Fire and Ice - Riven | Fate: The Winx Saga

Chapter Twenty-Six: Dowling's Side

"How'd you get on with Dowling?" Bloom asked as I approached her outside the east wing.
"Well, let's see. I asked her about her not knowing my parents and she didn't even deny it." Bloom frowned at me. "Don't worry. She doesn't know we know about Aster Dell or Rosalind. I just hope that Beatrix is telling the truth." Bloom nodded. "What happened with Sky?"
"I gave him a sedative." She told me.
"You what?"
"I trust him, Eira, I do. It's just- he would stop us." I took a deep breath and nodded. She was right. "And we sort of, um... kissed."
"You kissed him and then knocked him out?" I questioned.
"I gave him the sedative before we kissed. I didn't know it was going to happen."
"Well, I ship it." I smiled. "You two seem more suited to each other."
"I just hope he can see that what we're trying to do it right." Bloom admitted.
"Yeah. Me too." I said.

We started walking around the corner and frowned when we noticed who wasn't guarding the door to Beatrix. "Where's Dane?" I asked Bloom. 
"I'll text him." She said as she pulled out her phone. We stopped walking as we waited for a reply before we were approached by Aisha and Terra.

"He's not coming." Terra told us.
"What the hell are you doing?" Aisha asked us before dragging us into the open door on our left. "Breaking Beatrix out?"
"Dowling has been lying to me." Bloom told them. "To both of us."
"Everybody has been lying." I added. "You don't know what we know."
"We do. Dane told us about Aster Dell." Aisha said.
"So, you get it? You understand that w-" Bloom began before she was cut off.
"No. No. My dad would never do something like that." Terra frowned. "And Beatrix is a liar and a murderer."
"Your his daughter and your Dowling's little helper." I said. "We're not gonna convince either of you."
"I am not Dowling's little helper. I've been spying on the woman for days for you." Aisha claimed. "And anyway, your her daughter why are you going along with this?"
"Because she lied to me, Aisha." I frowned.
"I've seen her trying. They've all been trying to keep us safe."
"They lied about a woman being dead for 16 years, about war crime!" Bloom exclaimed. "I get that you guys wanna believe in them, but they're destructive, maybe dangerous!"
"Listen to yourselves. You literally sound like crazy people." Terra told us.

I scoffed and tried to leave only to be grabbed on the wrist by Aisha. "We haven't told anyone what you're doing. And if you give us the key, we won't." She told me. "But if you don't... I don't want to see either of you in the cell next to her."
"Can you just let go of me, Aisha?" I questioned before my eyes glowed white and the girl winced and pulled her hand back. Her and Terra looked at me with fear in their eyes and I turned around to see Bloom.

She was stood there with glowing orange eyes and an angry look on her face as she stared straight ahead at Aisha and Terra. "Bloom." Aisha frowned.
"We're your friends, Bloom." Terra cried. Bloom's face then dropped. Her eyes returned to her normal colour and her face looked more worried and scared than anything. I then watched as reached into her back and pulled out the trinket.
"Bloom, what are you doing?" I asked her. She ignored me and placed the trinket in Aisha's hand.
"I know how hard this must be-"
"You don't." Bloom stated. "Neither of you do."

Bloom then left and I frowned at Aisha and Terra before running after her. "What the fuck?" I questioned. "Why'd you give it to them? That was our only chance at learning the truth."
"Don't you think I know that?" Bloom shouted.
"So what do we do now?" I asked, much quieter.
"I'm gonna confront Dowling." Bloom told me. "I have to see Rosalind."
"Do you think that's a good idea?" I asked her. Bloom started to walk away from me but she turned back. "Are you coming?"
"Probably not the best idea but it's not like we have any others." I sighed.

***

We stormed straight into Dowling's office and the woman looked up at us. It looked as though she had been crying. "Excuse me." She said.
"I wanna see her." Bloom told her. "Rosalind."
"I told you. She's-"
"We know that she's alive so don't lie again." I frowned. Farah then looked at her phone and sighed.
"I don't have time for this right now."
"I'm from Aster Dell." Bloom told her. "Yeah. That's where I was born. That's where my birth parents lived. That is until you, Mr Silva Professor Harvey destroyed it."

Farah frowned and slowly turned around so that her back was facing us. "Is it true?" I asked.
"How could you do that?" Bloom whispered. "How could you think that killing burned ones is more important than people's lives?"
"You think we did it on purpose?" Farah questioned.
"That's what Beatrix said. That Rosalind had a crisis of conscience, and you did it anyways."
"Rosalind... She's still manipulating people after all these years."
"What does that mean?" Bloom asked the woman. "Tell me what happened that day."
"That day, I made a mistake." Dowling admitted. "Rosalind was my mentor. The most powerful fairy in Alfea. Feared but respected. I never doubted her, never questioned her. So when she told us about the burned ones at Aster Dell, we followed. The magic we unleashed that day was immensely powerful. Till then, we didn't know fairies could combine their magic. It was a secret Rosalind kept. Not the first. Still, we never questioned her. She told us she'd taken pains to evacuate the village. She told us only burned ones would be killed in the blast. We should've questioned her. When we realised what she'd done... what we'd done... That day has lived in my mind for sixteen years." The woman explained. "And I am reminded of it everyday that I look at you, Eira."
"You found me there." I whispered.
"I found you about a mile away from the village centre." Farah told me. "The only survivor that we found." She then turned to Bloom. "There are no words that I can say that can make right the damage I have caused you both."
"Why would she do that?" Bloom asked, shaking her head.
"She was a zealot. She wanted every burned one dead,  I matter the distance. She thought if she told us she couldn't evacuate, that we'd have said no. She'd have been right."
"What about me? Why did she save me? Why did she put me in the human world? Why did she tell me-"
"That much I do not know, Bloom. Rosalind kept many things from me."
"Which is why I want to see her." Bloom said. "Beatrix said that keeping her under the school-"
"Whatever she has to give you is not worth unleashing her back into the world for." Farah told us. "I will help you get the answers you need. I give you my word."

I turned my head when I heard footsteps and Silva entered the office. "We need to go." He told Dowling. "Now." He then left the room and me and Bloom looked back at Farah.
"Tomorrow." She told us.