Curiosity had stripped Mistress Hen of her timidity. She'd been told time and again that the coming of the witch would lead to the world's destruction; and upon learning that his death would prove just as fatal, there were certain truths she wished to know.

Alone in her small and shabby corner of the palace, before word from Master Brecke had come, and hours prior to meeting the dark haired maiden that would steal her away to the countryside, Mistress Hen pulled out an eel skin book. It wasn't too dissimilar from the one she'd sneaked into her master's room, and it was fortunate indeed that eels were plentiful in both Madning and the other world. 

The written word of the Divine. It was akin to having stolen letters from the realm of Hymm at her fingertips. It felt too precious to touch, too holy, and too overwhelmingly powerful, that at first she dared not cast her eyes upon its pages. But pleading for Maphis to protect her should the witch in the afterworld take grievance, she opened it all the same.

Half expecting the book would illuminate itself with the magic of the Maddening Witch, Hen was left with no choice but to draw her candle closer in order to read its contents.

'I can look back on it now, and see the evil of my ways...'

Hen had heard so many conflicting accounts regarding the witch, and now she alone had the privilege of unlocking the secrets that neither side had been given the chance to discern. It was wrong, of course, to read his private thoughts, but so utterly captivating that she could not put it down.

'He has come. Through the velvet water, from the other world. The years I have waited that he might join me, the wrinkles etched deeply into my skin that I no longer know myself.

My son has finally come to me.'

Hen pulled her knee to her chest and sat up straighter, hitting her shin on the corner of the rough wooden nightstand as she did so.

"F- fiddlesticks!" she cried, hoping that no one had heard her bang into the furniture before continuing to read.

'I saw the change beneath the surface of the lake. The colors were all wrong, as though ink had tinted the still and clear waters to a dark and violent shade of black. I knew all at once what it was, and yet I could not will my body to move. Before the portal even opened, Fiepet was rushing to my side in fear.

The tear was made from the other side, and a wrist caught in irons made its desperate attempt to cross into Grunterbad. I cared not for what the portal had brought to this realm, only that I myself might be free from it! 

Oh Jophis forgive me! Even now it is hard to admit what I have done.

I jumped into the water and swam towards the rift, unaware that Fiepet had followed after... unaware that the man I pushed aside and let plummet to the depths of the lake, was the son I left behind in Cimbria all those years ago. As I felt the water thicken around me, my aging body had not the strength to push against the resistance of the velvet water.

Expelled as I was... the portal closed without my passing through it. My head once more above the water, I screamed in frustration that I had not made it home. I pulled myself to lie breathless on the shore... and only then did I see them. 

Fiepet was struggling in the water, as though he had forgotten how to swim. And upon his flailing person was a body in chains... its long blond hair a wet and matted mask across its face.

I did not know. Forgive me... I did not know. But I wished that death would find him. For closing the portal too soon, I wanted him dead.

"Leave him!" I cried to Fiepet, assuming the weight of the body was dragging him down. While the boy could not speak, he'd been quick to swim and took well to horses; his constitution had greatly improved from the weakling found cowering in my storehouse.

To my utter astonishment, the mute boy spoke.

"Help!" he shouted, "Help me! I cannot swim!"

Taken aback as I was to hear his voice, it was the words he said that haunted me. Who was this child..? What thing had traveled here besides the corpse in its arms. A broken lever propped against the outhouse was all I offered to pull the bodies from the water.

Fiepet grasped it, not letting go until the two were safely laid ashore. It was then I saw the face of the youth he had rescued. The man I had wished death upon... that I had let sink into the mire in the hopes I might slip back into a world that had despised me.

My son.

Not the silent replacement that skulks around my house, but Delph... My flesh and blood Delph has found me at last! I have waited so many years for him... I have prayed to Jophis that he might learn how to wield the velvet water as I taught him, and come to take me from this place. And yet! 

When I ran from Cimbria, he was barely a century old. They had found us, and I had no other choice but to escape! I wanted to explain it... to beg for his forgiveness for what happened then... and for the lake... 

But he does not remember.

After carrying my boy into the house, I saw where the chains cut at his bloodied wrists, the sores that covered his body, and the hues of pitch that adorned his sallow skin. My son... What have they done to you..?

Fiepet lingered by the door of the bedroom, not content until he knew that Delph was breathing, and asking what he may bring to assist me. Whosoever inhabits Fiepet's body now, he seems to harbor no malicious intent... but I fear what my child has done to bring him here. And in part, too, I fear what became of Fiepet's soul when he jumped into the water...

May Jophis guide him.'

Hen pulled her legs closer to her chest, picking up the bedcover and wrapping it tighter where the chill of the air had cooled her skin. The Warlock believed the witch to be dead, and that these were his journals. But two had gone from this world to the land of Grunterbad. Hen shook her head, assured that the Warlock would not be so foolish as to have made such a gross mistake identifying the witch.

He must have seen his body, she reasoned.

'It took some work to remove the irons from about Delph's wrists... I have wrapped them with bandage though I fear the wounds will scar. He looks to be nearing two hundred, but seems small for his age, and much like his mother...

Fiepet assures me that he is the elder of the two. I almost laughed when he declared himself as such. But when I gaze upon my reflection and see my time running out... he is all there will be left to take care of my son when I am gone. I have failed as a father; and can only trust he will succeed as a brother. The soul in Fiepet's skin has almost endeared me to it.

Delph continues to recover. He remembers nothing of his past, of the day his mother died, when I selfishly ran from the man that called himself Protector. I cannot ask what became of Cimbria in my absence, if King Vireo quelled the barbarous warriors that sought to destroy us, and how he has lived all these years without me.

All I can do is atone. I will be a better man. I will be a better father. Delph has taken a liking to Fiepet's care, rather than that of my own. I will allow them to be raised together, and build them as comfortable a future as the land of Grunterbad can afford. No man will besmirch them, and no neighbor refuse them their kindness. Debts. I will see to it that all will owe a debt to my family. That never again will Delphin have to live alone in fear.'

Hen scoured the remainder of the journal, but all that was written was an old man's account of every good deed he had done, and his intention to write a ledger that the boys may know how many favors were owed to them. He lamented his age, regretted his past, and ruminated on what might have been had he never learned to shift the velvet water.

Even at the end, he had nothing left to say but that he'd done all he could, and hoped there would be a path from Grunterbad to the everlasting Hymm. 

Closing the book, Hen hid it away in the space between here and there. She wondered how much the Warlock knew. Biting at the skin around her nails, she stayed her hands and pressed them between the fold of her legs. It was hard to make sense of things, and until she received a reply from Master Brecke, there was little else to do but wait.

She knew as well as the next, that the witch was captured when the Protector ruled the Cimbran Isle, and during his transportation to the capital was when the Warlock fell in love with him. Who hadn't seen the Zauber Play at least a dozen times? King Vireo, on the other hand, lost his throne long before that fateful meeting, when the witch was a still boy. 

The author of these journals, he seemed far too old to have been the man the Warlock was searching for. But his son, Delph... wasn't it possible..?

Hen knew it was only speculation. That just because a man traveled from one world to another, it did not signify that he had any attachment at all to the Warlock. It was better for the Innate to determine fact from fiction; and to do what they could to keep the world turning.

The following morning, Hen was watching her master for signs of discovery, when a missive arrived from the Black Charnel. 'Tell no one of what you have heard,' it read, 'The people's panic will hinder us. Stay quiet, child, and remain in place.'

In her response she assured Master Brecke that she would, but alerted him that she had a journal ...written, it is said, by the witch... currently within her possession. It was not long sent before Lyre appeared at the palace with Fiepet Strahl himself. When she learned that Delph had followed, not only was it confirmed that he was very much alive, but that they needed to find him as quickly as possible.

Whether a harmless amnesiac, a source of great evil, or merely a man drawn into this world by chance; Hen needed to know, and refused to act rashly or reveal too much to either side. Not until she'd had the chance to meet him and decide for herself.

When Cuttle carried his name onto the breeze, the first of her assumptions was proven to be true. 'The Maddening Witch' was a name the winds of the Cimbran Isle had long since recognized. When Ramun arrived to collect them with the carriage, followed in turn by the slower Master Pie, Hen ushered Cuttle in behind the driver's seat and took her place beside him.

"Oh," remarked Lyre, left with no choice but the spot beside Ramun, "You needn't sit with Cuttle out of politeness Mistress Hen. He may have found our direction, but he'd do just as well sitting with Ramun."

Ramun's aghast expression strongly disagreed.

"It's safest for us all in this configuration," he declared, "Just keep a close eye on your lace fichu Mistress Hen, Cuttle's been known to take what doesn't belong to him."

 With no comeback from the rear, Ramun turned his head to ensure Cuttle was still breathing.

"Ah! I think Master Cuttle has eaten something that hasn't agreed with him," cried Hen, "I will take care of him as we go."

Her encouraging nod was enough to persuade them.

With a wave goodbye to Master Pie, Ramun spoke the horses to move. Grumbling beside him was the lovelorn Lyre, while in back, Hen and Cuttle were whispering secrets into one another's ears.

Ignoring the pointed clearing of Lyre's throat from in front, Hen did her best to assuage the shellshocked Cuttle.

"I know," she told him, assuming incorrectly what his thoughts may be, "But there is rumor he has lost his memory, and may not be so wholly evil as some have believed. Let us speak with him first before sharing what we know with the rest of the order."

Cuttle turned his pale and horror-stricken face towards her.

"You!" he cried in a frantic whisper, "I addressed the Divine as 'you'! I told him to lower his head and expelled him from the stage! Oh, Maphis forgive me, I did not recognize his beauty! I- I cannot meet with him again, however could I face him?"

Hen furrowed her brow.

"Master Cuttle," she began, "Do you know the Innate..?"

The actor shook his head. It was just as well, that she had found herself a neutral ally. A hand shot at once to Cuttle's mouth as though a realization had only just dawned.

"What is it?" she asked in concern.

"To think," he sighed, his eyes glittering like stars, "That the Maddening Witch might one day call me 'brother-in-law'."