There were only a few other people flying when we took off, but as we got closer to Thorten, the airspace started filling up.
Since Mom and Dad were already planning to stop in Thorten on their way to Rothermere to drop Jeremy off at school, Alexa asked if they would mind picking up a few students who lived nearby and giving them a ride into the city. Alexa arranged to meet us and accompany us the rest of the way. “They’re actually not that far from Rothermere themselves—we’ve got a girl coming from Glendale, and a boy in Teaneck. But I’d feel better if we escorted them ourselves.” Mom raised an eyebrow at this until Alexa admitted, “I’m not sure I trust the parents to get them to Rothermere. You’d be surprised how lazy some people get once they find out they have an ord.” Then she grinned. “Not every kid’s lucky enough to have parents as amazing as you guys.”
Dad smiled and shook his head. “Please. Go on.”
Alexa was waiting for us in the clear stretches of meadow outside of town, shielding her eyes from the sun as she watched us land. She gave us each a brusque kiss on the cheek. Jeremy pulled me in for a rare hug and made me promise to let him know about the curriculum. Then Alexa guided me and Dad back on the carpet while Mom and Jeremy headed off toward campus. He had to get checked in and make sure his stuff was all set.
Below us, the place was packed—move-in day in a school town is always crazy. Stores were open, hawking crystals or dried herbs or extra-long bedsheets or anything people might have forgotten. There were so many carpets, taking off and landing, it was a struggle just to get through; we didn’t even try getting close to campus, and lines of students checking in wound all the way back through the streets. Even from a distance I could hear the massive doors of Thorten’s front entrance groan happily as they swung open to admit a new student.
Alexa had arranged for us to meet the other new students at the Whittleby home. Their only kid, Peter, was going to be in my class. The Whittleby house was on the edge of town, small and white and square, with decorative blue tiles around the windows and tiger lilies purring along the fence. It was a nice place if you didn’t look too close: if you didn’t notice the chips in the tiles, or that the paint was faded and flaking, like no one was keeping up the maintenance spells.
There was a girl waiting by the Whittlebys’ gate, hugging a faded leather satchel, her cheeks pink from the sun. Surprise slapped Alexa in the face, and she jogged over. “When did they drop you off? I didn’t know it was going to be this early.”
The girl’s response was too quiet to catch. She was a tiny apple dumpling of a girl—soft and round and dimpled—with buttercup curls and a slump to her shoulders. There were deep, dark shadows under her eyes, and her fingers were bone white as they gripped her bag. She seemed to be trying to fold in on herself and disappear.
“Why didn’t you go in? Aren’t the Whittlebys here?” Alexa asked.
The girl shook her head and didn’t meet Alexa’s eyes. “No—I mean, yes—I mean, I didn’t check. I didn’t want to bother them.”
Alexa got that look on her face like she did when she thought we were being difficult for no reason, but she didn’t get a chance to say anything else because Ms. Whittleby came out then in a blur of questions and welcomes, dragging her son behind her.
Ms. Whittleby was what my mom would call a “striking beauty”—very fair with thickly lashed eyes and lots of long dark curls piled on top of her head—but the most noticeable feature was the bruise on her forehead and a scrape on her cheek.
That was what had me gaping at her. I mean, the bruise, yes, but also what it meant. Ms. Whittleby was a grown-up. And if her bruises were visible, it meant she was an ord. A grownup ord!
I wanted to hug her, which wouldn’t have been appropriate because Alexa was already angrily demanding to know what had happened to her face even as Dad was asking if Ms. Whittleby was all right.
“Oh, this? It’s nothing. I’m fine,” Ms. Whittleby assured us, with a glance at Peter. He was glaring at the ground. “We’ve had adventurers stopping by to make offers for Peter ever since he was … confirmed. Usually we tell them no and they go on their way. We got a pair yesterday that was a little more difficult than most. Apparently Barbarian Mike and Trixie didn’t want to hear no.”
“Yes, we’ve met them too,” Dad replied drily. “They came to our house and harassed Abby—”
“Her name is Trixie?” I burst in, then caught myself. “I mean, sorry. I hope you weren’t hurt too badly. But Trixie? Like, really?” Ms. Whittleby smiled and nodded. “I wouldn’t tell anyone my name, either.”
Alexa’s lips twitched but she stayed focused. “This is ridiculous. We can’t have a pair of punch-happy lunkheads harassing every family with an ord in the kingdom. As soon as I get back to my office, I’m going to let the king know.”
“You do that,” Peter said. “I’m sure it will help.”
Ms. Whittleby murmured for her son to behave and then turned to us. “Abby and Frances, right? This is my son, Peter. You’re all going to be in the same class.”
“Hi,” I offered. Frances started twisting her fingers and stayed silent. Peter didn’t say anything either; he just looked at me like he was trying to piece together a particularly boring puzzle.
“Where are the Randallses?” Alexa asked.
Ms. Whittleby shook her head. “I spoke with Mrs. Randalls this morning. She said they would be here. She gave me no reason not to believe her,” Ms. Whittleby pointed out when Alexa lifted her eyebrows.
“Who are the Randallses?” I asked.
“A family with another student,” Alexa said. “Frederick Randalls—Fred. He should be here by now. This is my fault. I knew they were going to waffle. I should have pushed harder last time I talked to that vapid—”
“Alexa, be kind,” Dad reproached her.
“I will not. I’ll save my kindness for her son, whom they are kicking out of the house. This isn’t like Abby or Peter; on the application, the Randallses requested that Fred spend all of his vacations on campus—which is a nice way of saying they don’t want him to set foot inside the house again. Frankly, I’m surprised they’re sending him to school and not just selling him … off.” Alexa stopped suddenly and looked at Ms. Whittleby. “You said the adventurers were here yesterday?”
“Yes.”
“Are they still in the area? Do you know if they’ve left town?”
Ms. Whittleby shook her head. “You don’t think—”
“I think that Mrs. Randalls has been complaining an awful lot about the cost of tuition.” In a second she turned into Official Business Alexa, who worked for the king. “All right, everybody on the carpet,” she ordered. “We’re leaving right now.” Dad unrolled the carpet in one smooth flick and we climbed on. The grown-ups called up the safety belts around us ords. “We’re going to do a couple of flybys,” said Alexa. “Hopefully we’ll see the Randallses on the road and pick up Fred. If there’s trouble, I will handle it. Everybody understand that?” she asked, yanking another knot in my belt. Dad nodded. The girl—Frances—stared at Alexa with wide eyes.
Peter glanced at his mom. Alexa caught it. “Ms. Whittleby, you stay here. If there’s trouble, we might have to run for it. We’re going to head straight for the city.”
Ms. Whittleby threw her arms around Peter, hugging him until he was forced to make gagging noises and plead for air. They took a pretty long time, and Alexa started fidgeting and kept glancing at her watch and then the road, and then back at her watch.
Ms. Whittleby gave Peter one last kiss, and the carpet lifted and we were soaring.
CHAPTER
7
Dad started on loops, small at first and then arcing out wider. This far away from the campus, the streets were mostly quiet. We zipped past a woman tending her garden, a man struggling to get his carpet to rise. Alexa told Dad that now was not the time to worry about speed limits, but Dad just shook his head and said it was better to be thorough and not miss anything.
O
f course, it was pretty hard to miss Barbarian Mike. He’s big as a mountain. He and Trixie were about ten blocks out, toward the very edge of town where the streets and houses faded away into rambling, mossy forests. They had a kid with them. He was kind of ordinary looking; short—really short—with a bumpy nose and big ears that stuck out through his hair.
“That’s them,” Alexa said, and she stepped off the carpet midair. The world magically pulled toward her, sky and earth smooshing together as she took the huge space between them in a single hop.
Dad let out a sigh and then said, “Hold on.” And we dropped. Okay, it was actually a dive; Dad knows better than to do a straight drop, but it was so steep and fast it felt like the carpet had disappeared from under us and we were falling. My stomach shot up into my throat and I couldn’t help but laugh. Peter squeezed his eyes shut and gripped the fibers, and Frances desperately tried to tuck her dress under her legs.
We came to a hovering stop right by Alexa, who was saying something about “by order of the king.” Coming from Alexa, that means be quiet and do what I tell you; she likes to use it when people are talking in movie theaters and at some of our louder family dinners. Barbarian Mike grabbed Trixie’s arm when she opened her mouth.
“Wow.” I looked at Barbarian Mike and Trixie. “You guys have really bad luck with ords.”
“Not this time,” Trixie sneered, tugging on the boy’s arm.
“I beg to differ,” Alexa replied. She’d gone red again, which meant, among other things, that she was probably going to end up filling out a lot of paperwork. “That boy has been enrolled in the Green School for months. He is not a candidate for purchase. You will hand him over at once, or you will face the penalty.”
Barbarian Mike shrugged good-naturedly. “Sure. What’s the fine going to be this time? Twenty bucks? I think I got that on me right now.” He started patting his … I guess he had pockets in those furry little shorts.
Alexa’s smile was rich with satisfaction. “The penalty for kidnapping a minor is imprisonment. It carries a sentence of fifteen years.”
Trixie looked more surprised than when my family told her she couldn’t buy me. Barbarian Mike shook his head. “This was a legal sale.”
“The sale and purchase of ords has been illegal for over two years now—”
“You’re joking,” Barbarian Mike insisted. “He’s an ord.”
“I understand that you have been traveling, but it is your responsibility to review updated legislation upon returning to a country—”
“That little changeling snakes his way onto the throne,” Trixie spat out, stabbing a vicious finger at Alexa, “and the first thing he does—”
Alexa’s face went as red as her dress, but she kept very still and her voice was calm. “If you find fault with His Majesty’s policies, you are more than welcome to bring it up with him. He takes an audience on Thursdays. I hear that it’s quite easy to file a petition from prison these days.”
“Someone should—” Trixie began.
Barbarian Mike snapped a silence on her before she could finish. “Easy, Trix.”
It was funny because even though Barbarian Mike’s spell was still active—it made the space around Trixie’s mouth and throat look hazy—I could still hear her. Not loud, it was like listening through marshmallows, but her voice was there. She was saying a lot of stuff that I wasn’t sure you could get away with saying to a king’s agent. Things like cheat and thief and how the crown didn’t belong to him and how it was their job to right wrongs and after they were done with the little eight-year-old king they were going to come back and—then a bunch of words I’m never supposed to say. I glanced at the other kids. It was obvious from Frances’s face that she had heard Trixie too.
“Please forgive my friend,” Barbarian Mike said. “Sometimes her enthusiasm gets the better of her.”
“She would do well to learn a little of your restraint,” Alexa replied.
Barbarian Mike nodded and said they’d been out of the country, and you know how it was, living on your own, off the land, away from people, and the whole time he and Trixie were still holding on to Fred with a death grip. Alexa was eyeing the situation with increasing quiet, which is never a good sign. The funny thing was that while Barbarian Mike was going on and on about how adventuring was a solitary life and if they’d lost some of their polish it wasn’t meant as an insult, that wasn’t what I heard. I mean, it was, but I also heard a lower, quieter Barbarian Mike voice, a soft rumble just between him and Trixie. You make a diversion. I’ll take the boy.
And then her reply, Fireball?
A little more subtle, babe.
I glanced at Peter, who was clenching and unclenching his hands into tight, white fists, and Fred, whose face was a resigned blank, and Frances, who played with the carpet fringe as if she hadn’t heard. But we’d all heard. I knew it.
“Alexa?” It burst out of me before I could think. “What’s a diversion?”
Now, “power” in magic doesn’t just mean having a lot of strength—being able to explode forests or level cities. That’s only part of it. The other part of it is control; it’s technique and finesse and speed.
Alexa has both parts.
The wind stopped. Everything stopped. Barbarian Mike pulled Fred toward him slowly, as if he were moving through syrup, and I saw a slow ember flicker luxuriantly between Trixie’s hands. Dad lurched forward, his hands passing through the air like they were fighting a current. Around us, trees pulled their branches back with the wind in slow, sleepy arcs. It took me a moment to realize what Alexa had done: she’d slowed down time, wrapped it through her fingers like a ribbon, and pinched it until the seconds stretched out.
Then she grabbed Fred and yanked him out of Barbarian Mike’s grasp in one smooth movement, shoving him toward us so fast her dress and hair seemed to be moving in slow motion behind her. Peter and I each grabbed for an arm as Fred half climbed, half jumped onto the carpet, and Frances clambered back to give him room. He was laughing. We were all laughing, especially at the adventurers’ faces as they realized that Fred had disappeared. We saw the confusion, the sense of but he isn’t magic, and then understanding starting to dawn as time finally caught up with them. But by then Alexa had leaped onto our carpet, the hem of her skirt tearing as she moved too fast for it, poofed Dad on with her, and willed us into the air.
In the next instant time shifted again and the world around us raced forward, clouds blinking by and the carpet tassels flapping so frantically I was surprised they didn’t rip off. It was weird, watching Dad’s jerky movements as he scrambled into a sitting position, hearing his squeaky, high-pitched exclamations. The ground winked into a stretch of brown and green and—
And then reality came back like thunder breaking, and the carpet snapped to a slow, easy soar. Frances moaned and clutched her stomach. Fred was still laughing, a little shaky, and he was holding on to Alexa as if he couldn’t let go. Alexa threw her arms around him and grinned at us. “Everyone all right?”
“We’re fine. Are you?” Dad began.
“Don’t worry about me.” Alexa started brushing off her sleeves and skirt with mostly steady hands.
“We should call the police,” Dad said.
Alexa nodded. “Meathead and Trixie probably ran the second they saw us get away, but you’re right.”
“Don’t mention us,” Peter said. “They won’t come if they think it was some fuss over ords. Tell them it was normal people.”
“I’ll tell them the truth,” Alexa said. “And they will do their job.”
Peter snorted.
Alexa kept her eyes on him as she said, “Our first priority, however, is getting you kids to Rothermere. Sorry, Peter. I’ll have to get your mom up to the city one day for a proper good-bye.”
He shrugged.
“What about his parents?” I asked, nodding to Fred.
“They’re not—” Fred began and then stopped.
“Are they going to go to jail?”
I asked.
“Abby.” Dad’s voice was a low warning.
“That depends,” Alexa said carefully. “I could probably talk to someone, arrange something. If that’s what Fred wanted.”
Fred glanced at all of us, mouth half-open, and then looked at his hands.
“You don’t have to decide now—” Alexa stopped, whipping her head around. The air inside the force field started vibrating with a sharp, heavy twang. “Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”
CHAPTER
8
“Dad,” Alexa said.
“I see them,” Dad replied. The carpet pulled forward, speeding up.
Alexa quickly checked and then double-checked everyone’s safety belts. She was on her third go-round when I finally saw the carpet. It was a flashy one, fast, and coming up hard behind us. It had to duck and weave around parents heading home after dropping off their kids. I saw Trixie’s dark hair flaming in the wind.
“These guys are desperate,” I said.
Alexa gave a grim nod.
Something whizzed around us. The carpet. It lapped us in tight, dizzying circles, so close it almost crashed into us a couple of times and Dad had to slow to a near stop.
Barbarian Mike chucked things that bounced harmlessly off the force field. On the next lap, I glimpsed Trixie pulling on a pair of long gloves. Even with the wind rushing, it was not hard to catch what they were saying. They didn’t really seem the “quiet conversation” type, and I definitely heard Trixie’s comment about how they’d be done by now if not for somebody’s ord mom. But she was smiling. She smiled at Barbarian Mike and he smiled back. They were enjoying themselves.
Peter had been watching the carpet’s circles intently; at that comment I saw his face go dark and hard. The next second he was on his feet, the safety ropes straining against his waist, his fist passing easily through our force field and theirs to smash into Trixie’s jaw. I caught the surprise on Trixie’s face before their carpet dropped down again. This time it didn’t come back up.
Ordinary Magic Page 5
