Chapter 58 - A Blind Boy

Characters - 

Felix Sutter: Poor boy living in Sacramento, recently found out magic existed. Hard worker, knows the price of everything.

Christopher Mau: The black cat. 3rd year Dragon student. Possibly has nine lives. Unusually lucky and dexterous.

Beatrix Brynwyll: 3rd year dragon student. A little uptight.

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 At first, even the fiercest doubted her.
But time proved her mind a blade as sharp as Bjorn’s axe.
Together, the coven wove secrets into steel.
They read fate like maps, and found the place where destiny turned dark.
Bjorn spoke of Dublin,
Of the house where ghosts dwelled.
Of vengeance not yet taken.

The Saga of Bjorn, Verse 16

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Felix was feeling a bit better after dinner. The whole day had fried him, then a break after the coven meeting and a good meal had done wonders for his mood. He headed back to the Dragon common room, where it was his turn to do ‘door duty’. He went through the antechamber, and firmly ignored the couple passionately kissing on one of the sofas.

Mostly ignored. With the way their hands were wandering, he decided it was their sofa, and he wasn’t going to use it. 

Felix went to his room, dropped his stuff off, and took out a half-dozen rolls and pastries he’d smuggled out of the dining hall into his room. He probably wouldn’t go hungry… but it didn’t hurt to have some snacks prepared. Just in case. Who knew what would happen? He changed from his uniform into more comfortable clothing. Chris and Beatrix met him in the common room, the former having a tattered blindfold over his eyes.

“Uh. You okay?” He asked Chris.

“This?” He asked, hooking a thumb under the blindfold. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just wearing it a bit for a ritual.” He said.

“And exactly how long are you going to be wearing it for?” Beatrix asked.

“Just a year and a day, no biggie.” Chris said. 

The crisp crack of Beatrix’s facepalm could be heard across the common room. The couple making out didn’t seem to notice.

“You idiot! Whyyyy?” She asked.

“Soulbind.” Chris said, like that would explain everything. 

“You’re going to try to do a year of class blindfolded?” Beatrix sounded like she was understanding, but also so done with it already. “How are you going to do tests? How are you going to do PT?”

“Yeah Chris,” Felix said, suddenly inspired. “That seems like a really short sighted decision.”

Beatrix half-heartedly swatted at Felix. He didn’t move, and the swat missed entirely.

“Carefully, and every branch is going to hit me in the face until I figure things out.” Chris said. “I should get a totally sweet mask out of it in the end. Plus, don’t you need to do fancy stuff for your soulbind?”

“A month of a mildly hallucinogenic plant is nothing like running around blindfolded!”

Felix was dead curious to learn more about soulbinds, but first things first.

“Should we get over to the monitoring room and do the tutoring thing?” He tentatively asked. “If you can’t because of your blindfold, that’s fine.” He said.

“Nah, I’m good, it’s all words and knowledge.” Chris said.

“Except you can’t correct his wand movements if they’re wrong!” Beatrix said. The three of them started to go over to the little monitoring station, where they could visually confirm if the person trying to enter Dragon house was, indeed, a Dragon, and not someone who managed to overhear the password. A very basic ego check, in some ways. Chris tapped his way around the common room, using his staff as a walking stick. The room was small and cozy, with three different silver bowls filled with water showing the antechamber from three different angles. 

“You hit this rune if the person looks real.” Chris said, then started to pat the table. He managed to smack the scrying bowl and spill water everywhere, before finally hitting the raised ridges of the rune carved into the wood. A handful of students were let in - right after dinner, they were all returning ‘home’.

“You’re cleaning that up.” Beatrix said, waving her staff over the spilled bowl. “Then go grab one of the adepts that knows the scrying spell, I’m not quite getting it. And stop flailing around!”

Chris grinned.

“Oh, this is going to be fun! Yes, have the blind man clean.”

“You’re not blind!” Beatrix retorted. “You’re willfully being blind!”

“That’s a whole lot of words to agree that I’m blind.” Chris pointed out with a smug grin.

Felix looked around the room.

“And if they don’t look real?” He asked, vainly trying to get the conversation back on topic.

“You go into the common room and get someone to help.” Beatrix said. “Apparently, a long time ago, there was a second rune to sound an alarm, but people kept screwing up and hitting it, so they removed it.”

“It’s not like anyone actually tries to sneak in.” Chris said. “The only ‘problems’ I’ve ever seen were members of a coven trying to get their friend, and their friend told them the password.”

“Which shouldn’t happen.” Beatrix said.

“Which shouldn’t happen, yeah.” Chris confirmed. 

The three of them settled in. 

“Wait.” Chris said. “I just realized, I’ve been duped!”

“By a dumbass ritual?” Beatrix snarked.

“No!”

“By not reading the basic directions?”

“Not that!”

“Did your instructions perhaps come from a book called how to prank your friends in three easy steps?”

“I’m talking about door duty!” Chris almost shouted.

“Oh. Yeah, what about it?” Beatrix asked. Felix was looking back and forth between them like it was a ping-pong match.

“Well. Thorne said we’d get out of it if we were tutoring Felix here. Except we’re tutoring him while he’s on door duty. Ergo… we’re still on door duty.”

“Mau.”

“Yeah?”

“You’re an idiot.”

Felix realized too late that nodding along to what Beatrix was saying might not be the best idea… then the older girl winked at him, and he grinned widely.

Chris was blindfolded, he couldn’t see a thing.

After about ten minutes of letting in students coming back from dinner, Felix pulled out his homework. He hadn’t managed to finish it earlier.

“You two are supposed to help tutor me, right?” Felix asked.

“Right. That’s why we’re here.” Beatrix said. Chris pretended to stroke his non-existent beard.

“Ask old uncle Mau what questions on the mysteries of magic you have, young tadpole.” He said. “Beatrix can look over your homework.”

“Sure.” Felix slid over the worksheets and essays he’d already done to Beatrix, who pulled out a quill with an aggravated sigh.

“Remember, we’ve got to leave 30 minutes before the end of your shift.” She said, bending over and marking up his essay in red.

“Wait, we do?” Chris said.

“Yes, that’s our turn to be tutored.” Beatrix said.

“Oh right. Anyway, Sutter, questions! Do you want to know the mysteries of rituals? How the alignment of the stars influences potion brewing? Or perhaps know more about the Running of the Beasts?”

“Pause a second.” Beatrix said.

“Yeah?” Chris asked.

“We have to tell Sutter about the Running of the Beasts.” She said. “First year. Dragon. No wards.”

“Bloody hell.” Chris swore. “That was close.”

The two of them paused. Felix rolled his eyes.

“You’re really going to make me ask, aren’t you.” He said.

“What, and torment you a bit? Of course, that’s half the fun of this.” Chris said. He didn’t see Beatrix’s smack, which almost dislodged his blindfold.

“Whoa, whoa!” Chris shouted, hastily fixing his blindfold. Felix hit the rune to let someone in. “Foul! You do not fuck with someone else’s ritual! Yeah, it’s only getting a component, but could you imagine someone knocking this off when I’m seven months deep? The backlash would suck, the ritual would get set back at least seven months, possibly years, just, NO!”

Beatrix blinked.

“Sorry. You’re right, I wasn’t thinking. I’ll be more careful.” She said.

“Running of the Beasts!” Felix said loudly.

“Righto! Running of the Beasts! Great Camelot tradition. Every year, a few of the upper years summon something big and nasty into the castle. Last year it was a troll. Lots of fun, lots of chaos, half the students go out to fight it, the rest run screaming. The wards make it an incredibly safe activity. One of the Unicorns just stood there last year and let the troll smash itself into his wards. It’s like an extra combat class. But, of course…” Chris trailed off.

“Dragon house doesn’t have any wards protecting us.” Beatrix picked up. “The Running of the Beasts can be lethal if we’re not careful. Generally, we tend to run away, group up, and finish the event with prejudice.”

“Which gets extra-fun when multiple upper years decide they’re going to summon a beasty.”

“Commander Thorne’s first year, apparently there was a four-way brawl in the Great Hall.” Beatrix said.

“One was a chimera!” Chris stage-whispered.

“It was not.” Beatrix retorted. “That rumor only got started because someone started swapping different parts of the monsters around.”

The two devolved into bickering of long-ago rumors, and Felix eventually cleared his throat.

“Tutoring? Which discipline should I focus on first?” Felix asked. Beatrix got back to marking his homework, while Chris answered.

“Easy. Mind magic. Figure out the eidetic memory stuff, then you don’t forget what you’re learning in your other classes, giving you more time.”

“That’s usually a ritual.” Beatrix absent-mindedly corrected, crossing through one of Felix’s hieroglyphs. “Work on the memory storage and retrieval. If you get excellent at it, that’s close to an eidetic memory, but it’s not perfect. Don’t chase perfection. It’s easy to remember most things the first time you read them. It’s increasingly difficult to continue perfecting memory skills. Get it to an ‘alright’ stage, work on your other classes, then move back.” She said.

Felix thought he understood, and nodded.

“Right. Err… I should get on with my work then, yeah?” He said.

“Only after you let this fellow in.” Chris pointed. “He’s been waiting there for a bit.”

Felix muttered a curse under his breath and slapped the rune.

“Tell me about your day.” Chris said. “What did you have first? I know it can be hard to think of questions, not with everything, so let’s walk through your classes one at a time, and I’ll see if I can answer any questions of yours that come up.”

“Well…” Felix started to go through his day, one class at a time, and Chris gave pointers on various parts. Like ‘your wand wasn’t a fantastic match, charms will be hard for you’ and ‘languages is almost entirely a reading/writing class, the spoken parts don’t matter too much’. Which got him another frosty remark from Beatrix.

“Yes, Mau, it’s almost entirely done with your eyes.” She punctuated the remark with a flourish of her quill, elegantly crossing off a section of Felix’s essay. 

“Did anything after class?” Chris asked, completely ignoring Beatrix’s acerbic remarks.

“Eh. Got in a small scuffle, found a challenge room, and talked about coven stuff. Actually. Can I ask you two for advice on a coven? I’m getting a bunch of advice but I’m not sure about the source.” Felix stumbled over his words.

“I want to know more about everything you just said.” Beatrix handed him back his corrected work. 

“Before that… do I need to entirely redo my runes homework?” Felix asked, tapping on the crossed-out symbols. “Because it kinda feels like I need to hand in something without a bunch of ink on it.”

Beatrix frowned over the homework, then looked to her staff. Her oversized staff.

“Fuck.” She swore. “Hand me your wand? Maybe I can use it for corrections.” She said. 

Felix slowly handed over his clover and horned rabbit wand to Beatrix, who waved it around experimentally.

“The connection’s shite, but I should be able to… yes!” She magically erased the crossed-out portions of Felix’s runes homework, and handed both back to him. He bent over, and worked on fixing his homework. After some silence, both Beatrix and Chris pulled out their own work, and the three of them quietly studied, with the occasional question being asked. Either Felix needed some help, or Chris and Beatrix debated a finer point of the material they were learning.

Eventually, he finished with his last assignment, and Beatrix paused her work. Chris was still fumbling through, and Felix was firmly with Beatrix on this one - Chris was an idiot.

“You mentioned questions about covens, then we got distracted.” Beatrix said. Chris tried to pack his work away, but it went poorly, and the two of them talked while Chris cleaned up. Again.

“Yeah. Some of the people I’ve met are wanting to form a coven, and they want me in it. But like… Covens are a lifelong commitment, yeah? We just met? How do we know we’ll like each other next week, nevermind a year from now or later? We’re just kids.”

“You’ve got a group that wants to form already?” Beatrix said, a hint of something in her voice.

“Yeah, but I’m not sure about it.” Felix said. Beatrix groaned, and leaned back in her chair.

“Sutter, if I didn’t like you so much, I’d throttle you.” She said.

“Uh.” Felix’s reply was eloquent and thought out.

“Hey, cut him some slack, he didn’t know magic existed, what, a month ago?” Chris said, having finally packed his bag.

Felix hit the rune to allow a Dragon in.

“Okay, it’s the first day, you’re brand new, I’ve just got a lot of bad feelings over the whole thing.” Beatrix said. “My coven had one of you in it.” She said. “One wishy washy girl that wasn’t sure about the whole thing, but wanted in, and held all of us up for months while she figured herself out. We were looking into replacing her, and that’s what finally got her off her arse and moving, but it was so frustrating! We-”

Chris bonked Beatrix on the head, and she swore.

“You damn wanker, that hurt! Look where you’re swinging that thing!” She rubbed her head, and Chris had the good grace to look abashed.

“Whoops, sorry, wasn’t trying to hit you, just bop you.” He said. “You were going on a bit strong there. Let me.”

Felix hadn’t realized how tense he was, and relaxed.

“Some people make a big deal about covens, and all their benefits. Some people worry too much about doing it perfectly. Relax! Chill! They can be a big deal, but only if you make them a big deal. Me? They’re good fun. We’re having a blast doing rituals together, just a simple three sets of three, our magic’s growing, and when school’s done? Okay, cool, see ya! We’ll probably bump into each other at parties, gatherings, and events, have a beer, laugh over how we utterly fumbled the first ritual together and ‘the good olde days’, and all that nonsense. Like, if you want to pull a Thorne and not do a coven at all, cool, that’s fine! But if you want in, jump in with two feet! We only do school once, we only have fun once. Coven’s are part of the fun!”

“It’s almost like a house.” Beatrix said. “Well. The other houses. You pick one early on, and while you’re committed, it’s not exactly binding, it doesn’t dictate your life. But think of it from this direction. If the Sorting happened in real time, not accelerated time, you don’t want to be the person pacing back and forth in front of the doors, figuring out which one to take. You hold everyone else up. Who are you thinking of forming a coven with?” She asked.

Felix was feeling much better about the idea… and like a colossal idiot. Maybe he should treat it as a school club, and not a decision he was making for the rest of his life.

“Erik, Alex, Sora, Vivian, and maybe Hazel.” He said.

“Six is a bad number.” Chris said.

Beatrix did a double-take.

“Wait. Morsin? You’re going to be in a coven with Morsin?”

“Yes?” Felix said, cringing a little.

“I would’ve literally murdered to be in a coven with Morsin.” Beatrix said. Even Felix could tell Chris was staring at her. “Well. Only if I would’ve gotten away with it.” She amended.

Chris shook his head.

“Girls, mate. Totally nuts. Don’t know what I see in them.”

“Right now? Absolutely nothing.” Beatrix snarked.

“Ouch.” Chris said, then shuddered. “Double ouch.”

Beatrix smirked.

“I do try. Sutter, join. Don’t be the one person holding it up for everyone else. A core’s growth in a coven is quadratic, but only until you’re around 22 or so. Several months delay now could genuinely set you back an entire circle by the time you’re an adult.” She said.

“Depending on the rituals you use.” Chris said. Beatrix rolled her eyes.

“Of course it depends on the rituals you use!” She snapped.

“Yeah, but Sutter here doesn’t know that.” He said.

“Right. Well, with the Morsins…” She trailed off.

“I mean, you had access to the Brynwyll library.” Mau said.

“Not the inner core.” She said. “They keep the really good stuff for the direct heirs.”

“I’m lost.” Felix said.

“Beatrix here’s part of the Brynwyll family. In case the name didn’t give it away.” Chris said, then managed to dodge a half-hearted swipe from Beatrix with pure muscle memory. “They’re roughly the same tier as the Morsins. Except Beatrix is what… the third cousin once removed or something?” He asked.

“Or something.” Beatrix grumped. “Heir and a few spares, heir and a few spares, and suddenly the family’s too big. My children won’t be Brynwylls, and will be lucky to inherit the core. Unlike Morsin, who’s set to inherit the entire duchy when he comes of age.”

Felix figured he’d need several charts just to start wrapping his head around who was related to whom and how, and looped back to what he was thinking earlier.

It sounded like he could treat the coven something like a club, or school activity with friends, and call it a day. He’d also be screwing over his friends if he waffled about it too long, or could possibly miss his chance entirely. He could be kicking himself in a few years for being in a shitty coven… or just as equally, he could be kicking himself for not being in a coven at all, and missing his chance.

Opportunity only knocked once, and Felix would be an idiot to ignore it.

“Is there a good way to send a message or talk with people at this time?” He asked. Chris laughed.

“Whoa, slow down! It’s not that important, it can wait until morning.” He said.

“Yeah. Tell me more about the scuffle you mentioned.” Beatrix said.

“It was nothing.” Felix was no snitch.

“Wait wait… I see what happened…” Chris mimed scrying in the bowl, made all the funnier by the fact that it was showing something completely different, and the blindfold wrapped around his face. “You… got randomly cursed by random students in the hallways.”

Felix blinked.

“Yeah, how did you know?” He asked. Chris smirked.

“Because that’s how it always happens.” He said. “It’s basically always a spell, and always in the hallways, nobody’s messing around in class.”

“Who was it?” Beatrix asked.

“I don’t know.” Felix said honestly. Beatrix shook her head.

“No, that won’t do. Ugh. Okay, look, I’ll have Leona explain it to you in the morning. For now, we’ve got to go. Can’t waste our tutoring time. Remember, you’re done in thirty minutes, at which point I strongly recommend bed. PT doesn’t stop because of school.”

“Wait, it’s time to go? Already?” Chris asked.

“Yes!” Beatrix said, standing up and gathering her supplies. “Which you would know, if you weren’t wearing a damn blindfold!!”

Felix leaned back, and stayed out of the lover’s spat. He was no expert on the topic, but wondered how long it would take the two of them to start dating.

Forever, if Chris kept making comments about how pretty the Unicorns looked in their uniform.