Black Hats, Black Cats. That Is Where The Witch Is At.
Nanny seemed to realize with how the twin cats were acting just then, that they were going to be excited about the song they just sung after how they had ended their performance. She had made her way back to Wren and purred against her legs. Wren smiled sweetly down to the black cat and rubbed her fur after crouching down near her. She wasn't sure who the 'Illya Pegasus' was that they mentioned on stage, for you see, Wren wasn't one to care about actors and actresses and singers and the like. They made music and entertainment for people, that's all she had to know about the things she hears and sees around her. They were people who typically sung for the enjoyment of others and entertained for their pleasure as well. They didn’t bother or influence her life at all.
A voice called out to her and the little witch smiled as she looked up, standing up at the same time.
“Grappa! Jellisha!” She smiles at the two as she picks up Nanny and holds her happily in her arms. The Yule where she really met the two girls was just a year ago, but she enjoyed the twos company regardless. Even if they try to constantly break into her room because of the extra plants she grows in there. She was severely debating on moving back in at Nelson’s Apothecary some weeks due to these two. She wouldn’t do that though… That would be really rude. It was a moment later after the two joined her, that she realised she was being put on babysitting duty with them without any warning. Her stare seemed a bit far away for a moment before she blinked and turned to see the two starting to make their own sweater, making Wren giggle at the effort they were putting in. She was just going to watch the two, rather than join in this time around. Instead of the two just picking a premade sweater to decorate, they physically
knitted one together. That honestly was not what she expected the girls to do one bit. But she couldn’t deny that their sweater looked rather great in her opinion!
As they showed off their shirt, Wren bursted out laughing to the point that she was almost toppling over. She continued to hold onto her cat, who was honestly confused about what was going on. The little redheaded witch eventually calmed down and stood up while wiping a tear away from the edge of her eyeball.
“I think you two really embraced the meaning of ‘ugly’ sweater!” She complimented with a huge grin on her face. Regardless of how the employee reacted, Wren at least appreciated the sweater and the gaudiness of the decorations on it. They went all out. And for that, she accepted that her sweater wasn’t
that ugly.
“I bet Serilda and Mythal would love your sweater! Lets show them when this is all done and over with, what do you two say?” She muses happily to the two girls.
It didn’t take her too terribly long to convince the girls to leave the ugly sweater activity area, and to walk around with them around the festival. She continued to hold Nanny as she let her brown eyes trail around. She eventually saw a familiar man over by the tree decorating activity, and started steering her feet towards him. Nanny looked up to her master and let up a meow. Hopefully no one here was at the rave event. The cat actually didn’t want others to know about her being able to change to a humanoid person. At least the group Wren had been with, she did ask them to keep it a secret for now. Now wasn’t the time for Wren to hear about her abilities.
Wren stared up at the tree that Scully was decorating and found herself mesmerized by the decorations on it. She actually hadn’t realized that Scully had since moved away from the tree at first, and looked around the area. She didn’t feel like decorating a tree if she were honest. She actually never had done so back home. Or at least, she hadn’t in a long while. Her family didn’t have the money to decorate a yule tree, but always managed to harvest a yule log at the very least and pray to the deities during the Winter Solstice. Wren would have to find time to do that here too in Fiore. It had been a while since she did a proper sabbat. Now she could do one with little issues, especially since she could pay for the things she needed. Her feet traveled away from the tree decorating activity, and out around the festival. She noticed that there was a present guessing game, and a mistletoe game? She had no idea what that was about, till some poor soul had stepped under it and had an employee ‘happily’ exclaimed that they were under the mistletoe and needed to kiss someone. That someone the person had to kiss was a complete stranger. Wren would have to be sure to steer clear of that game completely. Especially if she still had the twins following her.
She stopped walking a bit as she noticed Scully again, noticing he had four cups of hot cocoa and was in view of them.
“C’mon, Nans.” She murmurs as she begins jogging over towards the man with a grin on her face.
“Hey! Happy Holidays!” She giggles as she grabs the cocoa after letting Nanny down, taking a nice sip of her drink as she did so. She looked up to notice that they were by the tree decorating contest again, and smiled.
“The tree looks really nice! Would it be okay if I added some more decorations to it?”If he allowed it, the little witch would hold out her hand. Her brown eyes would shimmer before they turned blue from her using magic. In her hand, a wand would form with an intricately designed star at the end of it. She would grip the wand and lightly wave it in a small circle towards the tree before a nice cluster of small stars started to swim around the wand. They slowly began floating towards the tree and set themselves along the branches and the ornaments, making them all glitter in the glow of the stars.
Regardless if she was allowed to decorate the tree with her stars or not, the little witch would smile at the magnificence of the tree. She sipped her cocoa and looked over towards Grappa and Jellisha and grinned towards the two of them.
“Did you two have fun?” She couldn’t help but ask. Normally she was terrible with kids, but these two were cats as well, so they had a way to worm into her heart unintentionally already. If the Field Marshal and Director both didn’t adopt the two already, Wren would have probably tried to do so already herself!
While in the middle of her thoughts, the little witch heard Nanny start to growl at something in the distance. She blinked and looked towards Scully, then glanced to the girls.
“I’ll be right back.” She murmurs as she put the cocoa down and started to go after Nanny, who was running off towards something at the edge of the festival. The little witch was just a couple jogging steps behind the cat, and looked around the forest that was on the edge of the festival. Something flittered behind a few trees, and Wren cautiously took a step forward. That would be a bad idea though. Before the little witch could do anything else, her vision went black for a moment before the voices of her past came back to her.
“You should know your place…” The pain was all too real again. Here it was raining. Above her was Rowena. The best witch in all of her school. A short distance away was Nanny, laying on the ground and gasping for breath.
“You’re nothing more than the dirt under my foot. Under everyone’s foot. Even the ugliest witch is better than an ant like you… if you knew any better… you would scram from my sight, and from this whole school and sell yourself to earn money or status. Though you’d probably barely get money.” Rowena giggled before she delivered a nice, hard, kick at Wren's abdomen. The pain was wrong though. It was cold as ice. That was what had dragged her out of the visions of her past, one of the many times she failed to keep someone safe due to her terrible magic abilities.
The little girl before her looked surprised then was angry.
“Who are you? How can you easily break free of Christmas’ Past?!” The little witch blinked before she held up her wand and smiled.
“I’m a witch. A powerful witch now.” She points the wand at the ghost, and stars as big as Wrens head form around the ghost before they explode with her scream at the center of it, making the ghost disappear for good for now. Wren frowns at herself and then looks to her stomach. There was a nice ice chunk stabbing into her abdomen where that kick of Rowena had supposedly been going for. That hurt like hell. She needed to remove this ice chunk and heal herself. As soon as she yanked it out of her side, Nanny came up and purred at her, effectively healing her side of the injury she had obtained.
The cats attention was instantly torn from her master as soon as it healed. Behind them, was an older version of the ghost of Christmas Past, riding along on a skeletal reindeer.
“Hello. You harmed my Past. But the Present won’t be as easy for you to run from.” She says in a sweet voice. She pulls out a bow and arrow from her chest and instantly shoots it at Wren. The little witch was just barely able to jump out of the way of the arrow, but her shoulder did get nicked by it. That was enough for her to be sent into another vision. This time she was seeing her mother, Glenda. She was sitting in their run down home at the outskirts of Sailkia’s capital. She was sobbing as she looked at a sketch of her daughter. Wren felt her heart being completely
wrenched from her chest. She left her. Whatever spell the little witch used to get here completely tore her up, same as her siblings it seemed too. They didn’t have as much food in the house as she last recalled.
Shaking her head, Wren screamed.
“No!” She pointed her wand to the ghost on the animal while her blue eyes glared at the her.
“Mummy was stronger than that!” “But you failed her by not being there…” The girl smiled ever so sweetly as she aimed her arrow at Wren again.
“Please help us… He has us under his spell.” The stars seemed to form once again around the ghost before they exploded after she said that, making the remaining legs of the skeletal reindeer slowly fall down to the ground. Nanny hissed again before she raced towards the festival again. Wren was only able to turn to come to face to face with a black cloaked ghost now. Wren felt herself shivering at the sight of the cloaked ghost. It was Future. She didn’t even need to speak as Wren was instantly assaulted with visions of her future.
Nanny was nowhere to be seen, but she knew she was back home in Sailkia. Rowena was older, and grinning at the little witch with her arms crossed over her chest.
“You’re still so pathetic. You should die, like that feline had when it attacked me. You’re worthless as a witch. Honestly, you shouldn’t even call yourself that. Parasite. Magicless. Talentless. Waste of space.” Her words hit Wren like a drum. No! She would have gotten herself killed before she let Nanny die! This was a future vision.
“Your family also was no match… it was such a shame trying to not hurt them so much. But they just couldn’t help themselves and kept on coming up… at least they had enough magic to be buried under the witches tree… which won’t be the same for you.” She giggles at the redhead. Her head was smacked with a foot as she was somehow being restrained where she was, unable to get out of the way. That kick was what knocked her out of her vision as it felt icy like before. She held her wand up and instantly blew up stars around the ghost of Christmas Future.
No more messing around. She needed to find out who caused these ghosts to do this. Nanny must have caught the scent of something. In the middle of the square of the festival, she looked around till she heard a yowl and spotted her black cat on the back of an old man. Then he threw her.
“Nanny!”The man looked over at the little witch and glared.
“You take your blasted cat and your stupid holiday cheer and get the hell away from me child!”Wren looked at the man and glared.
“Pardon me? I’m an adult…”“I don’t give a flying fuck what you are! You and everyone else here are going to perish when I re-summon the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future!!” She felt his magic drop before Wren pointed the wand to the ground and let the stars blow up around the snow to instantly throw snow up in the air. With the man distracted, she quickly grabbed an arm and yanked back with the other to cuff him with anti-magic cuffs.
“Let go of me! Do you know who I am! I am the Duke Scrooge of Humbug!”“I’m Wren Hayden! A Rune Knight! You’re under arrest for attempting to disturb the peace here. I was wondering why one of the ghosts said what they did. You were the reasoning why they were attacking me.” She grumbles as she half shoves the man towards some guards. She was shaking now that that was over. Slowly, she got to her knees and let herself fall to the side to lay in the snow. Nanny had ran over to her and was purring to heal the wounds she had acquired from the ghosts, but Wren only moved to hug the cat to her. She needed all the hugs right now. Those visions were something she didn’t need to see. She was trying to forget about them. She had a life here in Fiore… this was home. She was stronger here… She was stronger. She slowly moved to sit herself up, tears in her eyes as she thought of the pain Nanny had gone through, and her mother, and what pain she could get others into in the future. Those ghosts were a big deal… more than Wren initially realized. They instilled a fear into her she was suppressing for a while.
||
Words: 2522 ||
Thread Total: 6526 ||
Job ||
Job Approval ||
Wren - #ff6600Tag: @"Grappa & Jellisha"
@WigglesEnemies: 6/5 peppermints
Karaoke - 1 peppermint
Ugly Sweater - 2 Peppermints
Tree Decorating - 3 Peppermints
Christmas Past, Present, and Future defeated and Scrooge captured.