Chapter Five – Servants of Evil

Flora quickly washed her hands, getting rid of the dirt on them. She had been planting seeds until she realized that she was almost late to meet her friends. The specialists were supposed to be training with dragons, and her friends had gone to watch their boyfriends.

Flora sighed as an empty feeling settled in the pit of her stomach. It wasn't that she wasn't happy for Bloom, Stella, Musa and Techna. She just wished she would meet a guy too, since she had started feeling a bit left out recently.

She realized that she was partly to blame, since half of the time she was the one who refused to accompany her friends when they agreed to get together. But the reason she did that was because the rest of the time, when she did go, she felt like a fifth wheel.

Flora got changed, since the clothes she was wearing were dirty as well and set out to meet her friends in the arena. The empty feeling wouldn't go away as she walked towards the arena, and she sighed again.

She realized that she missed Mertha. The witch had at first chosen to stay on Alfea, wanting to stay with her newfound friends there. But after some time, Flora remembered, Mertha started staying home alone as well. The witch had one day told Flora she would be going back to Cloud Tower, since the other students always saw her as an outsider and the Winx always made her feel like one.

Flora had been shocked. She and her friends had tried nothing other than to make Mertha feel at home! But Mertha had explained to her that it was the deep bond that the girls shared that made her feel like an outsider, since she had no such bond with any of them.

Flora hadn't objected to Mertha's decision, but had regretted it. And walking past Faragonda's office, she felt she missed the young witch immensely. She stood still abruptly. She found the feeling that surfaced when she walked past Faragonda's office to be peculiar, and after last year she had decided not to trust anything that felt peculiar.

She walked to Faragonda's door, and stood before it. The feeling of missing Mertha transformed slightly, and felt almost like a need to see the young witch. Flora knocked, but no-one answered. She hesitated as the feeling grew stronger, and she suddenly felt an urge to go into Faragonda's office.

Slowly, she pushed open the door. Faragonda's office was dark and abandoned, and Flora proceeded. Slowly, she walked to the headmistress' desk. For some reason, she seemed drawn to the communications device on the desk. She stretched her hand and touched it.

Suddenly Mertha's face appeared. "Flora!" Flora started. "Mertha?" The witch nodded. "I've been trying to contact you, Flora. We wanted to contact Faragonda, but no-one was there."

"We?" Mertha nodded again. "One of my teachers. When she couldn't contact anyone, I told her I'd try to contact you." Another peculiar feeling settled in Flora's stomach, but she didn't know why.

"Why were you trying to contact somebody here? And where's professor Griffin?" Mertha hesitated slightly. "That's why we're trying to contact someone. Professor Griffin has disappeared."

"What?" Mertha's face disappeared, only to be replaced by the face of someone Flora could only guess was one of her teachers. "The night professor Griffin returned from the Welcoming Ceremony, someone was at the front door. My colleague went to open it and…she hasn't been the same since. She simply mumbles something about a shadow and a great evil. Professor Griffin went to meet whoever it was that was at the door, and we haven't seen her since."

Flora was speechless. "I…I…I…" Mertha suddenly appeared again. "Flora, you have to tell headmistress Faragonda about this. She and headmaster Saladin are the only ones that can help us!" Flora agreed. "I'll find her and tell her right away!"

Flora was out of breath when she arrived at the arena. She had run through all of Alfea's buildings, looking for Faragonda or any other teacher, but she hadn't had any luck.

She looked around and saw her friends standing with the specialists in the middle of the arena. The dragons were flying around them, while the boys controlled them. Flora ran unto the arena's battleground and was running towards her friends when it happened.

A sharp flash and an indescribable pain took over out of the blue, and just before Flora grabbed her head and fell to her knees she saw her friends do the same. But what happened to them was nothing compared to what happened with the dragons.

The dragons all let out a piercing scream as their eyes started glowing red, and they became wild. One of them ducked onto the group of young people, incapable of defending themselves, and took a swipe at them with his tail.

As the others were knocked down, one of the dragons sped towards Flora. As the beast opened his mouth to unleash a powerful ball of fire to burn the fairy, the pain in Flora's head ebbed away a bit.

Out of the blue, someone jumped in front of Flora exactly when the dragon fired. Flora suddenly recognized Phoenix as the boy summoned a large shield in front of himself, thus protecting both himself and Flora from the ball of fire.

The force of the impact threw Phoenix back, and his shield dematerialized. Flora crawled over to Phoenix and helped the boy sit up. "Are you alright?" Phoenix nodded, but suddenly he extended his hand and emitted waves of yellow light.

Flora turned her head and saw the dragon that had just fired on them ready to fire again. But Phoenix' attack threw the beast backwards, into two of the other dragons, and all three fell unconscious.

The last remaining dragon, the one that had knocked out Flora's friends, flew towards them and landed in front of them. The crazed beast towered high above them, but Phoenix got up to his feet and stared fearlessly into the dragon's eyes.

Suddenly, to Flora's great surprise, the beast lowered its head and lied down, letting Phoenix pet him. The red glow in its eyes disappeared, and Phoenix actually kissed the dragon on its nose.

"What just happened?" Phoenix turned around and looked at Flora. "Someone cast a spell of insanity on the dragons, made them go crazy," he said, and suddenly he started emitting yellow light and levitated.

"Tend to your friends, I'll go after who's responsible," he said, and he flew off. Flora wanted to fly after him, but she realized her friends were more important. Phoenix could take care of himself, he had proven that, but she needed to know if any of her friends was hurt.

She ran to them, just as the girls started to come to. Flora checked each of them to see if they were alright, and they were. "What happened?" Bloom stood up, and the other girls followed shortly after.

"Phoenix said someone made the dragons go crazy. He's gone after them now," Flora answered. Bloom closed her eyes and she sensed what she had feared. Icy, Darcy and Stormy were in the woods.

"It's the Trix, girls. I've had it with those witches!" Bloom transformed, and the other girls followed suit. When they were ready they flew into the forest at high speed, determined to get even with the witches.

T.B.C.