A/N: Y'all love Sarah Paulson from the attention her characters are getting lol and I'm living for it. This one is really long and it's got a trigger warning for blood.
Reader is tested through the Seven Wonders and is observed by all the Robichaux's witches but supported mostly by Cordelia
I couldn't eat or sleep the previous night. Everything had to be perfect for this test or I'd feel like a failure of the Supremacy and of Cordelia. Misty helped me endlessly with my biggest challenge: resurging plants, small animals, and anything else. I honestly tried resurgence on myself because of how sleep-deprived and dead I felt at that point. It didn't really do much besides make me feel weird for a few seconds.
But the day finally arrived. All the other witches of the coven were sitting on the floor of the living room and fixed their multitude of eyes on me. Cordelia, Zoe, Misty, Madison, and Queenie stood beside the piano. I slowly walked up to them with a heartbeat so loud that they probably could hear it. My hands trembled slightly at my sides as I waited for Cordelia to give me the signal to begin.
She started her spiel about the ancient practice of the Seven Wonders and that was when I noticed it: my Supreme was gripping a thin, black cane to support herself in a standing position. Every time she'd met with me was either in her office while she was seated or when she was already waiting for me in my room in the evening. Cordelia was growing unstoppably weaker. It was all from my tireless practice throughout the previous week and it was draining my Supreme of her own power. I knew that it was how the ascension worked but I never expected it to be so serious. The strong, confident leader of our coven could barely stand up on her own and it was all because of me.
"Now, let's begin the Seven Wonders. The first event will be Telekinesis." Cordelia smiled gently.
I felt pretty confident about this one, it never felt that difficult to me and I'd managed to control waterflow well enough to flood the upstairs bathroom before. The only choice I had to make with this one was in deciding what to move so it would be clear that I possessed telekinesis. My gaze fell to the rug on the floor where some of the other witches were sitting, looking absolutely bored with my examination.
With no intention of being cocky, it seemed humorous for me to have the rug lift up off the ground with them on top of it. So I focused my mind and felt some pressure on my shoulders as I mentally commanded the rug to raise itself two feet off the floor. For a few seconds, the girls sitting on top of it were frightened at the strange situation they were put in until I gently released the rug from my control.
"Alright, outstanding work with Telekinesis. The next test will be Concilium, otherwise known as mind control." Cordelia congratulated, a hand placed over her abdomen as though she was experiencing pain.
"And don't try forcing us to do anything, we aren't part of your test." One of the witches who'd been lifted up with the rug snapped.
Her attitude took me aback but I decided not to bother with her. Instead, I looked directly at Cordelia and made her drop the cane, but walk perfectly on her own two feet. She made it across to the other side of the room and back. No one seemed too impressed at it besides Cordelia herself who'd been struggling to walk on her own in the last few days. I made her cane stand up on its own at her side with telekinesis, letting her get a grip on it before releasing my power over her mind.
"Thank you for granting me some of my last independent steps." She said sadly, tears welling up in her eyes, once I'd stopped.
"Wait, you were being mind controlled?" Zoe questioned, not entirely understanding that I'd made our Supreme walk on her own.
"Yes, I've been needing this cane to move around because my legs don't work as well as they used to." Cordelia admitted bitterly, sitting down on a leather chair and turning her attention back to me, "Go ahead and try Transmutation."
This was one of the hardest Wonders for me to complete from practice. It worked a few times but I could never move myself much further than a few feet away. The doubt was creeping into my mind, knowing that I weakened our Supreme but couldn't manage to perform Transmutation. Some of the witches observing me were whispering, maybe not even about my anxious state, but it fueled something inside of me to get away from the nerves they were causing and I suddenly found myself up in my room.
"Guys, I'm upstairs!" I shouted, informing them that I hadn't just vanished.
I focused myself again and, much faster, reappeared in the living room across from where I'd stood before. At least now there was a smile on my face and much less fear in my heart about whether I could pass this test. After all, I'd just completed one of the tasks that was more challenging for me.
"Descensum." Cordelia said, almost in a whisper.
The fear immediately returned. I'd never practiced this one because I knew how difficult it was to get out. That was, after all, how Misty died before someone brought her back years ago. I lied down on the ground as Queenie flipped over the hourglass, signaling that the event was beginning immediately. I muttered the spell and felt my soul leave my chest, feeling as though it were plummeting down through the floor to the center of the Earth.
Everything became clear momentarily. I was sitting in Cordelia's office with some of the meanest of the witches observing me from the side of the room. She kept telling me that I was a failure and could no longer stay with them, having to be kicked out of Robichaux's as well as being tossed back into the boarding school I used to attend where I couldn't stay out of trouble with my powers.
The teachers there were harsher, the principal always looking for an excuse to shout at me, and the students practically abusing me on a daily basis. Cordelia kept announcing over and over that I was to be kicked out, in a tone that suggested hatred towards me. The onlooking witches snickered and grabbed at me, pulling me out of the room by my arms. The scene reoccurred on a loop until I was mentally screaming for the illusion to end, knowing that it was nothing but a trick and that I had to get back now.
I sat up, loudly inhaling for air out of fear and nearly collapsed back onto the floor. It was such a painful vision that I refused to recount it for the witches around me, asking to hear what I'd seen. I wiped away the tears from my eyes, pausing to recharge for a few seconds before continuing. Cordelia told me to have strength and charged on with the next test:
"Demonstrate Divination for us. One of your belongings is in the hand of one of the Council members. You must tell us who has your belonging and what that belonging is." Cordelia instructed from her seat, the cane leaning against the arm of the chair.
Each of the older witches was now standing in a line behind the Supreme with their hands behind their backs. With just my vision, it would be a mere guessing game to figure out which one of them was holding something and what it was. I closed my eyes lightly and let my feet walk blindly. It was like some invisible force pulled them forward to the correct witch. My feet stopped and I was standing before Queenie.
"Whatever it may be, it's in your right hand, but give me a second to see what you're holding." I declared.
I shut my eyes again and felt as though someone was uncontrollably painting an image in my head. My mind couldn't think or see anything else even if I wanted to. It was a simple silver ring with a single larger stone in the center of the band.
"It's my silver ring." I announced.
Queenie shifted her arms to the front of her body and held her hands out, opening the right hand to show me the exact object I'd envisioned. It was, in fact, my ring. I took it back happily and looked at Cordelia for approval. She nodded weakly at me to assure that I'd passed, then told me to continue with Pyrokinesis.
This event was simple. I made a few small flames appear from my fingertips then directed them towards the un-lit fireplace. A loud noise thundered from the flames hitting the firewood under my power, causing a few of the girls closest to it to jump in their seated positions. But I turned to see the reason why the rest of the witches gasped and seemed startled.
On the leather seat beside the Council, Cordelia was slumped backwards limply with her eyes shut. She didn't seem to be breathing and the rest of the witches started talking amongst themselves in frantic whispers. I knew that the previous event must've absolutely drained her of power and that she may even be close to complete unconsciousness now.
In shock and quick thinking, Zoe piped up: "The last Wonder is Vitalum Vitalis and you can do it on Cordelia."
"But she's not dead." I pointed out, rejecting her thought.
"Yeah but we can kill her completely and you can try the Wonder on her." Madison added.
"Wait, no, you can't kill Cordelia. What if I fail? Then we'll be without a Supreme."
Madison rolled her eyes at me and used her telekinesis to retrieve a knife from the kitchen. She held it tightly in her hand and approached Cordelia's limp body, carefully steadying her aim to be just above where her heart would be. The knife went down and an audible gasp could be heard from all the girls just as it struck Cordelia's chest. Blood spurted out from her body and Madison pulled the weapon out of her, confirming that she would be dead in a few seconds.
The silence in the air was thick enough to cut with the knife Madison stabbed Cordelia with. I took a deep breath and resisted the urge to let the tears in my eyes to fall down my cheeks. My hands held Cordelia's and I leant in to where she laid. I whispered the words of the resurgence spell and breathed at her lips, carefully watching to see if I could detect any movement from her lungs.
Nothing happened initially. She just laid there as dead as a doornail and built up my anxiety even more by the second. It wasn't until I almost gave up all hope on her coming back to life that she sat up suddenly and gasped loudly for air. Her stab wound was no longer bleeding out. Cordelia stood up proudly and grabbed me into a warm embrace. I'd finally finished with the Seven Wonders without killing my Supreme. Well, former Supreme since I was now given that title. I had to endure such terrible tribulations to earn it that all I could think of doing then was transmuting back to my room and sleeping it off.