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Anna
“I still think our best option is to wait,” Jane said as the circle tightened, and they began to make their plans. “If these Infected are already growing in numbers, then how long before they’re too strong for us to defeat? If we go into battle against them, and we lose, they gain up to seven more of us on their side.”
Anna bit her lip. She hadn’t thought about it like that before. Not from the perspective that for every one of their team that went down, the enemy gained a new soldier. It was unpleasant to think about.
If her friends and the other witches at Winterspell came under attack from their own kind, how would they respond? Would Courtney be able to kill the creature inhabiting Anna’s body? Or would she too succumb, thinking that perhaps her friend could still be saved, only to realize too late that Anna was already dead?
“And I thought vampires were bad,” she muttered.
“What do you mean?” Damien was confused. “Vampires?”
“Creatures from the Abyss. The magical netherworld. Their bite contains a poison that slowly kills the victim, making them crave human blood for sustenance when on the mortal plane. But while the poison creates a new vampire, it only does so with the body. The mind is still the same person. Memories, thoughts, attitudes. That doesn’t change, they just become this blood-sucking version of their former selves.”
“But not the Infected,” she said. “They kill the mind, but keep the body. Your friends will never know that it’s you. Perhaps not until it’s too late.”
Damien nodded. “That’s how it was in the early stages of the war on our planet. Kids were some of the first infected as it spread rapidly. Mothers were attacked. It’s why we have so few of either, and why they are so precious to us,” he admitted quietly. “We lost so many so quickly...”
“I can’t imagine the horrors you have seen,” Anna said, squeezing his arm, wanting to pull him into a tight hug, but knowing it was best not to do that in front of everyone. “It must have been terrible.”
Damien was silent, the whole circle reflecting on what it must have been like to watch your world die, killed by its own people, all while you were forced to fight them and kill them if you wanted to survive yourself. Anna couldn’t imagine...
“It was,” he said, clearing his throat. “But our world is dead. There’s nothing we can do about it anymore, unfortunately. Your world, however, is not. Earth still has a chance, if we strike, and if we strike soon. Kill them now, before they can spread, and we can save humanity from the fate that befell Dracia.”
Anna nodded. “You know I’m with you.”
Altair and Rane as well were in, no one ever doubting their commitment.
That only left the trio of witches. None of them had faced combat before today, and Anna suspected that without something as tangible to fight for as she had with Damien, they were unsure of it all.
Well, you’re technically the patrol leader, Anna. Time to do your job and lead them.
“We’ve been training for this, girls. Since we first arrived at Winterspell, these are the types of events we have been training for, preparing for. True, we thought we’d be going up against a lone faery or rogue troll. Maybe a goblin tribe if we were lucky. But think about it. Do you think our ancestors were ready for what came their way when the big incursions happened?”
Genna and the others shifted uncomfortably.
“Exactly. How do you think they felt when Jack came across in the late 1800’s? He killed a bunch of our sisters in London before fleeing here, where he was finally stopped in San Francisco, but not before destroying most of the city and killing over three thousand people, including many of those who studied right here at Winterspell.”
“But...” Jane started to say, but Anna wasn’t done.
“Do you think they were ready to fight Hitler and his army of vampires when they burst out of the Alps and took over Germany? Or when Poseidon himself slipped through a rift and flooded Indonesia not fifteen years ago? Hundreds of thousands died before we could stop him and force him out. Do you think the initial witches who encountered him were ready for that?”
Jane subsided. They all knew the history, of the dozens upon dozens of times that the Abyss had been breached on a larger scale, and the witches of the Academies across the globe had responded. That was what they truly trained for. The one-off incidents were nothing. It was the big ones they had to be ready for.
Like this.
“We are tasked with defending humanity from paranormal threats,” Anna said. “At all costs. That is our primary mission. Tell me this is not fulfilling that. Nothing in our mission specifically talks about the Abyss as our only area of responsibility. We simply haven’t encountered another type of threat. Until now. Join me, my sisters, and let us strike the first blow against this horrible enemy and help save others from a terrible fate.”
She saw Damien looking at her out of the corner of her eyes, his face filled with respect and gratitude. He knew they would have to take this threat on together if they wanted to survive, and she knew that the worst thing she could do was nothing. Dying would be bad but losing Damien would be worse.
Her body entire body sang for him, in a way she’d never before known with anything, let alone a man. When she was near him, Anna felt complete, felt whole. In fact, she felt more powerful too. Her magic came easier, and when she thought of him, she cast it stronger, like she had against the ice dragon.
He was her source of strength, it seemed. One of them, at least, because Anna was no weakling on her own. Her magic wasn’t the strongest, but her brain was something she’d worked long and hard to forge into its own weapon.
“I’m in,” Maddison, said quietly. “I owe Damien, but you’re right, Anna. This is our mission. Our cause. If we back down from this, then everything we’ve ever expressed about wanting to help others was just a lie. It won’t always be easy. Sometimes it’s going to be hard. It’s going to ask a lot, or perhaps everything, of us. But if we aren’t ready to answer, then we’re not true Witches of Winterspell.”
Anna nodded in agreement and thanks.
“Me too,” Genna said, coming to her decision. “You’re going to need someone to watch your back,” she told Anna with a little smile, attempting to lighten the mood.”
All eyes turned to Jane, the senior-most Initiate of the group, and also the strongest witch among them. Anna had long thought that in time, Jane would eventually become part of the Coven. She was that strong in the ways of magic.
“You’re pretty good at that speech thing,” Jane told her.
“Thanks. I don’t have your gifts with the arts, but I try to be strong in every other way I can. I never thought motivational speeches would be one of them, but here we are,” she joked.
“You know we’re just as likely to die as succeed, right?” Jane asked, looking at everyone.
“Yes,” Anna answered for them. “We do. If we fight, we might die. But if we stand around and wait, then other people will die. That’s the difference we fight for. That we must fight for.”
Jane sighed. “Alright, I’m in. Let’s kick some ass.”
There was no celebration at their unity, but a sense of accomplishment did come over Anna. She’d helped to give them their best possible chance at winning. That was something.
“Thank you for your support,” Damien rumbled. “Gather what you need. We leave in fifteen.”
Anna swallowed nervously. This was it. There was no turning back now.
