I have to run.

I have no choice.

I don’t know where I’m going, or where I’ll end up, but as long as I’m as far away from this town as I can be, it’ll be fine.

“Clarice, please come back!” My friend Katherine called to me, chasing me through the trees as if this is just an innocent game of tag. “You don’t have to run! You can trust me!”

I clutch the lantern tighter in my hands, pulling up my heavily-layered skirt in the other. My feet tumble over leaves and twigs as I reach into the darker parts of the forest.

The glow of my lantern is slowly losing it’s brightness, slowly like the sun when it hides behind the horizon. The creatures of the night are becoming more visible, their eyes cutting through me like a knife.

“Clarice!”

A hand tugs at my arm, pulling me to a halt.

Katherine’s words decrescendo down to a whisper. “I promise I won’t tell anyone you’re a witch. You my best friend. My only friend. I couldn’t bear to lose you.”

“Kathy…”

My sentence trails off into the night air. I am unsure weather to push her away or let her return me to the village.

“I have plenty of places to hide the evidence. Nobody will know but us,” Katherine pleads.

“You know that’ll be—“ I sigh. Her brown eyes looking into mine like a stray puppy begging for food. Resisting her is no longer an option.

“Fine,” I say, “I’ll return to the village with you. But as soon as we get there, we’re burning the evidence. It’s the only thing we can do to reassure our safety.”

We walked back to our village from where we came, every now and then losing our way through the maze of trees. The leaves and brambles were much easier to walk through now that I wasn’t running for my life.

“You know, I’ve always suspected you were a witch,” Katherine says.

“Really?” I ask.

“Yeah. You’re very intelligent for a woman. Possibly more intelligent than the smartest boys at school.” She looked back at me and smiled. I kept my face in its natural resting position, not accepting her attempt at a compliment. When a woman is smart, it has nothing to do with the satanic rituals and spells witches. It has to do with her academic integrity. Unlike most of the girls in my class, I enjoy learning new things. Especially when they are things typically taught to men.

“We’re almost there. Just a little ways to go,” Katherine cheers.

I nod slowly, watching for the clusters of wooden houses and cobblestone buildings that emerge from the ground. Soon, we arrive. Meeting at our return was the rest of the villagers.

“Finally!” A sigh of relief escapes me. But the feeling is only temporary. As we approach closer, I can see the villagers carrying pitchforks and torches, their expressions angry like wolves in a pack surrounding its prey. Mutters of disapproval and fear snake amongst the crowd.

“Katherine, what is this?” I try to pull away, but her grip has tightened, chaining me to her.

“Burning down the evidence, obviously!”

One of the villagers—a woman with hair as black as night—took her torch, approached my home, and fed it to its destructive flames. From the ground up, the fire swallowed it whole, eliminating its foundations.

“No! Please stop!” I yell out. I express my fear and anguish until my vocal cords or raw, begging for all the mercy I can get, but instead I am surrounded in a circle of people, unable to leave.

“Witches deserve no mercy,” Katherine whispered, her haunting words brushing against my ears, joining in the circle. Tears brim my eyes, unable to truly believe her betrayal, believe her lies. I long to reach out and hug her, to feel her warmth one last time, but I knew she’d push me away, expel me from her comfort.

“Kill the witch,” The villagers chant, closing in on me like a cage. My breaths become heavy, burning my lungs like the fire that’s taking away my home.

“Kill the witch!” My knees buckle, collapse on to the dewy grass.

Kill the witch!” I have given up. The circle is now suffocating me, arms reaching out, grabbing onto me like handcuffs. My heart palpitates in my chest as I am taken to the hanging tree. My mind races, thinking of all the people I love. How I’ll never see them again.

“Kill the witch!” The noose is around my neck, just a kick of the stump away from cinching my airways closed. I have no choice but to accept death. Even when I was careful with everything I did, even when I did my practices at 10:00 pm and not at midnight, the so-called witching hour. After all that, I still ended up here. I close my eyes, accepting my slow death and soon, my journey to the flames of damnation.

“KILL! THE! WITCH!”