The desolate darkness faded into a blur of colours. The light seeped through—far more intense than usual—forcing a brief retreat back into the void.
Beatrice opened her eyes again. This time, things were more resolute, the brightness more bearable.
She tried looking around, though her vision was still foggy. Her head throbbed violently and her senses felt scrambled. Everything was crashing down on her at once.
"Oh my god." Her voice came out tremulous with terror and weakness, barely coherent.
She turned her head to the right, remembering she had been near the door before everything went black. But her neck lost balance mid-movement, and her head flopped backward, dangling helplessly a few times before steadying.
As she lulled there, staring at her living room upside down, it finally hit her—she was sitting on one of her dining chairs.
She summoned all her strength to pull her head upright. When she looked at her arms, she saw them tied in a scrupulously tight manner to the armrests.
It didn't take long for her to realise her legs were bound too.
"W-hat…?" she tried to speak, but in her weakened state, that was all she could breathe out.
"Finally!" a deep voice called from the side of her kitchen. It startled her senses into partial awareness.
"For a minute there, I thought I might have become Maleficent," Edward said, sounding oddly jubilant as he walked into the living room, a syringe in hand.
Beatrice still couldn't fully grasp who it was. She squinted, trying to see the person's face.
"The irony of it, huh?" Edward rambled on, approaching and flicking off the syringe cap. "I mean," he shrugged, "you're the witchy witch here." He plunged the needle into Beatrice's shoulder.
"Ahh—" Beatrice let out a frail groan. But just as she did, her senses came flooding back like an unhinged tsunami.
She snapped her gaze upward in alarm and finally saw Edward standing right beside her—dressed in his usual black hoodie and jeans combo, needle in hand like a deranged mad scientist.
She also noticed the syringe had drawn a portion of her blood.
"What's going on, Edward?" she demanded, terrified by whatever this was—whatever was happening.
Edward moved in front of her and sat at the corner of the dining table, about a metre away.
He placed the syringe on the table gently and clasped his hands. He stared at her, his expression darkening with something vile. Something like rage—the same rage he had stared at her with earlier. But suddenly, unexpectedly, he felt his heart race and his chest rise and fall like a great tide.
He thought he was ready—ready to face her, ready to take extreme measures if it came to that. His gaze flicked to the syringe on the table. But why then? Why was fear suddenly outweighing rage? His head buzzed, and not in a pleasant way. He pulled out a chair and sat down, trying to steady his breathing. It had become frantic, panic-attack frantic.
Meanwhile, Beatrice looked around in horror, trying to see if there was anyone else in the house. Panic—maybe more than panic—flooded her. That was when she noticed something lodged into her left arm: a needle, attached to a thin tube leading up to an IV bag filled with a light green liquid.
Her throat tightened. She felt like crying.
She turned to Edward. "Edward, child," her voice came out strangely soft. "Please untie me." She sniffled. "I don't know what's going on, but you can still stop it. It's not too late."
Her eyes drifted back to the IV drip hanging from her tall lampstand.
Edward followed her gaze, then looked back at her with pure… emptiness.
"Edward, please talk to me," Beatrice wept, clearly desperate. "Who put you up to this, child? Who?"
Edward's irritation spiked.
"Please, child, talk to me. I can help you out of whatever you've gotten yourself into. Just talk to—"
"SHUT UP!!!" Edward shot to his feet. He pressed a trembling hand against his face. "Just… shut… up."
Silence.
Beatrice swallowed hard. "…I know you're a good kid, Edward. I'm sure of it."
She was testing the waters.
"And I can clearly see that you don't want to do this. I see it, Edward. So please, just stop. And tell me who's putting you up to this."
"Shut uuuup! Just shut up!"
He stormed toward her and leaned in close, bracing his hands on her arms.
Beatrice recoiled, petrified by the animosity blazing in his eyes.
Edward sneered. "I did this." The words came out cold and unfiltered. "I… did this."
He pulled away from her.
"No," Beatrice shook her head firmly. She leaned forward. "You can't fool me. I know it's not you. He must have put you up to it, huh?" Her face twisted with contempt. "Such a scoundrel. He couldn't do the dirty work himself—"
"If I even hear pim from you again, so help me God you'll know what agony means."
Beatrice fell silent.
"Why is it so hard to believe I'm the one who stabbed you with a syringe and ambushed you in your own house? Hmm? And who is this he you keep mentioning?"
Beatrice stayed quiet, dazed, as if recollecting something.
"Hm." Edward scoffed. "Tch." He shook his head.
"You know," he said, turning slightly toward her, "you really are pathetic." Scorn seeped through every word. "For an all-powerful witch I'm supposed to tap into for my memories retrieval, you're surprisingly weak. I mean, what did it take to put you down? A syringe, an invisibility spell, and a MM juice to keep you at bay. I'm starting to doubt whether I needed to include mchawi majani in that delightfully sleepy dose at all. I expected more of a showdown, but then again—just look at you."
"Did you awaken your powers, Edward?"
Edward froze for a moment, speechless.
"And your memories were erased? Oh my god. Oh my god."
Beatrice looked down, breath quickening, panic flooding back. "It's happening," she muttered in primal fear. "It's really happening."
Edward let out an irritated, coarse hiss. "I'm not here for your theatrics, woman. I'm here for answers. So why—"
"What is it that you think I did, Edward?" she asked softly. "Does your mother know about any of this?"
Edward smiled. "Wow." He clapped slowly. "I must admit," he nodded with a puckered lower lip, "I underestimated you."
Edward retook his seat.
"You sly, evil temptress," he said, tapping his index finger on his lips while giving her a narrowed stare, as if something clicked. His smile persisted. "You're cooking something up, aren't you? You have been from the start. Trying to distract me with that innocent façade and nonsense talk about a 'him,' pretending to be surprised about my powers, and now bringing my mother into it? To what extent will you go to save your own cunning ass, witch?" He exhaled, pausing, then looked up. "But you know what?"
He grabbed his backpack and the syringe. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, he looked up at her once more. "I'm done playing your stupid game." He reached into the bag and pulled out a piece of chalk. "I'm going to make you bend to my will." He removed a ragdoll from the bag and flashed her a dark grin. "Literally. And your wily wits or great power—which I haven't seen yet, by the way—won't save you this time."
His gaze sharpened. "You're going to tell me what I want to know. And by that, I mean everything I want to know."
He resumed drawing on the polished wooden floor—symbols that made no sense at first glance. Symbols that seemed ancient, powerful, and forbidden.
Beatrice didn't like where this was going. Every fibre of her being screamed danger. She started struggling in the chair, screaming.
Edward, unfazed, took out his phone. "Tch," he clicked in irritation. "As if losing Mama Anita's bodyguards wasn't enough of a hassle, now I have to redraw this because your useless wiggling messed the floor? What a drainer."
He zoomed in on the photo of the symbols.
"So much for a quest." He looked up at Beatrice—still struggling, screaming, shaking the chair violently. "Did you know I barely slept last night prepping for this?"
She screamed harder. More desperate. The chair rattled.
Edward finished drawing and took out some candles and a needle from his bag.
He pricked his finger and let the drops fall onto the symbols.
He then arranged the candles around the markings in an organized pattern and lit them with the lighter from his pocket.
"Edward, please stop," Beatrice tried to plead her case. Her face was almost blue from all the screaming. "Edward, it's not safe doing taboo."
"Is that what it's called?" He paused midway through injecting the doll with Beatrice's blood. "Hmm." He shrugged. "Thought it was called black magic or something. Oh well."
He continued pushing the blood into the doll. But he didn't inject all of it. He left some, dripping the remaining drops onto the symbols just as he had done with his own.
He stood up.
"I didn't do whatever you think I did," Beatrice continued to plead. "I didn't erase your memories, Edward. I don't know what's going on, but I can help you figure it out. Just stop… please, before it's too late."
Edward continued chanting, his voice deepening into something hollow, distant, and ancient.
His hands instantly glowed a searing blue. Similar glowing pathways began crawling up his arms, with rune-like patterns appearing between them.
"Pepo," Beatrice muttered in terror.
The room began dimming—even though the sun still shone brightly outside—and flickered in a paranormal, unstable way.
The room shook violently, objects set on high places tumbling down; some breaking, some cluttering, some thudding against the floor.
The air grew thick and mystic, with a wind blowing between them from nowhere.
Beatrice began screaming and struggling again. This time with more desperate vigor.
The chair tipped back—but just as it was about to hit the floor, it slowly tilted forward again.
It stood on its four legs once more.
Edward lowered his hands. The glow and patterns that had reached up to his neck vanished.
The room settled.
But the doll remained hovering above the ritual's center, the earlier drops of Edward's and Beatrice's blood forming thin cords that spiraled around each other as they gradually ascended toward it.
Edward stepped toward Beatrice.
"I would have told you not to bother screaming," he said, his voice normal again, "but… ehhh." He shrugged. "Whatever brings you joy."
He looked around the room at specific points.
It was then Beatrice noticed four strategically placed bells around the space.
"Magic is cool, isn't it?" Edward taunted. Then suddenly, he pulled the needle from Beatrice's arm. "Don't need that anymore," he muttered.
Beatrice winced.
Edward stepped back. "So now you know they won't hear you," he added, taunting her even more.
He looked at the spirals that were almost touching the doll, then back at Beatrice. He sighed. "Time's almost up," he declared, almost jubilant.
"I didn't do it. Please, Edward," Beatrice begged, her tone more composed somehow, though her eyes darted between the doll and Edward. "I swear I didn't."
"Swearing now?" He clicked his tongue teasingly. "That's not so virtuous of you." His expression tightened. "Just be glad I don't even plan to kill you the way you killed Hallington."
"What?" Beatrice seemed genuinely shocked. She darted a look at the doll—the spirals were five inches from reaching it—then looked back at Edward. "What are you talking about?" she asked hastily.
Edward groaned. He rolled his eyes and looked away.
"Genuinely, Edward. I don't, okay? I don't really know what's going on." She began crying.
Edward didn't respond. He'd had enough.
"Sincerely speaking, Edward—"
"Oh yeah?" Edward spun toward her.
Two inches.
"Then how do you explain knowing my name? Because it's not like I'm some random student you'd know just because you're my teacher. How do you explain the familiarity you have toward me? There's no point, Beatrice. So many things incriminate you. So you might just as well shut up and let me torture the answers out of you."
The spirals and doll were making contact.
Beatrice had no choice. "I couldn't have killed Hallington, and I know so much about you… because Hallington and I were in love. We were lovers, Edward. Lovers."
The spirals suddenly detached from the floor and latched themselves onto the doll.
The doll plummeted to the ground.