"You are a fairy, a Fae," Griselle said to the former hunter while holding the recovering crow, which she wasn't sure who to call. Lucky, as she'd named him, or Solome, which had been his name all along.
"Yes," the Fae acknowledged, "but shouldn't I have someone important to me? You have each other... the lupmen have their pack... the leomen their Pride... there should be someone important to me... but I can't remember."
"Family?"
"Yes, shouldn't I have a family?" the Fae answered, "but I don't know... I can't even remember my name."
"Pucca."
"Pucca?"
"You're name," Griselle told her, "You're name is Pucca."
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"That's a cartoon," Lilly interrupted.
"Hmm?" Marie asked back.
"It's a cartoon about some Chinese girl that serves noodles in a restaurant," Cassandra answered, "that girl's name is Pucca."
"Griselle likely didn't know about this show or the likely origins of the name Pucca," Marie sighed, "she was trying to find a feminine version of the name Puck."
"Like from A Midsummer Night's Dream, by Shakespeare?" Lawrence asked, "They'd read Shakespeare?"
"They had heard about it while they still lived with the Wises," Marie explained, "they had likely read it or met someone who had. The people of the Praying Town likely didn't have it as it was probably thought too complex for them to understand... And even if that wasn't the case, Griselle was trying to find a more effeminate name then Puck."
++++++++
"I believe I can help," Griselle spoke, setting Lucky/Solome on her shoulder, the bird healed by Griselle's magic managed to perch there fairly well, "It'll be a test for Luc... which do you prefer I call you?"
"Solome, Mistress, that is my true name," the crow answered, "when introducing me to others who will not know me as your familiar, you may use "Lucky" as a cover name. Are you sure this is a good idea? This Fae's family may be human at the moment."
"That can be fixed," Griselle spoke, "and it will allow us to practice our roles as witch and familiar. Come along Pucca."
The Fae, renamed Pucca, fluttered her wings and landed on Griselle's other shoulder.
"Thank you," Pucca told Griselle.
She then made her way toward the main part of Glendale. She came to a relatively modest home on the western edge of town. She found an adult woman and young boy waiting by the door. The woman took one look at Griselle and then scratched her head, she looked more nervous when she notice the naked female Fae sitting on one shoulder and a young looking crow sitting on the other.
"What are you doing out, dear?" the woman spoke, trying to shoo Solome off of Griselle's shoulder.
The bird cawed and hopped over to Griselle's other shoulder.
"Don't be mean to Lucky!" Griselle commanded the woman, who in a trance like state then returned to her son's side, "I'm here to help Pucca, here."
The boy looked closely at the naked Fae.
"See, she's lost her family," Griselle explained, "and I'm here to reunite her with them."
"We're not... what are you doing?" the woman spoke as Griselle lifted a hand and the crow's eyes seemed to glow.
The woman then felt something strange go through her. Her body seemed to tingle all over and her clothing seemed to be getting larger. She struggled to keep her clothes on as she shrank down, but as two antennae grew out of her forehead, she lost the struggle with her clothing, and they fell to the ground at her feet.
The young boy stared in shock as his mother stood there naked, but now wasn't doing anything to cover up her nakedness. She was actually starting to play with her modest sized breasts as two orange and black butterfly (resembling the Monarch Butterfly's wings) wings grew out of her back. She continued to shrink until she was the same height as Pucca.
"Pucca!" the new Fae exclaimed once she had completed her transformation and flew up to the other Fae and began kissing the other Fae upon landing on Griselle's.
"Hello Titania," Pucca kissed her back, "It's good to see you again."
"And now it is your turn," Griselle turned to the boy.
"NO!" the boy screamed trying to move and run away, but found himself unable. Regardless, even as he felt his own body begin to shrink he struggled to break free.
His body shrank down in size, becoming smaller and smaller, but he could feel other changes occurring. Like his body was maturing rapidly. He felt his shoulders widen a little and stubble appeared on his face, but once his clothing was too large for him to wear, that began change again. His hips began to widen and his penis and testicles were somehow pulled inside him, becoming a woman's genitalia. He also felt two proportionately large breasts grow on now her chest.
But despite being female, the former boy struggled. The tingle in her mind hurt, as her antenne began to grow and her own wings were soon to follow. She tried desperately to push back against what was making her head hurt.
Griselle, however, kept focusing on the Infinite Chaos to force the transformation, and using Solome as a conduit for it. The act was nearly done when she felt something pushing back against her magic. And this was where some knowledge of mythological creatures would be helpful. In all the stories that had been told of the Fae in Europe, had them as magical creatures all their own. And Shakespeare's play, A Midsummer Night's Dream, had Puck transforming his own Lord into other forms with his magic. Pucca and Titania didn't apparently recognize this, and the newest probably didn't either, but he was taping into her own powers of magic as changed, trying to stop Griselle.
"If at first you don't succeed," Griselle said calmly, "Try HARDER!"
She poured all that she could from the Infinite Chaos through Solome and into the transforming Fae. What happened was the magical equivalent of an explosion. Griselle staggered back, forcing Solome, Titania, and Pucca to take flight, though Solome returned to Griselle's shoulder while the two Fae fluttered in the air. The third Fae finished transforming and was knocked back.
"Olga!" Titania and Pucca gasped and flew down to her, "are you alright?"
"Fairy Queen! Fairy Mother!" the renamed Olga stammered, "the darkness is coming! In darkness and revenge and evil! There'll be great suffering!"
"Olga, you're not making any sense," Pucca told her as she and Titania helped Olga to her feet.
"Can't you see it? Electric lights snuffed like candles!"
"Electric? What is that? Is it like lightning?" Titania asked.
Griselle did not stick around for the rest of the conversation. Pucca had her family now, she had her familiar, and she felt drunk with the power she had used.
+++++++++
"She just left them there?" Maddex gasped.
"Griselle saw no reason to stay," Marie explained, "What happened to the three Fae wasn't her concern... whether or not they still live is something that no one knows."
"Could they still be alive?" Maddex asked, "Amy could help the one that seemed to be driven nuts by trying to fight the transformation... or maybe Sarah..."
"Could be, the stories have always said that the Fae were long lived... if not immortal... but then stories can be wrong," Marie told them, "it's equally likely they died of old age at the same time as most people did at that time... and for Griselle, that didn't matter. She wanted to show her familiar to her sisters."
++++++
Griselle made her way inside successfully without being noticed. She quickly set about looking for Gita and Goldwyn. She found them in their room, watching Daisy strangle the life out of rat.
"I found him!" Griselle said in a cheery voice.
"Huh?" Gita and Goldwyn both asked and then looked up to see the crow perched on Griselle's shoulder.
"This is Solome, or as others besides us will know him as Lucky," Griselle introduced the bird.
"Hello," Solome cawed softly, looking nervously at the large red boa and at a black cat that had emerged from under one of the beds.
"You found your familiar!" Goldwyn smiled, "we knew you could do it... and Solome... that is her real name?"
"Him." Griselle corrected, "Solome is a male crow."
"But we're girls!" Gita spoke.
"Apparently the gender of a familiar isn't important," Griselle spoke.
"How did you figure out his name?" Goldwyn asked.
"Some hunter shot and wounded him," Griselle explained, "and I used my magic to heal him... and we just connected on every level... and I just knew."
"Maybe we should try that," Gita wondered, "touch them magically, I mean, not hurt them to use magic to heal them."
Goldwyn slowly nodded, "Maybe. But first, Princess, you will know not to eat Solome, okay?"
"Of course," Princess answered from Goldwyn's feet.
++++++++
In the basement of the Catholic Church, Madame Serenity, Father Michael, and Father Paul, continued working on putting together more of the powder needed to finally kill the game. They had put together several vials already, and the church apparently had a massive stockpile of the ingredients necessary.
"I do have a slight question," Father Michael spoke after a few moments, "My brother has told me of your idea to put in the city's water, and I am wondering how well you think it will work. The rules that govern the cure are pretty firm as far as I know."
"You mean about the circle around the individual and doing it one at a time?" Serenity asked back, "well, the city's water supply covers all the houses and buildings in Glendale which can be affected by the game, and with pipes going into a house and then out, each individual house would have a "circle" made by flow of the water. It's a technicality, I know, but its the only way we can do this quickly."
"Hopefully it works," Father Michael spoke, "the technicality, I mean."
"It'll have to," Serenity spoke.