The Beast challenged us to meet him in one month, giving us the choice of battle time and location. We knew this generosity was probably borne of arrogance and boredom, but we were running with it. We chose the Fillorian equivalent of "high noon" to give Alice's powers a boost (the dramatic effect was a bonus) and a moderately sized field encompassed by trees and water.
"A blank slate, perfect for Physical Kids to manipulate, right Eliot?" said the new addition of our motley group.
"That's the plan," I said.
Her name was Otoha Ortega, former loser Psychic from Brakebills with a discipline called Close Clairvoyance. She could predict the short-term actions of her target with uncommon accuracy.
I daresay we'd not had the misfortune of meeting a fangirl of this caliber since Quentin, although Otoha's obsession was more generalized and lay more in the realm of dark fantasy. That's right— vampires, were-creatures, etc.
An atypical Psychic, she possessed a proclivity toward socializing greater than, and an ego less than, the norm. In another sense, though, she was your typical unexpected powerhouse. A five-foot-nothing wisp of a girl looking about 17, she'd spent her post-graduation life modeling herself after her adored misfits of the night. The results were slowed aging, advanced speed and strength, and a hyper-efficient metabolism that allowed a single meal to sustain her for 48 hours.
Even better was her convenient shape-shifting. All she had to do was take a swig of potion, prick her thumb, and draw something like an exclamation mark on her chest, starting between her collar bones. A quick old-era Japanese phrase later, and she became an ebony fox. For a group like us, the impressive part was that her clothes and belongings vanished during the process.
Looking sheepish after changing back to face all our envious eyes, her hand went to the piercing on the bridge of her nose, as was her nervous habit.
"Truly, I would teach you, but it's old land and blood based magic. You have to have a relative three generations back, or less, that was born in Japan," she said in her calming, unexpectedly low voice.
Surprise, surprise— Margot was the first to find words.
"How do you have time for all this modification?"
"I don't work on much else," Otoha said.
"You come from money?" I asked.
"Hardly," she said. "But I do alright. Gambling, you know." She laughed to herself. She really did have the voice of an audiobook narrator, or phone sex operator.
Less than a week before the fight, Alice asked Otoha why she was helping us. The Psychic sighed in a world-weary manner that contrasted sharply with her youthful appearance. Oddly enough, in that moment I felt more connected to her than I ever had.
"The older I get, the less appeal a shallow existence holds for me," she said. "I want to be useful, change something. I'm tired of just taking and taking; I'm tired of feeling alone."
Silence covered us like a suffocating blanket. I was about to ask Otoha how old she was exactly, but she cleared her throat, waving her hand as if to dispel the somber air.
"I mean, it's only natural for a Hufflepuff to want to set things right. Lots of us stayed behind to defend Hogwarts, you know," she said, wearing a curious expression of grim pride.
"Hey, wait. I'm a Hufflepuff, too!" said Kady, an absurd grin playing across her face. I shook my head. I suppose it shouldn't have surprised me that she seemed the most bonded to Otoha. Kady was like a psychic-seeker. Perhaps she was a mental exhibitionist.
She snapped her fingers and pointed.
"Margot and Alice are Gryffindors."
Snap, point.
"Eliot and Q—"
"Slytherins, naturally," I interjected with a wink, throwing my arm around the shoulders of said snake-brother. He surreptitiously pecked a little kiss near the bend of my elbow.
"Yep, and Penny," said Kady.
Snap, point.
"Penny, uh…"
Snap, snap, snap.
If Kady didn't know, he'd probably never said. Maybe Penny was one of those rare souls left unaffected by the gospel of J. K. Rowling.
But then there was a haughty sigh— a huff, really.
"You really can't figure it out?" he said in a voice dripping with Ravenclaw-brand condescension.
"Okay, fine. Whatever," Kady said, rolling her eyes. Otoha laughed.
"Well, we're a well balanced group. That's a good sign," she said.
We met The Beast three days later. The colors of the sky and grass practically glowed in a scene of idyllic beauty and false serenity.
"Quite a lovely grave site you have here," he said, and I didn't need to see his face to detect the smirk in his voice.
There was a weighty pause, and in my head I could hear a huge, pre-historic clock tree ticking— a grandfather clock tree.
One.
Two.
"Go," Otoha's voice rang out cold and hard in all our heads.
Our key offense fell to their knees in a close line to perform the cooperative magic part of our plan. Kady dug her fists into the ground, Alice placed her right hand on her left shoulder, and Margot mirrored the action on the right. With their free hands they began signing and all three spoke an old Icelandic spell. Penny, Quentin, and I stood before them in defense.
The ground shook, and low walls rose up to form of a maze, glyphs etched into the walls coinciding with the circle of script burnt in the grass around The Beast's feet, binding him within the walls. Holes, tunnels, and lookout points were built in for fox-Otoha to dart around and watch.
In response, the Beast said nothing, but began dramatic signing with erratic elbow and shoulder manipulation. His flurry of moths expanded.
"Split and fight. He's morphing, not attacking," said Otoha.
Alice and Quentin went left, Kady and Penny, right. Margot and I shot into the air. Everyone attacked, but the spells were all deflected off the moths in a shower of neon blue sparks and metallic clangs.
Grotesque sounds emitted from the thinning moths. The Beast revealed himself as a horrid amalgamation somewhere between a spider and a crab— a towering creature with four multi-jointed legs. He laughed in a distorted voice, brandishing a scorpion-like tail that looked like an organic scythe. For the moment he seemed content with exploring the maze, testing his new form and the maze border. The barrier held.
"Forward, left, left," said Otoha.
Alice sliced at The Beast with huge laser blades of focused sunlight.
"Right, straight, right."
Margot summoned dozens of needle-sharp daggers of supernatural ice and aimed at The Beast's legs. He slowed, and Kady ran ahead to plant small orbs in the ground loosely containing volatile energy.
The explosions were deafening, the dust blinding.
"He's hurt, not dead, not moving. Keep attacking, keep moving." came Otoha's breathless voice, high-pitched with adrenaline.
Amid the chaos of our blows raining down on The Beast, half blocked once more by the moth shield, Otoha spoke again.
"He's listening," she whispered. "I can't—"
Suddenly The Beast leapt across the maze and crashed down on a seemingly random area.
We all knew immediately that Otoha was killed because the cerebral link shattered. It was a disorienting jolt, like being dunked into frigid water. We all faltered. Quentin was nearest The Beast when this happened, and his shield weakened. All it took was that one second, and he was cut down.
I couldn't control the guttural cry tearing from my throat as my lungs seemed to collapse. My peripheral vision dimmed and, fallen though I am, I prayed with my whole heart that I could become unconscious and be killed in tandem with the one person who had meant everything.
No such poetic end came for me, though, as a wave of emotional energy drew my eyes to Kady. Penny was just able to prevent a suicide strike by grabbing her and basically disapparating.
"Let's go," he said, aloud and in our heads. We retreated.
I see now that we were caught up in the manic confidence the savior trope inspires. It seemed we would be beyond such brash naiveté, but we weren't. … Honestly, though, our weakening was more subtle than that, subconscious. We had not felt invincible because of Otoha, but she had indeed dazzled us with her contagious hope.
No, we hadn't felt unstoppable; but we'd felt lucky, which proved equally foolish. Such a strange, invigorating feeling— what a small, primeval creature must have felt first crawling onto land. Our footing lost grip, our most pressing fears briefly numbed- and so the terror bird devoured us.
This would not be permitted to happen again.