The Phoenix and the Witch

by H. M. Gooden

  Cat was hopeful Mrs. Binns would recover soon, but there was no easy way for them to find out, which bothered her. Cat was just wondering if they'd be able to visit her in the hospital, when Evelyn asked her question out loud.

  "Guys, do you think we'd be allowed into wherever Mrs. Binns is currently admitted? Zahara? Is that something that's possible over here?"

  Zahara looked at Evelyn and shrugged. "It's possible, but we won't know unless we try. We don't even know which hospital she went to, but the closest one is probably the Royal Edinburgh. We can try there first, if you'd like."

  Cat nodded and Mai and Vanessa agreed.

  "It's probably as good a direction as any for today. We can go and check out the hospital for any nasties," said Vanessa, already slipping on her jacket.

  Without further discussion, the girls got ready to brave the early spring mist, walking the short distance from the B&B to the hospital. It was a foggy day and the streets were almost deserted, with the few people that they did pass hurrying by without even glancing at them. Cat was continually checking auras, but wasn't surprised by any dark ones along the way.

  When they arrived at the hospital, they entered the grand old building which appeared similar to an old castle on one side, complete with turrets, before it morphed into a state of the art, high-tech modern building on another side. The interior was every bit as modern as the newer half had indicated. The girls only wandered for a short time, having entered through the sliding doors and quickly finding the information desk in front of the Urgent department.

  "Excuse me, we're looking for an Ellen Binns? They would have brought her here yesterday afternoon," said Zahara, as she stepped up to the booth.

  A bored looking redheaded woman with spiky hair and large-frame glasses looked up briefly, before typing the name into her computer.

  "Floor thirteen, room 1329. You can go up now. Visiting hours are from ten until two."

  "Thanks."

  Zahara gave the woman a smile, but she'd already turned back to her phone. Zahara shrugged and walked back to the others.

  "Thirteenth floor. Apparently we have good timing. The elevators are just over there."

  Cat followed Zahara, who seemed to know where she was going, but remained on guard. Everyone she passed was busy, seeming to have a purpose and direction, whether they were hospital staff members or visitors. The auras came in varying shades, some muddy and others shining gold, but none displayed the deep black or absence of aura she was paranoid about seeing at each corner they went around.

  When they arrived at the ward where Mrs. Binns was located though, everything changed. Looking around, Cat was filled with dread. Most of the human auras were muddy, dark, and extremely unhealthy in appearance. A few auras were completely missing and the dead eyes of the people attached to them confirmed their absence.

  Evelyn. This isn't right. Look at these people. They all look sick or evil. What's going on here?

  Evelyn looked around, her expression confirming what Cat had seen.

  It's got to be a trap. There's no way this many people would be here, in a hospital, looking like this. What should we do? Do you have enough juice to heal them? Fry them?

  Cat looked around and quickly counted. She could see at least ten people with sick auras, as well as two individuals who were missing auras altogether.

  I don't know. But what if we don't? If we turn our backs, how many people could they destroy?

  Evelyn set her jaw and widened her stance.

  Let’s take out the two that are dark. Maybe the others will lose their tainted auras if we do that. Like when we removed Declan from the picture?

  Cat nodded, pressing her lips together.

  That's the best option. Fill in the others and let's work on the group attack strategy again.

  Evelyn quickly connected with the other three girls and they lined up in a semi-staggered way around a unit desk, isolating the two people that were the most dangerous. Naturally, the dark ones noticed as soon as the girls got into position. The one dressed as a janitor snarled at Vanessa, then he leapt on top of her, knocking her backward before she could even react. Cat threw herself at the other one while Zahara and Mai attempted to pull the janitor off Vanessa. Cat felt the now comfortable tingle course through her chest and into her hands as she incinerated what appeared outwardly to be a small brunette nurse.

  Cat turned to help the others, finding them backed up against a window, but before she could act, the janitor smashed Vanessa into it. The glass broke, causing them to both tumble out into the air.

  "NO!"

  Cat screamed, running toward the window as Mai and Zahara froze, stunned by what they'd witnesssed. Cat watched with her heart in her throat as her sister and the janitor tumbled out into the sky, thirteen floors above the ground. Vanessa appeared to grab her air power and Cat saw their momentum slow. But before they stopped falling, something unexpected happened. Vanessa began to shimmer purple, then seemed to expand as the janitor opened his mouth to scream but instead, his chest collapsed and no sound emerged and Vanessa was gone.

  The body of the janitor fell with a thud onto a portion of the roof that jutted out then lay motionless. Cat looked around the area in confusion, unable to see Vanessa anywhere until she looked up. To Cat’s immense relief, a glint of black and purple drew her eye and she watched as Vanessa circled the hospital, majestic with new ebony and purple wings. Cat could see by her sister’s newly avian facial expression that she was completely ecstatic at the turn of events as she swooped in large circles around the hospital. Cat knew that her sister’s elation would have been tempered by some discomfort, but she saw no sign of it on her face. If anything, all she could see was the same glorious freedom Cat remembered from the first time she’d achieved her magical form. In true Vanessa fashion, Cat heard her whooping with glee as she came closer and began to dive bomb her before she finally calmed down, landing just outside on the window ledge. She preened her feathers, smoothing them down while Cat watched and waited, relieved and amused at her sister's antics. Vanessa smoothly transitioned from a human-sized Raven back to her regular human form with a shimmer, then she was standing on the roof, again dressed in her warm clothing.

  She smiled smugly at Cat. "Did you see that? How cool am I?"

  Cat laughed. Her sister, as always, had very little modesty. "Super cool, Vanessa. I was a little worried watching you go through a window, but I guess I didn’t need to be. So, you finally got your true form. I guess I shouldn't be surprised you look like a giant raven, given your powers."

  Vanessa beamed. "It's amazing. I just want to go and fly around town now," she said, then noted Cat's concerned expression and rolled her eyes in response. "I won't though, don't worry. I know I have to keep things on the down low with the whole 'other form' thing. But this should help us, right? We all have forms now. Well, except Evelyn, but her powers work totally differently from ours."

  Cat nodded, but something in what Vanessa had said burrowed into her mind, niggling at her. She'd have to review this conversation later, she thought, making a mental note.

  The other girls hadn't observed everything about Vanessa's fall and transformation, so their relief at seeing her standing on the roof was palpable.

  Evelyn looked at Vanessa, dryly pointing out the obvious. "So, this is wonderful and I'm very happy for you, but there could still be more of those guys around and we haven't found Mrs. Binns yet. Are you going to come back inside so we can keep looking? It's a little chilly out there for a human."

  Vanessa looked around at the roof, then laughed. "Sure, just give me a sec."

  She levitated herself back in through the open window on a gust of air, then they watched as Zahara used her earth magic to fix the window.

  "Hey, cool. I didn't know you could do that!" Vanessa looked at her with approval.

  Zahara smirked. "It's only glass, which is made of sand. I can just rearrange the molecules and go down to a more atomic level, I guess. Either way, w
e don't want to advertise that anything exciting happened here if we can avoid it. Cat, do you have enough juice to fix some of the darkness you've seen on the ward, now that the soulless ones are gone? And what about witnesses?"

  Cat looked around and saw that most of the darkness had in fact already disappeared when they'd removed the janitor and the nurse. The remaining people looked dazed and she was hopeful they wouldn't remember anything. She was tempted, as always, to take away the illnesses that she felt around her, but resisted. She didn't have the time or the energy to do that, considering the danger that they were facing.

  "I think everyone's okay now, or at least they will be. Let's keep looking. We may still come across others we’ll need to fight."

  Zahara agreed. "Okay, let's keep moving then. Mrs. Binns' room is just over this way, at the end of the hall."

  The girls followed single file behind Zahara. Cat trailed behind, making sure to do a quick aura check on anyone they passed. Things looked a lot better now and Cat was relieved to find that everyone else appeared to be a normal human who had no idea what had recently transpired a few feet away. While the girls were getting stronger and better at fighting, none of them had unlimited energy. Now that Vanessa had achieved her magic form, things should be a little easier, as they could all recover better in their nonhuman form, but Cat was worried about Evelyn. She'd been so drained after the fight the other day. Cat wasn't sure if they'd be able to keep fighting with her help unless Evelyn was somehow able to get stronger, but that didn't seem likely considering the time frame Cat could feel shrinking around them. Whatever was coming wasn't leaving them much time and there were only so many miracles a girl could hope for.

  They arrived at a typical room with the usual faint antiseptic smell, dingy off-yellow curtains, and shiny shellacked floor one expected in a hospital. A small table with wheels stood next to the bed, holding the remains of what Cat assumed was disgusting greyish mushroom soup on a plastic tray. A half empty bag of fluid hung from an IV pole, draining slowly into a line in Mrs. Binns' left hand. She was sleeping, and looked peaceful but pale, with her eyes closed and her face free of bruising. Her arms told a different story though and were mottled with bruises in various shapes and sizes. Some had possibly been inflicted by the lab or nurses for blood samples and other medical work. Cat remembered how bad her own arms had looked when she'd been in the hospital after her car accident, but some of Mrs. Binns' bruises were larger and nastier in appearance. Evelyn made straight for the clipboard on the end of the bed and was already perusing it.

  "Looks like her vitals are stable, but she's had low blood pressure and a high pulse. She probably lost a fair amount of blood, but I'm just basing that on how we found her, and the fact that that guy said she was hit by a vehicle. I'm not seeing a diagnosis anywhere on the sheet."

  Cat was impressed with her medical knowledge, but Evelyn just wiggled her eyebrows.

  "My mom's always talking about blood pressure and pulses when she gets home. After awhile, you start to figure out what she's yammering on about. And she deals with a lot of trauma, so, you know."

  Cat nodded, moving closer to the bed to look at Mrs. Binns. While she appeared calm, Cat could see that her aura was definitely damaged. What had previously been a sunny gold whenever she'd seen the landlady was now a mottled, dark grey that seemed to be missing chunks. It was crystal clear to Cat that the damage to the woman wasn't just the result of her being hit by a trolley, or whatever that man had said. This looked as if it had been a deliberate attack, like someone had attempted to destroy her aura.

  "I think the reason Mrs. Binns is here, in the hospital like this, is our fault," Cat said, sadly.

  The other girls looked at her with shock.

  "What do you mean?" Mai asked. "How could this be from us?"

  "I think that we're being targeted," Cat replied. "Carman is sending her minions in our direction. Why else are we coming across large groups of them like we’ve confronted over the last few days? If it was a widespread problem, there'd be news reports about people dying or disappearing, but we haven't seen anything like that on the news or online."

  As Cat spoke, her friends were nodding.

  "I hadn't really given it much thought, but you're probably right," said Zahara. "If these guys had been acting up large scale, it'd be all over the news. I mean, there's the usual amount of crime here, but this would be an enormous story if it was happening everywhere. But if that's the case, is anyone around us safe right now? What about my family?"

  Cat lifted her arms helplessly. "I don't know. I haven't gotten that far in my thinking, but I'd suspect that anyone we stay with could be at risk. I think we should head to the coast right away and get this over with."

  Vanessa spoke up. "Don't get me wrong, I'm totally game to go and beat the evil tree at her evil lair, but you've been talking about how you don't think we're fighting the right way yet. Are you sure we're ready?"

  "We'll probably need a few days to prepare to get our thoughts and our crap together, but I think we should be gone before Mrs. Binns gets back home. I'd hate to have anything else happen to her. She's already been through enough. Zahara, I don't want to risk your family either, so I don't think we should go back there. But you should give them a heads up about what's happened. They should know that they might be at risk."

  Zahara just waved her hand dismissively. "I'll give my mum a call. But don't forget, they all have potent juice of their own. And they can always disappear into the garden and enter Summerland. I don't think that the soulless guys can do much to our animal form, although I'm not positive."

  Cat thought for a moment before agreeing. "Good point. Okay, I'm going to heal some of the damage I see in Mrs. Binn's aura, but then we need to go. Let's stop on the way back to the bed and breakfast and buy some things for travel. Camping supplies, food, that kind of thing. We might need to get a little rugged, depending on what happens and where we end up staying."

  The girls waited as Cat performed her healing on Mrs. Binns' aura. It took more time than she wanted it to and she wasn't able to do it as well as she normally would given their time crunch, but by the end she was satisfied with her work. Mrs. Binns would hopefully wake up and not remember anything, but even if she did she'd be unlikely to believe that it was anything more than a nightmare brought on by the accident itself.

  They left before she woke up, walking out quietly and carefully, watching for more dark ones. Cat kept her eyes open and her aura vision on, but they were in the clear at the moment. Evelyn also kept looking around, watching for any stray thoughts or emotions from anyone, but she saw nothing either. It was almost as though the darkness had been nothing more than a cloud passing over the sun, then it was gone again.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  With determined precision, the girls bought supplies and packed everything tightly into the van. They only had one small skirmish in the parking lot at the grocery store on the way back with their items when they were trying to pack up the non- perishable food. Zahara had apparently been in a no-nonsense mood and simply opened the ground and swallowed the two sketchy-looking soulless monsters without delay.

  Evelyn looked at her approvingly. "Remind me not to make you mad, okay? That was stone cold, girl. Very impressed with you right now."

  Cat laughed while Vanessa and Mai shook their heads in amusement at Evelyn's reaction. Even in the midst of all the stress and occasional overwhelming fear, Evelyn could still make them laugh and forget the downside. It was almost, but not quite, like being normal.

  Zahara had just shrugged in response to the teasing. "No one touches my food."

  Which caused the girls to laugh even more.

  They drove to the coast after stopping barely long enough to get their belongings from the B&B and some fresh food for the drive. Cat felt particularly strongly about not hanging around now that they appeared to have a target on their backs. She knew that if the dark creatures had found them once, they would keep coming back to
where they'd been. She had a brief pang of fear when she remembered Dr. Brown and asked Zahara call him to make sure that he was safe as they drove to the coast. She hoped that he was okay, but in reality, anyone associated with them was in danger now. She couldn't help feel responsible, even though she knew there was nothing she could do about it. Other than notifying those that they could, the only way to protect the people around them was to get rid of the evil that stalked them and everyone else before it could do any more damage.

  Darkness had fallen by the time they drove the narrow scenic route to the coast. It wasn't a long drive, but the traffic out of the city had made for slow going again and it was close to eight that night before they finally arrived at a cute little cottage on the outskirts of East Lothian.

  "Are you sure it's safe here? What about the owners, Zahara?"

  Cat looked at the little blue house in front of the van with trepidation. It was pretty, but Cat didn't want to drag anyone else into their mess.

  "It's a safe as houses."

  Zahara laughed while Cat rolled her eyes, relaxing slightly at hearing the silly expression she remembered her dad saying when she was a kid.

  "I know the owners well, friends of the family for years. Don't worry about it. There's nothing waiting inside that might would hurt us and the owners are away on a long trip. They like to head for warmer temps until May or June."

  Cat sighed with relief. It was nice to hear they could have a safe house, but it was even better to know that the owners wouldn't be in danger because of their presence. After all, one way or another things would most likely be finished before they got back from their holidays.

  It was the one way or another aspect that concerned Cat. She wasn't ready to lose or die, but she felt exposed in a way she hadn't when they'd been in the city. The area they were in now was much less populated so she felt that they stuck out like sore thumbs, obvious to everyone as 'outsiders'. They'd simply unpacked and brought their supplies inside and had only been outside for a few minutes, but during that entire time Cat had been on edge. The few people that she'd caught glimpses of she'd been compelled to watch until they turned away, uncomfortable having her back turned to anyone she didn't know.