Chapter 2
After they got Hari into her bed, the present people all converged into the living room, where Wanda was already pushing and prodding at the magic enclosed within. After a moment, the swirling red magic stopped and she floated back onto the floor, opening her eyes. She shook her head. “Nothing other than a simple transcribing spell,” America caught the letter as it floated back down too. “Soo… Can I open it?” she looked around. Nobody protested. She shrugged. “Okay,”
—
It took a while for Wong to see the glint of gold that Tony had pointed out, somewhere in the middle of the rubble that occupied most of the street. Gingerly, he fished it out; Wanda’s enchantments seared his skin for a second, but the moment it could register his magic, it quickly stopped and healed the skin. Wincing slightly, he turned to Iron Man, nodding. “It’s hers,” he said shortly.
—
The letter and its contents fell to the ground with a soft whump, as America turned her shocked face directly to Wanda. It made the witch feel both strange (heh) and guilty; after everything she’d done, America should have been looking at Tony for guidance, not her. Shaking the thoughts out of her head and trying to keep a cool facade, she pointed to her head. “I’m going to wake Hari up. She needs to be here for this,”
—
Wong cradled the ring as he walked around, fixing the broken city. Because it had been separated from its twin, the gold owl was much more volatile now; if Wong placed it anywhere on his person that wasn’t his hand, he would dissolve into red mist. An unfortunate but necessary side-effect of Wanda’s magic clashing with his. Hari’s swords may not be Relics, but they were the sharpest and hardest in the world. In their ring form, they could summon and sustain portals for a short amount of time, harness and use small amounts of Wanda’s magic, kill anyone who held the wearer with the intent to harm, and bestowed a limited amount of knowledge; in their ring form, they were deadly in the hands of a seasoned warrior and had much of the same effects. As a result, Wanda had put a large amount of wards around it; only he, Strange, America, her, and of course, Hari, were allowed to touch it. Anyone else would suffer severe effects; being turned into mist was the least of the concerns.
—
Hari, wake up. She sat up with a gasp, heart racing. The remnants of the nightmare kept flitting through her brain; a quick shake of her head and they were out. With Wanda’s words pounding around in her head, she scrambled to sit up and slipped on her slippers and her ring. Her door was opened, so she yelled down, “I’LL BE THERE IN A SECOND! JUST WAIT LIKE, I DON’T KNOW, FIVE MINUTES SO I DON’T GO DOWN THERE WITH A TORNADO HEAD!” She closed the door and let the Soundless Rune activate before she could hear the answers. Then, with a sigh and a flop, she landed on her bed. Nightmares were the worst, and she had them nearly every other night. Today was no different; it had been the usual dreamscape of her first fight, before the swords, when she’d put her magic to use and stopped her father from crashing into the ground. However, in the dream, she’d been too late, and she’d watched in horror as the suit malfunctioned and sent Tony Stark driving into the ground from over 5000 meters up in the air. The aftermath hadn’t been pretty, but thankfully, this particular dream stopped before she could see the horrid mess and wreckage; metal and dirt mixing in with her father's mangled body, blood and oil creating a disgusting soup in the ground, bits of flash everywhere and her father's head hanging off his neck.