Lost Magic

by Alexandria Clarke

  “Go to hell,” I shouted.

  The whispers ceased all at once. Silence fell. The sound of a hundred relieved sighs echoed through the darkness. Perhaps Morgan wasn’t the only trapped in here.

  She lifted her head and opened her eyes. Like mine, they glowed with the color of her aura. Bright blue light added itself to the mix. I held out my hand to her. She stared at my face then at my hand.

  “Come with me,” I said. “I can get you out of here.”

  She uncurled from her position and set one cold hand against my palm. I squeezed it, pulled her to her feet, and threw my arms around here.

  “Get us out of here!” I shouted into the void, hoping the green beast was keeping its enormous eyes on me.

  Sure enough, as Morgan clasped herself more tightly to my frame, a beam of light appeared in the middle of the darkness to wash over us. Our feet left the floor as we rose into the air and followed the beam upwards. I hoped we weren’t getting abducted by some kind of otherworld aliens, but there was no way of seeing what lay above us. The higher we flew, the brighter the light grew, until I could no longer keep my eyes open. I shut them tightly as they watered, grasped Morgan with as much strength as I could muster, and hoped for the best.

  When our feet met solid ground, the light had gone. Cautiously, I opened my eyes. We had returned to the barn loft of my alternate reality. Laurel huddled in the corner and shivered. She was weak from having expended all her energy on getting me through the portal. She didn’t notice our return until I tripped over a pitchfork and sent curses streaming through the barn, at which point she shook herself awake.

  With a gasp that sucked up half the oxygen around us, Laurel uttered, “Morgan?”

  Morgan rubbed her head as she looked around. “Laurel? Gwenlyn? What’s going on? What happened to the barn?”

  Laurel threw herself at Morgan, who grunted with the effort of holding up her younger sister. She patted Laurel on the head. “Can someone fill me in on what’s happening? Gwenlyn?”

  I cautiously stepped forward. “Wait, you know me?”

  Morgan rolled her eyes as she petted Laurel’s hair. “Of course I know you. I’ve known you since you were sixteen, you big dummy. What game are we playing?”

  Laurel pulled away to examine Morgan. “Wait a minute. Which Morgan are you?”

  “Which one am I supposed to be?”

  “Do you know who Dominic Dobbes is?” I asked.

  She groaned. “Ugh, that shmuck? Why are we even talking about him?”

  “What happened to him?” I questioned Morgan. “In your memory.”

  “You don’t remember?” She chortled heartily, seemingly unaffected by her time in the darkest level of the otherworld. “We connected the coven with a blood bond so we could share each other’s powers and lured Dominic into the town square to battle. You’re the one who shot him, Gwenlyn. I was so proud of you.”

  Relief and confusion flooded through me. This was my Morgan, the one that had mentored me for almost an entire decade. But how could she exist in this reality and the one that I’d come from?

  Laurel pointed between us. “Wait a minute. You two are from the same timeline? But what about me?”

  “Timeline?” Morgan said. “What are you talking about?”

  While Laurel filled Morgan in on the differences between our dimensions, I sat on the edge of the loft and dangled my feet. For whatever reason, I always did my best thinking when my feet weren’t touching the ground.

  “Unsolvable task,” I muttered to myself. “The soul realm presents you with a problem that’s impossible to fix. But I went and got Morgan, so that was the first step. Where do I go from here? Do I get a clue—”

  “Yo, weirdo.” Morgan flicked my ear. “What’s the deal? Why are you over here talking to yourself?”

  “I don’t know what to do,” I admitted. “I figured once I pulled you back from the otherworld again, that would solve the issues in this dimension, but if you’re from my dimension, does that mean I have to go back and get the right Morgan?”

  Morgan grasped my elbow and pulled me away from the loft’s edge. “First of all, get away from there because you’re either going to fall or get a splinter, and to be honest, you’d whine about either one. Second of all, you’re overthinking all of this. It doesn’t matter how many dimensions there are, okay? There’s only one of me and one of you and one of Laurel.” She clasped her sister on the shoulder. “We’ve experienced different things, but the root of the story stays the same. We accomplish our tasks together.”

  “But what does that mean?” I asked, exchanging a confused look with Laurel.

  “We’ve come back to this moment for a reason,” Morgan explained. “Something happened during the battle that defined you, Gwen. You shot Dominic and saved the coven. You have to save this version of Yew Hollow, right? Well, maybe this time, it should be you that leads the charge instead of me.”

  Laurel raised her hand. “There’s only one problem with that. In my reality, the coven lost. Dominic killed himself years ago. How are we supposed to redo a battle that already happened?”

  Morgan shrugged. “Time rewind spell.”

  I made a face. “You sure about that?”

  “Uh-huh!” Laurel furiously shook her head. “No way I’m doing that!”

  “Why not?” Morgan demanded. “From where I’m standing, we don’t have any other options.”

  “For one thing, it’s dangerous!” Laurel’s hair was in disarray from her head-shaking. She gathered it in a ponytail with deft fingers. “There aren’t many hard and fast rules in witchcraft, but the ones we do have, we have for a reason.” She ticked the rules off on her fingers. “Number one, don’t bring anyone back from the dead. Number two, never give someone a haircut by magical means. Number three, never play with the passage of time!”

  “Blah, blah, blah.” Morgan waved off Laurel’s protests. “This isn’t the real world. We can do whatever we want in here and get away with it.”

  “That’s very blasé of you,” Laurel spat.

  “It’s not my choice anyway.” Morgan turned to me. “It’s yours, Gwenlyn. This is your ritual. That means you decide what we have to do to make it right.”

  I remembered Karma’s advice from the night before. Listen to your gut. Go with your instinct. The first thing that came to mind—

  “Let’s time travel,” I said.

  The time rewind spell was an easy one. All you had to do was find a clock and wind the hands back according to how much time you needed to reverse. And, of course, you had to have enough power and control of your craft to do it. This was the main reason most witches didn’t attempt it, along with the warnings and reparations of screwing with time. I hoped Morgan was right about our actions here not affecting other dimensions. I just wanted to get home safe.

  Back at the Summers house, Morgan climbed onto the couch and pulled the clock off the living room wall with a little too much relish. Laurel crossed her arms and pouted in the foyer.

  “I still don’t think this is a good idea,” she said as Morgan dropped the clock on the coffee table in front of the hearth.

  “Laurel, as much as I love you, you gotta learn to live a little,” Morgan said. “Have some fun. If this doesn’t go the way I planned, then you can yell at me. As for right now, Gwenlyn needs our help. Come on, come on. Let’s get in formation.”

  The three of us made a triangle around the coffee table, the clock in the middle. Morgan called on her craft with an ease I envied, and the clock’s numbers glowed neon blue. Laurel added her flavor to the mix, and the inner mechanics of the clock lit up with the color of the sky. When I opened my aura up, the hands of the clock turned green.

  “Tell me I don’t have to rotate the hands hour by hour,” I said. “We’ll be here forever trying to get ten years back.”

  “I’ve got it set to years,” Morgan replied. “Ten turns should do it.”

  I took a deep breath to steady myself and leaned over th
e coffee table to take control of the clock. “Okay then. Here we go.”

  With the first rotation, the world blurred around us, as if I’d pressed rewind on an old VHS tape. The more I spun the clock hands, the faster things seemed to move. Only Morgan, Laurel, and I remained in focus.

  The witches’ faces changed. The lines on Morgan’s face smoothed out. Her hair became fuller and darker. Her shoulders broadened slightly as she regained the muscle she’d had in her late twenties. Laurel, likewise, aged backward. Her hair was more blonde than white, and her skin was ethereally pale. When both of them looked at me with raised eyebrows, I realized I must be reverting to my sixteen-year-old self as well. I completed the last turn of the clock’s hands and let go. The spinning room slowed to a halt.

  The house smelled like Cassandra’s famous sugar cookie recipe. Cassandra’s coat hung over the back of the sofa. A bottle of her favorite perfume perched on the mantle. Rain pattered on the windows outside.

  Morgan’s lower lip trembled as she looked around. Automatically, Laurel moved to her side, and the sisters embraced as they took in a past where their mother hadn’t disappeared so entirely yet.

  “Is she gone already?” I asked in a soft voice, unwilling to disrupt their moment.

  Morgan nodded and sniffed. “I think this is after she merged with the yew tree.”

  “When Morgan became the coven leader for the first time,” Laurel added. She beamed at her sister with pride. “I know you didn’t want to do it, but I can’t think of anyone who would have done the job as well as you have so far.”

  Morgan leaned her head on Laurel’s. “It’s grown on me. I don’t mind it so much anymore, except when witches like Thelma get on my case.”

  “Speaking of the other witches,” I said, looking through the window to the empty yard. “Where is everyone?”

  Morgan left Laurel’s side to join me. She surveyed the land. Everything was gray and mushy. Dominic’s warped craft gave the town the feel of a zombie movie. “It’s nearly dusk. The battle’s already begun.” She grabbed my hand and beckoned Laurel. “We gotta go before it’s too late!”

  The town’s mortals were nowhere in sight as we ran to the square. These events had happened so long ago that I couldn’t remember whether Dominic’s magic had driven the humans away or if they were smart enough to steer clear of the onslaught. As we drew closer to the square, the clash of fighting reached my ears. Morgan didn’t let go of my hand, no matter how awkward it was to run attached. This was the pivotal point in her life, laid out in front of her again. It was mine, too. Something about that felt significant.

  Smoke wafted toward us, obscuring the view of the square. I cast a spell to keep it out of our eyes and lungs, but there was no need. With a wave of her hand, Laurel cleared it from our path. Our line of vision opened up, and I let out a deep gasp.

  The yew tree blazed, fire licking the sky. Around it, the Summers coven battled against the ghosts and zombies that Dominic had woken from their graves. Auras flashed and popped like fireworks as the witches shot off attacks and defensive spells. The zombies fought with unrelenting power. If a witch lopped off an arm, the body kept fighting, down a limb, until it was struck through the heart. The ghosts were harder to deal with. The regular witches could hold them off but didn’t have the power to return to them to their rightful places. That was Morgan’s job.

  “The gun!” I said, turning to Morgan. “The one you got from the otherworld. Do you have it? How are we supposed to win—?”

  Morgan’s lip curled into a sneer, and I whipped my head around to see what had caused the expression to appear on her face. At the center of the fray, Dominic Dobbes stood on a bench close to the yew tree, reveling in the destruction and chaos. Morgan reached behind her and took something out of the waistband of her jeans—the magical gun inscribed with ancient runes that the dragon beast had deemed her worthy to wield.

  As she took aim, the gun’s neon-blue power wrapped around her wrists and entwined around her arms, so she had tattoos of the same ancient runes all up and down her body. In present day, they had faded to almost nothing, allowing Morgan to live a subtle existence amongst the mortals, but it was empowering to see her in all her glory again. She closed one eye, steadied her hand, and pulled the trigger.

  The bullet tore across the square and took out three ghosts all in one shot. Everyone’s attention shifted to us, including Dominic’s.

  “She’s here!” he roared to his army. “After her!”

  The ghosts and zombies swarmed toward us. The first time I’d joined this battle, I was armed with a baseball bat and the limited knowledge of witchcraft I’d picked up from Morgan during my short time with the Summers. This time around, I could do way more damage. It helped that the coven was blood-linked. We shared each other’s powers.

  As the army closed in, I made a wave-like motion with my arms and pulled on Laurel’s ability. The earth rose up beneath us—grass, dirt, roots, and all—and rolled toward the army like a huge tidal wave. The ghosts rose above the uneven ground, but the demon zombies couldn’t keep their footing. As they stumbled and fell, Morgan fired another shot into their skulls, putting them down for good.

  “Nice!” Laurel shouted over the fray. “I’m going to go help Karma and Malia!”

  The other sisters were on the opposite side of the square, holding off their own gaggle of undead. Morgan and I went back to back, circling around. As I cast more demons off their feet with force fields and bomb spells, she blew attacking ghosts back to the otherworld.

  “We have to get to Dominic!” I shouted over my shoulder. “That’s how we won this thing the first time!”

  “One of my finest moments!” Morgan called back. “And yours. Let’s get him!”

  We made our way toward the yew tree from the outskirts of the battle. The ghosts and demons were no match for me and Morgan, not with so much experience under our belts. We were both in our element. Each time I zapped another demon, a burst of adrenaline went through me. Morgan whooped with joy with every bullet she fired.

  When we cleared the last round of ghosts protecting Dominic, he stood framed against the burning yew tree. Unlike last time, when he was so sure of his powers, his lips were pulled back in an expression of fear.

  Morgan wiggled her fingers flirtatiously. “Hi, Dommy. Did you miss me?”

  Dominic stumbled off the bench. The fire from the yew tree licked his arm, and he batted the flames off his sleeve with his bare hand. “I don’t understand,” he stuttered, conjuring a shield to stand between us and him. “How did the two of you become so powerful? Even sharing your coven’s magic, you couldn’t have improved so much overnight!”

  Morgan and I awarded each other with satisfied smirks. It was rare you got to vanquish your greatest enemy twice.

  “Let’s just say we had some extra time on our hands,” I said to Dominic.

  Morgan raised the gun level with Dominic’s head. “Let’s get this over with. I’ve got an alternate reality to get back to.”

  “No!” Dominic pleaded, backing away from us. “Please! I only ever wanted to reunite with my family. It’s not fair!”

  “Oh, this is lovely,” I said to Morgan conversationally. “He didn’t beg the first time. It keeps getting better, doesn’t it?”

  “I’m pleased,” she replied, never lowering the gun. “Hell, I feel more alive than I have in years. Don’t you, Dommy?”

  He clenched his teeth. “You’re evil women. Nasty!”

  “Proud of it,” Morgan and I chorused.

  Morgan’s index finger bent, and she almost pulled the trigger to send Dominic to the depths of the otherworld. At the last second, she relaxed and offered the gun to me. “If I recall correctly, this was never my shot to take.”

  As I wrapped my hand around the gun, the scar on my wrist blazed the same neon-blue as Morgan’s magical tattoos. Energy ripped through me, from the top of my head to the end of my toes. The hair on my arms stood on end as I let out a yell of t
riumph. This was what had been taken from me on the night of the spring equinox, the ancient power of the yew tree. Now that it had been returned, my system balanced out. I didn’t feel empty or overwhelmed anymore. On the contrary, I felt better than ever.

  I turned the gun on Dominic as Morgan watched. He didn’t bother to make a last stand. After all, this battle had already played out once to his disadvantage, and you couldn’t really change history.

  “Goodbye, Dominic,” I said.

  My finger flexed, but before the trigger depressed, some unknown force yanked my heart out of my chest.

  20

  “Gwenlyn. Gwenlyn!”

  I gasped, clutching my chest. The gun had fallen in the grass somewhere. With blurred vision, I watched as Dominic took the opportunity to sprint away from the fight.

  “No,” I panted. “No! Morgan, he’s getting away—”

  My voice gave way to an anguished yell as the pull on my heart deepened. When I looked down, I expected to see an open wound, my rib cage torn open to expose all of my vital organs. But everything was intact. The pain was all in my head.

  “Gwen, look at me.” Morgan lightly slapped my cheek, bringing my awareness back to her. “What’s happening? Tell me what’s wrong?”

  My eyes flickered all around. The battle raged on. A witch fell to her knees beside me, struck down by a zombie. Morgan blasted the zombie away from us. Silvery ghosts zoomed to and fro. I couldn’t focus on one thing. The hypothetic hole in my chest widened. I sobbed openly, unable to process the pain. Morgan cast a force field around us and cut us off from the battle. It grew silent and still as she framed my face in her palms and forced me to look at her.

  “Tell me,” she said softly. “Use your words. You can do it. Focus on me. Focus on my voice. What’s wrong, Gwenlyn?”

  I tapped my chest, right over my heart. “It hurts, Morgan. It hurts so much. Like someone’s tearing my heart out.”

  Morgan rested her palm against my heart and listened to it pound. “You’re being pulled out of the soul realm, but it’s too early. I knew this was going to happen! Gwen, you have to fight it. Whatever’s going on in your reality, you have to ignore it!”