Disclaimer: I don't own The Worst Witch.

A/N: THIS CONTAINS HEAVY SPOILERS FOR SEASON 3, EPISODE 7. PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK!

*Ahem*

How shooketh was the fandom on Monday after that episode had aired online? Oh, my days! Did not see that one coming for a second!

Anyway, this was the result of my brain buzzing away. The title comes from the nursery rhyme about Magpies because, really, what else was I going to call this fic?! :D

One For Sorrow, Two For Joy

'Please, Hiccup. I bought these tickets especially! Surely the school can survive without your brilliance for a few hours? ... I just want to spend some proper time with you.'

The hurt in the blonde witch's eyes is clear to see and it makes Hecate want to close her own if only to block it out. Decades of repentance. And still, it seems that all she knows is how to hurt people.

Dangerous. Reckless. Disappointment.

She pushes poisonous thoughts from her mind, crushes them back into the box that she has unsuccessfully tried to store the past thirty years. It's somewhat ironic, Hecate thinks, how she has spent the majority of her life trying to run from a past she knows she will never be able to escape. On particularly dark days, she sometimes wonders how she would have faired in the non-magical world. Most days though, she prefers not to think about. After all, the non-magical world is how all this trouble started. If only she hadn't been so damn curious ... if only she hadn't met Indigo Moon.

... If only, if only.

Still, it's too late now.

With expert precision, the deputy headmistress schools her expression back to one that is completely unreadable, steadies the tremor in her voice. 'I'm sorry, Pipsqueak, but as I've already told you, I can't leave the school.'

She wants Pippa to leave it there, hopes Pippa will leave it there. But Pippa doesn't. Frustrated by her every attempt at bonding being turned down, she pushes it, further and further, bit by bit, until Hecate is left screaming into the void of her own mind.

'But, surely you could just-'

'Pippa,' Hecate's voice is firmer, colder. 'I can't.'

'Why ever not?'

She knows that she likely sounds like a spoilt brat, doesn't care. She's worked so hard to get her best friend back after their years of sudden estrangement. Everything between them is okay now. Better than okay. So, then why does it feel like they are currently further apart than ever before?

'I know that you dedicate your all to Cackle's, but come on, it's not like you are chained to the place!'

Hecate suddenly drops her gaze to the floor, says nothing.

Pippa blinks, wonders if she's missing something.

'... Hecate?'

Silence.

Fear.

Secrets.

Lies.

There's no immediate response.

In fact, there is no reaction at all. It's as if the woman has turned to solid marble. Hecate's eyes are paralysed with fear as she continues to stare straight ahead. It's almost like she can see something that no one else can.

'Okay, now you're actually starting to scare me. What's going on, Hecate?'

Still, there's nothing.

'Hiccup?'

Gently, Pippa waves a hand in front of her face. It's a risky move, but thankfully is successful in snapping Hecate out of her trance.

'Hmm?'

'Please don't tell me there has been yet another Hubble-related disaster?'

'No,' Hecate says somewhat distractedly, and then quickly amends. 'Well, no more than usual.' She busies herself, walks around to the other side of the immaculately organised desk, stalls for time. The internal conflict is outwardly visible across her features and it leaves Pippa terrified of what she is about to learn. 'I'm afraid that this particular disaster is, in fact, the handiwork of one Joy Hardbroom.'

At the mention of a name from long ago, Pippa's eyes widen.

Joy.

If she's being completely honest, she's sort of forgotten that Hecate's first name isn't actually Hecate. Joy Hecate Hardbroom. It had suited the young girl she had known back then. She was so smiley and full of life, and dancing. Always dancing.

Until one day she had stopped dancing.

Stopped laughing. Stopped smiling. Stopped being Joy.

Her legs suddenly give way beneath her, and as a result, Hecate collapses into rather than sits down on her chair. There's a pause, and then immaculate black talons gesture for the pink-clad witch to take the other seat in the room.

No one speaks.

For the longest time, sit is all they seem to do. Pippa tries to distract herself from the horrors that are currently going through her mind, while Hecate stares at her nails, desperately tries to find the right words. Unnoticed, time creeps by, until the silence is finally broken.

'Have you ever done anything really stupid, Pippa?'

Pippa remains quiet as she thinks the question over. Yes, she's done some incredibly stupid things in her time, but she doesn't voice them. Knows instinctively that it's not the kind of stupid to which Hecate is referring.

Hecate knows she has to tell her, knows she needs to go back to the beginning. But to get to the start, she has to begin at the end.

'Mildred Hubble stole a Wishing Star.'

She hears Pippa gasp, decides to carry on like she hasn't. If she can detach herself enough from reality then maybe, just maybe she will be able to make it to the end of this conversation. 'She used it to make her Mum magical.'

'Oh, Mildred.' Pippa's heart flutters in sympathy for the young girl she has always had a secret soft spot for. 'What has The Great Wizard to say on the matter?' Hecate blinks, and her jaw drops in realisation. 'You haven't told him, have you?'

'Something like this ... it will completely obliterate her future.'

'But-'

'She made a mistake, Pippa. An awful, terrible, stupid mistake. One that she has spent the rest of life repaying.'

'The rest of her life?' Pippa repeats, and her brow instantly furrows in confusion.

If it's only just happened, then how can that be?

'Hecate. That doesn't make any-'

And then, she stops.

Freezes. Looks into watery brown eyes. Realises they are no longer talking about Mildred Hubble.

Pippa's waits. She doesn't prod, doesn't push. She just waits.

'Do you remember how I used to sneak out of school?'

Pippa does remember. Remembers how happy Joy was when she would return from wherever she had been.

'I'd always wonder where you would go, Hiccup.'

There's a saddened half-smile as though Hecate is remembering happier times before the pained look returns once again.

'Magic always came so easily to me, but it wasn't enough. So I went out looking for ... I don't know, something more, I guess. In the Ordinaries world. Oh, it was fascinating, Pip! There was music and ice cream and dancing! Simple things that I had never known, things my parents naturally forbade. It was wonderful to be a part of something like that. Only, obviously, they couldn't see me. I was all on my own, until ... suddenly, I wasn't. Her name was Indigo Moon, and we quickly became the best of friend's.'

Pippa tries not to focus on the hurt she feels at the thought of Hecate having another best friend. A secret best friend. Manages to powers through her own jealousy enough to tell herself that having two best friends is not exactly a crime. Even if one of them being a non-witch would have been heavily frowned upon at the time.

'Are you still in touch now?'

'The teachers' found out,' Hecate says simply, her voice and eyes both heavy with regret. 'They gave my parents' a choice: they could expel me or I could continue studying at Cackle's, so long as I didn't set foot outside of the grounds ever again. She laughs bitterly. 'Well, I say there was a choice, but there wasn't ... not really. Not when generations of Hardbroom's had attended Cackle's Academy. If I had suddenly upped and left for another school, people would have talked, and it would only have been a matter of time before the truth got out. They couldn't afford to let my foolishness jeopardise anything; you know how important reputation is in our world.'

'I'm so sorry, Hiccup.' As jealous as Pippa Pentangle currently may be, the words are wholly sincere. After all, she knows better than most how it feels to lose your best friend. 'Did you ever see her again?'

Hecate nods. 'It was during one half-term.' She says it casually, like she doesn't remember the exact date, time. The memory forever embedded in her skull. 'Everyone had gone home for the holidays, and I, of course, had to stay. I was lonely, Pippa ... more lonely than I had ever been before-and, yes, I know that's no excuse for what I did, but-' She breaks off, takes a deep breath, tries not to think about what is going to happen after her tale is complete. Pippa is going to hate her. Everyone is going to hate her. The only small consolation is the knowledge that nobody can hate her more than the thirty years she has spent hating herself.

'I knew that I couldn't go to Indie, so instead, I brought her to me. To our world. I thought I could give her the gift of magic, like she had given me the gift of friendship. Only, it didn't quite go to plan. It was too much. Too dangerous.' Memories swarm her mind like insects, but she forces herself to carry on. She's close, so close to the end, so close to everything she has worked for being over. A final push. 'She ran off into the woods, and she-I ... I saw her turn to stone.'

And there it is, laid bare.

The deadly secret that she has carried for over three decades.

'She was my best friend. She trusted me, Pippa. And not only could I not save her, I as good as killed her!'

Words form in her mouth, only to immediately die on her lips. Emotions flood her mind like water. She stares at Hecate. At her Hiccup. Replays the confession as if on a loop. Keeps coming back to one particular part of the story.

"The teachers' found out. 'They gave my parents' a choice: they could expel me or I could continue studying at Cackle's, so long as I didn't set foot outside of the grounds ever again."

'Hiccup,' Pippa begins tentatively. Can feel the bile rise in her throat as she voices the question to which she fears she already knows the answer. 'When you say that you can't leave the school, you aren't just referring to an overly busy work schedule, are you?'

The beseeching look in the Bambi-eyes tells her everything she needs to know.

'Oh, darling.'

What. A. Mess.

'Although I have found a home here at Cackle's, I can't say I am here entirely of my own free will.' When the punishment was first set in place, she would try, spend hours pouring over old tomes, mixing potions, desperate to break the invisible binds that kept her from leaving. Over time though, she became resigned to her fate. After all, Indigo was trapped, so why did she deserve to be free? 'It's probably for the best,' Hecate quietly surmises, looking down.

Best for who? Pippa thinks, doesn't say.

'I understand if you are angry.'

'... Angry?' Pippa spits, suddenly standing with such force that she knocks the chair clean over. It clatters to the ground with a heavy thud, slices through the heavy atmosphere. 'Hecate, I am absolutely fuming!' Her eyes and fingers spark dangerously, and for just a split second, Hecate is afraid.

'I-' She starts, stops, falters. Because really what else is there left to say? What possible defence does she have to justify what she did?

'I'm sorry, Hecate. I just-'

Pippa's shoulders sag in utter helplessness. A wave of her hand and the chair is upright once more. She slowly lowers herself into it, her eyes never leaving the lost and lonely little girl who still sits opposite. 'How could they do that to you? Your parents? ... The Cackle's? How could they commit an innocent child to that kind of life sentence?'

And why didn't you ever tell me?

'That's the thing though, Pippa. I wasn't innocent. I chose to play with fire, and quite deservedly, I got my fingers burnt!'

'Thirty years though, Hiccup? That's ... barbaric!' Other words spring to mind, but Pippa knows that if she starts, then she won't be able to stop. The thrum of magic beneath her veins quickens and she takes a deep breath, forces herself to calm down. 'Okay, yes, what you did was incredibly stupid. But you didn't mean for any of it to happen! You didn't set out to intentionally hurt anybody, did you?'

'Of course I didn't!'

'Exactly, Hecate. It was a mistake. A terrible, life-altering mistake. But it doesn't make you a bad person. Anyone would agree with me — Mildred Hubble in particular.'

At the mention of her pig-tailed charge, a small smile ghosts across Hecate's face.

'You know every time I look at her, its like I'm looking straight at Joy.'

From the minute she first lay eyes on Mildred Hubble, it has been like looking into a broken mirror of the past.

'After ... everything had happened, I withdrew. Cut myself off from you and the other girls. Suppressed my desires for anything that was considered even remotely outside of the rules. I threw myself into the Witches' Code. Somewhere along the line, I became Hecate Hardbroom. I promised myself that if any small good could come out of this nightmare then at least I could ensure that no other girl would ever be so foolish to let such a thing happen. And it has ... I've let her down. All the hurt, all that pain, and for what? I've failed, Pippa. I've still bloody failed!'

She sinks her head into her hands and Pippa can tell by the slight shake of her shoulders that she is crying. It makes her want to start crying too as she thinks of Hecate and all that she has suffered. But she can't. She needs to stay strong. Hecate needs her to be strong.

'No, Hiccup. The only one who has been let down in this whole sorry mess is you.'

Hecate's head flies up in shock. In the entire history of this affair, sympathy is not something she has come to expect. A handful of carefully chosen people are privy to her best-kept secret, and almost every one has treated her with more disdain than the last.

And now, there's Pippa.

Pippa who smells like strawberries and honeysuckles. Pippa who isn't looking at her like she is some sort of crazed sociopath. Pippa who is still here, still wiping away her tears even after all those years that they've spent apart.

The soft pink handkerchief tickles as it brushes against her skin, soaking up the tears she has just shed. Afterward, gentle fingers linger, brush away a wayward strand of hair that has escaped her bun. 'We'll fix this.' The words are filled with a certainty Hecate can only dream of having. 'I don't know how yet, but this will come to an end. I promise you. And when it does, Joy Hecate Hardbroom, you had better believe that I am going to show you the world!'

Pippa smiles tearfully. Rests a comforting hand on her friend's arm.

'We'll have ice cream every day. We'll go dancing until the break of dawn. We'll finally do all those things that we were always meant to do. And if it takes another thirty years, well then I'll wait. As long as it takes.'

It was all sounds so easy, so simple, so perfect.

'I can't ask you to just put your life on hold for me like that. Too many people are already caged due to the reckless actions of my younger self.'

'Hecate, when are you going to realise that you are my life? I've loved you for longer than I can remember. Joy. Hecate. Hiccup. It doesn't matter who you are, what you've done, what you do, I'll stand by your side through thick and thin. You just need to let me.'

A hot lump of emotion settles in her throat.

'I wanted to tell you, please know that. I thought about it so many times, but I was so worried that you would hate me for what I did. Or worse than that, I feared that you wouldn't hate me. That you too would want to stay, and then we would both be imprisoned. I had to find another way. A simple way to make you believe once and for all that you were better off without me.'

'The display ...' Pippa whispers softly, years of wondering suddenly falling into place like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.

'I didn't abandon you that day because I didn't care about you. No, I did it because I cared too much. I-I couldn't deny the world of knowing the pure magic that is Pippa Pentangle ... I just couldn't.'

'And what about what I wanted, Hecate? ... What about what I need?'

Fingerprints mark the glass as Hecate stares longingly at the landscape of life beyond. A life that she will never ever know.

'... Hecate?'

'You deserve the best, Pipsqueak.' She turns away from the window, and back to face her unfortunate reality ' ... more than I can possibly give you.'

'No!'

Her eyes widen. Never, in all her years of knowing Pippa Pentangle, has she ever heard one word filled with such ferocity.

'Pippa?'

'You do not get to do this to me again! ... 'You do not get the right to just decide what is best for me!'

Each word that punctuates the air is accompanied by the elegant point of a pink-manicured nail. Pippa rises to her feet, halting the obvious attempt at a 'goodbye' in its tracks.

'When we were younger, you didn't let me choose! And now, I know, understand why.' She steps forward. 'But this time ... this time it is my turn to choose, and whether you like it or not, I choose you, Hecate. I will choose you every single time!'

'Pipsqueak, I-'

Another step.

'You say that I deserve the best, but what about you, Hecate?'

'I don't deserve anything.'

'Yes, Hiccup.' With that, Pippa takes a final step, closes the distance between them. Gently, but with purpose, she takes Hecate's trembling hands in her own. 'Yes, you do.'

She kisses her on her left cheek.

'You deserve freedom.'

She kisses her on her right cheek.

'You deserve forgiveness.'

A whisper.

'You deserve love.'

She kisses her on the lips.

And in the depths of that kiss, for the first time in over thirty years, Hecate feels something she thought she could never feel again.

That old, familiar spark of Joy.