Eye of the Coven: Season 1

Season 1, Episode 11: So Blessed Be

SCARLET

Scarlet's eyes spring open at the scent of smoke wafting through her bedroom. The four walls around her are painted mint green, featuring posters of Korean bands and dream catchers her friend at summer camp showed her how to make. The bedroom is pitch black except for a slanted glow of yellow streaking across the white carpeted floor. Scarlet sits up in her bed, rubbing her eyes with her hands. Stars darker than the room dance before her vision. She listens for any sign of her parents fighting downstairs or across the hall in their own room but the house seems silent, for now.

Creeping up out of her bed, Scarlet presses the side of the face to the floor, peering under the crack between the door and the newly swept carpet. She blinks, letting her eyes adjust to the wavering light blinking against the walls and the banister over the staircase. Why did her mom and dad leave all the lights on?

Scarlet lifts herself back up onto her knees, glancing at the time on her alarm clock over her shoulder. 3:03. She bites down on her bottom lip. She doesn't want her dad to come barreling out of his own room if he hears her slip out into the hallway and then down the steps. But the light that's inviting itself to the second floor doesn't seem like it's from a bulb. It seems like it's light from a bonfire. Scarlet had one almost every night last summer at camp. She would watch the flames wave to her, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. Every time she came back to the pit and a new fire was lit, she felt like the same flame was there, staring and waving. As if they were long-lost friends.

Scarlet holds her breath, slowly opening the door of her room. She peeks out into the empty hallway, her parents' room shut tight. She tiptoes across the floor, holding her breath in an attempt to make herself lighter and quieter. When she reaches the stairwell, that's when she sees it: a roaring fire at the bottom of the stairs, crawling up the walls and enveloping the fake family memories that are plastered almost everywhere. The entire house is cluttered with them, photos that are forced happiness and vacant smiles. Scarlet almost stays where she is, wanting to watch the family photo of her and her parents with her parents' friends on Halloween. The couple was dressed as doctors during the black plague era.

But then it occurs to Scarlet that the entire first floor of her house is burning to pieces. She backs up against the wall, a photo of her parents on their wedding day fumbling to the floor. She takes off down the hallway and opens up the door to the master bedroom. "Mom, dad!" Scarlet croaks, sleep catching in her throat. "The house is on..."

She stops speaking. The sight is too horrifying for her to go on. The entire bedroom belonging to her parents is up in flames, the ceiling crumbling down towards the door leading into their private bathroom. The walls are warping in a way that proves they were never as strong as Scar believed them to be.

"Scarlet..." Anita, Scarlet's mother, is a rotting body, crawling over the floor. She's covered in burns, her skin no longer copper colored like before. It's blistered, peeling into large curls and exposed flesh burning from the heat. The entire left side of her face has been morphed into one that belongs to the deceased. Like she was never really alive to begin with. "Help. Please, baby. Help me."

Fingers wrap around Scarlet's arm, so tight that it could cut off her circulation. "Come on. We're getting out of here."

Minx is yanking her into the hallway where Ephraim stands at the top of the stairs, using his powers in attempt to freeze the fire crawling up the steps. He's failing.

"What are you guys doing here?" Scarlet asks them, tripping over herself as Minx pulls her down the hall that now stretches endlessly into the distance.

"Saving you." Minx tells her as they start down the long hallway together, the doors covered in not only memories of Scarlet's mother but of Minx's family as well as Ephraim's.