"I'm here to set you free."
Daisy started at Pyrrha's declaration, turning to her friend in disbelief. "Are you bloody insane?" she asked the memory. "If she's trapped, that's how she needs to stay!"
Pyrrha ignored her, of course. She stepped closer to the cave, to the malevolent eyes shining just beyond the black threshold. "I can find a way to release you, help you pass on. I expect you're more than weary of this life." Pyrrha paused, as if waiting for the homicidal maniac to respond.
All Daisy could think was how utterly confused she was. Why did this have to happen at all? Sure, the witch was trapped for eternity, apparently unable to die, but . . . Daisy grimaced as she found herself a tad sympathetic. How could she feel badly for a monster that had wounded her friend so grievously?
Pyrrha seemed as resolved as Daisy was conflicted. She returned the witch's relentless stare with equal intensity, the only sound the soft whistle of the sea breeze. When Morrigan remained eerily silent, Pyrrha said, "With or without your cooperation, I intend to kill you."
With that, Pyrrha drew her wand and began casting on the cave, elegant gestures and complex maneuvers flowing smoothly from one spell to the next. She was dismantling the charms keeping the witch inside, Daisy realized with dread. She stood by helplessly as Pyrrha jabbed her wand out, sending a plume of fiery orange sparks racing in all directions across an invisible surface; they left glowing cracks in their wake that burned with light before the whole thing shattered, a quick series of snaps echoing down the cavern.
Pyrrha kept at it, pulling away the defenses steadily, one by one. Several odd and sometimes ominous noises accompanied the occasional flash or spark of light. Daisy twined her hands tightly, wishing she could stop watching this unfolding disaster, or at least skip the dreadful waiting. As she thought it, Pyrrha made one final flourish, pulling away the unnatural blackness from the cave mouth like a massive curtain. The thick shadows melted into nothing in the air.
Morrigan stood hunched just inside, dreary evening light from the clouds revealing her in all her grotesque desiccation. She looked as well-rotted as a corpse could be without falling to pieces, discolored flesh and bones bared to the pale day. Her slumped posture was oddly vulnerable, guarded, far from the terrorizing fiend that had blighted the Hogwarts grounds. Daisy's eyes lingered unwillingly on her pendulous, slimy tongue, and it swayed limply from her torn throat as she staggered forward.
The creature lurched to a stop before Pyrrha, looking up into her eyes with that burning yellow gaze. Daisy prickled with dread to see her so close to Pyrrha. The air was thick with anticipation, as though there were an entire breathless crowd in attendance along with Daisy, all waiting on tenterhooks for what came next. She held her hands tightly clasped as they stood there silently, eyes locked in quiet conflict.
Pyrrha broke eye contact, blinking rapidly. "Waste of your time," she said, stepping around behind the witch. "Remain still. It'll be over soon."
Her wand traced swift patterns in the air, aim directed at the witch's decayed back. Morrigan's form seemed to shiver without moving, other flickering likenesses superimposed for an instant before vanishing, replaced by others in the next, each in slightly different positions. Pyrrha eyed the effect with an unreadable expression before flicking at the witch; a small white light flew into Morrigan's head, to no visible effect. Pyrrha frowned and cast again, with the same result.
Morrigan's flesh made a wet sound as she turned sharply on her heel, her incandescent stare capturing Pyrrha's eyes yet again. Daisy's heart thumped as she watched Pyrrha's startled expression shift to dazed confusion. Seconds crawled while the contest resumed.
Pyrrha shook her head after a dreadful moment, face twisting into anger. "Enough of that," she said coldly, twirling her wand; stone shackles rose from the bedrock and clamped around Morrigan's wrists and ankles. At another flick they pulled taut and sank, and the witch was yanked face-first to the ground, landing with a disgusting squelch.
The witch heaved a rattling moan as Pyrrha stepped carefully over her, turning to face Morrigan's back once again. Pyrrha tapped her wand against her fingertips, eyes unfocused and wandering as she stood deep in thought; at length she glanced down and gestured hopefully. A thin stream of golden fire spouted from her wand and washed against the witch's back with a dull roar. Rich light danced over the cave walls and chased away the shadows until Pyrrha lowered her wand, snuffing out the flames with a whump.
Where the witch's torso had been, there it remained, utterly unscathed. Pyrrha was undeterred; she began casting anew, a rapid series of motions Daisy couldn't hope to follow. Faint humming faded in and out. Eventually, Morrigan's body began to glow dimly from within, the odd light growing more intense as Pyrrha continued to cast. Brighter and brighter it shined, until at last Daisy had to turn her head, blinking away the blotchy colors imposed on her vision. All at once the light flared more radiant than ever, stabbing between Daisy's fingers at her closed eyes before winking out with a sharp crack.
Daisy couldn't see for another minute, but it seemed Pyrrha had protected herself somehow; she made an irked noise in her throat at the spell's apparent lack of results. A steady succession of strange noises resounded throughout the cave; high pitched whines, tremulous buzzing and burbling echoes, and once, something like a far-off shriek. By the time Daisy's vision righted itself, Pyrrha was on her sixth spell, in Daisy's estimation.
The transparent spell rippled out gently from the tip of Pyrrha's outstretched wand, faintly tinged with purple. As the mellow waves rolled along the witch's body, they made a deep, resonant sound in steady intervals, like the somnolent breathing of some hulking beast slumbering just out of sight. Daisy gave an involuntary shiver. How many ways did Pyrrha know to destroy something?
Pyrrha maintained her efforts, lips thinning when the spell failed to do whatever it was meant for. Morrigan's head turned sharply to the side with a dry crackle of bones, and it kept turning; the witch's head twisted round with a revolting crunch to face fully backward on her body, and her shining gaze fixed Pyrrha in place, the spell left to fade away, forgotten.
Daisy could only watch with rising horror as Pyrrha stood transfixed, her initial surprised expression set static, and Daisy willed her friend to fight, damn the futility. Abruptly, Pyrrha blinked and clutched at her head with her free hand, stepping back unsteadily. "No, that's—I can't do that." She sounded unsure of herself, and Daisy lamented with a wordless moan.
Morrigan's eyes flared brighter, and Pyrrha flinched, still looking too deeply into those haunted pits. "Yourself? . . . I don't—I don't know . . ." Pyrrha massaged her temple, her wand hanging limply in the other hand.
"Oh God . . ." Daisy twined her hands over and over, wearing them down with dread that continued to build. Pyrrha wasn't in control anymore; her resolve was faltering, slowly but surely. The witch was overpowering Pyrrha. What little optimism remained to Daisy dwindled with a shriveling feeling in her stomach. "Damn it, damn it . . ."
The witch writhed in her restraints, pulled at her shackles, and Daisy watched the pathetic struggling with a wild hope that perhaps she wouldn't break free, perhaps it had all gone to plan after all. But Morrigan tugged, and her hands tore free from their arms with a slimy sound. The emaciated stumps of her wrists slid out from the shackles with ease, and the witch's feet were similarly ripped away. The wayward pieces scuttled and rolled across the stone, and the witch sat up and turned her body around, her unrelenting yellow stare rooting Pyrrha to the spot. The sundered appendages wove back together in their proper places with drawn-out sounds of crawling flesh.
Only Pyrrha's eyes moved, inexorably connected to Morrigan's own as the witch rose from the ground with a grotesque twist of her head. They stood there in a silent battle of wills, a battle Daisy was about to watch Pyrrha lose. It all begins here and now, Daisy thought, devastated.
Pyrrha shivered, and the hand that held her wand shook as she raised it haltingly, inch by inch, until it was leveled at Morrigan's chest. It wavered under Pyrrha's unsteady arm, trembling with effort, weakness, or fear, or perhaps all three. Her breathing was labored, just audible over the pattering rain. Her wand continued to rise until she slipped it into the chest pocket of her robes, her face still wearing her inner conflict.
"I . . . I think you're—yes . . . it makes sense." Pyrrha still clung to a shred of doubt, a spark of defiance, Daisy could see it in her eyes, but it wasn't enough anymore. Pyrrha's hand dipped into her robes and unbuttoned her bag, strained black eyes still snared in Morrigan's trap. Deliberately, Pyrrha drew out a length of twisted wood and held it tightly in both hands, finally shoving it out as if yanked forward.
Morrigan plucked it from her clenched hands with a tilt of her withered head, a mocking bow of gratitude. Daisy trembled with rage and terror while Pyrrha stood there in a daze, helpless before the witch, who uttered a throaty gurgle that might have been laughter.
In a momentous few seconds, several things happened at once; Pyrrha's bloodless face slackened with shock as she seemed to come to her senses; a maiden bolt of lightning blinded the world with a reverberating boom, heralding the incoming downpour; Morrigan thrust out her staff, a dark spell swirling at its head; Daisy cried out as Pyrrha blocked the curse in the nick of time, and the backlash sent her careening backward through the rain, crashing across the stone platform in a rolling heap.
Daisy sprinted across the bedrock, Morrigan's burbling groan spurring her to the limits of her speed. Pyrrha's lank form stirred, barely visible through sheets of rain, and Daisy reached her friend's side with a sliding halt as Pyrrha sat up. Her dazed expression quickly shifted, unrestrained fury burning in her eyes, and Daisy took an instinctive step back when Pyrrha stood, already soaked through. Daisy spun around and gasped at the sight before them.
Little yellow pinpricks drew inevitably closer through the escalating storm. Far above them, a behemoth sailed across the murky sky; liberated from the spire, the great white skeleton of the whale swam on the wind with indolent grace, looming like the sepulchral avatar of an impending apocalypse. The leviathan soared up and disappeared beyond the storm clouds, breaching into the rumbling heavens.
Lightning shot from the smoky thunderheads, lashing out to rip the air like empyreal whips, deafening cracks drowning out the raindrops. Daisy blinked the searing lines from her eyes, intent on the sky that harbored the risen whale. The clouds birthed it with unfitting quiet, gliding from the smog with its massive skull aimed directly for Pyrrha; it grew to fill the air as it drew near with prolonged beats of its spinelike tail, until Daisy could hear goliath bones groaning together among the turmoil of the storm.
Pyrrha's arm entered her captivated vision, wand issuing a swirling light that stretched over them like the widening eye of a tornado; the whale's skull impacted it with a thunderous crash and skidded across to plough headlong into the bedrock, mammoth ribcage raking the stone in a scream of grinding bone. The whale hurtled over the platform's edge and soared out across the turbulent waters.
Morrigan's golden gaze snatched Daisy's attention, holding to her prey hungrily from on high, wasted frame outlined by lancing bolts of light that roiled the air. She raised her knotted staff.
All around was an encompassing shift in the rain; every drop in a far-reaching radius turned in the air, coalescing into a deluge that surged at Pyrrha from all sides; Daisy's heart stopped as Pyrrha was consumed in a swelling mass of water, a suffocating cocoon that turned to solid ice in the next instant.
The ice went up in a cloud of hissing mist and streamed away like a thermal spring, the upsurge of steam sharpening to form reaching arms of fog that dispersed into nothing before they could touch the witch. Morrigan gestured, and around Pyrrha curled a trembling spell, creeping and sinister; Pyrrha raised a shimmering dome and lightning assailed her, tearing down from above one after another to strike with a deafening clamor like massive hammer blows, arcing blinding lines down her barrier until she dispelled the curse.
Far out, the skeletal whale completed its wide turn, swinging back around to descend again. Pyrrha glanced at it as she redirected a tide of sickly wind blasting around her with a plague-laden malodor still vividly remembered. The whale soared for her while she nullified a curse and cast her arm out, a wave of light sweeping through limitless stone creatures risen from the rock, reducing them to dust.
Pyrrha carved a wound in the air that consumed a craning mass of shadows before whipping her wand around, an invisible spell pushing air and rain from its path as it flew with a corona of indistinct golden light. The spell struck the whale's pale skull mere yards away, stopping it dead in its course; an eerie gonglike sound rang out, and the whale's bones hung fixed in the air while they fell more and more translucent, waning into a ghostly imprint like the waking vestige of a nightmare before fading away into nothing.
Daisy tore her eyes from the spectacle when she heard Pyrrha cry out, screaming in turn as she watched her friend carried away in a flittering wave of black feathers. The crows bore Pyrrha up and over the churning ocean, jubilant cawing echoing off the water, and the driving rain enveloped them in a shivering shroud. Daisy ran to the edge of the platform, heart pounding out of her chest while she strained to trace them.
Lightning slashed the sky and clapped with an ear-shattering report, and there was another light, a distant flare of purple, and Daisy caught sight of them again; a wiry shape plunging from above, dived after by a murderous flock of yellow-eyed forms. Daisy's heart caught in her throat as Pyrrha vanished in the air, and the world melted away.
There was no time to let it sink in; the next memory formed almost immediately, as if the pensieve could sense Daisy's desire not to draw things out. More likely, she realized, it was due to effortless remembrance, for she stood in the familiar field outside the Clay household. The sky was a clear midnight blue, speckled with winking stars that shined brighter by the moment as the vigil of the sun came to its nightly conclusion, ducking behind the trees. The halfhearted glow from the house's curtained windows trickled into the yard, where Pyrrha lay sprawled in the grass.
She pushed herself upright after a moment, still breathing heavily. Her wand quivered in her grip as she traced it over the deep cuts carved across her arms. Daisy squinted as she noticed Pyrrha's face was blurred, too indistinct to be natural even in the half light. Pyrrha directed her wand at her face, and its tip likewise fogged over like hot breath on a mirror. Daisy drew closer and knelt next to her, peering into the blur, but she couldn't discern a single detail. Abruptly, the odd effect ended, leaving Pyrrha with a fully formed, distraught face.
Daisy waited while Pyrrha sat in the grass, staring at nothing while her mind worked. After a minute she nodded to herself and stood, mending tears and scouring the bloodstains from her forest green robes, setting them dry with a final wave and heading across the yard to the front door.
Harrowing dismay bled through Daisy's heart, seeped down her spine. That she still hadn't seen Pyrrha cursed made it clear what would happen; Morrigan would find them here, and by the looks of it, Pyrrha wouldn't see it coming. Daisy followed behind as Pyrrha approached the front door, squashing down the niggling nightmare scenario she had kept suppressed.
Both of them startled a moment when Pyrrha opened the door to admit a wall of noise through the crack. They stepped into the sitting room, immersed in the powerful guitars and pounding drums blaring through the wireless set on the coffee table, the furniture pushed to the side of the room. Ashlin stood in the middle of the floor as if it were a stage, singing along into her wand the anthemic lyrics of Daphne's Firewhiskey Fever.
Pyrrha swung the door shut, and Ashlin spun around at the sound, breaking into a wide smile. "Hey!" she shouted, flicking her wand at the wireless. The volume sank into the background. "You're finally here—I bought ingredients for this weird recipe in Mum's old cookbook, I wanted your help for—" she cut off as she noticed Pyrrha's grave expression, her own following suit. "Something's happened?"
Pyrrha stepped forward and drew her sister into a tight embrace, surprising Ashlin and Daisy alike. She said nothing, only took a breath, as if gathering herself.
"What's wrong?" Ashlin said from her shoulder, face filled with worry.
"I'm so sorry, Ashlin," Pyrrha said quietly. "We have to leave."
"Leave? Leave what?"
"The continent."
Ashlin pulled away, wide and disbelieving eyes landing on Pyrrha. Upbeat rock music played softly over the silence. "This . . . has to do with Morgan?" she said.
Daisy followed when Pyrrha stepped around Ashlin to stand before the burning fireplace, staring at nothing past the pictures on the mantel. Guilt and shame clouded her expression. "I released her not long ago in attempt to destroy her, and . . ."
Fear trickled into Ashlin's countenance, color draining from her cheeks. "Y-you went after her tonight? Are you alright? And you—you couldn't—she's out there somewhere? Free?"
"I'm fine. And yes," Pyrrha said with a sigh. "I expect she'll be sowing havoc across the countryside in a matter of hours, if that. She'll be looking for us. I'm taking you to the United States while I sort this out; you'll have to attend Ilvermorny in the interim."
"Hang on!" Ashlin said. "You can't just drop me into another country and bugger off—"
"I'll be there with you, of course, until your term starts. After that, I'll have to return to Europe, and . . . rectify my mistake."
"Oh, so you'll be there for a whole two weeks?" Ashlin said. "Isn't that grand! And what the hell are you going to do, anyway? You just said you couldn't beat her—let someone else handle it!"
"I underestimated her . . . or overestimated myself. But it won't happen again." Pyrrha turned back to fix Ashlin with a determined, reassuring look. "I can still fix this. I have to."
"No you bloody well don't!" Ashlin said loudly, stepping right up to Pyrrha. "Stop putting it on yourself—she's not your responsibility! I am!"
Pyrrha made to brush a soothing hand across her sister's head, but Ashlin swatted her away irritably. Pyrrha gave a penitent, solemn look. "You are, and that means she is, too. Morrigan is after our lives, by virtue of our ancestry; I'll never stop until I banish her ghost from our family's future." Pyrrha ran a hand across her face, massaging the bridge of her nose. "In any case, I've unleashed her on the world, now. I could never stand by and let her raze it."
Ashlin blew out a distressed breath, brushing a hand through her hair. "You're not the only sodding prodigy on earth, you know! Isn't there someone who can help? Even the Ministry—"
Pyrrha shook her head. "The Ministry would only waste precious time and lives; they're not equipped to deal with this—even I hardly am," Pyrrha admitted. "And . . . I've sought out help. I couldn't . . ." Pyrrha said slowly, ". . . couldn't quite find it."
A huff of exasperation escaped Daisy. Did Pyrrha always have to be so bloody vague and mysterious about herself, even now, with their lives at stake?
Ashlin's eyes shone with worry and she made to speak again, but Pyrrha interrupted. "We can discuss this more later," she said, casting a glance toward the curtained window. With a wave of her hand the drapes parted to reveal the spacious lawn, a bed of shadow at the bottom of a boundless astral sea. "Go and gather the essentials you want to bring with us; we need to leave soon. Within the next twenty minutes, to be safe."
Ashlin nodded anxiously and turned to leave the room, shoulders tense with stress. She paused in the hallway entrance and turned back abruptly. "What about Daisy? My friends?"
"I'm warning them now," Pyrrha said, already holding a handful of Floo powder. "After I've relocated you, I'll be back to put Daisy's place under a Fidelius Charm. I'll offer the same to your friends' families."
Ashlin nodded, satisfied, then looked confused. "Couldn't we do the same—the Fidelius?"
"No. I've told you, Morrigan is after our family above all the rest, and she won't stop until she's found us. I'm not taking any chances; no protection is impenetrable. But the Fidelius should be more than sufficient for the others to remain unnoticed."
Ashlin made a face, shifting uneasily. "Should be?"
"They'll be fine," Pyrrha said. "Trust me. I wouldn't simply leave them vulnerable."
Ashlin's shoulders relaxed a little. "Yeah, alright." She disappeared down the hall, and Daisy could hear her respond irritably to some indistinct sentiment from the portrait hanging there.
Daisy stood between Pyrrha and the front window, glancing nervously between them as Pyrrha immersed her head in emerald flames. After a minute, she withdrew from the fire with a troubled frown; she seemed to have forgotten Daisy was at Hogwarts, or perhaps she hadn't read the letter, Daisy thought with a pang of sadness.
Pyrrha sat back on her heels, drawing her wand and turning it over in her hand with unusual apprehension. She raised it deliberately, tracing the beginning of a Patronus Charm, Daisy guessed, before faltering at the last moment.
Daisy wondered at Pyrrha's reluctance, the almost nervous expression she bore. She hadn't received a Patronus from her friend in years, not even now, when there was all the reason to. Yet another question to grate against Daisy's mind like sandpaper, steadily wearing away her patience.
Pyrrha stowed her wand and declared her next destination, poking her head back into the fire to speak to Titania Gresser's family. Daisy could hear nothing of Pyrrha's end, with her head lost to the flames entirely.
Daisy took to peering out the window, watching the stellar sky with stifling dread settling in her chest, a solid weight that pressed upon her lungs. She hardly noted Pyrrha calling out the Espinosas' address next. Her heart fluttered unpleasantly while she scanned the yard, trying in vain to pierce the distant treeline, to pick out the first hint of sickly yellow light. The yard remained tranquil as ever, almost deceptively so, as if the trees held themselves still in service of keeping the secret of Morrigan's arrival.
At length Pyrrha rose from the floor, glancing at the wireless that softly emitted the opening chords of Pretty When You Fly. It muted at an absent flick of her finger, and she turned back to look again at the mantelpiece, eyes gliding over the moving photos. She beckoned, and the pictures slipped from their frames and followed her hand, floating into the pouch in her robes.
Feeling like a fist clenched her heart, Daisy wrung her hands, breaking her gaze from Pyrrha to check the window yet again. There wasn't even a hint of light between the trees. Yard and forest alike were still as death, and the faintest ghost of illumination from the stars outlined the pines in fuzzy shades of black. Daisy cast half a glance up at the sky as she turned away, then spun back round in a double-take. The night sky was clear no longer; Daisy could just make out scattered drifts of wispy little clouds she was certain weren't there before.
"Pyrrha!" Ashlin yelled from down the hall. "Is America much warmer than here? Colder?"
Daisy turned around in time to catch a rare sight: Pyrrha rolling her eyes. In less grave circumstances, the casual gesture so unsuited to Pyrrha's serious nature might have elicited a giggle from Daisy. As it was, her fearful thoughts lingered on the nascent clouds while she watched Pyrrha perch on the edge of an armchair and draw her wand, placing its tip against her throat.
When she spoke, her soft, low voice resonated throughout the house as if she were everywhere at once. "I told you not to bother with what's not essential. Don't waste time, Ash. We really must be getting on."
"How are clothes not essential?" Ashlin called out incredulously. "Are we going into deep cover among a cult of nudists, or something?"
Pyrrha gave an amused hum, and the sound echoed dreamlike off the walls. "I'll come back later to retrieve more of our things. Failing that, we can buy new clothes. Collect everything irreplaceable and forget the rest, for now. You've got five minutes; what you don't have packed and ready at that point gets left behind."
Ashlin scoffed loudly enough to be heard across the house. "I'll bet anything you haven't been keeping time, there's no way it's been fifteen minutes already."
"Four minutes left, now."
"Alright, alright, I get it! Urgency!"
The house fell quiet once again, gentle crackle of flames in the hearth tapping at the cozy silence. Pyrrha stared into the fire with a pensive expression, eyes catching the warm light like smouldering coals. She hadn't yet glanced outside after the first glimpse; she didn't believe they were in immediate danger. Daisy couldn't have conceived of it either. She didn't know exactly how far that island was from the house, but the Clay household wasn't near Ireland's northernmost coast; for Morrigan to find them here so quickly was unthinkable, even for Pyrrha.
Daisy turned back to the window, and her heart skipped a beat. The sky was a patchwork of broken cloud cover, disparate masses billowing up tall as well as wide, barely visible grey blobs against the negative contrast of outer space. They seemed to seep outward and seek each other as she watched, spreading like a pallid pestilence across deep black skin. Dim sparks of light flickered throughout the insides of the encroaching thunderheads.
Daisy's panic returned in full force, driving the air from her lungs and squeezing sweat from her pores. Her heart beat an erratic tattoo against her ribs while she looked helplessly between Pyrrha and the window behind her. She wanted desperately to scream a warning, and she wanted even more to leave the pensieve, to redouble her stringent denial of what she knew was about to unfold before her eyes. All she could do was nothing.
It was the light patter of rain that finally did it. Pyrrha sat there enraptured by the fire a few moments longer, deep in thought, frowning as if she knew in the back of her mind something was off, but she couldn't place it. Her eyes popped and she sat up ramrod straight, and a brief flash of white flickered through the room. Pyrrha leapt up with her wand in hand as the following rumble of thunder groaned in the distance.
"Ashlin!" Pyrrha shouted, voice so strained with fear she sounded like a different person entirely. Daisy hurried along behind when Pyrrha flew across the room to the hallway, gesturing with her wand as she went. "Ash, we need to go now!"
They met Ashlin carrying a broom and a trunk through her bedroom door, blue eyes wide with terror. "She's—?"
Pyrrha snatched Ashlin's wrist without another word and they stumbled as reality quivered a moment, a sharp crack splitting the air in the next instant; Pyrrha and Ashlin lay sprawled on the floor among scattered possessions, the trunk warped as if something had exploded inside it. Pyrrha shot to her feet, and Ashlin sat up, clutching at the bloody stump of her elbow.
"P-Pyrrha—my arm—"
Pyrrha gestured her wand at the splinched limb resting on the carpet; it flew into place and reattached with a bang and a puff of purple smoke. "Come—the fire!"
Pyrrha yanked Ashlin to her feet and they sprinted out the door, down the hall to the sitting room. The jar of Floo powder zipped from the mantel and shattered itself in the hearth at Pyrrha's motion, and they skidded to a stop before the fireplace. It was out.
Pyrrha cursed and began casting at it, wand a furious blur of movement. Ashlin flinched beside her as thunder boomed outside, and the rain began to come down with all the force of an unnatural tempest, the endless roar of the elements drowning out all else. Ashlin shifted nervously from foot to foot while Pyrrha worked, twisting her hands around her broom before propping it against the couch.
Daisy went back to the front windows, and far away she could see a flying plague of shining yellow lights. The crows were fast closing in, distant hoarse shrieks gradually amplifying with proximity. A lull in the cascading thunder allowed their cries to ring out clearly over the driving rain.
Pyrrha melted into Daisy's side when she rushed to the window to peer out; Daisy stepped back, watching Pyrrha's face drain of blood, feeling as if her own insides had sunk away as well. While they looked on, the flock grew in size and number, tiny black shapes darting up from the forest to join the murderous droves soaring closer and closer.
"I don't suppose you have a plan C?" Ashlin said, peeking around Pyrrha.
Pyrrha whirled around, wand held in a white-fingered grip. "Ash, take your broom and leave through the back door. Fly until you can apparate, get to Hogwarts through Hogsmeade—"
"No!" Ashlin seized Pyrrha's wrist as if she might run away. "Don't do that, don't act like you're not coming with me—are you mad?"
"She's too fast," Pyrrha said, grabbing Ashlin's hand with an imploring squeeze. "I'm going to slow her down, and there's no time to argue," she said over Ashlin's noise of protest. "I'll be along later, I promise—now go! Fly!"
"Like hell!" Ashlin said fiercely, letting go to draw her own wand. "I'm not leaving you to—"
She fell abruptly silent when Pyrrha aimed at her. Ashlin's face went from momentary confusion to placid acceptance, and she replaced her wand in her pocket with eerie calm.
"I'm sorry, Ash," Pyrrha said quietly.
At Pyrrha's urging, Ashlin spun on her heel and darted away to the back door through the kitchen, snatching up her broom on the way. Pyrrha and Daisy followed behind, the door slammed shut, and they watched through the back windows as Ashlin's auburn hair whipped in the air over the forest, fading behind the rain into a dark red point in the distant gloom in a matter of moments. Pyrrha breathed a sigh of relief before turning back.
Daisy could feel her heart shrinking away with Ashlin, tears flowing freely down her face. Ashlin had never reached Hogwarts. Daisy clung to one last shred of hope as she trailed behind Pyrrha out the front door, hope that Ash had hidden someplace else, but she knew the girl too well not to know what would happen next. Stepping out into the storm again to confront what awaited them was like entering the highest plane of misery.
The rainfall shied away from Pyrrha, twisting in the air at the last moment to splash the sodden grass. She stood at the center of the lawn like a grim statue, a sentinel awaiting the tide of black feathers and beaks surging toward her. Daisy drew back, far to the side of the yard, where she might best see the coming battle and identify the curses Pyrrha was struck with. Daisy's heart thumped so hard she thought it may stop.
As the crows closed in, the cacophony of noise was nearly unbearable; pounding rain drummed over throaty shrieks relentless in their ferocity, all punctuated by periodic deafening blasts of thunder. It was near impossible to see, with the dense blanket of murky clouds overlaying the sky and obscuring the stars. Infrequent flashes of lightning illuminated the yard, and Pyrrha's pale face stood out from the gloom with dark eyes burning in contrast to her cold countenance; when the flashes fled, she became a still silhouette in the weak light of the house's windows.
A swarm of glowing eyes filled the black sky, and they dove as one over the trees, screaming their thirst for blood. When the murder swooped down upon the lawn a brilliant purple light burst from where Pyrrha stood; it enveloped the birds, imposing dark winged shapes on the sky framed in violet, and the spell caught them dead in the air. They struggled and flapped while they were drawn inexorably together, arcane light contracting with them when the crows were forced into the spell's locus.
Caws of eagerness turned to dismay as the creatures were melded, coalescing into each other in a grotesque amalgam of rotting flesh. The curse's light collapsed in upon itself and dragged the screaming flock along to melt into their brethren, forming a helpless conglomeration of snapping beaks, scrabbling talons and beating wings. Only a few agonized croaks could be heard from the mass as the violet curse shined ever more brightly before burning out, leaving the crows to fall to earth in a unified, twitching heap.
A plume of fire erupted from Pyrrha's outstretched wand, sending the yard and forest into a wild dance of light and shadow. The fire enveloped the crows in a swirling vortex of heat, roaring while it consumed the air until Pyrrha let her wand fall and the flames fell low; the foul birds were aflame, but they wouldn't burn, and they writhed and wriggled in the blaze until they began to blur. The crows shifted behind an opaque veil until Morrigan rose from the earth, wreathed in fire that licked at her exposed flesh to no effect before guttering out.
There was no preamble; Pyrrha and Morrigan raised their instruments in the same moment, and curses saturated the air with dazzling sparks and flashes, foreboding sounds of magic created to destroy. Pyrrha stood firm with unerring poise, turning curses aside with no more than a twitch of her wand and returning the thoughts in kind; her spells cut the air to be dashed against Morrigan's strength, dissipating into nothing or simply landing with no result.
The witch was slower but impossibly skilled, casting potent and varied spells with no care for defense, and Pyrrha was sorely pressed to keep up with the onslaught of magic. Daisy marveled at the depths of her skill; for every attack there seemed to be a singular counteraction, and Pyrrha employed them all as if they'd been waiting on the tip of her wand from the start.
Morrigan seemed to tire of their contested stalemate first; she struck the ground with the butt of her twisted staff, and Pyrrha stumbled for the first time when the earth shook with tremors worthy of a giant stampede. Pyrrha stabbed her wand down, sending ripples through the ground and stilling the quakes, and Morrigan lifted her staff; the yard tossed like a wave, mud burying Pyrrha beneath in a rain of muck that flew apart just as quickly, turning to searing spouts of magma surging through the air to cool into stone under the witch's staff; myriad fragments of rock shot back at Pyrrha to bury themselves in the house's front door ripped from its hinges.
The door folded in half to become a gnashing mouth, stone teeth clacking together as it shot for the witch and burst into splinters at her gesture. Morrigan waved away a curse and pulled at the heavens with her staff; a cloud peeled away and sank through the rain, crackling with energy. Pyrrha assailed it with a violent blast of wind shaking the sky, and her spell died out when she was yanked into the air with a yelp. Morrigan swung her staff around; Pyrrha hurtled into the midst of the storm cloud, which flared to life in a resounding series of electrical discharges like a cascade of explosions contained within the fog.
With a rush of air, the cloud burst apart in a brilliant flickering web of dissipating static; Pyrrha plunged down to earth amid the rainfall, landing steadily on thin air just above a widening chasm. She strode on nothing away from the pit, swiping down twisting serpents shaped from rain, reducing them to mist that came together over her to form an immense milky eye staring down with a beaming white pupil; pale light emblazed Morrigan, and her form flickered as if engulfed in invisible fire. The witch flinched away and howled through her rotted throat, and Pyrrha fell from the air as her spells died, the field swallowed by darkness again.
From where Pyrrha landed a brilliant star flared to life, casting the yard in rapidly shifting spectrums of the world's most beautiful colors; the star soared high, and Daisy found herself unable to look away, incapable of even a single blink while she followed the wondrous spell's progress over the yard. A nebulous sense of peace smothered her worries until the star exploded in a shower of sparks, and anguish came rushing back like ill water from a burst dam; she nearly gave herself whiplash turning back to the fight, where Pyrrha fended off humanoid forms leaping from the mud all around her.
The mud creations came to life as quickly as Pyrrha could snuff them out, endless waves pushing up from the mire that the storm had made of the yard, galloping on misshapen legs with dripping arms outstretched. An oily black cloud billowed from Morrigan's staff; Pyrrha released the spell that had taken apart the latest creatures like a flurry of invisible claws, gesturing as the cloud seeped toward her; her wand seemed to absorb the spell, sucking it out of the air through the tip. Her next curse bore the same oily look, enveloping a flittering swarm of fist-sized insects and turning them to inky sludge splashing down.
Morrigan brandished her staff, and Daisy jumped as the forest came to life behind her; from every side the trees lurched forward and scuttled into the yard propelled by creeping roots, branches twisted into hands gnarled and grasping, trunks splitting in faceless mouths hanging open with grisly anticipation. Pyrrha wrapped Morrigan in stone and cast a stream of twinkling lights into the nearest animated trees; one became a sapling, another burst into azure light and vanished, a third was turned inside out, and Pyrrha's focus was broken by clutching hands of mud sprouting from beneath to seize her legs.
She was dragged to her knees before she vanished the creature with a tap; she staggered back up, and the trees crept ever closer as more mud dolls tore from the earth. Those nearest Pyrrha burned to ash in a wave of light, then she fell back to the defensive, turning aside rain honed like daggers falling from all sides. Steadily, Pyrrha kept Morrigan's attacks at bay, and steadily she lost ground, every new wave of assailants a little closer, every successive curse deflected a little later. Daisy cried in silence at the look on Pyrrha's face, a grim mask of defeated acceptance, the solemn expression of one resigned to a final stand.
Morrigan's eyes gleamed as she leveled her staff, and a curse from above shattered her head in a shower of putrid gore. While her rotted skull began to reform, a redheaded shape swooped in, turning a cluster of mud animations to glass with a far-reaching spell. Daisy's heart plummeted into a bottomless hole when her dread was realized.
"Hey—up here, you rancid hag!" Ashlin called out over the storm, slinging another curse that was promptly batted aside.
Pyrrha's eyes were wide with panic, barely sparing time to hold back the legions of animations as she flung curses faster than Daisy thought possible, desperate to recapture Morrigan's attention. Ashlin swerved deftly overhead, weaving around flowing tentacles of rainwater lashing at her from above. She soared over Pyrrha and fired a jet of blue light at Morrigan's raised staff.
"I'll distract her! Take those monsters out!" Ashlin shouted, ducking a whipping tentacle.
"Ash—just fly—!" Pyrrha cut off when Ashlin darted back past the witch, hurling curses and insults as she dodged around in the air as if she were born on a broom.
Pyrrha performed a complicated gesture ending in a downward flourish; thick frost spread from where she stood, sweeping over the ground like a blight to sink deep into the earth; creeping trees were held fast by frozen roots, and mud creatures stilled mid-birth. Glittering icicles formed all around, growing by the second while the rain built upon them to create a pointed bed of ice across the yard.
"Yes!" Ashlin whooped, twisting around a rain tendril. "How's that—whoa!"
A shrieking flock of crows poured from the trees and shot for Ashlin like a hailstorm of bullets. She went into a sharp dive, edging around a coiling red curse Pyrrha managed to divert; Ashlin swept past Pyrrha, the birds hot on her trail, and Pyrrha yanked the many icicles from the ground to spear the crows precisely; they tumbled to earth in a pile of black feathers.
Ashlin rocketed back into the sky, swerving around an expanding scar in the air that Pyrrha wove shut, circling Morrigan to rain down curses. Pyrrha immersed the witch in violet fire without effect, breaking off to nullify a creeping white light aimed for Ashlin; Morrigan's eyes flared as she stared up at Ashlin, who made a choking noise when she stopped dead in the open, gaze fixed downward. A rain tendril slammed into her side, sending her sailing off the broom to crash into the mud between Pyrrha and Morrigan, gasping for the air knocked out of her.
They cast in the same instant; from Morrigan's staff flowed a tide of clear black water swirling with eyeless faces, each set in a terrorized rictus; Pyrrha summoned Ashlin, who slid over the frozen ground to halt abruptly when a half-frozen mud doll dived for her, clinging to her legs like a drowning man. Pyrrha vanished the creature and summoned again; the dark current lapped at Ashlin's ankle as she skidded across the frosted mud to Pyrrha's feet.
Pyrrha fell to her knees and cast over her sister with frantic speed, the battle forgotten. Ashlin's breaths were shallow and rapid. She clutched Pyrrha's free hand, her body already changing: her skin shriveled and paled into translucence; her hair turned snow white before falling out in clumps; her wide blue eyes clouded over to a milky grey.
Tears streaked down Pyrrha's face while she diverted the black water. Ashlin whispered something between cracked lips before she died, skeletal hand still holding her sister's as she turned bruise-black and mummified.
She crumbled to dust in Pyrrha's lap. The rain washed her away.
Daisy's heart broke, and Pyrrha's scream tore out to rend the remains. It meant that nothing would be all right ever again.
Amidst a blinding flare Pyrrha rose at the head of a radiant surge of cursed fire, an enormous dragon of flames blossoming from her wand to sweep over the swell of dark water and smother it with burning breath, spewing thunderbirds and cockatrices from its gaping maw to blaze over the ground in a living wave. The dragon's clangorous roar was the roar of a raging inferno as it broke itself upon Morrigan headfirst, a tremendous rush of air and fire wraiths erupting in all directions.
In seconds arcane wildfire overtook the yard; chimeras, nundus and manticores scorched black scars across the lawn with loping strides and lunged into the surrounding forest to consume the pines, appetite for destruction insatiable. The clamor of the thundering sky was outmatched by the howling of cursed fire, rain evaporating high in the air with a constant hiss. Morrigan was lost to the flames that coruscated like the surface of the sun.
The curse ranged further, searing sphinxes and basilisks coursing back toward where Pyrrha stood watching the devastation with a blank stare, wand hanging at her side. A dragon reared from the burning sea, wings like hellish sails flaring, and it poised itself for flight with darkly kindled eyes fixed on Pyrrha. She met the creature's flickering gaze and didn't stir when it launched from the ground with a guttural roar. Daisy's blood froze at the empty look on Pyrrha's face as death raced to meet her, trailing brilliant tongues of light.
Behind the dragon, Morrigan emerged from the chaos to soar into the air, her deathly gaze shining against the murk of night; Pyrrha's expression twisted into murderous loathing, and she turned the dragon aside at the last moment with a wide swipe of her wand, dashing it against the ground to erupt into a flock of searing harpies. Pyrrha turned and flicked her wrist as she raced away; she leapt, and Ashlin's broom darted under to catch her.
While she struggled around a burning wyvern, Morrigan aimed a shivering yellow curse at her; it lashed through the air to strike her head as she angled the broom away; she cried out, flying past the house and over the forest. Morrigan burst into a murder of crows and followed.