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Icy leans back against the bar behind her, legs crossed in front of her and glass cool in her hand, and surveys the club critically.
She’s no expert at the mental and emotional, not like Darcy, but the tensions simmering around her are nearly visible even without a tug at Darcy’s power rendering them in dark splotches of color. She doesn’t need her magic to pick upon that - she can read body language, thank you very much - but just because she doesn’t need to learn her sisters’ affinity doesn’t mean she won’t and Icy wants to practice.
She’s inelegant, frustratingly so, but she’s kept the hostility in the room from reaching fever pitch thus far and she’s feeling pretty good about keeping things that way.
The sophomores had wanted to let loose, and as one of the eldest Cloud Tower seniors, it’d fallen to Icy to chaperone. She’s not upset about it - it’s her duty. These girls aren’t coven, but they are sisters, and Headmistress Griffin has a fair hand - there’s a rotation. She won’t have to do this again until next semester, if she does her job well.
And. Well. It gives her a perfect opportunity to observe when the club’s entrance flies open and Darcy’s boytoy saunters in.
He’s with the rest of his little friends, the smart one and the idiots -
- and the wizard.
He’s tall and lanky and slender and pretty in a way that betrays mixed Linphean heritage. And he’s doing an absolute piss-poor job of hiding his wizardry.
She’s unsure if it’s a him thing or a wizard thing - he looks awkward enough to be as stupid as he’s being naturally, but wizards are so fucking arrogant that it’s impossible to tell which it is.
His clothes are soft and plain and comfortable, naturally dyed and woven not with magic but with clear signs of the skill and time and quality that wizards prefer - something about magic-crafting tainting it or some such. No one else has the money or inclination for apparel like that. And no one else is dressed like they’re a fucking monk; this is a club, after all.
Every witch in the club is looking at him. Icy’s pleased to note that her charges are uniformly subtle about it. He’s too stupid to have noticed if they weren’t, but that’s no excuse for sloppy work and her underclassmen know better than to disappoint her.
She’s not impressed, but it is just about what she would expect from Alfea and Red Fountain - power and fear and authority wrapped up in a neat bow of utter incompetence. They don’t need much else to spook their little knights and pixies into behaving.
They’ve never dealt with witches.
They, Icy can’t help but think as a familiar group of pixies pour into the club just behind their boys, have never dealt with coven.
The girls are dressed to go clubbing, ripped jeans and short skirts and fishnets and eyeliner. They look almost more witch than a fairy; Icy catches the smile the thought spawns before it can reach her lips.
Darcy, towing a reluctant Stormy behind her, appears like a whirlwind in their orbit, gaze zeroed in on her latest acquisition.
Darcy is an only child, and it shows - nowhere more starkly than her approach to dating. She likes to share good things with her sisters; that includes men. It doesn’t matter that Stormy would literally rather die than touch one, or that Icy hasn’t looked at a boy since their freshman year - she wants to offer and to show off and to include them.
Riven’s been - tolerant about it. For his sake, Icy hopes they end things amicably - that same attachment makes Darcy a fucking nightmare to break up with. Three exes have been permanently turned into small animals. One, Icy had fed to a freshman’s cat.
She can feel dark magic clinging to Bloom’s fingertips from here, the remnants of a recently cast hex shivering at the fairy blood that cast it. Stormy’s already throwing her arms around the fairy; good. No one else should be able to sense it - Icy hasn’t given anyone else one of her coven’s fucking grimoires - but it never hurts to be cautious. She thinks the magic complains as Stormy sweeps it up into her own nexus, but, well.
What dark magic wouldn’t thrill at the call of a fairy? Even one with mussed hair and dark eyes and lips painted so dark they look nearly black in the shitty, flickering lighting of the club.
Light magic, fairy magic - it doesn’t respond to her call the same way dark magic does Bloom. The fact that it responds at all would make her slaughter the entire fucking city of Magix, if it didn’t also respond to Stormy and Darcy.
She doesn’t approach. Riven’s the only one they have public cause to contact, and no matter how tolerable the brats are, they aren’t worth that.
Icy watches them for a moment longer, and then sighs. She drops her glass on the bar, and shoves off, and starts her rounds.
She finds Lucy slouched in a booth near the back of the bar, doing her level best to ignore the eye-searingly bright child latched onto her arm, and Icy has to take a moment to breathe.
“The fuck is a freshman doing here?”
“Hi!”
“Icy. Mirta. Mirta, never fucking speak again.” The threat is for Mirta’s benefit; judging by the way the child bounces her head, she picks up on it. Lucy ignores this. Icy raises an eyebrow, and then catches herself.
“If she dies, it’s on you.”
“Yes ma’am.” Lucy gives an exaggerated salute, something close to a smile in her dark eyes, and Icy sneers at her.
Lucy is a perfect witch in every way that counts; she’s talented and vicious and strong and dedicated. She’s Icy’s first choice as a partner when her sisters are unavailable for a reason. But she’s damaged, too - like they all are.
She’s not pretty. She’s striking, handsome when she bothers to try, but she’ll never turn heads the way Darcy does, the way Icy does. It’s pathetic, to insult another witch’s appearance, but Lucy is bad at hiding just how devastating those kinds of pointed insults are to her. That means she does not bother with anyone who so much as gives her a second look.
If she’s willing to bat for the idiot freshman next to her, if she’s willing to risk bringing her like this - if they were fairies, it would mean Mirta was a good person. As witches, however, it means that Mirta won’t last long at Cloud Tower. No one nice ever does.
“See Tall, Pretty, and Stupid?”
“The wizard? You know why he’s here?” Lucy’s cheer drops like stone, because she’s intelligent and sharp and knows when Icy’s operating on more information than her peers.
“Darcy’s new pet and his friends stumbled across something. Alfea and Red Fountain want it buried. He’ll try to pin it on one of us.”
The freshman’s eyes are huge. Lucy blinks, and then nods very slowly.
“We can fuck with him.”
“So long as you keep your distance, and keep the children away from him, enjoy yourself.” Icy says, and dips herself into the tiniest, shallowest little bow she can, because she is nothing if not theatric. Lucy throws her head back and laughs.
Icy’s hardly even reached the next knot of witches when the wizard yelps loudly enough to be heard above the music; she catches sight of him eating shit out of the corner of her eye.
Behind him, Lucy gives Mirta an approving nod.
X
Tensions skyrocket shortly after she finishes warning her charges, when another horde of Alfea fairies pour in. This is not the first club they’ve been to tonight; these girls are drunk and loud and uncoordinated and arrogant in a way fairies typically try to deny in the daylight.
By the time the shouting starts, Icy has a headache and frost on her fingertips, half-spent from the amount of work she’s had to put in. She’s ready to write it off as a lost cause and usher the sophomores outside a little early - and then she recognizes one of the voices. Recognizes the heat in the air.
She turns.
The fairy at fault is entirely forgettable, noteworthy only in the sheer ugliness of the sneer on her face and the words coming from her lips. She’s taller than Bloom thanks to a pair of ridiculously sized florescent pink heels, hands on her hips like she’s victorious already.
“ - freak from a hunk of dead rock not even worth the space it takes up! Your own homeworld didn’t even want you - “
“Earth is a fucking planet, you fucking bigot!” Bloom snarls. Her hair is already wisping with bright flame, hardly noticeable under the club’s flashing lights given how she’s teased and mussed it out for the night.
The music pixie is hovering nearby, and they make eye contact. This argument has been going on for a while, Icy summarizes, which explains why when the idiot fairy opens her mouth next and spews out a bunch of insults more slurs than actual words, Bloom’s entire body flickers.
Oh, for fuck’s sake, Icy thinks, and the music pixie trades a despairing look with her.
“I have had it up to here with you talking shit about my fucking home like Earth not having magic makes me or its people any lesser! You don’t even know what a fucking atom is and you think you get to lecture me on culture?”
So the idiot’s not from Zenith, Icy summarizes. More interesting than the argument is Bloom herself.
She’s pissed. She’s a little tipsy. And she’s clearly been defending herself and her home for much longer than just this one night. Which is, in of itself, interesting.
Magix is particularly stringent about its bigotry towards witches in very peculiar ways that arise almost entirely out of the presence of the schools. Alfea has always turned a blind eye to it - but does, on occasion, condemn those who go ‘too far’ in acting on their prejudices. Alfea never admits to any personal culpability and never frames the abuse as something systematic - or even individual. The last official statement had made vague allusions to disappointment and a call to get along.
The fight Icy is witnessing implies that prejudice against Earth is a whole other deal; one that Alfea and its fairies are perfectly willing to embrace whole-heartedly.
And here Bloom is, so angry and furious and so willing to defend her planet that she’s earning her wings over it. The lighting is too poor to make out much of Bloom’s transformation, but Icy catches glimpses of sparkling fabric and a skirt in a shade of blue too dark to match Bloom’s eyes.
Oh, what a waste. Bloom would have made such a spectacular witch.
The shouting raises in pitch, and the back of Bloom’s shirt warps. Icy’s reaching out before she has time to think, and the music fairy - Musa - is falling in step with her, her arm linked through Bloom’s other. Bloom’s already doubled over, apparently shocked. The other fairy has already turned away - she doesn’t see Bloom’s transformation pulse harder, less flickering and more clinging now.
The back door to the club opens when Icy slams her weight into it, and the three of them tumble out into a back alley. The crash of the door slapping shut nearly makes her jump.
Without the light of the club there to distort things - Bloom looks like shit. She’s pale, and her eyes are bruised and dark, and she seems frail in a way Icy has never associated with her, even when she’d had no control over her power, even when Icy had thought her to be nothing more than a non-magical Earth girl.
“What the fuck - “
“You’re getting your wings, hun.” Musa says, and Bloom’s back shifts again. There’s a sound, something wet and tearing and familiar in a way that leaves Icy cold, and just like that - Bloom’s transformation is complete. She’s still doubled over, eyes huge and wide and mouth twisted into a grimace, but there are a pair of gossamer wings shivering in the night, joined to her back above her shoulder blades.
She’s wearing a skirt and a backless crop top, shimmering like the night sky in a blue too light to perfectly match Icy’s own but close. She’s got ankle boots on in the same color, the treads a touch darker, and there’s an orange gem at her throat. There is a very tiny pin in her hair, three scale-like pieces of metal gracing the top of her head like a crown, and sheer coverings on her arms.
“My fucking back hurts.”
“Yeah, you have wings now.” Musa repeats.
“What the fuck, jesus christ, motherfucking goddamn, I hate that, please tell me it won’t be like that ever again, why the fuck do you do this all the fucking time?”
Icy sighs.
“Told you. Witches are superior.”
“Is it too late to transfer?” Bloom croaks, and - Icy can’t help the laugh that escapes her. She flicks her fingers towards herself and Bloom hobbles closer; Icy reaches out and presses a hand between Bloom’s wings. She ignores the brush of them against her arm, velvety and damp, and freezes the flesh beneath her fingers. Bloom lets out an audible groan of relief.
She wasn’t ready for her wings, Icy thinks, and that’s - peculiar. Most fairies earn theirs as teenagers; increasingly, as pre-teens. Bloom is late, and still her transformation is - it isn’t ready.
“You know how muscles atrophy if you don’t use ‘em? Wings are kind of similar. Gotta build up the muscles you’re missing. It’ll ache like a bitch once you start flying.” Musa advises, and Bloom whines.
“This is fucking stupid. It - does it look wrong? It - feels wrong.”
The music fairy shoots Icy a sharp look, but Icy’s already nodding. She can’t ignore the way Bloom wilts a little, the way she looks relieved.
“That’s what that is?” Musa asks, and - well.
“Witches only lend grimoires to other coven members. Sisters can…sense each other.” She says quietly. She can’t feel the music fairy, not yet - but she can feel, has been able to feel, Bloom. She’d eat her fucking heels if the whole lot of fairies couldn’t feel each other in some way by now.
“Can I change this shit? The fuck am I doing in a skirt? Where are my pants?” Bloom asks sharply. Musa reaches forward and smushes Bloom’s face in her hands.
“Yes. I can show you how later. Try to keep moving your wings, it will help. What do you mean your magic feels weird?”
“I’m a cowbird.” Bloom says flatly in response, and Icy -
“What the fuck are you talking about.”
“They lay their eggs in other birds’ nests.”
“…That’s called a changeling, you idiot pixie.” Icy says, but she’s - she has to swallow back the laugh that nearly tears out of her, because Bloom’s already shaking her head and she looks miserable.
“It’s a - disguise. Right? My magic’s - disguising me. That’s - it’s like I’ve got a sheet over my head.”
Oh.
“That’s…ingenious.” She says softly. She’s never heard of a homeworld taking such intense measures to protect its fairies before - fairies are meant to protect the homeworld, not the other way around. But there are homeworlds that genuinely love its children. Zenith, for one.
And -
“How can you tell?”
“Why the fuck else would I light myself on fire when I get mad now but not when I was on Earth?”
Because she’d blow her cover is the obvious answer. Because she’d no longer be hidden.
“You’re - you think your power is sentient.”
“I don’t think shit. Back aches too much for that. Freeze me again please.” The last is a plaintive whine, and Icy obliges automatically; this time she grows chunks of ice on the base of Bloom’s wings, and the fairy straight up just sinks to the ground, hunched over herself in a little ball.
“I hate this so much.” Musa breathes, and then scrubs her hands over her face. She smears her makeup something horrific.
“You have no room to complain.”
“She hasn’t been sleeping. Keeps having weird nightmares. Lit herself on fire while asleep a couple times, which should not be possible. Magic doesn’t work like that. Now she gets her wings, but she’s in pain? I don’t know what to do! Can’t carry you around to freeze her fucking solid every time it gets bad!”
“It’s called an ice pack.” Icy snaps, but - she files that information away for later consideration.
Bloom is interesting. It’s why she and her sisters bother with the fairy at all. She’s not mysterious purely by virtue of having no fucking clue what’s going on - and that is fascinating, because all of that mystery is just Bloom.
“She’s gonna start transforming in her sleep, now.” Musa says, snapping Icy out of her thoughts. She blinks, and then looks down at Bloom, and then back up to Musa.
“You’re serious.”
“Got any spells for dealing with that?”
“Don’t let her sleep on her back. Keep an eye out for sleepwalking.” Icy adds, because it seems the logical conclusion to draw. Judging by the absolute horror on Musa’s face -
“And that bitch! I’m gonna - I am going to knock her fucking teeth out - “ Bloom lurches to her feet, hair alight with flame again, and tries to shove past the two of them. She still hasn’t straightened fully; this ends with her leaning heavily on their shoulders.
“Oh, this will be interesting.“
“Bloom, you can’t use your wings to fight another fairy, that’s an automatic expulsion!”
“Who the fuck needs wings? I can throw a punch!”
For all their insane circumstances; Musa is still a fairy. Icy expects her to scold Bloom, to say no, to do absolutely anything other than pause, tilt her head, and grin.
“I’ll hold her down. Icy, you want her friends?”
Icy can’t hide her surprise - but oh how satisfying the offer is.
“Now that is my kind of evening entertainment.”