"Beneath the Waning Moon: A Witch's Oath to Shatter the Dark"

The air still hummed with spent power as Cormac stumbled into the mist-shrouded night, his shadow stretching long and brittle down the laneway like crackling parchment. Finola watched from the threshold, her silver hair catching the moonlight in a way that made Julie’s breath hitch—not merely strands of age, but threads of starlight pulled taut from the heavens.

“You showed him mercy,” Mia whispered, fingers whitening around her untouched Guinness.

“Mercy?” Finola’s laugh was the scrape of a blade being unsheathed. She turned, and in her eyes flickered the ghost-light of a thousand battles. “To live stripped of one’s purpose is no mercy, a stór. It is a dirge sung in an empty chapel.”

Midnight’s growl vibrated through the floorboards. The cat circled Finola’s ankles, her fur bristling with static that made Tony’s wristwatch blare interference. “You promised me a villain’s throat,” she yowled, pupils swallowing the room in twin eclipses. “Promised me vengeance for the nestlings he crushed beneath his boots!”

The admission hung like smoke. Julie’s gaze darted to Liz, whose hands had gone still around the teapot—a silent tell. They’d all heard stories of Midnight’s slaughtered kin, of how Finola had bound the fey-touched panther into feline form after the cat tore through three villages seeking retribution. Mercy, it seemed, came in shades darker than night.

Finola knelt, the ancient oak floor creaking like a ship’s hull. “Not vengeance,” she murmured, pressing her forehead to Midnight’s. “Justice. And justice…” Her voice fractured as the first tear fell—a liquid diamond that hissed against the cat’s fur. “…requires patience even when our hearts scream for fire.”

A shudder rippled through the room. Morena made the sign against the evil eye, her usual mirth extinguished. Tony’s Guinness frosted over in its glass.

It was then Julie saw it—the faint scar glowing beneath Finola’s collar. A rune-shaped wound pulsing like a second heartbeat.

“Aunt…” Mia breathed, horrified. “Your pact mark—it’s spreading.”

Finola stood abruptly, her shawl billowing though no window stood open. “The cost of tonight’s work,” she said too lightly, pouring dandelion wine that smelled of funeral lilies. “White magic cannot kill, but it can…redirect. Cormac’s darkness must go somewhere, no”?

Midnight yowled. Julie’s mug shattered.

The scar pulsed again, inky tendrils now creeping toward Finola’s throat.

“You took his corruption into yourself,” Liz accused, voice trembling. “After swearing you’d never—”

“What is one more stain?” Finola’s smile could have curdled dawn. “The Veil thins. The Horned King stirs in his barrow. And you, mo chlann, you still burn brighter than Beltane fires.” She swept a hand over the table; plates of soda bread and smoked salmon became a map of Ireland scored with glowing crimson fissures. “Cormac was but a pawn. The true battle comes when the moon bleeds crimson next month.”

Midnight leapt onto the map, her claws piercing Donegal. “Let them come,” she purred, the words slithering into their minds like smoke. “I’ll feast on shadows and piss on their graves.”

The laugh that burst from Julie surprised them all—a bright, broken sound that scattered the gloom. “So we’re really doing this? Fighting some…some ancient evil with a demon cat and magic tea?”

Finola’s fingers brushed Julie’s cheek, leaving warmth that smelled of sun-warmed libraries and forgotten tongues. “No, a chuisle. We fight with family. With Tony’s gift for hex-breaking knots. Morena’s memory of every curse ever spun. Liz’s soups that heal bone-deep wounds.” Her palm settled over Julie’s racing heart. “And your quiet courage that walks unflinching into shadows.”

Outside, the wind screamed. Or perhaps something screamed through the wind.

Midnight batted a biscuit onto the Killarney fissure. “I still want my bite.”

“And you’ll have it,” Finola promised, her pact mark now a black vine strangling her voice box. “When the Horned King rises…”

The unspoken truth curdled the honeyed air—if I still stand to see it.