by ERIN BEDFORD
Ian shrugged. “Hey, I’m just happy to be included. If you want to build yourself a harem of wizards or even witches,” - he wagged his eyebrows suggestively, making me giggle - “I’m game, as long as I get ample time with you as well.”
“Really?” I cocked a brow. “You’re not jealous or wanting to stake some kind of alpha male claim on me?”
Sliding his hands around my waist to draw me up against his front, I could feel exactly how happy he was to be there, pressed hard against my stomach. “I fought my whole life to be seen by someone the way you look at me. When I’m with you, I don’t feel like someone you settled for, like you’d rather have my brother.”
“But I like your brother too,” I reminded him, wondering if that would be a deal breaker for him.
“The operative word is ‘too.’ Not more or instead of. I’m okay with ‘too.’” He stroked the side of my face and then dipped down to press his lips to mine once more.
“What’d I miss?” Trina’s breathless voice interrupted. I turned to her standing in the doorway with her arms full of snacks. The girl did not know the word moderation.
Gesturing her to come in, I drew Ian over to sit on my bed. “Let me catch you up.”
Chapter 6
“So, I was thinking about what you said happened with your grandparents,” Trina said the next morning while we sat on our room.
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah, you should do a booth at the spring fair.” She took a large bite out of her muffin and crossed her legs on her bed.
“Spring Fair?”
“You know, the fair. Every year, a bunch of students sign up to make a booth to compete against each other. The booth has to have something to do with your major, and you have to write an essay too, stating why you should win but the winner gets next year’s tuition laid in full.” Trina waved a hand in the air as if she hadn't just told me something important.
“That would be perfect!” I bounced in my seat thinking of how the fair would take care of all of my problems. “So, what do I do for my major?”
Trina let out a hard breath. “Man, they really don’t tell you guys crap.” When I just stared at her, she threw her hands up. “Okay, so I guess it is up to me to be the savior of all human-raised witches.” She smacked her thighs with her hands. “So, unfortunately for you, you didn’t have all of elementary and high school to figure out what you wanted to do with your life.”
“Yeah, I did,” I interrupted her. “However, I think my fourth-grade aspirations to be an astronaut are kind of out of the question.”
“What’d you want to do at Brown?”
I laughed through my nose and grinned. “Political Science.”
“Okay, cool.” Trina gestured to me with her hands, spilling muffin crumbs over the floor. “So, you can still do that here. Just it would be magical politics.” I groaned before she even finished the sentence. “It’s not that bad. You’ve already got some great connections. You just need to make sure your classes line up with it and think of a platform. What are you taking this year?”
I reached into my bag and pulled out my schedule. When I got my schedule for this semester, I had only glanced at it, not really seeing what was in store for me. Now that I had to actually know where I was going, I took another hard look at it.
On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, I had Etiquette of Magic first. If someone had asked me what kind of classes I thought I’d have to take before knowing I was a witch, I’d have rattled off something like about psychics and palm reading, maybe even reading the stars. Etiquette, however, would not have been anywhere on that list. Based on the way the hierarchy system was set up with the so-called privileged students versus the lower bloods, I shouldn’t have been surprised that I’d have to learn some kind of etiquette. Unfortunately, I don’t think that this class had anything to do with place settings and covering your mouth when you coughed.
“Ick,” Trina said over my shoulder through a mouth full of muffin. “It’s like they want you to crawl back into bed and die.”
I wrinkled my nose at her. “That bad, huh?”
“Etiquette of Magic?” Trina snatched my schedule from my hands just shy of giving me a paper cut. “I took that in, like, grade school. It’s the kind that even the most astute student wanted to gouge your eyeballs out with a dull fork. Though, you’ll definitely need it for your major.”
“What about my other ones? Have you taken any of those yet?” I finished gathering up my books as she scanned over the list. Last semester hadn’t been that bad save for the time I almost blew up the whole lab in Potions. I could only cross my toes that this semester would go well too.
Trina hummed and played with the strap of her bright yellow tank top. “Most of these are pretty basic. Ooo!” she shouted suddenly pointing a finger at the paper. “I have Potions 2 with you. Ugh,” she added with a grimace. “And P.E.”
“P.E.?” my brow furrowed in confusion. I hoped I had heard her wrong. P.E. had to stand for something magical right? Philosophies of Elementals or something equally as obscure? There’s no way in this green earth that it meant what I thought it meant. Could it?
“I can feel my blood pumping already. I can’t wait to get my body moving. I’m going to kill some calories.” Trina moved her arms and hiked up her legs up like she was marching in place. There was a fire in her eyes that I’d never seen before.
“Please tell me this isn’t what I think it is.” I buried my head in my hands and groaned. “I thought I was done with all the running and the pushups when I graduated high school?”
“You don’t like P.E.?” Trina looked at me like I had grown a second head. Apparently, physical fitness was not something we had in common.
“No way.”
“Maybe you can get your new boyfriend to get you out of it?” Trina raised a brow and grinned at me.
That actually wasn’t a bad idea. Dale worked in the administrative office, I could probably sweet talk him into getting me out of it. Well, it was worth a shot. Jumping up to my feet, I snatched the schedule back from Trina and started for the door.
“Where are you going?” Trina called after me.
I waved the paper in the air. “What do you think?”
I heard Trina’s laughter all the way down the hallway. However, the good mood I was in slowly seeped out of me as the eyes trailed after me. Now, these weren’t the usual stares I’d gotten when I first came. You know, the curious ones every new kid got. They weren’t even the ones of fearful worship from after I beat down Sabrina. No, these stares said they had dirt, dirt on me.
As soon as I hit the quad, it didn’t take me long to find someone to tell me what was going on. “Hey, Steph!”
I came up beside a freckle-faced ginger which I had Potions with last semester. She had her phone out holding it up for another girl I didn’t know to see. When I called her name, however, she quickly put her phone down, and a guilty look crossed her face.
“Hey, Max.” She shifted in place, fidgeting with the bangs of her pixie cut hair. “This is Victoria.” Stephanie pointed a thumb at the girl beside her.
I gave her a polite nod but stayed focused on Stephanie. Crossing my arms over my chest, I inclined my head to her phone. “Want to tell me what everyone is so ‘The Hills Have Eyes’ about today?”
“Nothing.” Stephanie quickly shook her head. “It’s nothing really.”
Sighing at her reluctance, I fingered the necklace around my neck. Why wouldn’t she just tell me? My day had already started out crappy with the whole P.E. thing hanging in the balance, I didn’t need more crap on my plate right now.
Before I realized the words coming out of my mouth, I said, “I wish you would just tell me.” The necklace around my neck warmed, and I immediately knew what I had done. The one day I decided to wear my dad’s present, and I already use a wish. In all hindsight, I probably should have just used it to get out of P.E., not to get to the bottom of some rumor.
It didn’t tak
e very long for Steph to start talking after I made my wish. “It’s been circulating all morning, not just through text but on social media too. People are hashtagging it all over.”
She shoved her phone at me, showing me an image of Ian and me kissing, the one I knew Sabrina had taken. However, it wasn’t the image that made my blood boil but the caption with it.
#MancasterPrincess or #MancasterWhore? Looks like our resident queen has added another willing victim to her collection.
Wonderful. I was in the middle of a freaking Teen Drama centered around me and my love life. Did people not have lives?
“I’m really sorry.” Steph stared at me with sympathy or pity. Either way, I didn’t like it.
“Don’t worry about it.” I gritted my teeth and gave her the phone back. Suddenly, all the eyes on me made sense. I had a feeling they were only second away from making buttons and t-shirts spouting what side they were on.
Stalking away from Steph, I headed toward the administration office. My mood only got worse with each step I took and the more whispers and stares I got. By the time I entered the glass doors and weaved around the long line, I was burning mad.
“Dale!” I shouted, strutting into the administrator’s office like I owned the place. My eyes immediately found the reddish mop of hair as it jerked up from the student he was assisting.
A curious expression crossed his face, much like those who were watching me make a scene before he pushed his black-rimmed glasses up his nose and received me with a bland tone. “If you would like my assistance, I would be happy to help you ...” I opened my mouth to snap that he better hope to hell he would when he gestured to the line. “... when it’s your turn.”
I glanced at the line and then back at him, at the line again, then him before letting out a growl. “Are you serious?”
Dale tapped a pen on the top of his desk and nodded curtly.
Seeing I wasn’t going to get anywhere coming in here like a child throwing a temper tantrum, which I had been, I crossed my arms over my chest and stepped to the back of the line. If a pin dropped, it could be heard in the deafening silence that followed my and Dale’s interaction. That was until Dale began to speak to the student in front of him again. Then the cell phones came out, and there were hushed murmurs and not so discreet looks in my direction.
Great. I wanted less attention on myself, and here I was, adding fuel to the fire. Sabrina would be rolling in glee at the avalanche of rumors she had begun.
I stood in line, tapping my finger against my arm as it moved at snail pace. It was like people didn’t want to leave because they wanted to see the explosion that would bound to happen once I hit the front of the line. They weren’t wrong, the irritation in me that had more to do with the rumors being spread than the actual reason I was there only grew as the time ticked by.
Ten minutes. I stood in line for ten minutes before I finally arrived before Dale and had my day in court, so to speak.
“What’s this bullshit?” I slapped the copy of my schedule on the counter in front of me before he had a second to get a word in edgewise.
“Language,” Dale calmly stated before taking the paper from me and adding so low that those behind us strained to hear, “before I find another use for that dirty mouth of yours.”
My shoulders hunched up to my ears and my face flamed. “Not now, fox boy.”
Dale’s ears peeked, and he glanced up at me with an amused quirk of his lips. “Fox-boy?”
I scowled, gesturing at his face. “You know, fox boy. Red hair, angular face, a sneaky brown-noser.” I sniffed, sticking my nose in the air.
Clearing his throat, Dale fingered my class schedule without meeting my gaze. “I’m not sure if I should be offended or flattered.”
“Sounds like an insult to me.” The guy behind me in line decided to put his two cents in.
I shot a glare back at him which didn’t do much of anything. Note to self, work on death glare.
“In any case,” Dale interrupted my attempt to kill the guy with my eyes, drawing my attention back to him. “I fail to see what the problem is?”
“My schedule.” I tapped the paper until my finger hurt.
“Yes,” Dale drew out, innocent as could be. “What about it?”
Getting tired of his coyness, I picked it up and shoved it at his face. “Read it.”
Taking the paper from my hands and lowering it, he sighed. “I did. Since I was the one who typed it up. Hence the reason I do not see an issue. These are all required courses for you to progress to your next year.”
Frustrated that he still wasn’t getting it, I spelled it out for him. “P.E., Dale? Really? I thought I was done with that crap when I graduated high school.” A few sniggers from the line behind me made me twist around and glower. This time they quieted promptly, though it didn’t stop them from snapping pictures and texting. Really, didn’t they have anything better to do?
Dale rubbed his temple and leaned an elbow on the top of the counter. “Physical Education is just as important for your magical education as it is for your body. We here are Winchester Academy believe that with a sound mind and a sound body ...”
I jumped slightly and twisted around as the rest of the line behind me joined in his words like some creepy cult. “... makes for sound magic.”
Staring at the people like they had all drunk the purple Kool-Aid, something no one in their right mind would do, seriously. Grapes were only good for eating whole and wine, never a food flavoring. Scowling, I eased back around to Dale.
“That’s all great and stuff, but I’m not a runner. Or a worker-outer. I’m a downward dog kind of girl.” The guy next to me made a sound that earned him a death glare from Dale this time. At least, I knew the guy had my back on one level. “If I wanted to torture myself, I’d join a gym.”
“I understand your hesitancy,” Dale started and turned slightly to the next guy in line as if already dismissing me, but I wasn’t going to have it.
“No, you don’t.” I slapped my hand on the counter, bringing his attention back to me. “I signed up to come to this place to learn how to keep myself from killing myself or those around me, not to get in shape, which I might add I haven’t had any complaints from you so far.” I shoved a finger at his chest with a growl. “The only reason I will ever run is because zombies have, as they inevitably will, broken out and are chasing my fine ass,” I smacked my backside for good measure, so they were aware of how unworried I was about getting fat, then added as an afterthought, “or there’s a two for one sale on shoes. So, thank you but no.”
Dale stared at me for a moment and then took his glasses off. He pulled a piece of cloth from his pocket and began to rub it across his lenses. “Are you quite finished?”
Having lost most of my steam, I nodded. “Yeah. I’m done.”
“Very well.” Dale lifted his glasses to the light as he looked through them and then placed them back on his face. “The class is mandatory. I can’t do anything about it. If you have that much of an aversion, you can bring it up with the headmaster.”
My eyes darted to the headmaster’s door and pouted. “Really?”
Dale quirked a brow.
“Fine.” Sighing dejectedly, I grabbed my schedule and slogged away from the counter.
“That’s it?” The guy next in line cried out. “After all that, and you aren’t even going to wail on him or show any of your powers?”
Before I could answer him, Dale came around the desk and took my arm, pulling me flush against him. I could feel more than hear the phones coming out as they seemed obsessed with doing lately as Dale cupped my face with one hand. That was all the warning I had before his mouth crashed onto mine and the murmurs and click of cameras all fell away.
My hand clutched Dale’s arm the muscle beneath the shirt flex under my touch. His tongue buried in between my lips wrapping it around mine. I angled my head to the side, opening up for him, but as abruptly as the kiss started, it ended, leaving me brea
thless and light headed.
“What was that for?” I breathed, wiping the edges of my mouth and promptly ignoring the crowd of students staring at us.
“Proving a point.” Dale traced his thumb along the edge of my lip before pressing it to his mouth, tasting me. It was the hottest thing I had ever seen in my life, and if my knees had not already been rubbery, they sure were now.
I blinked up at his answer and then it clicked. The picture. Sabrina. Of course, he had seen it. It answered why he had been so curt with me in the first place, but not why he had kissed me in front of everyone. I’d think he’d want to be as far away from me as possible not add to the #MancasterWhore bit.
“But I ...”
“Well, talk about it later.” Dale dipped his head and headed back to his table, calling for the next person in line, leaving me dumbfounded in the middle of the office area.
After a moment, I shook my head and headed for the door. I caught sight of a few people’s screens as I went past. I should have been angry that they had taken such a private thing of me and were sharing it around, but the image of Dale with his arms around me did funny things to my insides, and not one of them were bad.
Chapter 7
Trina hadn’t been lying about Etiquette of Magic being a snooze-fest. I had a hard time keeping my eyes open regardless of the fact that the instructor was a Clark Kent type and less than thirty, two things that none of my previous professors had been. However, as pretty as his face and ass were to look at, his voice made a robot sound interesting.
Even Callie would have had a tough time staying awake.
“If you take anything away from this class,” Professor Morison droned on, his voice as energized as a cup of Sleepy Time Tea, “it is that the magical community comes from a long line of traditions. Those traditions must be upheld. No matter how asinine you may find them in this modern age.” Morison smiled, a little quirk of the lips that had most of the females sighing dreamily.
