Disclaimer: I own nothing.
A/N: Hello! This is the second chapter, please review!
They watched as Winifred opened one eye and then the other, she raised her head and blearily took in her surroundings, "What in God's body is this?" The red haired witch wriggled her hands out of their binding and turned around, that's when she landed on the crew outside the cell.
"You," she growled. She rose unsteadily and made her way to the bars. She was about to grasp one, but she pulled her hand away as if it had been burned. "Salt. How clever," she ground out.
Dani gulped and watched as Winifred studied them, "So… I survived then. I'm assuming my sisters did not."
Dani spoke, "No. They didn't."
Winifred glared at the girl, "What a pleasure to see that thou art still alive." Her eyes trained on Max, "Ha! Even the boy still lives." She took in the other three people, and cackled.
"So I am prisoner. What tis thy plan? Starve me? Torture? Do tell me the delightful details."
Max cleared his throat, "Prisoner. That's it."
Allison spoke, "Max, I should tell you, she did something."
Max turned to her, "What? I thought everything was okay."
She shook her head and looked to Winifred, "None of the parents are home. Or a good portion of the adults."
Max pushed the fear in the pit of his stomach down and walked up to the bars of the cell, "What did you do?"
"The party was a marvelous one. I simply did not want it to end for them." She examined her nails. "So I let them dance forever. Until they drop dead at least," she said airily.
"Lift it."
"Or what?" She challenged.
Max thought, "Or…" an idea struck him, "or we'll destroy your book."
That got her attention. Winifred snapped her head up and a look of hatred filled her eyes. "Tis impossible."
"Oh it may be impossible to destroy it, but trust me, there's a lot of other things we can do to it."
If it were impossible to die from a glare, they'd all be six feet under. Winifred ground her teeth, but relented and snapped her fingers. "There. The enchantment is off."
The kids seemed to breathe easier after that.
Binx glared at the witch; he hopped up onto Max's shoulder so he could be level with her. "I think we should set some rules."
The witch looked him in the eye, "And those would be?"
"No harm is to come to any of us. Especially Dani or any other child. You are not to trick or do anything of the like."
"And what rules are set for my benefit?"
"No harm is to come to you."
Dani faced Max, "We should go soon."
Allison buried her face in her hands, "I'm so dead. My parents are going to be livid. She's right, we should be going."
Max eyed Winifred, who was still glaring, "Yeah we should. But we can't leave her alone. We have to keep an eye on her."
Winifred groaned, "So I am to be watched constantly as well? Like an infant?"
"After what happened these last hours? We'd be stupid not to."
"And I was just so giddy with hope." Max rolled his eyes and saw Billy sit down by the opposite wall, "I've got her for ya." Binx padded over to where Billy sat and stopped at his feet, "I shall keep watch as well. Go ahead you three, go to your families. "
"Because poor little Binx cannot go to his," quipped Winifred, prompting a low growl from the cat.
Shooting a glance to the witch, Max replied, "See ya Binx. We'll bring back some food." With that, Max, Dani, and Allison found their way back to the surface.
"I better be going. My mom and dad are going to kill me," Allison laughed, "Bye Max, bye Dani." She gave the two quick hugs and started to walk away when Max stopped her.
"Dani," she stopped and looked back at him, "What time do you wanna meet back here?"
She thought for a moment, "Three maybe? We don't have school, and we did stay up the whole night, so I might sleep for a bit."
"Good idea."
She waved and walked off. Max glanced at Dani. He had come so close to losing her, he was unsure of all of this. From the look in her eyes, she was having similar thoughts. She looked up to him, eyes big and blue. "Max? Did I do something totally stupid?"
Did they? What were they expecting? For an -actual- soulless witch to be compliant? This could turn out to be very bad. They were all fooling themselves if they thought Winifred didn't have other tricks up her sleeves. So in truth, he had no idea. He sighed, "No clue. It was brave that's for sure."
Dani said nothing and just nodded. After a pause she took his hand and they walked home together.
Binx was going to claw her eyes out.
Or at least that what Billy was certain of. For the past hour-and-a-half Winifred had been whistling a particularly high pitched tune. For himself it was downright annoying, and he assumed it was worse for the feline. But that's what she wanted isn't it? If she couldn't harm, she'd annoy. She had to have power in some way or another. Detestable harlot.
Binx growled and put his paws over his ears when the witch hit a surprising high note for whistling.
"Dammit, would you shut your trap?" Billy snapped.
Winifred paused, sneered, and continued on even louder.
"Do you strive to annoy?"
She grinned, "I strive to cause any misfortune."
Billy huffed and stroked Binx with awkward fingers, trying to soothe the used-to-be boy. Winifred apparently found boredom once again and took to inspecting the cell. Squinting, she took it in.
"Couldn't have bothered to clean the filthy thing out could thee?"
Binx hissed, "You deserve less."
She rolled her eyes and sat back down. Her eyes settled on Billy, studying him. Billy shifted under her gaze, hating having one of hell's own furies evaluating him so. The bitch. So he closed his eyes. If he couldn't see her, and she wasn't making any noise, he could almost pretend she wasn't there anymore. It was almost like death again. Til it was disrupted.
"So how did the afterlife treat thee, Billy? Absolutely rotten? I sure do hope."
He tried to ignore her.
"Miss anything about life that you have been reunited with?"
He tried.
"Miss your head? I know thou was without that a few times."
He really did.
"Miss Sarah?"
His eyes shot open and he found Winifred staring at him, not glaring, but staring at him with a hint of accusation. So very like her to push the right buttons. He almost opened his mouth to spew hate at her, but did his best to bite back the insult. He would not give her the satisfaction. No matter how tempting it was.
Billy rested his head against the wall and tapped his fingers against his side, "How did you guess?" Winifred scowled and huffed; turned towards the wall to avoid any further discussion. Good. They had an understanding.
A/N: SOO Sorry! It's been what, about six months since an update? Apologies! I had lost inspiration for a long time, and found it hard to get back into this story. And I know the ending is a little rushed and abrupt, but I really just wanted to update. Please review!