John Murphy was at a complete loss for words as Winnie finally reached Jaha's words. She didn't go any further, but John could imagine the torture of her trial and not being able to grieve her own mother.

Winnie didn't talk for the longest time but she made the fire and they drank water they had collected. There was no food and Winnie had lost her appetite for the first time in her life so she lay down and rested. She didn't complain when Murphy came to put his arm around her and he said nothing when he heard her cry for the first time. All he did was stroke her hair and allow her to come closer to him so she could burrow her face into his chest.

She had told herself she wouldn't cry but sometimes Winnie had to allow herself to be human.

Murphy wanted to alter the story of Winnie. He wished to be more than just a character in her future and take over the pen writing her life because he would have never have written that tale for her. It was horrid, but there was only one thing to say to her and he repeated the phrase again and again.

"It's not your fault," He knew though that no matter how many times he did say it, Winnie would never quite believe it.

And deep down he had to be glad as because of that day Winnie is lying next to him and the dark days of his incarceration were just that little bit brighter. He could have ended up with Atom as a neighbour, how that would have sucked. For a person that would say he hated most people, Murphy had never been more thankful for company.

"And you're a great sister." He whispered although he couldn't say the same for Bellamy being a good brother.

"John Murphy you are a great son," Winnie looked at him and poured her heart out because she knew when she awoke that her guard would be back up.

She remembered what he told her one day in the Sky Box, the secrets he told under the cover of a restless night when he couldn't sleep and Winnie claimed she couldn't either. She knew his story. The blaming of her father's floating on him by his drunk mother and the orphaned John Murphy.

"And what they said back there, in the camp, about you deserving to die, that was a lie. I know you and you deserve life John Murphy. Just because your an utter Jack Ass by default doesn't mean that you deserved to hang. And I am so sorry because that was all my fault, all of it."

"I pissed off quite a few people Winnie, I'm not a saint," His eyes were dark and dropped down to watch her, "And I learnt to be a Jackass just like you learnt to be a witch. You just need to promise me one thing."

"What?"

"We need to stop being so damn sappy because honestly all this 'you're not to blame' and 'you're perfect just the way you are', although it's true, it also makes me vomit in my mouth a bit whenever I hear it."

"Deal." Winnie still kissed her Jackass despite the vomit comment.

"Also you know what else I deserve?" He added after a moment of silence.

"Tell me."

"Revenge."

Winnie thought about that for a moment. They had been hanged and yet they were the ones being punished, Winnie forget about the two lives taken as punishment, that was the universe striking a deal with them. The people who crossed them, those that hunted the witch, they needed to pay.

"You know what, I'll take you lead for that Johnny Boy."

"You already cursed the camp Winnie, I'm going to have a tough time thinking up something to top that."

"I don't doubt your ability John, just tell me what to do and I'll do it."

"Well, there is something you could do...." Murphy winked at her in the fading light.

"Do you honestly ever stop?" She asked.

"Oh come on, I mean I've had seventeen years to perfect my game and your the first girl who gets to enjoy them. You should count yourself lucky Scarfone."

"Oh I do Murphy, everyday."

And it wasn't the warm fire that helped Murphy sleep that night, it was the thought of revenge. Pure sweet revenge.

———

The next day they reached the lake and it took the whole of the next day to properly wash their wounds. To entertain themselves they would come up with the most wildest revenge plots they could.

Murphy had healed extremely well with the seaweed, it wasn't like it had never happened but it was as close as the pair were ever going to get. In fact they were almost happy, a thing that they thought was going to be impossible. Winnie wounds were healing the same, although neither of them bothered to go near the emotional cuts that abused them, they all cut far too deep.

So they just survived, it was all they could do.

He was a good hunter, Winnie had to give him that. Although two of the rabbits in question had been stolen from the camps own traps but that fact didn't matter. They weren't hungry anymore and that was enough at the moment. It had been five days without them seeing a single soul, although that didn't mean that they were invisible.

"Do you ever get that feeling that we're being watched?" Winnie asked Murphy as they walked around the forest for no reason in particular then to do something, "Like somebody is just beyond the treeline watching."

Murphy nodded. It was a constant nagging feeling at the back of his mind. He stopped and began to carve something into the bark of a thin tree.

"I used to swear I could hear voices in my cell, that's what isolation does to you." He did, it was painful and sometimes he could still here them. Fragments of memories coming back to him in no particular order.

"That was my voice." Winnie replied.

"Not always," Murphy confessed. Finishing off the last mark. It read J and Murphy was pretty damn happy for himself, "Little things." He told Winnie when she came to have a look.

She didn't reply. They were walking further into the wilderness then they had been before. Winnie had tried to make a mental map but she was better with winding halls and cabins then the wide open world, still it was growing day by day. She just was waiting to add in the more useful elements, such as 'Beware: Grounder territory."

"I think we should stop here," Murphy suggested taking a look around, "Don't want to bump into those people that keep on watching us."

They had learnt now that the wild was no place for real jokes, it was a place where all they could do was live day to day. And then Winnie saw something that made her day a whole lot better.

"Look at those bad boys!" Winnie actually made Murphy jump with her sudden outburst.

"Excuse me?" Murphy froze.

"Up there, the nuts in the tree,"

She pointed to one of the smaller trees in this area of the forest, about twice as tall as Murphy is. He looked up and frowned, they were encased in a protective green shell, he knew Pike had talked about them in Earth Skills but it wasn't like Murphy actually paid attention, "I'm going to go get them. God I need the protein,"

Winnie shook herself to get her muscles ready. She had noticed them as it looked like somebody had already been at the other trees, shells littered the floor. Murphy realised this as he stood on one, he didn't know who he wanted them to belong too. Squirrels, he lied to himself.

This would be the first bit of real exercise she has done, a good tester for her body, "Unless of course, you want to get them?" She asked Murphy and then thought twice about it.

"I'll let you become Spider Man," He smiles weakly, he knew he didn't have the strength to do that, in fact it was taking a large amount of his concentration just to keep his breathing in check.

"Just give me a leg up would you?" Winnie asked and Murphy reluctantly outstretched his hand for WInnie to put her foot into. He finally looked at her bad ankle, it was swollen but the injury didn't look to bad. Definitely not bad enough to stop her from climbing a tree.

"All we've been eating is protein."  Murphy called up to her as she went from branch to branch. Murphy didn't like heights not even those just above ground, if there was a chance he could sall he'd rather save the trouble and stay on the ground anyway.

"I'm trying to fatten you up Hansel." Winnie replied as she reached the nuts and her tongue slipped out of her mouth as she focused on how she was going to harvest them.

"I feel honoured," Murphy bowed slightly in mockery before making a suggestion, "Cut some down with your knife and I can open the cases down here."

Winnie agreed but first she wanted to try something. She cut the first one down and then broke open it's shell as well, the green outer casing was easier to get into then she had expected but the scraps and raw skin on her hands were still angry with her. They were larger than she had expected, about half of her thumb.

"Catch." She winked and dropped the nut down to Murphy who knew Winnie's way so well that he was expecting exactly that.

He caught it but not perfectly, it bounced against his teeth and Murphy swore under his breath  but he crunched it nevertheless. It had a gritty consistency that made Murphy over eggarate every bite and was not a pleasant sight to see. However once that was over it was the taste that made Murphy nod up at Winnie because it was unlike anything he had before.

"Good?" Winnie asked as she looked at another nut she had opened in her palm, anything look appetising when you've only had meat for the past two weeks.

"So good." Murphy replied.

Winnie ate the nut like she was swallowing a pill yet she chewed and despite this she still didn't recognise where she had tasted something like this before. It had been years anyway and it was as if she was tasting it for the first time again.

"You liar," Winnie called down to Murphy, "They're really good."

So they decimated the tree of all of it's spoils and Murphy kept most of the nuts for them both to share but ate more and more on the side. When he helped Winnie down he could have sworn she was as heavy as lead as he helped to hold her by the legs. Gravity, he thought, how stupid.

They ate them were they stood, sitting down with backs against trees and eating far too many for the first time. The effects therefore gradually came upon them, the slight distortion of the woods around them, the lightheaded feeling and slight buzzing in their ears.

"No," Murphy said suddenly and he tried to stand up but there was only contaminated blood that rushed to his head so he staggered even more, "They're all gone,"

He looked around and tried to focus on finding some on the floor but his eyes couldn't see anything but a sea of green, "There were hundreds and now they're gone." He pouted like a child, he was still so hungry, he swear his stomach was aching and growling.

Winnie eyes went wide, "What do you mean their all-" She couldn't continue because a laugh burst out of her mouth, she didn't know why, Winnie just had to laugh at that moment. She continued afterwards, visibly furrowing her eyebrows together, "All gone. We had thousands!"

"Looks like somebody did pay attention in school." Murphy pushed her a bit as a joke but it  came out far too strong and Winnie's wits weren't completely with her. She staggered forward but without missing a beat her neck craned back towards him accompanied with a look that could melt ice in her eyes. 

"Are you calling me a liar, Johnny Boy? Because I sure hope that's not what you are saying."

The hallucinogenic properties had different effects on different people, the Grounders had learnt to stop eating them long ago. To Winnie and Murphy it messed with their emotions, it made every high soar to the moon and every low plunged them into the murkiness of the underworld. At this moment, it was using their own disposition against them, they were both stubborn, both hot-headed. Normally they knew not to attack the person that they were stuck with for the foreseeable future, the drugs they had just eaten didn't know about their love, only that when they were annoyed, they weren't, they were furious.

"You don't always tell the truth." Murphy wiped his nose with his hand and then decided to stand his ground, he planted his two feet down, he wasn't moving.

"So what?" It was a childish reaction but Winnie couldn't think of anything else to say. She didn't always speak the truth, she lied and she knew it.

"Winnie-" He started but it was a good thing that she interrupted him as he would have regretted finishing his sentence.

"What?" The girl barked at him.

"What do you mean, what?" Murphy replied. The quick fire round of conversation was natural for them but this time something was off, both of them were irritable. Their conversation lacked any substance.

"John, I just mean what." Winnie said the word like it had no meaning out of pure annoyance and that ended that train of thought. Both just ending the conversation twenty times more annoyed than they had been before.

John's rational brain thought about how he was going to continue the conversation but the substances in his brain were thinking a bit more long term than the next ten minutes, "So what are we going to do then? How are we actually going to get our revenge on Bellamy Blake."

The question should of thrown Winnie more because his tone had never been so even, so sure of what he was suggesting and she loved it. She moved closer to him and ran a finger down his arm, "You tell me."

Murphy's eyes lit up in a way that the witch had only ever seen a couple of times before and He moved away from her to pitch his idea. Winnie laughed slightly under her breath, she didn't realise until now that maybe 'dork' was an adjective she could use to describe Murphy.

"How about you enter, drenched in blood. Like drenched, head to toe, serious shit Winnie." He motioned with his hands to all of her and smiled at the vision, "And then you use your telekinetic powers to turn the camp to shit and then you lock them all in the Dropship - like every single one of them -  that I have made sure is flooded," He lowered his voice, "Prior planning you know," And then he raised his voice to a gleeful shout for the ultimate end of his destructive revenge plot, "Then you sever an electrical wire and the whole place explodes. Boom. Done."

"That's the plot of Carrie, Murphy." Winnie replied, "And telekinetic powers, are you actually kidding me?"

"I don't know what you can do Winnie, I mean you curse the camp, you break people's arms and then you can't get burned. I mean it would be better if you could summon a demon or something but last time I suggested that I basically got my ass handed to me on a plate."

All of Winnie tensed, every single nerve stopped her from moving and she stood as still as she did when she first truly felt the noose around her neck.

"I'm a white witch." She told him honestly. She couldn't think of anything else to say. She didn't want that form of revenge.

"Oh that's no fun!" He shouted and kicked the Earth around him, "Come on, they deserve to die. It might as well be by your own spells."

"I don't want people to die."

"Little late for that. You killed the Leviathan and you killed the Fox. Might as well continue on Winnie. Might as well kill Bellamy Blake!" He screamed.

He wanted to shout even more and ask her where the Witch was, the girl who was dark and twisted, the person who came out occasionally and the one that felt like himself. He didn't want her to be like that all the time but he just pleaded for Winnie the Witch to come back to him, to help him do this one thing.

She began to shake, it was small movements at first but soon her shoulders began to turn into her chest and she had to bow her head to stop Murphy from seeing her. No she didn't even have the strength to keep on standing, she wanted to crumble into the Earth. This happiness, it was crashing down. Her and Murphy couldn't have that. Criminals and murderers didn't deserve that.

On her knees she didn't want to look at the way the forest was still and silent, the way it filled her with dread but also with beauty. She put her head into her knees and then her cheeks were saved from the salt as her trouser leg became damp. If she could have seen herself now, she would have demanded she put herself together. That it was never the time to cry, never. Tears never achieved anything for her. But that explained everything.

"I can't kill Bellamy, he's my brother." She could renounce him, she could say she hated him but that was a lie. Deep down, he was her flesh and blood and he was a good man. She knew that.

Murphy wiped his eyes as he bent down and placed one hand on Winnie's back, his tone suggested he was going to comfort her. However despite how much you give someone of yourself - and they had given each other almost everything - you have to put yourself first.

"Just promise you won't stop me." He asked but the response wasn't what John Murphy wanted to hear.