“You’ll get exactly what you deserve,” Trish said to Loni as he cowered into the corner of the basement. “I don’t go back on my promises.” Trish snickered. “As a matter of fact Loni… I think you’re gonna have a payment better than you could have ever imagined.” She laughed at him as Loni’s face contorted out of pure fear. “Oh yes, there is a LOT more than gold on offer for you! However, I need something from you.”
Loni remained silent. He didn’t want to open his eyes which he had clamped shut in horror of both what the sorceress was going to do to him, but also his own responsibility in whatever she might do to others in the world. It was all his fault. He couldn’t look at her. He couldn’t even look at himself right now. Trish did not like this and became a lot sterner.
“I said I need something from you.” Trish said, raising her voice which previously came off as so gentle.
“What?! What is it?!” Loni blurted out, not paying attention to the fact this might have offended her.
“I need… an audience.” Trish replied, her voice calming down again as she re-established control on the situation. “Loni… stop pounding on my door and look at me.”
Loni did not respond. Panic was still rushing through him. He had hit the door on the walls so hard that he’d made his fingernails bleed and had blue marks all over his knuckles. It was time for Trish to really impose herself, impose her powers.
Trish pointed her arms out towards Loni and stretched out her fingers. It was time to put an end to this racket before he did something bad to the door. In a not so humble manner, Trish closed her eyes and concentrated on her newfound powers. There was no sound, but Loni certainly felt a force greater than anything he’d ever felt in his life. Something completely unnatural. He found himself suddenly unable to move. His arms, which had been pounding away on the door, were sudden frozen in place. He couldn’t even take to kicking it as Trish saw to stopping his legs moving too. He was like a statue now. Suddenly, he began to rotate on the spot, his feet sliding against the ground like his boot soles were coated in oil. Trish turned him around to face her.
“Now that I have your attention,” Trish said, “I have something to show you. Something incredible. A reward you’ve never dreamed of before”
Loni wasn’t in a position to respond. He couldn’t even open his lips. Trish kept her arms trained on the unfortunate traveller, as the energetic panic shifted over to his racing mind. Whatever this great reward was, he wanted no part of it. At this point he didn’t even want the regular reward he previously expected.
Trish was not about to waste time. She focused all of her power on the next spell, knowing exactly what she had in mind. It would be the greatest magical achievement of her life so far. Suddenly, green beams shot out of the tips of Trish’ fingers like lightning bolts and enveloped every surface of Loni’s frozen body. Initially the feeling was painless, just visually disturbing, but then the most unwelcome of sensations happened.
The vision of the dimly lit room was replaced by an intrusive bright green light that surrounded every corner of his vision. He was effectively blind, seeing nothing but various tones of bright green and even brighter green. Any sense of place in the world was lost to him. This was followed by unpleasant physical sensations. He felt like he was somehow being stretched and squeezed simultaneously over and over again. It was like he was being pulled from his arms, legs and the top of his head by some crude torture device. Yeah, there was also the sense that he was being constricted. It felt like his stomach, kidneys, lungs and intestines were all getting squeezed by rough, angry hands. It wasn’t a feeling he’d ever experienced, a feeling he could describe, and it was a feeling he wanted to end immediately. As the bright green flashes and bodily sensations overwhelmed Loni, they were followed by a disorienting spinning sensation. At this point all sense of coherence of his place in the universe had stopped. He had no sense of direction; no bodily feeling beyond intense pain; he was blinded. Outside of this, the only thing that could remotely connect him to the world as he knew it moments before was the sound of laughs. Trish’ laughs, which were menacing beyond all measure. How could this witch possibly perceive what she was doing to him as a reward?
Suddenly, it all stopped. Everything except the laughter at least. Loni had fallen to the ground. He felt some aches in his tailbone and back having hit the stone floor hard, but he would invite that feeling for years before enduring another second of that magical assault. His attention turned back to Trish’ laughs. They seemed to be louder than before. Deeper than before. Something had most definitely changed about Trish.
It was then that Loni realized that it was not Trish who had changed, but it was him. He looked around and realized something truly horrifying. Everything was enormous! The table on which he placed his satchel was like a gigantic monument; all the treasures in the room looked like big shiny golden palaces; and most horrifying of all was Trish. She stood above him like a tyrant, looking like she was 100 times his size. Trish and the room were not made big. He had been shrunk down! If he had to guess it was somewhere around half an inch. As if his panic from before wasn’t enough to completely overwhelm him, this was on a whole other level. He didn’t even have time to run back to the door and pound on it. Running back there would be like crossing a small field from his venture, and from his perspective Trish was only 30 meters away. Without looking up, Loni was staring directly at Trish’ feet, taking note of her sturdy, dark-brown leather boots with a high heel. She could easily flatten him with her impressive footwear if he wanted to, and smear him on the ground like an insect.