She could still hear the screaming. Could still smell the fury of the fire and the sweet yet burnt smoke days after the devasting pep rally. The death of Winn Nelson was ruled as a tragic accident, but Carrie didn't believe it was an accident. Not even close.

The blonde teenager had a divided heart, for she believed that Michael Langdon had killed the bully in a column of fire that had ripped at the night sky at the pep rally Friday night. Her heart was divided because one half was thankful and proud and that made Carrie her stomach recoil with sickness. The other half of her heart was riddled with guilt and shame and above all, concern for her dear friend, because if Michael had killed Winn, that meant he was a killer.

A killer. A murderer. A sinner. A monster.

But Carrie Moore couldn't think of Michael Langdon as any of those things, and certainly not a monster. Couldn't consider that the kind and curious boy with a halo of golden hair that had shown her such wonder in a graveyard was a monster. But she knew what she'd seen at the pep rally. The strange whiteness of Michael's eyes that she'd witnessed before when he had made snow fall in the middle of May in Los Angeles.

And then there was that smile, that smile of triumph over killing a boy, whose only sin against Carrie was harassment. That smile at the sight of a burning body, the flames licking and reaping. Carrie had tossed and turned that night in her bed, trying to convince herself that it was impossible for Michael to create and control fire, but she knew he could do the same thing with snow. And was there much difference between snow and fire? Both were extreme natural elements and both were forces to be reckoned with. They belonged on the same spectrum and Michael could manipulate them both.

She spent the rest of the night praying to her heavenly Father for guidance and forgiveness, and for the boy that had lost his life in such a fiery display of power. She pressed her golden cross to her lips, her breath heating and fogging the metal, and even with her prayers filling her mind, she wondered what Michael Langdon was doing across the one-way street.

—

"I did something tonight, Miriam," Michael announced as he paced the kitchen. Miriam was unwrapping a few parcels of butchered animal parts, an apron with the words 'why you all up in my grill?' printed across the front was tied around her thick waist.

"Oh? Something that would make our Dark Lord proud?" she asked, reaching for the cleaver. The sharp edge of the knife shone under the kitchen lights.

"Yes, Father would be proud." Michael leaned against one of the counters, a huff falling from his lips. "I killed a boy tonight. He was a bad person." There was no remorse or guilt lingering inside Michael. He didn't regret his actions, didn't regret killing Winn Nelson. Not even for a second.

He knew he should regret it, should have felt something, but he didn't. It had always been this way, even when he was a babe living with Constance Langdon. It wasn't that Michael wanted to hurt people—he didn't—it was just that murder was in his blood and it was a natural instinct and impulse deep within the lining of his skin and in the chambers of his heart, and he wasn't good as suppressing it. He hadn't asked to be a monster, and boy he wished he wasn't, but he'd been created as a monster. Either from his bloody birth (that started with murder) or his turbulent upbringing (which also included a lot of murder), it didn't matter. No one had ever apologised for making him a monster, so he didn't feel the need to apologise for being one.

"That's not so bad," Miriam said, swinging the cleaver through the air. It acred high before the woman brought it down and it sliced through the bone easily. The smell of raw meat was rigorous in the air, but it didn't bother Miriam nor Michael.

"But it was evil," he expressed.

"Evil is a matter of perceptive, Michael," the woman stated, not turning away from her task. "Now, were you careful, son? We don't want to attract any unwanted attention, not yet." Miriam knew Michael had dark urges and she encouraged them, believing that's what her Dark Lord expected her to do in order to raise Michael Langdon. The woman believed her appointed task was to raise the Bringer of Doom, the Antichrist.

"Yes, I was careful. Though, I think Carrietta knows," Michael remarked, remembering how cool Carrie's skin had turned as they held hands. Worry tickled at the base of his spin. He hoped this wouldn't push the teenage girl away. He needed her.

"That's not good, Michael. I've warned you about her." Miriam's voice boomed with thunder, scolding the boy. Miriam Mead had tried to steer Michael clear from Carrie Moore, but the boy was stubborn and his attachment to the girl was rigid.

"She's different!" Michael's voice matched the thunder in Miriam's easily. "She understands me!" His demeanour lingered on that of a child's temper tantrum.

Miriam shook her head, bringing down her cleaver again. "No, she doesn't. You're meant for greatness and Carrie Moore isn't."

"I don't believe that," Michael said stubbornly as he crossed his arms over his chest. He had a feeling about Carrie, a gripping feeling rooted in his stomach, that she was meant for something or someone great, too. He was just waiting for Carrie Moore to bloom, to raise, just as he was waiting for himself to do the same. Maybe they could bloom and raise together?

—

The whole school seemed to be stuck in a gloomy mourning, and the hallways were quiet with whispers and low muttering. Bouts of tears and crying occurred too, even nearly after a week and a half since the pep rally. Deliah Snell and Christabelle Slater had organised a shrine out front of Winn Nelson's locker and each day more flowers and candles gathered there. But both of the teenage girls' grief was quickly turning sour and they needed to let that sourness out, so they planned something cruel for that day with malice pulling at their lips.

On her way to school that morning, Carrie had plucked some daisies, making a small bouquet for Winn Nelson. The bright yellow faces and pure white petals calmed her divided heart, but didn't heal it. She wasn't jostled as she made her way through the crowds at school and she manoeuvred through the sea of sadness towards Winn's locker and the collection of touching yet cheap supermarket flowers and scent candles. His yearbook photo had been framed and handwritten notes and mementoes were sitting among the grieving items. Carrie bent down, laying her tiny bouquet of daisies down gently as candlelight glittered in her teary eyes. Carrie didn't know why she was crying over her dead bully but her heart swelled with grief and guilt regardless.

Someone else bent down beside her, laying down a stuffed wolverine plush beside her daisies. Body heat reached for her and she was about to get up and retreat when she caught Tommy Ross's gaze and she stilled for a moment. He looked dishevelled and exhausted and Carrie's heart bled for the handsome football star that had watched his best friend burn to death. Her heart flared with more sorrow. Carrie felt partly responsible for the death of Winn, and although it wasn't her sin, it kind of felt like it was.

Tommy offered Carrie a small, tight-lipped smile, nodding in acknowledgement and gratitude, and Carrie did retreat then, heading for her haven away from the gloomy hallways. Carrie Moore couldn't get the knowledge—the truth—about Winn's death out of her mind.

Winn Nelson was now just another teenager killed by a Langdon boy at Westfield High, but his soul didn't linger forevermore.

—

The library was deserted before class, but Carrie found Ava Gold sitting by the far windows in a pool of sunlight. The golden light shone magically on her dark skin.

"Morning," Ava greeted her friend, but her happiness that usually glowed from her soul was dimmed, diluted. "Have you seen the shrine out there?" Tight curls shifted around her face as she shook her head slowly.

"Yeah, I just placed some daisies down for... for Winn," Carrie murmured, dropping down beside her friend in the bath of sunlight.

"I just keep thinking about it, you know. Seeing it in my head, and replaying it and replaying it. I mean, I didn't like the guy, but can you imagine going out like that?" Ava admitted as her eyes dewed over, closing the book she was reading. A Brief History of Pirates and Buccaneers—she was still on her pirate kick.

"No, I can't imagine that," Carrie agreed, seeing the mighty flames in her mind that had licked at Winn Nelson till there was nothing left, save for ash and cinder.

The teenage girl inhaled a shaking breath and then leaned forward, her voice dropping low. "The thing is, Winn wasn't standing that close to the bonfire." Carrie shifted in her seat, her skin prickling. "And then I remember that interview with Cordelia Goode." Carrie shook her head, not knowing what Ava Gold was talking about. Margaret Moore didn't allow Carrie to watch the news much; too much horror and Margaret didn't need the nightly news to tell her how wicked and evil humans were, she had the Bible for that. "The one where she revealed her coven to the world. I'm still surprised the interview wasn't done by Lana Winters, she's always been into the juicy stuff," she added.

"Her coven?" Carrie queried, eyebrows shooting upwards and pale eyes widening with astonishment.

"Coven of witches, yeah." Ava's voice dropped again, this time into a wavering whisper. "When the interview came out three years ago, I researched witches a lot. And I think that's what happened at the pep rally. To Winn." Gooseflesh developed along Carrie's arms and she felt freezing despite sitting in a spot of sunshine.

Carrie was baffled but her pulse was spiking. "You think there was a witch in the crowd that set him on fire?"

Ava nodded frantically. "Pyrokinesis maybe. But like, an advanced form of pyrokinesis. In all the reading I did, there was never any evidence of a witch being able to completely burn someone to ash in a heartbeat. It was more of creating fire and manipulating it," she informed Carrie, her voice barely carrying on the cool air in the silent library. No one was around to hear the girls anyhow, but the topic of witches was still rather frowned upon and most of the world and the media considered witches unnatural. "But what happened at the pep rally... that was something else entirely."

The words struck at Carrie like bullets and all she could see was Michael's eyes clouded over with that strange whiteness as flames erupted out of thin air, taking a human life with them. Was Michael practising witchcraft as well as Satanism? And what did all of this mean for Carrie's power? She recalled a passage from Leviticus about witches and warlocks. A man or woman who is a medium or a spiritist amoung you must be put to death. You are to stone them; their blood will be on their own heads.

—

Carrie's mind was fuzzy for the rest of day and she couldn't control her thoughts in class and her bottom lip was raw by the afternoon. She only had another period to go and she was walking towards her locker to swap over some books when she noticed a gathered crowd blocking the hallway.

There was malicious laughter bouncing off the parallel rows of metal lockers and fear snaked around Carrie's heart, strangling the steady beating. A bad feeling woke in her stomach and then the crowd parted like the Red Sea, allowing Carrie to see what was at the heart of this awful crowd being controlled by two virulent teenage girls that wanted a break from their sour grief, wanted to unleash the pain that tested their human hearts.

Red eclipsed Carrie's vision. Crimson and carmine. Smeared and sleek. Thick and tainted.

Her locker door was covered in blood, and rage warred against mortification, but motivation won, hands down, and Carrie's skin flushed like the blood on her locker.

Laughter rang out but Carrie couldn't hear it, couldn't hear anything suddenly. She was deaf, save for the echo of her bashing heart in her eardrums. She stepped up towards her locker as teenagers forgot about their sorrow and loss and relished in the event of a public humiliation. The students of Westfield High wanted to forget their grief for something sweeter, something more poisonous.

Crazy Carrie was written in blood and underneath the mean words was a bloody tampon, the pulling thread secured in the locker vents. It was then Carrie realised it was period blood that marked her locker and her stomach wretched. Hot tears flooded her eyes and she spun around to spot Deliah Snell and Christabelle Slater standing in the crowd, both roaring with sharp and cold laughter.

Crazy Carrie. Crazy Carrie. Crazy Carrie with a fetish for blood.

Carrie squeezed her fists closed into balls as rage broke in her blood. The lockers closest to Carrie vibrated with movement, shaking in their frames but the laughter was louder. Rage saturated her blood, rich and ruthless.

"What the hell!" There was a shout and the voice was so familiar that it sounded in Carrie's ears, jarring Carrie's momentary deafness. "What the fuck is wrong with you people?" the girl screamed at Deliah and Christabelle before moving to Carrie's side. Ava wrapped her arm around Carrie's shoulder like a protective blanket. "Are you okay?" she asked in a soothing voice, tucking Carrie even closer.

Carrie shook her head. "The blood..."

"I know," Ava replied, leading Carrie through the crowd that was just starting to disappear, melting away as the last bell called for class.

"So much blood," Carrie whispered and craned her neck to peer over her shoulder at her defaced locker. Blood leaked down the metal door, pooling on the linoleum. She wondered where two teenage girls had gotten that much blood from, surely it wasn't all period blood. And then she wondered if Deliah Snell was right, maybe she did have a thing for blood.