[Fillory, Timeline 40, Age of The Beast]

A soft ethereal haze settled over the village where The Magicians had taken shelter. The Knife Maker's cottage was a stone's throw from the little cobblestone bridge arched over a small winding river. Fen had been kind enough to lend Julia a warm woolen shawl, and she wore it wrapped around her shoulders as she leaned over the edge of the stone wall. The water below babbled over smooth pastel stones of all sorts of colors. They looked more like dyed Easter eggs than what they actually were.

Everything in Fillory was more vivid and beautiful than Earth. The trees were a deeper shade of green than she could ever remember seeing anywhere else. The air smelled of damp soil and fresh pine needles. The saccharine aroma of the villagers' gardens reached her even at the edge of town. Morning light somehow made every color more vibrant and every scent more potent. It was early enough that the others were still asleep in the sitting room of Fen's home. Penny and Lilly beside each other, their hands intertwined in slumber, and Margo draped luxuriously across the settee. Eliot still hadn't emerged from his marital duties. The two armchairs by the fire, however, were vacant.

"Jules, talk to me." Quentin leaned his forearms on the bridge wall beside her, a deep crinkle forming between his brows. Julia stared out at the river, flowing in a never-ending stream away from them. She wished she could let herself be swept up with it. Instead, she squeezed her eyes shut and sighed.

"You know, I actually believed our lady underground chose me."

"Jules." She could sense the pity in his tone, and she knew his face would have softened, that his eyes would've drooped, and his lips tightened as they always did when he was at a loss for words. Julia opened her eyes and dropped her gaze to her fingers, and dragged them gently across the coarse stone. It was cool and damp beneath the pad of her thumb as she traced the bumps and cracks with sorrowful intensity.

"Yeah, I know. What the fuck were we thinking?" Her laugh was too bitter, too broken to belong to the woman Quentin had grown up with. Even as Julia had outgrown childish things and stepped into the world of adulthood, she had always maintained her youthful optimism and curiosity. Something had changed. It was as if a gear had been knocked loose somewhere inside her.

"You were trying to do good, And you got duped. It's not your fault. Jules, you saved Kady." Quentin tried to lean into her line of sight, but she didn't oblige him. He wanted so horribly to make her understand. Make her see that this was in no way her fault. That her survival was not a crime, it was a triumph.

"Yeah, but what about everyone else?" She turned her head to look at him then, and there was a rim of tears in her eyes. The tip of her nose and the apples of her cheeks tinged red with emotion. "You know, what about--"

"Hey," he silenced her by placing a hand atop hers and squeezing. "I'm going to help you. I promise, whatever that means." Quentin's voice dropped an octave. His entire demeanor held such conviction that Julia felt a flicker of guilt for what she would have to do.

"It means find him. It means kill him." Julia swallowed hard and looked over her shoulder to where the Knife Maker's cottage peaked out between the trees. "Somehow, I doubt that's easy, Or even possible."

"Well, impossible shit is sorta our thing." Quentin shrugged, and his lips curled into a little smile of amusement. His eyes were alight with sincerity. A lump began to swell in Julia's throat.

"I just-- could I have a minute alone?" She managed to muster an apologetic smile when she saw the disappointment in him. His shoulders visibly drooped, and he pulled his hand back.

"Y-yeah, uh, I'll be inside." Quentin walked backward down the path, only turning away from her when he nearly tripped over a pebble. "Shout if you need me." He called with a wave. Julia let out a long sigh, her body relaxing in the solitude. She'd never felt like she needed to put on a show for Quentin before now. They'd rarely ever kept secrets from one another. Magic had changed so many things, taken as well as given. She wondered if she had the chance, would she go back and make another choice? Choose to preserve her friendship, her integrity, over the magic she had now? Her heart clenched when she realized that she wouldn't. Julia thought that this said a lot about the person she'd become.

"I know what you're planning." Julia whirled, throwing up a hand on instinct. Standing at the edge of the bridge was a figure shrouded in a midnight cloak. Fabric pooled around them like ink in water. Julia glanced nervously down the path to find Quentin was long gone. Had she been so wrapped up in her thoughts that she hadn't heard another person approach? Julia took a tentative step back towards the village.

"Who are you?" Julia tilted her head and narrowed her dark eyes on the stranger.

"A friend." The voice was smooth and delicate. Julia found it strangely familiar, yet she couldn't quite place where she'd heard it. The stranger reached up to grip the edge of their cloak with pale slender fingers. They ducked their head as they slid the hood down, and the first thing Julia noticed was long golden blonde hair, pulled back by two braided pieces and tucked into the back of the cloak. Then they looked up, and Julia dropped her hand and scrunched her face in confusion.

"Lilly?" Julia looked between the cloaked woman and the cottage. She'd left Lilly sound asleep on the other side of the river. "But you were just---" Her words trailed off as she looked at Lilly's quirked eyebrow and amused smirk. "You aren't Lilly." The suspicion had returned, and Julia twitched her fingers against her jeans in anticipation of a fight.

"I am, just not your Lilly." Julia looked her up and down, studying every detail of this strange woman. She was wearing the same robes that Jane had back in 1942. Around her neck hung her necklace, a clock face inlaid in a worn golden key. "Not yet, at least."

"You're The Watcher Woman?" Julia openly gaped, and the thought crossed her mind that maybe she was hallucinating.

"One of them." Lilly smiled lightly and took a step towards her. Julia stood her ground, eyeing every movement for any sign of hostility. There was none that she could see. "I've seen all of this unfold, and while in the end, you succeed, I can say with certainty, you will not like the cost." Julia's expression soured with rage. She'd spent the past six hours since returning from Ember's temple reliving the carnage of that day. The blood smeared across light wood floors, over the blanket she and Quentin had made as children. The bodies of the people she'd come to think of as family, strewn over furniture and discarded like trash. When she'd seen the Leo Blade strapped to Alice's waist, waiting to be used for defeating The Beast, her plan had formed. It was betrayal, but her friends could wait to kill Martin until she'd used him to vanquish Reynard.

"I can't just let him kill people, rape people, like he did me and my friends." It was like hot air had filled her chest, and Julia felt the only way to dispel it was to lash out in defense of her plan. "If The Beast can stop him I don't care what I have to do." Her jaw clenched and nostrils flaring, Julia glared straight into the eyes of a being far more powerful than she.

"The Beast is not your solution." Lilly's tone was matter of fact, casual even. It reminded Julia of Jane Chatwin's offhand remarks. Perhaps it came with knowing that time wasn't fixed, that anything and everything was part of a whole.

"Well, then what the fuck do you want me to do, huh?" She ran a hand through her dark hair and now frustrated tears burned at her eyes. "Give up on Reynard, let him run around the world unchecked?" Julia waved her arm around them as if to show firsthand what would be destroyed. Her voice cracked with emotion, and she expected Lilly to look at her with pity like Quentin had. But Lilly remained as cool and collected as she had before.

"No. I'm offering you another way." The Watcher Woman reached inside her billowing black cloak, and when her hands emerged, she was clutching a long thin object.

"An arrow?" Julia narrowed her eyes on the steel-tipped arrow. It was beautiful -- she'd give it that. Symbols she vaguely recognized as ancient Arabic were carved into the wood of its stem.

"An arrow capable of killing a God." Lilly's lips curled up at the corners as Julia eyed the weapon with an uncontainable hunger.

"Where did you get this?" She was breathless. Power radiated off it in waves. It was more than she'd ever felt before, even more than the magic of Ember.

"A Goddess." Lilly's chocolate eyes twinkled with amusement. Julia wondered if there was a joke she wasn't getting. But she cared little for humor when the key to revenge was within her reach. She took a step towards Lilly with an outstretched hand, only to have the arrow pulled away.

"Not just yet." Lilly tutted like a mother to an overly eager child. Julia pursed her lips and stopped short. "I've come to you because I know you're willing to do what must be done, no matter the cost." Julia looked up and found Lilly's gaze to be searching. She felt like she was being analyzed by a superior, assessed on a task she had yet to complete. Setting her jaw, Julia pulled her shoulders back and down. Her stare was piercing and determined.

"What do you want from me?" She whispered, and Lilly grinned proudly.

"I want you to change things."