Restricted Section

            Patrick waited until the library closed to leave the washroom; he’d been in there for two hours before the librarian finally turned off the lights and went home. Groaning as he stretched his back and stumbled out into the vacant, expansive building, Patrick pulled his phone out and turned it back on. While he’d been in there, he couldn’t risk it making a noise, so he’d shut it off. Plus, the battery wasn’t what it used to be and tonight promised to be long and dark.

            He stood outside the women’s room typing on his phone, trying not to make too much noise as he did it; there were rumours that they had a shapeshifter protecting the restricted section and didn’t want to alert them if they existed.

            “Just a minute!” shouted a high voice from inside the room and Patrick froze. Grimacing, he texted for his partner to be quiet, which prompted another shout, this one obscene.

            After a couple minutes, a short woman stepped out of the room and glared at him with piercing cat eyes. “You know this spell takes a few minutes to get right, correct?” Bell snapped, pointing at the ethereal glint and stalking around the corner towards the winding staircase.

Rumours had it that the stairs were engineered to ensure no one could accidentally perform any incantations while they were reading. According to most studies, most spells that required motion to cast wouldn’t stand up to the awkward angles of the steps and the looping back on itself would close most spells if they did get started. As far as the library was concerned, the building was meant to be a charm-free zone to protect the books; to anyone with mischief on their minds, that made it the perfect target.

When the pair finally reached the top floor, a large, round cage suspended above the open stairs, Bell walked right up to the door and glared into the enchanted lock. Standing back, she whispered, “I think you’re gonna have to deal with it.” She turned around and started to pace out the length around the cage itself in search of a break in the wards.

With a heavy sigh, Patrick set his bag down on the floor and pulled a crystal wand out from an interior pocket. After a few seconds of digging, and swearing at the light on his phone when it went out, he shoved a tiny vial of powder into his pants pocket. Stepping up to the door and stretching his neck, Patrick spoke a short incantation to the wand and sprinkled the shiny powder onto the stone. He held it out, away from himself, and it began to glow blue-hot and sizzled against the air.

Settling himself, he made a long swatting action across the door, tearing at something unseen.

“It’s coming down!” Bell shouted as she started the trek back around to the front.

Patrick continued to burn a tear in the wards until the wand encountered no further resistance. Whispering the counter curse at the wand, he placed the cooled stone back into the bag and searched for a weapon to defeat the next protection. For a few moments, he thumbed through the minuscule book until he came upon the right page and stood up.

“Look, Pat, I think the shapeshifter thing is bull. I didn’t see anyone or anything out of the ordinary,” she whispered as he held a lump of stone in his hand before the lock.

Suddenly, he turned to Bell and suggested, “What if you’re prepared to take on a shapeshifter, anyway?” There was a bit of annoyance in his voice; he was never great at working with other people, and this was a very important moment for him.

Yowling quietly, she nodded and stepped away to perform her spells away from his volatile ones.

Patrick concentrated on the spell at hand and, just as it had when he practiced before, the stone melted, and he was able to coax it into the lock. After a few seconds, he was able to turn the key and the lock clicked. Excited, he put the book back in his bag and stood waiting for Bell to finish up.

“Alright. We’ve got wings, strength, night sight, and claws; pretty sure I can take any shapeshifter,” she explained as she stood beside Patrick. Just as he put his fingers around the metal she asked, “You know I require payment before we leave the premises, right? And you have the gold?” She crossed her arms and purred quietly.

Nodding, he murmured, “Yes, I have the agreed payment with me.”

She grinned and Patrick opened the door. Almost instantly, they were engulfed by a thick black mist that suffocated and burned everything it touched. After a few seconds of struggling, Patrick waved a self-lighting candle at the smoke and it cringed away, sulking back into the room. Coughing and gasping on the floor, the pair eyed the mist warily as it floated.

“That was unexpected,” Bell gasped as she got to her feet and walked through the door. Something made a ruckus behind the desk in the center of the room and a creature unfolded itself from the darkness; a shapeshifter. As it shrieked, Bell turned to Patrick and shouted, “I can probably give you five minutes before I may have to call for backup. That’s a powerful shapeshifter.” She stared at the beast before taking flight on golden, feathered wings. Soaring around the creature, she got its attention and the two ducked out through the door just as Patrick careened out of the way.

He ran into the cage and started the search for the correct book, sending out spells and reading titles aloud. When, finally, the right book floated up from a back shelf, he ran for it and escaped the room just as Bell decided to take the fight back inside the restricted section. Spotting his thumbs-up, she dove to the floor as she crossed the threshold and the shapeshifted careened past her. Leaping up, she slammed the door to the cage shut and tore the key from the lock.

Patrick bent to retrieve the key, which was already melting back into a blob of rock.

“So, my gold?” Bell asked, trying to look presentable with gashes across her body, blood in her clothes, and her wings ruffled.

Garnet

“Red,” I stated, feeling my chest tighten as I stared at the tiny ruby speck in the crystal ball. I’m sure it was just my being nervous in the dim, heavily-perfumed room at the back of the store, but my skin started to crawl and I rubbed my arms.

Grinning toothily, the fortune teller, who’d been staring into the orb for several minutes making the odd humming sound, exclaimed, “Ah, yes, I see it now! The garnet trail floating along through the vast darkness until it reaches the pinnacle and sees the light!” Her arms were floundering, and her eyes were wide as she stood up from the uncomfortable metal chair. “There, when the light is revealed, so too will your true powers!” she shouted and deflated like a punctured beach ball. Retaking her seat, she cleared her throat and took a swig from something in a glass jar behind her; I could swear it was alcohol, from the smell, but my nostrils were overwhelmed. “That’ll be twenty-two dollars, sweetie,” she cackled, still trying to clear her throat.

I chuckled and retorted, “Seriously? That’s it? You didn’t tell me anything useful. What does a trail have to do with things? How do I know when I reach the pinnacle of darkness? And what is my true power?” Crossing my arms, I glared at the woman as she took another gulp from the bottle.

“Oh, my dear, I don’t know you well enough to determine specifics, only vague understandings about the universe interacting with you,” she explained in a suspiciously normal voice. When I made no move to pay her, she snapped, “I delivered a service, whether it met your expectations or not, dear.” Still, I didn’t move. “Fine, how about a discount, then? Fifteen and you buy a garnet out in the shop, hmm?” she coaxed.

Rolling my eyes, I took out the money and slammed it on the table as I left the tiny back room.

Out in the main store, a woman screeched and asked excitedly, “So? What did she say? I bet it was good. Was it good?” My best friend, Rosie, was really into all this crystal stuff, but I knew it was a load of bull; seeing that fortune teller was the only real proof I needed.

“Oh, she thinks I have powers and I need a garnet for something,” I murmured, trying to find where they kept the cheap garnets. I didn’t believe any of this stupid stuff, but I knew better than to break my word. When I reached a rusted necklace tree, one of the pendants caught my eye. Pulling it down, I examined the bright red gemstone in the center; a garnet. Around the perfectly cut stone were spirals of metal that looked almost like waves. It was way more than I’d been planning on spending, but it was stunning, and I hadn’t bought a nice necklace in a long time.

When we walked out, my pendant hanging low around my neck, Rosie was chattering away about how amazing the store was. I was just trying not to scold her for ever stepping foot in that place; I think I did a pretty good job. Stepping down onto the street, we started to cross when a car came screaming around a corner and was on top of us before we could step away, headlights blinding us.

I squeezed my eyes shut and held my hands out in the vain hope that they would stop the car from hitting us. The deafening sound of the car crashing rang through my mind and it took a few seconds for me to realize I could still feel my toes. From the non-pain and fact that I was still standing, I assumed the car had swerved and crashed into a car on the side of the road. Taking a breath, I opened my eyes and saw the car crumped around my hands.

The engine was smoking and part of the driver’s side had collapsed, while the entire passenger’s seat, which was empty, had completely crunched together. Staring at me from behind the wheel, the driver’s blood-covered face was incredulous. I turned my head and found Rosie lying on her back on the ground, also staring at me with shock in her eyes.

“Stella? Are you okay?” she asked, struggling to her feet, entirely unharmed.

Nodding, I replied, “I’m fine. You?” When she nodded back, I dropped my hands and stepped away from the ruined car. Shaking slightly, I looked up at the street sign to avoid the driver’s eye; the street the car reached was Pinnacle. “I guess the headlights were the light I would see,” I mumbled as Rosie and I sat down on the side of the road.

“Do you have powers now?” she asked quietly as people began to swarm the car to aid the driver.

I shrugged my shoulders, “I don’t know.”

Line by Line

I read through the spell a dozen times, committing it to memory over and over; line by line. Each step required specific timing and ingredients to go with the line of the incantation. If it hadn’t been important, I never would have attempted a spell this complicated, at least not now.

Shutting my eyes, I went over the steps again without looking at the book. And then I went through it again. And then again.

By the time I was finally standing at the edge of the circle, I could have recited the spell in my drunk and asleep. It was finally time. Sucking in a breath and counting the number of bowls on the alter one last time, I stepped across the line and started the ritual.

Royal Occasion – Part 1

            The roses bloomed before my eyes on the arbour, their soft petals deepening to red as they stretched up towards the sun. Grinning as a few fey worked their magic on the edges of the intricate benches lining the aisle, I commented, “These are spectacular. Thank you so much.”

            Nodding, they continued their work in near silence.

            Suddenly realizing I’d forgotten to have a cottage ready for the groom’s parents, I took out the enchanted scroll I’d been using for planning and found the still-to-do portion. Scribbling with my pen for my assistant to have a cottage prepared, I headed off towards the castle once more. I felt like I hadn’t seen my sister in days with all this planning and implementation going on.

            As I crossed the courtyard, which was being washed so it was shining, the horses were being led out for the final time before the ceremony. My two best Clydesdales were following the royal horsemen around like puppies, not realizing he was taking two carriage horses to be haltered. “Hey, Jason?” I called, hurrying over in my comfortable pants and with my hair in a messy braid.

            When he spotted me, he stopped and did a low bow, “My liege. I didn’t recognize you before, I’m so sorry.”

            Chuckling, I sighed, “You’ll remember that I don’t care if you bow. That’s part of the plainclothes thing,” I added, pulling at my loose-fitting pants. “Uh, I think I want you to use Darlene and Finnigan instead of the usual horses for the carriage,” I explained, checking where horses were on the list. When I found it, I looked up and continued, “Kiana loves them, and they can pull the carriage that short distance. Plus, they’re gonna be in the carriage house anyway.” Nodding at the enormous horses standing behind Jason, I smiled.

            “Oh, anything you please, my liege,” he replied, bowing again. With a nod, he continued across the courtyard with all four horses. I’d been queen for nearly five years now telling everyone not to pay any special mind to me and everyone was still bowing when I looked at them. I vowed to one day do something about that.

            Glancing at the scroll, I noticed the cottage request had been crossed off and smiled; things were running more smoothly than I could have hoped for a royal wedding. As I headed off to the castle again, the second-in-command of the centaurs in our region cantered up to me. “Queen Lily, we’ve run into some issues while clearing the royal highway,” he stated, nodding respectfully and pawing lightly at the paving stones.

            “Um, alright. What seems to be the problem, Canus?” I asked, feeling the first prickle of concern for the wedding.

            He leaned forward so we wouldn’t be overheard and explained, “Well, the portion leading through the Grey Forest has been overrun by dwarves who claim you didn’t invite them to the wedding.” Careful not to touch me, he turned around to point out the direction the road curved into the forest.

            Rerolling the scroll, I stuffed it into the ample pockets in my pants, and replied quietly, “We actually didn’t invite them.” Canus stared at me as though I’d grown another head. “You recall that some farmers from the outer edges of my kingdom went just before the last harvest and we had to perform magic to stop the crops from withering while replacement pickers worked the fields?” I asked, frustrated that my no politics wedding was starting off like this. When he nodded curtly, I continued in a low voice, “Well, it turned out that the dwarf mines in that area were understaffed so they were periodically kidnapping farmers from their fields. I couldn’t, in good conscience, invite them to a royal event like this.” I shrugged my shoulders but kept up a more powerful stance than I usually held.

            “Okay, I understand,” he replied slowly, considering.

            “What if we concede that part of the forest around the mines, where we’ve been gathering wood for years?” I suggested after thinking about options. When Canus’s eyes narrowed, I explained, “It’s right at the edge of their territory and none of our protected trees are there. Obviously, we’ll reforest it first, then they can have the new growth as penance for not inviting them.” Still, he stared. “Look, Canus, I cannot deal with this diplomatically today. I have way too much to deal with, but I will bring up some kind of reparation for our farmers and a promise to not do it again at the next meeting,” I stated, putting my foot down.

            He bowed his head and cantered back down through town.

With that emergency solved, I turned back to the castle again, now very concerned about what would happen next.

To be continued…

Tokens & Apples

            I’d been watching the pair of them wandering through the bazaar, getting awed looks wherever they went. Where most women in town, even wealthy merchant’s wives and daughters, showed their status with meagre adornments, the woman sported an expensive, tailored gown in a deep emerald fabric. Hanging from her neck and arms were intricate metal and stone chains; she twisted so the light caught a large, perfectly crafted crystal in a gaudy gold setting. Beside her, the man was sauntering around in pristine leather breaches and a bejewelled sword hanging at his hip. From time to time, he bumped into something with it and sheepishly shrugged off the mistake.

            It wasn’t just their obvious wealth that had the merchants staring, though. As one went to a table to admire the goods and request information from the vendor, which almost always included some form of seduction, the other would subtly brush trinkets or food into their pockets. For an entire afternoon, they had been absconding with valuable and unimportant objects alike.

            Finally, as they were biding adieu to the last merchants, a girl approached them with a basket of apples. She murmured something to them as she passed each a piece of fruit with a low curtsy. Raising his eyebrows, the man bowed to her, earning him an elbow to the gut, and the couple headed through the stone archway and out of downtown. Beyond, all was farmland until you reached the Impassible River; before a ferry was built, it had been impossible to reach the other bank.

            I began the morning sitting in a darkened alleyway where generous peasants occasionally dropped a token or scrap of bread into my lap. As I struggled to my feet, leaning heavily on a gnarled walking cane, one such trinket fell to the muddy ground and I groaned.

            “Here, ma’am,” offered a small boy of maybe ten as he ducked around me and plucked the metal from the mud. Passing it over with a crooked-toothed grin, he nodded and ran back out into the sunshine. I made a note to repay him one day, if I lasted long enough to see him again. With the coin safely in one of the hidden pockets of my tattered dress, I started on the long trek to the archway.

            When I finally reached it and staggered out onto the open dirt road, I took an immediate right and sat down in the long grass. Behind me, I felt the grass sway with the movement of a living creature and a girl’s voice hit my ear like a bell, “You’re looking awful today, Mistress.” As the girl sat down in the grass like a child, the basket of apples settling into the soft dirt.

            Rolling my eyes, I peered up and down the road to make sure no one was watching. I cleared my throat, shook out my hands, and snapped my fingers once. Warmth washed over me like a tidal wave and my aching joints were like new again. Where my skin had been sagging and lines had formed in my face like an ancient tree, I was now perfect. Glancing down at my hands, I realized I couldn’t wander around wearing an old woman’s clothes. I pressed my hands together as though I was praying, breathed on them gently, and in one, smooth brush down, the tattered clothing turned to a simple, beige dress.

            “How old are you, Mistress?” the girl asked as she carved deep slices into an apple with her thumbnail. When I said girl, I meant a teenager; she’d been my apprentice for nearly three years, the longest any had remained.

            Scoffing, I retorted, “How old do you think I am, my dear?”

            She looked up and studied my face in detail. Frowning slightly as her eyes crossed the top of my forehead and considered her findings, she sighed. “Forty, perhaps? You seem quite old, Mistress,” she finally decided.

            Chuckling lightly, I took one of the apples from the basket and took a bite. When the girl shrieked, I smiled at her and explained, “Only ones you said the spell over will be poisoned.” She didn’t seem convinced, but it wasn’t my job to convince her of things. “I’m one hundred and three years old,” I answered simply. Around here, the average life expectancy hung somewhere around thirty, so my age was entirely inconceivable. With a sigh, I added, “Where I’m from, most people live until their mid-eighties. I’m one of the lucky ones there, too.”

            Though she didn’t seem entirely convinced, the girl nodded and sucked the apple juice from under her nail. “What now?” she asked, taking a bite of the apple and savouring the tart juice.

            “We have to catch up to them before they get home to make sure the poison worked,” I answered as I stood up. Though I looked a lot younger and my bones felt better, I still needed the walking stick to move quickly; decades ago, I imbued it with healing magic for the time when my body would begin to betray me.

            For the first hour, we walked in relative silence and met very few people. When the sun started to drop behind the trees, I realized we weren’t going to stop them if we didn’t use some magic to catch up. Pulling a small handful of stones and a shallow clay bowl from my pocket, I stopped my apprentice and pointed to a green pond just beyond the ditch. “I need you to fill this with water from there and bring it to me,” I commanded, wincing as something in another pocket tensed and prickled. I was pretty sure it was a hedgehog I had just awakened.

            With the water and stones in the bowl, I shouted a short incantation and threw the lot into the air before us. As though the stones had become lodged in a solid wall, they stuck there, and the water swirled between them like a strong current. I shut my eyes and spoke the next part of the enchantment. Opening them and shoving the bowl back into my pocket, I grabbed the girl’s arm and walked right through the mid-air portal.

            The second our feet touched the soft forest ground on the other side, the stones fell behind us with a sound akin to a waterfall starting up suddenly. I waved my hand at the ground and the stones flew back into my pocket; the hedgehog growled and shifted but didn’t stab me further.

            As we followed a broken path in silence, I could hear the couple chatting about instant messaging and Facebook. Beside me, the girl was looking uncertainly at those terms; I just chuckled quietly.

            “-n’t believe no one else found it!” shouted the woman as she crouched by a pile of rocks next to a dark cavern in a sheer cliff. She shifted the stones to reveal a pair of hiker’s backpacks.

            The man, who was drinking from a plastic water bottle, replied, “I know. We are going to be rich. Like, buy that mansion you loved, rich.”

            Turning to my apprentice, I held up a hand and pointed for her to hide. This wasn’t an uncommon practice with my pupils; I didn’t want to put them into unnecessary danger or let them know all my secrets. I took a deep breath and emerged from the forest, leaning on my walking stick.

            “What are you doing here?” snapped the woman. She looked at me and pulled a blade from her backpack.

            I smiled and answered her previous statement, “I am the reason no one else found this portal between our worlds. I am protecting this one from people like you.” Though I’d been looking after this tear for nearly eighty years, this speech never felt comfortable. “If you will kindly leave the items you stole from the market and return to Earth, that would be great,” I added with a sigh.

            “And why should we? Pretty sure two healthy people can take you, a frail and probably sick old woman,” the man retorted with a sneer. He drew the sword he’d been wearing and waved it about like a child with a toy.

            Taking a step forward, I murmured, “I warned you.” I raised my staff high above my head and brought the blunt end crashing down on the stone ground. When it hit, the sound echoed and vibrated through the air. By the cave, the couple from Earth were now statues with their eyes rolling wildly as they tried to escape the prisons of their own bodies. Carefully plucking my way up to them, I waved my hand and all the stolen items from their garments floated into my hand. “Now, when you go through the portal, you will forget it ever existed and will find yourselves wanting to stay as far from it as possible,” I explained as I took the sword from the man’s hand and embedded it into the stone beside his foot.

            I put the trinkets and fruits into my pockets and waved my hands again to reanimate the couple. “How did you enjoy the apples? I wouldn’t stick around much longer if you did,” I murmured threateningly. As they always did, the pair exchanged a look before streaking into the cave and through the portal.

            “How did you know they were from Earth?” my apprentice asked as she came out of hiding.

            With a heavy sigh, I replied, “Because I was from there. They don’t have magic, so they have to be cruel to one another.”

Faux Milo

            Faux Milo got up and sat on his pillow preening his tail with slow, rhythmic motions while staring at me. Growling at the cat, I got up and checked the temperature of the water and returned to my seat. “Still a few minutes,” I called to the other room as I reread the spell we were going to try a few more times in my head. By the time we got around to it, I was going to have the whole thing committed to memory.

            Liza came back in and checked the water before clearing her throat and announcing, “It’s ready. I guess we’re gonna go for it.” After so much anticipation, actually performing the spell on the adorable grey cat was nerve-wracking.

            Quickly, we added ingredients while the water was the right temperature and said the spell. Then, it was time for the cat to be involved. I poured the liquid into a dish and set it in front of the cat, who’d stopped grooming to watch us mixing. According to the book, he needed to drink at least a fifth of the liquid for the spell to work so we took turns forcing Faux Milo to drink the sweet water.

            When I woke up the next morning, having slept for a few hours after my last turn, there was a stunning onyx cat sitting on the pillow where the grey had been. He glared at me as though he realized we’d changed the colour of his coat.

Now, we just had to hope our mother wasn’t too attached to his personality.

Easterly – Part 1

            The Easterly was the most feared of all the twenty-seven royal ships when it disappeared; none could match it in speed, maneuverability, or firepower. With four sails, enough cannons to weigh down any other ship, and a magical storage space that expanded and contracted based on the needs of the crew, the Easterly was a beast on the high seas and personally responsible for winning three wars. Though it was gilded in gold and had perpetually pristine white canvas sails, no one ever mistook it for a steed in the regular platoon. The fact that the captain was the first woman given control of the wheel in all the lands helped to differentiate it from the others even further. Jem was lost with the ship.

            I moored the dingy at the docks, ignoring the eyes of every male captain on me, and strode up to the gate purposefully. For the first decade of my career, I’d been hiding my gender, but in the last year, I decided I didn’t have to hide myself so others could be more comfortable. On my ship, I was still the toughest of the lot and could drink any crewman under the table; I also had three women comrades, which helped.

            “I’m Captain Aiden of the Westerly out there,” I stated to the gentleman at the table as I nodded toward the enormous vessel floating out on the waves.

            Chuckling, the man asked, “Did you mean to say you’re the wife of the Captain? Because, according to the dock records, that ship is captained by a man.”

            Unfortunately, he had a point; last time I docked here, I was pretending to be a man. I groaned and dragged the tiny bag of loot I’d brought ashore out of my pocket; I hadn’t anticipated paying off the docks man. “I am he. I was masquerading as a man so you lot wouldn’t be such dicks,” I muttered as I handed over twice the fee.

            Raising his eyebrow, the man asked, “Last you were here, you were impersonating a captain?” Honestly, I knew something like this was going to happen now that I was sailing through familiar territory again.

            “I was impersonating my father,” I snapped. Pulling off my hat to show him a small line of pins, I continued, “These were won by my father while serving in the royal navy. I use his name, rather, his son’s name, so that men will take me seriously. At least, I used to. Now, I take the name as my own.” I replaced the hat and added, “There is no one by the name Aiden who would find issue with my using it so just let me dock for a day.”

            Though he grumbled a bit, he gave me a pass for the docks and let me through the gate. “You may wish to hide your curves here, girlie!” he shouted at me as I hurried up the sloping path toward town.

            When I reached the top, I turned around and looked at my ship out in the ocean. My crew were to wait two days before assuming I was dead; I never had to do that when I was a man.

To be continued…

Blurred Past

            “It’s strange,” she murmured, eyes closed and reaching out for something I couldn’t see, “that there is literally nothing in your past to see.” Lady Miranda’s eyebrows knit together in the middle as she continued to stare off into some void behind her lids. With a sigh, she opened her eyes and stated, “It’s all blurred. Like you’re not supposed to see any of it or something.” Drumming her long nails on the table between us, she turned one hand over and offered it to me.

            I’d been sitting in Lady Miranda’s booth for nearly half an hour and she hadn’t been able to tell me anything at all; oddly, she was getting very frustrated about that. When I reached over, expecting her to gasp dramatically and state that she’d been mistaken for the last half hour, she shut her eyes and continued the same grumbling from before.

            “Maybe I’m a brand-new soul and there is nothing to see,” I suggested, wondering what my friend would think when I finally showed up at the Ferris wheel. In my youth, I had gone through an occult phase and I knew a bit of the lingo; well, enough to fake my way through all of ten seconds of conversation. My hand was starting to sweat but I couldn’t pull away from the iron grip of Lady Miranda.

            Growling lightly, she muttered, “No, but you’re not. You feel like a very old soul so there should be lots to choose from. Ugh!” She finally looked up and dropped my hand on the tiny table. “Sorry, my dear, but your soul’s past is just too blurred for me to help,” she stated.

            When I got up, she grabbed my wrist and purred, “Be careful; I suspect there is a very good reason you can’t know your past.”

Skylar

            Skylar was prepared when she decided to run away, but so was her mother. Like all sixteen-year-olds in our land, she was embracing that innate desire for freedom before she settled down into a career; soon enough, she would have to make decisions on the direction her life would be going in. Time after time, I’d had young adults just like she arrive on my doorstep wishing to learn the ways of a High Court Mage. It wasn’t as though I didn’t want to teach every last one, but most people simply don’t have what it takes to wield the kind of magic I do.

            When I opened the door and Skylar pulled her hood down, revealing long, braided hair and a fresh face, I chuckled to myself. “Young Miss Skylar, to what do I owe the pleasure of your unexpected visit?” I asked, sweeping my arm back so she could come in. While her arrival was anything but unexpected, I liked to keep that excitement alive if possible; in actuality, her mother already knew where she’d gone and that she’d be safe with me.

            “High Court Mage Yalla, please grant me the honour of learning under you,” she stated as I ushered her into a seat by the fireplace. Before I could reply, she added, “I know when you first became High Priestess in the Badlands, you were the youngest to ever hold that position, and now as High Court Mage, you’re both the youngest and the first woman to be named. I want to be you.”

            Normally, the children I tutored knew nothing of me or magic; this was a nice departure from the norm. Nodding solemnly, I replied, “I will tutor you so long as you agree to wait until you are seventeen to begin officially.” She made a move to resist and I held a hand up, silencing her without uttering a spell. “I know it seems like a cruelty to forbid you from learning for a year, but it is a kindness; you need to be sure and I need you to be sure,” I continued, passing her a teacup from the set at the hearth. “I think you could be a wonderful addition to the magical community, so I will teach you one day a week for a couple of hours, so long as your guardian is in agreement,” I explained further. Skylar was the first in nearly twenty years that I had hopes for.

            “Okay,” she sighed, her disappointment obvious in her look and tone. Taking a sip, she asked, “I have to go home tonight, don’t I?”

            I nodded. “Yes, but I’m certain your mother will be thrilled with your start in magic,” I murmured as I got back to reading.

Though Skylar only stayed for another few minutes, asking the occasional question about magic, she returned promptly the next day, and one day a week for the next fifty-two weeks. With patience, perseverance, and a top-notch instructor, she eventually became fluent in wielding magic and became a very skilled apprentice.

Magic Beans

            I stared at the tiny coffee bean, willing it to grow. Obviously, it didn’t. Perhaps I was just putting too much pressure on it, or myself. For the last few hours, I’d been bouncing between a grimoire website and two different herbal books to no avail. The dining table was almost empty, still.

            “How’s your bean doing, Alice?” I asked, turning around to look at her. The counter in the kitchen was strewn with books on spells and crystals and gardening bibles. In the very center of the mess, a tiny coffee bean sat alone. Plucking my coffee bean off the table and holding it in front of my eyes, I glared.

            Alice chuckled and replied, “Well, I’ve narrowed down the reasons these aren’t growing. Either they’re too old, or we don’t have any real magic.” Looking up, she added, “I’m hoping it’s just that these beans are old.”

            This wasn’t the first session we’d had in an attempt to bring forward some latent magical ability, not even close. I shook my head and sighed, “Maybe I’ll try it with another bean.” Heading to the fridge, I continued, “We were trying coffee beans because they give us energy, but that’s only once they’ve been steeped; perhaps we’ll have better luck with, like, something that’s already been growing?” Searching intently, I had a brainwave and dashed to the window and picked up two glass jars filled with water.

            Suspended with three toothpicks were large, brown avocado pits. I placed them carefully on the counter and glared at the one that hadn’t even begun to crack; for a while now, I had considered it dead, anyway, so this was perhaps not the best option. I left the cracked one on the counter and took the potentially defective one back to my ‘station’ with a sigh.

            I found the spell I thought would work and, using warm water and a small candle, I performed the incantation. Nothing happened.

            Glancing at a clock for the first time in hours, I exclaimed, “It’s almost two in the morning!” Alice looked up from her own spell work and yawned. “Bedtime,” I groaned, rubbing my eyes and heading for the main bedroom. After a few minutes, I heard the door shut in the spare room before I fell asleep, suddenly utterly exhausted.

            When I got up, I was surprised to find that I’d slept in my clothes. I mean, not surprised, surprised, but I didn’t remember I hadn’t changed. Trudging out to the kitchen to turn on the coffee maker, I grabbed the beans from the tables and started the process of waking up. I growled at the enormous amount of books and computers and crystals strewn across my naturally-cleanly kitchen.

            I began to shift piles to the table so I could sort through what was who’s when I noticed it. The tiny little avocado pit was now a root winding around the jar I’d put it in! My spell had caused it to grow overnight into a vine. Glancing over at Alice’s I noticed hers was the same; just a tiny thread of plan starting to emerge from the crack in the shell. For a minute, I thought about not showing Alice, but she was going to be ecstatic. And perhaps she just wasn’t using the right spell.

            I hoped she just needed a better spell.