“Aren’t you guys coming?” I asked Seth and Tristan, who were both stretched out on our couch.
“I’m not going outside. You know what I think of nature,” Seth stated, crossing his arms in defiance.
“It only wishes to kill you,” we all chorused in unison, having heard this statement every time we invited Seth to take part in any kind of outdoor activity.
“In the most slow, torturous way possible,” he added, shaking a can of insect repellant he had pulled from his bag and spraying it all around him. “Did you not see that TV show when that thing put those eggs in that guy and, well, let’s just say, dude died in a horrible disgusting way. I’m not taking any risks, thank you very much.”
I rolled my eyes. “And you, Tris? Are you going to stay to protect him from the evil wiggly bugs?” I teased.
“I’m staying to get dinner ready for when you lazy bums get back from your stroll in the woods, my darling wife,” Tristan teased back. He was still enamored with our newly married status and threw a “darling wife” into every sentence he could. He was so frigging adorable! “Seth is helping me prepare dinner, so stop ‘bugging’ him.” He chuckled. “Sorry, buddy, pun only half intended.”
“All right, have fun cooking, boys!” I wasn’t going to offer to stay and help, as I was the most rubbish of them all at cooking. I had won the lottery in terms of snatching up a master chef for my husband.
We left them at the cabin and went for our exploratory walk into the forest. Josh kept racing me, his competitive side ensuring he was always at the front. He kept choosing paths off the main trails, which had dead logs and rocks – as “obstacles”, he said – to make the race “more exciting”. Harry, Sam and Rocko tagged along behind, more interested in appreciating the sights the forest had to offer.
Rocko was having the time of his life, sniffing every inch of forest he could stick his wet nose on, and Harry wasn’t much different, poking things and picking up insects.
We would all howl to the forest from time to time – like true lost boys should – accompanied by Rocko’s excited little yelps. It was a lot of fun, our first stroll in the woods, but the night soon came and we headed back to the cabin in time to see the last rays of sun disappearing through the treetops.
We were almost at our cabin’s doorstep when we bumped into Craig the caretaker, who was also taking his last stroll of the day. He was glad to see we’d had fun exploring the forest and gave us a few tips on the most interesting places to discover around the camp, pointing out that the most beautiful trails were near the lake and offering to be our tour guide if we ever wished for him to show us the best spots of Misty Lake Woods.
Dinner was loud, deliciously filled with good food and a lot of laughter, but eventually, as night rolled in, the boys left Tristan and me to rest and get an early night.
Although rest and sleep didn’t actually feature in Tristan’s plans for the night. Our honeymoon – of sorts – of a month ago had been cut short by the sudden appearance of our friends for a surprise marriage celebration, so now he was seizing this opportunity to take back some of the “honeymoon time” we’d lost. We were still in that giddy state of newlywed excitement, and a private cabin in the middle of the woods was the perfect place to get right back to it. And back to it we went. Tristan was a very happy – and very exhausted – man when we finally settled down to sleep, the morning sun only a couple of hours from rising.
I had completely forgotten that I had an early meeting with Celeste and her group at the crack of dawn. I woke up to mousy Lizzie knocking insistently at the front door of the cabin. When I answered groggily, she greeted my pigeon’s nest of hair and sleepy face with a happy and refreshed smile.
Oh, goodie. She was one of those happy early-waker-upper types.
“Miss Harker asked me to come fetch you, Joe,” she explained. “We’ve been waiting for you at breakfast. You’re a bit late. She was worrying and asked me to check on you, see if everything was all right up here.”
I peeked around her, with only one eye open, to look at the dim forest in the distance. “The sun isn’t even up yet!” I protested with a whine.
“Miss Harker’s motto is ‘the early bird catches the worm’. And the sun is up, trust me; the trees are just in the way.”
“If I pass on the worms, can I sleep some more?” I asked grumpily.
“Uh, there’s no worms . . . it’s just normal breakfast,” she said, shuffling nervously from one foot to the other. “What should I tell her? You’re not coming, then?” She looked like she was about to have a seizure at the prospect of having to explain to Celeste why I wasn’t attending breakfast.
“No, tell her I’m coming. You go ahead, I’ll get ready and be with you guys in a sec.”
I left Tristan sleeping peacefully in our bed, and a few minutes later – after a quick shower and an even faster toss of clothes over my tired bones – I was entering the main house cafeteria like the agonized dying zombie that I was. I even had the shuffling walk, moan of agony and deadened gaze to fit the undead description.
Why did I have to stay up all night? It was all Tristan’s fault, the handsome, irresistible bastard!
“Oh, finally! The mighty Gray rises from her precious bed and decides to grace us mere mortals with her presence,” Simon greeted me, with a provocative sneer. “We’ve been waiting for ages, you know.”
You’d think he’d have been more thankful that I’d saved him from a spiked drink. Men can be so ungrateful, sometimes.
“You only arrived five minutes ago, Mr. Blaine. That can hardly be described as waiting for ‘ages’,” Celeste interrupted, greeting me with a short smile. “You two were the last of the whole group to arrive. Please, have a quick breakfast and join us outside by the front doors as soon as possible,” she instructed before quickly departing, with a bunch of people following at her back.
“Ages,” I scoffed at Simon.
“It was more than five minutes,” he mumbled, as I passed by him and made for the breakfast table.
Minutes later, I was heading outside, a Styrofoam cup of coffee in one hand and a muffin in the other. People were mingling around the entrance, bleary eyes and sleep-deprived faces everywhere you looked. At least I wasn’t the only one.
I leaned against the doorframe and watched as Celeste huddled in a circle with her sisters, discussing the day’s events and schedules. Their designated groups shuffled in flocks nearby. Simon appeared at my side, watching the groups’ movements with the same curiosity as I was.
“I’m sorry your chances of joining their group were shot to hell after what happened yesterday,” he mused, sipping from his own Styrofoam cup. “The famous Joe Gray should be dying to be part of the Glitter Coven. They are all about the glamorous lifestyle; you’d fit right in.” He gave a short nod towards Alicia and her minions.
I glanced quickly at him and took in his gothic, brooding style. He looked like he was trying as hard to make an impression as Alicia’s girls were with their “witchy” outfits. “You are the one fitting right in, dude. Stick a silver moon on your shirt and you’re good to make a pledge to the sisterhood of sparkly witches right away.” I looked down at the colorful attire I’d picked for the day: a vivid orange hoodie over blue jeans, and converse shoes. “I think I might fit in better with Arice’s group, to be honest. They look more tolerant of color.”
“Hmm . . . yes. The Daisy Braiders are painfully colorful,” he concurred. “Too much hippie for my taste, but I can see why a rock star would be interested in their ‘herbal’ knowledge.”
“Hey!” I turned round and flicked him on the forehead. “The Lost Boys don’t do drugs. We’re all about the music, not the ‘herbs’,” I said, affronted by his insinuation, but then added as an afterthought, “Although, we do fancy a nice cup of herbal tea in winter time, so you’re not totally wrong, there . . .”
He gawked at me. “What are you, ten years old? Adults don’t flick other people on the head!” he rubbed his fore
head, scowling at me.
“Oh, I’m sorry. You were acting juvenile, so I thought I should join in. My bad. What are you and your friends even doing here, anyway? I thought this Gathering was for witches. Can guys be witches, too?”
“No,” he scoffed indignantly. “There’s a male term for it. Sorcerer, if you must know.” He puffed out his chest, trying to look cool.
“Right. Sounds very manly. Not geeky at all,” I said, trying not to laugh at him. “So, tell me, what are we?”
“Excuse me?”
“Our group? What are we called? There’s the ‘Glitter Coven’ for Luna, the ‘Daisy Braiders’ for Arice. What’s Celeste’s group called?”
“Nothing! We aren’t called anything.”
“Come on, you can tell me. Of course we’re called something!”
Right on cue, Simon’s friend separated from the cluster of Celeste’s group and walked towards us.
“Hey, Blaine! This Lizzie girl here is asking a bunch of questions about that last book you read. You’ve been studying it for longer, tell her what’s it about,” he said.
I had seen that same excited expression before – on a very familiar face, belonging to a very geeky blond lost boy of my own. “Oh, Jeez . . .” I exhaled in realization. “We are the Cool Nerds.”
Chapter Five
The Cool Nerd
CELESTE’S FIRST PLAN for the early morning of witch boot camp was to lead our small group to a clearing in the middle of the woods, where we could sit on the grass and share our learnings with each other.
Why that sharing needed to be so freaking early in the morning, I had no idea, but apparently “communing” in the early hours of the day was better for the “craft”. It certainly brought the group closer, since we all felt like sharing the same awful bout of sleep deprivation we were experiencing.
We walked down a narrow trail, Celeste taking the lead, while the rest of the group shuffled sleepily behind. I noticed Simon dragging far behind at the back and slowed until I was walking beside him.
“So, Simon, do you come to these Gatherings often?” I began nonchalantly.
He eyed me suspiciously but responded anyway. “No, it’s my first time. I’ve lived in Russia with my dad for the past four years.”
“Oh, that’s where the accent comes from.”
“I grew up here, but my mother always made a point of speaking Russian inside the house, so I’ve always had a faint accent, hardly noticeable,” he replied. “It’s slightly accentuated now because I’ve been living out there since graduation.”
“I’d accentuate it more, if I were you. It’s a cool accent,” I said honestly. “Russian is a beautiful language. I wish I knew a few words.”
“You’re in a famous rock band. Haven’t you ever played in Russia?”
“Not yet. I hope we can go some day. How do I say, ‘Thank you for coming to our concert’?”
He gave me a small smile before replying. “Spasibo, chto prishli na nash kontsert!”
“Ugh. That sounds hard to say.”
“It just needs practice, is all.”
“Are you here on vacation?”
“No, I’m staying with my mother full-time now. I thought I should take the opportunity to see how these things are done here. Gatherings in Russia are very dull. This seems promising already, with the ‘famous’ Joe Gray attending,” he said, with a hint of provocation in his voice.
“Dude, come on, stop with the hate,” I protested. “You’re angry for no reason. I didn’t do anything to you.”
“You were going to let me drink that potion!”
“I told you, I was not! I was going to stop you. You shouldn’t be so upset; even if you’d taken a small sip, nothing would have happened, anyway. Alicia’s spells are utter crap.”
“I’m not so sure about that. The girl who drank the potion was acting exceptionally smitten this morning, following Alicia around like a love-struck puppy, you know.”
I widened my eyes. “Shut up! She was? Really?”
He turned to face me and nodded, a small grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. We stared at each other for a second before our shoulders started to shake with laughter. “That’s awful! We shouldn’t be laughing,” I admonished between giggles.
“She deserved it. It was a good punishment. Miss Harker was pleased with your way of settling the problem.”
“She was?” I hadn’t noticed; I had been so focused on Alicia.
“My room-mate told me Miss Harker doesn’t usually let students hand out punishments, but yours was so creative. She looked impressed by your quick thinking yesterday at the meeting. No wonder she made an exception to take you on as her apprentice.”
“An exception?”
He quirked an eyebrow. “You mean, you don’t know? Are you serious? Celeste Harker has never taken on an apprentice before. No one is ever good enough for her. At least, that’s what I’ve heard from the gossip mill. I know more than you just from one day of asking around. That’s priceless!”
I frowned. “Well, excuse me. This is all new to me. I haven’t been aware of this magic community up until recently. And Celeste has only taken me under her wing as a favor for an old witch friend of mine. She was my neighbor, once, and felt sorry for me and decided to help me. I’m mostly a charity case. Don’t need to mock me for it.”
“So, are you saying the rumors about you aren’t true, then?” he asked curiously.
“What rumors?” I played dumb. “I’ve heard quite a few wild stories lately. Some are very good, like the one where I walked through the Valley of Death, or the one where I can mess with people’s heads. I can also shoot lasers from my eyes, control the weather and even burst into flames. I’m sure that, by the end of this Gathering, you’ll be hearing I can make pigs fly,” I mused with a chuckle.
The best way to make people discredit you is to create a story so ridiculous they will think you’re only joking. The funny part was that I’d actually done a few of the things I’d told him, but I’d made it sound so unrealistic, it all seemed implausible.
He smirked, falling for my act. “People are stupid. I know those rumors are all fake.”
“What about you? What’s up with your brother . . . Cillian, is it? Alicia seemed quite taken by the name.”
His relaxed demeanor instantly changed to tense and guarded. “He’s a bit famous.”
“Why? What’s he done to be famous?”
“I can’t really talk about it. He’s a sorcerer of the Top League.”
“Top League? What’s that?”
“You’ve never heard of the Top League?” He eyed me with distrust.
“Is it like a sports thing for male witches?”
“Not ‘witches’, sorcerers,” he corrected impatiently, looking offended. “It’s not a sport. Are you really Celeste Harker’s apprentice? And you really don’t know anything about the League?”
“Can’t say that I do. Maybe I skipped that class?”
“You don’t seem to know much about anything . . . What are you even doing here? This Gathering is for advanced apprentices only. What can you possibly share with any of us if you have zero experience and no knowledge whatsoever?”
“I wouldn’t say I have ‘zero experience’,” I mumbled, feeling a little ashamed of my ignorance. Maybe I should have paid more attention to Celeste’s insufferable lectures, after all.
He shot me a patronizing look. “As charity cases go, you are a very privileged one. You should be thankful to be allowed in here. And also try to step up your game. Celeste’s influence won’t carry you for long if you have nothing to show,” he warned, and then picked up his pace so he could catch up to his friends at the front of the group.
Well, I guess that conversation was over. It had, at least, been partially fruitful:
I had discovered a lot of new things from Simon. Now I needed to find more about this secret Top League.
What worried me the most about Simon’s warning was the last part:
“step up your game”. Whenever I threaded through magical waters, things usually tended to get murky, as Tristan often put it.
I wondered if stepping up my game was really a wise thing to do here. Last time my game was “upped”, I almost burned everything in my wake . . . But if I continued hiding things, I’d have nothing to show. I’d be a burden on Celeste, a disappointment as an apprentice and a taint on her mentoring position.
I mulled this over the whole morning. Celeste and the group sat in a quiet spot in the woods and mostly talked. I listened to them sharing experiences they’d had with their mentors, and having philosophical debates about the meaning of magic in their lives.
It resembled a lot of Celeste and Vigil’s conversations that I’d overheard when we were hanging out in her house while she tried to teach me how to control Vigil’s powers. I had listened to the two of them talking endlessly about these intellectual things, but only ever grasped the edges of what they were saying.
I had hoped this Gathering would shed some light on the nature of magic – real, actual magic – and maybe teach me how to control my new abilities that kept appearing, but Celeste’s group only talked about things. That was it. Talking.
There were no practical demonstrations of actual magic; there wasn’t even a mention of abilities at all. Nobody showed any signs of being able to do anything “extraordinary”, like I could. The whole thing seemed awfully pedestrian, like group therapy or one of those self-help lectures.
And then it struck me . . . In all the years I had been in contact with magic – through my empathy-sight, bringing ghosts back to life, talking with Death, having Vigil’s powers, fighting alien magic creatures and, lately, even casting fire – I had always considered it normal. It was something that had been present in my everyday reality; it was a constant in my life. It was based on real facts and real evidence. I had seen it through my own eyes, witnessed it first-hand, fought and survived it. It wasn’t just theoretical considerations. It wasn’t just talk.
Lost and Found Page 4
