Authors Note: This chapter covers the aftermath of the battle- who will succumb to their fate and who will live to fight again? Warning- there are elements in this that may not be suitable for people of a squeamish disposition.

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Chapter 10

Agatha Cackle's momentary loss of concentration had cost her her life. She saw the jet of red light heading straight for her and knew that her time had come. She braced herself, hoping that death would come for her quickly. She flinched at the impact of the spell, but surrendered quickly to the numb feeling that was spreading throughout her corpse. Finally free of the poisonous shackles of Hecketty's possession, she gazed upon the world that she was now leaving with renewed attachment. Looking at her twin, her carbon-copy, her loathed sibling that she had fought against her entire life, they had entered the world together, but would leave it apart. Her dying seconds caused this slight emotional epiphany to rush through her failing brain, for once feeling guilt, her fading senses pleading for a pardon for her evil acts.

"Forgive me, sister" she choked as the lack of sensation reached her chest, her heartbeat slowing to a terminal stop.

xxx

Amelia had initially felt no sorrow as she watched her sister expire and fall to the floor, but as she ran forwards she felt the pricking of hot tears forming behind her eyes. Angrily she brushed them away- Agatha was not worth her pity! But it was the thought that she was her own flesh-and-blood, shared her genetics, her blood, which caused her to relent to some extent.

"Rest in peace Agatha", she murmured, conjuring a dark sheet over the body of her sibling.

xxx

Hecketty Broomhead was thrashing and writhing in agony on the floor of the stage, trapped in an unwaking state of consciousness, every single iota of pain that she had ever inflicted hitting her in one focused surge, provoking an ear-splitting, inhuman scream from her torn, bleeding throat.

Deluded amidst the intense pain, she decided that this was the ultimate, divine test that she must face to eradicate good from the world, she began laughing manically, coughing up dark flecks of her own blood in short, deranged guffaws from her panting, gaping mouth, as if to try and dispel the agony that was ripping her body in two pitilessly. She, Hecketty Broomhead, would be valued above all others- the mighty witch who had successfully removed another Fairweatherite witch from existence, her mighty ancestor would come to save her own, to help lift her from the overbearing force of goodness and purity that had flooded and was torturing her mind. She couldn't have been further from the truth. The vengeance of Harriet Hogweed had arrived as she came to claim Hecketty for her own.

"You failed me!" an outraged shriek of anger blasted through her mind, shattering her eardrums with its deafening resonance, an explosion like a grenade going off erupted in her ear canal, blood oozing in a thin trickle from her wrecked ears as her hearing shut down, leaving her incarcerated inside her own head, inside a black, noiseless hell, oblivious to her surroundings, unable to escape from the shattering wrath of Harriet Hogweed.

"You must now pay the price for your actions, Hecketty Broomhead", the demonic hiss echoed inside her mind, the only sound that she could now detect.

"You do not break your word to me, the solemn oath that was undertaken, the sacred promise made to me upon the very ground of resting place of my mortal body, without suffering the fatal consequences!" the voice menacingly proclaimed.

Hecketty's body began bucking and twitching feverishly as she was submitted to a further increased level of pain, so intense that the receptors inside her brain nearly exploded with the effort of projecting impulses of that magnitude, far exceeding the draining limits of any of her creative methods of torture that she had inflicted on countless numbers of people.

"Killing you now would be easy and far too lenient for a witch who has grossly underestimated the competition that she would face, choosing instead to bask in the reflected glory of my eternal powers! Electing to allow the presence of goodness to override any mental resistance that you had, allowing it to overwhelm your feeble mind, reducing you to this pathetic state! Your body will be consumed in the very fires of Hell itself- your soul condemned to an eternity of excruciating suffering!"

And with that final threat issued in the unforgiving tones of Harriet Hogweed, wide tongues of cursed, red flames began devouring the body of the cursed witch who was unable to hear her own frantic, blood-chilling screams, but could still smell the sickening, repulsive, charring smell of her own scorching, blistering flesh as she was burnt alive in the demonic fires that raged all around her stricken body, leaving nothing but a pile of sooty, dark grey ashes upon the polished wooden boards, all traces of the evil witch erased forever from existence.

xxx

Amelia had watched on in horrified disbelief at the screaming, shaking form of Mistress Broomhead that had been twisting around in agony, clawing at the invisible forces that had invaded her mind, her long talons tearing deep gashes in her pale skin, dark red droplets of blood dribbling down her limbs, leaving ruby stains as the blood was absorbed by the ancient timbers of the floor. Then, the convulsing woman had burst into flames, blazing red bursts of satanic light boring through her form, roasting her flesh, burning her alive. She could only watch on helplessly as Hecketty was consumed by the flames. Justice had been served.

She turned to gauge Constance's reaction to this extraordinary event, to witness the sight of the demise of the hated woman who had made her life a hell on earth. What she saw next made her heart skip a beat.

Constance was frantically sobbing over the cadaver of a little girl, whispering softly to the lifeless body.

Mildred Hubble.

Amelia was wiping the tears away from her eyes as an explosion of grief hit her full on- no student of hers should ever have met fate like this! She felt like a knife had been plunged into her guts. She had cared for them all deeply, like a mother, and she felt the loss of Mildred as strongly as she would have felt the loss of her own child. She walked over and placed a shaking hand on the bony shoulder of her loyal deputy who was breaking down over the lifeless body of her young student. United in sorrow.

"Come away Constance, there's nothing that we can do now, let go of her" she cajoled, choking back her own tears. Constance broke off from her murmurings and raised her red-rimmed hazel eyes to Amelia, beseeching her to understand.

"But I can hear her!" Constance choked on raw emotion, "She's not gone- she can't be gone!"

Amelia knelt stiffly upon her aching knees that were scraped and painful from the battering that they had taken in the duel and gently applied a slight pressure below Mildred's downy eyebrows, closing the soft eyelids over the staring, unfocused, glassy eyes that saw nothing of the world around her.

"She's moved on, Constance" she reiterated quietly.

Amelia paused, considering her next move. She conjured a soft couch, covered in black velvet and Mildred's body gently levitated onto it. Another gentle flick of her fingers and a bouquet of lilies appeared at the girl's feet. Resting in peace.

She turned away, allowing herself and Constance time to grieve in their own individual ways. She knew Constance of old, and knew that she would want to mourn in private. The tears that she had been frantically holding back now ran freely down her lined face in a silent, scalding stream.

xxx

Mildred had observed this entire scene, desperately wanting to return to the people that she loved, her heart calling out to them, pleading for them not to give up hope for her.

There was something almost beautiful about death, she mused, her young body frozen in memories for an eternity, development ceased, but then again, there was something more sinister about seeing only the blank shell of a corpse, no light of life gleaming in the eyes, inanimate, a mere graphic representation of life.

The artist within her was looking down upon her body and its papery-white skin, seeing only a blank picture for her to restore with the imaginary pallet of colours in her mind, focusing upon a living canvas on which she could create her own self-portrait, her epitaph , a detailed illustration of life. Drawing, sketching back the detail into her corpse, forming every little worried crease in the skin, a new, beating, unbroken heart was created to the last minute detail and located amongst the tired tissues of her chest. She paused to select a beautiful grey-blue from her fantasy colour block, painting existence back into her closed eyes, causing a faint sparkle of light to illuminate them once more, adding a pale pink flush to the skin of her effigy, reinstating the delicate contrast to the creamy white skin that she had reclaimed from the greyish tinges that it had assumed, her deathly pallor lifting as the rosy flush of blood crept back into her veins. She concentrated upon adding a faint gloss of chestnut brown to the long, lank tendrils of dark hair that hung, devoid of life down over her shoulders, taking time to breathe the essential essence back into her masterpiece, focusing her unique talent to lift her own portrait off the page, pulling the world back into focus, willing with all her might for her powers to return her towards the mortal life that she had recently departed, now as master of her own destiny. She was coming back. Her drawing started fidgeting nervously; beginning to chew upon its bottom lip as life started to flood back into the body.

"Old habits die hard!" she thought, and then cursed for loosing her concentration as the depiction became static once more. She was clinging onto the brink of existence now, determinedly focused on restoring movement to the magnum opus , her last ounce of strength directed at her own resurrection, hoping that she could lift the living illustration off her mental canvas into her own, freezing corpse that she was still looking down upon. Her last reserves were running out, coming down off the peak of that tidal wave of magic, plummeting beneath the surface of the icy waters, drowning, sinking towards her watery grave.

xxx

Constance looked up to see the ghostly figure of a little girl sitting next to her, observing her own broken body. Her hair was pulled back into lop-sided pigtails with little wisps of escaping hair; the ever untied bootlaces on the clumsy black hobnailed boots that adorned her feet left her an accident waiting to happen. She was smiling a gentle smile that laid no blame. The girl's small hands reached out and touched her upon her fragile wrist, unable to communicate through words anymore, but expressing all the things that she had never said in one glance. How much she respected her, how she trusted her, the numerous reasons as to why she laid down her life to save her, all listed in a single, emotionally charged gaze. The pale outline was becoming increasingly more transparent, her energy draining from her as she was losing her final battle. Constance reached back with her own slim hands, desperately trying to touch the ethereal hand palm to palm.

"Please don't give up Millie!" she whispered, trying to pull the spectre closer to her, yearning to protect her for one last time."Keep fighting!" Her arms closed upon thin air, her sweeping movement fanning a cool breeze upon her face, partially drying the tears that lay there. Walking between life and death, treading the finest line of existence, fading away to mere memories, the pale phantom vanished above the body of her mirror image.

She had gone.

Constance had been clutching at the diminishing straws of hope, but she couldn't even detect the faintest traces of Millie's soul now. For years she had existed, believing that she was the last of the Fairweatherites, then the incredible moment when she realised that she wasn't quite alone in her melancholy world, that there was somebody else who understood exactly what her tortured existence meant, somebody who she had been brave enough to confide her darkest fears and recollections in, somebody who hadn't been repelled by her horrific story, but had actually found it within themselves to reach out to her and offer her a source of comfort.

A familiar wave of self-loathing swept over Constance as she continued to deliver her silent eulogy, not for the outpouring of her affection and trust, (for once in her life not pre-planning what she said to the exact syllable, but allowing the liberation of her speech from her own self- censorship, permitting her defences to fall to provide people with the chance to sneak a glimpse at the secretive woman who lived behind the constructed walls, a woman capable of love, empathy and trust), not for this emotional outburst, but for the aching loss inside her that told her that there was nobody other than herself who was responsible for Mildred's death. If she had simply given herself up to Hecketty all of this agony would have been spared, she could have met her end, surrendered her worthless life to bring peace to Cackles-but no! She just had to involve Mildred, to put her life at risk! To make her a human shield in front of her, helpless to defend her ally against the crushing forces of dark magic. She had abandoned Mildred in her hour of need, too weak even to save herself- the girl should have left her to die in retribution for this desertion, but she had been so selfless that she had instinctively given her own life in place of Constance's.

She lent forward and deposited a light kiss upon the clammy, cold forehead in front of her, her soft lips brushing briefly against the icy surface, one simple action apologising for a multitude of sins one thousand times over.

She recoiled in fear at the feel of a faint rush of blood under the frozen skin as her lips made contact; she was hallucinating now, surely? Her own tortured conscience was giving her one final, cruel reminder of the damage that she had done. It was impossible! Her long, slender fingers felt the side of the girl's neck, trying to prove mercilessly to herself that her surge of hope had come as a result of her mind playing its sadistic tricks upon her; instead, she gasped audibly in astonishment as she felt the faint flicker of a pulse ticking away.

Back from the dead.

I will be posting a final Epilogue soon...