#BattleTheBeast

The Writing Room: #BattleTheBeast

"This is it," said Quentin. He ran his eyes along the bookshelves of Plover's writing room, his sense of wonder dimmed but not quenched completely, despite everything he now knew about its owner. "The place where it all began. The place where it ends. It just makes sense." Julia nodded.

"Penny should be here by now," said Alice.

"He will be, and the Beast will follow."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because Penny has the button. The Beast won't be able to help himself. Then, when he comes, bam! We release Prudence Plover, and Count Rugen gets an eternity of quality time with his sister, trapped in here." He patted the thick tome tucked under his arm.

Alice tilted her head, brow furrowed.

"Count Rugen," explained Julia. "Princess Bride. Six-fingered man." The corner of her mouth turned up, quickly pressed down again by the weight of the tension in the room. She elbowed Quentin. "Dork."

Eliot tittered.

"Why did we bring him?" asked Alice.

"Because he's the only one besides Kady who's learned battle magic, and she needs to protect Penny."

"And I can do it," slurred Eliot, pausing to take a slug from his flask, lately proven ten times over to be indeed bottomless, "because I don't feel emotions anymore, which is the whole point of Princess here." He kissed the polished metal with an exaggerated pucker. "Thank you, Princess."

Alice rolled her eyes behind her glasses. "He isn't wrong, though," said Quentin. "He's our drunken master."

"Not always!" Eliot wagged a finger in protest. "Sometimes I'm hiiigh." The last word trailed off into a falsetto. "Whoa. How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Shh! They're coming!" said Julia. A pure silence fell, then was broken by an ephemeral laughter, there and gone.

"It's just the kids," said Quentin, releasing a breath. He shared a glance with Alice. "They're still ghosts, but at least they're not, you know, getting murdered every single day."

"Unlike my poor liver," said Eliot, breaking out into giggles.

Julia sighed. "We could really use that djinn right about now," she said. "If only Margo hadn't..." She trailed off. Quentin knew why. Talking about it meant thinking about it, and none of them needed that distraction. "We'll get her back, Jules," he assured her. He and both girls looked at Eliot, almost recovered from his giggling fit, oblivious to their stares. "We'll get them both back."

"What? Sorry," said Eliot. "I'm not paying attention to you because I'm focused like a laser beam." He nodded seriously and fixed his eyes on the room's doorway.

"So we're sure that the seer was talking about the Beast?" Alice sounded worried; then again, Quentin couldn't remember the last time Alice didn't sound worried. At least she was here, paying her debts.

"As sure as we can be," answered Quentin, "with something as inherently wonky as prophesying the future."

"'His sister will be his downfall.' That's what he told us," said Alice. "But I still don't understand why the 'monster of magic' he talked about wasn't Charlie. And if it was, that would fulfill the prophecy, and if it's already come to pass..."

"It couldn't have been Charlie," said Julia, "because you're his sister and you didn't do anything."

"I was there."