by D. R. Perry
"Is this really all you're bringing?" Noah aimed a withering glare at the rolling suitcase next to the door.
"Why? Do you think I'll need more than that?"
"This would fit under an economy seat, Aliyah."
Noah clicked his tongue, making a beeline for my closet. After opening the door, he stepped back, mouth wide with shock. Even his serpent Lotan pulled back into a near-strike position, forked tongue flickering.
"Everything's still here!" He pulled a dress-swaddled hanger off the rail inside. "There's no excuse for not bringing this."
Noah shook the mint-green dress almost cruelly before dropping it at the foot of my bed. A purple and orange broomstick skirt that he’d picked out for me in the hippie shop down at the Wharf joined it. More dresses, skirts, and a few blouses I almost never wore finished off the pile. He even tossed in a cardigan, the kind with little fabric-covered buttons.
"That's more than what I already packed."
"You'll be wanting all of this."
"It's only five days of classes. I'll be spending most of this one in pajamas anyway. I plan to go straight to my room after the welcome assembly."
"You absolutely will not. I'll be introducing you to some upperclassmen, and then you may go and change. Not into pajamas, either. You'll want something festive." He snagged my other suitcase—the one we brought on long weekends to Bar Harbor—off the floor of the closet. He began folding each item in half, hanger and all, before stowing them in there.
After a moment, he glanced at my bureau.
"Hey, no rummaging around in there." I shook my pointer finger at him. "I already packed socks and underwear, thank you very much."
"Well then, where in the world do you keep your accessories?"
I jerked my chin at the inside of the closet door, where the handful of necklaces I own hang on hooks.
"You don't have any scarves?" He feigned shock. "Blasphemous! I'll lend you a few of mine."
Noah trotted across the hall into his room and returned in under ten seconds. The variety of scarves in his arms told me he'd been planning this wardrobe intervention at least all morning, and possibly even all week.
"I can't believe you're not letting me choose my own clothes." I rolled my eyes. "We're allowed to wear whatever we want under our school blazers, after all."
"Oh, but I did, for the most part." He chuckled, waving at my much smaller bag. "All of this is just for special occasions."
"Look, you might like parading around at every one of Hawthorn's social mixers like a peacock, but that's not my style." I crossed my legs and arms. "I intend to study more often than not, and you know it, too."
"I'm not trying to make you into my mini-me, but you don't understand." His back was to me, so I couldn't see his face. "You can ease back on them eventually, but the social events and mixers that they have these first few weeks aren't optional."
"Mom and Dad never told me that."
"Well, for whatever reason, neither of them bothers much with the grease on the wheels of extrahuman society." He chuckled. "Thank goodness that part of this apple fell farther from their trees."
"Hey!" I stood up, bumping my head but angry enough to ignore it. "You're my brother, so I expect snark and torment from you. But insulting our parents like that is going too far."
"Ugh. No." Noah waved his hand as though shooing a nonexistent fly. "I'm not insulting. Just saying that it's a good thing someone in this family can handle socializing. You should give it a try. Who knows, you might even be halfway decent at it."
I didn't protest. Instead, I left Noah in my room and went to brush my teeth. At least the bathroom had a high ceiling. As annoying as the ceilings were, I’d miss 10-1/2 Hawthorne Street.
I spat into the sink, running the water to rinse my toothbrush. While rinsing my face with water cold enough to feel abrasive, I wondered whether anyone in my family was as over the top as Noah when they were teenagers. He had to get that from somewhere.
Maybe it was Mom's side of the family. She never talked about, let alone to them. Noah and I hadn't found even a hint of her maiden name anywhere in the house, even though magi were better than Ancestry.com at keeping tabs on heritage.
What was curiouser was that we'd heard everything about Bubbe, plus her parents and how they came to Salem from London after World War Two.
I shuffled back into my bedroom, where Noah wrapped a selection of jewelry I barely ever wore in one of his scarves.
"Hey, does it ever bother you that we never see Mom's family?"
He froze, elbows bent and shoulders tense enough to hold the weight of the world.
"Bother?" He went back to his task, the slight tremor in his wrists the only sign this conversation disturbed him. "No. If she doesn't want to talk about them or have them around, that's her business."
"I seem to remember a chat we had a year back, the night before you went off to Hawthorn for your first year." I sat on my bed, shaking my head. "You told me that what you don't know can hurt you. What's different now?"
"You'll understand when we get there."
He tucked the silk-wrapped bundle of accessories into a pocket on the top of the oversized suitcase. I tossed my ragged old sheepskin slippers on top of all the party dresses.
"You've got subzero fashion sense, Aliyah, honestly."
"Haven't you ever heard of hygge, Noah?"
"Yeah, but the Danish aren't known for haute couture." He chuckled, leaning over to add a box containing my one and only pair of shoes with actual heels.
"Usually, Cadence helps me figure out what to wear." I stared at my bare feet. "But, well…"
"Good thing you've got a brother at your school with a decent eye, then." Noah's eyes twinkled. Lotan peeked out from his collar, rising up to bump my brother's earlobe with his nose.
I realized then what I should have figured out on my birthday back at the beginning of the summer. I'd wrapped my entire head and heart up in how badly I'd miss my friends when all the while, my brother had spent an entire year missing me.
"Yeah, that is definitely a good thing." I managed a smile.
Maybe everything would work out.
Downstairs, we had oatmeal. Again. Which I shouldn't have complained about, even though it's totally bland. A plateful of eggs or even a bagel with a super-basic shmear might not have sat well in my nervous stomach. Ember perched on the back of my chair, wrinkling her snout. I tried offering her a few grains of my breakfast, but she turned up her nose. After that, she gazed longingly at an apple in the basket on the counter.
"Really?" I reached toward the fruit, which elicited a series of excited peeps. "Okay, then."
Ember's diet was supposed to be omnivorous, and she’d already had some herring that morning. I snagged the apple and tossed it above my head. She launched herself into the air, chasing it down to spear it with the claws of one foot. As she perched to eat it on one leg at the counter's edge, I remember how I used to shave in the shower last year before I got my fire magic and used that to get rid of unwanted hair.
I glanced through the doorway into the living room, where our suitcases were piled in a stack. At least Noah had brought the most stuff. He probably had at least six pairs of shoes. Noah took his last bite of breakfast and headed to the sink to rinse his dirty dishes.
"Are you almost ready?" Dad cracked his knuckles, glancing at all the luggage.
"Mostly." I shrugged, scraping my spoon around in the bowl of half-eaten oatmeal. "But can't Mom come with us?"
Pregnant was a total understatement for the level of pause in the room after my question. She hadn’t gone with Noah on his first day last year, but I’d thought it was because she had to stay home with me.
"Lee, I don't think—" Dad started.
"You know what, Aaron?" Mom stepped out of her office, slinging her handbag across her body. "I'll come along. If only to help with all that." She grinned.
I scarfed down the rest of my oatmeal, finally getting some of my appetite bac
k. My mood improved so much, I even grabbed Mom's and Dad's empty bowls to rinse and load into the dishwasher.
After that, I put my Hawthorn Academy blazer on. It felt odd; not the kind of thing I'd have worn at my old school. Fortunately, the jeggings and tunic I had on underneath were part of my usual wardrobe staples.
As we hefted all the bags, preparing to leave the house and make our way toward Essex Street, my mood improved exponentially.
If only it had lasted.
Chapter Six
Rolling a suitcase should have been easy, especially on a street for pedestrian traffic only. But with cobblestone pavement dating back to the 1600s, not so much.
That was what we did as we tried to find where the entrance to Hawthorn Academy was that day.
The headmaster was supposed to be one in a long line of famously powerful space magi. No, he wasn’t an alien, just able to ensure the entire school existed in the space between this world and the faerie realm of the Under.
A lot of the more mundanely educated folks thought there was just a barrier there, like a wall. I guess it was easier to imagine it that way, but it was impractical when you were a magus who needed to pull energy out of or even through that space.
Plenty of schools didn't hide all or even half of their campus like this. Providence Paranormal College was one—those buildings were in plain old mundane space, even the ones with magically restricted access. That was one reason they’d had to deal with so much trouble a couple of years ago.
Hawthorn Academy was bigger on the inside and also safer. The pocket-school model did have one inconvenient feature, however. It was a mundane dead tech zone, along with most of Essex Street. Something about pocket buildings messed with wireless everything. Cell phones, wi-fi, satellite, and data didn't work there. No binge-streaming for the students at good old Hawthorn.
Wired phone lines existed inside the school, but they were for emergencies only. The worst part of all this was being unable to message Izzy and Cadence when I missed them, but I’d gotten a top-secret belated birthday gift from my friends. There was no way I’d be able to use it while looking for the migrating door, though.
It was supposedly for safety reasons that the school entrance moved up, down, and around Essex Street. After the Great Reveal when the entire world found out all the creatures of legend actually existed, people had started poking around, looking for places like Hawthorn.
Thing was, I had it on the best authority that the door had moved around back before Mom’s and Dad's days here, too. Bubbe had told me, so I sort of hoped the headmaster just thought it'd be more whimsical this way.
"Oh no, my shoe!" Noah wailed because a suitcase just scuffed his Oxford. "We've got to stop." He pointed at a storefront across the street.
"Didn’t you bring a kit with you?" Dad raised an eyebrow. "For your shoes and all that?"
"Yes, but everyone will see me before I unpack and get a chance to use it." Noah pouted. "Please let me go and see the cobbler?"
"You can get your shoe shined back up as soon as they finish the welcoming ceremony." Mom's always been firm with us, and Noah's tendency toward melodrama was never an excuse.
"But Mom—"
"I don't see Aliyah making a fuss, and she'll be meeting all those people for the first time." Mom sighed, maneuvering my larger suitcase plus one of my brother's. "We don't need to put on airs, not with Bubbe's place in the local community and you being third-generation legacy students."
Noah huffed and puffed and knocked his largest suitcase down. As he bent to stand it back up, Dad pointed ahead and to the left, dragging the third roller behind him.
"Found it."
I looked in that direction and concentrated. The faint tint of blue magic emanated from the alcove next door to the tinker's shop. We all followed Dad, heading in that direction slowly to encourage the suitcases to behave themselves. It was a good thing Mom had come along to help. How she managed those two bags without dropping either of them was beyond me, however.
As we passed the tinker's shop, I had a peek in the window. The place always fascinated me with its collection of magipsychic gadgets. Many of them were imbued and designed so anyone could use them. Because of this, every single item in there sat beside its official certificate of authenticity.
Magic or psychic services and devices always needed a license, at least when sold to the public. Magical animals needed them, too, which meant we saw the certifying board every year. The majority of licenses Bubbe issued came in August and September. That was because most of the magi studying familiar-based magic at Hawthorn had to bring their critters in no later than the first of October.
Not having one by that date meant you’d need to start the alternate program of study or leave school entirely.
I leaned my head to the side and gave Ember an affectionate bump. I was lucky to find her when I did, and not just because, as a fire creature, she was compatible with my magic. Dragonets are some of the rarest familiars out there.
I mean, sure, there were plenty of them around, especially in warmer climates than New England, but they were notoriously picky about who they bonded with. Usually this said something about the magus they chose. A dragonet was a sign I’d take after Mom, whose magic was all brute force. The Morgensterns tended toward finesse, one of the reasons three generations of them had bonded with serpentine Tallin.
Bubbe said dragonets picked either the strongest or the kindest person they could find.
I wasn’t certain which of those categories I fell into, but as I stared into the light streaming through the door my brother already walked through, I figured I'd find out. That was half the point of a magical education—discovering your potential.
While heading through the door, I overheard something confusing.
"Are you sure, Angie?" Dad didn't often call Mom by her given name, usually opting for “honey” or some other term of endearment.
"No." Her sigh had more weight than the one she’d spared Noah. "But my setting foot in here can't possibly be an issue after all this time."
"That doesn't mean it won't be, especially after current events." I heard a rustle of fabric. Were they hugging? Why? "You'll be okay?"
"You're with me." Mom sniffled. She was almost never emotional, so why was she crying? "I'll be fine. It's her we ought to worry about. In here. Practically alone."
I stumbled on nothing as they followed me down the hall. There was only one person they could be referring to.
Me.
"Peep." Ember flapped her wings, talons clutched firmly in the fabric of my school blazer.
My familiar kept me from toppling over, but the purring sound of fabric ripping meant she’d also clawed at least six holes in my uniform.
Well, so much for making an impressive entrance.
Chapter Seven
I followed Noah into the brightly lit lobby. It was hard not to squint as I stepped into the glare. I also had trouble keeping my jaw from dropping.
Even though I'd seen photographs of the inside of Hawthorn Academy, the real thing was totally awe-inspiring. The walls were wood, stained a honey brown hue, and polished to a soft shine. The floors were herringbone hardwood in pristine condition. Noah's soles tapped on the surface like he was performing a soft shoe routine.
From the ceiling hung a chandelier. It wasn’t what you’d expect in a place like this, having no crystal teardrops or gilt rods. Instead, it was a wrought iron affair fashioned in the shape of a spider, each leg holding a globe filled with solar magic. The spider's eyes glowed with the same light.
"Check it out, Lee." I forgave Noah's elbow to my rib cage as he pointed out the plaque on the wall.
"Lighting fixtures donated by Morgenstern Magical Creature Care," I read aloud.
"This is why we need to make a good impression," Noah whispered. "It's more than legacy; great-grandpa helped pull the school out of serious trouble when he came over from London."
"I didn't know that."
"Peep." Ember's tail curled around the shoulder opposite the one she stood on.
"Thanks for the hug, girl.” I reached up to give her a chin scratch.
"Oh, yeah, familiars are good for that kind of thing." The voice to my right belonged to a girl about six inches shorter than me. Her hair was jet-black and her skin tan, with ruddy accents on her cheeks and lips. She held out her hand. "I'm Grace Dubois, by the way. From Quebec."
"Aliyah." I reached out, and we shook awkwardly because of Ember's weight on my right shoulder and something under her arm. "Uh, Morgenstern. From down the street."
We both had a chuckle over that.
"Don't worry, Lune." Grace finished the handshake, then put her hand on her hip, curling her arm around a rolled-up blanket in some sort of sling. "I won't drop you."
"Is Lune your familiar?"
"Yeah. He's a moon hare." She smiled, smoothing the collar of her blazer, which covered a threadbare flannel shirt. "You're really a Morgenstern?"
"Yes, she is. Just like me." Noah's tone was so icy I almost caught a chill. "Come on, Lee. You ought to meet some of the more well-connected magi here."
Grace giggled so hard she snorted. I instantly liked her because the goofy laugh reminded me of Izzy. As Noah led me away, I turned my head to look back, giving Grace a sympathetic smile before rolling my eyes at my brother. Grace winked back.
"Elanor!" Noah dropped my arm, extending both of his as he rushed toward a statuesque girl with a pink pixie cut.
"Noah, darling!" She reached out and took him by the shoulders, placing an air kiss on either side of his face. She was dressed like a jetsetter, despite the punky hairdo. Her makeup included way too much glitter, but her jewelry was straight out of Tiffany's.
"I can't believe your parents made you work in Vegas all summer." Noah shook his head, clicking his tongue at what I assumed was his school bestie.
"Well, they couldn't let me traipse around up here for three months." Elanor's laugh was like broken glass tinkling on pavement. "I had to manage the act while they helped Logan train his dragon, of course."
