Eternal Love

Bewitching The Witch

Margery trimmed the candle wick, placing it gently onto her altar. The other coven members prepared for that night's full moon ritual, laying out herbs, crystals, and tools. Usually, Margery loved these gatherings, feeling the magical energy flow between her adopted family. But tonight, her mind was elsewhere.

"You seem distracted, dear one," said Tallie, the high priestess.

"What troubles you?"

"It's silly," said Margery, shaking her head.

"Nothing of the heart is ever silly," replied Tallie wisely.

"Share your burden."

"I just feel so alone sometimes," Margery replied with a sigh.

"You all have partners brought together by the goddess's grace. I wish I could find that special someone meant just for me."

Tallie squeezed her shoulder reassuringly.

"Do not lose hope. The wheel turns in its own time." She retrieved a bowl filled with dried crimson flowers from a wooden chest.

"Velvet red peonies," breathed Margery. "But those are so rare!"

"Yes, very rare and powerful. If you prepare your altar, you may use one to call in the romantic love you seek."

With trembling anticipation, Margery placed a pillar candle on her altar stump under the moonlight.

Taking a deep breath, she pleaded: "Goddess of Love and Light, please use this blossom to guide the one meant for me into my life."

She laid the flower atop the candle, watching the flame consume the velvety petals.

A week later at the flower shop where Margery worked, the doorbells announced a new customer. Margery's heart nearly stopped as their eyes met. He was tall, with jet-black hair and eyes shining silver like moonbeams.

"I'm Bastien," he said with a dazzling, dimpled smile.

As they talked, Margery was stunned by how much they had in common, how Bastien seemed to share every detail about her life. They spoke for hours until closing.

Over the blissful weeks that followed, the two were inseparable.

"You are everything to me, my darling," Bastien murmured as they lay entwined.

"I want us to be together, always."

But when Margery shared her news with the coven sisters, their excited smiles faded to warning looks.

"Tread carefully, young one," cautioned Tallie ominously.

"Passion can blind logic."

Confusion clouded Margery's euphoria. "Just meet him, Tallie. Then you'll understand."

But they refused, walling themselves off from Margery for the first time. Alone again despite finally finding love, a knot of sorrow began forming deep within Margery's spirit.

Sensing the change in her, Bastien drew her ever deeper into his intoxicating embrace.

"Forget them, my love. We only need each other," he crooned, smoothing back her hair as tears spilled down her cheeks.

The tender gesture soothed her battered soul, bruised by the rejection of those she had considered her sisters.

Confused, Margery asked them to meet Bastien, but they refused. Alone despite finding love, sorrow took root inside Margery. Sensing this, Bastien provided comfort and convinced her to fully break with the coven.

"I will be your family now," he said, eyes glowing.

That night as Bastien lay sleeping, Margery crept to her altar and tried desperately to reconnect with the goddess that had always been the center of her world before Bastien entered her life. But she could not feel the spark of magical energy that usually flowed so easily from her core. Panic rising, she spotted Valerie's crystal ball upon her altar. Somehow she knew deep in her bones that if she peered into its glassy depths, it would reveal what was really happening between her and Bastien.

Hands shaking, she held the crystal ball, gazing deeply into it and begging the universe for guidance. Inside the ball, images swirled, slowly resolving into a form both foreign and heartbreakingly familiar. Bastien's beloved face leered at her. But it was a cruel caricature of his beauty, eyes glowing red, row upon row of glistening fangs protruding from his mouth.

Margery recoiled in horror, nearly dropping the ball. In its inky depths, she now saw her own face, pale and gaunt, streaming blood from puncture wounds in her ivory neck. And she heard Bastien's voice, not the warm, seductive tones that have whispered all of his deceitful promises of devotion. But a menacing snarl that turned her blood to ice.

"Worship me, pet. I will have your very soul!" the creature in the crystal ball growled.

Sobbing now, Margery curled into a ball amid the dead leaves and fragrant loam. Her entire being felt shattered. She had given Bastien everything - her trust, her dreams, her magic. And in return, he had taken her soul.

As she wept bitterly into the cold earth, her fingers brushed against something smooth nestled against the tree's roots. Sitting up, Margery retrieved it from the forest floor with a gasp of recognition. It was a single, perfect velvet red peony blossom. Seeing it now, this flower that had bloomed so hopefully in her heart when she made her foolish wish beneath the full moon, made Margery fully face the truth. Bastien had used her longing for love against her in the most cruel way. And now, she desperately needed to reclaim herself and her power.

Margery returned to her cottage where her demonic lover still lay sleeping, enveloped in silken bedsheets. Moving silently, Margery gathered every dried velvet red peony. She tossed them liberally over Bastien's motionless body and around her bed. Then, Margery set the blossoms alight, chanting fiercely repeatedly,

"Be gone, demon of the damned! You have no claim to my soul!"

Bastien awoke with an unearthly shriek as enchanted flames engulfed him. His beautiful façade burned away to reveal the hideous, fanged monster from Margery's horrific vision.

Soon, only a pile of smoking ash remained on her bed. Margery sank to her knees, spent emotionally and physically. She had vowed to never again meddle with forces beyond her control. And she now realized why passion flowers like the velvet red peony also symbolized sorrow, betrayal, and loss.

But at last, after her painful lesson, Margery had reclaimed herself. And one day, when she was truly ready, perhaps true love would find her again – this time built upon trust, acceptance, and truth rather than obsession.