Mirta quickly stood by Layla's side. "You still want the sceptre? You'll have to get through me first!"
Darcy laughed and shook her head. "You've been hanging around with these pixies for too long - it's made your head soft. You really want to get rid of him?"
Mirta nervously nodded.
"Then our best option is to send him to Limbo - but only witches can do that."
"Send him to Limbo? But... don't we need THREE witches to do that?"
"Unfortunately, yes, but I have no idea where my sisters are. I guess we'll have to try it on our own, although I doubt a weakling like you is up to it."
Mirta waved the Spirit Rod at Darcy. "Weakling! You want some of this too?"
"Hey cool it you two!" Layla shouted.
Mirta took a deep breath. "Okay. What do I have to do?"
"Just follow me - and try not to mess it up."
The two witches stood either side of Kaiser and held their arms up. They closed their eyes and concentrated - they both knew that summoning a portal to Limbo could take every ounce of energy they had. At first nothing happened, but then a deep pink swirl of energy began to form around Kaiser, who remained helpless in the centre.
Meanwhile, Tegryn blearily opened his eyes and lifted his heavy head. "Musa," he murmered, wiping the blood that was gently trickling down his face from the chasm that had formed an ugly red grin on his forehead. He looked over to see Musa laying a hundred yards away, groaning weakly in pain. He sat up and looked around to see Darcy, Mirta and Layla standing around Kaiser.
'Darcy?' he thought to himself. 'What's SHE doing here. Is she... helping us? Man, I must've really hit my head on the way down. What the hell's going on?'
Using all his strength, he shakily tried to stand up and walk over to Musa, but he was still too weak from Kaiser's assault and collapsed on the ground.
Darcy gritted her teeth under the intense strain, and beads of sweat began to trickle down Mirta's forehead. Try as hard as they might, they couldn't quite succeed in opening the gateway, and it soon vanished.
"Hah! I knew it!" Kaiser taunted. "You're failures, all of you!"
"It's no good," Mirta said, panting. "We need a third witch."
'A third witch?' thought Tegryn. Once again, he slowly stood up, this time with a lot more success, and stumbled his way rather unsteadily over to them.
"What are you doing?" he asked Mirta. "And what's she doing here?"
"Ooh goody, you're awake!" said Mirta happily. "I'll explain all this later. Right now, we're trying to open a portal to send this creep into Limbo, but we need three witches to do it."
"Well then maybe I can help."
"You idiot - didn't you just hear what Mirta said?" Darcy snapped.
"You seem to be forgetting something Darcy - the source of my magic... is YOU!" Tegryn said breathlessly. "Right now, I'm the nearest thing you've got to a third witch. Now tell me what I have to do."
Darcy grunted. "I suppose you'll have to do. Honestly, I'm used to working with REAL witches, not you two wannabes. Just follow my lead."
The three of them stood in a circle around Kaiser and focused their energies on opening the portal. Tegryn grimaced - he was tired enough as it was, and now he was using up his very last reserves of strength in this last ditch effort to get rid of Kaiser once and for all. After all the horrible things he had done to Layla and now to his darling Musa, it would be well worth it. Sure enough, the swirl of energy soon reappeared.
Darcy shouted over to Layla. "When I tell you, release Kaiser - but not before. You got that, pixie?"
Layla nodded.
The magenta glow grew more and more intense until suddenly a vast portal opened up beneath Kaiser.
"NOW!"
Layla released her hold on Kaiser, and watched with great satisfaction as he was slowly pulled into the vortex, yelling all kinds of obscenities and threats as he went.
"You seemed to think it was funny playing me, but now it's my turn - YOU'RE DUMPED!" she said, waving at him as he disappeared with the portal closing up after him. And not a moment too soon neither, as Tegryn collapsed once again from his efforts.
"Teggy!" Mirta cried as she and Layla went to help him up, as Darcy looked on quietly.
"Musa. Where's Musa?"
"Come on, we'll take you." said Layla as she and Mirta lifted his arms over their shoulders and helped him over to where she lay. She heard their footsteps shuffling towards her, and opened her eyes wearily.
"Hey babe." she said quietly, trying her best to smile despite the major discomfort she was in.
"Musie. Are you okay?"
She groaned. "I've felt better."
Slowly, Layla and Mirta lowered him down. Tegryn knelt down beside her and cradled her head in his arms.
"Oh my gosh. Musa, what happened?" Musa and Tegryn looked up to see Bloom and the others racing over to them from the school. "Who did this?"
"It was Kaiser." Mirta said angrily. "That creep hurt Musa just to get at Teggy. Oh, that reminds me... Darcy?"
She looked around to see Darcy walking away. "What do you want now, pipsqueak?" she said, turning her head slightly and looking at her out of the corner of her eye.
"I just wanted to say... thank you."
"Yeah," said Layla as she joined her friend. "We couldn't have beaten Kaiser without you."
Darcy snorted. "Don't think for a minute that makes us friends, 'cos we're not, okay? And whatever you do, don't tell Icy or Stormy about any of this neither - if they find out about me helping you pixies out, I'll never live it down."
"Okay," Mirta said. "You have our word on that."
Musa looked into Tegryn's eyes. "Did we win?"
"Yeah, just about!" he said, gently brushing her bruised cheek with his tired fingers.
She smiled. "My hero!"
"No - Layla and Mirta are the real heroes here. They're the one's who had to put their past experiences behind them - you know, Mirta had all those run-ins with those witches when she was at Cloud Tower, and Layla facing up to Kaiser like that. Anyway, they're the ones who put him away. But me... I was totally beaten. I couldn't stop him from hurting you. I couldn't protect you."
"Shh. You're here now. That's all that matters." Musa said, placing her fingers wearily on his lips. "We're together now... together..." Her voice trailed away as she smiled, gave out a soft sigh and closed her eyes.
Tegryn looked at her tenderly for a moment - she looked so beautiful laying there in his arms, so lovely, so peaceful... but then a tiny shred of worry crept into the back of his mind.
"Musa? MUSA?"