Penny and the rest of the party stared at the witch who had turned to dust.
For a witch to turn to dust because of getting burnt or killed by the silver bullets wasn't anything new but since Penny had met the male witcher in the house fo the magistrate, she didn't understand why her needles nor the bullets had helped when it came to killing them completely, which was how the body had been taken to the council for Murkh to take a look at it.
Knowing and understanding that the witch had been operated to turn to a vampire, Penny had created the potion of poison accordingly for the black witches which had worked like a charm.
"Witches are not supposed to be taking part in the council," she heard the vampire who was leaning against the tree speak to no one in particular. His face was contorted in pain as he tried to catch his breath, "What's going on, and what was that thing?!"
Like them, the man stared at the octopus-like tentacles that had left a mark on the ground, having a stark contrast of grey dust against the muddy brown and black ground.
"There are black witches who have entered the exam and want to get through the council for their own use," Penny filled him in as this man appeared to be safe to talk to. He was a proper vampire who had not been turned into a vampire from being a black witch, therefore, she said, "There has been a certain movement in the background of the world where the black witches are trying to regain their powers by getting the black magic which had been locked away for several years now."
The vampire pushed himself from the tree and placed his hand on his back trying to stretch, "You're telling me there are more powers to the black witch than what they are now?"
Penny gave him a nod. The black witches were more powerful as they were corrupt. It was usually the corrupt creatures who were powerful because of their reach to different sources. If the black witches were returned with the unbound magic that was hidden and still not completely reachable to them, then it was possible that it wasn't just the pureblooded vampires who would be strong but also the black witches who would end up in a war.
The reason why the black witches' magic was locked away was that the first generation pureblooded vampires must have predicted something. This had led them to the pureblooded vampires to get the white witches to lock the black witches' power but in the end, even the white witches were feared for the damage black witches had done on the people.
"So what are you white witches doing here?" asked the vampire curiously, "You do know that witches cannot enter the council, right?"
"Yes, but the black witches who are in the exam right now can enter the premises. Their bodies have been manipulated," Penny explained to him to hear him comment,
"Clearly I can see that. She spoke about improvisation and here I thought she was a vampiress."
Looks could be deceiving, thought Penny to herself. Who to trust was like walking on a thin thread while not trying to step wrongly on it for it to break.
"Why is she killing the people?" the vampire asked wanting to know what was going on as he felt involved. He had come to complete the task but he didn't know there were going to be so many deaths. He had heard about the second exams but who knew it would turn to a gore.
"So what are you doing here then?" the vampire continued. Sister Jera wiped the sweat before walking towards the main body that had been burnt, bending down and collecting the samples of it.
"We are here to catch the black witches. Before meeting you, she said there are thirteen of us but with her gone, there are twelve of us remaining," which meant the three of them were in the clear leaving nine more examinees as suspects, thought Penny to herself, "We need to find and kill them. If possible bring one alive."
"Why not spray on them and get the answers?" on his question, Penny pursed her lips.
"If it was that easy, the council would have done it but it seems like someone has been giving them information," the witch knew about her being at the Artemis house and it bugged in her mind to know who had told her about it. The humans were under spell, therefore, making it impossible that they would know anything about it. Who had tipped the information?
Another thing that bothered her was the words regarding her mother. For voodoo magic to take place, the performer should have been in a close distance range. The black witch had told how her mother was still near the border the last she heard and Bonelake wasn't a small land. It was one of the largest out of the four lands. It only meant that the last voodoo that had been performed on her was not done by her mother but someone else.
Penelope had not made many enemies except for the silly girls who wanted to put her down but she doubted any of them were witches as they were still scraping from the life they had.
"We don't know how much the witches have modified themselves," Penny said, picking up the needles, she had used, she saw how they had turned black from silver after injecting it into the tentacles earlier, "The spray might now work on everyone and we can't fight all of them at a time. It would result in us turning to one of the dead bodies in the forest."
"What about the task then? Are there no dead bodies?" he asked in frustration.
The man had skipped the last exam which was conducted before this one and when he heard about this exam, he had given his name to attend but who knew he would end up in a mix.
Penny turned to him as Jera stood up after taking the sample of the dust, "There are dead bodies. More like dead people's organs that have been transferred to the black witch's body. We need to bring them to the council. That is the task," the man frowned to say nothing as he let the information in his mind, "We need to head and find the rest of them one by one. We don't know if there are innocent people out of the nine examinees or if all nine are black witches. Maybe except for one who is an idiot."