Chapter 102: 82. All Kinds Of Magic

I left Brian under the effects of a very strong sleep spell and put out all the candles so there wasn't any risk of fire. Then I climbed up the stairs and emerged from the cellar, to find myself in the front hall of a very typical little family home. There were dirty dishes on the kitchen table, dirty laundry on the floor of the laundry room, and even more dirty dishes on the coffee table in the living-room next to the sofa.

It reminded me of when Cerys and I snuck into the witch hunter's rented house. Mrs. Reeves left dirty dishes around, and I got the impression Brian had been in this place for a while. This house didn't seem like a rental property though, and I was worried about the original occupants. I moved towards the staircase with the idea of checking bedrooms upstairs, when the front door suddenly burst open behind me.

I spun around in time to see Paige there, with my mom and mum on either side of her. Nina was behind them, and past my little sister was the rest of Club Luna, all ready to charge in and save the day.

"Cass?!" mom gasped in shock.

Then mum frowned and asked warily, "Or Socha?"

Paige pulled back behind my parents, while Nina moved forward to stand between mom and mum. The small demon looked worried and upset as she stared at me, probably wondering if I was still her sister or if the chaos goddess had taken over.

I gave them all an awkward smile and wave as I cringed slightly into my hoodie. "Hi everyone. It's just me, I'm still Cass."

Apparently that was all it took to convince them, although I had a feeling it was my little wave and cringe more than my words that proved my identity. Mom and mum and Nina all rushed forward to hug me, while the rest of the gang followed them into the house. The front door was closed behind them once they were all inside, and just like that I was surrounded by everyone important to me. At the same time I was inundated with questions.

"What happened?"

"How'd you get free?"

"Where's Brian?"

"Are you ok?"

I was caught between smiling and hugging my family while also grimacing and cringing at everyone all talking at once. I finally raised my voice, "Enough! Stop! Please!"

Once everyone was quiet I continued at my normal volume, "I know you all have questions but let's leave that for later ok? Brian's out cold in the cellar, under a strong sleep spell. I don't know who's house this is but I want to check and see if they're ok. I'm worried he might have hurt whoever lives here."

"It's Kirstie's house," Kaylee responded.

I blinked at her, "Seriously?! He had to know I was last seen with her. I didn't think he'd be so careless."

"Brian's a dweeb," Nina quietly reminded me.

"He sure is," I replied with a brief smile, before getting serious again. I looked to Kaylee and suggested, "Maybe Kirstie never told him you knew I was with her? I don't think she was working with him by choice. She probably kept quiet about seeing you, so you'd have a chance to find me?"

Kaylee shook her head, "I don't know. I was worried since you never showed up at lunch, so we all went to look for you in the library -"

"I picked up Brian's scent, along with yours and Kirstie's," Melanie interjected. "We also found your backpack, and by then we knew you'd been taken."

My girlfriend continued, "I know Kirstie was upset with you before, so I could believe she might be working with Brian? But we really didn't think they'd actually bring you to her place."

"We honestly didn't think it would be this easy," Paige agreed. "Nina said we should come here and check though, she was pretty adamant about it."

"And as soon as we got close I picked up your scent and his," Melanie added.

Mom smiled, "And here you are. But what happened, how did you get free?"

"It's complicated," I grimaced, "And I'll tell you all later ok? I still need to check and make sure the Winters are all ok."

"You girls stay down here," mum told the rest of us. "Julie and I will go upstairs and check on them."

Nobody bothered to argue with my angel parents, and the two of them headed up the stairs together.

While they were doing that Kaylee asked, "What are we going to do with Brian? If we can find a box of salt I can do the banishing ritual right now, while he's still asleep."

"That sounds like letting him off too easy," Melanie stated with a frown. "Honestly I was kind of hoping I'd get a chance to hit him a few more times."

"Same," Cerys growled.

That caught a few of us off-guard, since the young blonde had never shown much interest in physical violence before. Then I remembered the next full moon wasn't that far away, and realized she was probably feeling a little punchy and irritable.

I noticed a few others looked like maybe they agreed with Melanie as well, like just sending Brian home was letting him off easy. Especially considering we didn't know yet what he'd done with Kirstie and her family. I understood that sentiment too, but I really didn't want to think about revenge.

Instead I suggested, "Let's wait and see what my folks think? They might want to question him or something, or they might have some other ideas."

"Good thinking Cass," Paige agreed. With a grimace she added, "This is definitely the sort of thing we'd have turned over to May in the past, and honestly I feel a little better letting the responsible adults handle that sort of thing?"

"That isn't a bad idea Paige," my mum responded as she came back down the stairs. "The Winters are going to be ok, but they've had a bit of a rough time. Julie's helping them right now. Nina, would you mind accompanying me? I'd like to have a few words with Brian. As for the rest of you..."

Mum glanced around at the mess, then gave us all an apologetic look. "Feel free to turn this down, but maybe you girls could all pitch in and help tidy up? The last thing the Winters need right now is to deal with the mess Brian's made of their home."

"Of course Mrs. Underwood," Paige nodded.

• • • • •

"Now will you please tell us what happened hon?" mom asked.

My mum and Nina both nodded, so did most of my friends. Kaylee added, "Enough stalling Cass! How'd you escape that circle in time to stop Brian?"

I grimaced slightly then looked at Paige and asked, "Shouldn't we do a circle with the candles and everything? I thought you wanted our club meetings to be more formal?"

The tall brunette rolled her eyes as she munched on a chicken wing. She swallowed then cleared her throat and stated, "Welcome everyone to the last Club Luna meeting of twenty-twenty-one. Considering we're all sitting around eating wings and potato wedges and onion rings, and considering the way things have gone today, I think we can forgo the formalities. Plus being in the house of a couple angels, I feel like we're already protected enough?"

She paused for a sip of her cola before giving me a pointed look, "First thing on our agenda is Cass. How'd you escape Brian's circle in time to stop him?"

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"And no more stalling!" my girlfriend insisted, this time with a warning glare.

"Ok ok!" I cringed. Then I immediately stalled again by having a gulp of water, as I looked around the living-room at all my friends and family.

It was about half past nine in the evening and we were finally having the club meeting we'd meant to have after school. Instead of Melanie's house we were at our place, and this time my parents were sitting in on the meeting. We'd wrapped things up at the Winters' house about an hour earlier, the four of them were all still a bit shaken but having a couple powerful angels help them out went a long way.

There was still going to be some more fall-out in the future though, since it turned out Mrs. Winters used that plushie after all. Their family was one human teen, plus a teen bunnygirl, a teen catgirl, and now they had a teen foxgirl too. And I was pretty sure either Kirstie or Kathie would be coming to me for more reality-bending magic sometime soon.

And finally, after mum and Nina spent some time questioning Brian they asked Kaylee to do her banishing ritual. So he was gone from Earth forever, and we'd never have to worry about seeing him again. Not that there was anything left for him to do or try here, since Socha was likewise forever exiled from our world. Except the others didn't know that yet, they were all impatiently waiting for me to explain that part of the story while eating the wings and stuff we'd ordered as soon as we got home.

"All right," I sighed. "So some of you saw those containment circles Brian set up in the Winters' basement? I was stuck inside them, and there was no way to get out. I might have been able to get past the first, but if I'd done that the second one would have killed me and freed Socha. So I was basically looking at either dying early while trying to escape, or dying later when Brian did the ritual."

Mum nodded, "That's what I was afraid of when I saw those circles. So how did you manage it?"

"The circles would have blocked any demonic magic," Nina added. "Did you use witchy magic instead?"

I froze for a second and stared at my little sister in surprise. It never actually occurred to me to try that, but I knew how to cast plenty of May's spells. And with the two protective runic circles in my chest it wouldn't have been too dangerous for me to use a few of them. It definitely would have been a lot safer to use that magic than let Brian complete his ritual.

"Actually I never thought of that?" I admitted with a blush. "But that's a good idea sis."

Mom facepalmed while mum stated, "Get to the point Cass! What did you do?"

I grimaced again but finally started telling them what happened, "I actually got this idea back at halloween, when I was sort of focused inwards on myself..."

Over the next thirty or forty minutes I explained what I figured out, the idea I came up with to take ownership of that shard in my chest. While my family and friends sat around eating wings I described how I'd been studying up on demonic and divine magic, and what I learned from looking at the rituals and runes Socha left behind with Nina. I explained how I was planning to use all that knowledge to make some subtle changes to the shard, so it would be mine instead of hers. Eventually I got to the climax of the story, and how after I was kidnapped I figured my only chance was to put my plan in motion.

"So that's what I did," I shrugged. "I didn't have all my notes and stuff, and I never actually got all the details worked out, but I went from memory and I kind of winged it a bit? And I finished just before Brian returned to do the ritual."

I decided not to tell them about the feeling of something in the shard trying to reach out to Socha, and I didn't say anything about the memory stuff since I still hadn't had a chance to deal with that on my own yet.

Instead I just had another gulp of water then finished the story with the important stuff they needed to know about.

"He did his thing, the last two binding and containment circles in my chest were removed, and Socha returned to Earth. I felt her try to take over my body, like she was kind of inside me, but she couldn't make it stick? She tried a few times to sort of anchor herself with the shard, but it wasn't hers anymore so she couldn't stay. And after a few seconds of that she was gone again."

After I was done the others all stared at me in silent shock for a bit, like they all needed a few more seconds to process it or something. So I munched on a wing and some potato wedges in the meantime.

"You mean there's no more protective runes inside you?" mum finally asked. "But that shard is still in there? What about the other runes, in your wrists and ankles?"

I nodded, "Those other runes are the ones that absorb magic, they're the ones that let me break circles and enchantments and stuff? And yeah, they're still there. So's the shard. It was supposed to be the source of Socha's power and divinity, that's how she could be a goddess-demon hybrid? But it's not hers anymore, it's mine. And I'm completely safe now, different kinds of magic aren't a threat to me anymore. I can probably even use all kinds of magic myself now too? So yeah, I'm fine."

Kaylee smiled, "Cass that's great news!"

The rest of my friends looked relieved as well, but my parents and sister still looked a little freaked out. Maybe because of how close I came to dying again.

Meanwhile Paige finally said, "Thanks for explaining all that Cass. I'm sure there'll be some more questions later, but for now let's move on to the next thing on our agenda?"

She turned her attention to my parents and asked, "Tanya, Julie, I have a request for the two of you. It's maybe a big ask, but here goes. Considering who and what you two are, and the fact that you know about Club Luna, and the fact that you've been involved in several of our recent investigations and you've helped out a lot lately, I was wondering if you two might consider becoming our new club sponsors?"

"We wouldn't be asking you to participate in every club meeting," she added, "The club's always been run kind of independently by its members, but it would be really nice to have some responsible adults overseeing things. And I think a pair of powerful angels would be ideal for that role."

Pretty much everyone looked surprised by Paige's request, especially my parents. Except Brooke didn't seem so shocked, which made me think Paige probably ran the idea past her girlfriend first.

After a few seconds mom and mum exchanged a glance, then mum nodded. "All right Paige. I think Julie and I are up to the task. And I'm sure we'd both feel more comfortable knowing what you girls are up to. I hope you don't mind if we're a little more proactive than May Hawthorne was, when it comes to making sure you all stay safe?"

Paige smiled, "Thanks ma'am. And no, I don't think we'd mind that. I can work out some details with you both later."

"So if you two are the new club sponsors," I asked my parents with a smile, "Does that mean we can keep having club meetings here if we want?"

"Not that I mind having them at your place Melanie," I added to the wolfgirl. "But like, sometimes your dad's around and stuff?"

Mom glanced around the crowded living-room, "I'm not sure this is an ideal spot for official club meetings Cass. Especially if you need enough room to set up a circle with candles."

"Then again," mum added with a sly smile, "Julie and I have been talking about renovating the basement? Perhaps we could set things up down there so you all had a proper meeting space."

She quickly amended that, "We're not making any promises at the moment, it's simply an idea that we'll consider if we go ahead with the renovations."

That was the topic of conversation for a while, as we all gradually finished off the wings and everything. Then as we started tidying things up, my sister moved closer so she could speak to me. My girlfriend was already next to me, so I was caught in between the two of them.

"Cass? When Socha tried to possess you, what happened to her power?" Nina asked in a low voice. "From what I know of the way everything was supposed to work, her power should have flowed into the shard along with her consciousness? But you didn't mention that when you were talking about what happened."

I blushed slightly and admitted, "Her power flowed into me as well as her consciousness. And like I said, her consciousness was rejected? But the um, her power kind of stayed behind."

Both Kaylee and Nina froze as they stared at me with wide eyes. My girlfriend asked softly, "So you're..."

"I'm still me," I replied quietly. "But I guess I got something from Socha after all? Like an inheritance maybe?"

I focused inwards and just for a moment I let a tiny bit of that power flow out of the shard and closer to the surface. I only meant to share it with Kaylee and Nina, but even that small amount was stronger than I expected.

Suddenly everyone in the house including my parents was staring at me with a look of wide-eyed awe on their faces. And I cringed as I realized, all my friends and family just found out what I'd left out of my story.

I'd become the demonic goddess that Socha planned for herself.

~ End of Episode Ten ~