By Ember
A cool, refreshing breeze blows gently through the golden autumn trees, the leaves rustling gently as they are disturbed, many dropping from the branches they once called home. In the middle of the trees, lay a small meadow, with a cabin, carved into the husk of a once mighty tree, now home to a lonely mare, a mare who's only desire in life is to brew potions and elixirs, in hopes of making a name for herself as a healer. Until that day, she banished herself to the depths of the twisted wood she called home, in a long-forgotten meadow, in a rotting tree. This, unsurprisingly, was her preferred way to live, in the center of the twisted wood, where all of her rarest of ingredients would grow their most potent, in the quiet forest, far away from the loud cities and towns, all by herself.
Her cabin door would oft find itself left open, along with all of the windows, allowing the crisp, cool, autumn breeze right through the cabin, refreshing her as she studied her potions. Another gentle breeze blows a deep orange leaf off of a branch of the nearest tree, causing it to glide just into the window of the cabin, landing in the bubbling cauldron of the mare.
"Oh, that doesn't go there," the mare mutters to herself as she uses a spell to lift the leaf from her cauldron. Her horn glows bright as the leaf is set down in a small pile of leaves next to her. "Beautiful colour, though." Her pink mane is gently swept about by the breeze, knotted, with split ends from weeks of ignoring it, for she was too busy with her studies.
"Just one more ingredient." She whispers, pouring in a small bottle of liquid with the label 'unicorn tears' taped upon its transparent glass. Just as the liquid hits the bubbling potion, a pink poof of smoke rises from it with a satisfying pop, gently blown away by the breeze. "Perfection!"
She grabs the leaf off of the pile of leaves and dunks it in the cauldron, the leaf near immediately turns green again, unfolding and plumping back up, just as alive as the day it had budded. "It works! It works it works!" She happily shouts to herself, prancing around the room, not noticing the mare watching her through her open window. A shadowy black mane and dark purple colour, dark purple eyes, quickly vanishing behind the window, just as quickly as she had appeared.
"You really did it, Ember! You finally made a regrowth potion! The mayor will certainly want to see this, no! The princess herself!" She squeals in joy, bouncing around a bit more, then sits down beside the cauldron, scooping some of the potion into a bottle, corking it shut, twisting a wire around it, holding the cork down onto the bottle. "You're not going anywhere, I finally did it!"
Ember sets the bottle in a saddle bag and darts off, leaving her windows open, running towards the nearby town, excited to show off her discovery, returning three days later, only to find her windows open, and door unlocked. Her spell and potion books, diaries all strewn about, thrown to the ground, clearly someone had been looking for something. "Oh, that can't be good."
Immediately, she notices that her cauldron was nearly empty, and her log book was missing, she had left it right next to the cauldron. "Oh no, this is bad, so very bad." She slowly walks around, using a spell to put her books back in their places. Shortly after putting the last book on the shelf, she hears a loud crash from outside, turning and slowly walking to her door. It was the middle of the night, surely nobody was here to visit her, but she looks out her window anyway, met with darkness, pure pitch dark. She turns around and sighs, "Probably the raccoon again."
A loud smash rings through her house as the door's glass is shattered, a black vine grabbing the door knob and ripping the door clear from the hinges, Ember screams, frozen in fear, grabbed by her front hooves and dragged, squirming and wriggling, trying to break free, panicked and sliding her left hoof free, swatting at the vine and pushing her right hoof free, bolting back into her house, running upstairs to her bedroom, pushing her dresser in front of the door, breathing heavily.
A loud smash rings through her house as the door's glass is shattered, a black vine grabbing the door knob and ripping the door clear from the hinges, Ember screams, frozen in fear, grabbed by her front hooves and dragged, squirming and wriggling, trying to break free, panicked and sliding her left hoof free, swatting at the vine and pushing her right hoof free, bolting back into her house, running upstairs to her bedroom, pushing her dresser in front of the door, breathing heavily.
It grabs her snout, spraying some odd gas in her face, making the air feel heavier, causing her mind to slow rapidly, making it harder and harder to think and struggle. She pushes with her hooves to try to dislodge the trap, but it just grips tighter and tighter, making her weaker and weaker, overwhelming her, before she knows it, the room is swirling, her eyelids drooping, her hooves collapse limply to the floor as a long, thin vine begins to wrap around her limp body, squeezing it tightly, and dragging it back off through the window it came in. Her mind slows further, until, finally, she drifts off to sleep.
Quite a while later, Ember starts to wake up, still heavily dazed and dizzy, her mind swirling just as fast as when she fell asleep, but for some reason, her mind wakes up, somewhat, just enough for her to be suggestible and to listen. Before her stood the black-maned, purple mare, staring at Ember, "You finally awoke, I see? I don't presume you know who I am, do you?"
Ember can't seem to form a response, too calm, too dizzy, too unfocused, only letting out a soft grunt, twitching slightly as something is sprayed into the vine strapped to her face, keeping her subdued.
"I didn't think so. My name is not important right now, but what is important is what you are going to do for me. You, you brewed that rejuvination potion, and I demand you make me enough of it to become immortal." The vines tighten around Ember, and one grabs at her neck, stabbing in and injecting something into her blood, pulling out harshly, letting a muffled yelp exit Ember's mouth.
"You will follow my every order, witch. You will not wake up. You will forever be under my control, my minion, my little witch, making me potions to build my dark empire!" Ember nods weakly, not understanding what is said, but liking the sound of it anyway, too calm to care, too happy and blissfull to mind. "You will help me conquer the world and overthrow the princess, starting my dark empire!"
Ember lets out a soft giggle, just as another spray of the gas fills her lungs, making the room just as swirly, making her body even heavier, she couldn't move if she wanted to, let alone struggle or resist, her mind too open, her body too weak, she was caught in her captor's web, helpless to resist her influence, not even having the thought of resistance cross her empty mind.
"Now, take a deep breath, my little witch, take a deep, deep breath and don't mind the prickly sensation through your mind as I do a little... redecorating, shall we say?" Ember immediately inhales deeply as she's ordered, another large spray of the gas flooding the vine mask, filling her lungs, making her drift, limper and weaker, barely even conscious now as two vines push into her drooping head, right in her ears, sliding in deep, thin enough to pierce into her mind without damage, probing around and rearranging her mind bit by bit.
Her mind turns twisted, evil, submissive to her new mistress, her works are only to build her mistress' evil power, build her mistress towards domination, and any form of resistance would be harshly punished, off limits, because she is a good little witch for her mistress. As she is being reprogrammed, her logbook is placed before her on a table, along with a copy of all of the ingredients, a cauldron of water over a burning flame. She is set down, immediately collapsing to the floor, too relaxed, too dazed, too swirly to move, until she is ordered to.
"Stand up!" As soon as her mistress orders so, Ember stands up on all four hooves, head perked up, focusing on her orders as the vines all retract, leaving her free from their tangled masses. "Now, make me another batch of that potion."
Ember begins quickly throwing the ingredients into the cauldron, stirring it, not knowing exactly what she's doing consciously, but doing it perfectly, her mind melted, too dazed to even wake up, the injection keeping her permanently under her mistress' control. Even if she wanted to, she could never question her mistress, because a mistress knows best, and a mere pet witch is just a tool for her mistress to use.
Before she even consciously processed her orders, the potion was done, her mistress walks over. "You done?" Ember silently nods, not needing to talk, for a good little pet witch needn't speak, only follow orders. "Excellent!" Her mistress grabs a bottle, dunking it into the cauldron, drinking it excitedly, the vines all retracting from the room as she begins to cough, grabbing her chest, collapsing down, holding her chest, "W...what is it doing to mmme?" She stutters as she gasps for air, Ember looking down in confusion, too melted to do anything about it.
"Help... me..." Her mistress mutters as she fades away, the potion reducing her to a pile of vines and slime on the floor. Ember sits there, waiting for her mistress to give her orders, waiting for days, before wandering back to her hut, collapsing on her bed and falling asleep, no longer having a mistress, but left with her mistress' desires imprinted on her mind, to build her mistress' dark power, and help her mistress topple the kingdom.