Cursed Love
Chapter Four
“She is not dead.”
“Not yet.” David agreed silently with the red headed witch who was refusing to take her eyes off her girlfriend’s body. “Time is still so she is not dead yet. But when the curse is played out and the time starts to move again …”
Maddy knew that her husband didn’t have the heart to complete the sentence. They had mourned too many neighbors and friends who had collapsed and later gone for no apparent reason. If it were possible they would put up signs on the town borders warning all the forbidden lovers but what good would that do other than just attract them more. That was the reason why they had decided to keep their town low key and made sure that the ones who came there were sent by people who knew about the consequences. But every once in a while passer bys like Jack and Dina would get lured to the town and then the whole cycle would begin.
Yet, this time it was different.
“I don’t understand how she is taken though. It has never happened before. Once the forbidden lovers are trapped by the curse, the curse never attacks the townspeople.” A man said thinking aloud. “Tell them Deputy that it is not possible.” He begged David as though his words would change the scene in front of them.
“Because we were there.” Willow answered.
“You saw the curse playing?”
“Yes.” Willow answered once again feeling guilty that she had needed Kennedy’s strong energy to get past the force field that protected the dimension where the Chosen Two were trapped. Only if she hadn’t asked Kennedy to hold her hand… if only she hadn’t taken Kennedy with her… if only… But wait… if nothing else … she could bring Kennedy back.
“I can bring her back.” Willow thought out loud before she got up and closed her eyes to summon the dark magic that by now she had learned to command without loosing herself to it. “She died of un natural cause. She died in a curse. I can bring her back.” She wasn’t asking for permission, she was telling.
“Yes….” The voice of the dark magic answered in her mind. “You can bring her back if you break the curse.”
“What is the curse? I must know what the curse is to break it.” Willow asked in her mind.
Willow waited for the answer but only silence continued. She screamed out her question couple of time but it was in vain. So she finally opened her eyes and walked to the book that had the curse.
The red haired witch stared at the book that rose up in the air before she spoke.
“Spell out the curse I command thee,
The untold story …Let it free.”
No sooner had the spell escaped her lips the book closed with a loud bang and positioned it self horizontally. Then two smoky figures, one on the ground looking up at the other, which had a dragger in its hand, appeared. The two figures were surrounded by hundreds of others, which seemed to be screaming something. First their scream was too soft to be heard but as Willow narrowed her eyes and concentrated she heard their chanting.
“KILL HER. …KILL HER… KILL HER”
“KILL HER.”
Buffy turned right around and stared at the statue that she could have sworn was the one that whispered. But it didn’t move. She looked at the statue right next to it and as life-like as the man looked; he remained still like the hundreds that were lined up just like it. Buffy just shook her head wondering why of all the places she told Faith to meet her by the cave. She had waited for Faith by the cave…around the cave …when she hadn’t seen her; she had decided to come inside. But now that she was already by the statues Faith was still nowhere.
“FAITH.” She screamed hoping Faith would pop out from between the statues just like she had done before.
“KILL HER…” She heard it again. Buffy stayed put. She knew this was no imagination.
“FAITH.” She screamed again but this time she wasn’t expecting a response from Faith.
“KILL HER…” Yes, the response did come; a different voice, different tone and even a different accent but the same message.
“FAITH.” She said keeping all her senses tuned to its finest.
“KILL HER…” Another voice, another accent.
The slayer flipped right around. No, she hadn’t seen any movement or heard any movement, but she knew. Her slayer senses knew. She stared right at the statue of what looked like a black man, slightly taller than her. She took a second or two to examine the statue then she gripped its neck and started to choke the stone. Of course as expected nothing happened but with slayer strength the stone should have crumbled but it didn’t. Yet Buffy kept the pressure on.
“You can’t kill me.” Another voice said from behind. Buffy turned with one hand still squeezing the unbreakable stone.
“I killed her.” The statue on Buffy’s hand said as the statue turned into human. Buffy let go of her hand in shock and took a step or two back glaring at the man in tears. He was covered in blood all over as tears streamed down his eyes.
“I killed her….” He said lifting a blood-drenched dragger.
“You kill her too.” He said offering the dragger to her. Buffy frantically nodded her head turning away from the man just to face another statue that had come to life in mirror state. She quickly looked both ways and yes…all the statues had come alive and all the statues were saying the same thing. “Kill her…. Kill her.”
“NO.” Buffy screamed as she grabbed one and threw it across but the next was right in front of her.
“KILL HER…KILL HER…”
Buffy tried to push her way out but she was right in the middle of all of them. She had nowhere to go. She kicked and then pushed. She even grabbed a dragger and started to slice them but even as the blood spilled out uncontrollably but they still kept zooming onto her, so much so that if they were breathing they would be doing so on her skin. But they were certainly speaking actually chanting. They were chanting one thing.
“KILL HER…. KILL HER…. KILL HER….”
“I have to go back.” Willow said walking towards the table where she had placed the candles.
“NO.” David said stopping her. “You have to understand. No one has ever died after the forbidden love is trapped. But now your girlfriend died when you went in the first time, we don’t know who else will die when you go back again.”
“David as much as I can understand where you are coming from but the fact is, those are my friends that are trapped in the curse and that is my girlfriend lying on the floor. Now, I will go back to break the curse as that is the only way that I can bring them all back.”
“But you don’t even know what the curse is to break it.”
“I do now.” Willow said addressing the entire town. “The town was cursed because one of the lover was forced to kill his love because it was forbidden. I don’t know why it was forbidden but I know one thing, the curse is for every forbidden love to face the same fate. That is why one of the lover the one who kills turns to statue, most probably reliving that moment over and over and the other …dies.”
She then turned to Maddy and David whom she considered friend by now.
“I can’t let Buffy be a statue she’ll be stuck in hell. I have to bring her back. I have to go back.”
Just then a hand grabbed her from behind and turned her. She was looking into empty eyes of on of the woman from the crowd.
“You cannot go back.” A monotonous voice said.
Willow had seen too many possessions in her life to not recognize that at that moment the curse had somehow possessed the whole town.
“You cannot interfere.” David’s voice but in a monotonous accent said from behind her.
Willow closed her eyes allowing the tears that had formed to stream down. When her eyes opened, it wasn’t the same. It was black; it was pitch black just like her hair. The Dark Willow smirked as she dared the woman that had turned her.
“STOP ME.”