Author's Note: This chapter is dedicated to my amazing reviewers, whose enthusiasm helped me pound out the rest of this chapter in one night – and convinced me to post it. I can't promise that all my reviews will happen this quickly - in fact, I can pretty much guarantee it. I will try to update as soon as I can, however.
Before she'd left work, Paige had done some research on the occult shops in the area and made a list of the most likely places to find the information she was looking for. So far, she was striking out.
The first two places clearly considered "occult" to be synonymous with "possesses hundreds of candles". The second store had actually caught fire – well, the curtains, at least. A discreet use of her new powers had gotten the curtains off the windows so that she could stomp out the flames – mourning the loss of a new pair of shoes in the process – and thankfully no one had seen her act.
The third and fourth shops had been nothing spectacular, and Paige had picked up a couple of likely-sounding books from each that she thought might further her education. But, her attempts to carefully ask about magic had failed. From the gum-popping teenager manning the front counter of one store, she'd gotten nothing more than a blank stare. From the other, a bubbly, vivacious woman who'd eagerly introduced herself as Marcy, she'd gotten a lecture on magic that had lasted almost fifteen minutes and contradicted everything she'd learned from her sisters so far. Paige had nodded politely in all the right places and escaped as quickly as she could.
The fifth shop had seemed to be the most promising. The proprietor was a young man with shaggy, blond hair and a Celtic knot tattoo peeking out from the hem of his short-sleeved tee-shirt. He'd actually been the one to initiate their conversation about magic, answering Paige's tentative questions with a broad, easy smile. And he hadn't been the least bit daunted when she'd snuck in a couple of questions about fighting and demons.
"I know all about demons," he'd reassured her, still smiling, and then he'd handed her a business card for a local drug rehab clinic. "They're very discreet," he went on, while Paige stared at him in disbelief. "They really helped me, and they can help you, too. You don't have to fight with those demons one second longer."
'So,' Paige thought, as she sat in her car outside the last place on her list, drumming her fingers idly on the steering wheel, 'where, exactly, is the line between neophyte witch and rambling drug addict? Because I'd really like to never have that happen, again.'
As she stared at the door to the unassuming storefront, she wondered if she was doing the right thing. Maybe she should go back to the Manor, throw herself on her sword, and her sisters' mercy, and beg them to teach her everything they knew. But, then she remembered the furious look on Piper's face, and she had a feeling that her oldest sister wasn't going to be in a welcoming mood.
She thought that Phoebe might be more welcoming, but things were still uneasy between the three of them, what with Paige being the odd man out, and the shadow of Prue's death still hanging over all their heads. And the last thing she wanted to do was inadvertently pit Phoebe against Piper, even in her defense, or to make Piper feel like she was being ganged up on. She still remembered the empty, hollowed-out feeling from when her parents had died, and how she'd clung desperately to her aunt and uncle as a source of support while pushing everyone else away. Piper and Phoebe were still leaning on each other in their grief, and Paige didn't want to do anything to mess that up.
Her mind made up, Paige got out of the car and started across the street to the store. There was no name on the storefront, but the battered sign hanging in the window listed palmistry and tarot reading as the owner's specialties. Paige slowly pushed the door open, hearing the melodic chime of bells suspended at the top of the door frame. The shop first looked empty when she stepped inside, but then an old woman, with a scarf tied around her head, stepped out into the main room.
"I'm sorry," Paige said, as she looked around the darkened store, "are you closing?"
"Not anymore," the woman replied, with a gentle smile as she approached Paige. "Welcome. I am Madame Theresa."
"Hi," Paige said, shaking the hand the woman held out to her. "I'm Paige."
"I know," Theresa said, and Paige raised an eyebrow in surprise.
"You do?" she asked. "Did you, um, did you read my mind?"
"Just your badge," Theresa said, gesturing at her belt, and Paige glanced down at her work badge still clipped to the waistband of her pants. She'd completely forgotten that she was still wearing it.
Snagging the badge off her belt, Paige stuffed it in her coat pocket, the elastic of the clip hanging out of her pocket. She took a seat at the low table in the center of the room that Theresa gestured to, folding her long legs underneath herself as she sat on the floor. She winced when her knee popped, and stared enviously at Theresa as the older woman lowered herself to the floor with a grace that she could only envy.
"Your hand, please," Theresa said, and Paige put her right hand, palm up, on the table. Theresa took her hand, her fingers tracing lightly over the creases in her palm. After a moment she glanced up at Paige, a small, sardonic smile on her face. "Didn't anyone ever tell you that all work and no play makes Paige a dull girl?"
"I haven't had a whole lot of time to play, lately," Paige commented, wistfully. "I've been kind of throwing myself into work, nonstop, the past while."
Theresa made a quiet noise in the back of her throat. She studied Paige's right hand for a while, and then she switched to her left, wordlessly. After a few minutes, she gently placed Paige's hand back on the table.
"I have to admit," Paige said, when the older woman remained silent, "you're making me a little nervous, here. What, am I dying, or something?" She punctuated her words with a nervous laugh, trailing off into silence when Theresa kept staring down at her palm.
"I have seen a choice in your future," Theresa said, abruptly, and Paige looked at her in surprise.
"O-kay," she said, slowly, drawing out the word as she tried to figure out what Theresa was getting at. "Um, what kind of choice?"
"Come with me, please," Theresa said, rather than answering, and without waiting for an answer, she stood up and headed into the back of the store.
Paige stood up, glancing between the curtain the older woman had disappeared behind, and the front door. The sensible part of her brain was shrieking at her to run as fast and as far as she could, that if she didn't, her sisters were going to be fishing her body out of the bay the next morning. The more adventurous part of her brain, the one that had convinced her to follow her sisters down this crazy magic path in the first place, wanted to follow the woman and see what she was talking about.
'It won't hurt to take just a tiny look,' Paige thought, glancing toward the curtain, again, ignoring the part of her brain that was now practically screaming at her to get the hell out of there. 'Just one second.'
Her mind (mostly) made up, Paige headed toward the back of the store. She pushed the curtain aside to find Theresa waiting for her, a mug of something cupped in her hands. She smiled at Paige, handing her the cup. Paige took the cup, glancing down at the dark liquid, and then she shot Theresa a quizzical look.
"What's this?" she asked.
"An innocent soul is in danger," Theresa said, another non-answer, and Paige resisted the urge to sigh.
"What do you mean?" she asked. "Who's in danger?"
"You are the only one who can save her," Theresa went on, undaunted by her questions. "That," she added, nodding at the potion, "will take you to where you need to go."
"And you expect me to just drink this?" Paige asked, incredulously.
"No," Theresa said, with a small smile. "There is something that I must give you, first."
"Hold it!" Paige barked, when Theresa moved to go past her. "I want some answers. Who the hell are you? Who's in danger? Why am I the only one who can rescue them?"
Theresa cocked her head to the side, as though thinking. "Which question would you like answered?" she asked, curiously.
"All of them," Paige snapped, getting annoyed. "Look, I don't know who you think I am-"
"I think you are a Charmed One," the older woman said, with an enigmatic smile. "I think you are a witch with potential beyond that which even you know. I think that you have a great destiny laid out before you."
"I don't believe in destiny," Paige told Theresa, and the older woman chuckled.
"He said that you would be stubborn," she commented, softly.
"He who?" Paige demanded, but Theresa wasn't listening to her.
"I cannot tell you that," Theresa said, sounding incredibly sad, like she regretted what she was saying. "Just as I cannot tell you where you are going, or who you must save. It is a quest that you, and you alone, must undertake."
"And you can't prepare me in any way for this?" Paige asked, huffing an impatient sigh when Theresa just shook her head. "Fine," Paige said, throwing her hands in the air in frustration, "I'll go get my sisters, and we'll be back to go save whoever needs saving."
"Your sisters cannot follow where you must go," Theresa interrupted her, and Paige stared at her in disbelief.
"You know that I'm a Charmed One," she started, and Theresa cut her off with an upraised hand.
"That is what you are, now," she said, gently. "Not what you can be."
"What does that even mean?" Paige demanded, in frustration. When Theresa still didn't answer, Paige glared at her. "I'm leaving," she threatened, backing toward the curtain, "unless I get some answers. And I mean now."
Theresa remained silent, and Paige whirled around and stalked toward the exit. She'd just shoved the curtain aside when Theresa called out to her in a strangled voice. Paige spun back around, thinking that the woman was hurt, somehow, and she found Theresa watching her with a mournful expression on her face.
"The one you must save is the one who came before you," she said, entreatingly, holding a hand out to Paige. "You are her only hope."
"You said her," Paige said, slowly, taking a cautious step toward Theresa. "The one who came before me. You – you're talking about Prue, aren't you? Aren't you?" she demanded, angrily, a hint of something like hysteria creeping into her voice, when Theresa didn't answer.
"I do not know her name," the older woman finally murmured, casting her eyes toward the ground. "She stood strong within the circle of three, in the place where you now stand."
Paige didn't fool herself for even a minute that Theresa was talking about her physical spot in the shop. No, she was talking about Paige's place in the Power of Three. There was only one person that she could possibly be referring to. The only problem was –
"Prue's dead," Paige said, flatly, ignoring the burning in her eyes at the words. "I was at her funeral."
"She lives," Theresa said, quietly. "And you must save her. Before it is too late."
"Why can't I get my sisters?" Paige protested, weakly, subsiding when Theresa simply shook her head. She glanced down at the cup that she'd forgotten she held in her hands, staring into the dark liquid. "Are you sure I have to do this alone?"
"You are the only one," Theresa told her, a solemn tone in her voice.
Part of Paige wanted to tell Theresa no, wanted to tell her to find someone else. Because wherever Prue was, it couldn't be any place good. If it was somewhere on Earth, she would have just made her way back to her sisters; from everything Paige had learned about her, she was too stubborn not to. Which meant that she was being held someplace that Paige didn't want to even think about. If Prue, strongest witch in their family according to both Piper and Phoebe, needed her rescue – Paige didn't necessarily want to see what she needed to be rescued from.
But, on the other hand, this was Prue they were talking about. She was the sister that Paige had never thought she'd get to meet. And not only would Piper and Phoebe never forgive her for walking away, she would never forgive herself.
Paige snorted, silently, thinking about what Theresa had said about having a choice. It was a choice in name, only; there was only one thing she could do.
"What do I have to do?" she asked, quietly.