A/N: I made a small change to the previous chapter, just so that I could make sure this next chapter came nicely after it, so you might want to check it out. But, it's only a timing issue, so the only thing that changes is that instead of going straight to Leo, Rose doesn't go to him until the next morning. It's literally 3 words at the beginning of the last scene.

Chapter Twenty-One: The Witch Is Back, Part 1

"I was going to tell Prue that she's my mom but I couldn't do it."

Rose's words hit Leo like a ten-ton truck. His eyes widened. "How the hell did you find that out, Rose?!" he demanded. It was Rose's turn to look confused, and then something in her mind clicked. The truth spell.

"You don't remember," she muttered. "Crap. You don't remember."

"Don't remember what?" Leo snapped. Rose sighed, she didn't know how to go through this all again, with the painful reminders that she had completely screwed up her chance to ask Prue the truth. "Rose..." But Leo's voice was stern: he wasn't going to let her get away with not telling him. Not this time.

"Walk with me?" Rose suggested; almost begging him. She was fed up with magic and fed up with how much it had been ruining her life recently.

Leo nodded, and the pair set off. "And no lying, Rose – I want to know everything."

"So..." Rose started; mumbling, wondering where she should actually begin her story. She knew Leo would be annoyed by a lot of aspects of it so wanted to try and avoid those bits as much as possible without it seeming like she was missing anything out. "Prue cast a truth spell – that's where this starts, I guess. And, it wasn't like I wanted to be in the house when she did it – I just was."

"Why were you in their house?" Leo asked suspiciously. "Me and the Elders have both made it clear that you should stay away from them."

Rose sighed. "All that day – 2 days ago now: the day after everything happened with Aviva – I had been having these weird... urges, almost. Telling me that I should go visit The Charmed Ones. I'm gonna guess it had something to do with the memory dust you sprinkled on me," she said accusingly.

Leo frowned. "How do you know I put memory dust on you? Did it not work properly?" he asked. If that were the case, he'd have to make sure to let the Elders know that their memory dust was faulty.

"Relax Leo, it worked fine. You successfully made me forget an entire evening and that I was related to The Charmed Ones – oh, and apparently I witnessed a murder that you removed from my head, so thanks for that," she snapped sarcastically. "Maybe next time, be more careful. As I was saying, I had this urge to visit them because of what you told me about being related to them, so, I did. I thought only Piper and Phoebe were in, because that's who I was talking to – they wanted my help with a vanquish and I'd seen the demon that was going to do it – although I'd forgotten by that point. Prue was in the attic and she was casting the truth spell; thinking that she was alone in the manor." Rose had lowered her voice at the last sentence so that mortals wouldn't hear her say stuff like 'vanquish', 'demon' and 'truth spell'.

"Um, do I want to know why Prue was casting that?" Leo asked uncertainly.

Rose rolled her eyes, thought about the question, and brushed it off. "Definitely not. And also, seriously not important," she said; impatient. "I got put under it, the next day, I woke up still feeling woozy from the memory dust and I wanted to make sure that you had healed me properly – you told me that's why I felt weird, remember?"

"I had a perfectly good reason to tell you that, Rose."

"Yeah," Rose scoffed. "The Elders told you to. I kept asking you questions and eventually you had to tell me that Prue was my mom and I didn't ask many other questions because I didn't want to know the answers."

Leo and Rose stopped walking as they got near a café. Leo felt awful – he had wanted to tell Rose for ages about who she was, and had held off, for fear of Rose not being ready. But he had told her, without meaning to, and now he didn't even remember! He wasn't even sure how much of the truth he had ended up revealing. "What did you find out other than that?" Leo asked.

Rose shrugged slightly, glancing up at the building they'd ended up by. Buckland's. This is exactly what she had been trying to explain to Leo – she had this weird sixth sense that just drew her to Prue, Piper and Phoebe. It made more sense now that she knew they were related. "Prue didn't know Barbas was a demon. That's all I asked about because I didn't think I wanted to know anything else. That was enough of the truth."

"And you wanted to –" Leo had been about to ask why Rose had wanted to ask Prue about it – and wondered why she hadn't when they'd both been under the truth spell – but his words were cut off by the shattering of a glass window in Buckland's.

"What the hell...?" Rose muttered as they both looked up at the noise.

A man was falling gracefully down from about 10-storeys up – maybe even more, Rose thought – as if he were floating. Leo and Rose watched as he fell, and landed softly on his feet only about 10 yards away from them. "Rose, come on," Leo said; urging her to turn away. This was magic and this was bad. They should not be near it.

But Rose's eyes were fixed on the window from where the man had fallen. In it, staring down at the street below, was Prue. Rose nudged Leo, motioning that he should look up too.

"Oh, crap."

"That's not good," Rose agreed. She glanced around as people in the café and on the street were talking about what they had just witnessed. "We should get out of here before the cops get called, right?" she asked.

"Yeah. That's probably best. I've got to get to work," Leo replied.

"What?" Rose exclaimed. "Leo! A man just fell out of Prue's office and didn't die and you're going to work?!"

"It doesn't concern us, Rose." Leo motioned for her to keep walking; away from the scene. Away from the obvious magic, and the obvious trouble. Rose glanced up at Prue once more before she started to walk. "Let them deal with this – it's not a problem that you need to get involved in," Leo told her as they got to an empty alley. Rose went to argue. "Rose, I'm warning you."

"Fine, fine!" Rose snapped. "I won't get involved."

She was lying.

~PO3~

As soon as Leo found a quiet place to orb away, Rose turned invisible and made her way back to Buckland's. She had nearly bumped into Prue as she got out of the elevator, but had managed to just move out of the way. Rose debated showing herself to Prue and asking if she knew anything about the man that had jumped out of her window, but decided against it: it could wait.

The cops were already pulling up outside Buckland's and if Rose wanted a chance to look around Prue's office without risk of bumping into one of them, she needed to forget about Prue and get a move on.

So, instead, Rose walked into Prue's office and made a point of not touching the door handle; using telekinesis to close the door instead.

She noticed an open but empty box and walked over to it. Rose touched it lightly and was pulled into a premonition – a power she still couldn't get used to – it always made her feel queasy.

In the premonition, Rose saw a woman and a man. The latter of which looked angry, and who had been the guy to fall out of Prue's window half an hour earlier. He called her Melinda Warren, she said she was going to banish him, she took back powers that he – Matthew Tate – had apparently stolen from her, and said a curse. He went inside a locket and Rose opened her eyes.

Melinda Warren. She recognised the name from when she'd first decided to find The Charmed Ones and had researched everything she could about them. Melinda was their ancestor, and had been the one to predict the existence of The Charmed Ones. Which meant one thing: Melinda Warren was Rose's ancestor too.

Rose swallowed the lump that seemed to have appeared in her throat and pulled her hand away from the empty box, as though it had burnt her.

"It concerns me," she mumbled to herself.

Leo had told her not to get involved in the business with the man and Prue's window because it didn't concern her. But it did! Melinda Warren had known the guy that had jumped out of Buckland's and Rose was Melinda's descendent. Leo hadn't known that when he'd forbidden it, and Rose was sure that he would understand Rose's urge to help The Charmed Ones once again.

Sure, she wasn't sure how she was going to face them, but she knew she had to. Well, she didn't really have to – Rose was positive that the three women could work out how to fix something without her help – but she couldn't help but want to.

And anyway, she had seen the premonition, which had been useful – even if it had made her feel sick. Okay, yes, Phoebe got premonitions too, but what if she didn't touch the box or whatever was in it? Yes, Rose thought, she definitely needed to help The Charmed Ones out, whilst hiding the fact that she was Prue's potentially – okay, definitely – unwanted child.

Before Rose could leave, Prue's office door opened. Instead of leaving, Rose decided to stay and see who was coming in and what they were going to do.

Three men – two of whom she recognised and one she didn't – and a woman, who Rose only recognised vaguely, walked in. "You said you heard some noises in here, before the incident. What kind?" the man who Rose recognised as Andy asked Rex and a ginger woman who Rose didn't know the name of.

"Uh, it's hard to say," the woman said.

"It almost sounded like a struggle. A fight, perhaps?" Rex added on.

"Yeah and then we heard a crash – which I assume was the window breaking – and we came to check on Prue and then she just went running out," the woman finished. Rose was listening carefully, still invisible.

Andy and his partner Morris, who Rose had met but did not remember because of the memory dust, continued to ask Rex and the woman questions until they seemed to have everything they needed. They let them leave, and Rose decided to follow Prue's boss out rather than stay in the room with Andy and his partner.

Rose stopped outside Rex's office, which was now closed. She listened at the door. "Well Hannah, I thought that went exceedingly well, don't you?" Rose heard Rex ask. Rose frowned slightly – odd question.

"We may have proven the legend of the locket true but now we have a seventeenth-century warlock running around the Bay Area," Hannah replied. "He may stick out."

Eyes widening at this new piece of news, Rose nearly stumbled into the door. Prue's boss knew about warlocks? Knew about magic? And seemed to be on Evil's side, considering the glee he showed at knowing that a warlock had been unleashed into San Francisco via Prue's office. Did that mean... Prue was working for warlocks?

Perfect, Rose thought. Absolutely perfect.

~PO3~

Prue had gone home and quickly gotten Piper and Phoebe up to speed in the attic, as Leo had arrived and was working in the kitchen. "So... Matthew Tate, you said his name was?" Phoebe asked, going towards the Book of Shadows, hoping to find something out about this mysterious man.

"Yep," Prue replied. "And somehow he knows that we're related to Melinda Warren."

"What? Book of Shadows Melinda? That burned at the stake?" Piper asked. Prue nodded and Piper continued to flick through a book she'd found in the trunk about legends of magic.

"Yeah, he came out of the locket." Prue held up the locket to show her sisters. "I think he wants our powers. He has stronger powers, stronger than mine and he did this thing where one second he was in front of me and the next, he was behind me," she explained. Phoebe looked worried.

"Rose can do that..." she mumbled.

"No, it was different. Not teleporting, you can tell when she does it that it's a Wiccan power. But with him..." Prue trailed off.

"If it walks like a warlock and talks like a warlock," Piper suggested.

Phoebe looked uneasy at the similarities between Matthew Tate and Rose but decided not to push the idea. She liked Rose, even if she didn't know much about her. "Besides," Prue started to add. "He fell twelve stories down and landed on his feet. Rose can't do that."

"That we know of," Phoebe added quietly. She didn't like being the one who was cautious about Rose – she had been so keen to trust her and get Prue to, and now Prue did and Phoebe was worrying. It was silly! She glanced up from The Book. "Can I see that locket?" she asked.

Prue nodded and handed it over. As she touched it, Phoebe was pulled into a premonition and saw the same thing that Rose had. "What did you see?" Piper asked.

"You say Matthew came out of this? I think I just saw Melinda put him in it."

"You saw the past?" Prue asked. Phoebe nodded slowly. "But you only see the future."

"Not anymore, I guess."

"We did always know our powers would grow," Prue agreed.

"Somehow I thought I was gonna get to fly," Phoebe smiled. She handed the locket back to Prue. "We should probably figure out how to put Matthew back in the locket," she said, flicking through the Book.

"Hey," Prue said. She was looking through a photograph album. "Was this the woman in your premonition?" She turned it to show Phoebe.

"Yeah. Melinda Warren – she's beautiful," Phoebe said.

"She kinda looks like mom," Piper added. "Listen to this: 'And because the warlock had stolen her love, she cursed him into the pewter heart so he could spend eternity knowing the sting of betrayal'," she read.

"That must be what I saw."

"And I let him out. Great," Prue muttered; annoyed at herself.

"No kidding. The legend says that Matthew must never be freed or he will destroy the Warren line. That'd be us," Piper continued.

"This is bad," Prue said.

"What should we do?" Phoebe asked.

"I say we hide," Piper suggested; only half-joking.

"No. We have to find out exactly what we're up against," Prue said. And then she said the thing that had been on her mind since Matthew had seemed to copy her power of telekinesis and she'd realised they were up against a warlock that was more powerful than any warlock they'd ever faced. "And I think we should ask Rose for help."

"What?" Piper asked.

Phoebe was also surprised. "She knows more about magic than we do – maybe she's familiar with the legend of Matthew Tate and Melinda Warren?" Prue argued.

"And even if she doesn't, I guess it wouldn't hurt to have her expertise. And her powers," Phoebe agreed. "How do we contact her though? She's always been the one to show up first."

Prue looked lost in thought. "Hopefully magic school shows the news and she hears about a man who jumped out of my window and walked away without a scratch."

~PO3~

Now Prue, Piper and Phoebe were back downstairs and watching the news. They were waiting, hoping, that Rose would find out what happened and turn up. And in the meantime, they were flicking through a couple of different books about seventeenth century magic to see if there was anything in them about Matthew, Melinda or the locket.

"Look, Andy's on TV," Piper pointed out. The doorbell rang and Phoebe glanced out the window.

"He's here too," she said. "I'll get rid of him."

~PO3~

"Andy, what a surprise. How you been?" Phoebe asked nonchalantly as she opened the front door and saw the cop.

"I need to talk to Prue," Andy replied bluntly.

"Prue, wow," she said casually. "How out of the loop am I? And here I thought you guys broke up."

"It's not about that. It's police business."

"Oh, well, uh, she's not home. She's at work," Phoebe replied, hoping Andy hadn't spotted Prue's car parked only a few houses down the road.

"No, she's not," he said. Well, Phoebe thought. At least he doesn't think I'm lying.

"I don't know where she is then, but I'll tell her you stopped by, okay?" Phoebe smiled. "Ciao!" She went to leave, but Andy grabbed her arm to stop her. "Woah."

"A man fell out of Prue's office window," Andy started. But Phoebe wasn't listening. She had just spotted the one person that the three of them needed right now. Rose! She was walking up Prescott Street, towards the Manor. "Which is suspicious enough. But then a man matching the description went and killed a lawyer down the street." Rose was now close enough to hear what Andy was saying. "A lawyer named Halliwell."

Phoebe motioned for Rose to walk by Andy and join her on the porch.

"Now, I know she knows who he is. One more time Phoebe – where's your sister?" Phoebe opened the door to the house, put her arm around Rose to lead her inside and turned to Andy:

"Where's your warrant?" She gave Andy a fake smile. "Come on, Rose."

A/N: Please review if you enjoyed, it means a lot to know people like where the story is going. Thanks!