by VJ Erickson
***
Taylor found Hannah sitting with Joseph and Tom at a booth in the corner. When Hannah saw Taylor, she gestured for her to come join. Taylor sat down next to Hannah and Tom. Tom gave her a cheery "Hello".
"Uh Hannah, I really need to talk to you. Privately, I think," said Taylor.
Hannah grew instantly serious and turned to Tom.
"Tom, do be a dear and talk with Joseph for a bit, and don't listen to anything that Taylor and I have to say, won't you?"
Joseph raised his eyebrow curiously at Hannah, but played along.
"There you go," said Hannah. "He's not paying attention now. So what happened?"
"He knew about the glamour," said Taylor, slightly out of breath.
"What? How?"
"I don't know. He's not a vampire right?"
"No, definitely not. Did he say how he knew?"
"No, not really, but he kept saying something about reading me or something. He thinks I'm not human, Hannah. Am I not human?"
"Of course you're human. What else did he say? This is important."
"Well he said something about forsaken. He thought I would know what that meant, but I really didn't."
"That's just another word for vampire, Taylor. Kind of old-fashioned, actually."
"And he said he could always tell when people are lying, but not in my case."
Hannah's eyes got big, and she stiffened up in her seat.
"Tell me exactly what he said, Taylor," Hannah insisted.
"He uh... I guess he said that he can always see the truth in everything."
Hannah stood up abruptly, knocking over Joseph's drink in the process. All three of them stared at her.
"Crap, Taylor. Crap crap crap. I mean, are you kidding me? Crap."
"What, Hannah? What is it?"
"Crap. It's crap, Taylor. We've got to go."
"Wait, go where?" asked Taylor. "What's wrong?"
"We have to go away."
"Like off campus?"
"Crap, Taylor. Yes, off campus. Off the island. Out of the state. Maybe off this continent. Crap, crap, crap. How on earth? Here of all places?"
"Slow down, Hannah. It can't be that bad, can it?"
"Oh, it can," said a voice from behind them.
All four of them froze. It was the dean.
"Please, have a seat, little one," he said to Hannah, but she didn't budge.
"Or not," he continued. "I'm not really interested in you anyway. Interesting company you keep, Taylor Bain. You say you do not know about the forsaken, but the minute you leave me you come straight to them. Including the one who tried to pass off a glamoured 'doctor's note'. Interesting."
"I didn't know what you meant, honest," insisted Taylor. "Look, whatever you're thinking, it's not the case. I just met these guys. I don't know anything."
"Really? You, a simple little human, come to college, meet two forsaken, and... wait a second..." he paused, looking directly at Tom. "How very interesting indeed. There's quite a lot of impossible at this table for you to claim innocence, don't you think?"
"Look, I don't know what you're thinking, but..." Hannah began.
"Oh shut up, little one," the dean said coldly. "I'm sure you're quite unused to being the least interesting thing in the room, but that's where you find yourself, now isn't it?"
"What are you...?" said Hannah.
"I said shut up," he interrupted and then turned towards Tom. "You know what I'm talking about don't you, faeborn?"
Tom stood up at this comment, and everyone looked at him.
"Tom...?" said Joseph.
"Oh don't even think about shifting, or I'll drop the glamour that's keeping this conversation private, and everyone will see. You're not the only non-humans in the room, of course. And I'm quite sure that druid over there would love to see you change, wouldn't she? I think that we can all agree that you don't want her to find you out, now do you?"
Tom reluctantly sank back into his seat, not saying a word.
"Hannah, what is going on? Druid? Faeborn? What is he talking about?" Taylor whispered.
"I cannot tell if you really are this stupid or if you're just a very good actress," said the dean. "It's annoying really. I've never been deceived before. Can't say I like it much. But for you to hang out with an elf and claim not to know their animosity towards druids really does stretch reason, now doesn't it? Now you, Taylor Bain, and the elf-boy are going to come with me."
"I'm not an elf," said Tom, clenching his fist.
"Oh of course, how offensive of me. Let me use the proper term. Leprechaun. Although I can't much see the point in formalities when you don't even technically exist."
"Oh, you'll see how much I exist. I don't need to shift to take you down," Tom replied.
"Oh don't you? I think you underestimate me, elf-boy," said the dean while holding his right hand in front of his face.
Suddenly, the color of it darkened, from a pale skin-tone to a dark grey. The fingers elongated into pointed claws, and they hardened into a crackled stone. His hand had transformed into an enlarged stone fist.
"I knew it! Taylor, we've got to get out of here. He's not just any Alistair. He's THE Alistair!" screeched Hannah.
"What?" said Taylor. "I don't even know what that means."
"He's a gargoyle, Taylor!"
"Oh dear, now I'm the one to take offense. Gargoyle? How crude. Guardian is so very much more PC, don't you think? Oh, and I doubt very much that you don't know what I'm talking about. Why else would you be blocking me?" said the dean.
"I... Please stop. I'm just a girl. I don't even know what you mean by blocking you," Taylor insisted.
"Oh, we'll see about that, one way or another. Eric told me what you did to him. Quite impressive, I must say. I've never heard of a curse being cured before, but I sensed it the moment I saw him. That and your curious abilities to block my power make you quite an interesting find."
"What are you going to do?" asked Hannah.
"What do you take me for? A Bond villain? I'm not going to announce my plans."
"You're not going to do anything with your plans," said Joseph, rising up from the table.
He had a gun in his hand, and it was pointed directly at the Dean.
"Joseph, what are you...?" said Hannah.
"Yes Joseph, what are you doing with a firearm on campus? Naughty naughty, little boy. Those aren't allowed," said Alistair. "And besides, it won't do you much good in any case."
As he said this, the stone spread from his hands down his arm. His other hand changed too, and the effect spread until it reached his face, hardening his features into a grotesque statue of a man. His eyes were the only part of him that were not stone now, and these were a soulless solid black. The effect was chilling.
Joseph lowered the gun.
"Ideas, Hannah?" Joseph asked.
"I... I... don't know," she stammered.
"Of course not. Not so clever now are you, little one?" the dean taunted her. "I don't really need you anyway. What's one less forsaken in the world, eh?"
He reached out and grabbed Hannah by the neck and lifted her up. She kicked the air trying to struggle free.
"Don't struggle now, little one. I might just have to pop this precious little head of yours right off. All I have to do is squeeze," said Alistair.
With this, Hannah let herself go limp.
"Don't hurt her, Dean. We'll come with you," said Taylor.
"My name is Alistair, strange child. And of course you will come with me. That doesn't mean I won't hurt her, of course. You don't really have a say in the matter one way or another."
"Don't I?" said Taylor, angry that her friend was being put in danger and feeling emboldened by her fury. "How do you know what I can do? You have no idea, do you?"
The dean frowned slightly. Had she shaken his confidence? Taylor wondered. But what could she do? All she knew how to do was create illusions, and she barely knew how to do that. Still, she had to try.
&nb
sp; She slowly turned her head to the side so that he was in the corner of her vision and tried to concentrate. The effect came quickly this time. Perhaps her anger helped her focus? She tried to think of a glamour to use. She needed help. A distraction, perhaps? If only someone could come to their aid.
With this thought, a figure started to materialize behind the dean. That's it, she thought. She imagined that figure was herself, and the fuzzy outline sharpened an exact copy of her. Perfect, she thought. But she could do more, right? So she imagined another. And another. And more until there was a whole crowd of Taylors behind Alistair.
"You might want to turn around," said Tom to Alistair.
"What do you take me for? I'm not taking instructions from you, elf."
"How about us?" said the group of Taylors from behind him, all in unison. "Can you take on all of us?"
He turned towards the voices and took a step back.
"I... am not fooled by your illusions, strange child," he said, but his voice betrayed his uncertainty.
"Aren't you?" they all said in unison. "We think that you are."
Whatever kept him from being able to read her, whatever kept Eric's thrall from working on her, she hoped that it would keep him from being able to see through her glamours. Given the uncertainty in his voice, she was beginning to think that she was right.
She imagined even more copies of her, until there were dozens. She didn't know the limit of her abilities, but she was going to test them now.
"Maybe I can't," said Alistair. "But what are you going to do? Bore me to death with imitations of yourself? You can't hurt me in this form, little girl."
"Can't I?" said Taylor. "You seem awfully confident for knowing so little about me. Now let my friend go."
"My only leverage against you. I do not think so, Taylor."
"Let her go, or we will break you," said the crowd of Taylors.
"Break you. Break you," they chanted in unison, closing in on him.
He backed away from them as they got closer, and he released Hannah. She scrambled back to the table, clasping her neck and breathing heavily.
"What can we do?" Taylor whispered to Hannah.
"We've just got to escape. He's right. We can't hurt him. But we can't leave a whole crowd of you behind. If he drops his glamour, then everyone will see dozens of you. You've got to remove yours first."
"And then what? He strangles us all to death? Can I turn him human? Like Eric?"
Hannah's eyes brightened.
"Taylor, you're a genius. If we could just get back to the dorms and get that syringe..."
"What's at the dorms?" said Tom, interrupting. "I can get there fast."
"In our room, in my desk drawer, a syringe filled with blood," said Hannah. "If we can get that..."
"Say no more," said Tom, and he suddenly vanished.
"What the?" said Taylor as she felt something brush past her legs.
She looked down to see a cat running towards the exit.
"Was that...?" she began.
"I think so," said Hannah. "Leprechauns were, er... are, I guess, shape-shifters."
"Why a syringe? Can't I just... I don't know, give myself a paper cut or something?" Taylor whispered.
"We've got to get it in him, and his only vulnerable spots are his eyes. I thought a syringe would do the trick," said Hannah.
"Hannah, YOU are the genius."
"We're assuming it does the same thing to gargoyles that it does to vampires. Here's hoping."
"What are you planning, girl?" said Alistair, bringing their attention back to him.
"What do you think I am?" the Taylors replied in unison. "A Bond villain?"
"Very clever, girl. I'd like you if you weren't such a liability."
"Such a shame," they replied.
Taylor felt something brush up against her leg. It was the cat again, back and holding a syringe in his mouth.
"You're fast," whispered Taylor.
"Meow," the cat replied and dropped it at her feet.
"Now here goes," said Taylor gripping it tightly in her hand.
She imagined the group of her doppelgangers closing in on Alistair and as they did he began to turn frantically.
"What are you..." he said. "Don't think you can... Just wait until I..."
"What?" they said. "Are you afraid?"
"Not as afraid as you will be when I get my hands on you."
"No," they all said still in unison and took a step closer encircling him in a crowd of illusions. "I am not afraid. You will not touch me."
Alistair turned to his right, and Taylor willed the crowd of her doubles to fill in to that side.
"I am not at your mercy. I am not at anybody's mercy. I decide, not you. Not anybody. Not ever again," they continued.
Alistair turned to his left, but they had already surrounded him on this side as well. He stepped back and then pivoted on his heel, directly into a syringe pointed at his eye.
Motivated by a mix of fear and adrenaline, Taylor buried her feelings of queasiness and did not hesitate as she plunged the syringe into his eye. It gave way easily. Looking away from the grotesque sight of his eye filling up with blood, she pushed it all the way in and then let go. He stumbled back a step and then ripped it out of his face.
"What have you...?" he began and then fell back another step.
"What... have... you..."
Each word came slower and slower, and his entire body slowed down with it, as if time were decelerating around him until he became perfectly still. He looked exactly like a statue.
"His glamour is fading, Taylor. Hurry, your copies!" said Hannah.
"Oh right," said Taylor and began to imagine their forms fading back into nothing.
One by one they vanished, leaving Alistair standing alone perfectly suspended mid-step.
"What happened to him?" she asked and hesitated a moment before gingerly placing a finger on his elbow.
At her slightest touch, the arm fell off from the stone body and fell to the floor. As it hit the ground, it shattered into millions of tiny pieces. The rest of him began to shatter and fall to the ground as well, until nothing was left but an unrecognizable pile of stone and dust.
"What exactly happened there?" said Tom, suddenly standing with them again in human form.
"I think, um," said Hannah, "I think that her blood sort of amplifies the effect of the blood of the person it encounters. Maybe with Eric it amplified the healing aspect of his blood, curing his curse, and with the dean it's like the stone part of him went out of control and took over the living part of him."
"Yeah, that made no sense," said Tom. "In any case, maybe we should get out of here? And can we keep a lid on the whole leprechaun thing?"
"Same with the blood, please," added Taylor.
"I don't really know what happened there, anyway. Hella creepy, though. 'Specially that Children of the Corn bit," said Tom with a shiver.
"Speaking of keeping a lid on things," said Hannah, "we need to put a lid on your brother, Joseph. I thought you took care of that?"
"I, uh... guess I missed a spot?" Joseph replied, sheepishly.
"Well, we're going to take care of that right now. Where is he?" said Hannah.
"How would I know?" replied Joseph. "Back at the dorms, maybe?"
"Well let's go find him then," said Hannah, and all three of them followed her as she marched out the door.
