Time waits for no one.

No matter how much Colin lamented, wept and wailed, it didn't stop to give him a break from all this. Hours turned into days, days into weeks and weeks into months, and soon Colin noticed he had spent a year at the witch's cottage, still trying to search for a way to return back to normal, but none of the books had any answers. Instead, they would all, as if mockingly, tell him only the person who cursed you could turn you back to normal.

Of course, this was impossible for Katherine's physical body was gone. And Colin knew she would never, ever turn him back: were she given a body strong enough it could do magic, she would either try to kill him or escape rather than helping. And Colin knew, he knew Katherine was far too prideful to help him out, and would rather rot on the bookshelf for all eternity than help her miserable servant who betrayed her not only once, but twice - and succeeded.

Colin couldn't go home. He couldn't go to the village either, and so he remained in the cottage.

He got rid of the rotting witch carcass, threw it out of the house for the animals to feast on, and cleaned. He started going through the witch's belongings, no longer restricted by her magic.

Colin made the cottage his own, arranged it to his liking and adjusted himself there. He read and studied the books of magic he hadn't been able to access during his forced servitude and he learned a lot, but nothing he learned was enough to fix the state of his body.

People still came to the cottage asking for help and Colin helped them, selling them the remedies and herbs they requested. Through these small interactions and tasks Colin started learning how to fix objects and eventually how to build.

The witch's familiars were gone, but he made new ones for himself that could help him: a crow to bring him mail, deers, wolves, foxes and bears to carry him heavier objects, and fish from the lake to bring him sunken treasures he could use to pay for what he took from the village.

More time passed, and while Colin had no core, he was working as a witch himself: he hadn't realize it for a long time, until a young man who had come to visit him asked if he was now the new witch with Katherine gone.

"So, you really are the new witch?" the young man asked excitedly.

"I guess I am..." Colin replied awkwardly. "I never thought about it; I'm merely using her cottage for my research, and what comes with it is no obligation to me. But I help because you all come here asking for it."

"Don't you like doing it?"

"Well, I certainly don't hate it..."

The young man laughed. "You're odd, Colin. But I like you, I like you way more than that old witch."

"Oh, how come?" the doll asked.

"She was scary... Had this aura of arrogance and whatnot... I was still young when I met her, like only 6 or 7, but I remember her mere presence scared me so bad I had to sleep with a lantern inside my room for years afterwards; I was scared she'd come to get me at night!"

"And I'm not like that?"

"You're not," the other nodded. "You look grumpy, and you look like a large toy... But you feel much more human than the witch did."

"I'm, uh," Colin started and rubbed the back of his neck. "I'm glad to hear that?"

"You should come to the village some time," the man then suggested. "It's almost time for the harvest ceremony!"

"I pass," the witch replied nonchalantly. "I'd rather not get involved with people; my appearance frightens them more often than not."

"Too bad, I'm sure you would have liked it. But I will bring you something from it!"

"You don't need to."

"But I want! And I will!"

When the man was gone, Colin sat on the cottage porch and looked at the forest that opened in front of him.

"So I'm a witch now..." he mumbled, and a white snake familiar from under the porch curled up on Colin's cold lap.

Colin didn't know how to feel about all this: he had always despised the witch, yet now he had inherited her title. The thought of becoming like Katherine terrified her, the title of a witch feeling like an ominous curse looming over him and waiting for its chance to consume Colin; to make him like Katherine.

But as he remembered the young man, his excited face and the promises of visiting again, Colin closed his eyes and smiled a little. It was not the life he had wanted or planned, but the life he led now wasn't something he exactly hated.

"I guess things are fine the way they are," he then whispered and gently stroked the albino serpent. "I suppose witches are needed..."

Would he want to get out one day, into the wide world outside of the forest he had not been able to see for decades?

Most likely, even if he had to collect more courage to do first.

But would he return to the house once he was done with his adventures?

Yes, definitely.

This was his home now, a place he had turned from a prison to a place of comfort. And, like he said, witches were still needed, and he didn't hate helping those in need.

Thinking about the smiling faces of those he had helped, Colin wondered if Katherine had felt the same before she became the way she was.