Sorrow's Gift

Chapter Twenty: The Witch

It was a pity that in order to earn the trust of these four humans, she was going to have to try to kill them.

But after watching them for the past few days, she realized the best way to gain the trust of people like this was to save their lives. Once they had put their lives in her hands, she would be able to control them. They would listen to her and include her in their decision-making. They would trust her lies without thinking twice.

As much as the young witch hated rodents, they were all she had been able to sneak in through the barriers Crash had set up throughout the building.

She'd crept out of the apartment in the early morning when the others were still sleeping to look for some kind of weakness in the building's defenses.

She knew there were more than a hundred rotters above them in the smaller apartments on the higher floors, but Crash had been clever in choosing his home. There was no direct access from those upper apartments to this one down below except for a small service elevator and a single narrow stairway. He had cut all power from the elevator, of course. And the entrances to the stairway had been completely sealed off on most of the floors, the doors welded shut. To break it down, she would have had to use too much of her energy. Plus, there would have been no explaining how all the rotters had gotten through the doors all at the same time without some kind of foul play.

She considered opening the door to the garage, but it would be too easy for them to tell that it had been tampered with.

No, she needed this to look like an accident. Or an attack from the outside. Above all things, the others could never suspect that she was behind any of the attacks or unrest amongst the group. Once they suspected her, she was useless to the Dark One.

Instead, she'd summoned the rats.

Hundreds of them. They ran through the sewers beneath the streets in packs, their nimble bodies able to squeeze through even the smallest of openings.

The witch created just such an opening at the far corner of the garage behind a row of abandoned cars. It was dark and out of the way. No one would ever see the rats gathering there.

Many animals were immune to the Dark One's magic and the virus had not taken hold in them. Dogs, cats, horses, most domestic animals. But there were others who had been infected easily. Monkeys. Bats.

Rats.

The witch leaned down and reached her hand toward the large rat with the red eyes. It skittered up her arm and up onto her shoulder, rubbing its furry body against her cheek tenderly.

Pride seeped into her bones. The Dark One approved of her choice.

"Soon," she told the rat. "As soon as the sun sets."

She crouched and let the rodent run back to the others who were gathering in the garage.

Tonight, things were going to get interesting.