Duality
By Risa
Disclaimer: See Chapter 1
Author's Notes: Thanks again for all the great feedback. This part ends a little abruptly and hopefully you guys can still put up with my long meandering towards a conclusion. :-)
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Chapter Six
As Darien drove out of his parking space, he said, "You seem to be dealing with this whole situation rather well."
"Well?"
"Yeah, you're calm, accepting of the situation. You don't spend a lot of time brooding about why this happened but instead try to find a way to deal with it. Not many people can do that," Darien replied.
"It's pretty ironic actually," Cole said, thinking over what Darien said, "I think it's 'cause of who I used to be. As a demon, if I wanted to stay on top, I had to have a streak of ruthlessness. I learnt that getting emotional just got in the way of things. Like you said, some things are hard to shake off."
Before Darien could reply, his mobile phone rang. "Darien Li," he said, as he answered it. He talked to the other person for a few minutes before he said, "Thanks Rhea, I wouldn't have thought about that. I'll get there as soon as I can. Bye."
"What was that about?" Cole asked curiously.
"Oh, it was just a witch who I went to see earlier to see if the witches here could help. She said that she would look into it and I could call her if we needed anything. Anyway, she called me to tell me that she had some wards and charms that might be useful and asked me to go pick them up. So if it's ok with you we can go to the hotel first before dropping by her place."
"Sounds fine to me," Cole said.
Darien suddenly laughed. "If Fortuna were here she would have started yelling at me for not using a hands-free thing on the phone."
"What's the point?" Cole said, grinning, "It's not like a car crash will kill you. Or me for that matter."
"That's what I told her," Darien said, "before she loudly reminded me that a certain someone wasn't lucky enough to be immortal like a certain 'blood sucking vampire freak', as she rather quaintly put it."
"How do the two of you put up with each other?" Cole asked, shaking his head.
"Very noisily," Darien replied, "but Fortuna once told me that it was a lot more fun that way." He laughed before continuing, "One minute, she'll be flinging insults at you, the next she'll go all sentimental on you."
"My relationship with Phoebe sounds a lot less tempestuous," Cole said, grinning. "Except that we fell in love when I was supposed to kill her and I proposed to her immediately after we vanquished a demon."
"Ah love," Darien said in mock sententiousness, "what a sweet and mysterious thing."
After picking up the things Darien needed from the hotel, they drove to a house not that far off from there.
"Is this it?" Cole asked. The house looked perfectly normal, but when he looked closely, he noticed that the front gate was decorated with black dahlias.
"Yep," Darien said as he walked up to the door with Cole following behind.
A woman who seemed to be in her twenties answered the door. She had brown wavy hair that cascaded behind her shoulders and striking violet eyes. "Hey Rhea," Darien greeted.
"Hi Darien," Rhea said, looking at Cole quizzically.
"Oh, this is Cole Turner," Darien said, indicating Cole with a wave of his hand. "Cole, this is Rhea Harman. So what do you have?"
"Come in," she said, "everything's out back."
She brought them to what seemed to be a work room, filled with all sorts of herbs, books, candles and all sorts of such paraphernalia. She opened her drawer and took out four silver bracelets, each intricately carved. All of them looked ancient.
"I was searching through some old boxes which Thea – my cousin – sent to me a while back. I've been meaning to sort through them but I just hadn't had the time. Anyway, I wanted to see if I had anything that I have that could help you and I found these."
"What are they?" Cole asked.
"Well, these bracelets have protective spells in them. If anyone nearby has ill intentions towards the bearer, it would warn them about it. It only works if the bearer has a certain degree of power though, since the bracelets draw on your own personal power. I think that the Halliwell sisters should have enough though."
"Thanks," Darien said, "but who is the fourth one for?"
"Fortuna, you dope," Rhea said, "you've been hanging around too much with those Redferns – it's made you dense."
Darien sighed. "Sorry my brain's functioning a little slowly, it's been a long day."
"No snappy come-backs from you," Rhea said, raising an eyebrow, "it has been a long day for you."
Darien smiled, "Anyway, thanks. I'd call you if there's anything else."
"Sure," Rhea said, "say hello to Fortuna for me."
"Thanks," Cole said as they left the house.
"For what?" Darien said in surprise.
"For doing so much to help me with the Source," Cole said.
Darien grinned. "Nothing to say thanks for. Like Fortuna said, our motives aren't exactly altruistic. She's got a job to do and it involves stopping you from becoming the Source, I'm just here for the ride."
"Actually, maybe if we just added more power to the spell, we could use the same one," Paige said.
Phoebe shook her head. "I thought about that. But the spell was meant for Belthazor. It might not work on the Source."
"All right, explain to me how this spell worked again?" Piper asked. The three of them were still in the attic. Leo had been called back by the Elders. He had been a little nervous and hoped that they hadn't found out about Cole.
"Well, what it did was break Cole and Belthazor apart and vanquish Belthazor," Phoebe said.
"Cool spell," Paige complimented Phoebe.
Piper stared at it for what was probably the hundredth time. "Maybe if we tailored it for the Source…"
"Possible," Phoebe said, "but we'll still need a lot of energy for that, energy that we might not have."
"How about just separating the two of them?" Paige suggested.
"Then what do we do when the Source is out of Cole?" Piper said. "Will we be able to vanquish him before he kills all of us?"
"It sounds workable," a voice said from the doorway.
All three of them turned to see Fortuna. Her face was still slightly pale but she had a small smile on her face.
"Shouldn't you be resting?" Phoebe asked in concern.
"Couldn't sleep," Fortuna said, "Plus I feel much better now, so I came up to see if there was anything I could do."
"Well, we're just looking at the spell which Phoebe used to turn Cole human to see if we could find anything there," Piper said.
"Let me take a look at that spell," Fortuna said. Paige passed it to Fortuna. She looked at it for a while, her forehead furrowed in concentration. "Hm," she murmured, "if you have enough power at hand, you just might be able to separate the two then vanquish the Source."
"That's the problem," Phoebe said, "where do we get the power?"
"Well, there's the power of the entire Halliwell line, my family, and whatever power the witch circle here can provide. Besides, I'll be able to amplify the power a bit."
"Ok, given that, we still have to change it to suit the Source," Piper said.
"Give me some time to look at it," Phoebe said, "Cole and I came up with the spell to vanquish the Source, we should be able to change this to suit him. By the way, where's Cole?"
"He left a note saying that he went with Darien to pick up some stuff at our hotel," Fortuna said.
Just then, they heard a crash and a shout. "Cole!" Phoebe shouted as she dashed out of the attic, with the rest of them following behind her.
After Cole and Darien had returned to the manor, Darien had said, "I'm going to go and check on Fortuna."
Cole had nodded and said, "I'll go check on the girls."
He was on the way to the attic when he seemed to hear a shout and a sound of struggling come from Phoebe's room. He ran there and saw Phoebe on the ground with a demon with a knife hovering above her. The demon was about to kill her.
Cole panicked. All he could think right then was that he had to save Phoebe. He couldn't let her die. Without thinking, he released a fireball. Immediately he felt the Source breaking free from his restrictions and felt the triumph of the evil within him. Cole began to feel as if he was losing control of his own body. Dimly, he saw Phoebe vanish in front of him and become the Seer.
"I said that they wouldn't be able to save you from the Source," she said triumphantly, a smirk on her face.
No, Cole said in his mind as he struggled to stay in control, I wouldn't let you win. The inner fight in his mind caused him to fall unconscious.
Phoebe, Piper, Paige and Fortuna rushed into the room just in time to see the Seer bending over Cole. Piper waved her hand at the Seer to try and blow her up. The Seer shimmered before the blow could have any effect on her. At that point Darien, who had also heard the noise, had rushed to the room as well.
Phoebe ran over to Cole. She cradled his head in her arms. "Cole, wake up, please Cole." Then she turned to Fortuna. "What the hell just happened!"
Fortuna held Cole's wrist for a while, as if checking something. Then she sighed. "The charm's close to falling apart."
"I thought you said it would last a month!" Phoebe shouted.
"Leo!" Piper called. "Leo, get down here!"
Leo orbed into the room within seconds. He looked at the scene of chaos in shock. "What just happened?"
"That's what I want to know," Phoebe said, glaring at Fortuna.
"The Seer provoked Cole into using the Source's powers. In effect, he let down the barrier that the charm I gave him provided and the Source is trying to take over," she replied.
"So fix it," Phoebe said.
"I would if I could," Fortuna snapped. She knew that Phoebe was just anxious and worried about Cole and that she would probably have reacted the same way if their roles were reversed. But that didn't mean that she couldn't get irritated.
Cool down, love, Darien said to her mentally. Fortuna sighed. Thank God she had Darien with her; he steadied her, calmed her down and reminded her that he was there to support her whenever she needed it. She took a deep breath. Then the idea struck her.
"There might be a way," she said softly. "But you'll have to get into Cole's mind."
*~To Be Continued~*