A Mixture of Mischief

by Anna Meriano

  The walk to the library should have been a nice one. The April afternoon was pleasantly warm and the sky stretched wide and blue behind dollops of white whipped-cream clouds. But instead of warming up Leo’s mood, the beautiful day burned the thin worried edges of her heart. The shops lining Main Street suddenly felt more threatening than familiar, each business’s bright spring window display competing to draw customers away from Amor y Azúcar. Colorful awnings striped the sidewalk in shadow, and Leo moved through the patches of light and dark with the creeping feeling that someone was following close behind her or watching her from around every corner. She shivered, suddenly cold in spite of the sun.

  By the time she reached the library, she was almost running and wanted nothing more than to escape into a board game with her cousin and her friends.

  Leo slipped through the clear glass doors of Rose Hill Library silently, not even getting a glance from the librarians sitting at the circulation desk. She inhaled the dusty old-book air with a smile. Daddy always brought Leo and her sisters here as soon as school let out for the year, challenging them to check out enough books that the stack would reach above Daddy’s head when he tried to carry it by himself. During the school year most of Leo’s books came from the school library or Caroline’s bookshelf—being in the public library always felt like summer.

  The sound of hushed giggling led Leo to a table where Caroline, Brent, and JP sat by a stack of board games. Settlers of Catan was spread on the table, the hexagonal board forming a colorful island for players to build roads and houses on.

  “I’m just saying, if we’re the settlers, then what happened to the indigenous people of Catan?” JP asked. “Maybe the so-called robber is actually trying to decolonize the land.”

  “Good point.” Brent nodded sadly. “It’s like when Ms. Wood told us the truth about Columbus Day.”

  “My mom’s been telling me about that stuff since I was in pre-K,” JP said. “She’s a professor.”

  Leo came up to the table, but no one even looked her way.

  “My prima in Costa Rica is like that,” Caroline said. “She gets really excited talking about Juan Santamaría and how the Central American alliance kept the US invaders away.”

  “Is that the same cousin who’s learning candle m—” Leo caught herself before saying magic in front of JP. “Traditions with you?”

  “Invaders from the US?” Brent asked, ignoring Leo and leaning right in front of her. “When did the US invade anyone? Why didn’t we learn this in history?”

  “Um, guys?” Leo asked, annoyed at her friends. They had spent all day with JP; any starstruck feelings they had about an out-of-towner should have worn off by now. And besides, ignoring someone was just rude.

  “It’s your turn,” Caroline told Brent, and the three turned back to the board to collect their resources as Brent rolled the dice. Not one of them acknowledged the fourth person at the table.

  This wasn’t rudeness. This was something else.

  She waved her hand in front of Brent’s face, then leaned across the table to do the same to Caroline. No reaction.

  “Are you ignoring me on purpose?” Leo asked hopefully. Once, when she was only five or six years old, Leo had played along with a prank Alma and Belén had cooked up to ignore JP, because he had accidentally spilled juice on their new coloring book. Even when JP stood right in front of them, face red and eyes watering, Leo had stared straight ahead until Mamá caught on and lectured her and the twins about how they should treat others. Leo still felt guilty remembering it.

  There was a chance that JP had dragged Caroline and Brent into an elaborate plot to get revenge for that childhood cruelty. But it seemed like a very small chance.

  JP rolled a seven and reached over the board so that his hand nearly bumped Leo’s elbow. She moved away by instinct but then thought better of it. When JP picked up the gray robber figurine, Leo quickly snatched it out of his hand and held it tight in her fist.

  “Uy!” JP snatched his hand back and waved it in the air. “I think something just bit me!”

  “A bug?” Brent asked. “I didn’t see anything.”

  “Let me look?” Caroline leaned over to inspect JP’s hand.

  “It doesn’t hurt, but it scared me,” he said. “I dropped the robber; I’m afraid I lost it.”

  “I’ll find it!” Brent dropped to the floor to search the carpet while Caroline cooed sympathetically over JP’s hand. Leo stood in the middle of it all, the cold she had felt just before walking into the library suddenly digging into her gut. The robber dropped from her hand.

  “Found it!” Brent crawled up from under the table and triumphantly waved the robber. “I’m a Hufflepuff,” he said, by explanation.

  As the conversation turned to house identity and eventually back to Catan, Leo felt tears prick the back of her throat.

  She was invisible.

  Then the watery feeling froze into a hard lump of understanding. She knew exactly who she needed. The same person who was behind all of today’s horribleness, the only person she knew with the power to turn invisible.

  It was time to talk to him.

  CHAPTER 10

  ABUELO’S PLAN

  The library had plenty of quiet, tucked-away corners for studying, so Leo found one close to the shelf of books for young readers. The familiar covers and spines gave her courage as she checked that the coast was clear, took a deep breath, and called out, “Abuelo?”

  She was afraid heads would turn and someone would come running to shush her, but the librarians couldn’t hear her any more than her friends could. She counted to three before trying again. “Abuelo Logroño? Where are you? I’m ready to talk.”

  She waited, eyes bouncing around the corners of the room as she chewed on her bottom lip. Hadn’t her abuelo said to call if she wanted to ask him questions? Was there a magic calling spell she was supposed to know? Or had he decided that she wasn’t worth talking to now that she had told Mamá about his visit? Leo clenched her fists. She wouldn’t want to talk to him either, if there was anyone else she knew who could help her with this problem.

  There was a crash from the front of the library. Leo startled, but the library patrons she could see didn’t lift their heads out of their books at the sound, or at the slap of footsteps running through the aisles. Leo craned her neck to see the strange sight of Abuelo Logroño running through the library, his arms flailing and his black robe flapping wildly around him, revealing a pair of old worn-out green flip-flops on his gnarled feet. Leo would have laughed, except that he was running full tilt at her.

  Before she could jump out of the way of her surprisingly speedy grandfather, he skidded to an ungainly stop just a few feet in front of her. He panted a bit, arranged the folds of his robe to hide his shoes, then smoothed his ruffled gray hair and cleared his throat.

  “What are you doing?” Leo asked.

  “Uy!” Abuelo Logroño hopped in place and looked over his shoulder before meeting Leo’s gaze with a suspicious squint. “You can see me?” he asked.

  “You can see me?” Leo responded, crossing her arms.

  “Well, of course I . . . oh.” Abuelo Logroño suddenly shuffled closer to peer at Leo’s face. “Are you . . . ?”

  “Invisible!” Leo threw up her hands. “And I don’t know how it happened, or what to do about it, but you said you know all about it, so help me fix it!”

  “. . . jamás en la vida creí que vería . . .” Abuelo broke into a smile so huge that Leo took a step back in surprise. “You’ve made your first jump already! With barely a nudge! This kind of power in my family—I’ve been waiting my whole life for this! And to find it in you of all people, a little girl!”

  Leo found herself enveloped by the huge puffy sleeves of Abuelo’s robe, a hug that felt cold and smelled like old coins. She shook herself free, glaring at Abuelo’s grin.

  “Don’t you see?” he continued. “You must study with me. You’re born for it, like a fish for water!”
<
br />   Leo pressed her lips together. “Is this my birth-order power? I turn invisible? I can’t even make my friends see me when I want to—this feels more like a curse!”

  Abuelo Logroño’s smile shrank. “Your power as a saltasombras is the legacy of your Logroño family. It is our birthright and destiny. It is not a curse. And your abilities will go beyond the silly parlor tricks of your mother’s lineage—if you let me train you.”

  If Abuelo Logroño wasn’t going to stop being rude, then Leo could be rude right back. “You’re not going to train me in anything. You’re going to tell me how to turn this invisibility off, and then you’re going to leave me alone.”

  “I don’t see why I would want to do that,” Abuelo Logroño said. “It makes no difference to me if you stay invisible for a few hours or a few years.”

  Leo glared. “Then I’ll figure it out myself.”

  “Saltasombras powers are notoriously difficult to control. Once you reappear, you might never be able to use your powers again without my help.”

  Leo stomped her foot. “I know all about you, and I know that my mamá banished you with her magic, and if you don’t leave us alone, then we’ll cook up something even worse for you.”

  Abuelo Logroño didn’t look happy anymore. He picked lint off the edge of his sleeve and breathed loudly through his nose. “You’re referring to those little warding spells on your house and your bakery, I assume? Terrifying. I’m shaking in my boots.”

  “Flip-flops,” Leo corrected. Abuelo frowned and shifted his weight as he pulled his toes back under his robe.

  “The fact of the matter,” he continued, “is that even if your family had the guts to hex me, which I very much doubt they do, they have bigger problems to deal with now. Like running their business properly, while they can.”

  Leo was often frustrated, and she didn’t always hold her temper when she was upset. She got mad at her sisters, annoyed at her parents, and sick of Señor Gato lying on her books. She had once been so irritated by Brent’s rudeness that she had cast a spell on him, with disastrous results. But she wasn’t used to feeling anger unsweetened by love. She wasn’t used to the way fear bled in like spice magic, turning rage strong and bitter. It felt almost like magic singing through her veins—but a magic she didn’t like.

  “Why don’t you leave us alone?” Leo demanded.

  “Oh dear, have I struck a nerve?” Abuelo Logroño smirked while Leo blinked to keep her wet eyes from spilling over. “That’s the trouble with your antepasada and her clever loophole. It’s a rather shaky foundation to build your magic on.”

  “What are you talking about?” Leo blinked a few times but made sure not to drop her death glare. “My five-times-great-grandma bound her magic and passed it down to her family. She started the recipe book, the initiation, and the bakery.”

  “Yes, a bunch of piecemeal traditions to try to make up for the fact that she had no family name to pass down,” Abuelo said. “Now your magic depends on those bulky inventions, housed inside that bakery of yours.” He spat out the word like it tasted bad. “And your mamá thinks she can lock you away from your real birthright. But you’ve proven that isn’t true.”

  A librarian came down the aisle with a cart of books. When she got close to Abuelo Logroño, she stopped, shivered, and then walked around him without seeming to realize she was doing it. Leo watched her go, wishing she could avoid her abuelo so easily. But he was the only person who could see her, and she still had no idea how to fix that.

  “Magic is a difficult force to grasp, you know,” Abuelo Logroño said as he watched the librarian hurry to a different aisle. “Existing throughout the world just outside of human reach, but not so far away that we can’t sense it.”

  “Part of everything,” Leo whispered, thinking of Abuela’s spirit. It gave her courage to remember that Abuela existed everywhere, even right here and now, when Leo felt so confused and alone.

  “Directionless and diffuse,” Abuelo Logroño scoffed. “Weak. Through studying, brujos of old found ways to access and channel magic, standardize it somewhat, and create clear rules and guidelines. Before those discoveries, magic would crop up wherever humans happened to stumble upon it, with no logic or will behind it.”

  “Everyone has different aptitudes,” Leo said. Abuela had once told her that magic touched people’s lives in different ways. “What’s wrong with that?”

  “Not much, if your biggest worry is a collapsed cake.” Abuelo Logroño smirked. “But I told you, we are weapons to protect humanity, and we must be at our sharpest.”

  “Why?” Leo asked. “Do you really go around fighting people all the time?”

  “Not people,” Abuelo Logroño snapped, “Creatures that haunt this land and try to pass as human beings. They’re dangerous; they can’t be trusted to live among us. We find them, expose them. We’re not heartless; whenever possible we try to send these dangerous creatures to other realms or to places where humans don’t live. It’s the way we have kept humanity safe for hundreds of years. It’s the way it has to be done.”

  “Mamá says they’re not hurting anyone,” Leo said.

  “Your mother is naive!” Abuelo Logroño shouted. He took a few deep breaths, flattening his hair and shaking out his robes. “As I was saying, brujos of old continued to experiment, and they found a way to bind their magic to a certain course. It could be passed down a family line through a shared name.”

  That sounded like her family’s magic, passed down from mothers to daughters, but Leo refused to ask any more questions. Abuelo Logroño kept talking anyway.

  “Names have always carried power, of course, and brujos of old took steps to ensure that the names they used would carry specific magical abilities to future generations. Names are stable, connecting new brujos to their ancestors through law and tradition. With magic tied to these lasting institutions, finally progress could be made. Brujo families consolidated power and knowledge, each generation training its offspring. Your ancestor couldn’t pass on her name, so she decided she knew better than every brujo before her.”

  Leo didn’t understand why he sounded so angry about that. Her antepasada had done something original, and now Leo’s family could bring love and magic to the town. Wasn’t that more important than some old tradition?

  “Our Logroño powers can be traced back through the fifteenth century, before our ancestors left Spain to bring magical balance to this continent.”

  Leo frowned. She had never thought about her family coming from Spain, even though they spoke Spanish. Abuelo Logroño seemed proud of the heritage, but Aunt Rita and Ms. Wood talked about how much harm Christopher Columbus and others like him had done when they first came to this hemisphere. What did that mean about her ancestors?

  “I could teach you about your noble pedigree,” Abuelo Logroño said. “Logroño is your primary name, of course, coming from your father’s father’s father and so forth. But you carry other strains of magic in your apellidos.”

  “I don’t need to know all my last names to know my power,” Leo said. Mamá didn’t have the same last name as Tía Paloma, and neither of them had the same name as their grandmother.

  “These legacies carry centuries of power.” Abuelo frowned. “They have given us some of the strongest brujería the world has ever seen. You mother’s power, her ancestor’s experiment, is a trivial footnote, one that may soon come to an end.”

  “Our magic isn’t going anywhere,” Leo said.

  “Maybe not. But in the absence of a name to carry power, your antepasada had to bind her magic to something. And physical things, books, bowls, bakeries—well, magic that’s tied to those sorts of objects can only last while the object does.” Abuelo shrugged dramatically. “Oh, but I’m sure you’re right. Your mother’s magic will last forever. Just like her business.”

  Cold fear tickled the back of Leo’s neck. Abuelo Logroño knew that the business was in danger. He must be the one behind the money troubles, just like Mamá suspe
cted. And now Leo knew why he was doing it: an attack on the bakery was an attack on the family magic.

  “By all means, warn all your sisters and your mother about me,” he said. “Put up a ward ten times more powerful. I think you’ll find my accomplices unimpressed.”

  Accomplices? Caroline’s dad sometimes called Leo “my daughter’s favorite accomplice,” so Leo knew it meant a partner in crime. What accomplices did Abuelo Logroño have? She felt like she was moving in slow motion while Abuelo Logroño ran circles around her with his knowledge and plotting.

  “You’d better think about what you want, young Logroño, or soon enough you might find your powers disappearing. And then you’ll come to me begging for training. So think hard before you make an enemy out of your last hope. . . .”

  He took a shuffling step to the side, the air around him rippling, but instead of disappearing into thin air, he stepped back into sight, causing the librarian, who had just reappeared with her cart, to shriek and drop a stack of books. Abuelo cursed, stepped back into the shadows of invisibility, gave Leo one last parting glare, and then stalked unglamorously down the aisle, flip-flops smacking the carpet as he went.

  Even though she was terrified and angry and tearful—or maybe because of all that—Leo couldn’t help but snort at the awkward figure he made in his robe, like a bird whose body didn’t quite know how to move on the ground. The snort popped out of her mouth like the plug of an inflatable pool toy, and a stream of laughter followed, flowing from the pit of worry in her stomach and warming her as it left. It felt good to laugh in spite of the scary things. Leo felt like she couldn’t stop.

  The librarian who had disappeared after her scare was now scolding someone nearby, her voice floating through the aisles of bookshelves. “Young lady,” the stern voice kept saying. It made Leo laugh even harder.

  “Young lady!” The librarian rounded a corner and stood face-to-face with Leo, just where Abuelo Logroño had been moments before. Surprise quieted Leo’s laugh. “What exactly is so funny?” The librarian, who Leo recognized from her visits to the bakery, frowned straight at Leo, the bright pins on her jean jacket and red stripes in her black hair making her angry face extra intimidating. She looked like the person Marisol would want to grow up to be, complete with Marisol’s grumpy annoyance with Leo.