago, but Angelique hadn’t realized just how long ago it was. I don’t believe it. Bratty Wybert is grown up with children of his own?
Wybert laughed at her shock. “It has been many years, Lady Enchantress Angelique. You look just as beautiful as I remember.”
“You’ve…grown…taller,” Angelique tactfully said.
Internally, she still scrambled for equilibrium as she studied his face. He was nearly unrecognizable as an adult, to the point where she wondered if someone was funning her. But as she tried to calculate the years, she realized it had been nearly twenty years since she met Wybert. The thought was staggering—it seemed like only months ago she and Evariste had been laughing in Wistful Thicket.
She knew as an enchantress she’d have a lifespan closer to an elf, and even regular mages tended to age slower, but Angelique’s appearance was that of an eighteen-year-old—perhaps twenty on the right day—while Wybert had grown, filled out, and had the beginnings of wrinkles around the corners of his eyes.
“Indeed!” Wybert winked, showing the glints of boyish impishness he had evidently retained even as an adult. “I never got the chance to thank you for your guidance when I needed it.”
“Yes, guidance.” Angelique wished the ground would swallow her up—she’d terrified the snot out of little Wybert because he’d been so naughty, but looking at him as an adult, she had to wonder if she’d perhaps been a little too vindictive. “I hope I didn’t scar you for life.”
“Not at all. You proved your point and taught me an important lesson. I’ve told my own children the story at least a hundred times, haven’t I?” He smiled down at his son—who was slowly starting to relax—then jiggled his daughter in his arms, wincing when his shoulders moved.
“Ahh yes—I saw you were injured. If you’d remove your cloak, I can see to it,” Angelique asked. “I have some healing spells at my disposal.”
Wybert set the little girl down and shrugged off his sheep-embroidered cloak. “I see to all the village’s domesticated animals, now,” he grinned when he saw Angelique’s eyes lingering on the embroidery. “But my friends and family do persist in giving me sheep-themed gifts.”
A crooked grin settled on Angelique’s lips before she swapped it for a more appropriate smile as she benevolently nodded to the children when they kept staring at her.
She didn’t care too much about her reputation anymore, but for the sake of the younglings, she’d play the part of the Lady Enchantress she was supposed to be—if she hadn’t had such a cynical and sarcastic streak to her personality.
“That is quite amusing,” she said. “Now sit down on a trunk, and let’s take a look at your shoulder.”
Wybert gamely plopped down on a fallen tree trunk, and Angelique twisted her silvery magic into a healing spell as she studied the red stain on his shirt. “It doesn’t appear to be bleeding too badly.”
Wybert nodded. “The goblin brute didn’t stab me, just cut across the top.”
Silver magic covered Angelique’s fingers as she pressed against his shoulder, transferring the spell to his injury. “This is a slow-burn healing spell, so it’s not instantly going to knit up your wound, but you should be right in a day or two. I added a cleansing spell as part of it, but you’ll want to wash and dress the wound like normal once you return to Boyne—that is, assuming you still live there.”