It was mid-autumn when the trees lost their leaves, birds immigrating to the south. The moon cast a pale light down onto the ground. A desperate woman, her hair in disarray, was trying to run away from an angry mob, wielding torches as red as their faces. She was wounded by the head of Camelot’s mob; a man with curly brown hair and a sharp chin. His lips were curled, baring his teeth in a sharp, malicious smirk. The woman’s face was half burnt; a large smudge of aggravated skin disfiguring over half of her features, boiling on her skin. Before she could realize her surroundings, it was too late.
She ran off of a cliff above a rushing river, strong and loud enough to be heard just before her fall. It’s the feeling of air rushing around her before cold, cold waters surrounding her and pinching her exposed skin. The furious mob, now triumphant, cheers and chatters amongst themselves for yet another successful hunt. They shouted in unison: “The witch has gone”. The leader of the hunting party spits down upon the river, where the woman is carried away, flailing, by the strong currents.
“Vengeance, for my wife and children, you disgusting wench.”
His comment is punctuated by loud hooting and hollering from his peers, who give each other pats on the back for driving a woman off of a cliff. They walk away from the deep waters, wary of the edge. The leader lingers, watching the woman go, making sure she doesn’t come back, before turning his back and following his friends.
The sun slowly approached, peaking through the mountain; raised the sunshine leaking through the foliage. A farmer, who was leaving Camelot to head back to his farm, accidentally found a woman on the side of the river. By his grace, he decided to carry the woman home and saved her. The farmer was nonetheless a young man who had never really seen such beautiful yet strong woman in his life. Although it was unknown to him how she got to the river, he praised her for surviving through the icy currents.
He carried her home upon his worn and weary back, and carefully treated her wound with a pair of tender hands belonging to that of a lover. He watched over her and measured her progress with focus, the longer she stayed within his humble home, the more and more he found himself in love. Watching over her was like a blessing, a balm to his lonely soul, and he feared, the day she would have to leave. He ached to meet her eyes, ached for them to see each other once again, like that fateful day when he plucked her from the river as if she were a delicate flower.
Weeks passed, and he grew desperate. Even thinking of calling a doctor, if only fearful of the reaction they’d have to her scorched face, he sat by her bedside almost every day, telling her how his day had been, introducing himself time and time again. He asked her of her name, once, and resolved to ask her once she awoke.

‘Once’ became ‘if’, at the mark of three weeks.

When she finally opened her eyes, he was out in the fields, cutting rye and watching the billowing willows, working hard and sweating. She was afraid of him, he knew, and he soothed her, by laying his farming tools to the ground and putting his hands up in the universal act of surrender. She flinched away from the movement, even if he was so, so far away, and it was like a blow straight to his face. The man wondered what she had been through at that time, only knowing that she was wanted, and decided that he wanted to heal her. Offering to her his name, he told her of how he helped her to recover, and how worried he had been when he found her floating in the river. She was touched, flattered even, that despite her ugly scars, she would still be able to find kindness in someone who didn’t even know who she was.
There was a time when she was out in the woods, collecting mushrooms. She tried to find the best mushrooms just so she could cook the best meal for her man. It was dawn when she was done collecting. She realized that she had better head home; otherwise she’d make her husband worried. Nonetheless, he had already left the farm to look for her, scared that she’d leave him once again. She wandered the forest looking for the way back but it was too dark. She thought of using her power to guide her home; but as she started a spell, she heard noises from a group of people approaching towards her. She recalled the last time she used her power, her eyebrows pressing together to create a crease of concern. Panicking, she tried her best to run away from the group. However, one man from the group spotted her running, and it alerted him to the notion of a witch being alone in the woods at night, killing animals or worse, innocent children. They ran after her with only one reason: to terminate her, and protect the innocent.
Once again, she ran without giving any thought as to where she was going, only concerned about fleeing and getting far, far away. She hit a solid wall and fell right away, crumpling like tissue paper. As she fell on the floor, she started stuttering, eyes wide and glassy. “Please don’t kill me! Please don’t kill me! I didn’t do anything!” Fortunately, she ran into her husband. He calmed her down by proving it was him and did his best to ask her why she was running. Knowing that it was him soothed her frazzled nerves. She was about to explain to him what happened, when the group of men caught up to her. Instead of telling her husband the story, she took his hand and ran. He was clueless as to the danger of their situation, but followed his wife faithfully, trusting her not to lead them both astray.
They finally escaped the group of men. With all the courage she had, she told him that she was a witch and the scar on her face was the result of the assault. She believed that if she told him, he would hand her in because all men were the same. But what she received not only proved her wrong, it also gave her hope. He promised to protect her and that no one would ever find her again.
In order to protect his wife, the husband built a tower on an island close to his cottage. He built four magnificent walls to protect the tower. The witch decided to secretly cast a spell upon the tower and was foolishly asked the power of the dark to protect one and only one person. And it was for her.
Unfortunately, happiness was not a part of the witch’s fate. She was ironically cursed for being a witch. The witch-hunting party once again came to the merciful man’s small cottage. Her husband advised her to stay in the tower, where it would keep her safe; however, she knew it would sufficient enough to protect both her and their child. So she would flee once more, through the ruby leaves and autumn air, scented with the danger of the hunt, and the pungent odor of fear.
Leaving to him, her husband, an amulet of protection she handcrafted herself. She hoped that it would somehow protect him from the hunters. She fled with her baby a few months after giving birth, allowing for her child to make memories with her father. She was very lost by the time the moon finally arose, her legs sore from carrying their first child through the fields. Not too far away from the cottage, she heard a scream. She turned back and saw men dragged her worn husband out of the cottage, calling him ‘witch-loving scum’ from a distant. They beat him to death for struggling against their ropes, and she even saw them tearing the amulet she left him out of his callused hands, the grooves of the necklace leaving red marks on his skin. Eventually, he stopped fighting against them, and fell limp, bruised and broken. By then, the witch was sobbing as quietly as she could, cradling her child to her chest, hiding her eyes away from the terrible scene.
Then, they burned his body, lighting a torch and tossing it onto his limp form. By then, the witch could care less of what they did to her. She would have ran into the scene, pregnant or not, if not for the tiny hand clutching onto her too hot palms and soft, delicate skin pressed against her own. Instead, she kissed her daughter’s head, brushing her chapped lips against the soft tufts of hair only just beginning to sprout and she snuck away from the danger to a tall, isolated tower that her husband diligently built for her. She cunningly chose to stay at the tower because it would give her more time to be with her daughter before she walked the same path as her husband. 
Living in the tower for many years, the little girl did not know why her mother never let her look outside the tower nor did she always act coldly towards her. She was taught to weave because her mother told her weaving would help her not looking at Camelot. She weaved all day and got tired of it over time. However, she wasn’t brave enough to stop weaving.
It was an unusually nice day, her mother not in the tower to keep her company. While weaving, she heard the sound of horses along with the chit-chatting of people. She grew used to these noises, her curiosity sated by the words of her mother. Suddenly, she heard a low voice singing. She stopped weaving and stared into the walls of her tower, bewitched. She completely disregarded her mother’s warning and ran out of the tower, spotting a young boy sitting on a horse. Beside him was a middle-aged man, stopping by the side of the river to allow the horse to rest. The boy sang like a siren, luring in anyone who listened to him. He finished his song and turned around to the man nearby, to make sure he was listening and to seek compliments. His father gave him a proud look, nearly beaming in praise. He smiled at his son. “I love it when you sing, Lancelot. You shall soon become a knight with a voice that could kill thousand men and seduce a thousand women in a day.”  The little girl was so amazed with his voice that she stood there, her eyes wide with wonder and amazement, continuing to look off into the distance. Her dream was then cut off when her mother angrily held her hand tightly and dragged her inside. Her mother was not happy to see her little girl ran outside, something that she had never done. Her mother raised her voice at her and listed what people from outside the tower could do as she pointed at her scar. Her mother then forced her to promise something to her; never to look nor listen to anything from outside of the tower.
The witch raised her child, until her daughter was old enough to protect herself and understand what she was saying, and told her to stay in the tower until she came back. The witch warned her daughter once again that looking out to the town would harm her deeply, that it would kill her, and kissed her one last time before she walked into the town of Camelot. The villagers rounded her up almost immediately, shouting and causing a ruckus, leading the witch hunters to her. She was reminded of when her husband was in her position, and her eyes grew glassy, her throat tight with her longing and grief.
While the townsfolk strung her up, she did not fight, even when they kicked her belly and broke her ribs, piercing her lung. All she could think about was her husband, of how he must’ve felt when they did this to him. Blood ran between her legs when a man stabbed her in her womb, and she did not utter a word through the loss, up until they lit her aflame. With the flickering flames spreading a disgusting stench of burnt hair and flesh, she began to murmur a curse, which spilled out of her lips like the crimson staining her pale, frail legs.
“Like the way the leaves burn red
You burnt him; now he’s dead

I won’t forgive
I won’t forget

You’ll understand my despair
You’ll know regret
When you see the leaves change
Await mid-autumn, the child of the Faye

You’ll see the most beautiful thing
And scorch like he did; you’ll die smoldering

You believe me to be a sin walking?
You’ll live long enough to see your sin come knocking.”

Little did she know, the future of her daughter would soon come to rot in her curse because her daughter was not the only thing that was beautiful. Camelot was also beautiful.
Far from the town of Camelot, safe within her tower, the little girl was weaving while she waited for her mother. She found herself a mirror, and stood to where she could see into the window. The moonlight cast a reflection of the still, golden rye fields, of the ransacked farmhouse just a few miles from her new home, and of the beautiful bonfire a large town had roaring within the centre of their tiny kingdom. The young girl then wondered when her mother would come back, the moon’s light which reflected off of her mirror painting her face in pale gold. She weaved as she sang a song from a boy named Lancelot.