Post by StoryGirl83 on Nov 1, 2021 22:14:35 GMT -5
Chapter Thirty-Six - Death, Murder, and Revenge
11:54 AM
Alanna looked at the various papers in front of her. "Well, this seems to say the first step is to vanquish the head witch." She grabbed another piece of paper. "And this says that's Willamina Richmond, which is also what Simon Richmond told us." She picked up a third paper, "But I'm not sure this can't be done at the same time and that's where your spell and potion come into play."
Paige smiled as she watched her daughter sorting through the papers. Alanna had been trying to explain her plan to her ever since she had returned to the attic. There wasn’t really a whole lot they could do until Cilly and Seth returned with her sisters.
"This is the last thing," Alanna informed them as she pointed to a paper still on the table, "but it won't work."
"It won't?" Paige asked surprised. This was new. Based on the way her daughter had been talking, she thought Alanna had it all figured out, which honestly would be wonderful.
"The wording's all wrong," Alanna told her as she shook her head.
Paige’s attention was drawn away from her daughter as the air shimmered around and Seth appeared with Prue.
"I'm not sure how to fix it though,” Alanna told her with a frown on her face. “I think we need the original spell."
"We have that," Prue told her, drawing Alanna’s attention away from her papers to her aunt. "What have you got there?"
"You have the original spell?" Alanna asked in surprise.
"Premonition," Prue replied with a nod. "I saw the past of someone who was there."
"Excellent," Alanna grinned at her. "Do you have it written down?"
Prue dug through her pocket and pulled out a piece of paper. "Here," she handed it to Alanna. Looking at Paige, she asked, "What's the plan?"
"We're working on it," Paige assured her, waving her hand in Alanna's direction.
11:56 AM
Pain racked through his body as if someone had stabbed him repeatedly with a dull knife. He doubled over as the pain just got worse as if someone had reached into his body and pulled his heart out of his chest. It was more pain than he had ever experienced in his life and he’d had more than one time where someone had tried to end his life and nearly succeeded.
This was worse.
Pain ripped through him until it was so much that he couldn’t retain consciousness and he slumped over in his chair. The last thing that registered with him before he was completely out was the sound of the door to his office banging against the wall and someone screaming something at him, what he really wasn’t sure. He couldn’t think. The pain was too much for that.
11:59 AM
Prue frowned and picked up a piece of paper from Alanna's pile. She was uncomfortable with a teenage girl being in charge of her when her husband was hours away from dying . . . again. Her frown deepened as she read the paper.
"What's wrong?" Paige asked, seeing the frown.
"We don't have thirteen witches that cast spells in our family right now," Prue looked at her sadly.
"Yeah," Paige agreed. "I know."
"So do you have a plan for how we are going to handle that?" Prue's voice rose with every word. The demon boy had said they had something. This was nothing. This was less then nothing. She shouldn't have left Andy's side. "Double our witch power or something. We can probably find thirty or so witches from what I understand."
"No," Paige shook her head, a tiny smile tugging at her lips. "Three should be plenty."
"Why on earth are you smiling?" Prue yelled at her. "Andy's dying, Leo's dying, I'm amazed Dad isn't dying. The whole world's dying, Paige, and you're . . . did you say three?"
Paige nodded. "I did."
"We already tried that," Prue reminded her, her voice only slightly lower.
"Not since you got Phoebe's powers," Paige grinned. "Three sisters. Three powers. Whoever did this probably transfered Phoebe's Charmed status to you."
Pink and white hearts appeared in the center of the room, turning into Cilly and Piper. Cilly went over to where Alanna was and silently started looking at what Alanna had.
"Of course," Prue said softly. A smile tugged at her lips as she repeated, "Of course. Maybe that's why they did this. Maybe they knew."
"Who knew what?" Piper asked.
Paige looked at her surprised. "The person who switched Prue and Phoebe's powers might have known we'd need Prue to be Charmed. Could the Elders have done this?"
"Don't be ridiculous," Piper spat out. "They don't help us!"
Prue blinked in surprise. "Your little demon friend over there," she waved at Seth, "said some of our ancestors are involved in this. If the power of three spell doesn't work maybe they could help cast this."
"Prue," Piper frowned, "ancestors are generally dead. If dead worked we could call Grams or Mom."
"No, dead probably works," Paige commented.
"No, dead definitely works," Prue corrected.
Paige shrugged.
“Even so I don't think this'll work with someone so distantly related." To Piper she added, "Besides, two of them are alive."
Piper's eyebrows shot up as Hank orbed into the room, unnoticed behind her.
"This would work," Prue whispered. Then, in a firmer voice she repeated, "This has to work."
"Do you need me?" Seth wanted to know.
“If they don’t I could use your help,” Hank announced, startling Prue. Hadn’t he been in the room when she got there? He hadn’t seemed in need of help them.
“What’s going on?”
“Not sure exactly,” Hank admitted, “but I think I’ll be of more use figuring out why Dad’s warlock boss just collapsed right after we cast a spell on him putting a twenty-four hour bind on his offensive powers.” He grimaced. “There is a lot going on and we can’t afford to just ignore the smaller things because there is a massive event going on. Yes, what you are doing affects more people, but . . .”
“Henry Wallace Mitchell, Jr,” Paige said, catching her son’s attention. “Go. If we need you we will let you know. Go and do what you see needing done. And be careful.”
“I will.” He looked at Seth. “Are you with me?”
Seth glanced around and after a moment sighed. “Yeah. I was going to go see my brother, but you’re right, so let’s go, see if we can figure out what’s going on and fix it.”
A moment later they were both gone in a twinkling of lights and a shimmer of air. As soon as they were gone, Prue turned to her sisters. “If you have a plan, let’s hear it. I don’t have time to waste and I am willing to try just about anything.”
“I think Aunt Paige is right,” Wyatt said as he pushed himself to his feet. He reached down and took a piece of paper out of Hope’s hands. She was sitting crosslegged on the flood across from where he had been sitting. “And we looked at this spell you copied down and we think we figured out what spell you need to reverse it. Unfortunately, it appears that some other information we have is also true, so I think everyone had better take a seat. It’s not the kind of thing I want us to do and I don’t think any of you do either, but we are out of choices and out of time, so we need to make some decisions now.”
“We can make that decision later,” Alanna protested. “The first thing we need to do is take out Willamina Richmond. That’s not going to be easy, even if Mom is right and you can now access the Power of Three. If possible we should have at least some of us go with you, but most of us don’t have much practice and we would probably get in the way.”
“Well, we can help,” Wyatt assured them. “Chris and I can act as backup for you.”
“Think we should get Seth back?”
Wyatt shook his head. “No, he probably could hold his own out there, but we don’t know what Hank is looking into and I’d rather Hank have someone with him who can fight if they get into a situation where that is needed. Besides, that very easily could be connected considering who they are trying to help.”
“What about Dave and Sam?” Cilly suggested. “This is going to have to take place in that woods where they are, so why not get them to help you out.”
“They’re our ancestors, or at least Sam is,” Paige reminded her. “I’m not sure that’s wise.”
“These people killed their parents,” Jani pointed out, surprising Prue with the sound of her voice. “If someone killed my parents, I’d want to be part of the group that took them out. Now let’s quit wasting time and kill some warlocks.”
“Janice Patricia Mitchell!”
“You heard me, Mom,” Jani glared at Paige, hands on her hips. “I won’t take it back. Kill. Those. Warlocks. Make them pay for all these people that have killed.”