Chapter 391 The Roots of Fear

Chapter 391: Chapter 391 The Roots of Fear

Emilia’s POV

News traveled fast in a place this small.

By afternoon, Grandmother had heard that my class had kept most of its students. She found me in the kitchen, pleased with the news.

"You’re doing it," she said, setting a cup of tea in front of me. "Slowly, but you’re doing it. They’re starting to see you."

"Some of them," I corrected. "The rest are still deciding whether I’m a traitor or a curiosity."

"Progress is progress." She tapped the table. "And since you’ve been so busy teaching my witches, it’s time you got back to learning some magic yourself. From me."

I lifted my cup. "Are you offering to teach me witchcraft, Grandmother?"

"I’m telling you, not offering. There’s a difference. You’ll learn that too."

From the stove, Mindy snorted. "Just don’t wear her out, Margarita. The girl’s carrying precious cargo now." She pointed her wooden spoon at me. "She’s our protected treasure these days."

I rested a hand on my barely visible belly, smiling at the thought of the little one.

"Please. I’d never do anything to upset this little one. We have an understanding."

"Good to know someone in this house does," Eve muttered.

Mindy laughed. "I’ll leave the magic to you two. Someone has to make sure you actually eat."

I followed Grandmother into her study. Dried herbs hung from the rafters, and the room smelled of smoke and something sweet. She pulled out an old book and began teaching me some of the witchcraft she’d practiced for years.

For the first time in a long while, I felt safe.

But that didn’t last.

Two days later, I arrived at the meeting hall to find my class notice torn off the wall. Its scraps were scattered across the floor.

I picked them up.

The next morning, someone had drawn crude symbols on the door in dark chalk. A half-blood. A wolf. Both crossed out.

On the third day, I found a block of silverwood on my desk. A faint curse clung to it. Whoever had left it clearly wanted me to know I wasn’t welcome.

"Charming," Eve growled. "I’d like to meet whoever left that. Just for a chat."

Word spread, and everyone had an opinion.

Some called it a prank by bored young witches. Others thought I should swallow my pride and put up with a little hazing if I wanted to fit in. A few worried that things might get worse and attract dangerous witches from outside Hollowthorn, putting everyone at risk.

Grandmother heard it all. When she came to see me, she was furious.

"Give me some names. Or at least tell me who you suspect. I’ll have them all in my study by sundown. They’ll regret treating you this way."

She meant it. She could drag everyone involved into her study, and the whole town would fall in line.

That was exactly the problem.

"No," I said.

She stared at me. "No?"

"If they only respect me because they’re afraid of you, nothing has changed. I’ll still be the outsider hiding behind your skirts. The half-blood who needs her grandmother to fight her battles."

She started to reply, then stopped. Maybe she’d never considered that protecting me with her authority could also keep everyone else at a distance.

"Then what do you want?"

"I want to teach my class. Same time, same place. That’s all."

I didn’t demand an apology or call a meeting. I simply gathered the torn pieces of my notice and pinned them back on the wall, crooked edges and all.

When class began that afternoon, a few witches who had only watched from the sidelines decided to stay.

Melissa was the first to get up. She picked up a piece of the notice I’d missed and pressed it back against the wall.

"There," she said. "Now it’s straight."

Carina didn’t help, but she didn’t sneer either. She took her usual seat at the back and let the lesson pass without a word.

After class, I thought about it. This wasn’t Carina’s style. She was blunt and sometimes downright rude, but she wasn’t the type to hide behind anonymous threats. Tearing down notices, drawing curses, leaving cursed objects on my desk. That sounded like someone else.

Someone who resented me but wouldn’t say it to my face.

"Cowards," Eve said. "The worst kind. The quiet ones."

She was right, but I still didn’t know why anyone hated me enough to go this far.

So I decided to find out. I started visiting the witches, one household at a time.

Not as Margarita’s granddaughter, but as myself. I wanted to understand the people I was supposed to live among.

Why wouldn’t Beatrice let the younger witches touch anything modern? Why was Hazel so afraid of the outside world? Why did Melissa follow Carina everywhere when they had so little in common? I wanted to know what each girl was good at and what she feared.

I found some answers in their homes.

I spent an afternoon helping Beatrice make honey cakes. While we worked, she told me she’d always distrusted phones. Years ago, someone had convinced her that photographs could steal a witch’s face and help hunters track her down.

"Nonsense, I know that now," she said, kneading the dough. "But fear takes root deep. It’s not so easy to get rid of."

I helped Hazel sort her herbs and label the jars. Her grandmother had filled her childhood with stories of witches dragged from their beds and hunted by men who called it justice. To Hazel, the forest wasn’t a prison. It was what kept her safe.

Another afternoon, I took a group of younger girls to gather reeds by the river. They traded stories about the outside world. Wolves who used witches and threw them away. Half-bloods who turned against their own kind, bringing trouble wherever they went.

They glanced at me, then quickly looked away. I was both things they feared.

Slowly, I began to understand.

Most of the hostility came from fear, passed down through generations. These women hadn’t necessarily been taught to hate me. They’d been taught to survive, and everything I represented seemed dangerous.

Outsiders hunted witches. Wolves betrayed them. Half-bloods brought trouble. To them, opening the door to the outside world meant losing everything they’d spent generations protecting.

They weren’t simply ignorant. They were afraid.

"You can’t bandage this the way you bandaged Posy’s arm," Eve said.

"No," I agreed. "I can’t."

Sitting by the river, I realized that trust couldn’t be taught in a classroom. Lessons about first aid and phones might help, but they weren’t enough.

The witches needed to see the outside world for themselves. Not hear about it from me or read about it on a notice. They needed to experience it firsthand.

I gathered the last of the river reeds and stood up.

Tomorrow, I’d go to downtown Haven’s Reach.