A day Cordelia Chase had been waiting for, for nearly a year had finally come. Over the last several weeks, several things had happened, she and Xander graduated from their respective high schools, Piper had nearly turned into a Fury because of her unwillingness to deal with her anger at Prue's death, Cordelia moved into the Manor and Xander into an apartment and he started working full time and Paige Matthews, the half whitelighter, half witch sister who helped reconstitute the Charmed Ones had begun to be welcomed into the family.

But today was a very special day for Cordelia Chase. Today her powers would be unbound. Piper and Phoebe had spent days carefully setting up for the ceremony, which was to be done in the woods at midnight. It would also be the first time Paige participated in a Wiccan ritual. The three of them started by casting a protection spell over the area. No demons or vampires were going to be allowed to interrupt this ceremony. The Sunnydale gang had traveled to San Francisco to witness the ceremony. They all gathered in a circle around the Charmed Ones, who were surrounding Cordelia.

Auger de gomay

Auger de gomay

Ancient one of the Earth so deep

Master of moon and sun

We shield you in our Wiccan way

Here in our circle round

Asking you protect this space

And offer your sun force down

They all felt the power of a barrier form around their group. And then the Charmed Ones held hands and spoke the invocation.

Hear now the words of the witches

The secrets we hid in the night

The oldest of gods are invoked here

The great work of Magic is sought

In this night and in this hour

We call upon the Ancient Power

Bring your powers to this sister

And Cordelia responded with:

I want the Power

Bring me the Power

A bright light shone down her, illuminating her as her power was unbound. It was beautiful.

Later, back the Manor, everyone was gathered and enjoying snacks Piper had made, too excited to sleep.

"So what exactly is your power?" Buffy asked.

"Freezing, the same as my mother and Patty and Piper, except it'll manifest differently then Piper's. Piper focuses her powers thru her hands. Originally, she could just freeze things, then she gained the power to blow things up. Prue could focus her power thru both her eyes and her hands. Originally, she could just moves things telekinetically, then she gained the power of astral projection. Phoebe gets premonitions and can levitate. As for how my power will manifest, well in an earlier life, Prue had the freezing powers and she focused it thru her breath, by blowing it. Paige's power is telekinesis, but it's mixed with her whitelighter powers, so she moves objects by orbing them." Cordelia told her. "So, I'll probably be able to blow my powers, of course it could manifest in some other way, we won't know until it kicks in. It's active now, but until I need to use it, I won't know how it works."

"And, Xander, I heard your powers are fully manifested now too." Buffy said.

"Yes, I can heal, orb, hear people calling me, understand every language, both written and spoken and sense mystical things like the Hellmouth and the Nexus. The only things I don't have, that a full whitelighter has, is immortality and lack of aging. Which I personally consider a good thing. Leo hates the fact that he'll outlive us all, especially any children he and Piper have. Piper sees it as him being able to watch over the Halliwell's far into the future. She's trying to see the positive in it. I don't want to outlive Cordelia, I want to grow old with her."

"Same here." Cordelia smiled her brilliant full faced smile at him.

"Also, it's time for me to start having my own charges. The Elders will let me know who my first charge is soon. I'm a little nervous, but it helps to know, I can always go to Leo for advice if I run into something I can't handle."

"And Piper is going to be teaching both me and Paige." Cordelia added.

"So you're still the baby sister?" Willow asked.

"Yes, Piper is twenty eight, Phoebe is twenty five and Paige is twenty three. I'm eighteen and a half. My parents had been married for quite awhile before I was born."

The Sunnydale gang left the next day, Cordelia's family plane returning them to Sunnydale.

It wasn't long afterwards that they discovered how Cordelia's powers worked when a different breed of vampire targeted the Charmed Ones.

"Another kind of vampire?!" Xander wasn't exactly sure why his brain wasn't exploding with this information. "What makes these ones different?"

"Well they're still dead bodies walking around, but there's no demon in them. They're more like bees. They're mostly female, a Queen and drones, all female. And usually one male." Cole told them.

"I'm tempted to say something really stupid, like lucky guy, but I'll refrain." Xander said dryly.

"Riiiight." Cordelia drawled. "So what else makes them different?"

"Well, if you kill the Queen, all the minions in her nest die and we have to do that before Page feeds. We can reverse the vampirism as long as she hasn't fed."

"Too bad we can't do that with the demon breed." Xander said.

"Well that's because the demon is what's in control of the dead body. With this kind of vampire, the body itself is being changed. Feeding from a human finalizes the change, which is why it can be reversed prior to that." Cole told them.

"You know that's probably why we've never run into them in Sunnydale." Xander said. "Demons are attracted to the Hellmouth. This kind of vampire isn't a demon. Evil being yes, demon no."

"Which is why they're not part of the Underworld and are rare. They're pariahs. They have a niche somewhere in between demons and humans, there's a few other types that are similar to them. We vanquish all of them the same way. Kill the Queen or the King."

"And how do we identify the Queen?" Cordelia's asked.

"She'll be the one everyone else is protecting and the one the male will be sticking close to. He's like a body guard."

"Well then, let's go hunting." Xander said.

They found the lair where the vampires were holed up and Paige smirking at them. It really was easy to figure out which one was the Queen. As they tried to grab Paige to get her out there, one of the vampires attacked Cordelia. She instinctively raised her hands in self defense and shot a stream of ice at the vampire. With a grin, she turned her hand towards the Queen and shot her as well. Once she was frozen in a block of ice, Piper's hands flashed and the ice exploded, killing all of the vampires in the nest and reversing the effect on Paige.

"Oh, I'm going to enjoy this power!" Cordelia crowed.