What makes a witch, Layla?

Darkness at 4 AM in late September. I was laying still and trying to sleep, while my witch was still awake, listening to the screaming of the storm outside our window.

„Layla?“, I asked. „What makes a witch?“
She did not answer, but I knew that she had heard me.
„I mean“, I tried to explain myself, what makes you a witch?“

„I believe, I already told you all there is to know“, she eventually answered, and there the rain began to buzz violently against our window.

But I was confused.

„You always say witchcraft does not work, but you know everything about it. You say that people wanted you dead because they needed someone to blame for disaster, and still you bring scented candles, and wine and praise the full moon.“

Layla waited for a moment, taking a sip of her vanilla scented tea. She was wearing nothing but a short, white nightdress and I wondered if she was getting cold.

„There are different ways to become a witch“, she whispered after a while. „One of them is to survive Dystopia, and be in the way when the world needs someone to blame.“ She hesitated, and I felt a strong and painful emotion rise within my chest. „But what if you survive all of that? Against all odds, there might be someone to save you, and you get another chance. A few more years to live in this world.“ Her cup was empty and she curled the purple strands of her hair over her long fingers.

I knew who she was thinking of. I knew why there was something yearning in our chest. For girls, this might have been the moment to think of a prince to come and save us from death. For us witches … Well, we think of a morbid figure appearing with death and despair and freeing us from the life that had condemned us.
“Your plague doctor“, I whispered.

I did not have one. I also did not have a prince. They never last, because they are not as strong as the witches plague doctor, and I constantly damage them. Ouch. Fragile, but delicious – and before I would curl myself up in yearning and sadness, another thought occurred.

„How was your life with the plague doctor?“, I asked my witch.

And Layla giggled into the darkness. „He knew all kinds of things“, she would say. „And people came to him, to ask him for these things. Dark and secret things. They risked a lot to see him, and to get a tea that would sooth their nightmares, or a root that would make their lover stay.“ Layla tiptoed into my bed and lay down next to me to rest her head on my shoulder. „Now and then he had those visitors over, and I loved the way he dealt with them. Some of them, he liked. Some were funny to him, and some really upset him, and afterwards evil words would slip from his lips that would make me laugh.“ Layla sighed. „He became a plague doctor to stay hidden. He was much older than me, and his understanding of secret things had already brought him a lot of trouble. But he knew how to deal with people. And so, when not being called for duty as the doctor when everything was already lost, he made a living of having the fascinating solution for a shameful problem.“

My hands ran over her ice cold shoulders fitting my night dress too well. „And when he … was gone …“
Layla swallowed heavily. „When he did not return one day, I had nowhere to go. I was still sentenced as a witch and could not get close to any city or village. And I had to survive.“
„So, you tried to continue his dark and secret business“, I concluded.

„Yes, I did“, my witch would admit. „But I was not as skillful as him. I was lacking the experience, and the knowledge of the outside world. So … One day, the wrong people became aware of the lonely Lady practicing forbidden crafts in her house deep in the forest.“
„And that time you …“
„That time, no one was left to save me.“