Thanks to: Meg and Kira (both 'fans' of Stormy's hair, it seems!) and Spongey (luv ya little sis!).
A special shout out goes to: my beloved Bristol Rovers, as they prepare for their big cup final right here in Cardiff on Sunday (1st April). Time to dig out my eyepatch and skull & crossbones bandana! Come on you Gas!!!
Random Quote: I've never bitten an angel, but they'd probably taste of clouds. (Miranda, in my other fanfic 'Miranda's Secret Diary')
Just a little side-note before we begin - the events of this chapter are happening similtaneously with the last chapter. You may be able to spot one or two little parallels.
In the left-hand section of the newly-divided room, Flora, Stella, Tecna, Mirta, Anyuna and Cornelia faced up to Darcy, who hovered above them with an evil glint in her eye.
"Well look what the cat dragged in. I must say, I've never seen you pixies looking so rough!" she crowed in her usual deceptively smooth tone of voice as she looked down at the exhausted girls below her.
"Rough? Hmmph!" Cornelia snorted indignantly, crossing her arms angrily. "That's rich coming from Little Miss Warpaint over there!"
"I can't believe I'm hearing this - I'm getting my looks dissed by a witch!?" Stella snarled.
"So what are you going to do about it then, pixie?"
"Oh I'll show you I'm going to do." the princess replied as she slid the ring from her elegant hand and tossed it into the air. "It's time to break out the big guns!"
Darcy's smug smile turned into a dark frown as she watched the glowing ring transform into a magnificent golden sceptre with a beautiful moon and star at its head.
"The Celestial Sceptre? How revolting - it reminds me of my worthless brother!" (1)
"The Celestial Sceptre?" Flora cooed as the girls all stared in wonderment at the items which Stella now proudly held. "I didn't know you still had that."
"Well, the folks back home couldn't seperate my sceptre from the Sceptre of Lunaria, so Daddy-dearest decided to let me keep it."
"A good thing too." Tecna interrupted. "If I'm not mistaken, because it's so powerful, it means you'll be able to fight without using up your winx!"
"Good! Then why don't I use it? The sooner we get home, the sooner I can check into a decent salon. Oh, my poor dirty, frizzy hair!" Stella said sadly, patting her once wondrous golden locks before pointing her sceptre at Darcy. "Okay then witch, let's see you handle this! Sun Burst!"
The sceptre glowed brightly before letting off a brilliant yellow fireball that streaked towards Darcy. But the dark witch didn't move - she simply crossed her arms in front of her, and the fireball thudded into her, revealing a pulsing purple sphere that surrounded her.
"Not good enough pixie!" she shouted. "Try again!"
"With pleasure!" Stella replied as she released a trio of the fireballs. Once again, they slammed into Darcy, each one edging her slightly backwards but otherwise having no effect whatsoever.
"Pathetic! You can have a million of those things, but it wouldn't make a blind bit of difference!" Darcy said, laughing as she raised her clenched fist in front of her, showing off her Gloomix. "Haven't you realised yet? This is my turf, and this combined with LD's new power means that I have one hell of a home field advantage! Allow me to demonstrate!"
With that, she raised her hands above her head and yelled "Screaming Skull attack!". A large skull appeared, glowing a gloomy shade of purple. The girls looked at this skull, and it stared right back at them through its dark, empty sockets.
"Cute, isn't it?" Darcy sneered. "Say Boney, why don't you go and play with the little pixies?"
With that, the skull suddenly shot forwards, its mouth wide open as it screamed a scream that was so chilling, it would set the hairs on the back of a banshee's neck on edge. Without a second thought, Stella planted her sceptre into the ground, and the group were immediately cocooned inside a protective golden bubble. But as powerful as the shield was, it was barely able to withstand the skull's impact as it exploded off it with a loud thud that rattled the walls. A split second after that, Stella's shield shattered.
"Wasn't that fun? Now let's try something different!"
With that Darcy closed her eyes and started to move her hands slowly in the air in front of her, in slow, soft, flowing movements. Fearing the worst, Stella raised a new shield as the group prepared themselves for the witch's new assault.
But Darcy had other plans. She opened her eyes, which had now taken on a purple glow of their own. Stella couldn't help but stare at her. Those hand movements, her glowing eyes - it was trance-like... hypnotic... mesmeric.
"Oh, hiding behind that shield won't help you Stella... not when the enemy is within!"
Stella gasped as Darcy suddenly vanished from view.
"Where did she go?" she cried.
"What are you talking about? She's still there!" Flora replied... but that was not what Stella heard. With a jump, she looked around to see Darcy standing there in front of her within touching distance, right where her friend was... and on her other side too, and behind her. A whole group of Darcys were all around her, surrounding her, closing in menacingly for the kill.
"No!" she yelled as she suddenly fired off a barrage of shots at her 'enemies'. She smiled with satisfaction as each one of her shots hit home, sending the fake Darcys flying.
"Stella, wait! What are you doing?" Flora pleaded as she struggled back to her feet.
"Oh... you want some more, witch?" Stella growled.
"But it's me... Flora!"
"Hey Darcy, I may be blond but I'm not dumb. Do you really expect me to fall for that?" she replied as she hit Flora once again with a shot from her sceptre.
Almost blinded by fear and pain, Flora backed herself against a wall and looked around her. All of her friends were trying desperately to get to their feet, only to be knocked senseless by Stella as she fought her imaginary opponents. And above them, Darcy looked on, her eyes still glowing as she focused in on Stella's mind.
'I've got to break her link.' she thought to herself. 'It's the only way.'
She shakily stood herself up, just as Stella turned around to face her.
"Oh, you never give up, do you witch?" the Solarian princess snarled. Flora paid her no heed, and instead concentrated on the ground beneath Darcy's feet.
"Venus Gobbler!" she shouted. With a rumble, a large carnivorous plant burst out of the ground, along with a pair of vines that shot up and wrapped themselves around Darcy's leg, dragging her down towards the hungry flower. Frantically, Darcy tried to free herself from its clutches but the vines hung on tight. At the last moment, she had the prescence of mind to split herself into three, and her two clones quickly set to work getting her free, blasting the vines with everything they had.
Flora smiled. Being the sweet-natured soul that she was, it wasn't her intention for Darcy to get gobbled up, but her desperation manouvre did have the desired effect. As Darcy had struggled against the vines, her hold over Stella was broken, and the young princess gave a start as though she had just been woken up from a bad dream. Blinking, she stood in the middle of the group and looked around her to see the others picking themselves up, all of them nervously keeping a very wary eye on her.
"Ummm, what's with you guys?"
"Stella? Are you okay?"
"I could ask you the same thing Flo. What happened to you?" she replied, looking especially puzzled by Flora's rather dishevelled appearance.
Flora smiled. "You did. You thought we were..."
Flora's explanation was quickly halted by a fireball which hit her square in the chest, knocking her to the floor once again. She was soon joined by the others as they too were broadsided by Darcy and her clones. As they were quickly felled by the Darcy trio's sneak attack, the girls would've been forgiven for thinking things couldn't get any worse...
They were wrong.
Right at that very moment, a horrifying sound made itself heard from the central section of the room - it was a blood-curdling scream of pure agony that would haunt them for many days afterwards.
Darcy looked over to her side and laughed. "It sounds like Icy's having almost as fun as me!"
Anyuna, who was closest to the thick wall of ice, crawled over to it and peered through the ice as best she could. Although the ice was so thick, she could just about see a figure laying on the ground, and... red... a lot of red.
"Oh my! That looks like..."
All of a sudden, she was hit by another fireball that threw her many yards backwards.
"Hey! Eyes front pixie - I'm not done with you yet!" Darcy yelled mockingly, her laughter filling the room as she continued to bombard the girls with fireballs... but then something else caught her attention.
It was a butterfly, which fluttered around in front of her before cheekily landing on her nose. She swished it away angrily but it came back, this time accompanied by a few thousand of its friends. Before she knew it, Darcy was completely enveloped by a thick cloud of butterflies, swirling all around her in a multi-coloured mist. The girls looked on in amazement.
"What on Majix...?"
"Like it? I call it my Butterfly Blizzard!" a voice spoke out from behind the swarm. It belonged to a familiar young fairy dressed in a sparkling golden-honey coloured halter-top and slit skirt, who flew a somersault in mid-air before landing in front of them. Flora gasped, half in surprise and half in relief.
"Delphinia!"
"Delphi." her sister replied.
"What are you doing here Delphinia?! It's too dangerous!" Flora cried, placing her hands on Delphi's shoulders.
"Oh, thank you Delphi! Your help is really appreciated Delphi! We couldn't have done it without you Delphi!" Delphi replied sarcastically, obviously hurt by her sister's lack of recognition for her good deed.
"I'm sorry... thank you Delphinia."
"Delphi!"
"But what ARE you doing here?"
"Long story really. I was out in the forest gathering some medicinal herbs for our Potions 101 class with that dishy Professor Palladium - by the way, is he single?"
"No idea, but I really don't think he'd be interested in dating students."
"Never mind - maybe I'll stick to eyeing up Red Fountain boys instead. Anyway, I was picking herbs when I heard this really loud BOOM in the distance - I mean, really, REALLY loud. So I flew up above the treeline and I could see this huge cloud of smoke miles away in the distance. I haven't seen any excitement since I came here so I thought I'd take a look, just for a laugh. Halfway there, I could see this huge ball of flame - it was massive it was."
"Oh, that sounds like the Ifrit's dome of fire, doesn't it?" Stella interrupted.
"Ifrit? What's that?"
"Really nasty, that's what. I hope you never get to see it." Stella answered. "So anyway, carry on."
"Well, I was about a mile away when this ship showed up and the fire just... disappeared. But the ship flew off before I could reach it and it came here, so I followed it. Then I heard a whole load of screaming coming from in here, so I squeezed myself in through that window." she explained, pointing at the thin openings in the wall. "I gotta say sis, you really do pick some strange places to hang out. What're you doing here, anyway?"
"We were just..."
"These stupid pixies are here on a mission to rescue their little friend - but it ain't gonna happen!" Darcy yelled out from within the cloud of butterflies that still swarmed around her. From her tone of voice, it seemed she was seething at this irritation. Suddenly, a magenta glow could be seen growing within the cloud, expanding until it enveloped the swarm before fading away into nothingness.
Delphi looked on sadly. "My butterflies!"
"They're not the only thing that'll be obliterated!" Darcy chuckled. "And seeing as you're so annoying, I think you'll be next!"
"You're not touching my sister." Flora said bravely as she stood in front of her.
"What, and you're gonna stop me?"
"Yes. You see, my sister has given me a rather good idea for getting you out of the way. Valerian Root!" (2)
At Flora's command, a single, tendrilly root sprang up out of the ground and coiled itself around Darcy's leg. The witch snorted as she peered down at it.
"What? That's it? You're weaker than I thought!" she said arrogantly as she tried to pull her foot clear. But her confidence was misplaced - as she tried to pull her foot up, a feeling of light-headedness suddenly came over her, and she stumbled dizzily, only just able to keep her balance. Confused, she tried once again, but it had the same dizzying effect, and this time she fell.
"Right! That does it!" the witch growled as she raised a glowing hand, ready to strike the root down with a well-placed fireball... but just as she went to release it, it suddenly fizzled out.
"Wow! That thing's draining her powers?" Anyuna asked.
"Yes. It's a little something I worked on over the summer, and Delphinia's..."
"Delphi." her sister cut in.
"...story about gathering medicinal herbs gave me the idea to use it."
"Right. In that case, I think I'll finish the job!" Anyuna said with a twinkle in her eye as she took off and hovered above Darcy's head. "Dream Dust!"
With an elegant wave of her hand, she showered the witch with her sparkling silver sleep powder. "Unpleasant dreams!"
"You... you won't get... away with..." Darcy said groggily, waving her hands in a futile effort to waft the dust away before letting out a loud yawn as she finally succumbed to Anyuna's sleep spell.
"I think we just did!" was Anyuna's cocky reply.
As she landed, she joined in the girls celebrations, giving each other high-fives and congratulatory hugs, but their jubilation was cut short as they remembered what had happened before - that scream - and their attention fell onto the ice wall that separated them from their friends.
"There's gotta be some way of breaking through." Stella said as she pointed her sceptre at the wall.
She let off let off the biggest fireball she could muster, but it just impacted against the wall with a dull 'whumph' and fizzled out. Again she tried, but it was no use - she was having no effect.
"One last time!" she gasped as she prepared herself... but right at that very moment, a loud BOOM shook the ground, taking them off their feet. A few seconds later, large cracks began to appear at the bottom of the wall, spreading upwards and growing larger until finally, the whole thing fell in on itself with a crash.
A few seconds later, the dust had settled, and the girls gasped in horror at the terrible sight that lay before them...
1. This is a reference to my third fanfic 'Oh Brother!' where Darcy's brother Kaiser brainwashes Layla into stealing Stella's sceptre so that he can combine it with the Sceptre of Lunaria to create the Celestial Sceptre.
2. Valerian - a medicinal herb whose root contains a naturally-occuring tranquiliser. A good remedy for insomnia and anxiety.