Blood Witches

A gathering of Blood Witches in "Are You a Good Witch or a Bad Witch?"

> Basically, their element is blood, so they can control muscles and bones. Their own and other people's.
>
> Bloom Peters to Aisha, An Hour Before the Devil Fell

**Blood Witches** are beings who use magic to manipulate their own blood and that of other living beings, thus enabling them to control muscles and bones. Through this, Blood Witches are able to fully puppeteer the bodies of other people and make them carry out their will. For millennia, Blood Witches have had a hostile relationship with fairies of the Otherworld, which have escalated into violent conflicts between the two groups.

## Overview

Blood Witches have a similar physiology to humans and fairies. When using their magic, the eyes of Blood Witches glow a reddish-orange hue, much like how fairies change eye color when they're channeling the elements. Unlike fairies, however, Blood Witches practice a forbidden magic that goes against the tenets of the Otherworld. They are said to draw power from human sacrifice according to the fairy Rosalind Hale.

When Blood witches use stolen fairy magic, instead of their eyes, their veins glow according to the element they use.

## Background

Blood Witches are not common, but they have existed in the Otherworld for a thousand years, dating back as far as the Dominion Wars. During that time, Blood Witches were powerful enough to control people's bodies from miles away. By 2004, a community of Blood Witches settled in Aster Dell, a village located in the realm of Solaria. Sebastian Valtor's father was a Blood Witch from Aster Dell who had an obsession with the Dragon Flame and the Dominion Wars. He had somehow discovered the whereabouts of a baby girl placed in stasis for one thousand years. This girl inherited the Dragon Flame from her birth mother, and Valtor's father saw this as an opportunity to gain an advantage in the Blood Witches' ongoing conflict with the fairies. The presence of the Dragon Flame in Aster Dell had attracted Burned Ones to the village.

Sometime later, a powerful fairy by the name of Rosalind Hale learnt that the Blood Witches of Aster Dell had the Dragon Flame in their possession. She was able to take the baby girl who held the power from them, and hid her away in the First World. Rosalind then saw an opportunity to eliminate both the Blood Witches and the Burned Ones at once. She lied to her allies, claiming that Aster Dell was evacuated for them to initiate an attack. Combining her magic with Farah Dowling and Ben Harvey, Rosalind conjured a lightning storm powerful enough to completely destroy Aster Dell, the Blood Witches, and the Burned Ones. Though Dowling and Harvey did not know the inhabitants of Aster Dell were Blood Witches at the time, they felt immense guilt in killing innocent people.

The destruction of Aster Dell did not completely eradicate the Blood Witches in the Otherworld. Many of the victims had relatives who survived the attack, such as Sebastian Valtor and Grey Owens.

## *Fate: The Winx Saga*

### Season 1

According to Rosalind, the inhabitants of a local settlement called Aster Dell were Blood Witches. They later kidnapped Bloom to use the power of the Dragon Flame within her.

When Burned Ones, seeking Bloom to destroy her so the Dragon Flame would not be used against them, surrounded Aster Dell, Rosalind took advantage of the situation to manipulate Farah Dowling and Ben Harvey into helping her cast a spell to strike Aster Dell with lightning and kill both the Blood Witches and the Burned Ones. However, once the damage was done, Dowling and Harvey were horrified to see they had killed the townspeople as well, believing them to be innocents. This caused them to lock Rosalind away, although they never knew the truth of Aster Dell's inhabitants.

### Season 2

Led by Sebastian Valtor, Blood Witches attempt to gain access to the Dragon Flame inside of Bloom. In addition, they drain several fairies of their magic, including Musa, to increase Sebastian's powers. Sebastian reveals to Bloom that the only way for the magic to be returned is for him to either willingly do it or if Sebastian to be killed. Sebastian explains to Bloom that he's actually from Aster Dell and that he seeks to *"right the wrongs of Aster Dell,"* although he doesn't explain what he means. Sebastian's family was killed when Aster Dell was destroyed, but his father had been obsessed with the ancient war that had created the Burned Ones, much like Rosalind had. As such Sebastian's father found Bloom and attempted to use her for the Blood Witches' purpose before Aster Dell was destroyed.

After Bloom kills Rosalind upon learning that she had murdered Farah Dowling, Queen Luna blames it upon the Blood Witches and declares war upon them. Led by Sebastian and with the help of Beatrix, the Blood Witches take over Alfea, mind control a number of the Specialists and begin draining the fairies of their magic. Beatrix eventually learns that Sebastian's plan is to open a conduit to the Realm of Darkness and have the entity known as Shadow resurrect everyone that was killed in Aster Dell. However, he either doesn't know or doesn't care that this will destroy the Otherworld too. Using Sky as a hostage, Sebastian succeeds in forcing Bloom to transfer the Dragon Flame into a Convergence Crystal until Beatrix sacrifices herself to intervene, killing Sky and stopping the transfer. Grey Owens, a Blood Witch with conflicted loyalties who was helping in order to get his brother back, manages to revive Sky, however.

Although Sebastian is tremendously powerful, Aisha, Stella and Terra Harvey are able to achieve transformation and combine their powers together with Bloom's to kill Sebastian. With Sebastian's death, all of the fairies regain their lost power, and the surviving Blood Witches flee. As Grey had helped them, Saul Silva lets him go home on the condition that he never return. However, Bloom discovers that Sebastian had already succeeded in opening a conduit to the Realm of Darkness, presumably using the stolen fairy magic, and travels through it in order to close the conduit for good.

## Magical Abilities

Blood Witches are ordinary humans and their magic derives from sacrifice and death. As they are not magical in nature, it is unknown if a person born of Blood Witches is a Blood Witch themselves or if they have to choose to become through their own sacrificial rituals. Their magic is useless against Fairies, however they can still use stolen fairy magic against them.

* **Spell Casting:** Blood witches have the power to cast spells and rituals. Primarily, the rituals they do are sacrificial, as that's where their magic comes from. They are also capable of casting spells with magical effects that vary, such as summoning spells.
* **Hemokinesis:** Due to their magic deriving from sacrifice, their element is Blood, and they are capable of manipulating people through it. It is said that they can control not only other people's bodies, but also their own. The range limit of their power is unknown, however it's been stated and shown that they can control multiple people at once, from miles away.
	+ **Organ Manipulation:** Blood Witches have the power to manipulate people's organs, such as muscles and bones. Through this they can incapacitate people, torment or even kill them. Presumably, they also use their magic for medical and healing related feats, such as restarting someone's heart.
		- **Puppet Mastery:** By manipulating the brain and other organs and muscles, Blood Witches can manipulate the actions of their victims and force them do their bidding, they can even force them to speak what they are speaking.

## Changes from the original series

Unlike the Witches  from Winx Club, who constitute a class of magical beings capable of naturally using magic just like Fairies  do, in *Fate: The Winx Saga* only Fairies can use magic and witches are humans who perform magic by unnatural means, such as drawing on sacrifice and death.

## Trivia

* The powers of Blood Witches are similar to those of the Bloodbenders from the *Avatar: The Last Airbender* franchise, and the Blood Witches might have been inspired by the Bloodbenders.

## References

1. ↑ Season 2, Episode 4: *An Hour Before the Devil Fell*
2. ↑ Season 2, Episode 7: *All the Wild Witches*
3. ↑ Season 2, Episode 6: *Poor Unfortunate Souls*