Chapter 32 #2
“What do Ena and I have to gain?” Cris asked. “Nothing really, except that we feel like what was done was wrong. Maybe they feel the same way.”
Ty barely spared Cris a look, but didn’t argue.
“Maybe we should ask them that, and if their answer is satisfactory, then we can allow them to join us,” Ena asked, looking at Ty.
She knew he was the deciding factor in all this.
It was he who had orchestrated all this from the beginning, and he who would be the daemon they performed the spell on.
He had to trust those involved with his life—with all daemons’ lives.
“Alright,” Ty agreed, nodding at her plan. “We’ll try that, but let me know if your Knowing picks up on anything suspicious.”
Ena nodded in confirmation, and the four of them headed back over to the campsite where Mel was sitting by the fire with their eyes closed, unresponsive. Their hands had gone slack in their lap, and the stick they’d been carrying had dropped to the ground.
“Mel?” Ena asked as she approached. “Are you alright?”
The witch didn’t respond.
Ena reached down to jostle their shoulder, when suddenly their eyes snapped open. They looked around, seeming confused for a second and taking in their surroundings, before their eyes landed on Ena.
“Oh, I’m back in the now,” they said, relaxing the tension in their body somewhat.
“Were you having a vision?” Ena asked gently.
Mel nodded, waving her off with their hand. “Yes, but before you ask me what it was, I have no fucking idea yet, so you need to give me time.”
“Oh, okay,” Ena said. She had been curious but hadn’t been planning to pry like that. She knew that a seer witch’s visions were usually reserved for the matriarch’s ears only. And that made her wonder…
“Mel, does Syrelle know you’re here? Is she okay with you helping us?”
Mel sighed. “No, she doesn’t know. I left her a note, so she doesn’t worry. Hopefully she doesn’t worry…” Mel said, seeming distracted by the thought.
Ty cleared his throat, nodding his head at Mel and giving Ena a look. Clearly, he wanted her to start their intended line of questioning now.
“So, Mel,” Ena said, wondering how exactly to begin. “We’re so grateful you’ve come to help us, but we’re wondering…why do you want to help us? Aside from the fact that you saw that you would?”
“Well,” Mel said matter-of-factly. “If I saw it happen then it has to happen. The future is fixed, so there’s really no way around it.”
“Okay…” Ena replied, her brow furrowing. That wasn’t exactly the answer she was looking for, but she guessed it made sense.
“But, if you want to know, I’ve also seen what will come…after. Parts of it anyway, and I know it’s what Gaia wants in the end. It was never meant to be this way, you know. Her intentions were not sincere.”
“Whose intentions? Gaia’s?” Ena asked.
“No, not Gaia’s. The Auster witch. The one whose idea it was to bind the daemons to Iblis in the first place. She was just angry, and jealous. And just a petty-ass bitch if you ask me.”
Turner burst out laughing from the sidelines, but Ena was still trying to keep up.
“Mel,” Ena sighed, trying to not get frustrated. “I know we don’t know each other very well yet, so no offense, but what in the Underworld are you talking about?”
Mel laughed. The sound was joyful and childlike, and luckily they didn’t seem offended at all.
“Sorry, I tend to get ahead of myself, and I forget that not everyone knows what I Know.” They stood up, looking around the campsite.
“Could I trouble you for something to eat? I’ve been sitting here for a while, and I’m starving.
I’d be happy to explain what I can then. ”
“Sure,” Ena said, looking at Turner, who went to fetch some provisions from his pack. He came back with some jerky and a hunk of cheese, handing it to Mel, who began to devour it immediately, as if they were afraid it would disappear.
“What I Know,” Mel began, talking around the food in their mouth.
“From what Gaia has shown me, is that the Auster witch, the brown-haired one, didn’t trust the female daemon after she seduced the witch’s husband with her Power, or so the Auster witch said.
The daemon did have the Power of cupido, so who’s to say if she actually used it on the man or not, but tensions were already high between witches and daemons, for many reasons, as you know, or maybe you don’t, but that’s a whole other story,” Mel said, waving that idea off.
“Anyway, it was the perceived personal slight that pushed the Auster witch to create the spell and convince the other two matriarchs to help her. That I know for sure.”
Ena tried to keep up as Mel was talking, and parts of what they said still confused her, but a lot of it suddenly made sense.
The brown-haired witch she’d mentioned, Ena had seen her in her own vision. She was the one who’d seemed much too pleased with herself after conducting the spell. The one who seemed to enjoy watching the female daemon suffer.
“So, long story short, it was never Gaia’s will that the spell be enacted in the first place. My Coven has always known that,” Mel finished, as if that explained literally everything.
“Occidens has? Really?” Cris chimed in. He was clearly having just as much trouble absorbing all of this information as she was.
“Yes. Our ancestor, the Occidens matriarch, was pressured to do the spell, but immediately regretted it. She could tell it was wrong, and she tried to convince the other two to reverse it, but they refused. Luckily, she got away with the amulet and hid it. She was brave for doing that. But the other Covens were not happy,” Mel said, laughing a little at whatever memory of a vision she was reliving.
“That’s what caused the rivalry between the Covens, right?” Ena asked, seeking confirmation of what she’d already suspected.
Mel nodded, and satisfaction filled Ena at having at least figured that part out already. But the rest of what they’d said…
“Do you mean to say that all Occidens witches know about the amulet and the bond to Iblis? Not just the matriarch?” Ena asked, her mind spinning at that revelation.
“Mmhmm,” Mel answered simply. “Of course, we don’t go blabbing it around.
That wouldn’t be helpful for relations with the other Covens.
And it’s not like we trust daemons any more than everyone else anyway, especially since they’re incapable of channeling Gaia.
But we at least know that what was done is not what Gaia wanted.
And at least from my perspective, I do feel quite sorry for them. ”
Mel looked at Ty and Turner then, their brow furrowing in pity, as the two daemons exchanged a what-the-fuck look with one another.
“I think I need to sit down,” Turner said. “This is a lot to absorb first thing in the morning.”
Ena felt much the same. She looked over at Cris, who had paled and was standing there just as dumbstruck as the rest of them. The poor guy had had a lot of information dumped on his plate lately. Maybe she should encourage him to sit down too.
Then she looked at Ty. He, at least, didn’t look overwhelmed, just contemplative. What was he thinking?
He approached Mel. Not in a threatening way.
For the first time, it seemed as if he really wanted to address them.
Not suspiciously, but respectfully. “Thank you, for all this information,” he said slowly, sincerely.
“And for coming all this way to help us, on your own. That was an incredibly brave thing to do.”
“Nah, I’m not brave,” they said, waving away Ty’s compliment. “I knew I’d get here okay, like I said—I’ve seen it.”
Ty smiled at them in a friendly way, clearly warming up to them now, and Mel smiled back, staring at him intently.
“Now she, the one you look like, she was brave,” Mel added, as if communicating something big and important to Ty. But Ena was, once again, lost.
“Who?” Ena asked, wondering how many questions she had left to ask before more stopped emerging.
“Kaya,” Mel responded, looking over at Ena. “I finally figured out it was her I was seeing. Then a lot of it made sense,” they said, sounding relieved.
“Who’s Kaya?” Ena asked them, shaking her head in confusion.
“My mother,” Ty responded. His voice was hard, and his expression more so.
“Yes! Exactly. I thought so,” Mel said, clearly giddy at this realization. “I told you, you look like her. It’s the eyes,” they said, gesturing at Ty’s face. Then they looked around to the rest of them, as if seeking confirmation of this, but no one could give them any.
“What?” Turner asked from where he sat. “You knew Ty’s mother?”
“Well, I didn’t know her. I was a child when she left Occidens, but I remember her. I mean, who wouldn’t, what with her absconding with a daemon and stealing historic journals and all,” Mel said. “And, of course, I’ve seen her,” they added offhand.
“You’ve seen her, like, in your visions?” Turner asked.
“Yes,” Mel answered simply.
Ena was floored. Not only was this another one of her theories proven correct—that Kaya, Ty’s mother, had been the one to take the journals from Occidens and give them to Petyr—but this witch had seen Ty’s mother? Maybe knew where she was or at least knew more about her? That was…huge for him.
She desperately wanted to ask more questions, ask all the things that she wanted to know about the last witch before her to visit the Underworld, but she knew that wasn’t her place. It was Ty’s.
Ena looked over at him to see what he was thinking, but his face was carefully blank.
Everyone was silent, waiting for him to continue, but all he did was clear his throat.
“Well, thank you, again, Mel, for joining us. We’ll let you finish your food and then we can all take a second to figure out what’s next.”
Then Ty grabbed his ax from his tent behind him and took off into the woods without a word to any of them.