With Cole, the imposing, six-foot-two half-demon, writhing in agony on the floor by the stairs, Paige had no trouble embracing her fear and successfully Orbing. “I think I did it again,” she celebrated, despite the looming confrontation.

  “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry!” Cole pleaded with the ghosts of his past, his face red from the strain of the Furies’ mental attack.

  Suddenly, a Fury barged through the front door, growling and flexing her forked hands.

  “Here we go,” Prue rallied, stalking forward at once to engage her.

  “But how do we, err…vanquish them?” Paige murmured, watching in morbid fascination as Prue expertly dodged, then ducked, separate slashes of the she-demon’s sharp talons, punched her in the gut, elbowed her in the face upon rising, and then telekinetically retrieved the knife from the coffee table and drove its blade up into her chest. “Oh, like that, I guess.”

  The Fury screeched as she burned up and turned to ash. Unfortunately, she took the athame along with her, leaving Prue unarmed against two more foes that were immune to her power, and considering whether they should keep a stock of weapons on hand for when company called uninvited.

  “Prue!” Paige called, alerting her to Piper’s arrival. She had Smoked in, in maroon Furies’ garb, with her other new comrade near the dining room. She placed her hands on Cole’s head. He appeared to be unconscious, or worse, apparently overwhelmed by their proximity to him. Thankfully, though, Piper still had five fingers on each hand.

  “A decoy? You’ll have to do better than that, sis,” Prue muttered before closing her eyes and letting her chin fall. A second later, she Astral Projected behind them, grabbed the second Fury by the arm, and swung her across the sitting room. “Keep her busy!”

  Using her momentum against her, Leo pushed the Fury all the way into the sunroom to isolate her.

  Piper’s eyes darted from Prue to Cole and back. “Be honest, Piper, it’s me you want, not him,” Prue told her, blocking her path to the man. “Unleash all your anger on me. I can take it. I deserve it.”

  Piper growled in response and began clawing at Prue.

  Paige hovered behind Leo, unsure what to do as he tried valiantly to keep the empowered demon woman at bay. Deciding that she wasn’t going to be much help, Paige ran to get the Book of Shadows. “Please let there be something in here,” she whined as the sounds of battle sounded around her.

  “Argh!” Leo cried out as his left arm was lacerated by the enraged Fury’s talon. Luckily, his Regeneration power was triggered, and the wound healed over with a flash of gold.

  A thought occurring to her, Paige rapidly flipped the pages of the book until it landed on the spell she had used earlier that day. Maybe this time, it would work as intended. She picked up the book and carried it open in her arms to the sunroom just as the Fury backhanded Leo, sending him flying across the room with her unnatural strength. He landed hard on top of the white patio table and chairs.

  When the demon set her sights on Paige, she ad-libbed at speed, “Cruelty, pain, and evil ways…this Fury brings…with deadly haze. Reverse the torment she creates, now turn on her…and seal her fate?”

  With the utterance of her final word, the advancing Fury swiped at Paige. However, she Orbed out just in time to avoid it, causing the book to drop to the floor with a thud. When she returned to the same spot a moment later, she found the Fury on her knees, gasping for air, clutching her throat as smoke billowed from her mouth.

  “Paige, get back!” Leo cried.

  She leaped back just as the Fury was incinerated from within by its own power. “Ooh, nasty way to go,” Paige commented, outwardly disgusted but inwardly delighted with her spellwork. She gave herself a well-earned mental pat on the back.

  In the dining room, Piper was getting to her feet after having her legs swept out from under her. “Just admit it, Piper; you blame me for Phoebe’s death, and you’re right!” said Prue, the pitch and speed of her words ever-increasing. “I let her go after Cole, even though I knew she was making a mistake. I was supposed to protect her, but she ended up saving me. I was supposed to die, not Phoebe! It’s my fault she’s—”

  Sensing a vulnerability, Piper delivered a spin kick to Prue’s abdomen, sending her flying toward the downstairs bathroom door, although she vanished in mid-air and returned to her real body, still standing near the front door. When she lurched over and dropped to one knee from the mental anguish, Piper ran for her, brandishing her claws.

  Paige emerged from the parlor to intercept her, causing Piper to bare her teeth. “You don’t want to kill me, Piper, you don’t even know me!” Paige reasoned frantically, coming to a sudden realization.

  Leo appeared on Piper’s other side, boxing her in. “It’s me you’re angry at,” he said. “You can’t forgive me for what I did in the other reality, can you?”

  “No, Leo. It’s not about us,” Paige corrected with certainty. “It’s not about Prue either, is it?”

  Prue frowned at Paige’s back. What did she know about Piper or how she was feeling? How could she? At this rate, she was going to mess up their last chance at saving her.

  Piper growled as she raked at Paige with all her might, stumbling forward when her sharp nails failed to connect, owing to the girl Orbing once again.

  Reappearing, Paige concluded, “Prue’s not the sister you’re mad at, is she? It’s Phoebe, isn’t it?”

  Piper’s face contorted with rage, and she lunged for Paige, grabbing her around the neck with both hands to silence her.

  Comprehension dawning, Leo reached out and disappeared with Piper and Paige amid a flurry of shining Orbs.

  “Wait!” Prue futilely called after them, her mouth agape with confusion. Mad at Phoebe? What was Paige talking about?

  Leo magically transported the three of them to the place he now believed held the answer that Paige had hinted at—the mausoleum where Phoebe’s body had been entombed.

  Piper took in her new surroundings and relinquished her grip on Paige’s throat. When she spotted the wall plaque identifying Phoebe’s final resting place, she backed away, her expression wavering between anger and any number of conflicting emotions.

  “Tell her, Piper,” Paige urged as Piper attempted to escape the room and her feelings, but found the doors locked and her Fury strength suddenly lost to her. “It’s all right to hate her. You should hate her! When my parents died, I hated them for it. I was alone, and I hated them. It is okay to hate Phoebe.”

  Piper turned to Paige, a look of abject rage on her face. “How dare you!” she roared, then suddenly ran over to Phoebe’s plaque, on which she pounded her fists, demanding an answer. “How dare you leave us!”

  Paige held back her tears, recalling the trauma of losing her parents. She understood the anger, the loneliness, the guilt, but as far as she had come, she hadn’t ever shared it with anyone.

  Piper’s voice began to crack as she continued to strike the wall. “How could you abandon us when we needed you most? How could you go and die all alone?” she questioned, her voice raw, breaking down into sobs between cries of frustration. “Please come back! I need you, please come ba-aaack.”

  When Piper finally broke down, literally and figuratively, held up only by the wall of the mausoleum, Leo knelt beside her. He held her in his arms as she bawled uncontrollably. “It’s okay. It’s okay, honey,” he told her as all physical signs of her Fury transformation—the markings, the claws, even the red clothing—rose off her as if evaporating.

  “It’s not okay,” Piper protested in falsetto, shaking her head, now free of the evil influence and able to express what she’d been holding in. “She chose Cole, a demon, over us, again and again, even after everything he did. She chased him into the Underworld without even considering what would happen to us if she were gone.”

  “I know,” said Leo, rubbing her back soothingly.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  Paige wiped her eyes as she watched and felt the metaphorical dam finally breaking, the cleansing floodwaters released.

  Before completely losing herself, Piper wailed into Leo’s chest, “How could she think that we could ever go on without her?”

  The next morning, Prue entered the kitchen, surprised to find Piper sitting at the table with two freshly poured cups of coffee. Her eyes were a little puffy, but she looked well, all things considered. Her makeup was done, her long hair was tied back, and her recent wardrobe selections of browns and blacks had been traded in for shades of blue.

  When her sister didn’t immediately sit down, Piper slid a cup across the table, indicating the adjacent chair.

  “You’re up early,” Prue commented, sitting down and accepting the steaming cup. “Is this leaded?”

  “Are you kidding? Absolutely,” Piper confirmed, the corner of her mouth curling upward.

  “What, you didn’t sleep?”

  “No, I did, actually. Better than I have in a while. But, if I hadn’t forced myself to get out of bed, I’m not sure I ever would have.”

  “That’s understandable,” said Prue. Leo had filled her in on what happened at the mausoleum after putting Piper to bed, though she still didn’t really understand it all.

  “You want milk?” Piper asked. “There’s loads left, and it’s about to go bad.”

  “No, black’s fine.”

  “I guess we got through it quicker with Phoebe around. Most of it went on her cereal,” said Piper, a sad smile flickering on her lips as she reflected on her little sister’s ironic fondness for Lucky Charms. “It’s strange, the things that you miss.”

  Prue distracted herself with her coffee, blowing on it and sipping it slowly to avoid responding.

  “So, how scary was I?” Piper enquired with a grin.

  Shrugging, Prue answered, “You’ve looked worse.”

  Wasn’t that the truth, Piper reflected. “And how did Paige handle things?”

  Paige had handled herself pretty well by all accounts, better than they had in the beginning. Her Orbing still left much to be desired, but she had at least used it a couple of times. Her spellwork, on the other hand, had actually impressed Prue.

  She hadn’t just read a spell from the Book of Shadows; she had reworked one on the fly, one that happened to work perfectly against the vengeful Fury, effectively creating a vanquishing spell for a demon the book didn’t list one for. “She did alright,” Prue downplayed.

  “Really? That’s high praise coming from you,” Piper remarked, knowing full well that her sister was holding back. “I think she probably saved my life.”

  Prue frowned, “That’s exaggerating things a little, don’t you think?”

  “No, I don’t,” said Piper matter-of-factly. “I could feel myself slipping away, Prue. I was so lost in my anger, even before that Fury smoked me. I couldn’t find my way back, not until Paige made me see what I was so mad at.”

  “And that was Phoebe?” Prue questioned, still trying to process what Leo had told her.

  Piper exhaled deeply, ready to talk about the feelings she had bottled up. “I miss Phoebe so much… But yeah, I was angry with her. I still am. Her whole relationship with Cole… I felt like she always put him first, like she abandoned us. I can’t help it, but now that I’ve faced up to it, I think that maybe I can start to let it go. Maybe you need to do the same?”

  “Me?” Prue flinched. “This isn’t about me, this is about you, and if that’s what you’re mad about, maybe you should be putting the blame where it belongs? On Cole.”

  “Cole wasn’t the problem, Prue,” Piper condoled. “There was no changing Phoebe’s mind about him. Or vice versa. In the end, she was doing what any of us might do in the same situation. She was following her heart. And how can I stay mad about that?”

  “That’s great, Piper, but I can deal with things in my own way, okay?”

  Piper took a sip of her coffee before continuing, “And what about Paige? She’s our sister too. As hard as it is to imagine opening up to someone else, to risk inviting more pain into our lives, I feel like I owe it to her, and to myself, to take that chance. Don’t you?”

  “No, Piper, I don’t,” Prue admitted. “I’m sorry, but right now, we should be focusing on finding Phoebe, not getting to know her replacement.”

  “Prue… Don’t say that,” Piper chided.

  “What?” said Prue, not fully cognizant of how insensitive she was being. “How can we just move on when Phoebe is still out there somewhere, maybe wondering where we are and why we haven’t found her already?”

  “She’s not out there, sweetie,” said Piper gently, remembering Leo’s advice. “Even if we manage to figure out what happened to her spirit, when the Elders have no ideas, it’s not going to bring her back.”

  Prue huffed at these words. It was precisely because the Elders had no clue where Phoebe was that they needed to be uncovering leads of their own. “So, what? We should just give up looking for her?”

  “I’m not saying tha—”

  “Then, what are you saying, Piper?”

  “I’m saying,” she started, trying to keep a cool head, “that we’ll find out what happened, but we need to be smart about it. Cole and Leo are right. If we carry on the way we have been, we’re going to end up just like Phoebe. In an early grave.”

  “Well, I disagree,” Prue argued. “We’ve been taking out demons left and right, striking fear in the heart of the Underworld, and I’m not stopping until I get some answers.”

  “Well, alright,” Piper sighed, afraid it may come to this, “but if that’s what you want, I can’t be a part of it.”

  Prue blinked. “Excuse me?”

  “I know good and well that you’re going to do what you’re going to do, whether I like it or not, but I won’t go on enabling your behavior.”

  Prue was thunderstruck. Enabling? She got up and made for the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To Scry,” Prue said resolutely. “Then, to summon Cole and find our sister. Someone’s got to.”

  Piper sighed. She had expected this reaction from her big sister, but it would have been nice if Prue had seen things her way just this once. She just hoped her way was the right way.

  When Piper walked into South Bay Social Services that afternoon with a snuggly long blue wool cardigan wrapped around her, a basket on her arm, and a light spring in her step, she quickly spotted Paige sitting at her cubicle, looking quite the young professional.

  It seemed like a nice place to work, nothing like the cold offices she’d inhabited back in her accounting days. Wow. Working at the bank while Prue was dating that smarmy creep and Phoebe was off in New York… It felt like a lifetime ago.

  When a basket suddenly plopped down in front of her, Paige looked up, surprised to see Piper. She smiled meekly in greeting, then peeked under the basket lining. “Muffins,” she remarked, and well-made by the look of it. “Thanks.”

  “Busy work,” Piper waved off the thoughtful gesture. She found baking therapeutic, so it had been for her as much as for Paige, or so she told herself. “I’m best in the kitchen. Prue’s the one that likes to, uh, chase demons.”

  Paige nodded in understanding, still a little taken aback by Piper’s unexpected visit. When they left things last night, she had only just finished choking her.

  “How’s it going with your ‘slimeball’ colleague?” Piper asked. She was interested, of course, but she also needed to follow up on the potential exposure risk she had caused.

  “Who, Donnie?” Paige sighed. “Well, I think Prue’s idea of making him think it was all a dream actually worked. Unfortunately, that means he’s back to his old tricks. I’d report the lech if he wasn’t in a senior position. So, how are you?”

  Piper wanted to address the harassment in more detail, but she wasn’t sure it was her place. Going along with Paige’s subject change, she answered. “I’ve had, uh, bad hours. And hours that aren’t quite so bad. I guess you know how it is?”

  Paige bobbed her head slowly in response. “Yeah. When my parents died, there were some days I didn’t think I’d survive the sadness,” she sympathized, before imparting some hopeful wisdom. “It’ll never be okay that she’s gone, Piper. But I promise, it will get better.”

  Piper appreciated that, but she wasn’t ready to discuss Phoebe’s passing anymore just yet. She turned her attention to the scratches on Paige’s neck, scratches she had inflicted, “You know, Leo could fix that for you.”

  Paige shrugged playfully, “It’s my first war wound. I think I’ll wear it with pride.”

  Only half-joking, Piper warned, “Unfortunately, in this family, it will not be the last.”

  “Well, every family has its pros and cons. A couple of demon battles in exchange for the power to clear up my friend’s skin? I’d say it’s worth it.”

  “The power to what?” Piper queried, an eyebrow raised in curiosity.

  Paige looked in Billy’s direction. He was chatting animatedly with Lila across the room. “He’s cute, isn’t he?” said Paige. “Well, you should have seen him yesterday.”

  Piper pursed her lips but held back the objection on the tip of her tongue. “Okay, uh, you saved my life, so I guess we’re even on the Book of Shadows swipe, but Paige, there are rules to being a witch. Rules that you will have to learn and follow.”

  “Well, I did have a Premonition about him, and not to be difficult,” Paige started, fully prepared to be difficult, “but…you’re married to our Whitelighter, Prue’s kinda doing that ‘punishing the guilty’ thing by the sound of it, and Phoebe was dating a demon. So, on balance, maybe my friend could stay cute?”

  Realizing that she didn’t have a leg to stand on, Piper smirked and decided to let Paige’s magical infraction slide.

  “My, my, my! That pile looks about the same size as it did about an hour ago,” Paige’s boss reproved when he arrived at her cubicle.

  “Oh, that was my fault. I distracted her with muffins,” said Piper, jumping to her feet, afraid she was getting Paige in trouble.

  “And you are?” Bob Cowan asked.

  Piper looked to Paige thoughtfully, then back at Mr. Cowan. “I’m her sister,” she answered poignantly, then made her exit, feeling good about the comment. However, her mood shifted suddenly when she crossed paths with a familiar face. “Hey,” she whispered, grabbing the man by his checkered necktie.

  “Hey, lady, what do you think you’re—” started Donnie, taking a better look at Piper as she pulled his face down toward hers. His brows shot up in recognition. “You! B-but…y-you’re a dream!”

  “No, but if you bother Paige again, I’ll be your worst nightmare!” Piper threatened menacingly under her breath, doing her best Fury impersonation. “You keep your hands and your disgusting comments to yourself! Got it?”

  Donnie nodded vigorously, his eyes wide with fear, and Piper turned to Paige, exchanging a knowing smile with her before releasing the man and leaving the building.

  

  A/N: There we have it, folks. My TTC version of Hell Hath No Fury is complete! What did you think? Was it worth the wait? Did it feel familiar yet fresh, but faithful to the characters? What were your favorite new moments and interactions? Are you enjoying the action scenes? Please let me know in the comments, and please consider dropping a Fave, Follow, Rating/Review etc.

  Wednesdays at 3.33 PM GMT.

  r/thirdtimecharmed sub on Reddit the Monday after each seventh chapter to reveal the next “episode” title, so keep an eye out for that if you can’t wait until Wednesday to get an idea of what’s to come. If you REALLY can’t wait for more TTC, 8 weeks/chapters Early Access is available as a thank-you for those supporting my writing journey, right now on Patreon @TEZofAllTrades!