Chapter 9: The Witch in the Alley

"Name's Agatha Harkness," she said. "And you are?"

That name struck Adrian like a bolt from the heavens. Not a revelation—an omen. The syllables rolled through his mind like distant thunder, each one leaving behind a trail of dread. Agatha Harkness. He knew it intimately, but not from any tome in a dusty occult library or whispered legend in the shadowed corners of 1925 London. He knew it from comic panels. From Marvel.

The truth fell upon him like the weight of the fog itself: he wasn't just in some arcane mirror of London. This wasn't merely a Lord of the Mysteries-inspired realm of rituals, hidden horrors, and forgotten gods. This… was the Marvel Universe.

And that, somehow, was worse.

The Marvel Universe had no guiding logic, no singular narrative thread. In the Seer Pathway, madness had a method, a trajectory. There were rules—however eldritch—that governed the climb. But Marvel? It was chaos personified. A world where timelines fractured without warning, where gods fell from grace, where villains wore halos and heroes burned cities. The dead returned. The past rewrote itself. The future never held still. Nothing—nothing—could be relied on.

And Adrian? He was a stranger pretending to be a psychic. A newly minted Seer who still hadn't digested his first potion, armed with tarot cards, a half-shattered divination mirror, and his late father's pocket watch. He was far from ready.

So who was this Agatha? The kindly elder from the comics who mentored Wanda Maximoff, or the dangerously seductive chaos witch from the MCU? She didn't look like Kathryn Hahn—that one small detail gave him a thread of hope. Perhaps this world, like a dream half-forgotten, was some interwoven amalgam of fiction and reality. Not a copy of either, but something new. Something alive. Still, one thing was clear: Agatha's presence changed everything.

With effort, he swallowed the panic rising like bile in his throat. There was only one safe answer.

"Adrian. Adrian White."

Agatha's keen eyes narrowed as if peering past his skin into his very soul. She caught the flicker of recognition on his face and didn't let it pass unnoticed. Arms folded, her posture relaxed but her aura anything but, she said, "So, Adrian, what are you doing following vampires? And how do you know me?"

Her voice was cool, but beneath it was the weight of centuries—of spells cast in blood and power earned through pain. Adrian knew he stood on a precipice. One wrong word and she could unmake him. But total honesty was a risk he couldn't afford. And so, as any Seer would, he danced the line.

"I'm a Seer," he said quietly. "I've been tracking these vampires. There are signs they're involved in something… dangerous. A ritual. Tied to the mob, maybe. I'm trying to understand it. Stop it, if I can."

True words, all of them. Just not the whole truth. Not the pentagram, not the mirror's whispers, not the seeping dread that told him something world-ending was being prepared beneath the city's skin.

Agatha studied him a moment longer. Then her shoulders relaxed ever so slightly. A corner of her mouth lifted—not quite a smile, but the closest thing to kindness Adrian imagined she allowed herself. She turned away from him and faced the two vampires still suspended in agony against the brick walls of the alley, their bodies trembling beneath the unnatural purple haze.

She lifted a hand and snapped her fingers.

The haze deepened, darkened, like a bruise blooming in the air. The vampires gave one final, guttural scream—then crumbled to dust. Ash spun in the humid air, carried on the wind like fragments of a nightmare being scattered.

Adrian didn't flinch, but inside he felt his breath return, slow and cautious.

"Bloody Campbell," Agatha muttered as she brushed ash from her cloak. "Only that idiot would try to meddle with a Black Art ritual and end up pulling a Seer into the mess. I've dealt with enough Seers to know—if one gets drawn in by accident, the whole tapestry begins to unravel."

There was something in her tone—disgust, yes, but something more. A grudging respect. She understood what it meant for a Seer to become entangled. That fate was no longer moving in straight lines.

The mention of "Black Art" sent a chill down Adrian's spine. He knew instinctively that whatever that book was, it wasn't meant to be read. Not meant to be touched. Forbidden knowledge, the kind that burned the soul before it burned the world.

Adrian cleared his throat. "Who's Campbell?" he asked, cautious.

Agatha turned slightly, her expression tight with distaste. "A rogue mage. Arrogant. Unstable. He stole a copy of Black Art from the restricted vaults—book of ancient, dangerous rituals. Not the kind of thing you survive using. Those vampires?" She gestured at the empty air where ash still danced. "His pawns. Tools."

The pieces began to click into place in Adrian's mind. The pentagram. The coordinated murders. The mob's strange obedience. The increasing pull of fate every time he tried to ignore it. This wasn't just a vampire plot. This was a full-scale magical conspiracy, centuries-old magic brought back to life in the shadows of London.

And he was standing in the middle of it.

Agatha turned back toward him, arms now behind her back, expression unreadable. "You're a Seer, yes? Then you can use that gift. Can you divine where Campbell is now? Or the book?"

Her voice was calm, but her gaze left no room for refusal. Adrian felt like he was being watched not just by her eyes but by some vast cosmic principle that lived behind her. The kind of gaze you felt in your bones. This wasn't just a question—it was a turning point.

He hesitated for a moment, then nodded slowly.

If Black Art had truly resurfaced, and if Campbell was willing to use it, then the stakes were greater than any secret he was hiding. This wasn't just about digestions or missions. It was about the survival of reality as it was. Adrian didn't know if he was ready for that weight—but the pendulum had already begun to swing.

And a Seer must always look forward.