Briallen Bevin and the Clocktower Guard

Chapter 5: The Darklight Duel

"Hey, that's Perdita and Brady back there!" said Marisol excitedly, as she watched Perdita Dogge and Brady Dolt disappear through a door a few yards away.

Marisol, Toby, and Briallen walked down the narrow hallway on one of the many cars of the Bergamot train, which was currently stopped at Chicago's Union Station. Marisol slid open the nearest compartment door and hopped happily inside where she proceeded to then dump the entire contents of her large purse onto one of the seats. After rifling through the mess, she proudly lifted a large dungbomb and showed it to Toby and Briallen. "I say we ring in another year at Bergamot with Perdita and Brady."

Toby shook his head. "The conductor will know, Marisol. Dungbombs leave a stench that's hard to get rid of... try a few stink pellets instead."

"Toby! You're supposed to be the good one," scolded Briallen, half-joking.

"But I don't like Perdita or Brady." Toby shrugged carelessly as he picked up a few of Marisol's stink pellets and strolled out of the compartment. A minute later, he returned with a smile on his face. "I think they might've seen me." He sat down and closed the compartment door just as Perdita, angry and red-faced, appeared outside the door's window.

Perdita slammed on the glass of the compartment's sliding door. "I'm telling Dante about this when I get to school, Davis! We'll see how happy you are then!" She gave the glass one more hard pound, screamed, and then stormed away back to her compartment.

"Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed," said Toby, surprised by the reaction he had elicited from Perdita. He had never actually heard the gloomy, droopy-faced girl speak before, not even in the few classes they had together their first year. "That somebody also forgot that Dante is scared of Briallen, and that Briallen is my best friend."

"Why is Dante scared of Briallen?" asked Marisol as she popped a Tinking Toffee into her mouth. Her hair changed from its normal raven black to sunshine yellow, and then back to black again in the span of a few seconds.

"I don't know. Whatever she did to him and his friends on Halloween last year really scared him away." Toby turned to Briallen and tapped her on the knee. "What did you do to him?"

"I made the room they were in hot as a sauna, and then locked him and his friends in it all night." At least, that's what she thought she did - she couldn't be sure since she had cast the first spell that came to mind, which just happened to be one she'd read in a book.

"So that's what you meant when you said you turned him into a great big, wrinkly prune... You should do that again. Just to remind him."

Briallen rolled her eyes. She had been so angry at Dante at the time that she had hardly been thinking straight, not to mention that was the same night she'd been put into a coma by Miss Winsome, her evil former Flying instructor. Reflecting on her actions that night, she almost felt embarrassed by her lack of control over her emotions. She mumbled, "I can't even remember the spell anymore. It was something I'd just read in some book, I'm surprised it even worked."

"You know, you can be really scary when you're angry," mentioned Toby, off-handed, with a tone of what Briallen thought might be slight admiration.

"I like riding trains... " said Briallen with faux cheer, avoiding the topic. She looked out the window at the people on the platform. The bullet-nosed train for the Lambency Beacon Academy of Magic was just pulling in and a large group of parents, and students, many of whom wore pine-green button-down shirts and khaki pants, began assembling on its platform. Briallen briefly wondered what their school was like, and if it was very different from Bergamot. She sometimes doubted her choice of schools.

Marisol shook her finger at her friend, grinning. "You're changing the topic."

"Of course I am."

Toby shoved the contents of Marisol's purse to the side and sat down before going through the clutter and taking a Chocolate Frog. "I'm just glad I'm your friend!"

"Hey, that's mine!" Marisol whined.

"Sharing is caring, as my mom says," said Toby as he opened the Chocolate Frog, caught it mid-leap, and shoved it whole into his mouth. While still loudly chewing on the chocolate, he removed the card from inside the box and looked at it. Marisol snatched it out of his hands quickly and then gasped.

"Caspian Everard! I didn't know they were putting him on the cards already! Oh! I bet I'm one of the first to get him!" She smiled arrogantly and waved it in front of Toby and Briallen. "Limited edition, you know!"

"No, I don't know. Let me see," Briallen said as she reached for the card. Marisol handed it to her hesitantly. Briallen knew Marisol took her Chocolate Frog card collection unusually seriously, but the name Caspian Everard rang a bell in Briallen's memory: she knew he was Minister of Magic, but she also remembered Lucan mentioning that he idolized the man. She read aloud, "Caspian Everard: 1898 to present. Current Minister of Magic for the United States of America, elected by an electoral landslide. Was named hero of the Great Lakes War of 1934, and is credited as the main contributor to the modern American... Werewolf Registry?" Briallen angrily tossed the card back to Marisol just as their train began to move out of the station. "That's terrible!"

Marisol and Toby looked at each other knowingly. They knew that if they attempted to engage Briallen in conversation right now she would go off ranting about the Werewolf Registry and how unfair it was, just as she had in many of the letters she had sent them that summer, and one two-hour tirade she had gone off on at Marisol's house when they all spent the weekend together. They had learned by now that so long as they did not speak to Briallen, or mention anything about werewolves or Gavin Ellison for at least an hour, she would cool down silently on her own.

It was a few hours later, just as the Bergamot train crossed into Kentucky, that the storm began. The sky darkened almost instantly, and rain poured heavily over the train as lightening flashed in the sky and thunder shook the train cars. Briallen, who had been absorbed in reading her new book, Deadly Dragons!, looked up from her current page just as the compartment and hallway lights switched on.

"'Bout time," muttered Toby, before continuing to try to transfigure a snuffbox into a mouse. It was something they had been taught in Transfiguration the year before, but Toby had yet to be able to do it correctly. He waved his long, white wand sharply at the snuffbox, and said the spell, but nothing happened. Marisol coughed lightly as her head rolled onto Toby's shoulder. Marisol's straight hair looked alive with static and the red ribbon wrapped around her head had come partially undone, from rolling from the seat to Toby's shoulder too many times. She had been asleep for only an hour, but not even the thunder outside was able to wake her just then. Toby pushed her head away but seconds later it was back on his shoulder. With a sigh of resignation, he left her there.

Briallen smiled at her friends, and then glanced out the window just as a lightening bolt struck a tree just a yards away. A shower of sparks flew from where the lightening bolt struck and then the tree fell over. Briallen could have sworn that she felt the train shake from the impact the tree made when it hit the ground, even though it was not a very large tree.

"Did you feel that?" asked Briallen, putting a book mark in her book. She set it on the empty seat beside her and stood up.

Toby didn't look up from the snuffbox. "Feel what?"

"The train shake. Just a few seconds ago."

He grunted. "Probably just a bump in the tracks... why won't this stupid thing turn into a mouse?" He swung his wand violently at the snuffbox and then suddenly there was a puff of smoke, and the snuffbox had legs and a tail and began to move. "Oh, great. Now what am I going to do with a mobile snuffbox?"

"Give it to somebody who's trying to quit chewing?" suggested Briallen, watching with amusement as the snuffbox scuttled around on Toby's leg. Toby, even though he was upset by his failure, couldn't help but chuckle.

Then Briallen felt again what she had felt when the tree had fallen. "There it was again! Did you feel it this time? Like... like a vibration or something?"

"Like when someone has their music on too loud or when you see a movie at the theater and it has a lot of explosions..." said Toby, nodding in agreement. "I don't know where it came from, though. That can't be thunder, can it?"

"I'm going to go see if anybody in any of the other compartments felt it or know what it is."

"Bored?"

Briallen stuck her tongue at Toby as she exited the compartment. The door slid shut loudly behind her, and caused an uneasy tingle to crawl down her spine. The hallway was abnormally quiet, with all of the kids now in the train compartments, and aside from the thunder and the muffled roar of the moving train, nothing out of the ordinary could be heard. Briallen walked to the compartment next to hers and opened the door. Inside were four short kids, two boys and two girls. To Briallen, they looked no older than nine or ten. She suspected them to be first year students.

"Hey, did any of you feel that weird vibration a few minutes back?" asked Briallen as she looked them over. The kids all looked at each other, not sure of what to say. For an uncomfortable length of time, Briallen stared at them, waiting for a response, and when it became obvious that she would not get one, she rolled her eyes, shut the door, and moved on to the next compartment.

"Hello," said Briallen in her best imitation of a giddy airplane stewardess. "I'm Briallen, and I'm in a compartment just down the hall. I was wondering if you felt a weird vibration a few minutes ago."

"Briallen? As in Dean Bevin's granddaughter? I've seen you 'round school. You get in a lot of trouble, don't you?" asked a teenaged boy with an runner's build and a buzzed head, in a way that suggested he already knew the answer to his question. He was sitting slouched in his seat, his legs apart and his hands behind his head, giving off the air of someone who definitely thought very highly of himself.

"Maybe - who wants to know?" asked Briallen suspiciously as she looked over the boy, and his two male friends. Nobody had put on their school uniforms yet and so she had no way of knowing who they were or whether or not they were friendly.

The boy with the runner's build held out his hand. "Julian Hawkins - fast as a hawk Hawkins, that is - Platt Quidditch Captain, Seeker, and brand-spanking-new prefect."

Briallen hesitated and then shook his hand, if only to humor him, because his fast talking made her uneasy. He reminded her of those charismatic salesmen from late-night infomercials - she'd always thought they were just over-acting, but after meeting Julian, she wasn't so sure. "You seem awfully small to be on the Quidditch team."

Julian barked out a laugh and, oddly, rubbed his head, before responding, "And you seem awfully young to be wandering this train all by your lonesome."

"I'll have you know, I fought three werewolves and a hag three months ago and survived to tell about it! I think I'll be just fine 'wandering this train' by myself," retorted Briallen defensively, her chin in the air. She was sick of wasting her time with these boys who were obviously bored and looking to use her to entertain themselves. "Now, did you feel the vibration or not?"

"Just as feisty as Stone says," mumbled one of the other boys with a guffaw. Now that she knew who Julian was, she recognized this other boy as one of Hayden's classmates.

Briallen turned to the boy and put her hands on her hips. "Excuse me?"

"Ignore him, he's been hit in the head with a Bludger one too many times," said Julian with a sharp, playful smile. "And yes, we did feel the vibration you're talking about. We were actually talking about it right before you came in. Why don't you join us for a bit longer? Maybe we'll come up with an answer together."

Wrinkling her nose, Briallen shook her head. "No thanks, I'm going back to my friends." She turned to leave the boys' compartment.

"Try asking the kid in the first compartment in the next car," suggested Julian right before Briallen shut the door behind her and cut him off. She shook her head as she walked to the next compartment. She could still hear their sharp, hyena-like laughter. The next compartment had its shades down, and Briallen took that as a sign that whoever was inside did not want to be disturbed, and so she moved on and found herself at the end of the train car.

Once she was in the next train car she went immediately to the first compartment, the one that Julian suggested she go to, and frowned when she saw that whoever was inside had pulled down their shades as well. With a careless shrug, Briallen slid open the door and saw a boy with dark hair and eyes, reading a book, and sitting by himself. His surprise at seeing Briallen in his compartment was evident. "...uh, Briallen?"

Briallen closed her eyes, and then pinched her arm before opening them again, only to see that the boy was still there. In a state of disbelief, she shut the door and sat down next to the boy. "Lucan? What on earth are you doing on this train?"

He stared at her, caught off guard, and then regained his composure and responded icily, "I'm on my way to school, of course."

"Well, yes, I know that. But what are you doing here. Where do you even live? Not around here, I thought..."

Lucan shifted in his seat. Briallen was very close to him and was still staring at him in disbelief. He was having a difficult time trying to act unconcerned, as he was just as shocked by her unexpected presence on the train. "I live in Vermont but I spent the last few days at a relative's house in Michigan, so I took the train out of Chicago instead of New York. You live in Virginia, though, I know that - so what are you doing on this train?"

"I was visiting with Marisol... this is just too weird, how we keep running into each other."

"I agree," said Lucan. Just then the lights went out and another vibration swept over the train. Briallen yelped in surprise, moved closer to Lucan and clutched a handful of his black slacks. "Briallen, did you feel that? Did you feel the shaking?"

"Yeah, I mean, yes. That's why I'm here. I was going around asking everybody if

they felt the vibrations earlier and if they knew what it was because, well, because I'm bored," whispered Briallen, looking out the window at the dark sky. "Do you know what's causing them?"

"Some sort of power surge, I would guess."

"Like an electrical power surge? I thought witches and wizards didn't use electricity? We light things with magic don't we?"

"That's what I meant," whispered Lucan, his breath heavy in the darkness, "a magic surge. Some older students might be fighting a few cars back and we're getting the tremors, except they would have to be using some powerful magic, or... "

"Or something dangerous is happening?"

"Or we're just in a very... in a very powerful magical location and their magic plus where we are, is causing the energy surges."

"Or maybe there's a dark wizard standing right outside our door?" whispered Briallen fearfully, as both of them looked to the shadow on the shade that was drawn over the door's window. Lucan defensively wrapped one arm around Briallen and with the other he held his wand out, ready to blast away whoever was there. The door opened and screams were exchanged, until Lucan realized the smart thing to do would be to light his wand and see who was at the door.

"When the power went out we thought we should go looking for you and oh, my, Briallen, what are you doing?" asked Marisol, her jaw dropped as she took in the sight of Briallen practically sitting on Lucan's lap, and Lucan with his arm around her. Toby stood next to Marisol, scowling at Lucan. Even though it had been Lucan who had helped knock most of the werewolves unconscious during their adventure in the north wood, Toby still didn't like or trust him.

"I was scared out of my mind, that's what!" said Briallen quickly, jumping off of Lucan. "I thought you were an evil, dark wizard come to kill me!" Briallen punched Marisol in the shoulder and was about to shout at her again when she noticed something, something small, but bizarre, which made it stand out in an already bizarre situation: Marisol was wearing a pink ribbon in her hair instead of the red ribbon Briallen thought she had last seen her wearing. "Marisol, weren't you wearing a red ribbon earlier?"

Marisol raised her hand to her head, slightly confused. "I, um, I thought I was. Is it not red?"

"No, it's pink. But I remember you... or I mean... I don't know what I remember. I'm so confused." Something strange was happening on the train, and Briallen knew it, she just couldn't make sense of the situation and articulate her thoughts on it, so that she could explain it to her friends. And, for some reason, the strange letter she received back in Dustum sprang to mind just then, and for one brief moment, Briallen wondered if the letter and Marisol's ribbon were connected.

She laughed at herself and shook her head as she thought, You're just being paranoid, Briallen. Miss Winsome is dead, there are no werewolves on the train, and there is no one out to get you...

Lucan looked at Briallen, concerned, which Briallen also thought was odd. Toby just rolled his eyes and said, "So what? Who cares about Marisol's ribbon? Let's go back to our own compartment now, Briallen."

"She can stay here if she wants," snapped Lucan.

"Just because you keep popping up around us all the time, and stalk Briallen, that doesn't mean you're our friend!" fumed Toby. He raised his wand as if he were about to attack Lucan, who had raised his own wand in retaliation. The two boys were glowering at each other with such intensity that Briallen and Marisol instinctually backed away from them and out of the line of fire.

"If you raise your wand at me, Davis, you had better plan to use it," whispered Lucan through clenched teeth. His head was down and his shoulders hunched, like a bull ready to charge. His threat, which came off more like an invitation, only seemed to fuel Toby's anger towards him.

All at once, Lucan and Toby shouted a series of hexes and jinxes, and the train car, previously darkened by lack of working lamps, was suddenly lit up in a spectrum of colorful lights and sparks. Their spell-throwing provided just enough light for the spectators to see bits and pieces of the spell effects. The show was over not long after it began. There was a barely detectable scent of smoke, like a sparkler that has just been put out. Unable to see much of anything, both Briallen and Marisol lit their wands and examined the damage.

Lucan was hunched over one the seats in the compartment, his hands on his buttocks, which were making a loud clapping sound. He also had flowering vines growing out his nose, and his ears were many times larger than normal. Toby, on the other hand, was sprawled supine in the train car's hallway and looked almost unrecognizable. He was twice as large as normal, bright purple, and oozing a green slime out of all of his visible orifices. Marisol gagged and covered her mouth in an effort to keep from vomiting as she kneeled next to Toby and cradled his head in her lap.

More proof of something strange going on - that's how Briallen viewed the current situation. She knew Toby well; she knew that he wasn't the sort of person to just start hexing people when angry. He was Muggle-raised, and still unfamiliar with fighting with magic; when he got angry, he pouted and shouted, and occasionally threw a punch, not a curse.

Marisol was babbling now, though Briallen was so involved in her thoughts that she only caught the last half of what her friend was saying. "And what's wrong with them?! Cursing each other on the train?!" screeched Marisol, waving her hands wildly as she spoke.

"It's the weather," mumbled Briallen. "It's making everybody a little crazy..."

"That is no excuse!" shouted a train attendant who had just entered the car. The noise of Lucan's and Toby's duel had attracted the attention of the kids in the rest of the compartments and many of them were now in the hallway as well. One of them apparently had gone for help. "We're about to stop in Memphis - we'll call a Healer there, and I'm contacting your school when we get The Village!"

The attendant pushed Marisol away from Toby so that he could pick him up and drag him into the compartment with Lucan. He then locked the door and turned to Briallen and Marisol to address them. "Your friends will be let out in Memphis. Until then, they're to stay in there. You two go back to your compartment."

"But we can't just leave them in there!" argued Marisol.

"It's only another ten minutes! I'm sure they'll live," grumbled the attendant. With that, he walked away from Marisol and began herding the kids in the hallway back into their compartments.

Briallen put an arm around her friend and gently began to lead her back to their own compartment. "They'll be alright, Marisol," consoled Briallen.

"I'm only concerned about Toby! What in Merlin's lab did Lucan do to him? You saw what he did to him, didn't you?"

"Toby got him too."

"Not as bad! So he's got big ears and some vines up his nose... he's not swollen and excreting puss! It's disgusting!"

"It's the weather, Marisol, it's making everyone cranky," repeated Briallen, only half believing it herself.

"You keep saying that, but it's ridiculous! People don't just go crazy when it gets icky outside!"

Of course Marisol was right, and Briallen knew it. There was something more than the weather. There were little things that were off, like Marisol's ribbon changing color. But there was something else, something Briallen couldn't quite put her finger on...

They sat back down in their seats where Marisol dropped her head in her hands and began to cry. Briallen, watched her overly emotional friend, confused by the extreme reaction. "The school year hasn't even began yet and we're already in trouble!" blubbered Marisol. "My parents are going to kill me!"

Briallen shook her head and leaned closer to her friend. "Now you're being ridiculous! You're parents aren't going to kill you... we didn't have anything to do with what happened back there, and I really don't think we'll get in any trouble."

"Toby's been acting strange, ever since the north wood. Maybe, do you think, when he hit his head, like something, like something might've happened to him or something," cried Marisol somewhat incoherently.

Briallen pat Marisol on the back and reached into her pile of goodies, still spread out on the seat, for a piece of candy to cheer her up. She grabbed a handful of the mess and dropped it in her lap. She found a Tinking Toffee and unwrapped it and gave it to Marisol. Still crying, Marisol popped the candy in her mouth and looked at her reflection in the mirror to see what color her hair turned. Briallen looked back down at the sweets in her lap for another piece of candy.

That was when she noticed it. Small and inconspicuous, but unmistakable - a folded piece of parchment with Briallen's name written on it in the same narrow, loopy hand-writing as the mysterious letter she got back in Dustum, only a few weeks ago. After a quick glance at Marisol, to make sure she wasn't be watched, Briallen slid the note discreetly into her jeans pocket, and then resumed consoling her friend.