053 - The Curse, part 27

Megan opened her eyes.

This had possibly been the most boring hour and a half of her life. Her first attempt at meditation had not gone well. Fifteen minutes into it, she pulled out some earbuds, but Dawn had given her a stern look, and she'd put them away. Only Mary seemed to be into it; she had been sitting perfectly still and silent for the whole duration. Megan and Dawn had whispered their frustrations aloud several times. Trying to clear their minds and focus on listening to the universe was next to impossible with all that had gone on in the last few days.

At last Megan and Dawn stood up. It was time to go to another class, and this was possibly the first time Megan had ever looked forward to geometry. She noticed that Mary still sat silently on the floor, her eyes closed. Was she...asleep? No wonder she had seemed so into this.

Megan nudged Mary with her foot. "Come on, sleepy."

Mary's eyes fluttered, appearing as if she had indeed been sleeping. "Oh...my. That was...enlightening."

Dawn chuckled. "Um, I'll bet. Wish I could nap sitting up like that. School would be much easier to get through." Megan giggled at her remark.

"Nap?!" Mary retorted. "Didn't you hear any of that? We've got to do it!" She jumped up, her ginger locks bouncing around her. She darted for Ms. Featherstone's bookshelf, scanning titles furiously.

"What are you talking about?" Megan replied. "We've been bored out of our minds for over an hour."

"Has it been that long?" Mary queried, her eyes not leaving the massive book collection. She paused, and pulled an enormous tome from the shelf. Its cracked leather cover appeared ancient. She returned to where Megan & Dawn stood, and plopped down on the floor, opening the book and searching its pages. "I guess it was just me, then."

"What are you doing?" Dawn asked. "I don't think Ms. Featherstone wants you to--"

"The old brownie," Mary interrupted, looking up at her two classmates. "He didn't just grow my hair faster. I think I finally realize what he was doing." 

"Wait, did the meditation thing actually work for you?" Megan asked. "I didn't hear a thing."

"I guess?" Mary replied. "It's hard to explain, but, all the time those brownies were in my hair, one of them was just constantly chatting away. I think it was the old one. But he didn't just give up his life to make my hair longer. I think he did some other spells, as well."

"What do you mean?" Dawn asked. She and Megan looked at each other quizzically.

"Well, while I was meditating, I--I don't know if I heard it, or if I just remembered it." Mary went on. "But I couldn't have remembered something said in that brownie language. My hair, though...it knew."

"Knew what?" Megan asked, almost annoyed. "This is not making sense."

"I'm sorry," Mary replied. "It's not making much sense to me, either. "But...I just knew things...it was almost like my hair was talking to me, just  not with words. I'll show you." She began flipping more pages in the tome.

"Ms. Featherstone is used to being in charge. She's a principal, after all. She knows her job and lets the staff and students do their jobs. She delegates certain tasks to her staff. But where being gatekeeper is concerned, she doesn't know how to delegate. She has to do everything herself. She's been keeping secrets for so long, she wouldn't know how to organize us into a proper team yet. She's still protective of us. And she's been beaten at every turn since Typhon started his mind games."

"What are you suggesting?" Megan asked. "We try to take him on ourselves?! I don't know any spells! The magic in our hair is just being used by one of Ms. Featherstone's spells to protect the breach, right?"

"Yes," Mary agreed. "But she said herself, it's time now to make some difficult choices."

"What do you mean by that?" Dawn asked, cautiously.

"I don't know how I know, but Julie is not safe. Typhon has her. Ms. Featherstone is going to face him again, right now."

"WHAT?" Megan gasped. "How? What's going on?"

"I don't know what the brownie did to my hair, but I am tapping into some powerful magic. Typhon has been influencing Ms. Featherstone's mind since she faced him last night. He had her take Julie away from here so she'd be vulnerable. He's setting a trap right now for the both of them. He'll take all the hair Julie can produce until she's dead, then he'll take Ms. Featherstone's hair, all the power it contains, and the breach will be opened. Then it's--"

"Open season on earth for all those monsters," Dawn interrupted. "So what do we do?"

Mary found the page she had been looking for. "My hair...or whatever I was hearing...told me to do this."

Megan looked down at the page. "How are we supposed to do a spell?"

"I was walked through it in my meditation," Mary said. "You two, stand on either side of me. This spell is designed to protect against mental invasions. We're going to use it and direct it toward Ms. Featherstone. She needs to know she's being manipulated still and to be protected from Typhon's mind."

Megan almost began to object again, but the thought of her new friend Julie filled her with determination. "I trust you, Mary. If you think you can do this, then I do, too."

Mary smiled. "Thank you." She parted her hair into two sections and placed both piles on either side of her. She formed a sweeping hand movement, following the instructions from the book in front of her, and began reading the incantation aloud.

The ends of Mary's hair glowed. Megan and Dawn stood in astonishment as the piles came to life, Mary's locks sweeping up and intertwining with Megan and Dawn's own hair. They all felt an odd sensation of warmth and connectedness. This was working!

The intertwined hair began to undulate, weaving further into each other's tresses, forming circular mounds around Megan and Dawn's heads. Dawn recognized the form their hair took as imitating the sigil on the page in front of Mary.

"With all three of us using our magic together, the spell will be strengthened," Mary instructed. "Concentrate as hard as you can on Ms. Featherstone!" They all did so, as Mary finished reciting the incantation. They felt a surge of magic expand outward from them, then just as quickly leave, and their locks separated from each other, falling to the floor once more.

"WOAH!" Megan yelled, full of adrenaline. "What WAS that? Did it work?!"

Mary lay backwards, falling onto a cushion of disheveled red hair. "I...think so?" 

"So what now?" Dawn asked. "I don't feel good just waiting here if we can still help."

"I wasn't told where Typhon was taking Julie," Mary said. 

"Well isn't it obvious?" Megan retorted. "The breach. Where Julie got cursed to begin with. Where all this started."

"As good a guess as any," Dawn said. "Let's go."