"What's a nice girl like you doing with the likes of a pathetic fairyborn like him anyway?" Anagan taunted Mariah as they circled one another.
Out of the corner of her eye, Mariah could see Justin fighting Ogron and Warren dealing with Gantlos.
"None of your damn business." she fired an energy blast at him, which he narrowly managed to run around her to dodge.
She whipped around to find him leering down at her from the branches of a tree.
"Missed me!" he fired an energy blast that knocked her off her feet.
"Mariah!" Justin called out in fear, yet somehow still managing to maintain his fight with Ogron.
"I'm fine!" Mariah levitated off the ground and using her own gift of super speed, managed to dodge most of Anagan's spells, blocking the rest with a dark grey energy shield.
"Not for long." Anagan attacked again, but Mariah conjured a tornado that absorbed and redirected the attack right back at him.
Anagan raised an eyebrow, seemingly impressed.
"Wind Blade!" she swiped her hand and a gust of wind that narrowly missed Anagan's neck emerged from her hand and sliced the branches of a tree clean off.
"I see you're not afraid to play dirty, unlike the Winx." he noted casually.
"Unlike them, I'm a witch and we witches are experts at playing dirty!" Mariah tossed an energy blast which he dodged- only to be caught in the path of a silver energy beam that blasted him face first into the ground.
"Nice shot, Nori!" Joanna high-fived Eleanor as they flew onto the scene, Arthur, Ross and Simone close behind.
"See?" Mariah smirked as Eleanor and Joanna landed on either side of her.
"Well, well, well. It looks like almost the entire brood came out!" Anagan regrouped with Ogron and Gantlos.
"Stella and Brandon's children and two out of three of Bloom and Sky's… I must say that I'm surprised to see the daughters of those two as witches…" Ogron admitted.
"Everyone says that when they meet us…" Eleanor rolled her eyes, clutching her Sceptre tightly.
"I think you'll find that we're quite different to our moms though…" Joanna threw a blast of dark fire at him, which he dodged casually.
"Indeed. Shadowfire? Never saw it manifest in anyone of the Domino royal line before…"
"Oh, just shut the hell up…" Joanna and Ross threw spells at him simultaneously.
"Three against one is hardly fair, don't you think?" Gantlos asked as he faced down Eleanor, Simone and Arthur.
The three of them narrowly missed his sonic wave attacks.
"I think Allegra would have something to say about that…" Simone commented. "Solar Flare!"
A blast of energy that gave off sparks at the same time knocked him into a tree.
Justin lunged at Anagan with his swords, but the speedster dodged, only to be hit by a gust of wind and an energy blast.
"You certainly seem to enjoy being smacked around, don't you?" Mariah chortled spitefully.
After some time, the three wizards found themselves surrounded by the group of three witches, one of whom already graduated, two Specialists including one that graduated, two wizards one of whom who had already graduated and an Enchantix level fairy.
Everyone present looked rather battered, but all were standing firm.
"Alright then. You want to play it that way? We'll leave you a nice little parting gift…" the three of them disappeared in flashes of dark light.
"Where the hell did they go?" Joanna whipped around.
"Joanna, I think we have a more pressing concern at the moment…" Ross' tone was unnerved, unnerving his sister in turn.
Her magic sense went off just then and before she realized what it meant, several dark creatures- some of which she'd only seen in textbooks- emerged from the forest, surrounding them.
Simone voiced everyone's thoughts quite adequately in two simple words.
" Well, damn…"
The creatures had materialized all over the immediate area and were proving to be a challenge for the others.
"Stone Hands!"
Juniper's spell caused a pair of stone hands to rise from the ground and begin smacking around several creatures.
Neima redirected a sound wave attack from some of the creatures and they crashed into the ones Juniper was smacking around.
Zara and Lewis stood back to back firing off energy blasts and flames respectively.
"Bloody hell. These things are tough…" Zara muttered.
They switched places and continued blasting away.
"I'll say. And there's quite a lot of them. I wonder if Joanna learns about these at Cloud Tower…" Lewis mused.
"You can ask her when we get out of this!" Zara exclaimed.
Adrian was doing his best to fend off the creatures, but was being overwhelmed.
"Nope, nope, nope. First the remnants of the Wizards of the Black Circle, then these fuckers. Nope!" he thought angrily.
He felt the presence above him before he saw it.
"No!" he drew the attention of everyone else with his shouts as it grabbed Allegra and flew off with her.
Neima ran off behind it before anyone could react.
"Let my best friend go, you… You thing!" she roared, pelting spells at it.
And let go it did- right over the side of a cliff.
"Me and my big mouth…" Neima thought. "No! Allegra!"
As she saw her friend fall, her eyes showed conflict.
"I… I don't like flying, but I have to save her!" she thought.
"She saved me in Rosaellum, so I have to save her too!" her eyes showed newfound determination.
The others showed up in the distance just in time to see her dive off the edge.
Neima still felt queasy at the thought of flying, but seeing her friend falling further, she pushed her fear aside for the moment and pushed her wings much more than she had before…
A lake was below them. Allegra would fall in unless…
Another boost of energy and…
Neima narrowly caught her just as Allegra was about to hit the water.
Flying back up towards the cliffs, she arrived to find all the groups back together, running towards the cliff she and Allegra had disappeared over.
"Got her," Neima was winded and the adrenaline started to wear off as she handed Allegra over to her brothers.
She sunk down onto a nearby rock.
"Holy hell. Neima, you actually flew down there?" Juniper asked in shock.
"Yeah, I did. I had to…"
"I thought you were terrified of flying!" Jaden exclaimed.
"I did what I had to. I couldn't just let her fall and die, could I?"
"No, you couldn't. You've got some lady balls, I can tell you that…" Joanna commented in approval.
Just as Neima got up (with Jaden's assistance) and began to walk with the others, a flash of light engulfed her and a gold single eighth note pin with its stem facing up, encased in a gold square with tiny citrine crystals embedded all around it appeared in the middle of her blouse.
She barely had time to glance at it before it disappeared n another flash of light.
"Charmix?" Neima murmured.
"It certainly looks like it, little sis. Congrats." Jaden put his arm around her as they walked towards the ship.
Timmy and Mirta came back to Magix as quickly as they heard that their daughter was saved and were waiting at secured landing site, in front of the other parents who were also gathered.
It landed, the hatch opened and Justin and Warren were out first, carrying Allegra between them, followed closely by Justin and Mariah.
Timmy and Mirta immediately moved to them and everyone took in the sight of them fussing over Allegra before they clamboured into their waiting transport and disappeared.
Juniper was talking to Neima and Zara while Lewis held Zara's hand, Joanna was talking with Ross, while the Solarian trio of Arthur, Eleanor and Simone were deep in conversation.
Diaspro and Anthony noticed their daughter holding hands with Lewis and frowned.
Bloom and Sky noticed their son holding hands with Zara and frowned.
Joanna and Ross looked at Zara and Lewis holding hands, then at their frowning parents, then at each other.
They grinned.
The heads of the three Magix schools walked to the front of the crowd to greet them.
"Congratulations on a successful rescue mission," Faragonda started. "All of you have certainly proved that you are strong."
"This, I knew already." Joanna thought, smirking.
"All of you will have a week off school to return to your homes and spend some time with your families. This is not optional." Griffin spoke, noticing Joanna's now annoyed expression.
"Ross, you are accounted for as well." Saladin glanced at him and he nodded in acknowledgement. "Any assignments for the week will be sent with you, so you won't have to fall behind." He added.
"Oh joy…" Joanna grumbled.
Each teenager separated and went to their parents.
"Come on, Zara. Your sister and brothers want to see you." Anthony put a hand on one of her shoulders while her mum did the same on her other side.
"Okay, you three. Your Earthling grandparents haven't seen you in a bit, so you'll be going there…" Bloom stood next to Lewis while Sky stood next to Ross, with Joanna in the middle.
Bloom and Diaspro gave each other the evil eye over their shoulders as they walked away with their families.
" Ah. So I see zat they managed to rescue Allegra…" Noémie noted as she and Rafe lay together under the sheets in her bed, watching television.
"So, what now? Doesn't affect us…" Rafe shrugged.
"I want to meet them. They would be very useful for my plan and with the intended end result of it, they would be willing to help us out, I think." Noémie sat up and got out of bed.
"Go put some clothes on, Rafe. We will need to see Stormy and ask her a few questions about ze Tome of Mortality." she rummaged around in her closet and pulled out jeans and a floaty black blouse.
"Do I have to?" Rafe's eyes lingered on her behind as she dressed.
"Yes. Yes you do if you want to continue having the… benefits part of our friendship." Noémie's tone was curt.
"Fine, fine…" Rafe grumbled as he looked for his own clothes.
Minutes later, they were outside, approaching Stormy, who was letting loose at some figurines in the rather spacious backyard.
"Stormy! We need to speak with you!" Noémie called out, making sure to stay her distance from the storm witch until she powered down.
"What do you need?" she asked, finally turning to them.
"The Tome. I need a powerful dark magic tracker spell. Are there any in it?" Noémie queried.
"There may be. Why don't you go and check for yourself?" Stormy retorted.
Noémie rolled her eyes and walked back into the house.
She walked through the kitchen and down a long hallway lined with doors.
Opening the last door before the hallway ended and seeing the main stairway leading upstairs from the entrance hall, she entered that room.
Looking around it, she took in the sight of the small potions lab.
There were several ingredients carefully labelled and stored in transparent jars on shelves lining the walls with the goblet of Black Willow tears and jar of Black Diamond dust standing out among them.
Cupboards on the ground with desktop surfaces that could be worked on contained more ingredients and brewing equipment, though they were currently locked tight.
In the middle of the room, a large, black steel cauldron sat.
Noémie walked past the cauldron and to a stretch of blank wall directly across from the door.
Lifting her hand, it glowed black as she traced a particular pattern in the middle of the wall.
A square outlined in black light appeared on the wall, slowly turning silver until it eventually turned into the door of a safe.
Rafe and Stormy stood behind her as she entered the safe's combination.
"Ah. Here we are. Still in its safe spot." she smiled slightly as her fingers closed around it and pulled it out.
With the snap of her fingers, the safe disappeared and the wall appeared as normal again.
"Alright then. Let us go have a look..." Noémie led them back outside and upstairs to a small library.
"Okay then..." she placed the book on a stand and used magic to flip it open.
Rafe and Stormy looked over her shoulder on either side.
The pages in the book were still white as if new and the text, in black ink, was still legible.
"Ah... Oui... This may suit our purposes, exactement, oui?" Noémie pointed at a picture under the name Spirit Tracker.
It was a vivid, full colour, detailed drawing of a thin figure with a sickly green pallor with long, limp hair hiding its face, glowing dark green eyes that shone through the hair, no legs and strange, limp looking arms.
"Le Spirit Tracker. A spell native to ze planet Spectra. It is partly necromantic in nature... It can track people via their souls or spirits... Takes more zan ordinary concealment charms to hide from eet... Noémie started to smile mischievously. "C'est exactement ce que j'ai besoin!"
"Previously thought to only be castable by a higher level necromancer, the Coven's research has found this to not be so. A non-necromancer can create one in conjunction with at least two others once they have the right ingredients, the right atmosphere and are powerful enough..." Rafe read. "Great. Just great. More convoluted spells!"
"A few runes et..." Noémie ignored him, glancing around at the shelves lined with potions ingredients. "...potions ingredients, all of which we appear to 'ave at first glance... Mother has always told me that I was decent at runes, so I can do those..."
"In the basement?" Rafe looked her in the eye.
"In ze basement. Nothing down there to destroy should zis spell 'ave... side effects..."
A few minutes later and they were all down inside a rather ordinary looking- albeit large- basement, empty except for a single corner table.
"Good thing you're good at runes. I had to pilfer Icy and Darcy's notes at Cloud Tower..." Stormy commented as she watched Noémie carefully cut the runes into the stone square slab she had conjured.
"So, you need to cut the last four runes in this order right down the middle: track, soul, magic and spirit. Then Raphael here has to fill in those runes with black diamond dust and Essence of Yew..." Stormy instructed, glancing down at the Tome she held in her hands.
"There. Eet ees all done. Now, let us begin ze process, shall we?" Noémie stepped back to admire her handiwork.
"We shall." Stormy put the Tome aside on the corner table and stepped forward to begin the convergence to bring up the Spirit Tracker.