The fins submerged as the skimmer vanished below the surface.
“Aren’t there concerns about invasive species?” Raine asked.
“Indeed, the careful balance of existing species and reintroduced Oriceran species is a subject of continued concern and research.” Professor Hudson cast a new propulsion spell, and the boat kicked forward. “Which is why endeavors such as the Magical Multitudes Project are so important. In some cases, we might have new species coming over or transported over from Oriceran. In others, the increasing level of magic leads to them re-colonizing areas or expanding their range away from preserves like this. The more we learn about what is out there and what might be coming, the better we can help to smooth the transition.”
Asher laughed. “Aren’t the gates supposed to take thousands of years to open? It’s not like we have to worry that much. A few skimmers here and there isn’t the same thing as dragons over every city.” He glanced at Raine. “I wish we had a dragon at our school like you do.”
She shrugged apologetically. They really were lucky to have a resident dragon.
Professor Hudson gave him a thin smile and shook her head. “The little magic that has initially returned has already fundamentally changed Earth. Even if a potential problem lay far in the future, careful work by each generation can help ameliorate the negative effects. As magicals, we also tend to live longer and can put more effort into such things. It’s something to think about. Part of our reasoning behind this trip is to help you understand such things.”
“Not everything that’s magical, even if it is an animal, is peaceful,” Adrien said with a frown. “There are some really nasty creatures on Oriceran—predators the average non-magical couldn’t even begin to handle. We won’t be able to leave everything alone.”
Finn and Asher both nodded their agreement with unusually serious looks on their faces.
“Of course.” Professor Hudson nodded toward the trees that covered the side of the island. “No one claims otherwise. This is a research project, so we’re trying to exercise restraint, but it’s not as if anyone suggests that deadly creatures will be allowed to roam unchecked. There is a difference between deadly and merely inconvenient, and that’s something that’s often forgotten, even when it comes to non-magical creatures.”
Raine shook her head. “One thing I’ve learned from studying all my FBI materials is that our laws are way behind on everything magical. The fact that I’ll be the first publicly acknowledged witch in the FBI is proof of that.” She sighed. “Our laws are based on so many assumptions about what and who a person is and what they might be capable of. I’m always surprised by how many bad presuppositions there are and how they don’t seem to want to accept the reality of magic.”
“All things change with time.” A thoughtful expression settled over the professor’s face. “I always think I am lucky to be born in a time of such transition. There are so many opportunities to observe how societies change fundamentally. We’ll now have a strong understanding of such issues that many of our ancestors could have used.”
Adrien frowned as if he couldn’t quite believe her. “You feel lucky? Even with all the danger and chaos? They didn’t need magical bounty hunters before the gates opened. It used to be that the Griffins and a few others could handle most trouble, and now…” He scoffed and shook his head.
“What you’re saying is true, Adrien, but incomplete,” Professor Hudson responded.
“Incomplete?”
“Yes. It’s never been the case, even without magic, that either world was completely at peace. All we can do is be part of the solution, and one way to do that is to make sure we’re equipped with the most relevant knowledge possible.”
A humanoid shadow passed between two trees.
Raine’s breath caught. “Are we the only ones on this side of the island today?”
The professor nodded. “Yes. There’s a team that will survey an area in the north, but they’re traveling up the west side of the island. That group includes Professor Kaylis, William, Evie, Dnai, and Silas, I believe.”
“I could have sworn I saw someone walking in the forest over there.” She frowned and pointed at the trees.
Asher and Finn exchanged glances before they turned to her and said simultaneously, “Mirror cats.”
“Mirror cats?”
The elf nodded. “Professor Tarelli mentioned them. They are jaguar-sized and can generate illusions when they hunt, but the illusions are based on things around them. Uh…you could say they mirror things. It’s not like Wood Elf camouflage, but it’s not as good as the invisibility from a stealth spell either.”
“If it’s mirror cats and they have reflected fake people, wouldn’t that mean there’s someone near them?”
He shook his head. “Not if they’ve mirrored us. We’re probably some weird monster from their perspective given that we’re heading through the waterway faster than anything else they might see.”
“Okay. I guess that makes sense.” She blinked. “Wait. There are illusion-generating jaguars on the island?” She looked at Professor Hudson. “Is that safe?”
“If we all keep a proper situational awareness, it should be.” Professor Hudson smiled. “I can assure you that neither the headmistress of our school or the headmaster of OAAS approve of an attrition-based educational model.” She chuckled quietly.
Raine laughed. “I hope so.” She stared at the forest in search of any other strange shadows but found only trees and the occasional bird. “Skimmers and mirror cats. Plants that can crawl. Musical fireflies. This place really is a magic island.”
Chapter Eleven
“And I can’t cut anything with a sword?” Adrien asked with a frown as he thrust some of the increasingly dense brush aside. He walked at the front of the group beside Professor Hudson. Despite the fact that the professor had told him earlier it was unnecessary, he held a long sword in his hand. “I can produce a machete if you think it would be more efficient.”
“This isn’t about efficiency, Adrien, and I’m sure the others told you the same thing on your trips with them.” The professor shook her head. “Nothing permanent. Not at this stage of the survey.”
Raine walked at the rear of the formation with Asher beside her. Finn remained in the center.
“I bet he’s awesome to have in a fight,” Asher murmured and gestured at the Light Elf. “I know he hasn’t revealed too much of what it means to be a Guardian in our chats, but I can tell. He might be a little uptight, but he seems like the real deal. Kick-butt Light Elf warrior.”
Raine nodded and kept her voice low as she responded. “Yes. We’ve had our share of battles together—against creatures and people. Adrien is brave and selfless. He’s also very skilled. I don’t know if I would have made it out of some of our adventures without him.”
Her companion’s expression turned contemplative. “You’ve never wavered from your path, have you? Not only the Trouble Squad but you in particular.”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“Going into the FBI. It’s like it’s practically destiny.” He shrugged. “Some Seer sat on Oriceran and recited quatrains about Quantico, probably.”
“It’s family tradition more than destiny.” She looked up to watch a giant metallic purple caterpillar crawl up the side of a tree and wondered if it would become an equally impressive butterfly.
“But you didn’t know you had magic before. Shouldn’t that have changed things?”
Raine shook her head. “It only made me want to go into the FBI more, not less. They need people like me and William. They need all the magicals they can get in this crazy world. Having to face Eris only convinced me of that.”
“I’m a little jealous.”
She frowned and hoped this wasn’t a segue into another question about her love life. “Jealous?”
“Of that kind of focus.” Asher raised his hand and whispered an incantation. An image of a small black sheep appeared before it blew away with a bree
ze. “That’s me. I come from a respectable family with a proud legacy, not only on Earth but also Oriceran, but I’m merely a goof at school. My parents don’t mind, but I think they would love it if I came to them and said, ‘I want to join the FBI and apprehend chaos witches.’”
Raine shook her head. “You’re not merely a goof. You seem like you’re the leader of your—I don’t know, Mainer Monster Hunter Squad?”
“Mainer Monster Hunter Squad? I like that, but I also lucked into that.”
“We all luck into our lives.” She chuckled quietly. “It’s not like we can choose where we’re born and who our parents are.”
The elf nodded and his normal easy smile returned. “True enough. What I mean, though, is that I’m not sure what I want to do with my life, and I admire that so many of you FBI Trouble Squad members know what you will do once you’re out of school.”
Finn yelped and launched into the air, a tight vine wound around his ankle. His wand slipped out of his hand and fell before he could even think to try to catch it.
Adrien spun toward the boy and gripped his sword tightly. “An enemy?”
Raine raised her wand but Professor Hudson sighed and shook her head.
The vine swayed back and forth. It stretched from a patch of glowing flowers nestled between three trees that grew close together.
“Get me down!” the wizard shouted and his face turned red, both from indignation and fear and the rush of blood to his head. “Before this thing eats me.”
Adrien advanced, but the professor put her hand on his shoulder and shook her head firmly once again.
The elf frowned. “He’s under attack, Professor. We have to help him.”
“Again, it’s the difference between deadly and merely inconvenient.” The witch raised her wand and cast a shield spell around the boy. “This particular vine is simply a moving vine. It lacks the capability of eating anyone. This is basically an anti-predator defense. It will hold him for a few minutes and drop him. Normal animals will immediately flee thereafter.”
“I don’t care about being eaten,” Finn shouted. “I’m getting dizzy.”
Professor Hudson aimed her wand at the ground and chanted another quick spell. A large floating disc of light appeared beneath the boy. “Tickle it.”
“Huh?”
“Tickle it.” She gestured toward the vine. “That will force your release, and it will grow quiescent for long enough that we can leave the area without additional trouble.”
“I can’t believe this. I have to tickle a vine.” He growled with real annoyance and grunted as he strained to reach his captor. Still muttering, he complied with the instruction and it dropped him almost instantly. The boy yelled as he fell but he landed on the professor’s disc and bounced once. “That was so not cool.”
Asher shrugged. “I’d consider giving it a whirl.”
Raine retrieved Finn’s wand from the undergrowth. She walked over to him and held it out. “Here you go.”
Adrien waved his hand, and his sword disappeared. “You’re right, Professor. A blade is unnecessary against an enemy we can tickle into submission.”
The Wood Elf laughed.
Finn groaned, his chagrin visible on his face. “Make this sound cooler when you tell the others, please.”
Raine smiled as she looked at the gleaming bushes directly ahead of her. She held her quick-transfer scroll up and pressed her thumb to a glyph. “Multi-colored bushes, about four feet in height, shimmering with no obvious external source. They have small round berries on them. Um…” She bit her lip as she drew a field guide from a wide cargo pocket. She somehow managed to flip awkwardly through it one-handed before she found a useful chart. “Oh…um, category A2-43 per the field guide.” She jammed the booklet into the pocket before she removed her thumb from the scroll. “I wonder what they taste like.”
“Sweet death,” announced Professor Hudson as she walked into the clearing.
“Excuse me?” She frowned. “I didn’t intend to eat one. I was simply curious.”
The professor nodded at the bushes. “I’m not an expert like Professor Fowler or Professor Kaylis, but I’m not totally ignorant of such things either. These are pretty to look at, but those berries can be used in some fairly nasty potions, even beyond their inherent poisonous nature. You’re worried about mirror cats, but always remember that not everything beautiful and magical is good. If you can take that knowledge away from this survey as well, it would be helpful.”
Raine sighed and nodded. “So, this isn’t a new species?”
Professor Hudson shook her head. “You’ve asked that before, but keep in mind that the point of the survey isn’t to find new species so much as to establish which species are here. It’d be more convenient in many ways if there were fewer unknown species. That would mean it’ll be easier to manage and decide on the disposition of this island and the creatures living on it in the long run, even if that’s not something our group will have to worry about.”
“I know.” Raine smiled sheepishly. “But it would be nice if I could find some crazy bird and name it Campbell’s Raptor or something like that.”
Asher, Finn, and Adrien returned from their examinations of other plants and animals nearby. They rolled their scrolls and tucked them into pockets.
The Light Elf pointed toward some shadows in the distance. “There’s a large group of aquaboars over there eating nuts and berries.”
Professor Hudson nodded. “We’ll go around them. They won’t bother us if we don’t bother them.”
A pulse of magic passed through the area and the group exchanged wary glances.
“Uh oh,” Raine muttered.
In the next instant, the ground shook beneath their feet. The trees around them writhed as the earth convulsed. Being a moving plant wasn’t only limited to ticklish vines anymore, but the bigger concern was the dozens of squeals in the distance.
The professor held her wand level, her face tight. “Everyone, get ready to cast.” She looked at Adrien. “Avoidance, not battle.”
He nodded without hesitation. “Understood.” A genuine smile appeared. “I haven’t played all that Louper without mastering avoiding dangers quickly.”
A chorus of squeals joined with the rumble of heavy hoofbeats and cracking branches. The dark forms in the distance grew more defined and left little doubt—the aquaboars had plunged instinctively into a panicked stampede. Unfortunately, they’d chosen the group’s direction for their headlong rush.
The ground continued to shudder, which stirred the creatures into greater urgency.
Adrien pointed his hands down and cast a burst spell. He elevated and caught hold of a jerking branch. Finn grinned and mirrored his maneuver.
Asher raised his hand and chanted a spell. A branch extended toward him, and he grabbed it with both hands as it pulled him up.
The stampeding aquaboars, their dark blue hides now more discernable, continued their loud rampage. The earthquake ceased, but the animals now moved with mindless instinct and were unlikely to slow or turn from their current course.
Raine followed the Louper players’ example and scrambled up a tree. She eased to a sitting position atop a thick branch.
Professor Hudson raised her wand in front of her face and a glowing ramp appeared.
“Okay, that’s one way to do it,” Raine said, impressed despite her heart-thudding trepidation.
The front line of the stampeding herd passed beneath the students and the animals made no effort to avoid the gleaming translucent ramp. Instead, they simply raced over it and jumped off as if they’d all decided to take up boar parkour. The witch stood quietly, her expression serene, as beast after beast leapt over her.
Adrien’s branch snapped, and his eyes widened in surprise as he fell. Finn shouted a spell, and a rope extended from his wand and wound around the elf. With a groan, he hauled Adrien up to his branch.
“Did you like that one, bro?” the wizard asked with a grin. “I wanted to save it
for next season and use it to surprise a few players.”
Adrien grinned, his relief evident. “I appreciate the save and the preview.”
Finn raised his hand for a high-five. The Light Elf hesitated for a moment before he struck his rescuer’s hand.
The last group of aquaboars passed beneath their perches. Professor Hudson remained untouched as the dark blue mass continued into the forest.
She looked up. “It seems everyone remains unhurt?”
Adrien nodded. “Thanks to Finn.”
Asher exhaled a sharp breath. “I feel like this was revenge for the fact that I like bacon.”
Raine laughed. “Maybe.”
“Meat preferences aside,” the professor said, “we should get going.”
Chapter Twelve
Raine sat on a large rock and stared at the beach, Cameron beside her, and a soft smile touched both their faces. The sun hung low in the sky, but there was still an hour or so before sunset. Without a watch, phone, or clocks, she had reverted to more basic rhythms. Individual minutes and hours seemed abstract and less important than the main events of the day—dawn, noon, sunset, and the coming of night. It might be too much to say she was in touch with her ancient ancestors, but she at least could start to appreciate what life was like before smartphones.
There was a certain taunting irritation to sitting in front of an ocean they weren’t allowed to swim in. Although they hadn’t confirmed the presence of anything other than skimmers and a few other minor sea creatures, all the professors agreed that there was a real danger of serious injury should the students swim in the ocean and possibly encounter a magical sea monster. For now, they’d forbidden anything other than a little splashing near the shore.
The last few days had passed without serious incident, either tremors or animal-related. To her continued disappointment, their surveys failed to identify any new species, but their cataloging had proceeded well, and their work would benefit the Magical Multitudes Project. Although they were focused primarily on large land plants and animals for their particular task and captured only a small amount of the island’s total biodiversity, she felt enormously satisfied every time she returned to camp and transferred her notes into Professor Tarelli’s book. It was rare that she could contribute to expanding the bounds of knowledge.
Untouchable Witch: An Urban Fantasy Action Adventure (School of Necessary Magic Raine Campbell Book 7) Page 7
