Chapter Text
Letting go is easier than starting over. There’s nothing to relearn because everything fades out. It all disappears in some deep, sunken darkness. The world falls away, and so does all she knows. It’s easy to let go of it. But what’s impossible is the after. She never dreamed of resurrection, not for herself, because hell hadn’t allowed for it. She’d been stolen away at Cordelia’s request, and she feels like a stashed jewel, a precious ruby ripped from where she was meant to be, the place she’d gotten herself locked up in. That place didn’t have a key, but Cordelia found one anyway.
The world is colder, and she doesn’t know if that’s just part of their impending doom, or if she’s simply accustomed to the fires of the underworld. Five years will do that. It will create a certain pattern in the soul, carve out a divot. It will say, “this is your life, now and for the rest of time, so make do.” And she had. She had adapted, had molded herself to fit in with the suffering. She’d conformed because that was the only card she’d been dealt.
It’s not anymore. She’s free again, and she is trapped, stuck in this dank basement of a school.
The Hawthorne School for Exceptional Young Men, she thinks derisively. But the only exceptional thing she’s picked up on is the complete lack of magic in these hallways. Even now, as she reclines on the sofa in the study and flips through the pages of some half-assed spell book, she can’t feel it, not really. This place is a nightlight, while Robichaux’s is the sun.
It could have something to do with Michael, and maybe his evil is sucking the power away from all the others. But maybe there was never much power here to begin with. Maybe these men enjoy lying to themselves. Anything to climb the ladder of self-worth, even if that means constructing this illusion of higher learning, when really, it is all just a competition to them. It is a way for them to prove themselves, to show that they have Supreme potential, that it lives within these very walls.
(It doesn’t. Misty feels it, and it is depraved, a low, rusted rumble. A dying predator fighting for air.)
She should be grateful, she knows, to be among the living. To be real again. And she is grateful to be swept away from that sterile, stifling classroom. But Michael used her as leverage against Cordelia, and she doesn’t appreciate that, doesn’t condone being a part of his scheme. A cog in his well-oiled manipulation game. No one here seems to respect Cordelia, or any of the rest of them. Therefore, she owes him nothing.
Cordelia has been tucked away in some room, discussing next moves with Myrtle and Ariel, and she hopes they don’t come to an agreement. She hopes Cordelia refuses to bow to Michael. But she supposes she hasn’t a leg to stand on; the Seven Wonders got her killed, and Michael completed them with ease, and then some.
She senses it, slowly. The evil. The putrid smell of sadism. It grows stronger as a shadow of a figure passes across the floor, just outside the doors, and then she sees him. He is stepping into the dim room, lit only by the fireplace, and Misty’s bones scream, her skin itching at just the sight of him.
“How does it feel,” Michael asks her, “to be alive again?”
She grips the edges of the book she’s holding tighter, curls her fingers into the leather-bound cover.
“If you’re lookin’ for gratitude, you won’t find it here,” she informs him, and his lips twitch around a smug grin.
She hates everything about him. She wants Cordelia to kill him and be done with it. She wants him never to interfere with their coven again, for good or for bad. Yes, he has returned herself, Queenie, and Madison. But there is a cost, and he will name his price eventually.
“I’m just trying to make conversation,” he tells her, as if he’s innocent. As if she should feel guilty for rightfully suspecting his ill intentions. “I’ve never been to hell before. But yours, cutting up frogs…that doesn’t sound so bad. Why is that the thing that haunts you?”
And his tone, the arrogance, the way the words drip with the need to know her pain, all of it makes her sick to her stomach. If she could wave her hand and make him disappear, she would. If she could flick her wrist and send him flying into the nearest wall, she would. She could, probably. But she won’t. She didn’t come back from hell to fight with a corrupt child.
“Maybe some of us don’t enjoy takin’ a life. Maybe the question you should be askin’ yourself is why the idea of killing innocent creatures doesn’t fill you with the same fear.”
He nods in surrender, but that disgusting grin is still plastered onto his face.
“Maybe you’re right,” he says, condescending, and she watches as another figure comes into view behind him, feels a different energy, one that stands to rival his in strength and purity.
“Leave us, please,” Cordelia says, and he levels her with a piercing gaze that dares her to ask anything more of him after what he’s done today, but she doesn’t falter, and he steps out of the room. Cordelia shuts the doors once he’s gone, heaving a sigh as she leans against them.
The smile she offers Misty once she turns to face her doesn’t reach her eyes, and Misty’s heart falls. Cordelia is worn thin, her seams are splitting, and she can’t hide the pain of this new world they live in. The one where she has been the Supreme for all of five years when it’s supposed to be a lifelong gig, and she is already being challenged. She is already this close to being dethroned. To fading away into nothing. Just like Fiona.
But Misty can’t think about the future of the supremacy. Not when Cordelia is standing here wearing a fake smile, and she’d like to turn it into a something a little more genuine.
“You know, their magic isn’t even real magic,” she says, sliding her hand over the page that the book is opened up on, the words of the spell written up in all the fashion of a dessert recipe. “Just tricks. Like a bunch of mutts in a circus.”
And that does it, catches Cordelia off guard, and she laughs, a bubbly thing that Misty wishes would happen more often.
“Don’t let them hear you say that,” Cordelia warns, biting her lip to stifle a smirk. “The misogyny here is truly unmatched. I almost pity them.”
“They envy you,” Misty says with pride in her voice, grinning widely as Cordelia comes to join her on the sofa. “I can smell it on ‘em, clinging like smoke. Poor bastards. All but beggin’ to be put in their place.”
Cordelia hums, contemplative but pleased.
“We’ll play nice until such a time presents itself. But that time may be closer than we think.”
Misty shuts the book, dust flying up from disuse and tickling her nose. She tosses it onto the floor beside her foot where it lands with a thunk, thinks about leaving it there so they’ll have to pick it up later. Hopes they know she’s been skimming through the pages and mocking them.
She’s no expert when it comes to magic, but she’s no fraud, either. This school, whatever these boys claim to be, it’s all stacked on misguided confidence. A male ego stoked one too many times by no one but himself, and what must it be like, Misty wonders, to never have to make yourself smaller? To think that you are so extremely deserving of everything, so severely lacking in respect, that you can overthrow the goddamned Supreme at will?
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asks, folding her legs under her and turning to Cordelia.
Cordelia grows solemn, her face grave like she has seen the ghost of all ghosts. She has, and it’s Michael. Michael and all his toy soldiers, guard dogs, primed for battle and ready to attack at his command. Power that he doesn’t deserve. Power that doesn’t belong to him.
“We’re going to lose this war,” Cordelia tells her, and how she says it with such acceptance, such resolve, Misty doesn’t know. But she must have a plan. Cordelia always has a plan. If they’re going to lose, then there must be a reason for it. There must be an endgame. Misty trusts her, wholly. “It’s my fault. It’s my curse, to see. To bear witness and remain complicit. We’re going to lose everything, and it’s far too late to stop him.”
This is depressingly interesting, to hear Cordelia talk about this boy like he’s supposed to be her undoing. To hear her surrender. It’s disheartening, and Misty suddenly finds herself wondering why Cordelia even ordered her return if they are all going to perish once more regardless. Perhaps so they can die together this time. Perhaps so they can tie up the loose ends that dangle between them, demanding attention.
The middle of the end of the world is no place for such things, Misty thinks. She believes they will never get their timing right, and if Cordelia’s curse is seeing, then the curse of knowing is theirs to share.
How many burdens do they share now? Too many to count, probably. Probably too many.
Misty doesn’t know what she can say to make this grim gleam in Cordelia’s eyes go away, so she simply shrugs.
“Well, I already told you, I can’t fight,” she says, and the words are jagged as a dagger as they come out, almost bitter.
And maybe she still has some unresolved anger that is now morphing into resentment. She has a swimming pool of forbidden thoughts in her head, and she swats each one of them away like pesky flies.
“I just wanted you here with me,” Cordelia tells her, and it doesn’t make it any easier because Misty knows. She knows Cordelia wants her here, until the very end, and Misty wants to be here. But not quite like this. She thinks she’s allotted a certain air of immaturity about the situation, seeing as how she’s been plucked from a wretched hell that she was stuck in for five years, only to be submerged in this completely different form of hell. She’s allowed to be a little angry as she readjusts, as she accepts that she has been brought back just to die again. “I wish you could be here and be safe, but if you’re here, then all you are is in danger.”
“I’m used to it now,” Misty says. “We’re friendly, me and danger.”
Cordelia nods, and the light from the fire hits her eyes just right, and Misty sees tears forming in the corners.
“I know. That’s my fault, too, and I’m sorry. I wish you had gone with Stevie like I asked. I didn’t want you so close to this, after everything.”
Misty snorts at that, shakes her head.
“You’re crazy if you think I’m leaving you again,” she says. “Little bit of evil never scared me away.”
“But I wish it would,” Cordelia whispers, voice strained and hushed.
“Well, don’t. I’m here, and I’m here to help. I just can’t fight, that’s all.”
Cordelia shakes her head, reaches out to place a gentle hand on Misty’s arm.
“I won’t ask you to. The outcome remains the same, either way. At least you’re here with me.”
That’s right, Misty wants to say, is burning with it, I’m here to watch you die, and then I get to die. Again.
She subtly moves out of Cordelia’s grasp, doesn’t trust herself to not give into it, and stretches her legs out in front of her, muscles rolling with the motion.
“Do you think we might be able to get the hell out of here now?” she asks, deciding to bury her anger deep down, nice and tight, silencing it, because it won’t do any good out in the open. “Smell’s giving me a headache, all these damn wizards.”
Cordelia allows herself a chuckle at that, and Misty hates that she sounds so tearful, but the sadness sounds infinitely better than anger right now. She’d love to feel sad. She’d love to be able to cry and feel sorry for herself. But she’s just too frustrated.
What an inconvenience, to have fallen in love during the apocalypse. What a shitty inconvenience.
She rests her head against the glass by the window seat on the flight back, watches the thin, wispy clouds just outside. Leaving that school, stepping outside and feeling the grass give and rustle beneath her boots, had immediately lightened her mood. And being in the air, above ground at such heights, where she can see everything and nothing at the same time, is therapeutic, in a way. It is strangely calming to know that she is way up here, and everyone else in the world is way down there, going about their business while she is blissfully removed from the routines of life right now.
Cordelia is in the seat next to her, but she is asleep. Myrtle is beside her, wearing large, gaudy headphones, and her eyes are closed, too, but Misty doesn’t think she’s sleeping. Her hands rotate in the air, swaying as if she is conducting an orchestra. Yes, she is very much awake. At her own odd version of peace, maybe, but awake.
She is exhausted; being raised from the dead really drains the mind and body, and maybe she would be sleeping right now, too, but something that won’t allow her to rest is what Cordelia said to her back at Hawthorne’s. About missing her. Forever. A passing comment, thoughtless, probably, and just meant to emphasize Cordelia’s joy at having Misty returned to her. But it lingers, like all curious things do. It beats like a heart, the words, the memory of Cordelia uttering them. So strange, so…unwarranted. But not unwelcome.
Did Cordelia miss Queenie forever, Misty wonders. Did Cordelia miss Madison—or any other witch that they have lost—forever, she wonders. Did it bring Cordelia to tears every time, or is she special, Misty wonders.
Cordelia has never taken advantage of Misty’s presence. Cordelia has always appreciated her as she was and has always supported her, encouraged her. But something has changed. During her test, during the sprinkle of the last few sands in the hourglass, Misty could hear Cordelia. She couldn’t see her, but she guesses Cordelia couldn’t see her, either, so it had been even ground. Cordelia spoke to her. Cordelia wept for her. Cordelia held her in her arms, on her lap, and Misty didn’t need to see her to feel her embrace. Misty still thinks about it. She remembers the hand cradling her head, fingers clutching her hair, the other hand at her back, trembling on the carpeted rug of the great room at Robichaux’s. The soft, tearfully whispered Latin right at her ear.
But Misty had failed, and that had been that, and she wonders if it had broken Cordelia’s heart because she lost a member of her coven that day, or if it had broken her heart for an entirely different reason unrelated to witchcraft.
That memory feels like a lifetime ago, and Misty reaches over without even thinking, seeking a reminder. She carefully takes Cordelia’s hand, her fingertips sliding around the back of Cordelia’s hand, gently grazing her skin. Cordelia starts, eyes blinking open as she glances around until she realizes where she is.
“Sorry,” Misty says sheepishly. “I just…needed to feel you.”
Cordelia’s sleepy eyes soften as she smiles, gives Misty’s hand one, light squeeze. Then she fumbles under the armrest, finds a button and pushes it, lifting it up so she can move closer. Cordelia nestles her head onto Misty’s shoulder and goes back to sleep, and Misty knows this is a kind of warmth that she isn’t just imagining. This is no fabrication, and it’s no wishful thinking. It’s real, whatever it is. She’s real again, and so is this.
“We’re fucked,” Madison says as she paces back and forth, arms crossed. “We’re so fucking fucked.”
“Madison,” Cordelia says softly, an attempt at reeling her in.
“He’s the spawnofSatan!” Madison exclaims, raising her voice, and Misty’s never seen her so distressed before. Under any other circumstance, it might be amusing, but this is how Misty knows it’s bad. Even Madison is afraid.
“But did anyone that you spoke with actually use the term antichrist?” Zoe asks, and Madison groans in irritation. Queenie rolls her eyes. “What? We don’t know what he is, all we know for sure is that he’s evil.”
“What we know,” Madison snaps, “is that he sprung from the pits of hell that are festering under that demonic, ghost house, and that a bunch of Satanists showed up and sacrificed a fucking soul for him, and then he ate a human heart.”
“Okay…” Zoe says, stepping down slightly. “But—”
“Girl, stop,” Queenie interrupts, “he’s the antichrist.”
“I’m not saying he isn’t, I’m just saying—”
“Well, you’re wrong!” Madison argues. “He is, and he’s gonna kill us all, and then he’s gonna blow up the whole fucking planet.”
“Damn,” Queenie mutters, “I don’t think it works like that.”
Madison scoffs.
“Yeah, well, I’m sure we’ll get to find out exactly how it works, because he’s about to become our next Supreme.”
“Shut up,” Queenie says, shaking her head. “Some snobby-ass, white boy isn’t strong enough to take down Cordelia.”
“He will be if he has the goddamned devilcheering him on,” Madison counters.
“Enough,” Cordelia says, her voice piercing sharply through the arguments, and the room falls silent as everyone looks at her. “That’s enough. First of all, he is not the next Supreme, and he never will be. His status as the son of Satan disqualifies him. He will never be in charge of this coven. Second of all, no one is to breathe a word of any of this to the other girls. This stays right here, between the Council. They are here to learn, and you will not scare them with stories of the antichrist and the end of times.”
“But he is—”
“I know he is,” Cordelia says, cutting Madison off coldly. “And that information stays here, with us, just like I said.”
Madison lets out a loud, furious, “ugh,” and turns on her heel, stomping away and slamming the door to Cordelia’s office behind her.
“So…what do we do?” Zoe asks, and Misty can feel the nervous, timid energy radiating from her, radiating from Queenie and Cordelia, too.
It’s too much. It’s too intense. They’re going to die, every last one of them, and they all know it. Their fear is palpable, like Misty could reach out into the air and touch it. Her pulse jumps rapidly, unable to handle all the negative emotion around her, and Cordelia breathes in deeply, some of her tension rolling off and away with the exhale. It calms Misty only slightly.
“We try everything,” Cordelia says. “We fight, relentlessly, with everything we’ve got. We don’t allow him to maintain any other advantages over us.”
Zoe nods, and quiet passes over them again, a pensive, terrified stillness. Then, Queenie speaks up.
“Misty,” she says, and Misty is jarred from her internal processes, analyzing the mood of the room and doing her best to keep stable, to hold solid. “Are you good over there? You haven’t said anything.”
“I’m fine,” Misty lies, to all of them and to herself. They are all watching her now, and Cordelia’s gaze is especially difficult not to crack under, so she pushes herself off her chair and to her feet, clearing her throat so her voice does not reveal just how immensely she is struggling. “I’ll just be in the greenhouse.”
The walk from Cordelia’s office, through the hallways, and to the outside world is a blur in her memory, her head pounding with a million tiny thoughts, unable to focus, unable to pin down any sort of protection plan for herself. Because she’s not a fighter in this war, not a player in Michael’s game, and she can’t expect Cordelia to watch over her like a helpless child and try to save all of humanity at the same time.
She needs a plan. She has to protect herself. She has to help in any way she can. She has to pull her weight.
Stepping foot into the greenhouse feels like a revival, the clean, humid air, and the delicately thriving plant life. The power in this place is a tranquil kind. It doesn’t scream and suffer; instead, it is silent. It exists, and that’s all. Nothing here is in pain. Nothing here is afraid.
Misty sits on the cool, concrete floor and pulls her knees up to her chest, leans back against the wall and just breathes. She breathes.
“Hey,” a voice calls from the doorway, and, Zoe. It is Zoe. Sweet, caring, intuitive Zoe.
Misty opens her eyes and smiles weakly.
“Hey,” she answers, and Zoe comes to sit next to her on the floor, her legs folded under her, knees angled towards Misty.
Zoe pulls a chain from the pocket of her dress, her hand covering the pendant so Misty can’t see it yet.
“I got you this,” she tells Misty, and Misty’s eyebrows pull together in confusion. “It’s a welcome back gift. Happy homecoming.”
Misty holds out her palm, and Zoe drops the necklace into her hand, the chain curling into a heap that she has to pick up between her thumb and forefinger, untangling it and holding it by the clasp to fully view it. And when she does, it is beautiful. When she does, she feels tears burning her eyes.
“It’s a phoenix,” Misty whispers, a laugh bubbling in her throat, staring at the small, silver bird with its wings outstretched.
“Yeah, because rebirth is, like, kind of your whole thing,” Zoe tells her. “Rising from the ashes. And this time, not even the flames of hell could keep you down.” She nudges Misty’s arm with her elbow. “You’re fireproof.”
Misty puffs out a breath of laughter, a soft exhale through her nose, and pulls Zoe into a tight hug, clutching the necklace in her fist even after she pulls away.
“Thank you,” she tells Zoe, and Zoe grins and shrugs like it was no big thing. Like it wasn’t an incredibly thoughtful gesture meant to make Misty feel like she is back at home where she belongs.
Zoe has always been kind to her. Misty considers this once Zoe has left the greenhouse. Misty has friends here. Real, true friends who care about her. Friends who are in danger. Friends who need all the fire power they can get right now.
She shakes her head, because no. She can’t. It’s too soon. It’s too much. Misty will help serve this coven any way she can until she draws her last breath, but she can’t fight for them. She’s still reeling from the culture shock, her reemergence to the corporeal realm. She hopes protection is enough, because it’s all she has right now, and if she’s being completely truthful, she doesn’t even know if she can manage that much. Doesn’t even know if she can protect herself.