Beast Below

I overreacted. Holy shit, did I overreact. Freya had just been trying to be nice, and I turned into the biggest douche in the history of douches. But, god, I walked out and nothing was where I’d left it and I just saw Leanza moving my meager belongings around to mess with me. She knew I hated it, knew I liked finding things exactly where I left them, and she used that to her advantage. She used every weakness to her advantage. It was what she did, her whole angle.

And for some inexplicable reason, I was heading towards her.

“Twenty two years old, runaway, powerful warlock, studied under the most powerful witch of the age, has to wear a ring to dampen powers,” I muttered to myself as I trekked carefully through the woods, the sun beginning to rise over the forest. “Gets angry over clean space and gets into fight with gorgeous best friend. Way to go, Bennett.”

I stumbled over a root and nearly faceplanted into the ground, hands flying out to catch me with a burst of instinctive power. I levitated for a moment before easing myself up back onto my feet with a shake of my head. The walk from our home to Leanza’s was long and vaguely treacherous, roots popping out from nowhere and low-hanging branches reaching out to snag, and by the time I grew familiar with the woods, the sun was already up, peaking through the thick canopy and casting shadows over the forest floor.

I snuck in over the wall, dropping quietly into the magic garden as if I hadn’t been away for months. It was so beautiful, and I had to stop myself from rolling around in the silky grass like a dog or chasing the fox cubs around the yard like I did each spring. I followed the shimmering, winding path through the rose bushes and found myself staring at the familiar cottage door.

“Just come inside, you stupid boy!” Leanza’s harsh voice snarled from inside the house. I let out a slow breath before pushing the door open, the hinges screaming in protest. She was sat, as she normally was, at her desk with a single oil lamp burning bright. An old quill rested in her hand, neb resting on the parchment unrolled in front of her. She was so sickening old school, I wondered how she survived in the 21st century numerous times since I was 16. “Nice of you to return, Bennett. Were you with that disgusting abomination again?”

I smothered the urge to smother her and sank into the stool beside her desk, as if no time had passed and I was right at home.

“She’s not an abomination, Leanza,” I replied with a grimace.

“Oh, please, Bennett,” she said with a roll of her blue eyes, setting her quill down. “Why are you here?”

“Can’t a boy stop by and see his favorite mentor?”

“No. Why are you here?” she repeated. I didn’t respond.

“I’m trying my best,” I said after a long, quiet minute. “I don’t want her to hurt anyone, and I’m trying to do everything I can to keep her safe.”

“She stole from me, Bennett,” Leanza reminded me, acting as if one girl attempting to take something from her garden was the worst offense against her. It wasn’t, trust me. I’ve seen some of the turf wars that Leanza gets herself into, this was a mole hill compared to those mountains.

“She doesn’t deserve to become a murderer because you have a problem with sharing!” I snapped, the words flying out of my mouth before I had a chance to stop them. Leanza’s eyes grew wide with surprise and then narrowed with anger, her open palm flying out and connecting with my cheek with a sickening SMACK! I should’ve expected it, should’ve kept my mouth shut, but all the months with Freya had let my guard down, lulled me into a false sense of security.

“Don’t you talk to me like that!”

“Sorry,” I murmured, holding my cheek in shock. I stared at my feet and the words started to tumble out, and soon I was retelling how I fought with Freya and she ran off, and how I found her destroying a village. “It was bad, Leanza. Devastating.”

“I know, Bennett. I’ve seen the damage. However, it’s not the worst damage I’ve ever seen.”

“What do you mean?”

“I went to your hometown, Bennett.”

“Wha-” I started and she shook her head, cutting me off without a word.

“There’s nothing left, from your tantrum. It’s a hole in the ground, a crater. In your little careless fit, you destroyed your home, your friends, your parents because of some girl! I went back there to try and ease your passage, but there was nothing left!”

“I didn’t, it wasn’t, I couldn’t have. I’m not that powerful!”

“I crafted that ring personally because of how powerful you are, Bennett, but you lack control. This is what I was trying to teach you, have been trying to teach you since I found you in that tree. You need to learn how to keep your magic in your control, but I can’t teach you that if you deny your true ability. And I can’t do that if you’re around that abomination.”

I ignored her comment about Freya and focused. “How do you do it? You’re more powerful than me, I know you are. How do you keep it all under control, kept in check?”

“I had a teacher,” she said, nearly visibly preening. “She taught me the ropes, reining in my wild energy and focusing it. I’m trying to be that for you.”

“I’ll try to be by more often,” I resigned, staring at the ring. How many things would I have destroyed without it? How many lives? How many towns? I was suddenly grateful for her teachings, for her creation, despite how narrow-minded and selfish she was. She had some good qualities, not many but some.

“Did you find any more diamonds?” I asked, changing the subject.

“Oh, yes. They’re in the back, near the pond. They’ve grown with the strawberries this year.”

“Thanks, Lee. I’ll bring something back nice for you from the shop, how’s that sound?”

She nodded, waving me away as I stood from my stool. I left, grabbing a cinched khaki rucksack from near the door, heading to the back garden, near the pond. Just as Leanza said, in the back corner, next to the strawberry-kiwi mutant fruit bush and the glittering Seer pond that showed me too many horrors to be beautiful. The diamonds grew on vines, snaking up the stone wall and on pegs in the ground. They grew in the center of beautiful stargazer lilies, in reds and oranges, purples and greens, some growing in hearts and some in ovals, most in regular diamond shapes. They grew every 30 or so days, dropping off and onto the ground at the full moon. The garden floor is littered with the diamonds for the fox cubs to bat around like toys.

One of the cubs danced around my feet, a heart-shaped blue diamond held in her mouth, her little wings beating ineffectively against its sides.

“Hey baby,” I cooed, reaching down to pet its soft fur.

I opened the rucksack and started loading the diamonds from the ground into the bag, scratching at the cub’s ears between scoops. When I had enough to satisfy my budget, I pulled the cinch shut and clasped the cloth flap over the lid of mouth of the bag.

“Okay, baby, I gotta go. Go flutter back to momma.”

I hopped over the stone wall, leaving the diamond vines undisturbing, grabbing a strawberry-kiwi on my way over. I started my trek to the nearest town where a jeweler paid a pretty penny for my engagement rings, every one crafted by magic and protected by a slight charm to make them unbreakable. I focused my energy on each diamond, envisioning each ring individually, the designs unique and intricate. The designs were half of the reason why my rings sold so well and for so much, the other half being the pristine cut, rare colored diamonds. My transformation spells are some of my strongest, my most well crafted. It was how I’d transformed a pile of logs into my home with Freya, and how every diamond was blooming into a ring as I walked. By the time I reached the jeweler in the town square, they were cooling from the transformation.

I let myself in the back, setting my bag on the owner’s work bench and headed toward the front to inform him of the delivery and get my payment. It wasn’t the most honest transaction, since there was no legality to it at all, but he got plenty of business and press for it, and I got plenty of money in return.

“I heard this was the store with the Flower Diamonds,” a voice filtered through the door to the storeroom floor. I knew that voice. Where did I know that voice?

“You’re in the right place. We don’t have many left, our supplier has been surprisingly absent but what we have left are the best quality in the entire store. Here, they’re over here. Let me show you some that you might like.”

I stood nervously in the backroom, shifting for foot to foot while they discussed the finer points of my last shipment. I rolled my eyes and went to push open the door, tired of waiting.

“That is one lucky girl you have, son,” the owner replied.

“Yeah, well, my Colby is a one of a kind girl, so I was hoping for a one of a kind ring.”

Colby? As in... Colby Colby? I pushed the door open and my heart dropped, Ethan stood with the owner at the Flower Diamond display case. Ethan McGregor, the boy who bullied me every day of middle school and half of high school and stole my girlfriend right out from under me, stood at that stupid display buying one of my stupid rings for that stupid girl I was in love with. An inexplicable rage welled up inside of me and I was banging through the back room, leaving the diamonds and finding myself in the employee parking lot.

The rage wrapped itself like greedy fingers around my power, burning hot in my gut as I tried to control myself. Something about seeing Ethan preparing to propose to a girl I’d thought I’d have forever with, I had no control. All of my pent up magic spread through my body and lashed out at my surroundings. A bush caught fire near me and the sky darkened with heavy, angry storm clouds, the air buzzing with excitement. A Dumpster exploded to my right, trash flying to the heavens, and the car beside it set aflame, and before I could stop it, it imploded and set glass and metal screaming through the air. I stared in horror, backing away before bolting to the safety of the forest. I held my quaking hands up.

What had I done?

“No. Never again. I am never using my magic. I am too dangerous. No more magic, Bennett,” I muttered, pulling the ring off and tucking it away in my jeans pocket. “No more.”