Author's Note: I just finished watching ALL 8 seasons of Charmed. I've been waiting for inspiration to strike so I can break into this new fandom. This is the first thing I felt like writing. It's angst but, hey, that's who's writing!
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Inside She Grieves
Ducking a punch, I slammed my hand into the side of the demon's neck and knifed him, watching as he burst into flames, mere inches from my face. I didn't move as I saw his face crumple in on itself, revealing the skull and finally bursting into sparks and ashes. When the last remains of spark finally dissipated, only then did I step back and re-sheath the dagger.
No sense of satisfaction had been there, no knowledge that what I was doing was right filled the void that had opened in my soul. No, I wasn't vanquishing for the good of it all. When you've just killed your sister, your last living family, the only thing to do, the only thing you can do is take it out on the rest of the world.
Dropping a transport potion, I reappeared at Magic School. Surrounded by the destruction and degradation that the demons—that we had brought there, I struggled against the urge to collapse, to lay there and weep. After those first moments of realizing I had just killed my own blood, with sobs being torn out of me in painful handfuls, I'd dried my tears and encased myself in ice. Christy, my sister, whom I had spent years looking for, had betrayed me in the end and I had betrayed her, taking her out with our combined magic.
But I still couldn't blame her, couldn't face the fact that it was Christy who'd chosen the life she had, because she hadn't. She'd been taken as a child and raised by Evil Incarnate, the Triad. She had been good, we came from a line of good witches, not evil and I believed that she would have come around in the end, if I had just been able to talk to her instead of fight her.
My eyes watered and I blinked furiously, breathing deeply, using any and all amount of willpower to control these weak emotions, emotions that would get me killed. A clatter drew my attention to the main corridor. The sound had been just around a corner. On silent feet, I made my way down the corridor, daggers in both my hands, at the ready.
It had been weeks since I'd picked myself up off the floor, since I'd left the Charmed Ones to live out their happy endings. Since the death of my own sister, I hadn't stopped killing. The Underworld, already weak with the loss of the Triad, already afraid of me for having been The Ultimate Power for just a little while, whispered my name in sharp fear of what I'd become. I knew this, but I ignored it because this, the hunt, was really the only time I felt something other than guilt and grief.
Adrenaline washed through me, heightening my perceptions, tightening my muscles. Other than potions, I didn't use magic in vanquishing demons. The closer I could get to the disgusting creatures, the better. The more flesh I pounded in, the more times my knives bit, the less my own pain felt. If I'd been good before, I was deadly now.
Rounding the corner, I smoothly met the demon as he rushed me. Taking his momentum, I bent down, grabbed his arm and flipped him over my shoulder. Rather than stabbing him as he fell on his back, I shifted on my feet and kicked his side viciously and he yelled in pain. He tried rolling away from me but I grabbed his hair and ran my knife down his cheek, revealing a stream of blood. As I pulled his head back, I bared my teeth in a grotesque resemblance of a smile as I took in his fearful eyes. I was playing with him, and he knew it. "Please," his voice barely audible.
I felt the air leave my lungs at the word. But it was a critical mistake, as he snarled at me and twisted around to take my legs out from me. The impact barely registered as a I hit the ground and rolled to my feet and faced off with him. His wound was dripping and he was breathing hard. I ignored the pounding of my own blood, the sudden fractures in my armor, as I swiped left, right and left again, faster than his eyes could follow. He tried to block me but I knew he wouldn't in the end. With an almost dance-like motion, I got in under his guard and drove the dagger home.
His shocked eyes met mine and I snapped back as he burst into flames, his agony echoing through the corridor. I couldn't shake that last image from his eyes, the cold-hearted murderer I had become. My walls were shattered and I finally let go, screaming my grief to the empty school as I fell to my knees. The wounds which I hadn't allowed to heal gaping open for all to see. And I cried. I cried for Christy, I cried for my parents and I cried for myself, for the loss of innocence.
Suddenly, warm and loving arms surrounded me. Paige. So caught up in my sorrow I hadn't even heard her orb in. Her soft and gentle voice reached me in the darkness. "Come on, Billie. Let's go home." And I was swallowed whole in the light.