Truly! Different – oh so different, I have always been different – but a witch I am not. My mind produces different thoughts – not paranormal, not otherworldly. My behaviour, to you, may seem strange and erratic, but this is not due to any kind of mystical activity on my part. It was the girl who meddled with dark forces! Yes, it was her! Where ever she went, evil followed, hopelessness and emptiness flowing through the bodies of those nearby; so, I took it upon myself to rid us of that evil.

​

It is no surprise to me that you accuse me of this dark craft – this town leaps at any opportunity to ridicule me, to make a fool of me. I know how you all see me. How you both fear me and mock me. I hear your whispers as I walk by, I spy your judging gazes. I know you tell your children to steer clear of me. Yet never did I wrong you! All your fear and judgement, all your hate – based on purely unfounded thoughts – and yet I did not wrong you. I am not the witch you see me as. I am your saviour. I did not bring evil to our town – I removed it.

​

You fancy me a witch. Witches are strange and different, just as you believe me to be. But you should have seen what I saw. What happened to me. You should have felt how empty I felt – how cursed, how worthless – with what self-loathing I was filled. I had never felt as sorrowful as I did the weeks after her visit. Her curse worked hard to alienate me more than I already was. And every day, as the sun started to fall, I would hear the whispers of spirits – oh, how much fear they roused! Gradually, subtly, they increased in volume, as the demons pressed closer and closer, until they were murmuring in my ear, wrapping their cold hands around my throat and waist.  Oh, how you would have shuddered at how spine-chilling they felt, how fearsome they sounded. Would a witch be as scared as I was of such hellish things? And then, out of the corner of my eye, I would see one for the first time. A movement of a shadow, a twitch, a jerk, no real form as of yet. I looked around thoroughly – so very thoroughly, not neglecting any angle, not allowing myself to miss anything – I looked so that I could find the source of the movement. I did this for what felt like hours – every single night – but the movement always stayed at the corner of my eyes, no matter where I set my gaze. And every morning, after a sleepless night, the shadows would leave, and take up residence outside my house, waiting for me to step outside. So now you must see why I acted so rashly, with such fear.

​

After several nights of this, the demons were more than usually loud in their whispering. The wind outside could not drown out the sound. Despite the sheer severity of the noise, I still could not work out what it was they were saying – the words were surely some kind of incantation, a hex of some form. Before that night I had never properly seen what it was that haunted me – what awfulness awaited me. I could not stay in that house, not with that thing there. And so, for the first time since she had visited, I left. I ran outside with such speed! You would be unable to think of anything that moves as fast as I did in that moment, as I fled. Once I had gotten outside, I saw her. Now, many would think that she was there by coincidence – but no. I knew. It was late, and dark, and so I knew she had no reason to be outside, to be by my house. She noticed me, and smiled. It was a small smile. It was a mocking smile. It all made sense to me then, where these demons had come from, and why. It was her.

​

I stood in place, silently, unmoving. Neither of us moved, nor made a sound. She was staring at me, watching, eyes scathing, just the same as everyone else. When I had not moved still minutes later, she started to relax and let down her guard. I knew this was as good a time as any, and with great speed and strength I ran at her, wrestling her to the ground. She let out one small shriek – and then no more, as I had filled her mouth with my handkerchief. I grabbed her hair, and with one yank and a slam her struggling ceased. She was still alive at this point. I had no desire to kill her. After checking no-one was around to see, I hauled her up to my house. Using the rope from my curtains I tied her to a chair, in case she would wake. But, even with her current state, the whispering did not stop. In fact, it got louder. Why, her fear must have increased the strength of the curse, her desire to have me gone large than it ever had been before! Louder it grew, and louder! Then from her unconscious form it came – from her eyes two black tendrils reached out, from her mouth spilled a jet sludge. Towards me the limbs reached, from the liquid a distorted hound-like form started to emerge. With a scream, I grabbed a knife I had left on the table and leaped forward. Without so much as a thought I raised my hand once, twice, then three times, each time bringing it down with force into the contaminated areas of her skull. I felt arms around me, I was yanked back.

​

“A witch!” I shrieked, “A witch, I say, a witch! Let her curse wreak havoc upon me no more – let her torment us no more – as her foul body is left to rot!”