“Do what?”
“The magic.” Boke seemed almost amused at this question.
¨I just do it,¨ she answered with a shrug, in her usual not-very-expressive way.
¨But how?¨ Sophie asked again.
¨I don't know,” she frowned in thought. “I just think what I want, and it happens. Sometimes though, it's hard for it to happen if it's unnatural.¨
Like a newspaper remembering what page they’d last read was natural!
¨If I think it and still nothing happens, then I say the words out aloud. And sometimes, if what I am to do is difficult, I have to accompany the spells with charms and potions, or Runes, just like other Witches, or even dances. But most of the time, I can just say the words, and what I want happens,¨ she explained.
¨What words?¨ Sophie wondered aloud. She’d witnessed her chant so many different words. How could anyone remember so many spells?
¨Of whatever I want to happen, in the most clear but precise way.¨
¨Like a spell?¨ Sophie thought back to her first few days in Spells 1 class, where she’d watched everyone else read from large textbooks and repeat the Latin words over and over again to learn the spells by heart. After the first three lessons, Sophie decided to give up the class to lighten her study load. She planned on taking it next term, or in her sophomore class.
¨Yes like a spell..¨ Boke tried to explain, furrowing her brow as she tried to find the right words.
¨But you did not learn the spells by heart like the other magical beings do?¨
¨No, I don’t do recital magic. Mine is- well, it is expressed. I make a command from my own choice of words. I don’t have to remember written words in books.¨
“Why not?”
“My magic is free, not like yours, and for most others,” Boke said.
¨What do you mean?¨
¨My magic, unlike with other magical beings, does not come to me from nature or otherwise. I generate it.¨ She said absently, perusing the faded newspaper before her.
¨Because you are a Wailer?¨ Sophie was still confused.
Boke looked up from the paper then, her tawny eyes startling Sophie with their sudden intensity.
¨I do not like that word. I am a Mchawi. That is what gogo told me.¨
¨Moochurwi..¨ Sophie repeated slowly, causing Boke to giggle. She must have pronounced it wrong.
¨Moochurwy..?¨ Sophie tried again. Boke was now laughing hysterically, her shoulders rocking. Sophie found herself laughing too, and struggling to remain seated on the uncomfortable high backed chairs
¨I guess I’m not pronouncing it right?¨
¨You pronounce it terribly!¨ Boke exclaimed.
¨Well you should listen to yourself speaking English,¨ Sophie told her.
¨I speak perfect English!¨ Boke claimed, but laughed again for she knew that wasn’t entirely true.
“Who taught you English anyway?” Sophie asked when they finally settled down again.
“School,” Boke said with a shrug. Sophie felt ridiculous for having asked the question.
“Honestly, I assumed you’d never been to school,” Sophie confessed.
“It gets boring at home sometimes,” Boke said with a shrug. “So I’d at times visit classrooms.”
“Where?”
“Around,” Boke said with another shrug. “Sometimes I visited foreign places, like where your people come from-”
“How?” Sophie asked baffled.
“By porting,” she said.
“Like how you appeared at the airport?”
“You saw that?” Boke asked.
“Yes- I mean, I think so. One moment you weren’t there, and the next you were.”
“It works like that.”
“Could you teach me?” Sophie asked longingly.
“Sure, but not here,” Boke said, gesturing around them.
“Outside?” Sophie asked hopefully.
“Not there either.”
“Why not?” Sophie asked with a frown.
“Don’t you feel it?”
“Feel what?” Boke looked very shocked.
“That constant buzz in the air, and the- what’s the word? Ummh- viscosity, when you try to do simple spells.”
“I don’t know any simple spells,” Sophie reminded her.
“Oh!” Boke looked very stunned, as though she couldn’t imagine such a life. Sophie chuckled at the expression.
“Well, there is a limit to the kind of magic allowed in the school building. I can break it easily enough, but it’ll be hard for you. I’ll teach you porting when we are outside the school grounds, if we meet outside the school grounds.”
“It’s a date!” Sophie said, glad at the promise of a future for their friendship beyond this school’s confines.
Chapter 23
They managed to go through most of the '96 publications that week, but found nothing on Maseke or Nyangwi. considering how much media attention they’d gotten in the previous years, it was almost as though the two Maiga women didn’t exist that year.
Celebrity gossip and news of what royalty family members were upto filled most of the news. Nothing happened on politics, for there were few mentions of the High Council, other than a highlight of their meetings or other such mundane mentions.
These researches afforded Sophie with a lot of information about the Supernatural Realm. Like the case with the summer solstice festival, which Sophie was now determined to never miss. It was one of the major yearly highlights for magical beings. A family event, magical beings of all ages could attend the night time event aimed at honouring the elements for aiding them in their magic. It was a festival, with many show stands where particularly talented Witches could show off, magical instruments such as amulets, wands and charms were sold, and there was a lot of music and dance. The event was held every summer in Prague.
It was while perusing the tabloid sections that Sophie found the disturbing article. It was a blurry photo taken of a tall man ushering a shorter woman away from the cameraman. Below it was the caption: Is Avalon prince Jan Sanguine romancing with his parents’ ward?
The article itself was short and thin. Maseke Maiga- a Wailer Witch, and daughter of the most notorious terrorist of the Supernatural Realm, caught on camera leaving a coffee shop with the Count’s dashing son. Is it brother-sister love between mortal enemies, or is something more biblical blossoming between the two?
Sophie called Boke to her side of the table to read the article.
¨That can’t be true,¨ Boke said the instant she was done. “why would my mother fall in love with her captor?”
Sophie said nothing in response. She had a gnawing feeling that there was too much coincidence around Principal Jan and Maseke to be just random.
“Keira could I please talk to you?” Sophie attempted later that night. She was in the bedroom she shared with her cousin, and Keira was going to bed, yet another day gone without them speaking.
“Please..” Sophie tried again.
“No Sophie, you may not speak with me!” Keira retorted hotly.
“I don’t understand- what did I do?”
“What did you do? What did you do, Sophie?” Keira’s voice was rising with every word uttered, but the next sentence was whispered, almost as though frightened the walls would hear them. “What are you doing, Sophie?”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t act dumb. You’re playing with fire, and fire burns, in case you don’t know.” Though her words were whispered, they were angry and almost scalding. They felt like a warning.
“Keira-” Sophie began.
“She’s a Wailer Witch!” Sophie froze upon hearing Keira’s words. She knew.
“What? Did you think I wouldn’t know? You’re my cousin- I look out for you even if you don’t want me to. She’s trouble, and will either get you excommunicated, killed, or in Apros.”
“It’s not what you think..”
“It doesn’t matter what I think. That family is t
oxic..”
“Don’t be so blindly prejudiced..!” Keira’s laugh outburst was short and angry, and its sound suprised Sophie into silence.
“Prejudice has nothing to do with it, dear cousin. The Witches of the High Coven are out to eliminate all Wailer Witches, and they’ll do anything to bring them down. Everyone with a brain knows to stay away from her, so I’m staying away from you as I don’t wish to be collateral damage.” Then Keira threw her bed coverings over herself.
“Witches of the High Coven?” Sophie hollowly echoed the words. Whoever they were, they sounded like bad news.
“Check your desk,” Keira said, her voice muffled by her beddings. “You’ll find help for the sup. Realm term paper.”
Sophie went to her desk, and there on it was a large bound book. She opened it to the first page.
FAIRY FAIRYTALES
MYTHS OF ORIGIN
“Thank you,” she said, turning to the lump in bed. Keira remained silent.
Two days later found her in the library again, perusing through the last of ‘96 papers. Boke sat across her, furrowing her forehead again over algebra homework, every now and then letting out a loud sigh.
“Do you need help?” Sophie asked amused, but Boke only frowned harder.
Sophie turned back to the newspaper before her with a hidden smile. The papers were uneventful until October that year.
Sophie called Boke to her side. The papers were abuzz with reports on the Witches of the High Coven storming the school.
“Who are those?”
“Bad Witches,” was all Boke said.
The Witches of the High Coven wanted Maseke, to bind her powers. Sophie’s goosebumps rose as she read on. The High Council debated on the matter, but finally agreed that it was time. Maseke was now eighteen years old, though still a junior. It was time her powers were bound, they agreed.
Chu mana resurfaced again, publishing articles negatively brandishing the power binding practice, stating it had claimed many young Wailer Witches lives and sanity in the past.
Nobody listened to her however, all were in favour of Maseke Maiga’s Wailer nature being bound, and claimed any side effects would be unfortunate but unavoidable.
The papers were now filled with a very frightened young woman’s photos as she was lead from the school, her foster brother and personal guard, Jan Sanguine, walking protectively beside her.
She was taken to an unknown location, and for a whole month, nothing more was heard of her. When Maseke was brought back to school again, there was a hard to miss smirk on her face. The papers announced that the binding exercise had gone well.
Sophie sighed with relief.
¨Do you think they'll try bind your power too?¨
“Yes,” Boke said, heading back to her seat. “It’d be silly of them not to try.”
“Are you scared?”
Boke shook her head. ¨No.”
“Why not?”
“Can I tell you a secret?”
“Of course,” Sophie promptly answered.
“My nature can’t be bound.”
“How can you be sure? Other Wailers.. Mchawis were bound.”
“I’m sure, because of this,¨ Boke said, lifting her school shirt, tie and windbreaker to show Sophie the lion paw printed on the skin over her bare chest, with what appearred to be chains snaking across her chest to meet on her back- one of the various tattoos on her small body.
Sophie still remembered the tattoo from the first day she’d met her. She investigated it a little more today. The snake of chains crossing her chest seemed to be fastening the tattooed paw tight to her chest. They appeared tautly bound, the chains, and when Boke next inhaled, Sophie almost expected the realistically rendered chains to break and drop to her feet. Sophie found herself reaching out to touch them, but of course rather than the cold metal her mind had been foolish to expect, she touched warm skin.
“They seem so real!” Sophie exclaimed in a whisper. “What are they?”
“The symbolic culmination of a very powerful spell,” Boke said. ¨My grandmother cast the same spell on my mother.”
“But- the High Coven claimed they bound her mchawi nature.” Boke chuckled, but once again, despite Sophie’s irrational expectation, the chains roped around her chest didn’t clink.
“Don’t you see, Sophie? They lied, they had to. How could they reveal to the whole realm that they’d failed to undo my gogo’s spell?”
“How do you know they failed?” Sophie asked skeptically. “You can’t be sure of that.”
“Did you see my mother’s face?” Boke asked proudly as she tucked her shirt into her skirt again and righted her uniform.
Boke looked back at the image of the smirking woman, and then understood that expression. It was triumph in Maseke’s face. The Witches of the High Coven had failed to bind her Wailer nature.
“She was not sure it would work, gogo,” Boke went on speaking. “But when they tried to bind mama’s powers and failed, my grandmother knew it had worked, and so cast the same spell to protect me. She taught it to me, so that if I ever have a family of my own, I could do the same spell to protect them.¨
¨How does it work?¨ Sophie asked.
¨I can't tell you,¨ Boke answered apologetically. ¨My gogo made me promise never to tell another living soul except my descendant. It is the only way to ensure our bloodline survives. It is not my secret to tell, Sophie.¨
The rest of the year ended uneventfully, and as dinner was only a few minutes away, they put off starting on the ‘97 papers.
¨I'm going to Hamburg tomorrow,¨ Sophie said as they stacked back the papers onto the shelves. “There’s a tennis meet.”
¨I know, I heard you and your friends talking about it.¨
“Oh.” It was easy to forget that Boke was always about, even if her presence was never acknowledged by others. She could have overheard Sophie and Klaus talking in class, or even in the dining hall.
“Will you come in here tomorrow?” Sophie asked, hoping her friend would say no.
¨I’ll wait for you,¨ Boke assured her. “We can go on next week. We are doing this together, remember?” Boke smiled, and then Sophie was smiling too.
“Yes, we are.”
Chapter 24
The school tennis team met for an early breakfast in the what now felt dwarfing dining hall, for they were only eight. Sophie finally saw their team patron, a tall female Avalon teacher that joined them for breakfast. The team captain, Connor, three Faeries and one other Witch were going for the trip too.
Klaus and Sophie were so excited, that even the normally uptight Witch was smiling sheepishly throughout breakfast. Despite his unbending manner, and clear demarcations of right and wrong or black and white, Klaus was cool, even funny at times. He wasn’t a big fan of Avalons, which always resulted in strange stand-offs between him and Markus.
¨So you’ve been hanging out a lot with Boke.¨ Sophie nearly choked at those words, resulting in a fit of coughing when she tried to sip some juice to help.
¨Chew your food, newbie!¨ Lukas, a sophomore Faery called from the other end of the table, and the older students roared with laughter at her expense.
When she’d recovered, she found Klaus peering back at her apologetically.
¨Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you,¨ he said quietly.
¨It's alright, you just took me by surprise,¨ Sophie managed to say. ¨How did you know?¨ Did everybody know? First Keira, now Klaus. Would she lose him as a friend too?
¨I did not know for sure. You just now confirmed it.¨ Sophie frowned. ¨I won’t tell anyone, if you want it kept secret,¨ he continued.
¨Thank you. And I do want it kept secret.¨
He nodded.
¨What are you girls doing, if you do not mind me asking?¨
Sophie instantly disliked his proper polite manner again.
¨It is not my secret to tell, Klaus,¨ She answered him as calmly as she could. He nodded again, and went on eating in silenc
e.
¨The chopper is ready,¨ the Avalon teacher suddenly announced, getting off her phone.
The chopper!
Sophie looked back at Klaus with large eyes, her face lighting up with excitement. “Did someone just say the chopper?” She squealed, unable to curb her excitement. Klaus seemed amused by how excited she got.
“Well excuse me, but I am not Supernatural royalty like you,” she explained herself. “I’ve never been in a chopper before, or even been within a few feet of one. Those are things I watch in movies.”
“I’m not judging,” he said in a relaxed tone, leaning back into his chair. “Squeal away.” Sophie found herself laughing at this, and then he too was laughing.
The chopper, parked on the clearing to the east of the school grounds, was a grey machine with double black lines running along the middle of its body, and on it’s tail was the school's crest. The same crest could be found almost everywhere in the school, including prefects badges, on the breasts of school issued blazers, and on the school team uniform.
Sophie’s teammates let her sit by the window, and Klaus edged in next to her, before the rest piled in.
It appeared that their patron was also to be their pilot.
“I hope her piloting is better than her sunbathing!” Sophie whispered into Klaus’ ear before she could stop herself. Klaus chuckled, but both the patron and Connor, also sitting in front, turned around to them. Of course, they’d heard her, as Connor was Werecat, and so had super senses like the team’s patron. Sophie’s face flushed beetroot red, and Klaus' closely resembled a carrot. But when the patron turned away, Connor winked their way, before turning away too, leaving Sophie and Klaus battling their chuckles.
There were no words to measure the roller coaster of emotions Sophie was exposed to during the flight. Excitement, fear, panic, calm, fear, panic, excitement, panic - something like that. It was a memorable experience, and Sophie was certain her teammates were nursing slight headaches from her constant squeals and screams.
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