Rewrite That Witch
CH238 · Rewrite
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Chapter 238: How Could I Possibly Regret This?

A week later, the expedition force returned to Border Town.

From departure to return: nearly half a month. Five days longer than expected. The cause had been a report from Longsong Stronghold—Acting Duke Petrov’s messenger, arriving on the day the fleet had set out for home, carrying word of an unknown plague. Petrov, following the protocols Roland had established in advance, had isolated the infected and closed the city before sending the report. Roland had dispatched Maggie east along the Redwater River at once, flying hard until she found the fleet, delivering new orders: detour to Longsong Stronghold, eradicate the demonic plague, then continue home.

On the day of their return, Roland brought everyone to the docks—the full remaining garrison, the families of every soldier in the expedition. The familiar march carried across the water before the ships were visible, and when the soldiers came down the pier they were met with cheers, with arms open, with people going down on one knee to shout long live His Highness in the way they had learned from watching the army’s own ceremonies. Soldiers embraced wives, embraced children. Echo’s gun salute went up at precisely the right moment. The celebration spread; refugees from the temporary camp came to see what was happening, and the serfs from across the Redwater came too, and for a time the docks held more people than the town’s square had held a year ago.

In the castle afterward, Iron Axe gave his full report.

“The attacker who penetrated the First Army’s camp was a witch,” Roland said, when Iron Axe had finished that section. He turned it over. “She was unlikely to belong to the street rats.”

“Theo agrees. He believes the rats are controlled by a separate force—street organizations of that size almost never operate outside their territory of their own initiative. The only forces in King’s City capable of directing them and possessing a witch are the Church and King Timothy.” Iron Axe’s tone was considered. “Even the most powerful nobles would be unable to mobilize the Skeleton Fingers at full strength and leave their own territory exposed. The rats were commanded, not hired.”

“Timothy is in the Eastern Region. And I don’t believe he’s bold enough to send a witch alone into a combat situation.” Thinking of Wendy’s and Ashes’ prior encounters with the Church, the picture that formed was not surprising. A group of witches raised and trained in secret—that fit. “Are you certain she’s dead?”

“Nightingale’s shot entered the chest and destroyed the thoracic cavity,” Iron Axe said. “We buried her in the wheat field near where we found our sentry’s remains.”

The final accounting: over their last day, the three-hundred-strong expedition had faced a full-strength attack by the Skeleton Fingers. Result—one dead, four injured. The one casualty was the sentry taken by the witch before the alarm was raised; the four injuries were crossbow hits from the approaching rats before the firefight ended the engagement. The revolving rifles had brought the battle to a conclusion before it ever reached the melee phase. The injured had been bandaged immediately, Lily’s presence preventing infection, and sent back to Border Town for Nana’s treatment. As long as the bolts had missed vital organs and the bleeding was managed, survival was near-certain.

Roland was satisfied. The capability gap was real, and widening. As for the sentry problem—how to ensure posts always had eyes on one another—he left it with Iron Axe to solve. Iron Axe knew the answer to that kind of problem better than he did.

“You’ve all worked hard. Tomorrow I’ll hold a ceremony in the central square—go notify the full force.”

When Iron Axe was gone, Roland let out a breath.

He reached into his desk drawer and placed a packet of dried fish on the table.

“Well done,” he said. “If not for you, I’m afraid the outcome would have been very different.”

Nightingale’s figure appeared beside him. She accepted the fish with a smile. “As I said—I had everything under control.”

“How strong was she?”

“Agile. Determined. She’d been training for years—I could tell.” Nightingale pulled a piece of dried fish apart with her fingers and reported the sequence of events in a level tone, with the deliberate casuality of someone who has decided how they want to feel about a thing and is presenting it that way. He heard the small disruption when she reached the shooting. “When I saw her eyes as she moved toward Wendy—I understood. There was nothing that would stop her, short of death.”

A moment of quiet.

“Do you remember what you said to me, on the way back after we defeated Timothy’s militia?”

She considered. “‘This is not your fault’?”

“Yes.” He nodded. “If she was raised by the Church from childhood—trained from early on to see witches outside the Church as traitors, as fallen—years of coexistence probably wouldn’t have changed her. That kind of thinking doesn’t cure easily.” He paused. “At least her death meant Wendy lived.”

Nightingale laughed. “Are you trying to comfort me?”

“Ke—” He cleared his throat twice. “Those were my genuine thoughts.”

“Relax. I don’t mourn the enemy.” She ate a piece of dried fish. “She was a witch, yes. But the path she chose was entirely different from anything I want to see in the future. I said this on the ship during the return journey—I knocked her down while protecting my sisters. I fulfilled my duty. Nothing more.”

“Good.” He meant it. He had thought she might come back shaken—that killing another witch for the first time, regardless of the circumstances, would leave something unresolved. She had resolved it faster than he expected. In mind and in belief, Nightingale was different from the woman he had first encountered.

She swallowed the fish and hesitated. The hesitation was brief and then she looked at him directly, voice dropping slightly. “There is one small thing I want to ask.”

“What?”

“What were you and Anna doing while we were gone?” The voice went quieter still, but the eyes stayed steady on his face. “You know what I mean.”

Roland nearly knocked over his cup. “Ke—that’s very sudden—during those days I was occupied finding shelter for the refugees, there was almost no time to—”

Her eyes lit up at once. “That wasn’t a lie.”

“Of course not—”

Nightingale disappeared.

A moment later he felt it: a pair of lips against his, light and brief, there and gone. The faint salt of dried fish.

He sat very still for a long moment.

“Wait—”

Two fingers settled over his mouth.

“I know what you want to say.” Her voice came from somewhere just beside his ear, barely above a whisper. “I don’t want to change anything. I’m not placing myself between you and Anna—I only want to stay by your side. That’s all. Forgive me for not letting you see my face right now. I don’t know what expression I should wear in front of you.” A pause. “Your Highness—you don’t dislike me?”

He opened his mouth.

Saying he disliked Nightingale was not possible. That had never been the barrier. What stood between them was not feeling but the weight of twenty years of habit, twenty years of a framework for how people were supposed to relate to each other—a framework imported from somewhere else entirely, increasingly difficult to pretend was native to this world. He could no longer deceive himself about what it was.

“In that case,” she whispered, “don’t say anything. This isn’t your fault. I only did what I wanted to do. That’s all.”

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