Electric Blue

by Jamieson Wolf

  Poppy stared at her in horror. She felt Alicia behind her, shaking. Her father had left her alone to defeat this thing? This woman who had climbed out of the body of her dead friend and killed another while he was beside her without so much as a second thought? She had no idea what she was going to do. She had to think of something, get herself some time. She tried to keep the woman talking.

  "What is your name?" Poppy asked.

  Thrown off, the woman stared back at her. "What?"

  "You heard me. If I'm going to fight you, I have to know your name so I can curse you."

  The woman laughed. "You may call me Mistress."

  "You said this was decreed by prophecy. Whose prophecy are you talking about?"

  "Why, yours and mine. Your father created the Coven."

  "You know of that?"

  "I know many things," the woman said.

  "YOU!" there was a rushing sound and then a wispy shape threw itself at Mistress. Monica had floated down through the floor to see if Poppy needed help and found her enemy present. "I SHOULD KILL YOU FOR WHAT YOU DID TO ME!" Monica screamed. "YOU TOOK AWAY MY LIFE! YOU TOOK AWAY MY LIFE!"

  "I can take away your afterlife just as easily," Mistress said with a cold smile.

  "You wouldn't dare!" Monica turned to Poppy. "Stop her before it's too late, Poppy! She's the one who put me in that room! She's the one who-" but Monica never got to finish. Mistress grabbed hold of Monica as if she were wisps of cobwebs. She stretched Monica as if she were cotton candy, making her scream with each pull.

  "NOOOO!" Poppy turned at the sound. Moe had arrived to help, coming in time to see the love of his life hurt at the hands of a madwoman. She tossed Monica's deformed spirit away as it were a shadow; Moe cradled her to him as if she were a baby. "Oh, Monica. . . ." he said, his voice choked. He dragged her body to a corner in the basement. Poppy could hear him whimpering. "Please don't leave me. . ." he said. "Please. . . ."

  "Oh, how touching," Mistress said. "Young love. I remember love once."

  "How could a thing like you remember love?"

  "Even evil can be loved," Mistress said.

  "Who are you?" Poppy asked again. "Who were you before you were Mistress?"

  "Her name was Anna Margarette," said a voice on the stairs.

  Poppy, Alicia and Mistress turned to see who had uttered those words. Cecelia, Naomi and Lucia were on the stairs.

  Mistress laughed. "This is your army?" she cackled. "This is all you have?"

  "There are others upstairs," Cecelia said. Lilly and Edgar were with David, staying with Chip and Roz in the attic. They had to keep Roz safe. "They are not involved in this fight; they are not part of the Coven. These people are." Cecelia gestured to Naomi and Lucia. "They are part of the Coven. You may not fight the others. You know the rules."

  "Of course I do." Mistress snapped. "You and I helped write most of them after Poppy's father gave us control of the Coven."

  "You?" Poppy turned to Cecelia. "You were the ones that helped my father?"

  "Yes, Poppy. The Prophecies spoke of you long before you came."

  "Did they speak of this?" Poppy asked. "Did they speak of this fight?"

  "Not this fight specifically," Cecelia said. "But they speak of one between good and an ancient evil."

  "The evil is older than me," Mistress said. "I have my own agenda here."

  "One we can't let you get away with," Cecelia said. "To kill the first Shifter in a thousand years would bring about the death the Fey. We can't let this happen."

  "Spare me," Mistress said, making a gagging motion with her long red fingernails. "I don't want to hear this. I want power, don't you understand?"

  "That's what this is all about?" Poppy said. "Your quest for power? You want my power, I know this. You've gone through all this, killed people, for your quest for power?"

  "Others have done worse," Mistress said. "I am just following in their footsteps."

  "Not if we don't let you," Alicia said. Blue magic flickered at her fingertips.

  Mistress rolled her eyes. "This is where we fight, right?" Mistress sighed. "Alright, come on. . .let's see what you're all made of."

  * * * * *

  Upstairs, David paced the floor. He had not been allowed to go downstairs when they had heard the commotion start. Cecelia had shot a look at Lilly and the woman had nodded and then Lucia, Naomi and Cecelia had shot down the stairs to the battle below them. Lilly took David's arm and steered him towards the attic.

  "Someone needs to stay with Chip and Roz, to make sure they are alright," she said.

  "And we're best kept out of the way. This is a Coven fight," Edgar said.

  "I still can't get over the fact that you can talk," David said.

  "Neither can I," he said, with a growling laugh.

  "How can you laugh at a time like this?" Lilly asked. They were going up the stairs to the attic, despite the sounds below.

  "What better a time for happiness than a time of sorrow?" Edgar asked.

  "I think we're going in the wrong direction," David said.

  “What do you mean, dear boy?" Lilly replied.

  "The fight is down there, Orlando is down there."

  "Which is why we're going up here," Edgar said. "We are not part of the Coven."

  "But we can still fight with them!" David said. "When Jethro came back, we all fought together."

  "This is not your fight," Lilly said. "This is Poppy's. It is part of her quest."

  "Have you seen the outcome?" David asked.

  "No," she said. "Only the possibilities."

  "What is the use of prophecies if they can't tell us what will be?"

  "Because prophecies can show us what is possible, what can happen, what has happened. Like anything spiritual, it is not an exact science.”

  They closed the door to the attic and locked it behind them. Chip came out to meet them. "Is everything okay down there?"

  "Orlando is down there," David said. "I have to go to him, see if he's okay."

  "I'm sure he's alright," Chip said. Lilly shot Chip a knowing look and Chip understood.

  "He wasn't with the others," David said. "They all went downstairs, I didn't see him. I have to go see if he's alright."

  "But David," Edgar said, "we have to,"

  "We don't HAVE to do anything!" David screamed. "My soon-to-be husband is down there and I'm going to go find him!" He pelted down the attic stairs, unlocked the door and ran out. Lilly and Edgar were close behind him. They chased him down the front stairs, but Lilly knew they would not have to chase him much further. She could see Orlando's arm in the hallway. David saw it too. Lilly watched as he slowed down and turned to look in the kitchen. She watched him back away, slipping on a little of Orlando's blood that had pooled on the floor. He hit the floor with a thud, falling on to his butt, and the wind was knocked out of him. He looked at Orlando's blood on the floor, streaks made by his running shoes. He looked at his hands.

  Lilly's heart broke in two for David; she knew the pain he must be going through. She too had lost a love. Everyone at one time has lost a love, someone important to them. Even though Orlando had been brought back to life once before, it was too late. The time between his death and his discovery was too long. They could not bring Orlando back to the land of the living. Lilly watched as David, a sob breaking from his mouth, went to Orlando and kissed his face softly, touching his cheeks softly with his lips, placing a hand over the wound in his neck to stop the blood that still flowed from Orlando's body. David kissed Orlando's eyelids, his lips, not caring that his lover's blood stained his face.

  She went to him then, Edgar behind her, and watched as David lifted Orlando into his arms and then he looked at her. His face was crestfallen, devastated. His heart had been broken again. "We'll bring him upstairs," David said. "We can't leave him down here. He'll get hurt." David blinked back tears as they spilled down his face anyway. "I don't want him to get hurt," He said. Lilly nodded and, together, they went back up the stair
s. She had failed in keeping Orlando's death a secret from him and for that she was sorry. But Lilly couldn't help thinking that, if David had found out after the battle, the result would have been much worse.

  David cradled Orlando like a baby in his arms. Lilly listened as David sang to Orlando, softly, as if he were afraid that anyone would hear him singing. The notes sounded clear and pure. When they walked to the attic, Chip was shocked to see David holding Orlando. He nodded and pulled up another cot. He placed a blanket and a pillow there and David lay his lover down on the pallet. He closed Orlando's eyes and crossed his hands on his chest. He then sat down on the floor, in front of the cot. David then placed his head on Orlando's chest. Lilly, Edgar and Chip said nothing. They knew David was grieving. Chip squeezed Lilly's hand as he moved past her to check on Roz. Lilly listened to David sob for a few moments, but her attention was drawn to Chip, who stumbled out of the bedroom and vomited in the corner.

  Concerned, Lilly went to the bedroom and looked inside. There, on the bed, Roz lay dead. The room was filled with blood and insides had been splattered on the walls, on the mirror in front of the bed, on the ceiling. Her stomach had been ripped open. There were grey bits that hung from the bed canopy, splatters on the gauze that draped the bed. Sitting in the middle of the carnage, rolled up against his mother, a baby was sleeping soundly, sucking his thumb.

  Chapter Forty Nine

  Magic Lending

  "Spare me," Mistress said, making a gagging motion with her long red fingernails. "I don't want to hear this. I want power, don't you understand?"

  "That's what this is all about?" Poppy said. "Your quest for power? You want my power, I know this. You've gone through all this, killed people, for your quest for power?"

  "Others have done worse," Mistress said. "I am just following in their footsteps."

  "Not if we don't let you," Alicia said. Blue magic flickered at her fingertips.

  Mistress rolled her eyes. "This is where we fight, right?" Mistress sighed. "Alright, come on; let's see what you're all made of."

  The lightning flew from Alicia's fingers before Mistress knew what hit her. Her head arched back and she cried out in pain.

  "This is for everything that you've done to us," Alicia said.

  Mistress let out a roar and threw her hands up. A loud, massive boom sounded as they were all thrown off the stairs. Mistress used a magic that no one could see, but they could feel it. Lucia landed on top of Cecelia and Naomi fell to the floor with a smack, getting up seconds later. Alicia, getting the brunt of the damage, was thrown backwards to the very wall which Karma had hit.

  "You think you can hurt me so easily?" Mistress said. "You think I'm a pansy to push around, one of your garden variety Witches?" she laughed. "Think again."

  Mistress held her hands out in front of her and she began to trickle away, as she had done before when she invaded Karma's body. Her laugh followed her as her being, floating like small marbles made of shiny glass, floated up the stairs. They heard her laugh louder as the marbles crashed through the door.

  "What the hell are we supposed to do?" Alicia asked. "There's no way we can fight her."

  "We can't," Cecelia said. "This is part of Poppy's quest."

  "I'm sick of this damn quest," Poppy said.

  "But you are almost there!" Cecelia hissed. "Your first quest was to find who you are, the second was to find who is destroying Ashling and the third is to destroy her." She looked at Poppy pleadingly. "Please," she said. "Please do not give up while you are so close. If you die, we have no hope left."

  "How am I supposed to fight her?"

  "I have an idea," Alicia said.

  “I'd really like to hear it," Lucia said.

  "What if we give our power to Poppy?" Alicia asked. "Not all of it, just some of it, like Orlando did to David and David did to Orlando." Poppy flashed back to that day, when Orlando had lay dying and he had passed his power into his lover and then David has brought him back to life using that same electric blue energy.

  "Too much may kill her," Naomi said.

  "If we do not try, we are all dead anyways," Lucia said. "Monica may already be dead, Orlando is lying upstairs dead in the kitchen, Tholonious was killed before the battle could even begin, almost like a ritual sacrifice. Karma has died twice now. Roz, Chip, David and Lilly and Edgar are upstairs. We have to try, otherwise we will all be dead too and all this will be for nothing." Tears were streaming down her face. "We have to try, otherwise, what was all this for? What was Valentine’s Day? Someone has been screwing with our lives and we're close to finding out why." She looked at all of them. "We have to try."

  The others looked at her and nodded. Alicia took a hold of Poppy's hand. "What we're doing is passing you power," Alicia said. "We won't hurt you, but this will increase your natural magic. It may make you strong enough to hurt Mistress."

  "She must be stopped at all costs," Cecelia said.

  "No matter what the cost," Naomi said.

  "If any of us should die," Lucia began.

  "Don't say that," Poppy said, "Please, enough have died already."

  "If any of us should die," Lucia continued, "keep fighting. Do not let her win, okay?"

  Poppy, speechless, nodded. They each took a hold of each other’s hands, standing in a small circle around Poppy. Lucia, Naomi, Alicia and Cecelia circled around Poppy slowly, chanting in a language that Poppy did not understand. Their soft, low voices calmed her and she closed her eyes. Poppy felt the energy building in the middle of the circle. She could feel the electric blue energy raising the hairs on her arms, lifting the brown curls on her head, making them stand on end. She could feel the energy rising, building. It felt hot on her skin, like a warm breeze.

  "Poppy," Alicia whispered in her ear. She opened her eyes.

  She could see the blue lightning dancing in front of her, flying around her as if she were at the centre of a large storm, or an electric blue tornado. She had one moment to take in its beauty, one moment to watch the shapes moving in front of her. That moment seemed to go on forever, but it really was only a few seconds. Poppy felt gentle hands pulling her head back and then choked back a gasp when the blue energy filled her like a liquid, flowing into her mouth like velvet. Then it was done and the room was thrown into darkness once more. There was no sound except Mistress' laughter as they destroyed the house upstairs. Then, there was a sound, like a match being lit. In the darkness of the basement, a blue light began to glow. Slowly, the glow intensified until there was a shape and then intensified more so you could make out the shape. It was Poppy, electric blue energy flickering over her skin like snakes and giving it a blue cast. Her eyes, though, her eyes had narrowed to that of a bird’s. Small, dark red eyes glared at everyone in the room.

  "Alright," Poppy said. "Everyone ready?" Everyone around her nodded. She smiled a dark smile that did not reach her eyes. "Let's go," she said. She lifted her hands and floated three feet off the ground to the stairs. She lifted her hands a little more and she floated above the stairs, reaching forward to open the basement door with a flick of lightning. Alicia had never seen Poppy angry. Poppy said that when she was angry, she went to a dark place. It looked as if Poppy was all the way inside the darkness now and she said a silent prayer to the Goddess that her lover would be okay. Poppy was scaring the crap out of her. They walked slowly behind her, like an entourage, careful not to be touched by the blue energy around her.

  They followed Poppy to the living room, watching as Mistress reformed herself high above the floor. She had her hands raised and they watched as the balls that had been causing havoc slowly rejoined their master. It was as if Mistress was surrounded by a small whirlwind and then it cleared. She looked down at Poppy and smiled. "Oh, my, don't you look pretty," she said.

  "That's not quite the look I was going for," Poppy said.

  "Did you want to come out and play?" Mistress said with a sneer. "Come on little girl, come play with mommy!"

  Poppy gritted her teeth.
Alicia could hear them crunching. "You. Are. Not. My. Mother." Poppy said, emphasising each word.

  "Oh, sad but true, I'm afraid so, why, you don't think your father would have found me attractive? You don't think he would have liked a little foreplay before ritual? He created the Coven, Poppy. He had any one of us he wanted, he had me the most of all. When I had you, I was blessed."

  "YOU ARE NOT MY MOTHER!" Poppy screamed. Her eyes had gone completely red, as if they were bleeding. Alicia shielded her eyes as Poppy flung out her hands and blue energy was flung from her fingers. It pushed at Mistress, shoving her with a brutal force. She was thrown through the large glass picture window, shards of glass falling everywhere and tinkling down like diamonds. There was quiet for a moment, silence.

  "Is she dead?" Lucia asked quietly.

  "We have only just begun," Poppy said.

  Chapter Fifty

  Magic Breathing

  Poppy floated outside through the large hole in the window. The electric blue energy followed in her wake. She turned to Lucia, Alicia, Naomi and Cecelia. "Stay here. Stay inside the house. Go get Monica and Moe in the basement and bring them up to the attic with Chip, Roz, Lilly and Edgar."

  "But-" Alicia began.

  Poppy's eyes flared a dangerous blue. "No buts. Do as I say. Get you and the rest them upstairs. Lucia, look after Monica if you can. Cecelia, keep an eye on Roz, her time is near."

  "But Poppy!" Lucia began.

  "No," she said. "Cecelia is right, I must do this on my own, this is something I must do. It is my quest, my destiny. I don't know why, I don't know how, but it feels right somehow." She floated down in front of Alicia and kissed her softly. The electricity flying around her tickled Alicia's face and lips. "I will miss you most of all," she said. "If I should die, Alicia, know that I love you."

  Alicia looked at her lover with tear-filled eyes. "And I love you." She kissed Poppy again, just as softly and touched her long brown curls. The electricity tickled her skin, brushed against it. "I love you so much."