Spellcaster (29 page)

“Are you guys okay?” I asked,
and they both shakily nodded their heads.

“How do you feel?” Randi asked,
her voice raspy.

“Pretty damn awesome, I won’t
lie,” I admitted, nodding my head energetically.

“That reminds me,” Randi said, a
little sheepishly. “I forgot to warn you about something.”

“What?” I squeaked, staring at
her with my mouth agape. “
Now
you tell me there’s a warning?

“It’s nothing you can’t handle.”
Randi shrugged, tugging at her bustier. “It’s just something to be aware of.
That whole ‘feeling awesome’ thing—it’s dangerous. You’re going to be
tempted to do spells that you shouldn’t be doing. It could make you a little
power hungry. So just keep yourself in check. You’re not accustomed to this
much power.”

“So you’re saying don’t try to
rob Tiffany’s or anything?” I asked, confused.

“More like, don’t try to injure
someone who knocks into you in the subway,” Randi clarified. “You’ve got a
lot of power—basically, we just gave you a taste of what kind of power Megan
will get if she pulls off her spell. But you can start to feel a little bit
entitled, a little bit better than everyone, with that much
power.”

“I’m going to think I’m better
than everyone? Oh, good, tomorrow will be the first day I actually fit in at
Vincent Academy, then,” I snorted. “Maybe I’ll get elected class president
over Austin.”

Angelique laughed—and then
yawned. “Damn, I’m exhausted. I feel like I could sleep for a
week.”

“I told you it would be
fatiguing,” Randi chastised her, and Angelique huffed loudly.

“So, what do you want? A
lollipop?” Angelique snapped then sighed. “Sorry, I’m just
cranky.”

Randi leaned against the drawers
of Angelique’s desk and shut her eyes.

“Goddess, thank you for
the light.

Now return us to the
night.”

She looked expectantly at the
candles, which still flickered with orange-and-red flames.

“What spell did we just do,
genius?” Angelique said snarkily, throwing her cousin a catty look before
turning to me.

“Emma, you want to try this?”
Angelique asked as Randi handed me the piece of paper with the spells
scrawled on it.

“Can’t I just focus and say a
spell of my own doing?” I asked, taking the paper and squinting my eyes. I
could barely make out Randi’s loopy penmanship in the dim light of the room.
She dotted her i’s with little stars—it looked like a fourth-grader’s love
note. I half expected it to read, “If you like me, check yes.”

“My spell works, why wouldn’t
you want to use it?” Randi asked, sounding a little offended.

“I have to cast my own spell
tomorrow night anyway—might as well practice now,” I reasoned, shrugging my
shoulders. “Something like, ‘Lights, begone!’”

I waved my hand dramatically as
I said the words, and it instantly got darker in Angelique’s room, the
candles extinguishing with a soft hiss. The smell of smoke and hot wax
filled the air, burning my eyes.

“Whoa,” I breathed, looking
around Angelique’s bedroom. Only the lights from the New York City skyline
streaming in her window illuminated the room. It was dark.
Too
dark.

“I don’t believe it,” Angelique
whispered, pointing to her ajar bedroom door. The hallway lights weren’t
on—and they had been a minute ago.

“Emma, I think you just turned
off all the lights in my apartment.” Angelique sprang up from her sitting
position on the throw rug and flung open her bedroom door.

“Yep, you did,” she said,
sounding a little awestruck. She ran out of her bedroom, and I heard a loud
crash coming from the hallway, followed by Angelique swearing.

“This can’t be happening,” I
said as Randi grabbed a candle. She jumped up and ran after her cousin, me
close at her heels. We found Angelique at the entrance to the kitchen,
rubbing her knee with one hand and flicking her kitchen light switch on and
off repeatedly as she glared at a now-askew side table in the
hallway.

After fumbling with a lighter,
Randi lit the candle in her hands, giving us a small circle of light. She
carefully shuffled farther into the kitchen, placing her hand on the
refrigerator door. “The fridge is still running. I can feel the motor going,
so Emma didn’t take away your electricity. Just the light.”

“All the light?” I confirmed
weakly, leaning against the kitchen counter for support. All my newfound
strength suddenly abandoned me. “I didn’t mean all the light—just the
candles.”

No one answered me. Instead
Angelique and Randi stumbled into the living room, fumbling with a table
lamp.

“I don’t know how I turned off
all the lights!” I fretted, afraid to move from my spot against the kitchen
counter. For all I knew, I’d take a step toward the stove and open a portal
to a new galaxy.

“Um, that’s not all you did,”
Angelique called from the living room. I peered around the corner to see
Randi holding the candle as Angelique’s hand frantically explored under the
lampshade. Finally she stood up, and stared at me, dumbfounded.

“The lightbulb is gone,” she
said, awed. “Emma, you said, ‘Lights, begone’ and you literally made the
lights
be gone.
”

“How do I get them back?” I
asked, panicked. “What’s the opposite of begone? Regone?”

“Try return,” Randi suggested
calmly, but even in the dark I could tell she was rolling her eyes at
me.

“Oh, yeah,” I admitted
sheepishly. “I’m a little freaked out right now. Um, lights return!” I
whipped my head around the dark kitchen in a frenzy. It stayed
dark.

“You’re not focusing,” Angelique
called from the living room, where I heard her open a window and swear
again—words that would have made my brother, Ethan, blush, and his mouth was
filthier than a porn star’s diary.

“Oh, crap, Emma, you better
focus,” Angelique warned, running into the kitchen. “I think the lights are
begone
in
the entire building.”

“What?” I gasped, my heart
beginning to thud in my chest. “Why did you tell me that? There’s no way I
can do this spell now! This is a thirty-eight-story building! There’s no way
I can—”

Randi put both her hands on my
shoulders, effectively interrupting my full-blown freak-out. “Yes, you can,”
she said seriously. “You have to, because tomorrow night will probably be
even more stressful.”

“Right. You’re right,” I said. I
shook my hands, jumping up and down like a boxer before a fight. I took a
deep breath and forced myself to focus in spite of the hysteria that
threatened to overtake me. I shut my eyes, and pictured the apartment
flooded with light.

“Lights, return!” I said
confidently. My vision brightened, and I heard the distinct pop and buzz of
fluorescent lighting turning on. I opened one eye cautiously and looked up,
my shoulders slumping with relief when I saw the flickering overhead light
in the kitchen.

“I really hope I didn’t cause a
blackout in New York City,” I said, worried, as all three of us collapsed
into the white chairs around Angelique’s kitchen table.

“It was just the building, from
what I could see.” Angelique consoled me as I buried my face in my hands.
“Maybe just this side of the building,” she added hopefully.

“Still, what if someone got hurt
because of me?” I asked, worried, my voice muffled from my
fingers.

“The lights were gone for three
minutes—max,” Randi said, calming me. “I’m sure the elevators were still
working.”

“If someone got hurt I’ll never
forgive myself,” I moaned into the palms of my hands.

“Well, Emma, there’s a nice
lesson for you in spellcasting—make sure the words you write are specific.
The spell you do tomorrow night had better be written well,” Randi advised,
leaning forward on the kitchen table and resting her chin on the heel of her
hand. “A renegade, powerful witch is much worse than a little
darkness.”

“Tell me about it,” I said
nervously.
If I can’t control this power when
I’m among friends, what am I going to accidentally do tomorrow?
With my luck I’d cause pigeons to start shooting
lasers out of their eyeballs.

I stayed at Angelique’s house
for another hour, making plans on how to sneak away from Brendan and working
on my spell until Aunt Christine called and asked when I was coming home. I
headed out, with Angelique walking me to a cab.

“You’re in super spell mode,”
she said wisely. “It’s probably better for everyone involved that you don’t
accidentally shut down the subway system.”

“You think that could happen?” I
asked, worried.

“Nah, probably not,” she said as
I spotted a taxi with its overhead light on, flagging it.

“Just be careful what you say
tonight and tomorrow,” Angelique advised. “You don’t want to accidentally
cast a spell that causes the Statue of Liberty to come alive and, I don’t
know, start eating people.”

“A zombie Lady Liberty. Great.
Now that’s in my head,” I groaned, squeezing my eyes shut against the mental
image. “Maybe she’ll eat Megan and end all our problems.”

“She’d spit her out,” Angelique
retorted as I got into the cab. But when I got home, I quickly turned on my
laptop, checking the news to make sure I didn’t somehow accidentally cause
the Statue of Liberty to go on a killing spree. So far, all seemed quiet
(relatively speaking) in New York.

After Aunt Christine had gone to
bed—and I toasted some Pop-Tarts, since I still hadn’t had dinner—I went
into my room, practicing some spells. I had a particular one in mind—the
opposite of
Emoveo,
a different Latin spell that Angelique had managed
to pull off once or twice.

I peeled a photo off my wall and
set it in the middle of my room, jumping on my bed and staring at
it.

Focus, Emma. You have to be on
point.

I whispered the Latin phrase for
“Come here”—
Veni huc.

The corner of the photo
twitched.

I repeated myself, outstretching
my hand, palm up.
“Veni huc.”

Slowly the photo rotated, rising
from the floor in a corkscrew pattern.

I jerked my index finger in the
“come here” motion, and the photo sliced through the air, landing in my
palm.

“Whoa, I feel like a Jedi,” I
said aloud, staring at the photo. It was a picture of Brendan and me, a
candid shot Gabe had taken when we weren’t paying attention. We had gone on
a double date with him and Cisco, and were sitting in a red vinyl booth at a
diner. Brendan’s arm was casually slung over my shoulders, and he was
looking at me, laughing at something I said. I, of course, was grinning up
at him like a love-struck goon.

I grabbed a fresh piece of tape,
sticking the photo back on the wall.

“You can do this,” I whispered
to myself. “You’re
going
to do this.”

Chapter 16

I hadn’t even realized that I’d fallen asleep until my clock radio went off, the excited morning disc jockey blathering on about the upcoming night’s lunar eclipse.

“It’s going to be a clear night, in the mid-fifties. Perfect weather to bring all the moon-worshipping crazies out tonight, people!” He crowed, laughing with a raspy voice.
I can tell you the name of one crazy that will be out.
I groaned and rolled over, putting my purple pillow over my head. I contemplated casting a quick spell to make his microphone melt like chocolate in the sun.

“I probably could do it, too,” I muttered, as if he could hear me. And then what DJ Shut-Up-Please was saying sunk in—it was Wednesday. D-Day. And last night, I’d had no dreams, no hints, nothing. I tried to tell myself that it was a good sign—maybe it meant I was on the right track—but part of me worried that it meant I was doomed, regardless. A lost cause.

And then another part of me fretted that I might say the wrong thing and accidentally cause the pavement on Park Avenue to turn into marshmallows—so I kept fairly quiet on the drive to school. Brendan was also quiet—the shadow I could see under his non-black eye a telltale sign that he hadn’t gotten much sleep last night. I wanted to ease his mind, to reassure him that I was going to be fine, but I didn’t know what to say. So I stayed quiet, holding his hand in the space between us in the backseat of the car service. The space felt like it expanded with every block we passed.

Finally when we got down to my basement locker room, Brendan leaned against the locker next to mine and spoke.

“I’ve been thinking, Emma. I really don’t think we should meet Megan tonight,” he said quietly, looking down as I threw the small bag I’d packed for that night into my locker. “I was up all night, doing research online…maybe we don’t need to approach this magically. Maybe we can just get her arrested, or charge her with harassment.”

“Brendan, I don’t think—”

“No, listen to me. We can get a restraining order on her—I almost got one freshman year, to be honest,” Brendan admitted, looking down sheepishly. “Casey suggested it, actually, so I’m sure the paperwork still exists. Come on, Em, can’t we talk more about this?”

He looked at me hopefully, his eyes searching my face. The black eye actually made his eyes look more vibrant green.
Of course Brendan can make a bruise look hot. When he has a paper cut I bet his abs somehow look better.

“Sure. Of course we can,” I lied, stuffing my books for my morning classes into my backpack. “I’ll meet you after basketball practice and we can talk about it then.”

Brendan just chuckled.

“What’s so funny?”

“Emma, like I’m really going to go to basketball practice with all this stuff hanging over us?” He shook his head at me, before brushing my bangs out of my eyes tenderly. “Come on. I have my priorities.”

My mind raced. Brendan
had
to go to basketball practice. I was counting on it as a diversion. Otherwise, he’d stay with me—and I’d never be able to sneak away to meet Megan alone.

“I don’t think you should skip practice,” I said calmly, my mind grasping for an excuse he’d agree with.
He could risk another suspension? No, he won’t care. The team needs him? Nope, won’t work.

“We don’t know who Megan’s little spy is. What if it’s someone on the basketball team? Why would you skip unless you were with me?” I reasoned.

“That’s kind of a stretch, don’t you think?”

“Do you really want to risk tipping off Megan?” I asked innocently enough, and Brendan relented, nodding his head in agreement.

“I’ll just work on my spell in the library, and I’ll meet you in the quad at five,” I fibbed, giving him a bright smile. But Brendan looked at me skeptically.

“We’re handling this
together.
Remember you promised me that I’d be with you,” he said somberly.

“I remember,” I said as sincerely as I could. I also remembered that I lied.

Brendan just raised one jet-black eyebrow. “You promise? I’m serious, Emma, I think we can handle this without magic. I just think—”

“You never know who can overhear us, so wait to tell me all about your idea later,” I said, picking up my backpack by the shoulder straps. I leaned up on my tiptoes to derail his train of thought with what I intended to be a quick kiss. But as soon as my lips touched his, Brendan’s hands gripped my hips, pulling them closer to his. His lips were soft but demanding, parting my lips as he elevated our kiss from casual to intense. I dropped my backpack with a thud on the floor, winding my arms around his neck as Brendan gently pressed me back against the lockers, one hand sliding up to cradle my face. Finally he pulled away, his breathing a little more even than mine. But when I rested my hands against his chest, I could feel his heart pounding through his white shirt.

“Emma, if something happened to you, I would never,
ever,
forgive myself,” he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. “I don’t know if you realize it, but you’re the most important thing—the best thing—that’s ever happened to me.”

“Brendan, you’re the—”

“I’m not saying this so you’ll say it back to me,” he interrupted. “I’m only saying it so you understand how important it is that we stand together tonight.”

I nodded, blinking twice to push back the surge of tears that threatened to flood my vision. Brendan wiped away one escapee tear with his thumb and smiled tenderly—and I felt the stabbing ache of guilt in my heart. He was going to be so hurt when I didn’t meet him. When he realized I had deceived him, and was going alone. But it was the only way I knew to keep him safe.

A few minutes later, I slipped into my desk behind Jenn, as my classmates chattered around me excitedly. Nicole McAllister was leaning forward on her desk again, her butt back in the air as she made plans to watch the lunar eclipse at Paul Cuevas’s house. Marcus Colby tried to take pics of her in-the-air rear with his cell phone, but Madison Wefald kept shoving her hand in front of his camera, blocking his view and sticking her tongue out at him. The rest of the juniors were in just as jovial a mood, anxiously awaiting the bell ringing at three—to them, it signaled the start of a week and a half of Vince A-free days. In comparison, I sat dolefully in my desk, lazily drawing loopy scribbles on my already doodled-upon green notebook. The only student who looked even remotely as miserable as me was Jenn. Her head was down, resting in the crook of her elbow, her other arm swinging as it hung off her desk. She’d been pouting ever since her parents grounded her for getting wasted at her sister’s dorm. Jenn treated her grounding like an epic social injustice; I half expected her to call Amnesty International to plead her case.

As she heard Nicole and Paul making their plans, Jenn turned around, resting her elbows on the back of her desk and frowning at me dejectedly.

“What are you doing for spring break?” Jenn spoke as mournfully as if she’d asked me where I’d buried her puppy.

“I haven’t really made any plans.”
Fight an evil witch with your superstar triple-threat mojo, save your boyfriend from a vengeful threat, maybe go shopping.
“How about you?”

“Nothing.” She sulked, her glossy lips turned down in a pout. “My parents are insisting on grounding me. It’s so unfair.”

I studied Jenn. Her eyes were alert and clear, her honey-colored hair was carefully brushed. She looked pretty damn good, to be honest.

“You know, Jenn,” I began honestly, “that might not be a bad thing, to take a break from the partying.”

She rolled her eyes. “You and Cisco need to move into an old age home in Boca Raton together, I swear,” she said. “You sound just like him, and he sounds like my parents.”

Jenn’s tone turned acerbic as her lips pulled down in a scowl that defined the term “bitchy.” “He ripped me a new one on the phone last night. ‘You should really cut back on the raging, Jenn.
I
don’t need to get drunk every night and I have plenty of fun. Bleh, I know everything, look at me, I’m so perfect,’” she said in a mocking, faux-deep male voice that was supposed to be Cisco. My temper flared, heat crawling across my skin. He’d been nothing but a good friend to Jenn, and honestly, he had a point. We were all getting a little tired of having to pour her into a cab at the end of the night.

I took a deep breath to calm myself down and stared at her, irritated. “He’s right. You
should
cut back on the drinking. You party too much. You’re going to look like an old lady before graduation,” I told her sternly. I meant every word. I didn’t care if Jenn threw a fit—I was sick of her acting like a spoiled brat.

Jenn’s eyes glazed over and her lips parted. She stared at me, slightly slack-jawed with a vacant expression on her face.

“He’s right. I’ll cut back on the drinking. I party too much. I’m going to look like an old lady before graduation,” she repeated, almost robotically, before turning around in her desk, sitting up straight instead of slouching dejectedly over it as she had been.

“Oh, very funny,” I said sarcastically, and Jenn turned back around to face me, staring at me like she’d never seen me before.

“Hey, Emma,” she said, blinking in surprise. “What did you say? When did you get here?” She looked up at the clock on the pale yellow-beige wall behind me.

“I’ve been sitting here for a few minutes,” I replied slowly. “We just had a whole conversation—remember?”

“Um, no. What are you talking about?” Jenn asked, squinting at me in confusion. “And you guys say that
I
should stop partying.”

I stared at her, dumbfounded.

“Don’t look so shocked—Cisco talked to me about it last night,” Jenn said calmly. “I’m not mad. He’s right. I’m cutting back on the drinking. I party too much.” She repeated the words as if they were her own, adding, “I’m going to look like an old lady before graduation.”

And then I realized what I’d done.

I’d cast a spell on Jenn, without even knowing it. I didn’t light any candles. I didn’t make anything rhyme. I didn’t wave an athame or a wand. I didn’t even throw my hands in the air and wave them like I just don’t care. All I did was say something—and mean it—and my trifecta of witchy goodness took care of the rest. Me, someone who usually has to spend half her time focusing and concentrating to levitate a simple highlighter, just threw out some words off-the-cuff and brainwashed my friend.

It. Felt.
Awesome.

The last bell rang, and Jenn turned around in her desk, sitting primly. She probably now looked like the model student—thanks to me. I stretched out my feet in the aisle next to me and crossed my ankles, leaning back in my desk with a smug smile creeping across my face. My head bopped slowly from side to side along with the little tune in my head, a variation of “Ring Around the Rosie” but with different lyrics.
Nyah nyah nyah nyah boo boo, I put a spell on yooooou.

Mr. Agneta strode in, yelling at the chattering students to calm down.

“Yes, yes, spring break is here. So exciting.” His voice dripped with so much sarcasm I expected to find a puddle of it on the floor.

The class continued talking, seemingly oblivious to Mr. Agneta, who scowled as he stared at the class. He eyed the large wooden compass and picked it up, holding the chalk end against the board.

Oh, no, not again.
I plugged my fingers in my ears, bracing myself for the inevitable deafening screech—but then I had a flash of inspiration.
What rhymes with ears?
And then I had a perfect rhyme in my head.

Narrowing my eyes, I stared at the white nub of chalk sticking out of the wooden compass. I leaned forward on my desk, resting my chin on the heel of my hand, my fingers splaying across my face to cover my mouth. I whispered, “Break in half and save our ears, break in half and calm my fears.” I glanced around the chattering classroom speculatively. No one seemed to notice that I was essentially talking to myself.

Mr. Agneta put the compass against the board, and dragged the chalk down the length of it, leaving a jagged, thick white line on the black background. He turned to stare at the classroom smugly—but then paused, realizing that his little display didn’t bring about the ear-destroying screech he intended.
Ha! Suck it, Agneta!
I smirked at my arrogant math teacher—sure, the wooden compass didn’t break in half like I’d wanted, but at least I’d silenced his favorite instrument of torture. He’d have made an awesome dungeon master in the Dark Ages, the sadist.

Mr. Agneta stared at the blackboard, his beady little eyes twitching. And then those eyes opened comically wide as a large crack appeared in the center of the craggy chalk line, splitting it in half. Flakes of white-covered slate broke off as the fissure grew, the chips raining onto the floor. They hit the glossy wood with a light tapping sound, like fingernails drumming on a desk. Noiselessly the jagged crevice stretched out, veins shooting off it and radiating out like outstretched fingers. Fingers that gripped the top and bottom of the blackboard.

Mr. Agneta cautiously backed away from the cracking slate, protectively holding the wooden compass in front of him with a shaking, white-knuckled grip. The loud buzz of student voices in the classroom halted as everyone stared, fascinated at the silent phenomenon in front of us.