Evil has returned to the world. This there is no denying.
Three sisters, practical magic casters far from the great sorcerers of old, have set out with the completely realistic and attainable expectation of saving the known Realm. Fate sees them sum...
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Gia
When breakfast at last ended—which it felt like it never would—the sisters convened on a terrace overlooking the castle's gardens. The clouds had broken for the first time in days and allowed the slightest bit of the sun's light to bleed through what was otherwise a grey-and-white expanse of sky, but it did little and less to warm the chill that had settled over the sisters since their arrival.
Darkhaven's grounds were eerily silent aside from the sounds of nature: the song of the birds, the way the towering trees creaked in the wind, the distant rush of water passing under the bridge.
To Gia's right, Blowdwyn paced back and forth along the balustrade as she practised spinning a dagger in her hands, seething in silent but obvious rage. There were times she paused as if to say something, thought better of it, and wordlessly resumed her pacing.
To Gia's left, Roslin was fiddling with what looked to be a patch of weeds growing through the cracks in the terrace. She picked at closed buds of clover, or maybe creeping phlox. Gia squinted. It was phlox.
"What do we do?" asked Gia, standing at the balustrade but out of reach of Blodwyn's pacing. The sprawling gardens before them were as wild as they were beautiful—a tangle of rich greens and unkempt growth. She sighed and leaned against the cool, cut stone. "We're wasting time. What do we do?"
Roslin stood and dusted off her skirts. "We rest," said the middle sister to the oldest. "I don't think there's anything else we can do."
Gia offered a half-smile. "I know you're right. We've been doing so much for so long, though. I don't know how to rest. It feels like we're wasting time."
Roslin began tucking the little phlox buds into Gia's hair, letting her knuckles brush against Gia's cheek lovingly. "We all feel the same. I'm never one to be idle, you know it—"
Gia did know it. Roslin always had to be doing something.
"—But I don't think I've been this depleted since...ever. Not ever." She looked over Gia's shoulder at Blodwyn, who nodded.
Blodwyn, practising upward slashes, said, "I hate to admit it—," an empty jab at nothing, then a horizontal slash, "—but we're no use to anyone dead."
Roslin wrapped a final twist of Gia's hair with one of the phlox, smiling at her work before murmuring, "Florify."
Gia glanced down as the small buds opened, pink and purple and alive.
Roslin hummed, pleased with her work, before starting on her own hair. "At least we get to live like royalty for a few days."
That much was true. They'd had so few silver linings as of late that it felt nice to finally find one.
Blodwyn hopped up on the balustrade and took a seat facing Gia, legs dangling over the side. "Yeah, we get to live like royalty, my lady." Her eyes flashed over to Roslin.
