She could only hear her heartbeat drumming in her ears, as they all stood motionless. The air was hard to breathe, being thick with tension, and Epithumia's teeth naturally gritted together painfully.

Fate's fists were bright with golden luminescent magick and the witch's eyes were trained on them, being watchful of any move that they dared to make. Jonathan was keeping his distance behind her, noting fully that he was out of his element.

Everyone was still. Everyone was quiet until a small and faint scratching could be heard. The witch held her breath and her pulse quickened, unsure where the disturbance was emanating from, but still too tense to move.

Fate suddenly, and at an incredible speed, turned and issued a blast at Drine, who had been attempting to pick apart Jason and Zattana's bindings behind him. The bird managed to flutter out of the way of the beam and let out a shrill shriek at the fast attack.

Epithumia's rush of adrenaline shook her awake, in realizing the battle had now begun, and she jumped at Fate, with her talons aiming for his helm. The lord of order quickly set up a wall of gold to push her back and she landed hard on the ground.

Drine had quickly reverted into his original form and swung his large, beastly, and stringy arm at Fate before he could proceed to harm his mistress. The god countered quickly to the demon, but failed to stop Epithumia as she rebounded and kicked her talons up to his chest to proceed in taring his flesh apart. He yelled out in agony and blasted Drine, who was coming in to take another swing, and pushed Epithumia to tumble across the floor with a shield of magick.

Warm blood spilled from the deep gashes that were in threes upon his chest, but Fate started to charge another beam and aimed it directly at Drine's head, who was beginning to rush his way. Epithumia quickly rose, leaped, and tried to claw open one of Fate's outstretched arms, but he tucked them away and stepped back just enough to where the whoosh of wind from her talons, that were inches from him, was the only thing he felt.

Before she landed, just a foot in front of him, Fate grabbed up a fistful of her flight feathers and gave a sharp pull. The shockwave of pain splintered the feeling in the nerves up her arm, and the witch screamed a terrible cry as he yanked a second time to finally pluck away several of her large flight feathers from her fingers.

She quickly collapsed into a whimpering heap upon the floor, cradling her winged arm as it oozed red. The god towered over her feeble form; eyes glowing with power before suddenly being thrown across the room. It was Drine who had rushed back to pick Fate up by his throat and, with a tremendous inhuman force, had catapulted him into the bookshelves, just to the right from where they were.

As Fate seemed to crumple into the pile of fallen books around him, Drine knelt down to the witch to check the seriousness of her wounds. While his claw extended to hold up Epi's arm, two blasts launched into his turned back and he created a loud thud as he fell, unconscious.

Epithumia cried out Drine's name in horror while the Lord of Order slowly lifted his arms for one last blast, to render the witch helpless. The bright gold lit up her eyes as the light charged brighter and brighter, anticipating its release, when suddenly, the sharp sound of glass shattering could be heard. The growing golden beams evaporated and soon to rise after were Fate's cries as he clutched his head and staggered back.

The witch blinked, from the sweat that had started to roll down her face, and saw Fate beginning to crouch, back onto the pile of fallen books, while an unmoved Jonathan stood just beside the man's episode with his hands in his pockets, glancing down at the witch.

While Dr. Fate didn't scream, it was painfully obvious he was battling with an unknown force as he thrashed in place.

Jonathan's mouth twitched, as he was finding it hard to hold back his smile from the sight of a grown man on his knees before him.

"T-thank you", was all Epithumia could stammer out to him, after registering that he had saved her. Her eyes were still watering from her pain, and she blinked to clear her sight, while Jonathan knelt down and carefully lifted her arm. She quickly yanked it away from his touch and a frown creased his face. There were large holes from where the feathers' calamuses had been embedded deep into the skin and bone, and they were still oozing blood, from what he could see.

"Ms. Bashem, I highly recommend letting me wrap that properly. If you don't cut off the blood flow now, you are going to pass out in the next four minutes."

Drine was now starting to rise and appeared dazed as he staggered to his feet and began to shape himself back, once again. He eyed Jonathan's hands on his mistress and let out a barely audible hiss at the informal contact.

She hazily glanced down at her arm. The red was staining her feathers and starting to become sticky; causing the barbs to awkwardly clump together and become useless. The witch stared up at him, looking for any hint of malice before reluctantly pushing her injury back towards him. He took it tenderly and urged her to follow him to the couch, where a throw blanket was waiting.

Epi glanced back at Jason and Zatanna who were still tied up behind them, and pressed Jonathan to be quick.

It took him no time at all to wrap her arm tightly in the blanket and for her to immediately rush back to her friends.

Jason's muffled cries only got louder, and he struggles more ferocious as his dear friend neared. She tugged the gag out of his mouth, to which he immediately began to ramble in such a speed that the witch felt the need to place a firm hand on his shoulder to calm him; a beautiful action that he had blessed her with many times before. Instead of calming down, however, he took his bound hands and clasped them firmly on hers.

"Jason, please, you need to calm down. It's over now."

"No! No, listen to me!"- his hold on her grew harsh as he tried to shake her awake - "Take Jonathan away from here! Only he can touch Durratine! Only he can defeat him! You have to help each other, so don't try and do this alone, Epithumia. Please, don't kill yourself."

"Jason, why? What can defeat him that only Jonathan can do?" She tried to keep her voice calm hoping it would help Jason calm himself, but his volume only grew.

"Epithumia, believe me! You can't do anything alone to contain this demon. It has to be Jonathan, no matter what it is, it has to be him."

"Jason, you need to calm down, let me help you out of these bindings and we can"-

"I believe that's enough talk."

She nearly choked on the air and spun around finding Dr. Fate recovered and hovering closer. A bright golden light began to envelop her sight and obstruct her view of everything, save for the large ankh of glowing gold slamming itself down upon her.

The light became so blinding that she had to tightly shut her eyes and cover her face. She felt nothing but a gentle warmth and a cradling force within everything becoming obsolete. The light faded away and she fluttered her eyes open. Blackness. Darkness. With the fading of the light was also the fading of the warmth and odd comfort it provided, and it was slowly replaced with a cold and dreaded emptiness.

The first thing she could see in that dark was chipped white paint, as she laid on the wood planks of a porch. The witch slowly sat up to see even clearer the vast forest beyond the front yard, and by the white eyes that glistened in curiosity and hunger as they all looked on at her defenseless state. She knew then where she was. She was home.