"Bloom," Enola shouted, running over to the side of the road where her fiery friend waited for her, more nervous than usual as she fiddled with the zipper of her jacket. The small mind fairy leaned on her knees as she finally reached the red-haired girl, "Why did you text me to meet you here?"
Bloom's head whipped around the road as if she was looking for someone before she turned to look at Enola as she stretched her back, "I explained everything in my text."
Enola nodded her head, waving her hand for the Bloom to continue, "My phone died immediately after."
"I know this sounds crazy, but I can explain," Bloom hesitated.
"Explain what," Enola asked, her eyebrows furrowing as her lips set in a tight line. Whatever Bloom was doing, she knew that the mind fairy wouldn't be happy about it.
"Get in bitches," Beatrix called out, causing both girls to look over and see the air fairy in the driver's seat of an all-black car. She wore a smirk on her lips as she looked over at Enola, "Glad you could join us."
Enola turned to Bloom with a sense of betrayal as she shook her head in disbelief, "What the hell is going on?"
"Look," Bloom tried, holding her hands out to stop Enola from running back to the school, "Beatrix says she knows who Rosalind is and where she found me. The place is called Aster Dell."
Enola listened to Bloom explain everything she had learned during the assembly before squinting her eyes over to Beatrix, reading her mind to see if she was lying. From what Enola read and what Bloom told her, however, everything was true.
"I still don't trust you," Enola said as she moved to sit in the passenger seat, her eyes not moving from Beatrix. If it weren't for the fact that she wanted to help Bloom, then she would never be doing this.
"Don't need you to," Beatrix hummed as she began driving down the narrow road that led away from Alfea, "I am simply your chauffeur to Aster Dell."
"And how exactly do you know where this is," Enola interrogated, trying to see if she could find any holes in Beatrix's story or thoughts. She found it strange that the girl who was usually so manipulative wanted to just help Bloom.
Enola was also uncomfortable with the fact that Beatrix seemed to already know so much about Rosalind and Aster Dell.
"How did you steal this car," Enola raised her eyebrow, looking over to the fairy, who simply shrugged with a small grin on her face as the answer appeared in her mind. Looking down, the mind fairy looked at the hot wiring below the steering wheel.
"I thought you were smart," Beatrix said, causing the mind fairy to open her mouth for a comeback.
"Can we please pretend like we don't want to kill each other," Bloom huffed, as she felt awkward sitting in the backseat while the two girls were at each other's necks.
"Fine," Enola huffed, leaning her head against the car window as she watched the landscape begin to change as Beatrix drove them further away from school. The green forest lush quickly faded into a more rocky biome as they neared one of the ledges that broke off from the mountain that Alfea resided upon.
Beatrix slowed the SUV down once they couldn't drive closer to the ledge anymore before pulling into park. Enola was the first one to get out of the car, desperate to remain at least a few feet away from the sneaky ginger who could not be trusted.
Enola still didn't forget the fact that Beatrix may have been the one to murder Dowling's assistant. If the suspicion was, in fact, accurate, then Enola and Bloom were in more danger than they thought.
Bloom and Enola hesitantly followed Beatrix as she stumbled closer to the ledge, nearly slipping on a grassy knoll. If it weren't for the fact they were supposedly looking for a town, then Enola would have enjoyed the beautiful view of the area during sunset.
"Aster Dell was a town, right," Bloom asked, looking around at the virgin area. It did not look like anyone had lived here for at least a thousand years, "Are you sure this is the right place?"
"How could a town be marked on a map if it is on the side of a mountain," Enola hummed to herself as she looked to Beatrix knowingly, "Unless it doesn't exist," she huffed, crossing her arm.
Beatrix raised her hands in the air as electric sparks began to fly from her hands, causing Enola to stumble towards Bloom, "Beatrix?!?"
Enola couldn't believe that Beatrix had brought them all the way over here just to kill them. Tears watered her eyes as she tried to reconcile with the fairy, "Please stop!"
Beatrix didn't stop, however, causing both Bloom and Enola to move away from the girl before falling down on the ground covering their head as they waited for the spark to hit them. Just as the electric crack occurred, however, neither girl felt any pain, causing them to look down at themselves.
Just as they were about to ask what was going on, Enola's eyes moved over to look behind her. Where there once was just grass and rock, now law an entire city entirely composed of granite stone and completely ruined by what she could only imagine being an explosion.
"Welcome to Aster Dell," Beatrix frowned as she looked over at the city, walking to stand near the two girls. Enola quickly moved to her feet, trying to compose herself from her embarrassing outburst as she turned to listen to the air fairy, "it was a beautiful place filled with people just trying to live their life. Till' one winter when burned ones surrounded the settlement, and a military unit from Alfea decided that killing the burned ones was more important than the lives of the people here."
"You are making this up," Bloom laughed as she shook her head, "I'm piercing the magic veil that Queen Luna placed to hide the atrocities that happened here. Think about that," she scoffed, "Leader of our realm tried to erase a war crime."
Bloom stood in shock while Enola stood frozen as much to her amazement as she could faintly hear the screams of the people who were killed.
Stumbling forward, she put her hands on the stone as an image appeared in her mind. Her eyes glowed pink as she saw what appeared to be a pink mirage of a confused woman, hunched over her child as she pointed up to the sky. Looking over to where she was pointing to, Enola could see four figures with their hands raised. The dusty pink figure suddenly moved to completely shield her child with her body just as a glow came from the city, causing the scene to fade away.
Enola blinked her eyes back to normal as she looked over at Beatrix, "You were born here," she spoke, her voice barely over a whisper. The mind fairy had no idea how she was able to fabricate the air fairy's memory, but by the reaction Beatrix gave her, she did.
"My family died here," Beatrix nodded as she looked over to Bloom, "Two days before your First World birthday."
"Do you think that I was born here," Bloom began before her eyes dimmed in understanding, "That my family was killed here?"
"Not think," Beatrix corrected, "Know."
"How do you know," Enola began watching as Beatrix rolled her watery eyes as she looked at the city.
"Because I saw it," Beatrix whispered, "You did too, didn't you. The bodies. The death," she looked over to the girls, "The someone scooped me up. Carried me away. As we ran, I saw them walking through the carnage like conquering heroes."
"Who did you see," Bloom asked, as the wind whipped her hair around her face.
"Dowling, Silva, Harvey," Beatrix said, as Enola's eyes glowed, relaying the memory to her as well. She couldn't believe it was all true, but Beatrix's mind told no lies.
"How do you know this is real," Enola began, shaking her head as she tried to make sense of it all, "You were a baby."
"Because the woman who saved me used her magic to burn the memory in my mind," Beatrix said as she turned to look at Bloom, who seemed to already know of the power, "Sound familiar."
"Rosalind."
☹ ☻
The car was silent as they drove back to the school. Each girl was thinking about what they had seen just a few minutes before. The haunting fact that their faculty, their leaders, were lying to them. That they weren't the good guys.
Beatrix decided to break the silence, naturally, as she looked up at her mirror to meet eyes with Bloom, "After the party, when you asked about Rosalind, I wasn't sure what to make of you."
Enola's eyes moved over to look at Beatrix, although her head remained against the window, as she found comfort in the cool glass on her forehead. Her eyes kept flicking in and out of pink and green as she kept waiting for a moment when Beatrix would slip and confess to being the greatest liar in all history. But it never happened.
In fact, the more she read her thoughts, pulling memories as well as she could since she had just discovered the ability, Enola was only more certain that Beatrix was telling the truth.
"Then I found out you were a changeling," Beatrix continued, "Did some math and put two and two together. But I wasn't sure until today."
"Does this mean that you were one too," Bloom asked, hopeful thoughts filling her mind, only to be shot down by Beatrix.
"Rosalind left me in the care of a close friend while she stashed you in the First World," Beatrix said, turning her head to look over at Bloom whilst she drove.
Enola wanted nothing more than to go back to the suite. Wash off the day and pretend like none of this happened. She wanted to be with Sam as he promised her that nothing would be wrong, before pulling her into the tightest, warmest hug in the world. Nobody else could make her feel better right now other than Sam.
"Because my birth parents, my real parents, were," Bloom trailed off as the thought of what her real parents may look like came into her mind before disappearing, "Dead."
Enola wanted to joke that Bloom's thoughts were too dark for their first-ever road trip together but couldn't seem to find the humor in it herself, as she thought of the illusion she had seen before her very eyes of all the people crying for help.
"It's a lot," Enola let out a mirthless laugh as she pulled her legs up to her chest.
"I carried that memory for years," Beatrix confessed, "Before I was able to fully understand what it meant."
"Why would Dowling bring me to the Otherworld if she killed my family," Bloom thought aloud, bringing up a good point. It wouldn't make sense for the headmistress to risk getting caught for murder just to have Bloom as part of the student body.
"Not sure if she's put the pieces together yet," Beatrix spoke, "and if I were you, I'd keep it that way."
In Enola's head, the answer made perfect sense. Dowling's thoughts never alluded to knowing anything about Bloom's origins, and Musa never mentioned her feeling any guilty emotions. Beatrix, of course, could still be lying about the entire thing and just wanted them to stay quiet, which is what Enola preferred.
"Which is exactly something you would say if you were making this up," Enola pointed out, moving so she could look at Beatrix, who s=tightened her hands on the steering wheel in frustration.
"Yeah," Bloom nodded her head, looking over at Beatrix in distrust, "Keep us from comparing notes."
"Why would I make up a story about our teachers being murderers," Beatrix asked the two girls, looking at them if they had grown two heads.
"You were always a bit weird," Enola muttered to herself, causing Beatrix to snap.
"Are you still doing this whole enemy thing," Beatrix snapped, turning to look over at the mind fairy. She seemed to calm down once again as she took in a deep breath, "Fine. You shouldn't trust me until I am trustworthy. That's what the faculty expects, and I am nothing like them. What you need are answers."
"Yeah," Bloom laughed, "From a woman who died and left nothing but half-truths. We need more."
"And we'll get it," Beatrix smiled, looking over to the girls, "Rosalind's alive."
"How," Enola sighed, looking over at Beatrix in defeat. She was tired of fighting Beatrix, as the fairy has so far proven herself to be trustworthy aside from her unlikeableness.
"Dowling imprisoned her," Beatrix spoke, with a proud smile, "And I am at Alfea to break her out."
"And you need out help," Enola began to ask, wanting to know what this escapade would entail. Just as Beatrix was going to respond to her, however, there was a screeching noise from the tires, causing all the girls to cower into themselves as the car halted to a stop.
"Shit," Beatrix mumbled, rushing to get out of the car, while Enola and Bloom looked to each other in shock before quickly following the fairy out. Their eyes widening as they watched Dowling step up to Beatrix before wrapping around some thorny steel trap around her wrists, causing the girl to scream out in pain.
"What are you doing," Enola asked, running up to help Beatrix along with Bloom before they were pulled back by Silva and Harvey as they began to assure the girls that everything would be alright.
Bloom fought against Silva while Enola fell to her knees, with Harvey rushing to catch her. She didn't know if she didn't fight against the man because she was dating his son and friends with his daughter, because he was a murderer, or simply because she was too tired. But she knew that everything would not be alright because of the one thing Beatrix said to her before Dowling took her away.
'Rosalind is the only one who can help you with your powers.'
☹ ☻
Enola felt disarmed as she sat in the backseat of the SUV beside Bloom. Both girls didn't know how to act as they numbly watched as the car halted to a stop before the doors were opened for them, a guard helping them out and onto their feet.
Before Enola could even process what happened, she was pulled into an enormous group hug as her suitemates crowded her with concerned thoughts. She gave the girls a smile as they broke away, "I'm fine," she spoke, looking to Bloom, who nodded her head.
"Yeah, fine."
Aisha rubbed their arms, "We were so worried about you."
"Legit freaked out," Musa nodded her head before pulling her twin sister into another hug before moving back as she felt the wave of fear and hysteria coming off her sister. She wore a strange expression as she tried to read her sister further.
"What did that bitch do," Terra asked, looking as they escorted Beatrix out in her magical handcuffs. Her dark red hair covering her expression, as she tripped over her feet, trying to follow them to wherever they planned to keep her.
"Nothing," Enola shook her head, uncomfortably rubbing her arms as she remembered what happened.
"She is not some monster," Bloom said with assurance as she tried to look and see where they were taking Beatrix. It was obvious to Enola that Blooom was willing to break the air fairy out if it meant getting the secrets she needed.
And after what Beatrix told her, Enola wasn't so sure if she would object.
"Bloom, she killed Callum," Terra scoffed, causing Bloom to frantically look between the girls.
"Who told you that?"
"Dowling, Silva, Harvey," Musa began to list as Enola thought back to the image of the three walking over the carnage with pride, not a second of hesitation in their eyes.
"And so you have proof," Bloom shot back.
Enola didn't say anything as she looked behind the girls at Sam, who was running to stand near the lit up entrance of the school, a look of concern on his face. She didn't need to read his mind to know that Musa told him everything. And she didn't even care.
Rather than remaining in her spot and acting like everything was fine before sneaking off the see him later, Enola took off, darting past the girls as she ran up to the Harvey boy.
Sam didn't hesitate as he wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her up into his arms before burrowing his head in her shoulder, pressing a light kiss on her neck as he whispered sweet nothings in her ear, "Hey, shh, I'm here."
"I," Enola began as she tried to put into words everything that happened, but Sam simply shook his head as his hand went up to rub her head. A soft melody taking the background of his other thoughts as he held her in his arms.
"It's okay."
All the earth fairy's thoughts were reminding her how reckless she was and how terrified he was that she would get hurt. Enola smiled as the sense of security she had been yearning for the entire time finally came over her, as Sam pulled her tighter into his arms.