Chapter Text
There were two solid weeks of this soul-crushing cycle. Cordelia would have a dream about Misty, wake up, and lay awake in her bed, going over the events of that fateful day that she was declared Supreme. After over two weeks, that once wonderful day in the blonde’s memory was now overwhelmingly tainted by her failures. Her failure to prevent discord between the girls, her failure to teach and prepare her students well enough for the Seven Wonders, and her failure to pick up on Misty’s hesitance. These dreams that she had been having about Misty ranged from that domestic dream she had the first night, to violent nightmares where she lost control of her power and accidentally murdered the young necromancer. Those nights she woke up screaming, tears streaming down her cheeks.
The first night that had happened, Cordelia laid there clutching her pillow like a child, sobbing into the soft surface as she attempted to calm down. She looked up when a gentle knock sounded on her bedroom door. She sat up in bed and quickly wiped the tears off her face before addressing the visitor.
“It’s late, who is it?” Cordelia called out towards the door, trying really hard to assume a microcosm of control in her voice.
“Miss Goode, we heard screaming. Is someone in there with you?” Kyle’s voice was muffled from behind the door, but the older witch could tell that he was incredibly worried.
“Miss Cordelia, we need to make sure you’re alright, you woke up half the house.” Zoe’s voice was more annoyed than usual, but Cordelia could almost feel her concern.
Cordelia swallowed down the tears threatening to spill over, and willed the door open. Zoe and Kyle traipsed in. Kyle had his flashlight cautiously drawn, ready to take down any potential threat to the Supreme. Zoe rushed to Cordelia’s side, hesitating for a moment to take in the sight of her Supreme. Even in the dim light from Cordelia’s bedside, Zoe could see the faint puffiness around the older witch’s eyes, the new tear tracks forming along her unevenly colored cheeks.
“Are you alright? Have you been...crying?” All the annoyance had dripped out of Zoe’s voice, sinking it into only a concerned whisper as the young witch wrenched the pillow out of Cordelia’s white-knuckled grasp and laid it back in its spot. Before Cordelia could protest, Zoe got up on the bed and turned to the blonde.
“Is it alright if I touch you? Madison used to have these panic...things and she got so scared when I would tou-” Zoe was interrupted when Cordelia suddenly clung to her, sobbing quietly, but shuddering violently on her shoulder. Zoe was shocked by the emotionally decimated state of her Supreme, but recovered quickly, squeezing the crying woman in a tight embrace. Kyle came out of her bathroom and turned his flashlight off, setting it on Cordelia’s bedside table next to the polaroid. His curiosity got the best of him, and he picked it up, looking at it intently.
“Is...Is that Misty?”
Cordelia’s head shot up from its perch on Zoe’s shoulder, and Kyle flew back from the picture like it was an explosive. Kyle’s back slammed against the wall, and he sat there, slumped over.
“Oh my god, Kyle!” Zoe moved from the older woman’s embrace and dove down to the floor to attend to her boyfriend, while Cordelia got up and bent down to retrieve the fallen polaroid. She took a look at it again, her breathing grounded by this image of her favorite necromancer in the presence of good food. She eased down on the silken sheets of her bed, her face now twisted in a hesitant smile. Cordelia was snapped out of her fixation on the Polaroid by the shouting of her name.
“Cordelia!” Zoe’s brows were furrowed, an expression of indignant anger as she tried rousing a passed out Kyle. Cordelia calmly got up from the bed and gently laid the photo on the wrinkled pillowcase, before striding over to Kyle. She sunk to his eye level and held his head up by his chin with her hand. She took a deep breath. Her dark eyes began to glow amber in the dim light.
“Et erit excitare ” Cordelia intoned in Latin, stepping back when the young man shuddered awake, rubbing the back of his head in pain and confusion.
Zoe pounced on him, capturing the disoriented man in a hurried hug.
“Wha’ happened?” He groaned out. “I was lookin’ at that photo and then I… just got pushed back, n’ everything went dark.”
“That photo is one of the only things I have left of her. Touch it again, and you’ll feel a lot worse, Mr. Spencer.”
Both the servant and witch looked up at Cordelia, her face shadowed in a stern expression as she looked down on them.
Zoe’s concern for her boyfriend turned to disappointed resentment for her Supreme. How could she...just hurt Kyle like that? For looking at a photo of Myrtle? She was certain there were other photos of the fashionable witch out in the world. Zoe took a beat to glare at the blonde witch before helping up Kyle and leading him out of the room. The door slammed behind her. There were girls anxiously waiting for news of the Supreme in the hallway.
“Hey, Ms. Benson, is Miss Goode okay?”
“Yeah, did you find out what’s wrong?”
All the girls came towards them, questions bubbling from their anxious lips. Zoe turned towards them, confusing clouding her delicate face.
“She’s fine, I think. Just a nightmare.”
The girls shuffled off to bed, some of them relieved, others disappointed, as Zoe helped Kyle into their bed.
When Zoe slipped below the covers, she couldn't help but stare at the ceiling. Cordelia had obviously been hurting ever since Myrtle’s death, but how could she
hurt
Kyle like that? She had always prided herself on being a way gentler Supreme on her mother, but injuring a servant over a photo was a Fiona-esque action. She turned over towards Kyle, meeting his eyes as she stroked his cheek and jaw affectionately.
“Are you okay? You hit that wall pretty hard. Want me to kiss it better?” She spoke quietly, her voice dropping to an alto growl as she quirked her brows at him. He chuckled, and turned away, an easy smile forming on his boyish face.
“That’s a tempting offer, Z. But I’m really concerned about Miss Goode. Is she alright? I couldn’t find anyone in her room to hurt her, but that was her scream.” His smile dropped off his face.
“She mentally drop kicked you, and you’re worried about her?” Zoe quietly admonished as Kyle looked back at her, shocked at his girlfriend’s demeanor.
“She’s hurting. I know what that’s like, and I don't really blame her. She lost someone really important to her, and I messed with her stuff. It’s my fault.” He shrugged, smoothing back his messy locks as he slightly sat up in bed.
“Doesn’t give her the right to launch you. I don’t get what’s so important about the photo anyway, there are so many photos of Myrtle around Robichaux’s anyway…” Zoe trailed off, looking at her boyfriend. Kyle shook his head.
“The photo wasn’t of Ms. Snow.” He said uneasily.
“It wasn’t? Who was it, then?” Zoe sat up as well, inquiry playing on her lips. Kyle sighed, his heart sinking slightly.
“It was Misty.”