Fair is foul, and foul is fair

Aghast at what was happening, Jane had pressed her eyes shut at the last moment. Now, tearful, she slowly opened them. Once open, she couldn't believe them. There Mrs Weir stood, exactly as before, perhaps with a slightly sadder expression, completely unharmed.

She understood, though, as she saw the black streak of ash on the ground a little way off, and the absence of a floating witch. Marguerite was no more. There was something else missing, though – the enormous red monster.

Ignoring its mysterious disappearance, Jane rushed over to Benny's grandma and embraced her tightly. Mrs Weir returned the gesture affectionately, but distractedly. "What happened?" babbled Jane.

Mrs Weir frowned, and then opened her mouth to speak –

"She thought that she could control me," said a smooth voice. "She was wrong." Stepping from behind the barricade was a tall man, neatly dressed in a garishly crimson suit, but otherwise normal-looking from the crown of his head to the ends of his immaculate shoes. He smiled politely, displaying an uneven row of teeth. "This is much more civilised, isn't it?" he said, flattening his lapels.

The others shrank back, string at him in silence.

He raised an eyebrow. "What? Frightened of something?"

Slowly, they all nodded. "Well, uh, you are the devil, right?" said Emily, tentatively.

"Yes, I would have to concede that point."

"And you did just incinerate someone," pointed out another witch.

"Yes. Again, I agree with you there."

"And not two minutes ago you were an enormous three-headed dragon," said a third witch.

"Well, then, perhaps you have good reason to be afraid. But I have no good reason to harm you – if I had, then, you can trust me that you would already be harmed."

Jane frowned. "But – but you're evil. Surely you should be trying to destroy us?"

The man snorted. "You're witches. Shouldn't you be doing something evil? Or, if I'm evil, and you are, by your own definition, good, then why are you doing nothing to stop me?"

"Um…" The witches shuffled awkwardly. Even Mrs Weir seemed somewhat at a loss.

"I'm not interested in destroying you. I don't want power over you. All I want is not to be controlled."

"How can we believe you?" argued Mrs Weir. "You are, after all, the devil – lying is what you do."

He shrugged. "The one who wanted to do those things was Marguerite. She summoned me; she wanted to destroy you; she wanted to be all-powerful. And, you'll note, that she did that entirely on her own. I certainly didn't make her do it. It was formed, planned, and executed all on her own, human, initiative. It was certainly convenient for me, for I am now free from my ancient prison, and that dreadfully clumsy form, but, trapped as I was, I had no power in your world to influence her actions. Also, I destroyed her, not you. I saved you, actually! You would all do well to remember that."

"But what can we do?" said Mrs Weir. "We can hardly let you go."

He laughed. "Let me go? You're hardly in a position to do that. No, there's nothing you can do against me. I can leave whenever I like. In centuries of witchcraft, this has been your advertised ambition. You may dress it up in an ironic, postmodern method, claiming to be above it all, but you are, after all, witches. Your powers ultimately derive from the magical world – a world of which I am king. Whatever you may claim, the truth of your order is based on me. Either accept that I mean you no more harm than you mean ordinary people or not, but you cannot dispense with me. You have, inadvertently, completed your task. Congratulations."

"So what do you intend to do?" asked Mrs Weir, cautious.

The man shrugged, and then spoke while smoothing out a wrinkle in his suit. "I don't know for certain. I thought that I would talk abroad in the world for a while. I can tell you, though, that I do not want it ruined. I have spent time enough in one Hell not to want to create another." He tipped his head to one side, and pondered. "Perhaps I'll play with your race a while. A little mischief in the world. Perhaps I'll lead people to wrong-doing. Perhaps I'll lead them to good. Really, it's been such a long time since I've been in the world that I have no idea how I want to act. It may well turn out that I can create no more evil; perhaps you've all outdone me."

He sighed, and put his hands in his pockets. "I'll meet you back here next year, then, now I know that this is how you try to contact me." The man looked around. "You might want to clear this place up, though, or you'll have a pretty angry farmer in the morning." With that, he strolled off, gradually becoming more transparent. "See you around…" echoed a last jaunty call on the wind, before, whistling, he disappeared.

The group of witches were silent for a while, before breaking out into relieved chatter. Jane looked up at Benny's grandma. "Should that have happened?"

Tight-lipped, Mrs Weir spread out her hands. "I have no idea. I can't think of anything that could have stopped it. But," (here she looked a little surer of herself) "I am going to see if there is a way to send him back – certainly find out how Marguerite summoned him – just in case we have to. But, I suppose, we're just going to have to trust him." She sighed. "Perhaps this was all a mistake from the start." She walked over to the streak of ash that had been her friend. "We treated it as a game – we were so confident in our powers. We should have known that it couldn't last."

With a wave of her hand, she created a wind that blew away the dust, and then rushed across the field, putting out the last of the fires. With that sad gesture, she walked back towards the entrance to the field. Jane followed obediently, keeping her head down as they passed an angry looking witch standing by a ruined car. She'd had nothing, nothing to do with that…

"Come on, Jane," Mrs Weir said, wearily. "Let's go home."

"Ethan? Is the answer just 7?" asked Benny, looking up from the workings he'd been frowning t for the last twenty minutes. "Aargh!" he shouted, lurching back in surprise when he found that Ethan was only a few inches away.

Ethan winced sympathetically as Benny banged his head on the wall behind his bed.

"Ow…" murmured Benny. He looked back at Ethan, who had stayed where he was. "Er… Hi…!"

"Hi…" repeated Ethan. It was all rather awkward. Ethan then looked down abruptly and patted Benny's leg. "Shift over, will you?"

Benny obliged, shuffling across the bed. Ethan perched on the edge of the bed in the space by the crook of Benny's knee. There was another awkward pause. Then Ethan leaned forwards and brushed Benny's hair off of his forehead.

"You're very sweet, sometimes, B., do you know that?"

Benny opened his mouth to reply, but Ethan placed a finger over it, and continued speaking.

"You can also be slightly creepy."

Benny blushed, and glanced towards the cupboard. "And this was … sweet?" he said, hopefully.

Ethan's mouth quirked up into a smile. "Close, but no. This one is definitely creepy."

"Oh. Sorry, Ethan…"

Ethan smiled. "It's OK, Benny, but please get rid of it. What do you need it for when you've got me for real?"

"I suppose. But you can't be here all the time…"

"I can try!" laughed Ethan, bending forwards to kiss his boyfriend, before leaning back to lie full length on the bed. "At least it's made you more prepared for the maths test tomorrow," he said, swinging his feet up.

"Hey, Ethan!" cried Benny, pushing Ethan's feet away from his face.

Ethan grinned, and was only more persistent, wiggling his toes through his socks under Benny's nose.

Giggling, Benny tried to do the same to Ethan, but Ethan was too fast, grabbing Benny's legs at holding them tightly to his chest. "Spoilsport!" said Benny, pouting, and giving Ethan's feet a shove.

Still laughing, Ethan toppled off the bed with a thump. He picked himself up, grinning. Then an odd look crossed his face. "You're grandma is back," he said.

"How do you know?" asked Benny.

Ethan shrugged. "I just – knew…" At that moment, they heard the key in the lock. "Shall we go and find out how it went?"

"OK," said Benny, springing up, planting a kiss on Ethan's cheek and leading him by the hand out of the room.

"I'm sorry, Jane, that that had to be your first experience of witchcraft. It's exposed rather more of its flaws than you should have seen for the first time. I'd understand if you didn't want anything more to do with it."

The girl, spattered from head to foot with mud, a faint overcoat of ash, and just very slightly singed, beamed up at Mrs Weir. "Of course not! That was amazing! And –" She broke off, looking more serious. "And – if there are going to be problems like that, then I want to help you fix them."

"It's dangerous, Jane," said Mrs Weir, pulling up outside the house. "You've seen that now. You know what it feels like to know that you could die at any moment."

Jane shrugged. "Lots of things are dangerous. And, if Ethan and Benny can do it, and they're the wimpiest people I know, then I think I can handle the danger."

Mrs Weir smiled faintly. "Well, if you're sure… Same time next week? I think we'll just stick to training for now, though."

Jane nodded enthusiastically.

Mrs Weir cast an eye over her. "We'd better get you cleaned up – or your parents will never let me take you out again."

"Uh – yes…"

"And we'd better see what Benny and Ethan have done to the house while we've been gone…"

Jane laughed, getting out of the car and following Mrs Weir to the front door. Opening it, they looked about the immaculate hall.

Mrs Weir raised an eyebrow. "Suspicious," she muttered. Jane smirked. Was Ethan going to get in trouble? It was difficult to tell what for, but there was bound to be something.

Suddenly, there was a laugh, and Ethan, followed by Benny, rushed down the stairs. They stopped abruptly on seeing the state of Jane and Mrs Weir. "What happened to you?"

"Witches…devil…mud…" droned Jane, sloping off towards the bathroom.

"Good…" said Ethan, shaking his head. He turned to Benny. "I'll be going home, then. No often I get in before Jane!" He headed for the door. "'Night!" he called out, cheerily.

Mrs Weir grabbed him by the shoulder. "Hold it right there, young man. What have you and Benny been doing? This place is too clean."

Ethan spun around, confused. "Nothing. Really, nothing!"

She gave him a hard look.

"No, just maths work, honestly! – Benny, what's the cube root of 729?"

"9," replied Benny, after a moment's thought.

"See?" said Ethan.

Benny's grandma narrowed her eyes. Well, by comparison he was probably the most trustworthy person she'd been asked to trust that evening. "All right, I believe you. Just don't tell your parents about Jane."

"They'd never believe me, even if I did," said Ethan, resignedly. "Bye, then!"

The door clicked shut behind him. Benny grinned wryly at his grandma before going back upstairs. "Don't stay up too late, now!"

And that ends Episode 6. Hope you enjoyed it!