xp_logs | Asgard - Amanda and the Enchantress.

With Alison out of the way, the Enchantress makes her move. It's amazing what a magical makeover and a mind control spell can do.

Amanda roused from a troubled sleep, the pounding in her head somewhat lessened. There was an indistinct shape by the bedside, the candlelight glimmering off blonde hair, a woman's voice softly humming.

"Alison?" she croaked, trying to blink away the fuzziness of her vision.

"No, child," came the response, and Amanda tensed every-so-slightly. The Enchantress. "Do you want for something?"

"Where…" Her voice cracked, and she swallowed and tried again. "Where's Alison?" A hand brushed the hair away from her forehead, cool and somehow comforting.

"She has left, my dear. She wished to go and seek her son, and would not wait for you to regain your health," the Enchantress said, her tone regretful. "I sought to advise her otherwise, to offer her my aid, but she would not stay."

Fear bloomed, sharp and enormous, and Amanda winced as her headache intensified. Despite it, she tried to sit up. "She wouldn't do that," she managed to say, before clenching her teeth against the rising nausea. "She promised she wouldn't leave me."

"Do not tax yourself, child. You are still weak, and you will do yourself harm," the Enchantress soothed, stroking the girl's face, her other hand gently but firmly pressing on her shoulder, keeping her from moving. "The lady… she was most specific. She said she had no time to wait for you, that her son was more important. I tried to tell her that there was no indication he was even in Asgard, but she would not be gainsaid."

The words stabbed at Amanda. "She promised…" she whispered brokenly, eyes brimming with tears she had no energy to hold back.

"Hush, my darling, you have nothing to fear." The Enchantress leaned forward, her long golden hair brushing Amanda's face as she gently kissed her forehead. "Sleep, and recover. No harm shall come to you."

"But…" Dimly Amanda was aware of the faintest trace of a spell, a shifting of mystic energies, but she was so tired, her eyes so heavy… The Enchantress's voice seemed to come to her from a very long way away:

"Sleep, daughter."

***

Amanda dreamed.

There was a hissing of waves on a beach, smooth pebbles under her boots. She looked up, the light brightening around her as she did, and realised she was on her beach, the mindscape that resembled Brighton, the two piers stretching off into the distance and the boardwalk behind her. Looking around, she more than half-expected to see Nate. Instead there was a woman, blonde and beautiful, strangely out of place as she walked across the beach towards her.

"What're you doin' here?" she asked, almost belligerently: Nate and Manuel had visited her dreams before, sure, but just because they had didn't mean her subconscious had an open house policy. And she didn't know this woman.

"I come offering you sanctuary," the woman replied, smiling brilliantly. "Don't you remember, child? I came to your aid when you entered our land."

The dreamscape darkened slightly as clouds rolled in, lightning flashing jaggedly across the sky, and Amanda winced in remembered pain.

"How d'you mean, 'sanctuary'? An' why are you in me head?"

The woman folded her hands in front of her in a non-threatening way and smiled again. "The offer I make is more than shelter and leeching for your injuries. I offer you training, power, position. I offer you a place to belong, where you can fulfil your true potential."

"I already have that." Behind Amanda a ghostly image of the school appeared, followed by the faces of those she considered her family, her friends.

"No longer. There is no way back for you, child. All that you had is lost. No device, no art of mine, can return you there. And what did you have? A school that cannot teach you what you need to know, that is ill-equipped to cope with your abilities? Tutors who are afraid of your potential, who restrict your powers rather than teach you to manage them?" As the woman - the Enchantress - spoke, the images wavered and flickered out. Amanda frowned, uncertain.

"They try, at the school. An' I'm makin' up for the stuff I done, fixin' things…"

"But they still fear you, don't they? Your masters at the school, your peers - they barely comprehend that magic exists, let alone the perils and skill involved. They left you to fend for yourself, and let you stray into dark places." The Enchantress's voice was soft, but compelling. "And those who call themselves your instructors… they have failed you, haven't they? Their skills have been insufficient, or they have been ill-prepared to perform the role of guardian."

"Rom… she helped me, she got me off the streets, found me a tutor…" And she had, but she also had sent her to the school because she wasn't able to deal with Amanda's mutation, hadn't been able to cure the addiction, hadn't been able to teach her to control her powers without the pendant. Had waited a whole two years before removing her from Rack's clutches… Amanda clamped down on that last, traitorous thought. And Strange hadn't been there when Rack had reclaimed her, had he? And he hadn't been able to stop what had happened at Columbia. Pete was so often away on his jobs, and one day he mightn't come back, and where would she be then? "Even if that's the case, there's still me friends. They care 'bout me. Why would I leave 'em?"

"If they care so much, why do they so easily replace you?" The Enchantress gestured, and another image appeared, a figure Amanda knew well. Jubilee. "I can see from your memories, this one seeks to take your place. And she succeeds, with your friends, with those you consider family, even your beloved…" As she spoke, more images, Amanda's memories, and the imaginings she had been tortured by after every exchange on the journals: Jubilee and Shinobi sharing a joke over hot chocolate in the kitchen; Jubilee and Angelo watching some television show she'd never seen and quoting along; Nate giving Jubilee that particular affectionate look he usually gave her; and worst, Jubilee and Manuel by the pool, laughing and joking and him rubbing sunscreen into the smooth unmarked skin of her back… Amanda closed her eyes, even though it was stupid, this was happening in her mind, in her dreams, and these were her own thoughts. "Why return, when there is no place for you, when they do not need you?" the Enchantress asked, refusing to relent. "I offer you something far better than those scraps of affection you have to compete for, prove yourself deserving of."

"An' what exactly is it yer offerin'?" Amanda asked, intending the tone to be challenging. Instead, it came out almost pleading - offer me something better, part of her screamed.

The Enchantress's face grew sad. "I had once a child, a daughter, stolen from me these many years past. Her father was mortal, a child of Midgard, like yourself. He… betrayed me, stole the child, fled to Midgard with her. I never thought to see her again." She paused, looking Amanda full in the face. "Until now."

Amanda laughed outright. "You're fuckin' joking. You think I'm… That's just fuckin' ridiculous."

"We share our power, you and I - we take the mystic energy inherent in a place and shape it to our wills. It is how I found you - your power called out to mine. 'Tis exceedingly rare, that two such talents should exist. Unimaginable that there should be no connection between us… Your parentage, your lineage, it is unknown to you."

Another ghostly image, Rack in Mexico. "Bought and paid for, girl," he said before fading again, "Five hundred quid you cost me."

"So what if it is? You can't seriously be thinkin' I'm yer daughter. We ain't anythin' alike." Grasping at straws, Amanda knew. There was a twisted kind of sense to the woman's words.

"Not so unalike." Again, the woman gestured, and an ornate mirror shimmered into existence in front of Amanda. She gaped at what she saw - a girl, her own age and build, with honey-blonde hair and deep blue eyes, pale skin unmarked by cosmetics or metal. She was wearing a dark blue gown of the same cut the Enchantress wore, and the low neckline revealed the first lines of Rack's binding spell. Amanda reached out to touch the cold glass, and the girl did the same. It was herself, as she had never imagined in her wildest dreams…

As if summoned by the thought, a child appeared between the two of them, dressed in a plain white cotton shift, marked with bright red bloodstains. Her hair was the same blonde of the mirror-girl's. "My real mother is sweet and kind and powerful, and I was stolen from her, and one day she'll find me and no-one will hurt me ever again…" She turned blue eyes too old for her on Amanda. "We used to tell ourselves that, every night, until we were six and we didn't believe it any more. Remember? We wanted it so badly to be true."

The Enchantress spoke again, her voice almost hypnotic: . "See, my child? With those… adornments gone, and your hair restored to its true glory, can you not see the resemblance? You have your father's eyes and stature - he was not gifted with height - but you cannot deny that the likeness, it is indeed marked. I knew from the moment I sensed you, you were my daughter, returned to me from exile."

"This can't be true, it can't…" Amanda stumbled back a couple of steps, hands out as if to ward off a blow, and it was then she realised the silver chain, the one that represented the link with Manuel was gone. Not broken, not blocked, just… gone. As if it had never been. She was alone, completely and utterly.

Stepping forward, the Enchantress laid her hand on the child's shoulder. "This is no trick, no game, just simple truth. An offer of protection, instruction, a mother's love to heal the wounds done to you…" Under her touch, the bloodstains began to fade from the child's shift. "Power, without fear, without restraint, to prevent harm from happening again. To stand alone and unafraid. Love, unconditional, and without threat of being taken away again. You have been hurt so much, and I can prevent that."

The child reached up and took the Enchantress's hand. "Everything we ever wanted."

"I don't… I can't…" Amanda took another half-step back, mind reeling - around them, the sky was boiling with colours, the sea roiling, the very landscape swirling. "I have those things…"

"No, we don't," said the child, blue eyes fixed on Amanda's. "I just want to be safe."

"I can promise that." The Enchantress again, her voice seeming to fill the world.

One trembling step forward. Then another. "You ain't my mother," she said, but it was token protest at best.

"I could be." The Enchantress held out her hand, the one that wasn't being held by child-Amanda. "If you allow it, I can be that, and more. Come to me, child, call me mother, and you will never have to fear again."

Another couple of steps, her hand reaching out to the one extended to her. "I want…"

"I know you do. All you have to do is take it. Take my hand, Amanda."

Another step, and she was within reach. Yet she still hesitated, something screaming at her, telling her it was nothing but lies, that she couldn't trust this woman. Amanda met those emerald-green eyes and the doubts fell away. She took the hand, and everything went still.

"Mother," she said.

***

Amanda awoke.

Morning sunlight was pouring into the room - Amanda groaned and pulled the sheet up higher and rolled over, away from the brightness. But before she could slide back into sleep, there was a respectful, almost hesitant tap on the door, and it opened. A young woman, about Amanda's age and wearing a homespun dress of brown and cream came in, bobbing a nervous curtesy as she did. "Good morning, my lady," she said, her voice trembling. "Your good lady mother bid me come help you rise, if you are fit."

Amanda blinked, for a moment unsure of who and where she was, and which language she was hearing. It seemed the girl hadn't spoken in a language she didn't know… yet she had understood it perfectly. "Fit?" she asked, in that same language, and why shouldn't she? Asgardian was the language of her people, after all. "Have I been ill? My recollection… it is unclear, blurred…"

The girl looked, if it was possible, even more nervous. "Why yes, my lady, you have been abed these past two weeks. Some sort of curse, I believe…" Her words halted as there was another brief tap on the door, this one almost commanding, and then the door opened, revealing a majestic blonde woman of Asgardian proportions.

"Good morning, child! It gladdens my heart greatly to see you recovered." She wasted no time in brushing past the maidservant, sitting on the edge of the bed and laying one white hand on Amanda's forehead. "You have been laid low with the foulest magic, but no child of mine would allow herself to be beaten by so craven an attack." She smiled and leaned forward to kiss Amanda's cheek and brush back the tousled blonde hair. "Do you not have a greeting for your mother?"

There was a pause, a breathless moment, and then Amanda took the Enchantress's hand in hers and replied:

"Of course, Mother. My mind is still hazy from my illness." She smiled back, just as brilliantly as the woman seated before her. "But no more. You have your child back, whole and unimpaired."