Confronting the Shadow

The air in Blackwood was thick, like a forgotten stew left simmering too long. It clung to my skin, heavy with the scent of damp earth and something vaguely… wrong. My brambles, usually a magnificent, thorny spectacle, looked less like a magical defense and more like a sad, wilted haircut. They drooped, their once vibrant green leached away, leaving them a sickly, pale imitation of their former glory. Honestly, it was enough to make a witch want to curl up and hibernate until spring, or maybe the next millennium.

Then, there she was. Lily. The herbaceous ray of sunshine who seemed determined to burst my gloomy bubble. She popped out from behind a particularly pathetic-looking patch of nettles, her cheeks flushed with exertion and that infuriatingly optimistic gleam in her eyes. “Amy!” she chirped, as if we were old chums off for a woodland picnic, not a witch whose magic was slowly sputtering out and a village herbalist practically begging for a miracle.

“What do you want, sunshine?” I grumbled, kicking a loose stone with the toe of my boot. “Can’t you see the forest is having a bit of a… *mood*?”