After a secret morning breakfast of apples from the orchard, Anya and Dimitri had come up with a plan.  There was only one thing to do: they had to leave Wiebke's farm immediately.

"We'll tell her when we go back inside," he said as they sat on the loft at the top of Wiebke's barn (in shoes, which Dimitri was very grateful for!).

"I'm not telling her!" Anya said.  "You can count me out!"

"Fine, fine, I'LL do it.  But I expect you to back me up!"

"Anything as long as we get out of here."  She shifted a little, then looked over at Dimitri.  "Do you think we made a mistake in switching the medicine?  Wiebke looked really distraught when she saw Vlad wasn't any better."

"Probably because she was expecting a dead corpse!"

Anya sighed.  "I think we've blown this out of proportion."

"Look, you KNOW there's something strange about her.  I just...don't know what."  He rested his head in his hands.  "I wish I could figure it out."

"Oh children!  There you are!"  Wiebke appeared below them.

"Um, uh...Hi, Wiebke!" Anya said as she and Dimitri jumped up.  Wiebke's smile faded.

"I think I feel danger.  Yes, something is going to go wrong...I think you two should come down immediately!"

"Oh great, she's a psychic!" Dimitri muttered.  "Oh, no, we're fine, thanks.  Really, we are just fineeee and dandy."

"Dimitri, please, I feel that something wrong is about to happen and..."

"I promise it's -- AHHH!"

The loft caved in under Anya and Dimitri, sending everything up there -- including them -- spiraling to the ground.

~*~

Dimitri felt like his head was about to split right in half.  He opened his eyes slowly, then shut them.  That light was so bright...

"Close the curtains, Vlad," Wiebke said.  Vlad obediently closed them.  Dimitri opened his eyes, this time met with a peaceful dimness.

Wiebke was standing over him, Vlad over Anya.  The accident came back to Dimitri -- but shouldn't he feel more pain?  Right now the only thing that hurt was his head.

"Are...are we okay?" he finally whispered quietly.  Wiebke smiled and nodded, slowly smoothing his hair back.

"You're both fine.  Barely even a scratch!  But I'm sure you have a horrible headache!"

"Yeah," Dimitri laughed.  He heard Anya slowly wake up in the bed beside his.  Wiebke smiled and distributed two small cups.

"Drink all of this.  Before you know it you'll be as good as new."

Dimitri hesitated, then gulped the whole thing down.  Anya followed suite.  They must have nine lives if both he and Anya could have survived that loft tumbling in with little more than a bruise!

Wiebke sat down in a chair between their beds.  "I just feel so sorry that my medicine didn't work for Vlad.  I felt sure it could!"

Dimitri blushed and looked over at Anya.  She looked down at the coverlet in shame.

"Wiebke we...kind of switched the medicine," she said quietly.

"You what?" Vlad said.  He ran the hankie under his dripping nose.  "Why ever would you do that?"

"We...eh..."  Dimitri sighed.  "We thought Wiebke was trying to kill us.  We thought she was a witch."

"A witch?!" Wiebke said.

Dimitri prepared himself for the cruel remarks that would obviously follow -- but instead got playful laughs.

"Oh my, a witch...that's rich!  Do I have a big wart on my nose or something?" She and Vlad both laughed together.  Even Pooka seemed to find the whole incident funny as he rolled on his back and panted.

Anya joined in.  "It was a little crazy, I guess.  Okay, make that VERY crazy!"

"We saw the guns," Dimitri explained, "and then we started to worry about the medicine.  Before long we were reading curse books in the basement and trying to capture possessed mice!"  He tried to hold it back, but chuckled along with them.  "I guess you could say we definitely exceeded the bounds of a good house guest!"

Wiebke giggled.  "Those guns you were scared of were my late husband's collection.  He was perhaps a little eccentric like me, and loved to go hunting!  The 'curse book' is a copy of Shakespeare's MacBeth -- at least I think that's the one you mean!  And as for the mice...well, unfortunately I don't possess mice.  If I did I'd send them away!  No, I'm just a lonely little old woman, with my dog Hans to only keep me company.  Oh, and quite a few rats and bugs!"

Dimitri smiled and touched her arm.  "Well, I think I speak for all of us when I say that we'd LOVE to cure that loneliness and stay a few days!"

~*~
"I can't believe that tomorrow we'll be on a boat to Paris!" Anya said excitedly.  She and Dimitri were sharing a booth at a small hotel restaurant as Vlad rested upstairs.  Ever since Wiebke's medicine he'd felt like a new person -- except when Five o'clock naptime hit!

"Me neither," he said as he took a bite of an onion ring.  "You know, this food is good, but Wiebke's Sauerbraten was the BEST!"

"Mm, I know.  I can just taste it!  We were so foolish when we stayed at her farm."

Dimitri laughed.  "I know.  I felt so horrible after jumping to conclusions like that.  Talk about being idiots!"  He took another bite.  "What worse could we accuse her of being?  A ghost?"

Anya giggled. "Yeah, like she was the Lady of the Lake!"

"Boo!"  Dimitri teased her.  "And I bet Hans was the ghost dog!"

They both laughed, then stopped abruptly.  Looking up slowly, they met each other's eyes.

"Do you think...?"

"No, she couldn't...could she?"

"It's ridiculous..."

"Jumping to conclusions..."

They both leaned in a little more towards each other.

"Or are we?"

© 1999 AnyaMuse@aol.com
© 1999 AnyaCI@aol.com