Spellbooks and Sleepovers

by Amanda A. Allen

  Maeve shook her head and said, “I don't think I can.”

  “You have to Maeve,” Lex said, and his tone was firm. “These girls are dying, and whoever you all were bullying is being tormented.”

  Maeve sniffed and then nodded. Her face was deathly pale, there were dark shadows under her eyes, and she looked about to keel over, but she sat up, crossed her legs, and held out her hands to Scarlett.

  Scarlett dropped to the ground, crossed her legs and took one of Maeve’s hands and laid the other one on top of the girl.

  “Is it Amy?”

  Maeve shook her head and said, “Wendy.”

  Scarlett shrugged and nodded. She linked her nature magic with Maeve’s as if they were two vines that grew twined together. It took long minutes to find their way to the druid girl and the landscape of her mind—the part that Scarlett and Maeve could connect to was a rocky, windy beach. In the far distance, a figure walked in the waves.

  “Wendy,” Scarlett called and tried to reach her, but each step towards the girl seemed to move her father and farther away.

  “What’s her last name?” Scarlett said it under her breath, not that whispering in someone else’s mind was effective.

  “Willvin,” Maeve said, trying to step towards the girl and failing. “Wendy?” Maeve just said it softly which was far more rational given yelling had no purpose here.

  “Wendy Willvin,” Scarlett said using magic and her mom voice combined. “You get over here right now. There is a girl who needs you, and it is long past time for you to show your inner-druid.”

  The girl disappeared.

  “Scarlett,” Lex said. And she was suddenly half-in and half-out of the girl’s mind. “Hurry up, please.”

  The intensity in Lex’s voice told Scarlett that at least one of the girls was suffering.

  “Ms. Oaken?”

  Scarlett snapped back to the beach and turned to Wendy. In this place, her hair was long and black, her skin was pale, the acne Scarlett had seen in the real world was gone, and the eyes that she’d never remembered seeing as silver. This was probably how Wendy viewed herself mixed with the effect of her magic on her spirit.

  “Wendy, it’s time to go home.”

  “I don’t understand what’s happening.”

  “You guys did a spell beyond your skill set. It’s draining you and messing with the environment around you.”

  Wendy must have remembered what they did because her gaze darted to Maeve and then to the ground.

  “Wendy,” Scarlett said. “Now.”

  She held out her hand and when the girl hesitated, she heard Lex calling to her again. Scarlett’s hand darted out, she grabbed Wendy, twining her magic around the girl before she could escape, and yanked her back to the real world. The house shook as though a major earthquake had hit the house. The TV toppled over and smashed down onto the floor, and several pictures fell off the walls.

  What they’d just done would have been impossible with a full-grown druid, not in her own mind, not against her will. But Wendy was very young and pretty unskilled.

  “Is she out?” Lex asked.

  Scarlett looked up from Maeve who’d gone from pale to almost green. Scarlett brushed her sister’s hair back and rubbed her back as she glanced over to the girl. The girl hadn’t moved and the others looked even worse.

  “Why are they so determined to hang onto this spell?”

  “Katie’s boyfriend dumped her for Jenny Higgins,” Maeve said. “I didn’t think it would work. I didn’t…”

  “She’s 12,” Lex said, aghast as he stared down at the pile of dying girls.

  “Jenny isn’t as pretty as Katie. But Jenny’s…she’s smart and funny and…”

  “Nice?” Scarlett asked softly.

  Maeve nodded and a tear slipped down her cheek. “I didn’t think Katie would be able to do it.”

  “She’s not able to,” Lex said. “It’s why everyone else is dying. But she’s too stubborn to let go.”

  “Too spoiled,” Scarlett said. “Entitled little brat.”

  Maeve flinched and sniffed, but she sat up straighter, and her spine stiffened. “What do we do now?”

  “Good girl,” Scarlett said. “We need to get another one. Who else wouldn’t have wanted to do this?”

  Maeve looked at the lineup of barely breathing, not moving girls and said, “Phoebe.”

  She crawled down to the girl with a fantastic afro and deep skin. She wore a beat-up pair of all-stars and jeans with ragged cuffs. “We debated coming together since Lila is…”

  “Horrible?” Scarlett finished and Maeve shrugged.

  The two of them crossed legs facing each other with their knees touching, grasped hands, and laid their free hand on one of Phoebe’s ankles.

  “Is she your best friend?”

  Maeve nodded.

  “Then you call to her. We’ve got to get to her quickly.”

  Maeve closed her eyes and Scarlett wound their magic together as soon as she felt her sister’s mind with hers.

  Phoebe was not a druid and it wasn’t a landscape of nature in her mind. It was the middle school. The halls were empty and ominous, but there was echoing laughter that came out of nowhere and left Scarlett covered in goosebumps.

  “Phoebs,” Maeve called, using a nickname that somehow felt more right that the girl’s full name. There was a clatter, and Phoebe appeared at the end of the hall.

  “What are we doing here?” Phoebe asked, her gaze glanced to Scarlett and then back to Maeve.

  “Katie’s spell worked,” Maeve said.

  Phoebe’s expression was sick. “Jenny?”

  “I don’t know. The spell is doing something to us. We need to break the circle down. You need to come with us.”

  “How do I know it’s you?”

  “What are you talking about?” Maeve asked. And then the laughter that had seemed to come from nowhere came from everywhere, louder and louder.

  Suddenly the hall was filled with shadowy forms.

  “What are you?” Scarlett demanded.

  The girl looked at Scarlett and Maeve and then ran.

  “What is she?” Scarlett asked, her nails digging into Maeve’s arm.

  “She’s a conjurer. Half-conjurer, half-shaman.”

  Scarlett cursed and then cursed again for breaking her streak of good language.

  “We have to go,” Scarlett said.

  “Scarlett,” Lex shouted, his voice intruding into this dreamscape.

  “We can’t leave without Phoebe. We just can’t.”

  “Then you convince her, right now.”

  “Phoebe Aliyah Anderson,” Maeve shouted, “It is me, the real Maeve, and you will come right now, or I’ll tell your mom what you were really doing while your sister was at homecoming.”

  The hallway fell to silence and then a locker door opened and Phoebe stepped out from it, glancing both ways.

  “It’s me, but I can’t tell you anything that will convince you. So, look into my eyes, and trust me.” Maeve said.

  Phoebe’s gaze met Maeve’s and then she closed her eyes and reached towards Maeve. Scarlett’s sister grabbed the wrist that was held out, and Scarlett yanked them both out of the dreamscape and Maeve out of the circle. The spell backlashed on the house and it rumbled with the force of energy until the spell settled down again and pulled harder on the girls remaining in the circle. One of them moaned and another whimpered. Maeve slumped onto Scarlett again, and she hoped what they’d been able to do so far was enough because she was worried that Maeve would burn through her life force if they kept dragging her back into the dreamscape.

  Lex cursed, and Scarlett looked towards him from where she cradled her sister. A crack was forming in the plaster of the basement wall as the house settled and there was an ominous shifting of the home.

  “We’ve got to wrap this up, Scarlett. Or the house is going to bury us alive.”

  “Great,” she muttered. “Well Phoebe is out of the spell, do you think it
’s enough?”

  “It’ll have to be. We have to try to break the spell again,” Lex said. “There’s no way we’re going to be able to do this slow.”

  Scarlett nodded and pulled her sister upright. “Go upstairs.”

  Maeve shook her head.

  “Lex, take Phoebe upstairs. I’ll get the other one.”

  Wendy was smaller than Phoebe who looked like she might be statuesque and athletic whereas Wendy was a wisp of a pre-teen.

  Lex shook his head and said, “We have to move, Scarlett. We don’t have time.”

  “We aren’t losing all of them,” Scarlett countered. “These ones can be saved. We’ll put them in the bathroom in the bathtub. That’ll be more supported.”

  Lex would have argued, but Scarlett would not be countered. She’d risk herself for the other 5 girls, but not without giving Maeve and the two who were safe from the spell a chance. If this all fell apart—maybe Maeve would live in the right circumstances.

  Lex sighed and grabbed Phoebe’s arm, hauling her over his shoulder while Scarlett pushed Maeve up and then heaved Wendy into her arms.

  “Now,” Scarlett ordered Maeve. There was no point trying to move the others. They’d either be successful in breaking the spell, or they’d all die.

  Scarlett tried to call on the nature magic, but whatever her mom and grandmother had been doing to feed her magic had ended. She hoped that was because they were working on the issue on the other side.

  The stairs creaked underfoot as she climbed them. That hadn’t happened before, and she felt a chill of horror. Katie’s parents were going to have to get a new house. Did insurance cover pre-teens run amok with magic? Scarlett doubted it.

  By the time she’d struggled up the last step, Lex was back and taking Wendy from Scarlett. She followed him to the bathroom, told Maeve to get in the doorway and arranged the other two side-by-side in the wrought iron tub. Fortunate that they had a claw foot tub. She thought about moving the parents but decided against it.

  She was feeling the pressure of the knowing, and it was whispering, hurry, hurry, hurry.

  Chapter 5

  Lex and Scarlett went back down the stairs together. When they reached the bottom, Lex said, “This is bad, Scarlett. I can try this one my own.”

  “Don’t be stupid,” she said. Trying and failing to blow out another candle.

  “I’m the sheriff here. I have the responsibility for this.”

  “We’re all stuck here until we’re successful,” Scarlett said. “I’m not going to sidestep and leave these idiot little girls hanging.”

  Lex tucked one of her vine-covered locks of hair behind her and said, “Druids make the best Te Fitis.”

  She laughed as she said, “Given our abilities, it isn’t really a fair competition.”

  He tried blowing at the candles and kicking the spellbook, but none of it worked.

  “Can we link with the druids outside and try to break through that way?”

  Scarlett shook her head. “They’re gone.”

  “What? Why?”

  He didn’t really expect an answer and it wasn’t like she could give one. She shrugged one of his classic shrugs and he said, “I guess we’ll have to do it ourselves.”

  Lex examined his charm bracelet and asked, “Do you have a lock charm?”

  She nodded and pulled them off her bracelet. She used them normally for when she locked herself out of her car or house…something that happened far too often. But, she had 3 because of that.

  His breath whooshed when she handed them over and she grinned. That was a druid movement if ever there was one.

  “Puffy cloud thoughts,” she told him.

  He glanced towards her and then put the unlock charms on the spellbook. He pulled a knife out of his boot and said, “There isn’t much puffy or cloudy about this.”

  He slit his palm and held out his hand for hers. She took a deep breath. This wasn’t druid magic—-they never used blood. But one look at the pile of girls convinced her to take the risk. A quick, sharp slice and her blood was mixing with his over the unlock charms and spellbook.

  “One,” he said in a gravely low voice.

  She gritted her teeth and tried to connect with as much magic as possible. This wasn’t her grove or her circle, and she was much, much weaker because of it. But those trees outside were old and wise, and they liked her. The wind, her friend, was swirling around the house and fed her the magic. She hoped it would be enough. They were blocked by this horrible spell and the house. It wasn’t touching her skin. It wasn’t ruffling her hair, and she was buried in a house that blocked her from nature.

  “Two,” he said. His eyes were penetrating and bright in the flicking candlelight. He knelt on one side of the spellbook and pulled her down on the opposite side. Their knees touched with the spellbook between them.

  The house shook and she watched the crack in the plaster grow and fray, and she closed her eyes.

  Think of Luna and Ella, she told herself. Calling on her strength. They were two against five. But they were stronger and more trained. The girls were bound in stubbornness and their very life forces.

  “Three.”

  He took one of her hands and used the other to slam the hilt of his knife down on the charms. Then he took hold of her cut palm and she could feel him in her head.

  It wasn’t her actual mind, but the dreamscape that led to her consciousness. Or maybe theirs. They were in the grove that had been planted centuries ago in Ireland next to the coast. It was one of her favorite places ever, but her natural version was with the sun rising, and here… the sky was black, the moon was high, and the stars were brilliant and shining.

  “Where are we?”

  “In my dreamscape,” Scarlett said. “I think.”

  Her friend, the east wind, swirled around both of them, and the magic of the east wind poured into her.

  “Find the spell,” he said, but she was distracted by this depth of warmth in his eyes. That was him. Those were his feelings that he couldn’t hide as easily here. Perhaps it would have been more straightforward if they hadn’t combined warlock magic and druid magic, but druids operated more on instinct and teamwork than straightforward things like spells and energies.

  She closed her eyes against that warmth in his eyes, having to wonder if it was love she saw there and just what she thought about that.

  “Katie,” Scarlett said.

  The girls had to be here, they were pushing through the spell that they’d made. The girl tickled Scarlett’s mind and tried to hide, but this was Scarlett’s dreamscape.

  “Katie,” Scarlett said and if you could make a verbal fishhook and snag someone to your presence that was what Scarlett did. The girl came shrieking and wailing, but Scarlett simply reached out and slapped her.

  The gasp silenced the shrieks and that was good enough for Scarlett.

  “You slapped me,” Katie said, eyes narrowing. In this place, she looked older than she was. her eyes were circled with kohl and her lashes were far thicker than in real life. She was curvy and feminine, and there was something aged and knowing about her eyes. That lack of guile made Scarlett sad. This child was so very young.

  “I slapped your consciousness. Your body is—well it’s not fine—but you did that to yourself. Not me.”

  “Kid,” Lex said. “Break the spell.”

  “No,” Katie snarled. “Jenny has to pay.”

  “You’re the one paying,” Scarlett said, shushing Lex. “You’re burning through your life force.”

  “I’ll be fine,” Katie said with a narrowed, cold gaze. “You can’t make me do anything.”

  She was too cemented in the spell for Scarlett to be able to drag this one out. The other girls had been at least semi-willing.

  “True, you will be fine,” Scarlett said casually, examining her nails. Here they were perfect ovals with smooth edges and nary a hangnail. “But your hair won’t.”

  Katie froze, face examining Scarlett. “Your hai
r is already falling out. It might not grow back if you keep this up.”

  Katie’s gaze was so intense that Scarlett could feel it physically on her face. Of course, that was also the dreamscape. “You’re lying.”

  “Is being bald a risk you want to take for a boy?” The mockery in Scarlett’s tone was enough for Katie to open her mouth, close it, and then open it again.

  “Fine,” she said.

  Scarlett shoved the girl out of the dreamscape and with it the circle. The house shook as though it had been picked up by a tornado and thrown. Scarlett curled over her knees, covering her head, and praying, that the house wouldn’t implode.

  When the shaking slowed, it didn’t stop so much as turn into incessant shivers.

  “That’s bad,” Lex said, pushing to his feet.

  Katie was sitting up across the room from them and the other girls were moving.

  “Scarlett,” Maeve shouted, “Run. The circle is holding the house together and they won’t be able to do it long.”

  Scarlett looked at Lex, and they hauled the girls to their feet, shoving them up the stairs with Katie protesting the whole way.

  Scarlett finally took a vine from her costume, wrapped it around the girl, and frog-marched her up the stairs while Lex dealt with the other three.

  As they left the basement, the couple that had been passed out were pushing slowing to their feet.

  “Get moving,” Lex ordered them, grabbing the wife’s arm and pulling her to the door. Scarlett’s mom was shouting inside the house while clutching Maeve to her.

  “Did Phoebe and Wendy get out?”

  Scarlett’s mom, Maye, nodded and huffed, “Hurry.”

  There was something so intense in her gaze that Scarlett dragged the protesting Katie out the door. The other four girls had gone ahead and Lex followed with the parents. The moment the last of them reached the yard, the druid circle that was operating at the edge of the property let go of their magic and the house crumpled in on itself.

  “Well, goodness,” Scarlett said, dropping to her knees to clutch her daughters to her. “Good job realizing something was wrong, ladies.”

  “My phone was in there,” Katie said in the silence as people stared at the house. “And all my makeup.”