Read Witch & Wizard for Free Online

worst thing that could ever happen to me.
    As we rode through the city, we kept our faces pressed against a tiny window in the foul-smelling van—desperate for sunlight, if nothing else—watching the city streets go by, watching soldiers, soldiers everywhere.
    Until we saw a new sign being constructed by workmen.
    WANTED FOR TREASON
    AND CRIMINAL PRACTICE OF FOUL ARTS
    Underneath the words were black-and-white photographs of Mom and Dad.
    And then the kicker:
    DEAD OR ALIVE!
    “They got away,” Whit whispered. “They’re out there somewhere. Somehow, we’ll find them.”

Wisty
    WHEN THE UGLY BLACK NEW ORDER VAN finally stopped, it was raining hard outside and the wind howled. We were parked in front of another large building, this one with high stone walls that looked charred, kind of like an old factory. Stains over the doorway revealed where foot-high letters used to be. They had read GENERAL BOWEN STATE PSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL .
    For a moment, I got the idea this nightmare might actually make sense.
That’s it!
I thought with a breath of hope.
I’m psychotic! Everything that’s just happened has been a clever collection of my own delusions.
    That would explain the fire… the strange and random appearance of Byron Swain… the death sentence for being a witch.
    The good doctors’ll treat me here, Mom and Dad will come get me when I’m well, and everything will be fine again. I’m just psychotic, is all. No biggie.
    I smiled involuntarily at the thought. Whit looked over at me like I was—not surprisingly—certifiably insane. I sure hoped so.
    “What’s with you? You’re half smiling. Why? This looks like a hellhouse.” He grimaced.
    “Well, what were you expecting?” I said with a titter. “Warm and fuzzy?”
    We were whisked out of the van and past the stone walls. “Move it!” The guard jabbed me in the back with his baton, pushing me into a wide, dark hallway. One faint fluorescent light flickered at its distant end. A light at the end of the tunnel? I doubted
that.
    “Will I be treated here?” I took the chance of asking. “When can I meet with the doctor?”
    Whit twisted his head around and gave me another confused look.
    “This is a jail of the New Order, girlie,” one of the guards said, sounding both brusque and nervous. “For
dangerous
criminals. Like you two.”
    We were pushed into a very dim stairwell, lit by only the faintest light seeping under the doorways at each landing. My legs were shivery, probably because we hadn’t had anything real to eat since oh-nightmare-thirty. The guards marched us up higher and higher until I surrendered to fatigue and quit counting the landings.
    Finally we entered yet another dark hallway with what looked to be an ancient nurses’ station front and center. A woman inside was slouched over her desk, engrossed in
New Order Administrator
magazine. She must have been enormously tall, because even though she was sitting, she was able to look down at me.
    “Yes?” she croaked like a frog who’d smoked too many cigarettes. “Why are you bothering me?”
    Dark eyes, without any whites, bored into mine. She had a crooked nose and a pointy chin with a huge mole that had wiry black hairs growing out of it. Heck, if the New Order was really looking to arrest witches…
    “Two more despicable degenerates for you, Matron,” announced one of the guards. “A witch and a wizard.”
    My stomach sank down into my socks. My short-lived fantasy of psychosis was officially over.
    You know life really sucks when you’re desperately wishing to be institutionalized, drugged, or shocked back to reality. I’d gladly take a lobotomy at this point. I guess that’s what you’re faced with when freedom isn’t even a pipe dream any longer.
    Give me lobotomy or give me death!

Whit
    “POLICE MUST BE DREDGING every rancid trash pile in the country,” the Matron snarled, “finding all these…
maggots
for me to look after.”
    And with that cheerful introduction,