Page 79 of Uncharmed

He shrugged. ‘If you insist.’

Tightening the reins in a swift command, Hal brought Mage’s back legs up to kick Barnaby hard and solid in the chest. The man folded in two, flew at speed into the darkness between the trees and disappeared from view. Mage gave a satisfied snort.

Annie reeled at the unnerving sight, but all she could think about was Maeve. Somewhere, buried in the brawl of Selcouth against the Sorciety, her girl was in need.

Hal swung Mage around again to gallop through the clearing and into the fight, aiming straight for Morena, who was locked in a collision against a Herald. Meanwhile, it was Vivienne herself who stepped into Annie’s eye line.

‘This is all your fault, you stupid bloody bimbo! Look at my dress!’ Vivienne screamed, stomping her foot into the mud and sending even more splatters up her skirt. She let out a whine and her magic appeared in a fraught tangle between her palms.

‘Oh, get it dry-cleaned, you unbearable crone!’ Annie yelled back, startling herself with the viciousness that tumbled out of her mouth. Her emotions were roaring, all of them truer and more vivid than she could ever have dared to imagine. ‘Did it ever occur to you that there are more important things?’

‘More important than vintage Vespertine lace?’ Vivienne squawked. ‘I think not!’

‘Perhaps like friendship! Your so-called friend and queen bee was just thrown to the wolves by her own vicious hag of a mother,’ Annie shouted. ‘Look at her! Why aren’t you helping her?’

Pouting, Vivienne reluctantly turned to search for Romily among the frenzied, battling crowd of witches, warlocks and wicche. Eventually she spotted her, injured and cowering against a tree trunk, clutching onto the bark with terrified eyes. In that moment of chaos, it made Annie’s heart twang with surprise sympathy to realize that Romily, in all of her self-preservation and determination to be admired, was only a product of her parents. And tonight, Romily had met the same startling reality as Annie once had, that her own mother would sacrifice life with her daughter to remain at the addictive, all-consuming helm of the Sorciety.

Vivienne huffed a final snarl at Annie, then ran to Romily’s side, throwing an arm around her shoulders to carry her as she staggered and whimpered, clutching her side where Maeve’s magic had hit with a painful blast. Together, they looked so weak, so feeble and cowardly, that they felt unrecognizable to Annie. How had she ever admired these people, feared their opinions, longed for their pointless, superficial approval? Shaking her head to clear the complicated thoughts, she threw herself into the mix once again, clawing to get to Maeve amid the fight.

‘Karma, that’s enough!’

Annie’s familiar was still hard at work on shredding Harmony’s up-do in the most efficient way she could manage, claws sinking into the sleek bun while Harmony flailed in circles. At Annie’s command, Karma paused mid-swipe, gave her ear a quick clean, then leapt down from Harmony’s head to run straight to Annie’s side, altogether looking rather pleased with herself. Annie gathered her up and gave her a hurried but emphatic kiss on the head. ‘Nice work. You’ll be safe at home, I love you,’ she whispered hurriedly, before quickly vanishing her familiar back to the safety of the cottage. This was no place for a princess like Karma – even if she had put up a grand fight for the cause of protecting their girl.

A scratch-covered Harmony staggered towards Romily and Vivienne, gratefully receiving their arms around her as they sobbed dramatically in unison. All three of them turned towards Annie, lit up by the fireworks of imploding magic that showed their matching hate-filled glares. The way that they rallied against her felt wickedly familiar. The trio gathered their magic to aim and screeched their final blows in unison.

‘Look what you’ve done to us!’

‘I knew you would always be trouble, I said it from the very beginning.’

‘Stop!’ Annie shouted, sending a wall of protective magic up in front of her like a screen, making their spells rebound back. ‘I don’t want to fight you all. We have too much history to end this way.’

‘But we are the Sorciety! And you’re ruining it all,’ Vivienne screamed.

‘You always put yourselves first. Why is this suddenly different?’ Annie sighed, feeling broken. ‘This isn’t your fight, just because it’s your parents’. We don’t have to keep making their same mistakes all over again.’

At that, Romily faltered just the tiniest fraction, the bitterly vengeful expression that she’d inherited from Glory softening the smallest amount.

‘Rom, please,’ Annie begged, one last attempt to make them leave of their own accord. ‘Get out of here. Be safe. There’s still time to make different decisions of your own. Things can change.’

Romily looked away, furious, refusing to hold eye contact, but Annie noticed the way that she blushed. Her old friend frantically chewed on the inside of her cheek, a pained and uncertain look on her face that Annie hadn’t seen there for years. Harmony and Vivienne only awaited instruction, wide-eyed and desperate, until Romily finally gave the most imperceptible and reluctant of nods. In a bright flash, the Fortune Four, minus one, huddled together with matching whimpers and vanished as a dark mist rolled in to carry them away.

‘Annie!’

Somehow, somewhere in the melee of rebounding, snapping magic and exploding powers, Maeve had struggled to her feet again. She was grimacing and rubbing at her ribcage where Glory’s magic had struck her, but there was a steadfast look in her eyes as she staggered.

Annie went to run to her, but an arm quickly swooped around her waist and pulled her backwards. It was Hal. She would recognize his strength and warmth anywhere.

‘What are you doing? Let me get to her,’ Annie yelled, struggling to free herself.

‘It’s her time,’ he shouted back into her hair. ‘Let her fix this for herself. She’s brave and she deserves it. She wants to shine.’

‘But . . .’

‘We’re here to pick up the pieces if she fails. But she won’t. Let her try.’

Annie knew he was right. Her whole body fell limp against him and it was as though the world stood still, stopped spinning on an axis altogether. This was Maeve’s moment. Their eyes locked and Annie hoped the look that passed between them would remind Maeve that they were here, waiting in the wings, along with everything that she had told her before the chaos began. Maeve, you are capable of shining brighter than every star in the sky . . .

With her very last ounces of strength and determination, Maeve threw her casting hand directly upwards. Annie couldn’t understand what she was trying to do. But then she saw that she was wielding something between her fingers.