The Curse of Deadman's Forest by Victoria Laurie

changed at the last minute, and that he intends to take the children with him on the journey.”
    The driver was silent for a long time. “Master will insist we find out why they are going there.”
    “Yes, my thoughts exactly.”
    “We have friends in Madrid,” he said after a pause. “But I would not trust them to uncover this information alone, and I cannot go. I received a telegram from the master earlier this evening. He needs my assistance in Versailles. I must depart for France immediately.”
    “I can go alone, Dieter,” volunteered the passenger.
    Again the driver was silent while he contemplated that. “Very well,” he said, relenting. “Follow them, Hylda. Once you arrive in Madrid, make contact with our Spanish comrades and enlist their help to discover why the children are journeying there.”
    “Of course,” she replied with a wickedly sly smile she reserved only for her husband.
    “And if you gain the opportunity …,” he added, allowing his voice to trail off.
    “Kill them?” she asked coyly, stroking his cheek.
    “Yes,” he confirmed. “And have no doubt,
liebling
, if you do, our master will be most pleased.” And then he leaned in to give her a kiss. “Most pleased indeed,” he whispered again before starting the car and driving off.

A DARK MEETING
    M agus the Black sat across from the Witch of Versailles and was already irritated by the woman’s nervous manner. Since he and Dieter had entered her dirty and cluttered flat, he’d been unimpressed, and he had already made up his mind to kill her for wasting his time.
    He watched her with disdain while she hovered over her crystal ball, waving her shaking fingers and muttering under her breath. He’d asked the woman only one question, “Where is my sister, Lachestia?” and for the past several minutes, she’d been mumbling incoherently, delaying her answer.
    Magus looked over his shoulder at Dieter, who only shook his head contemptuously and frowned as the woman muttered on and on under her breath.
    Magus turned back to the witch, his eyes smoldering with impatience. He knew she could sense the evil that wafted off him, but it had made the woman almost too petrified to help him, and he was quickly becoming tired of it.He allowed her only a few more moments before he slammed his fist onto the tabletop, causing sparks to fly out from the impact. “Speak, woman!” he shouted at her.
    The witch was so startled that she reeled backward and nearly toppled out of her chair, but Magus’s outburst seemed to shake some sense into her, and the ugly middle-aged woman gasped, “She resides in a grave!”
    Magus’s sneer turned sinister. “If you are telling me that my sister is dead, then we are finished here.” The sorcerer knew that his sister lived. Her passing would most definitely have been noted by his father when her spirit was received in the underworld.
    “I did not say she was dead,” the witch added in a rush. “I meant to say that she resides underground.”
    Magus tapped his fingers on the tabletop, and each tap left a black smudge in the wood. “Where?” he asked after a long silence.
    The witch wiped a strand of stringy gray hair out of her eyes and focused on her crystal ball again. “She is imprisoned by stones,” she said to him. “Deep within a forest bound by a powerful curse. Within the earth that surrounds her are the bones of dead men, too numerous to count.”
    Magus’s fingers ceased their tapping. “Where?” he repeated, and this time his tone was deadly.
    The witch closed her eyes to concentrate. “East,” she whispered. “Just the other side of Germany. You will find your sister at the German/Polish border on the edge of a village … called …” The witch’s voice trailed off for a moment as she concentrated. “Lubieszyn!”
    Magus leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms, considering what the witch had told him. He was well aware of the legend regarding the last sighting of Lachestia.