"I saw Will disappear days before it happened."
No matter what Blair did, no matter how much she moved or sat or simply just breathed, her hands wouldn't stop shaking, bones trembling and skin practically vibrating as she sat against the kitchen table and simply shook. And for the fifth time in the space of a minute, she found her aching eyes flickering over to the clock upon the wall, watching as time ticked past ever so slowly and praying to whatever greater force there was in the universe that Jonathan would hurry the fuck up and get here.
There was a tension wound deep inside her that threatened to explode with every simple creak from the old home, every flutter of wings from the birds outside, every stomach rumble, every single noise that echoed through her brain like a void canyon of all of her sins had her flinching in her seat, body curling in on itself as she remembered flowering teeth and clawed fingers stained with blood, blood, blood.
Her eyes clenched shut quickly, hands balling into fists once more as her short nails dug into her boiling hot palm, catching the scabs against it and not caring, focusing on the pain as she buried her nails in deeper, brows furrowing and nose scruchuing up against the panes of her face, the pain grounding and familar and yes, incredibly unhealthy but between her hideous anger, her overwhelming terror or the blissful numbness, she had really no other option but to hurt.
And then the most blissful sound of someone knocking on the door and then opening it reached her ears and her eyes snapped open, hearing Jonathan hesitatingly call out her name and she didn't waste a moment before rising to her feet and practically spitting towards the hallway, skidding across the floor as she tried to grapple with her footing, legs having gone slightly dead from lack of use only to freeze in her tracks when she noticed they had company.
Nancy Wheeler painted a rather strange picture in her untidy home, the girl was always looking so prim and proper with the perfect family life, perfect grades, perfect reputation, perfect personality, perfect everything...the complete opposite of who Blair was. The mousy brunette looked all sorts of nervous but somehow also determined as she stood in the doorway, openly meeting her gaze calmly and raising her thin chin in some sort of wobbly defiance that had Blair's eyes narrowing in distaste.
"What the fuck is she doing here?"
Jonathan and Nancy shared a flinch at the venomous sound of her voice, rough and low and brimming with a certain kind of threat that screamed 'danger - do not engage' as the Byers boy shut the door behind them, already begining to shrug his jacket off like he had done many times in the warm home that felt more like a sauna then anything else, a thin layer of sweat already gathering along his hairline but he couldn't tell if that was because if the heat or the anxiety formed in the pit of his stomach.
"I'm here because I think we saw the same thing."
"You think?! Did it have a face?" Blair snapped, looking at her indignantly with eyes flashing like a churning fire of something explosive and she crossed her arms, using the unblemished skin to start digging her nails into the soft part of her arm, practically shaking like a dog getting ready to piss itself as she took deep, calming breaths as her fear, her anxiety, her pure and unfiltered terror just made her angry...like everything else if her life did because she was beyond fucked in the head.
"No."
"Then we saw the same thing, genius." She smiled mockingly, running her trembling and rapidly paling arm through her messy hair to push her bangs away as they continued to fall over her eyes, the look more of a threat of flashing teeth than welcoming grin, already setting off to storm back into the kitchen just so she could do something with her body other than stand and stew like a woman who'd just found out her husband had cheated for the sixth time that month.
And it wasn't long until she could hear cautious footsteps following after her, hesitating in the entrance to the kitchen as Blair took to turning the kettle on with her forearms resting against the cool wood, her eyes firmly trained on the window as she looked at the reflection of the two out of the corner of her eye, watching as they looked at each other, how they opened their mouths and shut it like gaping fishes and tried to resist the urge to just throw one of the pots in the sink at their stupid heads.
"Blair‐"
"No. Fuck you for making me socialise asshole, I'm already scared out of my fucking mind and you decide to dump Harrington's girltoy on my lap?" She spun around to glare at him in annoyance, a disbelieving laugh escaping her throat that sounded anything but mouthful as she watched an offended look appear on Nancy's face, who wisely decided to keep her mouth shut when she noticed the dangerous glint in her eyes. Blair Jones was a well known bomb that was just waiting to blow up, ready to spark and burn and take everyone out with her if they were close enough.
Nancy didn't want to find out just how close she was to finally detonating.
"I'm sorry, okay? Not just for this but for everything. It's- it's just...Will's gone, okay? Mom is losing her mind and I'm struggling here! Now there's some- some thing that's stalking Hawkins and it's come for you too. We're all just trying to make sense of everything, but if you want us to leave...we will." Jonathan told her, his eyes flickering as he struggled to hold eye contact, wanting her to see just how much he meant it, all of it, but most specifically his apology.
She held his gaze for a long, terrifying moment before a sigh slipped through her lips, and she rose a hand to push her bangs out if her face and gave him a quick nod, both of their shoulders deflating in relief at the quick make up between the two that would leave anyone else absolutely stumped in confusion.
"Blair...what happened?" Nancy stepped forward unhesitatingly, feeling alot more confident than she had any right to be as she looked at the girl, just wanting to find any sort of clue on how to find Barb and hoping that she'd find some answers her, but the sound of her voice only made the dark eyed girl flinch as she threw her a dangerous look that told her to stay exactly where she was. In other words, away from her.
"Last night I- I got chased by some thing, I couldn't see what it was, just knew that it was hunting me and I ran for it...I guess i thought i lost it when I got home but then this morning i went outside and there it was! It attacked me but..." Blair found herself trailing off, remembering how that, that word had slipped through her lips without her permission, how the creature was sent flying after it tried to touch her and felt herself pause.
How the fuck was she going to explain that without sounding like she was losing her damn mind? However, upon further analysis, she simply decided that she couldn't bring herself to give a fuck. She knew what happened, she knew that she was telling the truth and that was all that mattered. Grams would of believed you, a voice whispered inside her head, but she stubbornly pushed that thought to the back of her mind just as quickly as it had overtaken hers.
"-But I said something, I said this word that my grams told me to say if I was ever in any danger and...and whatever it was couldn't land a hit on me." The silence that suddenly took over the kitchen was nothing short of deafening as they both stared at her in confusion and she could see in their eyes what they thought of her without the words even having to leave their parted lips. They thought she'd finally lost the plot. But it was Nancy that once again stepped forward, looking up at her cautiously as she began to speak awfully slowly.
"So...you think that saying that word protected you? Like it repelled the creature or something?"
"No? Yes? I don't know okay? All I know is that thing couldn't touch me after I said that-" And then a metathorial light bulb lit up over her head as her eyes flashed over to one of the shelves by the couch, gaze instantly zeroing in on one of the leather-bound books her Grams would always hold in her weathered grip and she quickly ran off towards it, sliding across the floor as her shaking and fumbling fingers pulled it off the shelf and quickly began to flick through it desperately.
She felt her heart gave a sudden lurch, like it was being seized in a strong grip and pulled down hard when her eyes came across a familar looking word. Scutum. Blair looked down the page, hoping to see something, anything that could help her but the words written in a different language in these books had never made sense to her...until they did.
The young girl could only watch in a mixture of horror and awe as the words seemed to shuffle around, switching places and dancing across the page like some articulate dance until it finally, finally began to be understandable. It was a protection spell, meant to repel those with evil intentions with a bubble like shield, the book said...no, not a book apparently as she slammed it shut and tucked it under her armpit, turning around to rush back into the kitchen.
Not a book, a Grimoire.
Unseen to her, Nancy and Jonathan exchanged rather concerned looks at her frantic movements as she stumbled back into her place at the head of the counter, slapping the grimoire onto the cool surface and beginning to shuffle through it again with her heart in her throat and eyes strangely teary as she was able to read everything for once because it didn't make any sense. None of this made any sense and it was starting to really freak her the fuck out.
"Blair...have you been sleeping enough?" Once again, it seemed that Nancy couldn't keep her mouth shut as she looked at the taller girl, taking note of the dark bags under her eyes, the shallowness of her skin and the way her cheeks seemed spread too thin over the bones of her face and felt her hesitation about being there rise ten-fold.
"Fuck off Nancy, I didn't hallucinate shit, especially if you're seeing the same thing." She kept her head down, not even giving the Wheeler girl the time of day or seeing her hurt look with her tone curt and venomous, trying to find an easy looking...spell that she could try to see if she truly was going crazy or if she was, well, something unnatural because if she was- if she was she was going to look into alcoholism.
"Blair, she's just saying-"
Jonathan began, about to jump to her defence like some valiant knight in shining armour while his friend, his best friend, his only friend began to teeter over the edge of something darker, trembling hands knotting through her thick strands of hair as her eyes continued to violently flicker around the pages, trying to make sense of it, and upon hearing the words about to be spewed from Jonathan's mouth, she finally released something that had been bottling up inside her for days.
"-I saw Will disappear days before it happened, Jonathan."
Silence. Absolutely deathly still silence took over once more after her confession, air tight and taunt with tension until it was all she could feel, wrapping around the three teenagers in a dangerous embrace of numbness as they each tried to process the information, tried to make sense of it, tried to understand it. Blair finally rose her gaze from where she was glaring at the grimoire, to look into Jonathan's eyes, to find a certain kind of indifferent grimace on his face, disbelief and anger fighting for a hold.
"What?"
"I watched him run through Mirkwood with that...thing chasing after him, okay? And then the night he went missing, I watched him go into that fucking shed and not come out but...God, it was like it was all in my head, like some shitty dream but- but I don't think it was." She ran a shaky hand across her forehead, feeling the still healing scab plastered across it and only just managed to resist the urge to dig her fingers inside it until it bleed, maybe the physical pain would lessen the emotional one currently swarming inside her like angry Hornets.
"What? And you didn't say anything?" Jonathan broke, slamming his hands onto the counter before gripping the edge of it tightly, because at the end of the day, even if he was struggling to believe what was going on, struggling to believe his brother had been taken by some creature with no face, that his mother had been right, that something strange was happening with his friend, the fact that Blair had kept it to herself, the fact that she'd allowed it to happen make his insides curl.
"What was I supposed to say!"
"You could of said something! Anything!"
"You don't think people think I'm crazy enough as it is? Blair Bitch having another one of her episodes again? Only this time shes going as coo-coo as her grams!" She screamed, chest heaving as more and more weight bared down upon her shoulders, making her feel like she was less being tethered to the earth but instead weighed down with an anchor, drowning in a pool of her own rage and hostility, shaking hands and trembling fists as she bared her threatening teeth.
"He's my brother, Blair! You should of- you- I don't-"
"I'm sorry, okay! I'm sorry but this, all of this is fucking terrifying and it feels like I'm losing my mind right now...but maybe we can still help him, right? There's got to be something-" Her eyes flickered towards the closed grimoire again, and this time, Jonathan's eyes followed after her, staring down at the dark book that felt all sorts of ominous as he tried to calm down, knowing that sitting there and screaming wasn't going to help anyone, especially not Will.
"Mom said she was talking to him through the lights, that it isn't his body and...and I believe her. But, I don't know what to do. We don't know what to do." Jonathan said, gesturing over to Nancy who was pressed against a wall, as far away as she could get from the two and somehow looking even more awkward after the attention had been brought over to her, clenching her jaw anxiously.
However, before she could say anything and potentially add on to the tense atmosphere, the book in front of Blair did a rather...strange thing, which happened to be suddenly slamming open without anyone touching it, the leather hard cover banging against the counter loud and dramatic, and making everyone jump in shock, staring down at it in something akin to the horror of the unknown. "Did you-"
"No."
And as soon as the confirmation left her parted lips, the pages of the grimoire began to flutter and then turn violently, pages flickering through the others, like a breeze was rushing over it as everyone staggered back with wide eyes, unable to do anything but watch as a hidden and invisible force searched through the book for something they couldn't understand.
It was over as quickly as it had started, landing on a double-sided page that looked connected, though Blair couldn't read it from where she was, but when she went to take a step closer, she was hit with a sudden scent washing over her, skin pricking and hair standing in edge as she felt like something...or someone had walked over her grave with the smell of stale whiskey and old books engraving itself in her senses...in her memories...so familiar and safe and warm.
"Grams?" She whispered, lower lip wobbling as another breeze brushed over her, pushing her messy bangs from her face like some sort of phantom touch that was gone, just as she raised her hand to touch the empty air in front of her. Her eyes clenched shut for a moment, just a moment as she held onto that feeling if comfort, before opening them again with a determined gleam shining through them as she looked over at the still shocked couple currently trying to blend into the wall.
The young girl finally moved away from where the sink pressed uncomfortably into the skin of her back to wander over to the table, tilting her head to the side as she read the chosen page with her brows lightly furrowed, ignoring the two as they fumbled over what to say.
"What is it?"
"I- I don't really know, hold on let me just- A spell that is able to create fires or ignite flammable objects such as alcohol, one of the most useful offensive spells a witch can learn in a true time of need." She quoted directly, translating the latin that Nancy was currently trying to look at, her voice stuttering when she read over the 'witch' part before becoming clearer once more as she took a deep, calming breath, trying to keep whatever it was that was bubbling up inside her contained, a horrifying mixture of fear and rage that had her ready to blow.
"Maybe it's a clue." Nancy said slowly, thinning her lips as she looked at the words written across the page that made absolutely no sense to her but apparantly made every sense to Blair, who's glare she felt digging holes into the side of her face until she rose her eyes to meet hers. "Like you said it's a spell to cast fire right? So...so maybe fire is the only thing that can hurt it, maybe this spell is the only way we can kill it."
"That makes sense."
"Nothing about this makes sense, fucking hell. Look I have no idea what's going on around here, but you can't seriously believe I'm a witch? I believe in ghosts, okay? Hell, I even believe in monsters but there's got to be a different explanation for all this shit." It seemed Blair had finally lost the cool facade she'd desperately been trying to keep, exploding with her face flushed and skin burning hot until all she could feel was anger coursing through her veins as she laughed hysterically.
"Then say it." Nancy said quietly, looking up her staring contest with the leather-bound book to look up at Blair who'd stopped her pacing to stare over at her in indignation, but she quickly continued before the girl could say something hurtful or blunt or, well, for lack of better word bitchy. "Say the spell... I mean, maybe you're right and this is all some freaky coincidence, maybe it's a hallucination and just bad dreams, but you'll never know unless you try."
Blair paused, body still, hardly moving and hardly breathing as she absorbed the words before her eyes glanced over to one of the many candles scattered around the kitchen, around the whole house really as she slowly walked towards it, her brave, almost confident stance wavering the second her fingers touched the cool wax as she dragged it over into the middle of the table and stepped back away from it as if burned.
"Blair." Jonathan suddenly said, causing her attention to snap over to him as he still stood at the opposite end of the room, now trying to smile at her, though she couldn't help but think it looked far more like a grimace of fear. "Whatever happens, we're right here. I'm right here, alright?"
She gave a jerky nod, mouth feeling dry and swollen in her mouth and she refused to embarrass herself by trying to speak as she moved closer, looking up at Nancy and Jonathan one last time for...something, reassurance perhaps, maybe even a hint of hesitation but they just continued to stare at her. Her dark eyes fluttered shut, and she raised a shaking hand and hovered it above the candle with a trembling sigh.
"Ignis absumet." And as soon as the words left her lips she heard a startled gasp, felt it wash over her ears like an ominous promise and she had to fight everything inside her body that told her to cry, to sob and to breakdown as she opened her eyes, dreading to see what she'd find...but it seemed nothing had happened, the candle her hand had hovered over was still not lit, just a normal candle in the middle of the table and a relieved laugh bubbled inside her throat as she dragged her palm over her face.
But when she looked over to Jonathan and Nancy, she realized that they weren't looking at her, weren't looking at her candle and, with a sudden heavy feeling stirring into her gut that felt like an aching, she followed their line of sight hesitantly...to see that every candle in the room was alight with amber flame, dancing through the shadows of the room with their strong energy and heat, all of them except the one she'd chosen alive with fire.
"Well...Fuck."