6°35’44.9” N 6°04’44.2” W

  Near Kouétinfla, Ivory Coast

  18.05.2024 – 20.45 UTC+00:00

  Guarin’s expression was clear: he had had enough. He stood up and went towards his sleeping bag. Rox showed him the pot of boiling muddy soup, but he gestured goodbye. She ignored everything I had just explained, reminding me that my words did not matter anymore. For them now, I was just another witch meant to Curse them.

  The rest of us had a bowl of the vegetable broth and then decided we could catch some sleep for an hour or so. Akissi would stay watch, not that it mattered to me.

  “Kill anyone who threatens me,” I whispered to Sparked Kouadio before I headed to my sleeping bag. I was careful so that no one heard me. I did not want them to know how far my control of him went. It would be better if they could not guess. Kouadio stood still, eyes open, looking at the fire, perhaps looking for the tiny spider in it.

  “Just wake me up when we are ready to go,” Rox said, as she also headed to her sleeping bag. We all chose to go a bit further than the fire. We all needed some space and privacy.

  From where I lay, I could see Akissi looking at the fire. She was speaking to herself. Guarin must have found a spot away from the fire, or to a corner not visible from where I was. Rox seemed fast asleep.

  I took out the small journal from my backpack. I kept it for the past decade through my missions. It was written in a coded form of Dida, so no one would ever be able to read this. Well, one would surely be able to. One day, once this diary was filled with enough horrors, Drissa would inherit its code and read it. Knowing that, sometimes I even referred to him as the reader of the journal. It was perhaps the easiest way to battle the loneliness of my Curse.

  Drissa was the young man that I was bound to by my Curse, and I planned to gift this journal to him, to pass on its knowledge, but only when I knew my death was near. Definitely not yet. For mine and his sake.

  Maybe I would see Drissa soon. I was heading in his direction anyway. Once this was over, I would pass from Yamoussoukro and speak with him.

  Dear Drissa,

  Marin is dead…

  I wrote everything I could for the next few minutes, before my eyelids turned heavy. Until my eyes could not take it anymore. Events got mixed up, as well as locations. I was the most unreliable narrator of my life.

  I guess. I just really hate what I am.

  That was the last sentence I wrote. I did not deserve to write more that night. It would be better if I just slept with that last thought.

  ? ? ?

  At first, I heard the blood. Sleepless and disturbed, and hearts racing. My bloodsense was strong on dreamless nights – but was this real or just a dream? I shifted and shook in my sleeping bag. And then, in a spike of action, I felt blood moving. Striking. I struggled to shake off my sleep and open my eyes.

  I heard a scream.

  “Why PLEASE STOP!” were the crying words that made me finally jump up. This was not a dream. I could now clearly hear there was a deadly commotion in the camp. And then – a gunshot.

  “Guarin?” I shouted. The fire was out, and I could see nothing through the darkness of the wilderness. Struggling to realize what was happening, I closed my eyes: I felt only two more pulses nearby, which could only mean one of us was either far enough or dead.

  I would not take any chances. I had to command Kouadio into action.

  “Kouadio, kill!”

  I heard the Ivorian run, and I stood up from the sleeping bag, trying to take a peek without exposing myself to any stray bullets. I looked next to the fire, extinguished. My eyes were slowly adjusting to the night.

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  Akissi was holding her machete, but she lay lifeless near the campfire. Hers must have been the voice that cried for help. Blood was spilled everywhere around her forehead. She was shot in the head, but it was not a clean shot; it was messy. As if something rugged had forcefully broken through her skull.

  I never thought she would be the next to go. If I were to bet, it would be…

  I heard someone moan their last breath. Guarin. He was bleeding out near the rock he was sitting on just before we headed to sleep, where we had talked about what awaited us in Kouétinfla. I could hear his heart, weakening by the moment. His neck poured blood like a fountain, adding a black, glistening texture to his clothes. He would be gone soon.

  I reached for my gun, unlocking its safety. I had no idea who was shooting and from where. Kouadio was running to the right, and that was my chance to head to Guarin. Maybe save him. Or at least take his pouch.

  I sprang up, ready to shoot if I saw a pair of eyes anywhere or felt a foreign heart pump the wrong way.

  I slid next to Akissi as soon as I could, grabbing her pouch. And then I heard a heartbeat. A familiar one, where Kouadio was heading. I turned my eyes up.

  “Rox?”

  She simply stood there, on the other side of the campsite, holding her hand up. A small dark pebble floated just on top of her palm. For a brief moment, in the dark, I saw the familiarity with the girl I had shot the day before, prowling. She had been taking aim, and so was Rox right now.

  Why? Had she done all this?

  Kouadio thought so. The Sparked brute was on his way to her, following my earlier command. A Sparked man, two times her size. She did not even flinch at the sight of him. She looked at me dead in the eyes, knowing I was the source of this. But this was not simple hate or fear; this was calculated. Her eyes glistened darker than Guarin’s blood.

  I did not even have time to react.

  Her fingers quickly swiveled around the pebble floating on her hand. I heard a gunshot, and the pebble was gone. It felt as if warm water had spilled across my chest. No pain, no breath. I fell to the ground, bleeding out next to Akissi. My eyes locked onto the hole in her forehead, knowing that if I looked at my body, I would see a similar one in my chest. I did not. I stared at Akissi’s mockingly empty eyes.

  What a terrible thing it was again, like every single time.

  ? ? ?

  I charged at Rox. Her expression changed as my left arm, double the size of her neck, grabbed her, her eyes widening in horror, as if she had just realized her terrible miscalculation. I had orders to execute, and I would.

  Rox’s hands wrapped around mine, trying to break free. She was confused, she stuttered, she wanted to fight back, but she quickly realized she was far weaker than me.

  “I am sorry, Kouadio,” she begged.

  On my right arm, I had already grabbed the large stew pot. The only thing that felt fitting. I pinned her to the ground. She flailed her hands and legs around. I felt nothing. The spiders inside had numbed all the pain. I made sure not strangle her. I did not want her to pass out.

  “I AM SORRY!” she begged, trying to stretch to my left. I looked: a satchel, opened with pebbles spilling out. All marked with a peculiar grey dot. They were not pebbles; they were her weapons, and she desperately tried to reach them. I looked at her. I knew she could not, but this was enough hope for her. I dragged her further to the right, pressuring her against the ground as I did, making sure she felt each rock like a knife.

  It was super-human. Insane strength. I could never drag someone across with my left hand. She was like a toy in my hands.

  She stopped screaming, but she was alive, spitting blood and mud. I pinned her once more to the ground, this time far away from anything she could use to escape. She looked to me with begging eyes. She was going to negotiate.

  “You have to believe me, I had no choi-”

  With my right hand, I raised the stew pot and smashed it over her head. I did not hold back. My strength had tripled; every web spun in my muscles had made them quadrupled in size.

  I raised the pot and smashed it again at full force. Amazing.

  “Kill!” I shouted.

  Again, again, again. And again.

  I stopped. My arms were finally tired, swollen; I looked at them. Covered in blood and spider webs. And on the ground lay the woman with the pulverized head, another Cursed girl. What was left of Rox. Her pouch, one of the six, was strapped to her belt. I ripped her belt, and strapped it alongside the mine and Marin’s.

  I turned around. I walked to Guarin. He had all but bled out just next to the large rock. Had he seen my glory in the last of his painful moments? Maybe. I relieved him of his pouch as well.

  On the left, next to the fire, Akissi’s soulless eyes met mine. But her pouch I had taken. Demi had taken. I walked up to my Cursed body, lifeless. It had a big, open wound in its chest right at the center. I looked beautiful and peaceful. Demi looked beautiful and peaceful. Rested.

  I snapped the two pouches off of her, bringing this to a total of six.

  I looked at the sky. I could still make it on time. I wanted to roar. But I could only say one thing.

  “Kill.”