Chapter Text
Eli felt it again, that pull. She rolled her eyes, the Salem seven had found a new mouse to toy with. That meant that Eli was now temporarily on top of the food circle thingy that they had going on. Whenever they found a new target, they stopped hunting her and the tables turned.
It was like a game. Neither could kill each other, in fact no one could kill Eli until the Salem seven were dead. It was like a weird souldbound thing, except anyone else could kill the Salem seven. The Salem seven however, were very hard to kill.
Something felt different about this target, there was more than one. Her heart was pounding, she could feel them starting to attack. She said this every time but maybe these people had a chance of killing them and freeing her.
She knew she was going to regret this but she closed her eyes and let the shadows take her to them. When she opened her eyes she was met with a face, not much older than hers. Well, not much older than she looked.
His eyes were brown and he had dark, curly hair. He was sitting in an armchair looking quite nervous. She frowned glancing at the window next to him. She felt the string around her heart tighten and she pulled him out of the chair.
Sure enough, a second later, the glass broke and one of the hags burst through, clawing at the chair that he had been sitting in. He looked at Eli, a mix of confusion and fear on his face.
"How did you..?" He breathed. She shrugged, really wanting to get out of this place. She grabbed his hand and led him to the centre of the house, away from Windows and doors. The disembodied screeches were growing louder by the second.
"Oh my god!" He screamed, whirling around in terror at the sound. The house was shaking now, a snarl drew Eli's attention towards the door where one of them stood, approaching quickly.
The boy took off, screaming someone's name, followed by Eli. There was a creaking noise and then a thud from somewhere below them.The boy stumbled down a set of stairs, going towards the noise. Maybe he had back up?
They stumbled down the stairs, shouting. "Agatha! Is this it? Is this the road?" He asked whilst running towards what looked to be five witches standing over a hole in the floor. "Because we should really, really go, like, right now" he told one of the witches.
She moved out of the way and he ran down into the hole, Eli followed him murmuring some greetings at the witches. The hole turned out to be a giant spiral staircase. The blue glow gave it an ominous feel to it, but anything was better than the Salem seven again.
She heard the others clambering down a few seconds after them, she assumed they'd realised who Eli and the boy had been running from. The further down they got, the more tree roots ran along the walls. Eventually it opened up into a forest looking place.
Eli narrowed her eyes, who has a whole forest in their basement? She glanced at the boy who was looking around in awe at the place. Apparently this was new to him too. The others came into view and Eli finally got a look at them.
They looked less than ideal to kill the Salem seven. God, she had been so stupid to think they could free her. Of course they couldn't, no one could. That was the whole point of her curse in the first place.
The one dressed in purple watched her closely as she introduced herself. A few nodded as she told them her name. She didn't want to share too much information though, so she just stuck to who she was, no mention of her curse.
"Right, and why are you here again?" The purple witch stepped closer as she asked, eyeing the boy.
"Oh I was just er- walking and I saw him" she gestured at the boy. "In trouble so I followed him into the house and then down into the forest in your basement, quite odd by the way but who am I to judge" she smiled, innocently.
She could tell that none of them believed it but they didn't care enough to question her further. "Right, well with that out the way, welcome to the road everyone!" The purple witch pushed past her and faced the group.
If Eli had been drinking water, she would have spat it out. "Wait, the road." Eli looked around, suddenly very aware of how deadly everything looked. "You don't mean the road, the road, right?" Eli laughed nervously.
Everyone turned to her. "Cus that's not actually real, you realise some witch made that up to-" she stopped midway when she noticed the purple witch staring. Suddenly she noticed how similar the purple witch looked to someone she had been told about ages ago.
Her heart dropped. That couldn't actually be her, could it? "We haven't been properly introduced" the purple witch spoke again. "My names Agatha" she smiled sweetly. The words hung in the air.
Eli swallowed, if she played this game she'd have to be extremely careful. But it might be fun, seeing how far they'd make it before they turned on each other. "Nice, how about the rest of you" she looked around, pretending to be bored, something she was very good at.
They said their names in turn and Eli did her best to remember them. "Lovely bonding moment, uhuh, now let's take our shoes off" Agatha suggested.
"Sorry, what?" Alice snorted. The others shared her confusion. Agatha raised her eye brows.
"It's common knowledge that you take your shoes off in respect for the road" Agatha scoffed. "Trust me, I've done this before" she added when none of them looked convinced. Eli shrugged, why not? She took off her vans and revealed a pair of blue, fluffy socks.
The others did the same with their respective shoes and socks and in some cases, no socks. Agatha nodded once they were all shoe-less and they continued. Eli exhaled, this was going to be a fun journey, she wondered how many would die.
Agatha and Teen led the way, Eli followed closely behind. Just in case they happened to have an interesting conversation or two. She walked alongside Alice, who was only a bit taller than herself.
"It's exactly how I pictured it" told Agatha in disbelief. Eli let out a quiet laugh. Of course it was, he'd been the one to create it. Alice looked over, concerned.
"What's wrong?" Alice asked. Eli shrugged, Alice probably thought she was crazy.
"Nothing, just crazy that we're here, you know?" Eli redirected smoothly. "I mean, I didn't think it was real at first but.. well this is all a shock" Eli finished off. Alice nodded, she seemed to understand.
Their conversation was interrupted by a mildly panicked Mrs Hart. "You know what this is?" She yelled, causing them to all stop and look her way. "This is a kidnapping" she looked distressed.
"And I think it is high time we involve the local authorities" she continued.
"Are we gonna ignore the fact that something just chased us down here?" Jen pointed out whilst Mrs Hart fiddled with her phone.
"Chased Agatha" Alice corrected. Eli's eyes wandered over to Agatha, she was turned away but looked back and made a face at Alice.
"Okay, no cell service" Mrs Hart waved her phone in the air. Everyone slowly started walking again, ignoring the interruption. Mrs Hart sighed and followed, looking at the fog as if it was a poisonous gas.
"Well, whatever chased Agatha down here it's our problem now" Lillian exclaimed, annoyed. Teen turned around to talk to Lillia.
"Is that because covens share blessings and burdens alike?" He asked with a glint in his eye.
"If that's true does that mean we're gonna have Agatha's anger issues by the time we leave?" Eli mocked panic. Agatha turned around, frowning. She looked like she was about to hit Eli, luckily Jen interrupted before she did.
"Okay, someone really needs to call these kid's parents" Jen proclaimed. Teen opened his mouth to say something but was stopped by a side wards glance from Agatha.
Mrs Hart ran forward and started saying a bunch of nonsensical things at Agatha. Jen frowned and started questioning her. "I'm sorry, but why are you here?" Jen sniped. "You have no obvious magical ability." Jen pointed out
"Hey, she has a name! It's Mrs Hart" Agatha defended. Mrs Hart cleared her throat.
"Actually it's Sharon" Mrs Hart told her. Jen rolled her eyes.
"Well whoever she is, she has no business on the road" Jen chided. Teen said something at the same time as Mrs Hart and then they all started speaking at once. Eli chuckled silently, watching Agatha's coven fight with each other.
They all went quiet, however, when Lillia spoke. "Tame your fears" she whispered. Agatha stopped and turned to her. "That's what we're up against" Lillia continued. "Our worst nightmares".
"But in what form?" Jen inquired.
"Trials" Alice blurted out.
They looked to Agatha for confirmation. Eli watched the cogs in Agatha's brain turn, working out an explanation. Agatha inhaled sharply before she began. "The road will test us, and our knowledge of the craft" she put her hand to her heart and then pointed at each of them.
"One trial for each skill" Agatha looked pleased with herself. Eli let out a short laugh, Agatha shot her a dirty look.
"How do we pass them without any powers?" Jen ventured. Teen stepped into view.
"Well there's always analog magic" he reminded them, cheerfully. The others were clearly not as cheerful as him.
"Who are you, again?" Jen sneered. Teen began to tell them but as soon as he tried to speak his name, his mouth was covered with rope, distorting the sound. Everyone stared at him intently.
"Well I'll be, someone's put a sigil on that boy" Lillia marvelled. The others looked him up and down.
"A what?" Teen seemed taken aback. Lillia opened her mouth, before changing her mind and glancing at Agatha accusingly. Agatha scoffed.
"Don't look at me, I didn't put that clumsy glamour on him. Sigils are beneath me" she grumbled. Teen was still looking puzzled.
"A sigil is a spell?" He guessed.
"A sigil is a redaction spell that hides something." Alice confirmed. "In this case, you, from witch folk" Alice explained.
"Looks like Agatha brought a sparkly little mystery with her" Eli snickered. Agatha chewed on her lip. She pushed Teen behind her, shielding him from everyone else.
"Look, I have no idea what's under that sigil." Agatha confessed. "He could be something special, or he could be a pest that a cranky witch stashed under a rock" Agatha pondered.
"Anyway the most important thing is we get to the end of the road" Agatha emphasized "so let's get going!" She turned around, ready to go when Eli stopped her.
"Ahem, aren't you forgetting someone?" Eli hinted. Agatha frowned and looked at them all again, counting on her fingers. Eli shook her head.
"I'll give you a hint, we're missing our 'green witch'. She's wandered off somewhere" Eli made a show of looking around for her before facing Agatha again. "But you knew that, right because you care so much about our coven" Eli taunted.
Agatha snarled at her whilst the other ran off in search for her. "So, who do you thinks gonna die first?" Eli implored. Agatha ignored her attempt at small talk and got straight to the point.
"I don't care who you think you are, but you will not ruin this for me." Agatha enunciated. Eli nodded, over enthusiasticly. She even dared to add a mimicking salute. A distant sound caught her attention, though.
"Do you hear screaming?" Eli breathed whilst walking towards the sound. She turned the corner just in time to see Mrs Hart, half covered in mud, being dragged out of a ditch on the side of the road.
Agatha joined her. "My money's on Mrs Hart" Eli whispered, not taking her eyes off the chaos. Agatha mumbled some sort of agreement before walking over to them.
"Well, I thought that this was pretty obvious, but for the uninitiated, rule number one, do not step off the road" Agatha recited. Mrs Hart looked at her like she was crazy, which she probably was to be fair.
"So, if we just follow the instructions of the ballad, we'll be safe as kittens. Okay?" Agatha explained. Mrs Hart frowned.
"I don't know how you expect me to just walk and walk and walk, when I don't know where I'm walking to." Mrs Hart stressed. Agatha clicked her tongue and nodded.
"Look" Jen was walking towards a beach. Eli frowned, a beach? When had that appeared? But it wasn't just a beach there was a house as well. It was blue and quite big. It looked very out of place with the hedges at the front.
Everyone had noticed it now and they were starting to go towards it. "Wait!" Eli shouted as she hurriedly tore her socks off. They did not wait, leaving her to catch up. They were talking but she only heard the end of their conversation as she was busy finding a pocket to put her socks in.
"Maybe this is the end?" Mrs Hart asked hopefully, to no one in particular.
"That would be such a bummer" Teen replied, causing Agatha to give one of her omniscient looks at him. Eli caught Agatha's gaze as Teen left, she looked worried for a second but then flickered back to neutral so fast that Eli thought she had imagined it.
The door was light brown, with weird engravings in the centre. Lillian ran a hand across it. "The phases of the moon" she told them. Teen looked at the door again.
"It's full." He noticed. "The water phase? " he volunteered. Lillian nodded, smiling slightly. "So, what do we do?" He questioned.
"Well, we don't want to surprise anyone" Mrs Hart reasoned. She rung the bell. Agatha raised her eye brows.
"Don't we?" She winked at them, and with that she went through the door. The others followed, unsure. Mrs Hart was the last one, after her the door shut and the handle disappeared. The first trial had begun