The tires of Piper’s Jeep screeched as it rounded a sharp corner at speed.

  “Okay, turn left up here,” Piper ordered Cole from the back seat.

  From the passenger seat, Prue added, “And hurry, would you? The demon isn’t going to wait around while you figure out how to find fourth gear.”

  “Does somebody else want to drive?” Cole complained as he turned again without slowing.

  “Piper, there’s a fork ahead, which way?” asked Prue.

  “Okay, hold on,” Piper answered, consulting the map they had marked while pinpointing their next quarry.

  “Piper, the turn?” Prue pressed.

  “Alright, a right.”

  “You heard her, go right!”

  “I thought she said ‘alright, alright?’” Cole queried.

  “Piper?”

  “Right,” she confirmed.

  “Right as in right, or right as in yes?” Cole snapped.

  “Right as in turn right right now or else!” Piper replied irritably. “Oh, wait, I meant left!”

  At the last second, Prue used her power to turn the steering wheel and make the Jeep veer left, only narrowly avoiding a telephone pole and an oncoming taxi.

  “What the hell, Prue?!” Cole roared as several car horns sounded in the vicinity. “Enough with the backseat driving!”

  “Err, I’m not in the back seat,” Prue retorted, causing a vein on the man’s forehead to bulge.

  “You’ll wanna take the next right after this one,” said Piper. “And could ya step on the gas?”

  Through clenched teeth, Cole asked, “Do you even have a plan this time? Randomly Scrying for evil tells us nothing. What if you need a potion or the Power of Three?”

  “Between your powers and ours, we have plenty of firepower,” Prue insisted, bracing her arm on the roof as the car drove over a pothole. “It’s been working just fine for us so far.”

  “Working just fine?!” Cole repeated in astonishment. “She almost blew your arm off last week!”

  “Yeah, but I didn’t, did I?” said Piper indignantly. “It was just a burn in the end. Nothing Leo can’t handle.”

  “Besides, we got an answer about whether Piper’s new power works on good witches, didn’t we? Now, I don’t have to worry about her blowing me up,” Prue reasoned.

  Cole shook his head at this ludicrous statement. Prue may not have been hit with Piper’s dangerous new power, but the air around her had, and the resulting wound was more than a simple burn. She had been incapacitated mid-fight due to friendly fire, and from her own sister, no less. “Yeah, well, speaking of,” he said into the rearview mirror, “any chance you’ve mastered your powers since then, or are you still freezing and exploding at random?”

  “Random!” Piper proclaimed, unabashed. “But you know what they say, there’s nothing like field practice. Turn here!”

  Prue stared daggers at the man, “What are you even saying, Cole? Piper’s on board with getting answers about Phoebe. Why aren’t you?”

  “I am!” Cole insisted, turning into an alley behind a row of warehouses. “You know I am.”

  “Then why are you fighting us on this?” Piper interjected. “What’s the problem with us getting a little proactive? The faster we find and get rid of these demons, the faster we can find Phoebe and get back to our everyday normal lives, or at least what is left of them.”

  “I just don’t want us all to die before that happens!”

  While Prue’s expression was rife with signs of internal conflict, Cole watched Piper in the mirror, rolling her eyes. “Oh, brother,” she groaned, before Cole slammed on the brakes. “Hey, why are you stopping?”

  “We’re here, look!” said Cole, gesturing at the windscreen.

  Ahead of the car, their demon was in the middle of strangling a man. Seeing this, Prue, Piper, and Cole quickly exited the car. “Hey!” Prue yelled, waving her hand at a discarded rusted pipe and sending it flying at him. The pipe struck his lower back, causing him to relinquish his grip, allowing his target to flee.

  The bald demon turned their way, his eyes glowing bright red. “Witches!” he sneered.

  “Big scary demon!” Piper mocked in response.

  Before he could make another move, Prue waved her arm forcefully, flinging the demon into the brick wall, where she kept him pinned with her mind. “What do you know about the death of the Charmed Ones’ sister?” she interrogated without missing a beat, focusing her power to press him harder.

  “What?” the demon answered. “Nothing! And even if I did know something, I would sooner die than help a witch!”

  “Let’s test that, shall we?” said Prue nonchalantly, taking an athame out of her pocket with her free hand and twirling it between her fingers. “Piper, freeze his body and unfreeze his head.”

  “You can do that?” Cole asked dubiously, yet with mild approval.

  “Yep, did it once when we were looking for you, actually,” said Piper proudly, raising both of her arms and flourishing her hands. “Now, let’s see. Oh, wait.” Instead of freezing, the demon began to swell and smoke.

  “He’s gonna blow!” Cole warned, backing away.

  A moment later, the demon’s cells were excited to the point of combustion, instead of being slowed to the point of immobilization, and he exploded in an unexpected deluge of green blood and guts. Prue raised her hands in time to telekinetically shield herself and Piper from the cascade. However, it was deflected at an angle, most of it landing where Cole had been taking cover.

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  The man stood up slowly, looking furious, his left side covered head-to-toe in green ooze, which dripped from his long brown coat in globs.

  Prue and Piper covered their mouths with their hands, both in shock and in an attempt to conceal their amusement. “Oops,” they said as one with recognizable insincerity.

  Nervous about her looming visit to Halliwell Manor that evening, Paige had spent the weekend reading through her library books, keen to show she had done her homework. There wasn’t a lot of information about real magic in the books, she didn’t think, but witchcraft was, in general, a far more interesting topic than expected.

  Paige had taken one of the more interesting books with her to work on Monday morning, planning to peruse it over lunch. That plan forgotten, she absently curled a lock of her dark hair, which fell in waves today, around a pencil, as she surreptitiously read at her desk between busy work:

  Throughout history, witches have been misunderstood, persecuted, and destroyed. The public hanging, drowning, and burning of women suspected of witchcraft is a far more recent chapter of our history than most people realize.

  “Paige?” a man’s voice spoke.

  “Yeah?” she responded, dropping the book and picking up a random folder in response to her boss’s sudden appearance.

  “What’s the holdup on the O’Brien application?” Bob Cowan asked curtly.

  “Well, at the moment, the only hold up is my boss, who’s standing over me, distracting me from my work,” she answered smartly with a toothy grin, hoping he wouldn’t press her.

  “Nice teeth,” the man commented, not in the mood for her antics. “Have it on my desk by noon.”

  When he walked back to his office, Paige whispered to her colleague, “Lila! What’s the O’Brien application?”

  Lila, a fellow assistant, whose dark-blonde bob and boundary-pushing work attire gave her a rock-chick vibe, responded, “Adam O’Brien…? The foster kid we’re trying to get into the boarding school.”

  “Oh my God,” Paige despaired, mentally kicking herself. With everything going on in her crazy life, she had completely forgotten.

  “The scholarship application is due, like, today,” Lila reminded her.

  “I am so lame!” Paige said, putting her stupid book aside and pulling up the file she needed. As frantic as she now was, she still found time to joke with the mail guy when his cart rolled by her desk. “Aw, Billy, I thought I told you to throw anything from creditors in the trash.”

  Billy, a tall young man with an unfortunate case of adult acne, flashed Paige a bright smile. His skin condition had obviously knocked his confidence, but he was such a sweetheart, and Paige was pretty sure he had a little crush on her. She would totally consider dating him if he weren’t four years her junior. She wasn’t the cougar type, at least not yet. When she accepted her mail, her fingers grazed Billy’s ever so slightly, and she let out a gasp.

  Before she had the chance to think, not again, Paige was having another Premonition. It ended as quickly as it began, but she had seen enough to feel more than a little unsettled—Billy, with an expression of turmoil, balanced precariously on the edge of a tall building.

  “You okay, Paige?” he asked tentatively.

  Paige didn’t answer immediately. She didn’t know what to say, what to do. Was it going to happen? Or could she prevent it? She needed to know how these darned powers worked! “Yeah, just a static shock,” she said, attempting to plaster a smile on her face.

  “Ooh, sparks are flying over here,” Lila jested, causing Paige to giggle and Billy to flush scarlet.

  At that moment, Donnie, one of the lawyers and a grade-A jerk, approached Paige’s cubicle. “Hi, Pizza-face,” he insulted Billy, which was rich considering his bad toupee, then eyed Paige’s sleeveless magenta top. “Look, I understand how difficult it is to tear yourself away from the cleavage in this section, but I’m gonna need my mail sometime today. Okay?”

  After what Paige had just seen, she wanted to scream at the man, but she settled for a scowl. Donnie’s crass insults about her appearance were one thing, but for him to taunt Billy like that, after the vision she just had…? She wasn’t certain how to handle the situation. She didn’t want to cause a scene or risk making things worse for the boy.

  “No problem,” said Billy timidly, stooping over his cart.

  Donnie shooed him away and gave Paige a lascivious look as he strutted off.

  She cringed, while Lila shook her head in disgust. “Nice rug,” she muttered under her breath, feeling powerless. It occurred to her then, though, that she wasn’t powerless. She was a witch, dagnammit! That had to mean something. It was time to find out what. Paige got to her feet and grabbed her jacket. “Lila, if Cowan asks, I’m out for lunch.”

  When Leo Orbed into the attic, he found Piper and Prue consulting the Book of Shadows, both wearing leather jackets over dark ensembles. “Is everything okay? I thought I Sensed trouble earlier.”

  “Relax, Leo, we’re fine,” said Prue. “We just took out…?”

  “Kevmay,” Piper elucidated in a detached manner. “Hmm, this one could incinerate human flesh with his eyes. That must sting.”

  “Ouch,” Prue commented. “Right, well, I’m going to go Scry for the next one.”

  Leo did a double-take. “Wait, you’re going out again?” he asked.

  “Yep. This is just a pit stop,” said Prue.

  “Where’s Cole?”

  “Oh, he’s fine. He just wanted to…freshen up.” Prue gave her sister a knowing smirk.

  Piper chuckled noiselessly in response before casually crossing out the Kevmay page in their treasured heirloom with a marker pen.

  “Piper, what are you doing?!” Leo cried, moving too late to stop her. “Why would you deface the book like that?”

  “What? I’m just trying to keep track of things, add a little organization,” Piper answered.

  “Disrespecting your ancestors aside, you might need that page in the future! The Kevmay isn’t one demon, it’s a branch of demons.”

  “Oh, come on, Leo, it’s hardly our ancestors’ best work. No vanquishing details, and it doesn’t even mention the goo.”

  Prue exhaled in amusement, thinking fondly of Cole’s dripping, green visage, then made for the attic door. “Don’t worry, Leo, there’s plenty of evil left in San Francisco,” she called over her shoulder. “There’s a demon out there who knows what happened to Phoebe, and we’re going to find them!”

  “Right,” Piper agreed, closing the book with a definitive thud and following Prue.

  “Piper, we need to talk,” said Leo, stepping in her path. “I’m worried about you, and not just because what you’re doing is dangerous.”

  Piper sighed and rolled her eyes, then said pointedly, “Leo, Whitelighters are supposed to guide, not judge. Just because I’m doing things a little bit differently doesn’t mean that there is a problem!”

  “Piper, I’m your husband, not just you’re Whitelighter. When you speak to me like that, there is a problem,” he responded sternly. “I can’t help you unless you talk to me.”

  Piper inhaled loudly. “It hurts to talk, Leo. It hurts to breathe! So, unless you and your bosses have some new idea about where Phoebe is, I don’t want to talk right now.”

  “Is that what you don’t want to say? That you still blame me for not being able to bring her back?”

  “No, Leo. I don’t blame you. I blame evil! W-why do you think I’m doing all this? For kicks?” Piper exasperated.

  “Honestly? I think you’re doing it because it’s easier than confronting what you’re really feeling,” he told her. “Paige is coming over today. Are you going to be here, or are you going to be off playing demon hunter with Prue and Cole again?”

  “We’re not playing, Leo!”

  “I hope not, because this isn’t a game. What you’re doing is putting us all in more danger, Paige included. What if the Source targets her again?”

  “That’s why you’re watching her, isn’t it?” Piper challenged.

  Leo took a calming breath before responding, “I can’t watch Paige and my other Charges while constantly keeping tabs on you and Prue in case one of you needs healing again. You’re neglecting your responsibilities, not to mention your jobs! Something’s gotta give.”

  “We’ve given enough, Leo!” said Piper. “And as for our responsibilities, I told you I was done with the Elders, and I meant it. We’re not working for them, we’re doing this for ourselves, to find Phoebe. That’s it!”

  “Phoebe’s gone, Piper, and finding out what happened to her spirit isn’t going to bring her back,” said Leo bluntly, “but if she were here, she would agree with me, and you know it.”

  Piper’s right eyebrow arched upward, and her lips practically disappeared. She was sorely tempted to freeze her husband. If she were confident about her powers, she might have. “You know what?” she said instead, stepping around him. “I don’t have to listen to this. I’ve got work to do!”

  “Piper… Piper?” Leo called after her to no avail, then sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He’d been harsh; he knew that, but nothing else was getting through to her. He had no idea what would.