Death's Echo

Chapter 10: Finding Home Again

Agatha sat by a stream alongside the witches' road, knees drawn up to her chest, arms wrapped tightly around herself as if she could somehow hold the shattered pieces of her soul together. The soft murmur of the water over the rocks was the only sound that seemed to ground her, but even that felt distant, like it was too far away to pull her back from the abyss she teetered on.

Behind her, the fire crackled, casting faint light over the coven as they huddled in quiet conversation. They hadn't spoken to her since the trial. Maybe they knew. Maybe they understood that what she had been through—what Rio had been through—was beyond words.

There was no comfort that could ease this kind of pain, no kind words that could stitch up the raw, bleeding wound the trial had left behind. And for that, Agatha was thankful for their silence. She didn't have the strength for pleasantries, didn't know how to string together words that didn't scrape against the jagged edges inside her, cutting her deeper with every attempt.

She felt fragile, so fragile. Held together by nothing but a thin, trembling thread that threatened to snap under the weight of her grief. She could feel it unraveling, could feel the pieces of herself slipping away like sand through her fingers.

In a strange way, Agatha was thankful she didn't have her magic.

It was an odd blessing, to be powerless right now. She knew herself too well—knew the darkness that lurked inside her, the rage that could tear through her like a storm when she wasn't in control. She had seen it before—lived through it before. After they lost Nicky the first time, she had become something else entirely, something monstrous. She had let the grief consume her, let it try and fill the gaping hole that Nicky's death had left behind. She had unleashed a fury on the world that even terrified her.

She had made the world feel her pain, made sure that every soul who crossed her path suffered for what she had lost. She'd become the thing her mother had always warned her about, the thing her mother had said she would turn into—a monster. And for a time, she didn't care.  She didn't fight against the name—she embraced it.  The devastation she wrought had been her only comfort, a twisted balm for the emptiness inside her.

But it was never enough.

No matter how much power she took, no matter how many lives she ruined, it never filled the void Nicky had left behind. She had stolen magic from witches more powerful than her, had torn apart covens and kingdoms alike, all in the name of vengeance she couldn't even name. She thought that if she just kept feeding the darkness, kept taking and taking, eventually, she'd feel whole again.

But it never worked.

Agatha's throat tightened at the memory, the pain of those years still fresh in her mind. She had lost herself in that grief, let it drown her until there was nothing left but anger and hate. It had taken nearly a century to pull her back from the edge.

But without her magic—without that outlet—she was left with nothing but the pain. No way to make the world suffer like she had. No way to make it all go away. And maybe that was the point. Maybe she wasn't supposed to run from it this time. Maybe she was supposed to sit with it, let it hurt, let it tear her apart, and still find a way to survive.

Her fingers twitched as if searching for something they couldn't grasp. She rubbed them together, feeling the phantom sensation of Nicky's hair slipping through her fingers, soft as silk, curling at the ends like it always did.

The memory of his weight in her arms was still so vivid—so real.

She had felt him.

She had felt his warmth, his heartbeat against her chest, if only for a fleeting moment.