A/N: This is the home stretch folks, despite my delays, the whole story is written, and will be posted over the course of the next week. This chapter, while not the finale, is the climax of our story, and so I hope you all enjoy this, despite how long it took me to get it finished. As always, reviews are appreciated.
Apotheosis
Icy liked waking with the sun. The early morning air still carried some of the chill from the previous night, and the rising sun created ever-changing patterns as it refracted through the various frozen displays Icy kept around, some as decorations, some as warnings. These early mornings had become even more enjoyable as of late. It turned out her nemesis Bloom was anything but a morning person, and any chance to further torment the princess of lost Domino was a chance Icy relished. Yes, Icy was in a rather good mood as she ate her breakfast; smirking with wicked joy at Bloom whenever the princess-turned-maid glanced at her friend Flora, powerless to do anything but watch the Linphean fairy shiver and whimper as nightmares plagued her restless sleep.
A chiming sound echoed through the upper levels of Cloud Tower, an indicator of crystal ball contact from one of her sisters. Neither sister was likely to be awake at this time of day, so whatever this was it was clearly important. She stood and headed toward the door, not even bothering to look at Bloom as she spoke,
"Stay here princess, I'll be sure to let you know if one of your little friends died or something..." She smiled as a startled "y-yes my queen." escaped the fairy's lips. She loved leaving Bloom with thoughts like that, it left her with something to agonize over when Icy wasn't there to torment her in person.
The crystal ball continued to chime with greater frequency as Icy reached her room. Activating it with a wave of her hand, an image slowly cleared, revealing the identity of the witch on the other end.
"Darcy? it's not like you to-" Icy was cut off as her sister's image clarified, "Darc, you look like dad after that thing with the dark elves." Darcy rolled her eyes at her sister's sarcastic taunt. The dark witch did look rather disheveled; her hair was a mess, her glasses were askew and the skin around her eyes looked darker than usual.
"I'm fine, thanks for asking..." Both witches chuckled a bit before Darcy continued. "I was up all-night working, but-" Darcy's face wore an expression of barely contained excitement and pride, "I did it Ice, I deciphered the ritual!"
Icy's eyes went wider than most people would think possible, her voice caught in her throat, and a volcano of emotions threatened to burst out of her.
"Y-you don't... you didn't..." She stared at her sister through the crystal, words faltering, prompting Darcy to finish her thought for her,
"I did, I figured it out, I double and triple-checked everything, it will work."
To say Icy responded favorably to her sister's news would be like saying water was damp. She let out a shriek of pure joy, the resulting uncontrolled outburst of magic turned most of her room into a gallery of ice sculptures.
"Darcy you're the best!" Darcy nodded sagely from her side of the magical conversation,
"Of course, I am. And before you ask, yes, we can do it today, I'm on my way over right now, and I'll have everything ready in a couple of hours."
Icy thanked her sister again and cut the connection, leaving her alone with her gleeful thoughts. This was it! This was the day the Trix had trained their whole lives for! The day they were born for! The anticipation was filling her with nervous energy. After today anything would be possible, no one would ever stop them again, no one would-. Another thought cut off the previous one, a thought that brought the ice witch another kind of dark, wicked joy.
She hurried back to her throne room, finding everything, and everyone, as she had left it minutes ago, though Flora was awake now, and looked down in fear as Icy entered. She strutted to Bloom with a predatory look in her cold eyes.
"Today is a wonderful day, pixies! Today is the day I finally take what destiny promised me!" Bloom shrank back from the witch, her face pale as Icy's hair. Icy's smile widened at her fear, "That's right Bloom, today I win!"
It was nearly midday by the time all the preparations were complete. Darcy had finished the ritual planning and set-up hours ago, but Icy had wanted an audience. She wanted every single witch, fairy, and specialist present for this, and so the witches had gathered up everyone from all three former schools and brought them to the field in front of Cloud Tower.
The Winx girls had been give seats of 'honor', just outside the ritual circle. They had been given time to speak with each other while the rest of the populous had been gathered, and most of that time was spent in silent, shared sorrow. Seeing the poor states of friends they had not seen in a month and a half had made their own conditions seem even worse.
Flora burst into tears each time one of her friends eyes met her own; Stella had the bittersweet experience of finally being able to see again, her sight having been restored for this special occasion; Musa alternated between sobbing silence at the situation, and guilt-inducing joy at having her sense of sound returned to her for the day; Tecna hardly said anything, and panicked whenever one of her friends spoke to her, giving multiple different answers to asked questions before shrinking back into her seat; Aisha faded in and out of the conversation, her grip on reality seeming tenuous at best. Bloom sat in the center of the group, nodding in half-hearted thanks to her friends whispers of sympathy. She tried not to think about what was happening, about the potentially fatal outcome of this ritual, about how she had failed everyone here. Failed as a fairy, failed as a leader, failed as a friend...
The Trix chatted amongst themselves as they made their final preparations, glancing over at the six fairies, observing each other's handywork.
"Wow Stormy, i'm impressed," Darcy nodded appreciatively to her sister, "is Tecna even sure of her own name any more?" Stormy cackled, the excitement of the day had the weather witch so full of energy that stray bursts of lightning kept arcing off of her and striking the ground nearby,
"Some days I feel like I could convince her she's not even real! But Icy does deserves the real applause, I think the flower girl would start crying if someone breathed on her!" She cackled again and hopped around the sections of the ritual circle like a child with too much candy.
"Thanks, Stormy, but really, Darcy gets the praise today, she managed all of this, and still managed to find such wicked, poetic punishments for the two in her care. Dad is going to be so proud of you D, he might even cry." All three witches laughed at this and smiled at each other in a moment of renewed resolve.
Icy waited for Darcy to give a final nod of approval over the preparations then snapped her fingers, causing a familiar ringing to go off in Bloom's head. She grinned wickedly as the fairy shot to her feet and hurried over, trying to maintain her composure despite the tears streaming down her face.
"I-I'm here my queen..." Bloom found she couldn't meet Icy's powerful gaze, each passing moment made her feel smaller and smaller, more insignificant. She silently complied when Icy commanded her to stand in the center of the ritual circle.
Darcy handed Icy a small golden object, the Ring of Solaria, which Icy slipped onto her finger before addressing Bloom once more.
"If this is goodbye princess, know that we really couldn't have done this without you." All three witches laughed as they took positions around the circle as well, in smaller circles prepared for each of them.
"Ready to become a god sis?" Darcy teased her elder sister with a chuckle, prompting a wicked grin from the ice witch.
"Literally born ready D."
Each witch began to concentrate, each expanding her power outward toward her sisters, the patterns on their Covenix outfits glowing brighter than ever, all three linked by intertwining bands of white, purple, and red magic.
"The covenant was formed, the Dragon was promised." The three spoke as one as the waves of magic began to link to Bloom as well. "Three as one, three above one, three are one."
"The Storm douses the strength of The Flame!" These next words came from Stormy alone, lightning arcing around her, dark clouds swirling above her, the red band of magic pulsing powerfully as a scream tore itself from Bloom's throat.
"The Darkness smothers the light of The Flame." Darcy spoke next, the added energy causing Bloom to double over in agony as waves of black and purple cascaded around the shadow witch.
"The Ice saps the heat of The Flame." Icy's eyes glowed pure white as her own energy caused Bloom to stop screaming and collapse to the ground.
"What was, now comes to pass, The Flame confined to an eternal prison of ice. The covenant is fulfilled, the Dragon is ours!" Bloom's limp body lifted off the ground, her eyes flew open and she began to scream once more, a bright spark of orange emerging from inside her core, wrapped in bands of purple and red that pushed the spark along the white beam linking Icy and Bloom. The ring on her finger glowed as the energy reached Icy, and she began to cry out in a mix of pain and exhilaration, a wave of the whitest white energy bursting forth from inside her, causing Bloom to drop to the ground once more, knocking her sisters to their knees, and the watching Winx from their seats. The rest of the crowd was far enough away to only feel an echo of the blast, but all felt a chill to their very core for a few moments.
Stormy struggled to her feet, but found that she was otherwise unharmed. Upon closer consideration, she found she actually felt even better than she had when they had begun. Stormy had always been able to feel her power more acutely than most witches, like she had lightning in her veins. But now... now Stormy felt as though the lightning wasn't just inside of her, it WAS her! She let off what she meant to be a small test bolt, and opened her eyes to see she had blown a large hole in the side of one of Cloud Tower's supply sheds.
She turned to her sisters, seeing Darcy standing as well, gazing wide-eyed at a shadowy copy of herself standing in front of her.
"We're only supposed to have echoes of the power, right D?" Darcy nodded slowly without even looking at Stormy, but both turned as Icy began to laugh, a long, powerful cackle that caused the air around them to chill significantly. "Ummm, Darcy, I'm not sure it worked, I think you broke her." Darcy was about to protest when Icy stopped laughing and turned to them with a smirk.
"I'm fine Stormy." She stopped and shook her head, "Forget fine, I'm amazing, I feel-" She paused again, "Hmmm, I'm not sure I can describe it, it's too... much."
"Darcy nodded shakily as she dismissed her shadowy doppelganger,
"I think we have some idea Icy, though I promise to look up some proper words to describe your feelings later." All three witches laughed at this, all amazed at how simultaneously indescribable yet right this all felt to them. A stirring from the middle of the circle drew their attention, and with a flick of Icy's wrist, Bloom was pulled to her feet, coughing and shivering.
"And look at that princess, you survived too. See? Everybody wins!" More cackling teased and tormented the utterly broken fairy, who was also finding her situation hard to describe. While she was clearly alive, and didn't feel as though that would change in the immediate future, she also felt an aching emptiness deep inside her, a cold that reminded her of the Omega Dimension, yet even that paled in comparison to the void inside her. Her thoughts were interrupted by a familiar ringing in her head, and the automatic response of her body overrode everything else, causing her to shakily walk the few steps between her and Icy.
"Good girl... What do you think D? Would she survive if I tore her wings off right now?" Darcy laughed but shook her head.
"As great as that would be to see Ice, I have a feeling you'd be out one well-trained maid if you tried that any time in the near future. And while its ultimately up to you, do remember what dad always told us."
"Icy rolled her eyes, but nodded. "Yeah, yeah, letting them live to see your victory is the better revenge. And you're right, I went to all the trouble of training her, I might as well keep her, goddesses do need servants after all... Now come on girls, time for a family reunion!"
Stormy cackled happily and Darcy let out a sigh of contentment, the Trix watching the other witches take charge of all the fairies and specialists again, and collecting their own charges. They had had fulfilled their destiny as witches, it was time for them to fulfill their promise as sisters...