Chapter 2: The Witch is Back Part 2

Halliwell Manor

Phoebe had led Melinda into her room where she was pulling out a dress for Melinda to change into. She pulled the zipper down, about to hand it to Melinda when she spoke up.

"No, don't-don't rip the dress to make it fit me," Melinda exclaimed suddenly, causing Phoebe to jump slightly in surprise.

Phoebe smiled as she realized what Melinda was thinking. "Oh, no, no. I'm not ripping it. It's called a zipper, see?" she explained, showing Melinda how a zipper worked.

Melinda's eyes widened in understanding. "Oh, a wise witch made this," she decided with a smile as she zipped and unzipped the dress.

"Yeah, and wise witches in this century keep a low profile. Slip this dress on, you'll blend right in," Phoebe assured her.

"It's so odd to be here again. To breath and feel," Melinda commented as she stepped into the dress. "What sheep has wool so soft?" she asked as she ran her hand over the material.

Phoebe laughed softly at the question. "A synthetic one."

"Oh!" Melinda giggled while Phoebe zipped up the back of her dress. "So did it, did it take you long to make the dress?" she wondered curiously.

"Make it? No, no, I bought it," Phoebe explained.

Melinda nodded slightly. "Oh, you must be rich," she replied in understanding.

Prue and Piper came in in time to catch the end of the conversation. "No, she's got credit cards," Prue corrected pleasantly as she led the way in.

Piper's eyes widened a little as she caught sight of Melinda. "Wow, Melinda, you look great," she complimented, pushing a strand of her hair away from her face.

"Thank you. Oh, but how do you keep your legs warm?" Melinda wondered curiously.

"We drink coffee," Prue replied with a smile.

Leo approached the doorway only to halt upon seeing the four girls in the room, obviously getting ready for something. "Oh, sorry, I let myself in and it didn't occur to me…" he apologized quickly.

"Leo, it's, uh, okay. This is, uh…" Piper began but trailed off, glancing nervously toward Prue, who appeared to be trying to think of something quickly.

"Our cousin, Melinda," Phoebe finished saving her sisters from coming up with an explanation.

Melinda smiled in greeting. "It's nice to meet you."

"Leo's fixing our plumbing," Piper explained for Melinda's benefit.

Melinda frowned in confusion. "What's that?" she asked innocently, tilting her head to the side.

The three Halliwell sisters looked stunned at the unexpected question and Prue hurried to cover up her ignorance. "Uh, we've got to go now," she spoke up, motioning for everyone to follow her out of the room.

Phoebe nodded and began to lead Melinda to the door, but she stopped and looked up at Leo. "To work with one's hands is a great gift," Melinda commented with a wide smile.

"Well, I am a true laborer. I earn that I eat, get that I wear," Leo replied, seeming flattered.

"Owe no man hate, envy no man's happiness," Melinda quoted, recognizing the words of Shakespeare.

"Shakespeare," they both said at the same time, causing Melinda to giggle softly.

"Well, wasn't that fun? Okay, let's go now," Prue ordered, again motioning for everyone to follow her. Piper let Melinda go out before her as Leo passed them through the door.

Melinda turned to watch Leo leave before turning to Piper with a knowing look. "He's a treasure, Piper."

"Why you telling me?" Piper asked as they followed Prue downstairs.

Halliwell Hardware and Appliance

Matthew glanced over his handy work with pride despite his frustrations of still not having found any of the sisters. The owner of the store, by the name of Halliwell, was hung up on the wall by some of the garden tools, obviously dead. Matthew turned to leave when Rex and Hannah met him at the door and he stopped out of curiosity.

"Hello, Matthew," Rex greeted as Hannah glanced over him.

"We have got to do something about his clothes," Hannah remarked before Matthew had time to respond.

Matthew narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "Who are you? How do you know me?" he demanded.

"Well, the short answer is we're the ones who gave the witch the locket to have you freed. I suppose you could say we're partners," Rex explained simply.

Matthew shook his head in disagreement. "I work alone."

Rex frowned and narrowed his eyes. "No, not in this century you don't. You're new in town, new in time, you need our help," he argued. His eyes flickered to see the shop owner hooked to the wall. "Hmm… I see you've been shopping. Find what you're looking for?"

"I want Melinda Warren's children," Matthew stated.

Hannah smiled and her eyes flickered from the shop owner's dead body back to Matthew. "Ooh, talk about your coincidences," she pointed out, looking pointedly at Rex.

"You see, we have the means to find him for you. And you have the ability to take their powers. Come," Rex ordered, turning to leave the shop before the police arrived. He glanced back when Matthew didn't immediately follow. "What?"

"How'd you find me?" Matthew asked.

Rex laughed and rolled his eyes. "Prue Halliwell, a Halliwell attorney, now here. You are leaving a trail, my friend, and that has got to stop," he warned.

Outside Halliwell Manor

Buffy looked at the address she had written down: 1329 Prescott. She then looked up at the old Victorian style house. This was it. She got out of her car and headed up the stairs.

Inside

Piper, Phoebe and Melinda all sat down at the dining room table while Prue helped place the locket around Melinda's neck.

"Once Matthew had what he wanted, he told the town council I was a witch, and they arrested me. Then they burned me at the stake," Melinda explained.

Piper lowered her eyes in thought as Prue made her way to sit beside Phoebe at the table. "Why didn't you save yourself?" Piper asked curiously.

"Yeah, why didn't you use your powers to escape?" Phoebe spoke up, not understanding.

Melinda smiled faintly as the conversation began to head toward her daughter and her niece. "I had a daughter. Her name was Prudence," she began, glancing with a half-smile toward Prue. She thought of her sister, Emily, who like herself had left the world young. "I was also raising my niece, Penelope. My sister, Penelope's mother, was killed two years before I was burned. They meant everything to me. If I had used my powers, I would've proven Matthew's charge and both Prudence and Penelope would've burned too. So, I thought, I'll accept this and pray some kind soul will take pity on them and raise them in a safe home. Only then could the Warren line continue. And at least with my daughter, it must've worked, because here you are."

Phoebe frowned slightly noticing a parallel between Prudence and Penelope's lives and theirs. "Why do Warren witches lose their moms so early?" she asked softly.

Melinda hesitated trying to think of the best way to phrase the answer. "Phoebe, I can't change the past, but I think I can protect the future.

"How?" Prue spoke up for the first time. "Matthew is so strong and he has this wild power. He can be at one place and then another."

"In the blink of an eye?" Melinda wondered, having a vague memory of that power when she had been alive.

"Exactly," Prue agreed.

Melinda nodded in understanding. "It's called 'blinking.' It's a standard warlock power, they all seem to have it. I stripped him of all the powers he copied from me, but who knows what other powers he still has."

"What do you mean copied?" Phoebe questioned, raising her eyebrows slightly.

"Matthew's gift is to copy the power of a good witch when it's used against him," Melinda explained.

Prue sighed audibly. "Then he definitely has mine," she muttered.

"Once he's copied a power, it has no effect on him. Should he gain all three powers, he will be impossible to vanquish," Melinda warned carefully.

"So, what do we do?" Prue asked, glancing hopefully toward Melinda.

"We curse him back into the locket," Melinda decided.

Piper was the only one to bring up the nagging thought in the back of their minds. "And if we can't?" she whispered.

No one answered as a knock came at the door. Prue looked to her sisters as Piper got up and moved to the front door opening it. She saw on the front porch a blonde woman she was sure she recognized. But couldn't quite place. "Yes?"

The blonde looked at Piper and smiled. "Prue, Piper or Phoebe Halliwell?"

Piper nodded as Prue and Phoebe walked up beside her. "I'm Piper. Who are you?"

The blonde smiled. "Grandmaster Buffy Naberrie of the Jedi Order."

Piper's eyes went wide as she remembered where she had seen the woman. She, Prue and Phoebe had been watching a news conference two months earlier about visitors from another world who had come in peace and were going to give Earth the technology to bring itself up with the rest of the galaxy. She looked to Prue who shook her head. They had more pressing matters to deal with than her.

Melinda gasped as Piper, Prue and Phoebe looked at her. When it came to the lost Jedi Arts, she knew only what her mother had known and her mother before her. But she recognized the word Jedi. She then took a good look at Buffy, who she swore could be the spitting image of her sister, Emily. "Emily?"

"The name is Buffy," Buffy said as she looked at Melinda, who she swore could have been a twin for her sister, Dawn. "You look familiar though. Do I know you?"

"Let her in, please," Melinda said as she looked at the Halliwell sisters.

Prue looked at Melinda for a long moment. If Buffy was a warlock who had somehow fooled the United Nations then should they let her in?

"Prue," said Melinda looking at the eldest Halliwell sister. "Let her in."

Prue sighed. "Please come in, Ms. Naberrie."

Buffy stepped across the threshold as Piper closed the door behind her. "Buffy will be fine," she said. She looked at Piper, Prue and Phoebe. "I came because I wanted to offer you three the opportunity to be trained as Jedi."

Piper looked at her sisters and saw the mirrored reaction to Buffy's statement.

"Jedi?" Prue asked skeptical.

"How much do you know of your family tree?" Buffy asked.

"We have genealogy going back to the 1600's to Charlotte Warren," said Piper as Prue slapped her on the arm. She glanced at her sister and understood Prue's hesitation. She looked back at Buffy. "Why?"

"What if I told you I had genealogy for your family dating even farther back than that to the 1200's. And it started with Charissa Hanas and her husband the first Jedi to ever set foot on Earth."

Melinda smiled and took Buffy's arm in hers. "Your Emily's descendant?"

Prue, Piper and Phoebe looked at Melinda as she led Buffy into the living room. Who was Emily? they wondered.

"If you mean Emily Warren, yes. Who are you?" Buffy asked.

"Melinda Warren." Melinda replied. "Emily's sister."

Realization crossed Buffy's face. Why Melinda had called her Emily and why Melinda looked like Dawn. She was Melinda's sister reincarnated and Dawn must have been Melinda reincarnated. She looked at the Halliwell sisters. "You summoned your ancestor?" she asked.

Prue looked at Buffy for a long moment and was obviously confused on who Buffy was. She was sure now that Melinda would not be so personable with a warlock. That meant that the press conference had been real. But why would Melinda treat someone from outer space like she was a member of the family? "I thought you were from outer space?" she said.

Buffy shook her head. "I was born in Los Angeles," she explained. "About ten years ago, a Sith Lord by the name of Glorificus using my sister's blood opened a portal. Dawn and I both fell through it and found ourselves on another planet. We were gjven the chance to become Jedi. Our ancestor was Charissa Hanas and the Jedi Revan. And they are yours as well."

"I would ask how you came up with this information." Prue said. She was skeptical that Buffy had this genealogy.

"While I didn't know the name of Charissa's husband," said Melinda.

"No one alive today knows is birth name," said Buffy. "From what I've learned he has had more than one during his life. Revan is what we call him as it is the most commonly known name he went by."

Melinda nodded in understanding. "Our lineage had been passed down through the generations," she continued. "It would have been lost with my death. Charissa was my ancestor." She smiled as she looked at Buffy. "It is good to see that my sister's family survived."

Buffy pulled out a roll of paper of her shoulder bag and put it on the dining room table and unrolled it. She motioned for the sisters and Melinda to have a look as she pointed to Charissa Hanas. "This is our ancestor Charissa and that is her husband Revan, the first Jedi to come to Earth. Now…" She pointed at where Charlotte Warren's name is. "Here is Charlotte Warren and if you look underneath you will see Melinda's name and her sister Emily's. As Melinda already surmised Emily is my ancestor."

The sisters looked at Buffy and then back at the detailed family tree in front of them. Emily, they noted, had been born three years after Melinda. They then looked back at Charissa Hanas. Melinda had supposedly been the beginnings of their magical line. But what if it wasn't true, what if their powers came from someone else. What if their family had been destined to be Jedi instead of just witches?

Buffy smiled. "I can see this is a lot to take in."

"That's an understatement." Phoebe said as she looked up at her cousin. "Do you have powers?"

"I assume you mean like you have." Buffy said as the sisters nodded. She remembered when Revan had told her of Melinda Warren's descendants, that they had been gifted with magical powers on top of their latent Jedi abilities. When she had Giles look up their genealogy, he also found a prophecy written by Melinda Warren herself, which had mentioned briefly the powers that would be handed down through the generations. "A Jedi can do similar things, yes. Who has the power of premonition?" Phoebe raised her hand. "The Force can give Jedi premonitions like your powers do you. Who has the power to move things with her mind?" Prue raised her hand. "With the Force I can do that also." She looked at Piper. "Which leaves you with the power to freeze." Piper nodded. "There is an ability that can put someone into stasis."

"So were you a witch before you became a Jedi?" Phoebe asked.

Buffy sighed and shook her head. "No, the Slayer."

"The Slayer? What's that?" Piper asked.

It was Melinda who answered. "The Slayer is normally a mortal, but not always, that is gifted with enhanced abilities to fight the forces of darkness. Such as strength, agility and an increased healing rate."

Buffy nodded. "Melinda is correct. How I became a Slayer is long complicated story that ties in with how my sister and I wound up on another planet and eventually trained with the Jedi. I will give you all the full story later. So, if I may ask why is it you used your magical powers to summon Melinda?"

The sisters looked at Melinda who nodded indicating it was alright.

"We need to vanquish a warlock," Prue stated. "One that Melinda imprisoned and was recently released from his imprisonment."

"How was he released," Buffy asked.

"I opened the locket that he was trapped in," Prue said as Melinda lifted the locket in question off her neck to show Buffy. "I did not know he had been trapped in it at the time."

"What's the plan?" Buffy asked.

"To trap him in the locket again," Melinda said as the sisters led her and Buffy up to the attic.

"I can't believe I can't remember all the ingredients," Melinda commented as she and Buffy followed the sisters' directions up the stairs to the attic. She pushed the door open and led the way to the pedestal that held the Book of Shadows.

"It's been awhile since you cursed Matthew," Prue pointed out mildly. She followed after Melinda carrying a piece of paper and a pencil.

Phoebe followed after Prue, chuckling at the truth of the statement. "Yeah, like three hundred years," she laughed.

Piper was right behind Phoebe while Buffy brought up the rear. "Whatever you don't remember should be in the book," Piper added, crowding around the Book of Shadows with her sisters, Buffy and Melinda.

"The Book of Shadows… Oh my, it's gotten so thick!" Melinda whispered happily as she picked up the familiar book and flipped around randomly.

"It wasn't always?" Buffy asked as she touched the book, flipping a page. She noticed that the sisters let out a sigh of relief.

Melinda smiled and turned to the middle of the book. "No, it used to be much smaller, but obviously each generation of Warren witches has added to it over the years and has made it so." She looked at the Halliwell sisters. "Have you added anything?"

"Us? Are you kidding? We're new at this. We can't just make up our own spell…" Phoebe laughed before she suddenly thought through the question. "Wait, can we?"

Prue narrowed her eyes at Phoebe in a teasing way at her little sister's sudden enthusiasm.

"All things in time, Phoebe. The book will grow as you grow. Sometimes you add to it, sometimes it teaches you. And sometimes you learn from other ways," Melinda explained as she glanced at Buffy. The sisters nodded in understanding that if they took Buffy up on her offer that they would have a lot to learn from her. Melinda turned back to the book as she searched for the curse. "Oh, here's the curse," she announced, pointing toward the page.

Piper and Phoebe eagerly crowded around on either side of Melinda to read over her shoulder while Prue passed Melinda the piece of paper and pencil. Melinda glanced over the pencil in confusion. "Just start writing," Prue responded simply.

Melinda was still looking doubtfully at the pencil. "No ink?" she asked.

Buffy shook her head. "No. And as Earth's technology comes up with the rest of the galaxy, pen and paper will become a thing of the past as other forms of writing come about."

Prue smiled and watched as Melinda began to write with the pencil. "Ha!" Melinda exclaimed in surprise.

"Grams must have added this one," Piper said staring at the page next to the curse.

Melinda leaned over and quickly read over the page. "Too increase patience," she read with a hint of a laugh in her voice.

"I bet she used that spell a lot raising us, huh," Phoebe guessed, nudging Prue with her elbow pointedly.

"We weren't all troublemakers, Phoebe," Prue countered, narrowing her eyes playfully at her little sister.

"I was not a troublemaker," Phoebe argued lightly, feigning hurt at the comment. "I was just..."

"A pain," Piper finished teasingly.

"A free spirit," Phoebe corrected.

"A handful," Prue countered with a laugh.

Buffy smiled as she watched the sisters. It reminded her of herself and Dawn before their enslavement.

"A Warren," Melinda decided for all of them as Phoebe and Prue cast teasing glances at each other. "It's a family trait. So are the short tempers, the great cheekbones, the strong wills, and, of course, the powers."

"All except the powers seem to have been handed down from Emily also," Buffy said. "My sister and I share those same traits." Though she had to wonder if even the powers had been handed down. Aurora did in fact have the power of teleportation. But that was because of the Key or was it?

Melinda nodded as she looked at Buffy. "Emily passed something else down. Emily was called as a Slayer."

"That's how you knew?" Buffy asked.

Melinda nodded. "Her daughter, Penelope, was born on Emily's eighteenth birthday, three days before Emily died fighting a vampire."

"During her Cruciamentum?" Buffy asked.

"Yes," Melinda said. "I take it that particular test is still given?"

Buffy sighed and nodded. "Yes. The Watcher's Council gave it to me when I turned eighteen. Not only did I lose my Slayer abilities but the vampire they had for the test got free and kidnapped both my mom and my sister."

Melinda looked at Buffy with sympathy. She then turned back to the sisters. "Everything our family has handed down are all blessings, all signs of where you came from. This book is your connection to me. The rest began with Revan and Charissa," she said.

Buffy nodded. "That is your legacy also. You were destined to be both witches and Jedi."

Prue looked from Melinda and Buffy to each of her sisters in turn. "Well, let's make sure either legacy doesn't end with us. We need to get going," she ordered, hurrying her sisters along after her.