Legacy: Pieces of Eight

by Lady Dawson

Chapter Four: All Guardians Down

"You went and saw the Oracles?" Brandon asked incredulously as Susan finished recapping what she and Bobby had been doing. She nodded as Chris flipped through the Book, trying to find any reference to the Avenger guy that the Oracles had mentioned. "That's . . . okay, that's . . . what the heck were you thinking?" he demanded. "That was an extremely dangerous stunt to pull! Talking to the Oracles and trying to approach the Powers that Be, that's just—"

"Completely and totally risky, yeah, I know," Bobby told him, "but we didn't exactly have a lot of options here. We're running out of time."

"Enough, we're wasting time arguing," Susan said, holding up her hand to prevent any further debate between her Whitelighter and brother. She sighed, running her hand through her hair. "Okay, so the Oracles said that if we can prevent Peter from getting Candace's amulet, then they won't be able to resurrect this demon. But I vote that we find a way to stop him, because we're not going to be able to protect her forever. Eventually, she's going to have to go back to her life and we can't watch over her twenty-four/seven."

"Yeah, I agree," Chris said without looking up. "Besides, we need to have a plan just in case Connelly does manage to get to Candace and retrieve the amulet."

"Nice to see you're so optimistic, little brother," Wyatt said sarcastically. Chris looked up at him.

"Okay, first of all, leave the sarcasm to me, bro, because you fail at it miserably," he told him. "Second of all, I'm not being a pessimistic, I just think that we need to figure out what to do if something should go wrong. It's not crazy to look at door number two."

Wyatt rolled his eyes. "Whatever you say," he said with a sigh as Alex stood up, looking towards the ceiling quickly. So did Brandon. "Uh . . . what's up with you guys?"

"It's the Elders," Alex responded, giving Brandon a quick glance. "Uh . . . you stay here, I'll go see what They want." Without another word, he vanished in a series of orbs and Brandon sighed, running his hand through his hair as he sat back down, casting a quick glance towards Brooke as she shifted uncomfortably in her chair as he looked at her.

Susan frowned as she noticed this, wondering what it was exactly that she had walked in on after she and Bobby had gotten back from the Oracles. Something had happened in that room just before she'd walked in, even if they weren't saying. A suspicion crept into the back of her mind, but Susan pushed it down quickly, not wanting to go to that place. There was no way that Brooke would do that again, not after the last time.

At least she hoped that she wouldn't, because if she was wrong, then Wyatt's heart was going to get broken.

"Aha! Found him!" Chris announced, breaking her train of thought and she jumped up, hurrying over to look over his shoulder at the picture of the Avenger. "Okay, pretty much everything that we knew . . . demon from another dimension, an army went up against him . . . took eight witches to bring him down and separate him into eight amulets . . . no weapon forged can kill him."

"Yeah, but we already knew all of that stuff," Brooke complained as she flipped through the books for any mention of the demon. "There has got to be something that we're missing, something that we can think of that would kill him if he got resurrected."

"I really think that we should be looking for this last guardian," Bobby spoke up, startling them all. "Even though the Oracles said that we'd be too late, they're not all knowing, right? I mean, even the Powers that Be have to have their limits."

"Actually, I think that's what the Powers that Be are is all knowing," Susan told him weakly. "But you might have a point. Even if we can't save the last guardian, maybe there's something there that we can use to stop Peter from merging the amulets."

"Or even better," Chris said slowly as he looked at his girlfriend, "maybe there's a way to destroy Candace's amulet." She looked at him quickly. "That'd be a sure way to keep him from integrating the amulets and bringing forth the Avenger."

"Yeah, it would, but we have absolutely have no idea of how to find the last guardian," Wyatt pointed out. "I mean, scrying doesn't work, so what else are we going to try?"

"Candace might know," Brandon suggested. "I mean, she's a guardian, so she might have some idea—at least a general area—of where to find him. Maybe with a more focused area, we could pinpoint the location."
"That's a good idea," Susan agreed, looking gratefully towards her Whitelighter. "So, where is Candace, anyway?" she asked, looking around and missing her cousin's charge.

"Magic School," Wyatt, Chris, and Brooke all answered and she nodded, realising that was the most obvious spot. Evil couldn't enter into those endless magical halls, so her being there was probably a whole lot safer than she was with them.

"All right, so then let's go off to Magic School," Susan said, taking Bobby's arm and orbing off with him, followed closely by Brandon, Chris, and Wyatt. Brooke went with Wyatt as they materialised into the library as Leo was talking with one of his teachers. Almost immediately, he noticed his sons entering into the building.

"Back so soon?" he asked as he walked towards them, a relieved look on his face. "I thought that it was going to take a whole lot longer to figure out what was going on with the amulets."

"Yeah, well, we're not exactly through with it yet," Wyatt explained. "We're kind of hoping that Candace might be able to tell us where to find the last guardian at, see if he might have some answers to how to destroy the amulets or something equally useful."

Leo nodded grimly. "Yeah, good idea. She's lying down in her dorm, this way," he said, leading the way through the endless halls until they reached one of the dorms. Susan had half-forgotten that Candace was a student here. He knocked on the door. "Candace? It's Leo, can I come in?" Susan frowned at the lack of answer, her precognition sense flaring up in high definition.

"Something's wrong," she said sharply. Leo looked at her and moved out of the way as Chris blasted the door apart, leaving it hanging on its side as they moved into the room, looking around at the darkened room. Susan reached for the light and turned it on.

The moment that the lights turned on, Brooke let out a scream at the sight of the battered, mutilated body that lay on the floor. Chris let out an exclamation. Wyatt whispered a swearword. Leo's eyes went wide with shock. Bobby had frozen, his face pale as he stared at the body. Susan, who had suspected something of this before Chris had blasted the door down, slowly moved towards Candace, kneeling down beside her and touching the body. It was cold.

"Something isn't right," she whispered. "She's cold. She's been here for several days like this. Something got her before . . ." Susan stopped in mid-sentence as she raised her head towards Bobby. "Before we found her," she finished slowly.

Wyatt was the first to recover from seeing the body like that. "So . . . if it wasn't Candace, then who was with us when we were looking for the amulet?"

Susan couldn't answer, because her attention had been drawn to Bobby, who had suddenly pulled away from the group, clutching his stomach as he staggered away. "Bobby!" she exclaimed, hurrying towards her brother as he doubled over and threw up onto the rug.

Taking him into her arms as he threw up what was left in his stomach, Susan held him as he collapsed into her arms, pale and clammy, rubbing circles around his back like her mother used to when she was little, whispering comforting words to him as he clung to her.

"She's been sitting like that," Bobby whispered as he rocked back and forth, "for days? Without anybody knowing about it or . . ." He shook his head as Susan shushed him, running her fingers through his hair and holding him gently to her.

"What I'm worried about," Chris said slowly, "is who could get into Magic School and kill Candace without anybody knowing about it? I thought that evil couldn't get into the halls." Susan had to admit that he had a point, but she was more worried about her brother. Not to mention, whether or not Peter had Candace's amulet.

"Check the body," she said softly, "somebody, see if she still has the amulet." Wyatt moved over and bent over the body, checking it carefully as she returned her attention to her brother. "Easy, buddy, it's okay," she whispered as Bobby clung to her, laying his head into her chest as she enveloped him in a tight hug. "It's okay."

"It's not here," Wyatt said quietly. "Which means that whoever was impersonating Candace has the amulet."

"Okay, we need to come up with a plan and fast," Brandon said as he looked around at the others. "Anybody got any ideas, because we're running out of time really fast."

"This is what we're going to do," Susan said as she held Bobby. "Chris and Wyatt, you guys go to the Connelly Manor and see how close they are to reassembling the Avenger. Brooke, you go back to the apartment and find something—anything—to stop this guy if he's gonna get released. Brandon, go find my cousin and give him the updates. While you're Up There, talk to the Elders, find out everything that They know about the amulets and where to find the last guardian. And tell them that I'm not taking no for an answer. If They don't work with me on this, then I am going to go Up There and—"

"I think I can give Them the message," Brandon said hastily as he orbed out. Brooke looked at Susan.

"What are you going to do?"

"Gonna go pay a visit to an old friend," Susan said quietly.

--

Pushing open the door to the bar that she had occasionally gone to during her visits down here in San Francisco to look at colleges with her mother and brother, Susan looked around at the various species that occupied it, none of them looking up as the young witchlighter crossed over to the bartender, who was serving a customer.

"Don't worry, it's my special blend, made it especially for you, darling," he was saying as Susan walked up. The female demon gave her a glance and sniffed at her suspiciously.

"Witch," she hissed dangerously and about half a dozen heads turned in her direction. "Come to kill us lower beings? You won't make it to the door."

"Oh, please," Susan grumbled. "Can't a girl just go into a bar without having any trouble? If I wanted to vanquish you, then I wouldn't be so idiotic to come along. I'm not giving you any trouble . . . yet," she added more quietly, staring down the demon. She gave Susan one last scowl before she moved away from the bar. Susan sighed as she looked towards the bartender. "Hey, Evan," she said as the bartender looked around.

"Whoa . . . if it isn't little Susan Dawson," he said with a weak laugh, cleaning a glass more thoroughly than needed as his eyes darted around, looking for an escape route. "What, uh . . . what brings you down to these parts of town?"

"Information, need it fast and I'm not accepting no for an answer," she said, looking at the bartender straight in the eye. He gulped and lowered his gaze as she placed both hands on the bar, her fingers starting to crackle with electricity. Evan cast a quick glance at them and slowly looked back up, meeting her blue eyes evenly. Susan Dawson was probably one of the most even-tempered people who existed, but when she did get mad, things tended to explode. And the last time it happened, Evan had to rebuilt the entire bar, much to his displeasure.

Jerking his head, Evan moved towards the back and Susan followed, keeping an eye out for traps. Evan might be informative when it came to otherworldly things, but he had no loyalty to good or evil. He would give information to whoever would pay him the most—or would cost less for him.

"Okay, so what kind of information are we talking about?" Evan finally asked when they were out of view.

"Peter Connelly is collecting amulets to reassemble a demon known as the Avenger," Susan replied. "I need to find the last guardian and fast otherwise he's a goner as much as the rest of them." She crossed her arms as Evan frowned at her words.

"Not a whole lot to go on there, sweetheart."

"Don't call me sweetheart," Susan said warningly, giving him an evil eye. "And besides, you and I both know that you've got all the information in that thick head of yours. Want me to see how long it takes for you to start talking with lightning going through you?" she threatened, blue eyes blazing.

Evan winced. "All right, all right! Look, then thing about the Avenger and these amulets is . . . there's no guardians left to find. The girl at Magic School, Candace, she was killed a couple days ago? She was the last one. Haven't you heard about her?"

"She was only found a couple of hours ago," Susan said, closing her eyes painfully as she remembered Candace lying there helplessly. Bobby was still recovering from the affects of seeing a dead girl there; apparently, he had never actually seen a dead human before. He was staying with Leo at Magic School while they figured everything out. "And what do you mean, she was the last one? There should be another one . . . unless—"

"They got him, over a week ago," Evan said with a shrug. "The Avenger . . . they should be assembling him any time now." Susan spun around as two demons approached her from behind, with two more behind Evan and four on either side of them. "Your friends, the Halliwells? Yeah, they're probably heading into a trap right now. It's too bad you're not gonna have the chance to tell anybody about it."

"Big mistake, Evan," Susan growled as she released the electricity, not bothering to miss any of the objects in the back that made Evan's bar working and running. "I would've thought you learned your lesson the last time. And by the way?" she added as she finished vanquishing the last demon. "Don't try lackey demons again. It just costs you more."

Without another word, she left the bar, closing the door behind her as she hurried to the Connelly Manor, praying that she wasn't too late.