Chapter Text
Zelda woke to find herself in a dream. She gasped and pushed Mary away, stumbling backwards in the snow.
“Where am I?” she gasped. She looked around wildly at the familiar trees, their white bark and black knots. She saw the first yellow light of morning stealing across the sparkling snow, and it cast long shadows behind the trees. They were high on some lonely mountain, in a place that did not taste of earth.
“I know this place,” she whispered to the treetops.
“You’ve seen it before?” Mary asked softly.
Zelda looked at her sharply. She had almost forgotten the other woman was there. She was normally alone in this dream, but she was not dreaming now.
“How dare you bring me here,” she sneered, wherever this place may be. She raised her chin. She was glad of the steely fierceness in her voice, and she glared at the woman in front of her. Her body was humming with magic and she felt something looming in the air, as if a storm was brewing, even though the morning air was clear. They must have traveled far.
“I had no choice,” Mary said simply. It was a hollow explanation, and Zelda realized now the entire woman was hollow. She was just a disguise with a false name and false face.
“There is always a choice,” Zelda argued. “You could have let me be.” She had asked her to leave once. Leave the town, leave my house, leave my bed. Yet she remained, and Zelda was haunted by it.
“No,” Mary shook her head after a beat. “I couldn’t.”
Her voice was soft, and Zelda bristled at the softness. She wanted none of it. She wanted anger and hatred, she wanted fire and rage and to smite this pretender onto the side of the mountain. She did not know what to do with all of this, this thing between them.
“That is not your face,” Zelda said angrily, and for the first time the other woman looked nervous. Zelda decided that was sure footing. “Let me see it,” she demanded.
Mary huffed. “It’s just a face.” She sighed when Zelda crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows in a challenge. With a muttered curse, she brought up her hand to peel back the skin.
Zelda tried not to show anything when she looked at her. The face was haunting, cruelly strange and twisted. It was the face of something that had seen the beginning of all things. Her eyes were black, and her teeth were jagged and askew. Her fingers were long and thin, a witch’s hands. She seemed taller, now that she was without disguise. Zelda swallowed as she loomed before her.
Zelda raised her chin again and looked the creature in the eyes.
“You’re Lilith,” she accused, although she couldn’t help the tinge of wonder in her voice.
“Guilty,” the woman grinned. It was unsettling, like the grin of the possessed fortune teller in the marketplace. Zelda shivered. That was not her Mary’s grin. Although she probably had never even met the real Mary Wardwell.
“Why did you bring me here?”
Lilith cocked her head. “Don’t you know?”
Zelda shook her head, her arms still clasped around her.
“Why, sweet Zelda, I want you to make me a god.”
Zelda laughed. “You would be a false god,” she dismissed without hesitation.
“Perhaps,” Lilith muttered. “False to some.”
“There is only one god,” Zelda recited, the words learned from rote memory, the passages echoing throughout her childhood and all the way through the years to now. “To say otherwise is blasphemy.”
“Then call me a blasphemer, I don’t care,” Lilith spat. “But his time is ending, and I would end it with a sword at his throat.”
Zelda gasped at the bitterness in her bones and the violence in her words, and took a step back as Lilith began to walk toward her through the snow.
“You have dreamed of this place because you were always going to come here,” Lilith declared, as if she was preaching the word from the pulpit. “And I was always going to be here to meet you.”
Like an old friend.
“That first night, you spoke in your sleep Zelda,” she continued. “Do you remember?”
Suddenly Zelda looked away to the trees, anywhere but at her lover. She had never told anyone, had only hinted to Edward, and Hilda had only guessed half of it. Satanic confession had always been a time of repenting, and she had never confessed to the things she saw, lest the coven try and crack open her mind and see the secrets spill out of it. She hated being seen like this, hated to be torn open and rendered vulnerable.
“You spoke the first language, the dead tongue,” Lilith said more quietly when Zelda’s eyes start to glisten. “The one I used to sing in the garden when I dwelled in Eden.”
Zelda shook her head, looking to the ground and then away to the sky as she tried to fight back tears. Lilith took a gentle step toward her.
“It’s the language magic was first spoken in, long before Sumerian and Latin, and long before men learned to harness it.” Lilith came a little closer, and her voice was reverent now, as if seeing Zelda for the first time and finding her beautiful. Zelda stood still, as if she had suddenly grown roots like the trees.
Lilith reached her, and to Zelda it felt like the journey had taken years, but it had only been a few steps across the clearing. Lilith reached out tentatively, but didn’t let her hand quite touch Zelda’s crossed arms. Zelda still couldn’t look at her, but after a moment she reached out and let Lilith take her hand, and they stepped close again. They were toe to toe, just like they had been before Lilith winked them out of her bedroom and into this inbetween place.
Zelda heaved a sigh and felt a tear slip down her cheek. She looked down at where her hand was clasped with a green one. Lilith’s fingers were changed, larger than Mary’s had been, and her wrists were not as delicate. She turned the hand over to look at the way the skin seemed to glow in the sunshine.
“Why have you brought me here?” she repeated.
Lilith squeezed her hand.
“Because I have lost my purpose,” she murmured. “I have spent an eternity fighting the wrong battles. I now wish to walk amongst the garden of the earth and to tend to them.” Her voice was quiet, softer than Zelda had ever heard her. It sounded like a benediction.
“The greed of man has ravaged the earth. Magic is dying, we are dying Zelda.”
Zelda recalled Sabrina’s voice over the breakfast table. We Spellmans are an endangered species .
“He would have mortals grow and grow like a cancer,” Lilith explained. “I used to revel in the greed of men, and encouraged their darkest thoughts. They think they are so big, but they are tiny, like insects. They cannot see beyond themselves. They have polluted the land, the sea is awash with plastic, and the air grows thick with smoke. Even Adam never understood the beauty of the seasons.”
Zelda listened, earnestly, but her brow furrowed the more Lilith spoke. “It has been this way for centuries. Why now?”
“I hadn’t seen it before”, Lilith explained quickly. “I had been in Hell and could not see it.”
A lie.
Zelda shook her head. “No,” she said and finally looked up at Lilith’s face. Her eyes were still piercingly dark and Zelda found she missed the blue. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”
Lilith paused. “The truth can be painful,” she said carefully.
“What can be more painful than this?” Zelda said, as she placed her hand on her heart.
Lilith watched her movement and her face grew haunted. “Satan wanted me to groom Sabrina to rule at his side.”
Zelda dropped her hand and reeled. She shook her head. “No,” she whispered. “She’s a child!” Her heart was beating fast in her chest, and she spun around, looking for a portal, for a door, for anything back to Greendale. All she saw were trees. I have to get back, I have to protect her.
“He can’t take her, it’s not what she wants!” she nearly shouted at the sun, at the trees, at Lilith. The tears were coming steadily now, and she sobbed at the thought of Sabrina dragged down to Hell, screaming. She would be molded and twisted until she was an abomination of her former self. Their Lord and Master was indeed a cruel one, if he intended to take a child to be his bride. “He cannot have her! I won’t let him!” she cried as she finally turned back at Lilith. “I won’t let him.”
“It is the Dark Lord’s will,” Lilith said.
Zelda shook her head, and came back to her. She grabbed at Lilith’s shoulders. She wanted to hurl her away, drag her close, she wanted to kill something.
“It doesn’t matter,” she whimpered bitterly.
She remembered when Sabrina had played a game of chicken with her in front of the entire coven. The lamb entrails had dripped blood all over the carpet, and it had taken a few of Hilda’s cleaning spells to get the stains out. Sabrina had looked up at her from the foot of the stairs. She had seemed so small.
Aunt Zelda, what would have happened if it was me who was selected Queen and not Prudence?
Zelda’s heart had clenched.
Would you have let them do to me what was done to Mildred?
Never!
“It doesn’t matter,” she repeated, and her hands trembled as she abandoned her god.
Perhaps it had been a long time coming. The lingering feeling of dread that had filled her when she realized that her coven had shrunk. In her heart her coven now only contained herself, two witches, and a warlock. The Church of Night had huddled in the dark and had left the mortals to their fate when the red rider had come to take them in the dark. They were a backwards crowd, fearful and sedate. They had excommunicated Hilda, imprisoned Ambrose, and they would have eaten Sabrina until they were filled to the brim with her sweetness.
Ambrose had told her of the secret meetings, the ones where only men were allowed through the doors. It was a splinter that would rend the coven to pieces, the small pebble that would roll away and start an avalanche.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said a third time, and the sky turned red with the sunrise.
“Zelda,” Lilith murmured.
Zelda looked up and smiled softly at Lilith. I know your face, for you are the monster in my dreams.
“He is a god because I made him one,” Lilith explained. “I worshiped at his feet, thanked him for my freedom, and begged him for a purpose” she said softly . “He gave them to me but put me on a leash and demanded I kneel before him.” Her breath was heavy now, and her chest heaved with ancient anger. “He is a god because my devotion made him one.”
They were silent for a moment, and the moment raged in the quiet.
“Is that what you will do to me?” Zelda asked quietly. “Have me on my knees?”
Mary shook her head, her eyes filled with something. Zelda thought it might be sorrow.
“No, my dear Zelda.” Lilith stood a little straighter and she reached out to take Zelda’s hands in hers. Her skin was cold and clammy, but Zelda clenched her hands around them and tried to warm them. “I would not want that for you.”
“What do you want for me?” she whispered.
Mary took in a deep breath. “I would have you in the forest, walking amongst the trees and singing my songs. Build me a temple of stone. I would have you in the valleys, and in the sand dunes by the sea, shouting out into the thundering waves that I am coming. I would have you at the source of the rivers, just as they come out of the ground. Stand in the lonely canyons and pray to me. Welcome the new world and worship on the mountaintop.”
Zelda shook her head. “These are words, riddles” she said earnestly. “I don’t understand.”
“You can love without understanding,” Mary insisted. At Zelda's frown her voice became small and frightened. “You do love me, don’t you Zelda?”
How can i love you? I barely know you. You are a stranger.
But then Zelda remembered the long nights, the moon above them, and the spirits looking out to her. She remembered the way Lilith had held her hand when she was frightened, and the look in her eye when she had called her beautiful. I so very nearly loved you.
Then, she found the right words.
“No, Lilith, I don’t love you.”
She echoed the words back, as if they had traveled around the world and the sound was hurtling back after the long journey.
“I don’t love you.” Zelda smiled. “Not yet.”
Lilith smiled back.
...
It wasn’t anything like a dark baptism in the end, nor was it a rebirth. It wasn’t even a coronation, although Lilith had placed a golden crown on Zelda’s head. It had resembled the spirit’s antlers, and a small red jewel sat in the center. The ruby had sparkled in the sunlight.
Lilith had conjured a blade and Zelda had laid out her palm but had gasped when Lilith cut into her own flesh instead. Her hand was sliced open and black blood dripped to the ground. Then, she handed the knife to Zelda and she cut her own hand open too.
“Blood for blood,” Lilith said in a language Zelda had never heard, but knew in her heart.
“I name you my high priestess, my prophet. Without you I am nothing. Without you I would perish. We are equals. And so I give what you give to me, freely and of your own will.”
They clasped their hands together, and their blood intermingled and moved through them. Zelda shivered as she felt the blackness seep through her and travel everywhere. She opened her eyes and was changed.
They sealed it with a kiss.
…
It felt senseless coming here, deep in the forest where no one would follow. She had no congregation beyond the trees and the spirits, the birdsongs, and the mossy ground. But she found broken twigs at the foot of the cairns, and flowers piled up, as if placed there by rabbits. Nuts and berries and little treasures, slowly gathered in little bundles on the ground.
It was senseless, but she had promised she would come. She brought incense and candles, and placed a ring of stones around the tallest tree and sat in contemplation for an hour or two. She had no prayers, for there weren’t any rites for a new god. There were no ceremonies or services, no ritual she could fall back on. So she sat on the ground, and listened to the sounds of winter becoming spring. The forest was waking up after its long sleep.
At first she just sat, and waited the hour out. She rolled her eyes when nothing happened, and left with a huff. Then, she sat and tried to come up with something, some phrase or saying that would give her strength.
“Praise Lilith?” she whispered uncertainty, and looked around to see if the trees burst into flame at the blasphemy. Although it wasn’t really quite blasphemy anymore. She waited for a moment, but nothing happened. And she left after a few minutes, slightly more discouraged than before.
She tried to tell Lilith of her dreams. They had faded somewhat, but they still came. She had almost asked Lilith to take them from her, relieve her of the heavy burden. But they were a part of her, and in the end she would not wish them away. She could no more go without them than she could without the shape of her hands, the memories of her childhood, the sound of her laughter. No, her dreams were hers to carry.
She talked about her family instead, about Sabrina’s schooling and Ambrose’s new travel plans. Hilda had been working on a few new recipes, some were marvelous and some were marvelous disasters. It was a quiet form of worship, and Zelda wasn’t sure if anything would come of it.
Lilith had been formidable, frightening. Her face had been the monster under her bed, the thing lurking in the corner of her eye in her nightmares ever since she was young. Zelda missed her.
She talked about the changes in Greendale as the snows retreated and the ground grew soggy. The streets were muddy and the tires of the hearse had gotten stuck twice on the way home. There was a new baby on the way, a young couple in the coven were expecting. It had brought new life to the coven, and the couple’s families were bursting with excitement. They were eager to have Zelda be the midwife, but were puzzled by her absence from church.
Zelda had not been to the Church of Night since Lilith had popped her back on her front porch with no more than a quick kiss on the cheek and a murmured goodbye. She wasn’t excommunicated, at least not officially. It was self imposed exile, and Zelda had gladly perpetuated the fortuitous rumors about her and Faustus.
“He stares at me while he’s preaching Hilda.”
Hilda had shuddered. “Stay here then, and we’ll have a cuppa.”
She hadn’t told Hilda about Lilith. How could she? “Hilda, I’ve turned my back on Satan and am trying to overthrow him and put his lover on the throne. Although she’s my lover now.”
Ridiculous. The whole situation was quite ridiculous. Especially since they were strangers to each other, or at least Mary was a stranger to Zelda. She still had trouble calling her by the right name.
She didn’t tell Sabrina, even though she was upset that her favourite teacher was out on sabbatical. The teachers of Baxter High were leaving at an alarming rate it seemed. Mr. Hawthrone was still missing, after all, and a virgin had been found murdered near the hanging tree. Ambrose didn’t know, but he had come to Zelda late one evening, after being out at one of Faustus’ secret meetings.
Insects , came Lilith’s voice in Zelda’s head, and she couldn’t help but agree.
“What is he planning?” she had asked Ambrose carefully.
“I don’t know,” he said worriedly. “I’m still not entirely trusted. And it doesn’t help that none of you attend services anymore.”
“It’s complicated,” Zelda said quickly. “But I can’t go back there.”
Ambrose eyed her warily. “Did he… did he do something to you Auntie Zee?”
Zelda smiled reassuringly, and reached out to touch his elbow. “No, my dear. Nothing like that. It’s just that… I have some qualms with what he’s teaching, and until things are different I just can’t bring myself to go there.”
Ambrose shook his head. “I still don’t understand.”
“I know, but trust me,” she said with a small smile, “things will work themselves out. They always do.”
Ambrose’s eyes twinkled in return. “Careful Aunt Zee, you’re starting to sound soft.”
“Promise not to tell anyone,” she stage whispered with a glinting smile.
“Promise,” he said.
…
“Praise Lilith, I guess?” she said bitterly to the trees.
It had been weeks and Lilith still did not come. The war in Hell must still be raging.
In Greendale the snow was nearly gone, and spring was right around the corner. The darkness of winter was fading, and the dawn came earlier and earlier every morning. The smell of fog hung in the air, and the first rain of the season would happen any day now. Grass was peeking through the pockets of snow, and the trees dripped water. The sound of the water falling from the branches was so loud it sounded like a soft rain. The drops fell from the roof of the forest and landed on the dead leafs on the ground. Large drops pitter pattered on the stone of the temple as the world melted.
The water fell on Zelda’s bowed head, and she waited.
“I miss you,” she whispered to no one in particular. She was all alone.
It was hard not to think of her parents, aged and infirm. They had left their deathbeds in the middle of the night and had gone into the forests to walk amongst the trees one last time. They had breathed their last under a canopy of stars and pine. Perhaps that is why old witches always retreated into solitude, and dwelled deep in the woods where the world of men could not find them. They left their covens, abandoned the teaching of warlocks, and lived as they wished. When things end, one yearns to go back to the beginning, to go back where one came from. Everything started in a garden.
Zelda had built a humble temple in the Greendale woods, and she attended it nearly every day. Werewolves came and howled at the moon, and goblins gathered to watch them. Fairy circles appeared, scattered throughout the forest floor, and the spirits followed Zelda as she wandered. They had unnerved her at first, but they meant no harm. The spirits greeted their new caretaker with raised heads, and they presented their coats of fur proudly. The Earth would thrive, and magic would return, if only one gave them attention. They were the same thing, love and attention, and Zelda felt herself returning to the old ways of when she was young.
She went up to the mountain and was alone, and felt the crown on her head. She was hardy and wild and free, and she felt magic in her fingertips. Her spells had always consisted of a set of words, a formula or verse, a ritual action. Now they spilled out of her with just a thought or a look. She required no runes or sigils, no poppets of clay. She had incantations in her heart, and the amulets of Lilith’s kisses around her neck. She gazed into the gleaming reflection of pools of water in the mountains, and yearned for the return of her god.
“Tell me, what sort of god are you anyway?” she asked the wind. The wind howled back.
Lilith did not come.
God had heaven, Satan had hell, and Zelda would tend to the earth. Lilith was somewhere in the depths of fire, far out of Zelda’s reach. All she could do now was fortify her with prayers murmured over biscuits, and one sided conversations with owls. The owls still lingered in the trees outside Mary Wardwell’s cottage. Zelda had gone to board the place up, covering the furniture with linens, and locking the door behind her. It stood empty, but the owls were still watching and waiting.
“What are you the god of?” She asked the sea. The foam spread along the rock and lapped at her feet. The sea roared back.
Lilith did not come.
Zelda did not wail or tear at her skirts. She did not slaughter any lambs or spill another’s blood. She simply looked to the earth with haunted eyes and went to bed alone. The path to the temple looked more and more trodden, and the trees seemed to move out of her way as she wandered through them. Mushrooms grew in a ring around the temple, and suddenly it was spring.
She prayed to Lilith for Sabrina to be safe, and prayed for Ambrose to be free. She prayed for Hilda to be happy, and for Leticia to grow up strong. She buried her worries beneath the altar, whispered her longings, and prayed for her god to come back to her.
When Sabrina had returned to the house the night Tommy was put back in the ground, they had cried on the steps together. Zelda had held her and whispered sweet nothings, shushing her and rocking her like she had when Sabrina was a baby. She had guided Sabrina through the house and up to her room, placing her softly in her bed. Sabrina had cried again, just as Zelda went to leave her.
“He said there was no flying in his life without me.”
Zelda teared up at the thought. Mortal or not, Harvey Kinkle was sweet and true, though he knew not what he said. His words were beautiful because he had wanted to mean them, and Sabrina had wanted to believe them too. Zelda was glad she was there to pick up the pieces.
And now she was here, going through the motions, making her own secret religion. It had been easier than she thought. She would slay Satan himself if he moved to harm anyone in her family. And perhaps that is why it had been simple, because Satan thought he could take and take and give nothing back.
Zelda had changed when Lilith’s blood had moved through her. She was no longer just a witch, but something in between. She was a conduit, a god’s beloved. She had seen some of Lilith’s life, flashing before her in bursts of terrific agony. There were earthly pleasures and great triumphs, but she had spent a lifetime crawling after him. Zelda wished to comfort her, wished to go flying with her.
“I want to fly with you,” she whispered to the stars. “I want to touch the sky and feel the cold wind in my hair. I want to fall through air, and I want to see the world below us restored. And when my feet touch the ground again, I want you there to catch me.”
But Lilith was a new god tangled up in conflict. Zelda prayed to her anyway, even if she could not grant her wishes or bless her with good fortune. She maintained the temple and brought offerings, and expected nothing in return beyond the promise that Lilith would one day return. It was a bizarre, futile sort of worship. What a foolish, hopeless, wonderful existence.
She took Hilda to the babbling brook that weaved its way through the trees. They remembered together, and Hilda clucked about the vegetable garden and about the possibility of Sabrina going to university. They worked together side by side, preparing the garden bed for spring. Zelda felt power in it, in the way the earth moved beneath her hands, the way the dirt lodged beneath her fingernails. She remembered the days when she would pick a bouquet of bluebells and foxglove, daffodils and lilies of the valley. She remembered the way Sabrina had followed her aunts, meandering behind them as she became easily distracted.
Perhaps Lilith was simply the god of Zelda, the god of the mountain dweller, the god of the vegetable garden. Or maybe she was the god of knitting? The god of so called women's work, the work that sustained a family, that gave life to a family. What kind of god loves a witch?
They made tea that night, and watched some film on the television. Zelda smoked as Vinegar Tom snored at her feet and she listened as Hilda chuckled at the film. Ambrose’s music wandered down from the attic, and Sabrina studied on the floor by the fire. Her books were spread out and her notes were strewn about.
“Two schools, two sets of homework assignments,” she grumbled as she highlighted another passage.
Hilda hummed in sympathy and Zelda held her tongue. The peace was treasured, and Hilda went up to bed after a little while. Sabrina went up to bed too but she watched Zelda for a moment too long.
Zelda wondered how long it would take for Sabrina to finally get the courage to ask her what was happening in the forest.
...
Zelda dreamed one night of an owl flying out of the impenetrable wood, and it came to land on the tree outside her window. It loomed and sniffed at the smoke coming out of the sleepy chimney, and it called to her softly.
We only have a few hours my love, the war is yet to be won!
Zelda woke to the call, walked to the window, and opened it quietly. The world was awash with silver, tucked in and sleeping under a blanket of shimmering moonlight. It was a grand, almost otherworldly evening, and the air was crisp and clear. It was a perfect night for flying.
And so she pointed to the sky and whispered softly to Lilith.
“My darling, the sky is too lovely to sleep tonight.”
The owl winked, and Zelda jumped out the window and felt her arms turn into wings. They flew up and up, until the earth was far away. Lilith would return to hell in the morning, and would make her way to the citadel. The demons and hell-spawn had taken up arms, and Lilith told her of the day's battle and how a queen had no need for a king.
Women should be in charge of everything.
Zelda laughed as her god flew beside her for a spell, and she soared beyond all the things she had known before.
A few clouds passed below them, and Zelda thought, just for a moment, that one was shaped like a dragon.