Rewrite That Witch
CH365 · Rewrite
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Chapter 365: The Journey to the West

Petrov yawned, sat up, and immediately felt the cold bite through his upper body. He would have stayed in bed forever if he could — warm sheets, Shirley’s company, no particular reason to do otherwise.

“Don’t you want to sleep a little more?” The woman beside him turned over, voice still blurred with sleep. “It’s still early, isn’t it?”

He bent down and kissed her forehead. Shirley had brown hair that fell in soft ringlets, skin like a child’s, and a pair of round dark eyes that had undone him the first time he saw her at the Longsong Theatre — one glance, and the matter had been settled.

“I think it’s nearly noon,” he murmured. “I should head downstairs and see if anything needs attending to.” He kept his voice low. “Go back to sleep. I’ll have someone bring lunch up to you.”

“But I want you to stay.” She wound an arm around his waist. “It’s snowing anyway. What official business could there possibly be?”

She wasn’t wrong. Ever since the Months of Demons arrived, the city had folded into itself like a closed fist. Theater performances reduced to once a week; merchants gone from the markets; even the taverns shuttered. A man walking the streets in daylight might have thought he’d stumbled into a ghost town.

He considered it. A year of pursuit, and Shirley had finally relented — he was still adjusting to the fact of it, the warmth of it, the particular satisfaction of something long-wanted finally in hand. Last night had worn him out thoroughly. Now that he’d recovered, perhaps there was a second morning to be made of this one.

Then came the knock.

“Sir Petrov. There is a blue-envelope letter.”

He rolled out of bed at once, caught the robe off the floor, draped it on. “I’ll be there in a second.”

“Sir?” Shirley murmured.

“Give me a minute.” He knotted his belt quickly and went out. He returned shortly, crawling back under the quilt with the blue envelope in hand.

“What is that?” She was awake now, sitting up and leaning against him. “Who wrote to you?”

“Border Town.” Petrov turned the envelope over. “It must be from His Highness.”

He broke the seal and scanned quickly. His frown arrived before he finished the first paragraph.

“His Highness orders me to visit Border Town.”

“Right now?” Shirley stared. “In this weather?”

“Yes. Something urgent.” He let out a breath. “I’ll pack this afternoon and leave. You should go home for now — I’ll come to you the moment I’m back.” He found himself thinking, almost against his will, of the journey a year ago: sailing through a blizzard to deliver Duke Ryan’s warning to Border Town. The cruel irony of now being summoned in the opposite direction by the man he’d warned against.

“Can’t you just pretend you didn’t receive it?” She was annoyed in the particular way of someone who had only just gotten what she wanted and was watching it leave through the door. “Even though he conquered the Stronghold, you’re the real authority here. Even a royal order doesn’t require immediate compliance.”

It would have been true of the Duke. But Petrov knew Roland’s impatience too well to test it. He stroked her hair. “It’s not the same. The King might ignore the Western Region, but His Highness Roland cannot afford to — and he doesn’t. He isn’t only the Lord of Border Town. He is the ruler of the entire Western Region.”

During the Months of Demons, there was genuinely little business requiring the governor’s presence in Longsong Stronghold. Petrov delegated what needed delegating, placed the town under his father Earl Hull’s supervision, and left the castle.

The difference from last year was visible immediately. Before, he’d made the journey with one assistant. Now he sailed on the Duke’s private ship — the Lionheart — with more than ten attendants, two family knights, and a traveling kitchen that could produce hot food in motion. A different class of errand entirely.

They were passing through the outer city toward the Stronghold harbor when the noise reached him — a commotion coming from a side street, the kind that draws neighbors from their doors. He could see ten or so civilians forming a rough ring around something, and above the muttering he caught the word: demon.

Then, with more edge: “Hang her!”

Petrov felt a familiar weariness and signaled his knight. “Go look. If it’s an ordinary brawl, send them back inside.”

“Yes, Sir.”

The knight pushed through the ring. The crowd opened at the sight of drawn steel and fell back. He returned with three people in tow: a woman, a boy, and a girl with a rope still knotted around her neck.

“What happened?”

The woman dropped to her knees at Petrov’s feet. “Kill her immediately, Sir! She’s fallen to temptation — she’s a witch!”

The word landed like a stone dropped in still water. Petrov looked past her. The boy had placed himself in front of the girl, face badly bruised, expression set with a kind of readiness. “She isn’t the demon’s minion,” he said. “I’ve seen the plays — there are good witches and bad ones. Why punish her?”

“Are you certain she’s a witch?” Petrov ignored the woman’s posture and asked flatly.

“Yes, Sir. Don’t be fooled by those plays. If the Church were still here, it would never have let such lies reach a stage. This creature here is a little demon, and I was punishing her on the Church’s behalf. Hang her now, Sir, before Hell’s influence spreads further through Longsong!”

“Get to the point.”

After enough jabber to fill a sermon, Petrov extracted the story. Since the Church burned down, this woman and a handful of believers had been preaching in the outer city on their own initiative, waiting for the Holy City of Hermes to send a replacement priest and rebuild the Western Region’s congregation. The incident itself was coincidence: the girl had been using her abilities to clear snow from her neighbors’ rooftops in exchange for food, and this woman had walked past and seen her.

While she talked, the woman kept complaining — about the immorality of primary education, the corrupting influence of theater, about how the onlookers had refused to help her hang the demon even now. In the old days, she kept saying, the corpse would already be on a beam. Each word made the muscles in Petrov’s jaw tighten.

“Arrest her,” he told his knight. The woman’s mouth fell open. “You’ll remain in the Stronghold. When I return, I expect all the disciples like her to be in custody.”

“What — no! Sir, you can’t—” She didn’t finish the sentence before the knight’s palm connected with her cheek, once, twice, and she went quiet.

Petrov looked at the girl. She was crouched on the frozen ground, trembling.

“Are you really a witch?” His voice came out steadier than he felt. “Show me what you can do.”

No response. She didn’t look up.

He tried again, louder: “If you can prove it, I’ll let you go.”

A long silence. Then the girl pushed both hands into the snow at her feet. Slowly — Petrov watched it happen — the snow around her palms gave way, a layer nearly an inch thick melting into flowing cold water.

“I see.” He nodded. “Come with me.”

She looked up for the first time. “Come? Where?”

“A place fit for witches to live.” He motioned to one of his servants.

Behind them, as they moved toward the harbor, the boy’s voice followed — desperate, cracking. “Put her down, you liar! You said you’d let her go!” The sound receded, swallowed by the distance and the cold.

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