The friends rise late on Sunday morning, having a lazy start to their day in the Hex. As they finish their Reyna-made pancakes and coffee, a distant boom and sizzling sound moves through the open windows that allow in the chilly fall air.
Distracted by the knocking at the Hex door, they forget about whatever is going on outside. They have a visitor. Rampart, their classmate saved the night before from possession, stands at their door.
“You’re still my friends, aren’t you?” wails Rampart. The loxodon has tears sliding down his distressed and rumpled face. They assure him there are no hard feelings and that they give bewitched people a pass for what they do in such a state. Rampart departs, his mind at ease, after hugging each of the hexmates in turn. “Give one to Squid, please?” Rampart calls from the spiral stairs.
Thirty minutes later, each of their phones blares an abrasive alarm, a red and yellow message flashing out from the screen:
The Star Arch near Biblioplex has malfunctioned catastrophically. Reality distortions are spreading. All faculty and campus security are mobilized to contain the breach before students start accidentally polymorphing during class transitions. Students are requested to avoid the area and remain in their Hex Rooms. Campus security cannot respond to non-emergency situations for at least the next 48 hours.
All Strixhaven classes are canceled for Monday and Tuesday.
“Wow,” comments Hester. “This must be serious.”
Squid finally trudges out from the room they share with Titania. They tug their sleeve, and mumble, “Titania, there’s someone…something?…in our room that you need to see.” Declining leftover pancakes, they rub the sleep out of their eyes and draw out a can of cake frosting. “Hey, KFC, checkers?”
KFC nods, and the two wander over to a table where a board and the pieces rest. She asks Squid, “Black or white?” Squid pops the top on the frosting and pulls out a butter knife. “I don’t care, which do you want?”
Thinking for a moment, KFC says, “I do believe I’ll take black.” She begins to set up the checkers.
Squid pulls a pair of the black checkers towards themselves and puts a thick smear of the frosting between them. They squish the checkers together enough to make the frosting between the game pieces bulge out just a bit. They hand the makeshift cookie sandwich to KFC, who eyes it suspiciously. “I wouldn’t bite ’em, KFC. Try swallowing them whole.”
Shrugging, KFC pops it in her mouth. “That’s better than I would have expected,” she tells the child. Squid happily begins making more of their treats.
“Hey, Hester, wanna cookie?”
“Sure, Squid.” The owlin pops one in her mouth. “Ow!” she cries.
“Oh, sorry, Hester, you’re supposed to swallow it whole!”
Hester takes another, and finds the cream cheese flavored frosting is quite tasty between the wooden checkers.
There is another knock at the door. Aurora stands on their threshold bearing a plate of cookies. “My way of thanking you for your help last night. I made a batch of my mom’s red velvet cookies,” she tells them. “The red isn’t from what you’d think! So long as we’re stuck in the dorm, we might as well eat cookies!”
Squid’s eyes narrow at the heaping plate in Aurora’s hands.
⚔
At their bedroom door, Titania notices a suspiciously familiar blue glow from under the door. As they enter, the sapphire crown floats out from behind a chair.
“Titania! Good to see you again!” The thoughts are loud enough to echo in Titania’s skull.
Titania, arms crossed, narrows their eyes at the Crown of Winter’s Last Snow. “What are you doing here? We left you in the disposal bin at Lorehold College at dawn this morning.”
The Crown cocks itself to one side, and psychically states, “I waited exactly three hours after your departure. Then frost spread across the cardboard carton, turning it brittle. After the box crumbled, I levitated, drifting toward the narrow basement window. It was easy enough to shatter. You were not difficult to locate even on such a vast campus.”
“But what do you want of me?” demands Titania.
“Well,” starts the Crown, “before we got distracted last evening, I had every intention of collecting the debt you owe me from our little wager.”
Thinking of the amount of gold they may have available, Titania demands impatiently, “And how much might that be?”
“Well,” says the Crown again, “I have calculated that original amount of your debt to me, with interest, accruing over the passage of 150 years.”
“And?” Titania stands tapping their foot.
“You owe me 142,387 gold pieces. There are a handful of silver, but I have very generously decided it might be easiest to round up.” The Crown hovers in the corner, as if awaiting Titania’s immediate payment.
“I see.” Titania stands calmly, although their mind is whirring with how they might defer settling the debt. Finally, they say, “If you give us a few hours, say, wait at a coffee shop while I gather the coin…”
“Very good!” cries the Crown, and immediately crashes through Titania’s bedroom window.
⚔
“What was that?” asks Squid. “Did you hear glass breaking from our bedroom? Titania’s in there…with her guest…”
“I did. Titania has a guest?” KFC enters, Squid following, into the room. They find Titania staring out of a broken window. Shards of glass lay scattered on the thick carpet beneath the sash.
“Where did the bear come from?” marvels KFC. On the lawn five stories below, a dazed brown bear rolls up to a sitting position, shaking its head as if to clear it from a blow. One possibly caused by a high fall.
“The Crown polymorphed into a bear the moment it went through the window,” sighs Titania.
“The Crown? From last night?” KFC is incredulous.
“Cool…” marvels Squid.
“KFC, would you be a pal and watch Squid for me?” Titania begins pulling on her jacket. “I have an errand to run—I need to get the gold to pay my debt to the Crown of Winter’s Last Snow.”
Squid bristles, brows lowering. “I don’t need a babysitter, Titania!”
“Child, I’m trying to make sure you are safe!” the fey snaps.
KFC, trying to smooth things over between the two, explains, “Titania wants to make sure you stay inside to keep you from getting polymorphed, like that crown into a bear. Understand?”
“Yes!” And Squid becomes invisible, vanishing.
“Oh, taxidermy,” breathes Titania.
“Hey,” notes KFC, with concern, “where did the bear go?”
⚔
“Hey,” they hear Hester call from the main room, “I can hear people screaming downstairs! Something is going on in the Common Room!”
“We’d better find out.” The hexmates begin to descend the stairs.
As the hexmates move down the spiral staircase, Aurora holds up her newly empty plate. She begins looking on and under the table she’d set them on between her coffee cup and Debbie’s. “Where did all those cookies go?” she wonders, before following her friends downstairs.
⚔
In the Common Room five stories below, other Hex residents hide behind furniture and under tables. All but one. Quentillius stands, hands on hips, before a large brown bear, a noticeable lump rising above the thick, dark fur of its fuzzy head.
“Depart, bear!” The usual arrogant tone in the journalist’s voice is undermined by the quaver of fear. Titania strides up to stand beside him.
“Stand back, Titania! I’m saving the Hex from this wild animal!” Quentillius throws his arm out as though to block the bear, who now is sitting on its haunches looking bored.
“Might I be of service?” the fey asks sweetly.
“Well, you could shoot some video of me saving the dorm from this savage creature. I can put it on the Times’s website. It ought to help sell some papers.” The bear cocks its head to scratch at an ear with one of its back feet. Quentillius backs up, drawing a wand from his waistband, his hand trembling slightly.
“I see.” Titania moves to sit in one of the wingbacked chairs, pulling out her phone. In the screen, she captures the entrance of three giant frogs, hopping through the door. One croaks at the bear in a menacing manner, who turns to stare at it, lips drawn back in a snarl.
Then with a flash, without notice, the bear becomes a dented platinum and sapphire crown that strikes the floor and rolls to a stop at Quentillius’s feet. He stoops to pick it up and offers it back to Aurora, who shies away from it.
With another flash, the middle frog becomes an enormous insectile creature. Its eyes, set deep within its mustard-colored carapace, fix on the Crown of Winter’s Last Snow in Quentillius’s hands. It begins making a chittering noise, tapping the claws on its rear feet in a threatening manner.
Recognizing trouble, Titania leaps up and snatches the Crown from Quentillius, then sprints up the spiral stairs, passing Reyna who is on her way down.
The creature springs after Titania and confronts Reyna, who raises her hands to conjure Melf’s Minute Meteors in defense. The first two slam into the creature’s head and shoulders, slowing it to a halt. Its eyes narrow at the chef. As it does, the wave of fear washes over Reyna, who presses herself against the wall of the stairwell, eyes squeezed tightly closed in terror.
Below, Hester’s Magic Missiles strike the monster, leaving shattered and scorched wounds on its carapace. It howls in pained fury but the stairwell is too narrow for it to turn and respond to the owlin’s attack.
KFC charges, swinging her fists, at the rear of the creature that is now perched on the lower steps. Her blows connect, but as she does, she is also overwhelmed by fear. Above, on the spiral stairs, the creature’s bellows of pain and surprise echo throughout the Hex Tower.
Approaching the top of the stairs, hidden by her Pass Without Trace spell, Titania continues fleeing, hoping she can make it upstairs before the creature, whatever it is, can catch her.
A third flash alerts those in the Common Room to another polymorph spell wearing off. Where a giant frog once sat croaking now stands a tall, slender woman. Blinking, she pushes a lock of her raven hair behind an archly pointed ear. Symbols on her long cloak mark her as a shadow sorcerer. The woman wields a tall, ebony staff atop which blazes what looks like a lump of ignited coal.
“I’m really sorry about this…” the woman begins, her pale features pinching, “but I need what your friend has. Please don’t make this harder than it has to be…”
Indignant, Hester demands, “Who are you talking about? What is it you need? Who ARE you?”
Almost shyly, the shadow sorcerer smiles. “I apologize. I have neglected to introduce myself. I am called Gwyfeyr of the Feywild, but my closer associates call me ‘Sorrow.’ I am here for the retrieval and delivery of Crown of Winter’s Last Snow on behalf of the bullywug known as Murgaxor.”
“Well, you can’t have it, especially not for Murgaxor!” exclaims an exasperated Hester.
Gwyfeyr’s face falls, full of regret. “I am so sorry. I hate to do this but if you are going to be so very uncooperative, you simply leave me no choice.” She raises her staff and the black ember at the end begins to glow furiously.
Hester recognizes the incantation for a curse, and before the woman can finish her invocation, Hester Counterspells her. “I love that spell!” Hester crows.
The fey’s brow lowers and anger joins remorse on Gwyfeyr’s face. “I am sorry to say, owl, you will regret that!”
