I wake up relaxed and at peace like yesterday. I'm leaning back, against Percy's chest, in his arms. Credence has his arms around my waist, hands resting on the small of my back touching Percy's sternum, head under my chin and his ear resting above my heart, his nose brushing between my breasts and his breath making me shiver.
I try to close my mouth, but a moan escapes me, the emotions I feel from the bond overwhelm me. Joy, trust, serenity, love.
Everything flows in my heart. I try to calm myself, today we all have to be focused or someone could die, and as much as I would like that Creed still loves his mother.
I try to get out from under Credence and put him on the mattress, but the arms around my waist tighten, even Percy tightens his grip.
I don't think they'll let me go unless I wake them. I don't even know what time it is.
I try to focus, I try to feel my magic inside me. I search and feel a warmth, my magic, my core my very essence. A different flow of heat surrounds me, so warm and comfortable, it seems made for me.
I immerse myself in it. I open my eyes, previously closed, it seems like nothing has happened, but a few seconds later I feel the heat of my magic and the other flow spark, my chest is flooded with the heat that comes from my body. I open my eyes and above me the numbers, 7:10, hovering in the air.
"Oh my god! I did it" I whisper ecstatically.
"You were great" says a hoarse voice behind me
"That was beautiful" an amazed voice peeks out from in front of me.
I look at Creed, he is awake with his eyes fixed on me, they shine with amazement.
I blush, I thank him and turn to Percy.
In his eyes, pride shines through his gaze.
I thought they were asleep, I tell them.
"I woke up because I felt my strange magic." He's confused.
My eyes widen.
"Oh my god. I thought that wasn't possible." Fear and worry creep into my tone.
He tilts his head, asking me to continue.
"It is said that some soulmates can use their partner's magic in an emergency. I… I didn't think that was possible." I look away in horror at what I have done.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to use your magic. I won't do it again."
I feel stupid, for taking, even borrowing, Percy's magic for something so trivial, I feel disappointed in myself.
"Don't worry, nothing bad happened." He comforts me, index finger and thumb on my chin and he lifts my head, aiming his eyes at mine.
I see only calm, pride and acceptance in his eyes.
"I took your magic to do something stupid." I play guilty.
"You didn't know that was possible. And it was your first spell. You didn't do it on purpose. Your magic needed help and it got it." He reassures me.
"Now that we know it can happen, we'd all be more careful, okay?" affection and trust make me release tension, I nod feebly.
We get up, have breakfast, shower and get dressed. An hour later we're ready.
Percy is in blue.
Percy is wearing a blue vest with silver threads, a white shirt and trousers that match the vest.
Gellert is wearing a sandy brown vest, his jacket is burgundy red. A white shirt, trousers and a tie of the same colour as the jacket.
I am wearing a black and white vest adorned with delicate flowers in a very light pink, made of dragon skin. White trousers.
Credence is wearing a green vest with finely decorated gold ornaments, a white shirt and black trousers.
Tina knocks on our door at 8:00. She is wearing a white shirt and black trousers, a dark blue coat and a hat.
Newt is behind her.
We leave the building and walk towards the church on Pike Street, to the soup kitchen.
We wait for the children to finish breakfast and for everyone to leave the building. We stay outside so as not to be seen.
After a few minutes we enter the building, there is no one here, everyone has left.
Gellert, Tina, Percy and Newt make the area untraceable and impossible for muggles to notice.
A gurgling that turns into cries of pleas to stop and deafening pops, coming from above, make us turn our heads towards the stairs.
We stare at each other and we all sprint for the stairs. I am the first up the stairs. Creed, Percy, Tina, Newt and Gellert follow immediately.
We go to Chastity's room, the scene we see from the open door stops us in our tracks.
Mary-Lou Barebone stands over her daughter, who is kneeling, a belt in her hand.
At their feet, a fake wand lies nearby.
I recover and leap into the room, grabbing the woman's hand as she was about to fire another shot. I stand in front of the child.
"Let go of me." He says trying to free his arm from my grip.
"Don't touch her" is Credence's voice, joining me, at my side.
"Why are you punishing her?" I ask the woman.
"She's an abomination! When I entered the room I found her with that stick, waving it and saying words in rhyme." He comes out, spat out of the woman's mouth.
"So?" I ask calmly.
"She's a witch! I will eradicate the evil from her, she will no longer be an unclean being" the aversion in his tone irritates me, I frown, but I remain calm.
"Even if she was a witch, whipping her will do no good, punishing her and hurting her will never destroy her magic."
"She's my daughter, I can punish her however I see fit."
Disgust and contempt are the only thing I hear in his voice.
Credence beside me begins to lose control, black smoke and red lines zigzagging like crazy. I release Mary-Lou's hand and turn my back to her, my shoulders to her.
I try to hide Creed's loss of control from his mother's view, but he's taller than me so she can see it anyway. She begins to scream in a frenzy, about witches, children of Satan, about punishing Credence.
I watch as the woman, turning her head slightly, charges and swings her belt into the air but I don't move and take the blow to my lower back and right side. I whirl around to face her and grab her weaponized hand again.
"Don't call him that again. He's special, he's a gift. And you'll never touch him again." In the pain of the blow, in the fury of the moment, the truth and rawness of my anger, escapes my mouth.
"You're not God. By what right do you punish, you're nobody."
"You are an abomination too, aren't you? You should all die, witches!" she spits madly.
"I may be an abomination, but as you can see I am still here. Death himself hasn't come to claim me, or any other deity, and you dare take his place, who are you? No one. Just a stupid woman who doesn't know her place."
The anger and revulsion for this woman, who thinks she is respectable and who thinks she has the right to punish others, disgusts me, so much.
I snatch the belt from his hand.
I focus my anger, the burning anger I feel. I close my eyes. When I open them the belt catches fire and I throw it to the ground, away from us.
"Credence. Give me your belt," I say softly, trying to use as much gentleness as I can, leaving out the anger, the fury and the hatred for his mother.
He hesitates, his eyes full of fear and uncertainty. I soften my gaze, and slowly he moves his hands down to his belt, undoes it with trembling hands and removes it from the stirrups of his pants.
I thank him.
I set fire to his belt too, holding it in my hands until it is reduced to a pile of ash and liquid silver.
A strangled groan of terror rises from the room in the corner. There, trying to shrink, is Modesty.
Credence goes to her and pulls her up, the same with Chastity, who remains kneeling on the floor with the back of her dress open on her battered back. Red, blood, so much blood.
'How long has it been?' I think.
The girls remain at the side of their brother Credence. Modesty looks at me with terror and fear.
I kneel down at Chastity's height.
I ask her to give me her hands, she hesitantly does so after a few minutes.
"Did he do this to you?" I ask, looking at both sisters.
They nod.
I concentrate and close my eyes. I think about the pain. The relief from it. The need for it to heal what is hurt.
I open my eyes and the wounds, the scars on my hands fade. I continue on the little girl's back. Finished with Chastity, I treat Modesty who is still on the defensive.
"Guys, I've thought about how to punish your mother but I won't do anything without asking you first." I speak softly, low voice, they've already heard too many screams, I don't want to scare them.
Credence ponders my words, but in the end he understands and gives a small nod. The girls look at their brother and then at each other, doubt in their eyes.
They ask why.
"He hurt you, not me, he abused you and your trust, he should have protected you and taught you. He instilled in you hatred and fear for something different, for something you don't know, making you believe that they were the words of God and that if you didn't obey you were bad and you would go to hell. But that's not the case. That's not the case."
Mary-Lou continues to rant about witches, plagues and children of the devil, she seems like the crazy person she is.
"God forgives because He is merciful, if you truly repent and do penance you will be forgiven. And God will not judge you for something you didn't choose to have. Like magic; like religion because God is in everything that surrounds us; never be afraid of the different, or of what you don't understand. Because you will only have to learn to understand what you don't know or know."
The girls follow my speech and remain silent trying to understand. A few minutes later they seem to look at each other in mutual agreement, their eyes brighter than before, before all this, a sort of understanding in them.
I check the others in the room. Credence has not left the side of the sisters who are in front of me. Percy stands back with the others, his eyes bright and happy he nods slightly in my direction looking at the girls and Creed.
Tina, Newt and Gellert next to him have expressions with different emotions appearing on their faces.
Tina is furious at everything that happened, despite having seen it done to Credence. Newt is averse to the scene he walked into.
He keeps moving his gaze from Creed and the girls to Mary-Lou. Tina told him why they demoted her from being an Auror.
Gellert ….. looks murderous, but devastation also plays in his eyes. I guess as I saw in the visions he thought Credence was a muggle or a wizard.
While I'm distracted I don't notice Mary-Lou's sudden movement; coming out of her corner and her ramblings, she decides to attack screaming, aiming at me again.
"They are my daughters, you will not corrupt them, witch!"
Her arms raised in fists land on my left cheek making me turn my head the other way. Surprised and stunned, I watch as she tries to give me another, but I don't give her time. Like lightning I lock her wrists.
I look at her trying to put all my anger, fear and frustration into my gaze, looking straight into her eyes.
I take her wrists in one hand and slap her as hard as I can. Her head turns the other way and she is so stunned, eyes wide. The redness of my handprint is already starting to appear on her cheek.
"It's you who corrupts them, not me. You're a squalid woman and I'm surprised no one noticed."
"Tie her up." I order.
I take her back to that corner and immediately return to Creed and the girls.
"Now. What do we do with her?" I ask them.
"Are you going to kill her?" Modesty asks.
"You have two options. Put her in the dungeons and serve in Gellert's castle, erasing her memory. Or kill her."
They think about it for a few minutes. They look into each other's eyes, talk and confide, without having to open their mouths. Credence is the first to speak.
"At the castle" is determined. He still loves his mother, but I think he is slowly realizing that her behavior towards her, now reinforced by the fact that her mother hurt her sisters, was wrong, cruel, evil.
A few seconds later the sisters' agreements follow.
"Good. Girls, we will take you to another, safer place. Gellert, take care of that woman, please."
Gellert nods and disappears. He reappears a few minutes later.
The girls take the few things they have and in half an hour we are ready. We take the girls to another orphanage. There are no goodbyes, just promises to visit, talk, and stay in touch.
We all go home.
As soon as we enter Percy's apartment, Tina demands our attention.
"Queenie invited you to lunch today. She knew it would be a rough morning."
We all exchange a look.
"Your sister is a blessing," I say happily, smiling.
We leave quickly because we hadn't gotten rid of our coats.
Before we enter the complex, Jacob joins us. The boys put on a spell of disillusionment.
We go up, Tina and I say goodbye to the concierge lady.
When I enter the house and get rid of my coat, I rush to Queenie, who is at the stove, and I hug her.
The scene that was presented to us today pops into my mind and she gasps.
I hold her to comfort her, and comfort myself.
'They are fine, they have been healed and are safe. Little by little we will warm them up with us and the magic, today we have turned their whole world upside down and everything they believed in. But we have time,' I think and she nods in understanding.
I walk away and let her finish.
Let's tell Jacob how it went.
Jacob is furious at hearing all this.
Queenie finally calls us to the table. We eat with some light conversation.
Queenie congratulates me for destroying the object chosen by the woman to inflict pain on her children. This leads everyone else to compliment me, rejoicing with me, for having controlled the fire without a wand and without pronouncing a spell, and for not losing control of both the fire and my corporeal form.
Everyone remembered the brief flicker of my almost losing control.
After eating we settle into the living room and clone the armchairs again.
This time Percy is sitting on the armchair and Creed and I are on the arms, Gellert has an armchair of his own, for his joy and comfort. Jacob and Queenie on the two-seater sofa.
"Tina I would like to speak to you for a moment. In private"
He nods and gets up we lock ourselves in the bedroom.