Briallen Bevin and the Snatcher's Cave

Chapter 14: The Very Best Revenge

"Find anything useful yet?" asked Marisol, bored, as she sat down next to Briallen with the large, black leather book she had just pulled from the bookshelf behind her.

"Nope," said Briallen, shutting the book she had been flipping through. "There were spells to make people change colors and potions to change people's voices but nothing big enough or scary enough to make Dante and his friends leave us alone forever. What's that book?"

Marisol closed it briefly to look at the cover and then opened it again. "The Big Black Book of the Best Bewitchments... all of these spells look too advanced for us, though."

Briallen moved closer to Marisol and looked down at the page she had opened to. "We don't have to hex him and his friends today. We could just find a really good spell, practice it, and then hex them in a couple of days."

"A lot of these will take more than a few days to learn, Briallen. And who would you practice them on? I'm certainly not willing to let you practice casting a butt-clap curse on me."

"Butt-clap curse?" asked Toby as he sat down across from the two girls and unwrapped a chocolate bar.

"Don't ask," said Briallen after quickly skimming the description of the curse and rolling her eyes. "That's too childish anyway. We need to do something that will scare the living daylights out of them... something big."

Briallen and Marisol had decided the night before that Halloween, which was the next day, would be the most ideal time to get revenge on Dante Garcia and his friends for all the times they had bullied Briallen and her friends that semester, since a scary prank on that day would attract less attention from everyone else. Marisol also wanted them to concentrate on getting their revenge on Dante because it took Briallen's mind off of what had happened earlier that week with Miss Winsome. The only problem was that they had limited time in which to find, plan, and execute their revenge because Briallen had to spend two hours every night in detention with Professor Morra.

"Why not lock him in a room with a Red Cap?" suggested Toby cheerfully.

Marisol snorted. "We want to frighten him, not kill him. I don't want to risk Dante coming back as ghost, anyway. We'd have to transfer schools then because he would never leave us alone!"

"I bet he wouldn't go into the light just to spite us," said Briallen with a shudder. "Can you imagine waking up at two in the morning to find Dante's ghost hovering over you?"

"Stop it! You're going to give me nightmares!" screeched Marisol, aghast. "Oh, how about this one: Pooch Producing hex. Give your enemy more rolls than a bread basket!"

Toby choked on his chocolate bar he was laughing so hard. The librarian, Mrs Shan, shushed them angrily from her desk. "That would be a good one if Dante was like Conall and obsessed with his body," said Toby as he wiped the tears from his eyes.

"It's not an obsession, it's a hobby," said Briallen, chuckling, "At least, that's what he says."

"Conall also says that anyone who can't ride a broom should be tied to one and floated down the Mississippi," Toby muttered as he rolled his eyes.

"Focus, people!" said Marisol, sharply. "Remember what we're here to do. If you want to stay, Toby, then look through this book for anything that would be fun to use on Dante." Marisol shoved a book towards the blonde-haired boy.

Toby sighed in defeat and opened it, only to close it seconds later. "Looking through random spells and potions isn't going to help. You need to start with an idea. For example: Should we set him on fire? Throw him over the north wood's wall? Feed him to whatever is in the lake?"

"There's nothing in the lake that would want to eat him," said Marisol, sounding almost sad. "And throwing him over the north wood's wall would get us into too much trouble."

"And setting him on fire wouldn't?" asked Briallen, not lifting her eyes from her book.

"Mrs Krause has salves that heal burns... Actually, that isn't such a bad idea," said Marisol, sincerely.

"Except that it would be too obvious that we did it," pointed out Briallen. "We're trying to do something that can't be traced back to us, remember? I don't want any more detentions."

"Yeah, yeah..."

"I like the sound of this one," said Toby abruptly. "It's called 'Three Nights of Hell,' and it's complicated, but the result is that the person you cast it on will basically have the plague for three days and then suddenly return to normal."

"Other than the fact that it's a complicated spell and the effect wears off too soon, it's a good start. I would prefer something that doesn't seem like some random sickness, though," explained Marisol.

Briallen pulled a book titled The Very Best Revenge towards her and opened it to the contents page where she saw something that caught her eye. Excitedly, she flipped to the page she had seen listed in the contents and began to read. "I have found the most perfect way to get back at Dante," said Briallen with a twinkle in her eye. "But it's going to take a bit of work to find what we need..."

* * *

Briallen peeked her head around the corner of the wall and then turned back to Marisol and Toby and whispered, "It's all clear."

It was almost seven that night and most of the students and staff of Bergamot were in the dining hall enjoying their supper, unaware of what the three first years were conspiring to do. Briallen, Marisol, and Toby had to work during dinner, however, since Briallen started her detention at eight o'clock sharp.

"This would be so much easier if we had an invisibility cloak," complained Marisol as she and Toby carried a small trunk into the hallway lined with suits of armor. They all had jack o' lanterns in place of their helmets in the spirit of Halloween and the light given off by the candles inside cast spooky shadows on the hallway walls.

"Those are real?" asked Toby.

"Of course they are! My tío used to have one! Or so he likes to tell us."

"I don't believe it!" said Toby, incredulous.

"Hush," said Briallen forcefully. "I think we should set up here... this place is so creepy right now, it's perfect! We could put the trunk by one of the suits of armor, hide behind that wall over there and then we can open it with magic without being seen... I love being a witch; it's so much easier to be sneaky and not get caught!"

"Sounds good to me," agreed Toby as he and Marisol put the trunk down in front of the formerly poetry-reciting suit of armor. "And we're sure that Dante is in the dining hall right now?"

"Yes, my informants told me he started eating... approximately seventeen minutes ago." Briallen looked at her watch to confirm her fact. "So we won't have to wait that long until he's done."

Marisol and Toby nodded and then followed Briallen out of the hallway their hiding place to wait for Dante to arrive. Sure enough, ten minutes later, Dante walked into the armor-lined hallway with his usual group of followers: Brady Dolt, Morana Tenebros, Perdita Dogge, and Amon Qusay.

Marisol giggled excitedly. Toby put his hand over her mouth. Briallen took out her wand as Dante and his friends stopped to look at the mysterious box in the middle of the hallway. They stood back, eyeing it warily, while discussing why it was there and what could be in it, overall agreeing that it must have something to do with Halloween. The whole school was decorated with scary gags everywhere so it wouldn't be so unusual for Dante and his friends to come across Briallen's trap.

"Adaperio!" whispered Briallen while she pointed her wand at the trunk.

As the trunk opened, the five people in the hallway jumped back. A black cloud floated out of the trunk and hovered for a moment before it suddenly began to change shape.

"Vampiro!" screamed Dante as the black cloud morphed into the form of a tall, broad, brown-skinned man. He wore a large red and gold head-dress and a matching cloth about his waist and his skin was rotted and covered in strange symbols. The man reached a hand out to Dante, his long fingernails almost touching him before Dante pulled away and ran back into the entrance hall, screaming.

Amon, who was now standing closest to the Toltec vampire, stared at it, unsure whether or not the strange man was indeed a threat since he had never seen anything like him. Then the Toltec stood there no longer and another creature took its place. It was a large lizard-like humanoid that hissed as it approached Amon. Amon fell to his knees, lowered his head, and began to cry. Morana, the only one of Dante's gang still in the hall, began to pull Amon away from the lizard creature.

"Oh, no!" said Marisol, worried. "I just realized we don't know how to get rid of it! What do we do?"

"I don't know! The book didn't say how to get rid of a Boggart!" cried Briallen defensively.

Toby tapped the girls on their shoulder. "We should go! Teachers are coming!"

Briallen, Marisol and Toby ran up the stairs towards the library and then up the next flight of stairs to the third floor. Though none of them had ever been on the third floor and had no idea where they were going, they continued to run until they felt safe.

"Do you think anybody saw us?" asked Marisol breathlessly as they stopped at the end of a small hallway off of the main third floor hallway.

"I didn't see anybody come into the portrait hall and nobody yelled for us. I don't think anybody saw us," Toby said as he leaned against a window and placed a palm on the cold hard glass. "You guys! Look outside!"

The three of them lined up next to each other in front of the small window, all trying to get a good look at what was going on outside. They could see the hedge maze, the locked gate and the north wood's wall perfectly from where they were.

"Oh, my gosh! The north wood's gate is opened!" whispered Briallen, shocked.

"What?" asked Toby. "That's not what I was talking about. Look down there, on the path. There's a duel going on!"

Briallen leaned against the window to get a better look at what was going on directly below them. She could see the light of multi-colored sparks as they shot back and forth between two figures. By what little light the half-moon gave off, Briallen recognized one of the duelers as a Platt student because of the blue on his robes, but the other dueler was wearing a black hood and cloak without any markings or other distinguishable features.

"Who do you think they are?" Toby asked, his face pressed against the glass. "One looks like they might be a Platt but I don't know about the other one."

"The other one is definitely a girl. Look at the way she moves. It's very feminine," Marisol commented.

"The Platt's been taken down! Hey - what's that guy doing?"

"That girl, you mean."

The hooded figure moved over the fallen Platt and stood over the Platt for a few seconds. Then the figure stood up, raised their wand once more and the Platt began to hover in the air.

Briallen knew what was going to happen next. "I think Mr Hoody there is taking that Platt into the north wood," she said as the hooded figure led the hovering Platt through the gate and stopping only briefly to turn and lock it.

"How do you know that path leads into the north wood?" asked Marisol. "It looks like it could lead back towards the cemetery... "

"Why would they lock it if just led to the cemetery?"

"Good point. But why is there a path leading into the north wood anyway? I mean, there are, like, werewolves and Gytrashes and Giants in there!"

"No, there isn't," said Briallen seriously. "I'm going down there to look around."

"What?! No, Briallen! If you're caught outside at night without permission you'll get another week's worth of detention! Briallen!" shouted Marisol to her best friend's retreating form.

Briallen ignored Marisol and ran back to the portrait hall, through the armor-lined hallway (which was now clear of students, staff and Boggarts), through the entrance hall and outside. Once she had made it safely outside, Briallen ran as fast as she could to the north wood's wall. When she got there she stopped so quickly that she fell backwards. There was a light near the wall, a few dozen feet from where she was. She walked quietly towards the light, just in case it was Mr Eldred or someone equally powerful enough to give her detention.

"Lucan?!" said Briallen in disbelief. "What on earth are you doing out here?!"

Lucan shushed her and then waved her over. "Look," he whispered as he pointed to a hole in the wall. Briallen glared at him momentarily, knowing he had made that hole even though they had spent hours patching the wall up, and then looked through. The view of the other side was much clearer then it had been the first night she and Lucan had peered through a hole in the north wood wall to see what was on the other side. This time Briallen could clearly make out the shape of a person walking with something floating in front of them.

"Those are the duelers!" Briallen said as she looked back at Lucan.

"I know. I was hiding in the hedge maze while they were fighting."

"What? Why?"

Lucan sighed and shook his head. "Why should I tell you? You don't care about what's going on in the north wood anymore."

"I didn't even know there was something going on in the north wood!"

"Yes, you did. We saw the beginning of it that night we had detention."

Briallen raised a hand to her brow and groaned. "What are you talking about?"

"What we saw that night. We did see somebody. Did you know that they still haven't found Christabel Lewis? Isn't it weird how nobody talks about her anymore?"

"I completely forgot about her... "

"Most of the students have. It's because nobody was told she was kidnapped. We were all made to believe she just went home. She didn't."

Briallen's jaw dropped. "But my Grandpa... "

"Lied to you. Honestly, Briallen, did you really think he was going involve his twelve year old granddaughter in something like this?"

"And what is this, exactly?"

"I'm not quite sure. When you wouldn't talk to me about Christabel, I went and had a chat with Takashi Wu. He's a fifth year in my house and he's very smart - his father runs a detective agency in San Francisco. They specialize in finding lost persons and he helped his father out on some of the cases so I thought he would know something." Lucan took a breath and leaned against the wall. "He's spent the past month and a half researching Christabel's disappearance and just this morning he came to me and told me that he thinks he knows what happened and to meet him in the hedge maze later tonight. Well, you and your friends saw the rest. Takashi never made it to the hedge maze and he was taken by the same person that took Christabel."

"Did you see who it was?"

"No, they had a hood over their face."

Briallen sighed and leaned against the wall next to Lucan. She had gotten over what she heard him say about her and, while she liked him even less now, she knew he didn't keep talking to her because he had a crush on her. Their relationship was an accidental partnership only because they happened to see the same thing the night of their first detention. Then she realized something very important: if Lucan had noticed her, Marisol and Toby up in the third floor window then it was possible the mysterious, and obviously dangerous, hooded figure could have noticed them as well...