Julie opened the door.
"Shannon!" she exclaimed cheerfully as Briar immediately started crying.
"Hey," Shannon said softly, before turning to her daughter. "There, there sweetheart, it's okay."
She mentally berated herself - she should have considered Briar's aura reading before bringing her with her.
"Come on in," Julie said. "This is a pleasant surprise."
A little distracted, Shannon stepped inside.
"What's her problem?" Julie frowned.
Shannon looked up, a little startled at the harshness in her tone.
"Well, Briar can read auras. And I think yours is freaking her out a bit."
"Why would my aura scare her?" Julie asked, closing the door.
Shannon paused, and decided to plunge right in.
"Because of the beauty spell Ara cast on you."
Julie rolled her eyes.
"Oh hell, you haven't bought into Zac's theory that I've changed since having the beauty spell cast on me, are you?"
"I don't need to buy into the theory. It's a fact," Shannon replied seriously. "Beauty spells always change people, and unless they're custom made, they also seriously alter personalities as well."
"Yeah right."
"Briar? Briar sweetie?" Shannon said. "You remember that spell I taught you?"
Briar sniffed and nodded.
"Can you cast it on me and Julie please? Then you can play with Julie's kids."
Briar looked at Julie again fearfully, then recited the spell through a dribbling nose. Shannon wiped it.
"What spell?" Julie demanded. "Oh!"
As she looked at Shannon, she discovered that her appearence had changed. No longer could she she Shannon's half-elven form but a mixture of colours and patterns and shapes."
"Where's the nursary?"
"Oh, umm..." Julie said, and then lead the way.
Shannon put Briar into the care of the nannies, thanked them and walked with Julie to her room.
"It allows us to see what Briar sees," Shannon explained to Julie. "It was very useful for figuring out why Briar was always so freaked out around Rogue - all those personalities all superimposed ontop of each other. Very chaotic. I'm not surprised it scared her."
"Huh."
"I can't read them, not the way that Briar does," Shannon went on. "But I can understand what I'm seeing up to a point."
They entered Julie's room and Julie turned instinctively towards the mirror. Instead of seeing, however, her beautiful form she saw instead a black body. It was streaked with blood-red lines all through it, and some of the black patches were transparent. Past them she could see other colours but they were faded and the shapes and patterns were obscure. Around her body was a white outline and she could see that all the red lines seemed to lead there.
"Huh," Julie frowned. "Other than the white bit I remind me of what I might design a demonic golem to look like. I still don't see what's so scary though."
"Did you see the auras of the nannies? And your kids?"
Julie shrugged.
"Maybe. So what?"
"This," Shannon said, pointing to the reflection, "is not normal."
"Big deal."
"That white light? That's your beauty. That's all that's good in you. The spell that Aranince cast on you - 'beauty is only skin deep' - it works by drawing everything that's good inside of you to the outside where everyone can see it. And it keeps drawing. Until you're just like the apple in snow white - beautiful on the outside, poisonous on the inside. Inside you're nasty, cruel, depressed, everything that normally would be kept in check by the goodness in you is now free to do what it wants."
Julie rolled her eyes.
"And you expect me to believe this?"
"If I did, I wouldn't have expected that response," Shannon replied. "People who have cheap beauty spells cast on them... they don't last very long. I'd say you have until Christmas before you kill yourself."
Julie looked up sharply, startled. How did she know? Involuntarily, she moved her right hand towards her left wrist. Shannon caught the moment, and walked over. Julie pulled away.
"I see," Shannon said sadly. "It's already started."
"I haven't tried to kill myself," Julie inisted.
"Then you've flirted with death, perhaps yours, perhaps someone else," Shannon replied. "Suicide isn't the only way they do, you know. Some of them become sado-masichistic. Or cannibals. Or torturers. Or all of the above. Right now you're probably capable of killing me, your kids, anyone really, without a moments' regret."
"I am not," Julie objected. "I wish people would stop saying I'm going to do a Kylie. Seriously. It's getting on my nerves."
"The fear is well grounded."
"No, it's not."
"Julie, right now you're incapable of love. You can't even love yourself," Shannon pointed out. "Love is another one of those bits of good that's beeing drawn to your skin to make you appear physically beautiful."
"Well, that's the name of the spell isn't it? Beauty is only skin deep?" Julie started laughing hysterically. "At least I'll leave a beautiful corpse."
Julie giggled merrily, collasping on the floor and clutching her ribs, she was laughing so hard. Shannon shook her head sadly. It was worse than she thought. She opened her bag and pulled out a powder. She had hoped to have Julie's co-operation, but she sensed it was too late for that. With Julie immobilised for now with her laugher, Shannon decided to take advantage and sprinkled thr powder over her friend.
"Hey," coughed Julie as she went in her mouth. "Whatcha doing?"
Shannon ignored her and started reciting the spell.
"Oh no," Julie objected. "No! You're not taking this away from me!"
She launched herself off the floor, her hands reaching for Shannon's throat.
"Stop it!' Stop it!" She screamed.
She drew her hands tighter around Shannon's throat, squeezing as hard as she could, but try as she might all her efforts seemed to have the opposite effect - instead of tightening her grip, her grip instead loosened.
"Shut up! I want this! You're wrong! There's nothing wrong with me!" Julie screamed.
Shannon met her eyes and spoke the final words.
Julie screamed. She screamed and screamed and screamed. The door opened and one of the nannies looked inside trying to find out what was going on.
Julie crumpled into a little ball and looked up at Shannon piteously.
"I hate you."
A moment later her eyes closed and there was silence.
"Umm..." the nanny coughed.
"She'll sleep for a few days," Shannon said more calmly than she felt. "When she wakes up she won't be physically as beautiful any more but she should have a pleasenter personality. Well, it might take a little while to settle down, but it won't be as bad as it has been."
"What... what happened?"
"I removed the beauty spell."
"Ahh," the nanny nodded. "Good."