The Pisces Stone

Quentin and Julia stared down into the Brakebills fountain. It was a warm spring day, late afternoon. Above the sky was a perfect blue, but in the fountain there was a profound darkness spotted with an endless number of shimmering stars. A few comets shot like ribbons over the black expanse, streaking silent lines over the surface. Both of them recoiled slightly from the strange coldness radiating out of it.

Julia pulled her scarf tighter around her neck and looked at Quentin, brown eyes full of trepidation. "So?" she asked. "Are we really going to do this? Like, really, really?"

Quentin swallowed. "Really." His tone did not inspire confidence. "Spring Break is almost over and everyone who has, you know, an actual life might not be crazy about us putting their lives at risk."

"What about our lives?" said Julia. She leaned back. "I have a bad feeling."

"That's how you know you're awake. Or, in our case, asleep..." said Quentin.

"So you're still having the dreams?" They both looked back to see Eliza standing in a black trench coat, her red hair swirling around her face. As usual she looked both intrigued and mildly unconcerned. Her shrug was elegant. "Don't worry yourselves. Waking and sleeping are the prejudices of the unevolved and undereducated. Magicians must be wiser."

"And yet somehow they still won't hire you as a teacher," said Julia, shaking her head. "What a waste."

Eliza smiled, striding to Quentin's side so she could look down into the fountain herself. Quentin shifted uncomfortably, glanced at Julia, away again, put his hands in his pockets then took them out, but Eliza didn't notice. "I turned Henry down. He's asked me many times, I assure you, but my skills as councilor will have to suffice. So, what are you planning?"

Quentin looked expectantly at Julia who continued to stare down in silence. "Oh, umm," he said, realizing his input was required, "well there's an old artifact Julia found, one that can stop the Beast."

Eliza nodded, impassive. "Delightful. How?"

"Entrapment." Julia's confident hands rose, running smoothly through the forms and gestures. As she did so the beautiful darkness in the fountain began to change. Each star engorged into a ball of hungry red flame that shot out beyond the rim of the fountain, a dizzy display that washed their faces crimson. At the same time the black paled to blue, to turquoise, the green and blue elements swirling around each other before sharply separating into a clearly drawn scene. August trees half shrouded in mist tilted back and forth in the wind of this other place. It was dusk there. A troupe of just barely visible centaurs thundered out of sight, darting beyond the mist as if they had been startled.

Eliza looked at Julia, almost tenderly. "Remarkable. Your gift is like poetry."

"Sad and lovely?" remarked Julia, who was not touched. She pulled her hands in close to her chest and thrust them both down firmly. Frost rimed the edges of the fountain, spread into the center to form a solid pane of ice. She bent slightly to blow on the surface and the whiteness of the frost cleared so once again the scene was clear.

"You're friends with Margo this time..." murmured Eliza.

"What?"

"The future, the past, awake, asleep, night and day, life and death." She rolled her eyes, exhausted. "Such distinctions only grow more tiresome with time. This is a clever spell, but I still don't see its purpose."