Dean McIntosh waved her hands and suddenly Mink and Rowan were pushed to either side of the room. Rowan teetered and then righted himself against a bookcase and Mink smoothed his purple coat and adjusted his hat.
“Gentlemen, can I please remind you that this is my office and we will remain civil or I will use my right as dean to silence and restrain you both?”
Neither said anything. Dean McIntosh might have been a petite woman, but we all knew she was one of the most formidable magicians in the world.
Her eyes flicked up as if just realizing I haunted her doorway. “And, Miss Rivera, why do I always find you mixed up in every conflict that falls upon my doorstep?”
I shrugged. “I’m that good, I guess. I came with Rowan. We wanted to speak to you.”
The dean pushed back a lock of gray-brown, shoulder-length hair. She seemed tired but quickly adjusted her expression. “And I would be happy to speak with you once I finish my conversation with Mr. Mink.”
Mink interjected. “Rowan should hear directly what he’s facing. Let the boy prepare himself.”
“I want to hear,” Rowan said, eyes flaring.
Dean McIntosh sighed. “Rowan, did you have an altercation with Cruise Knightley?”
Cruise Knightley? Was that a name? I didn’t know him, but then I remembered the d-bag Rowan had choked down by the lake, the one I now affectionately thought of as Captain Pee-Pee Pants.
“Who is he?” Rowan’s face tensed as if he knew exactly who he was.
Mink flexed his hands on his cane. “Cruise Knightley is the young man you assaulted and nearly bit, a criminal offense worthy of incarceration in Drungheim, the magical penitentiary in Germany, carrying a sentence of at least fifty years.”
Rowan blanched. “I didn’t.”
“It’s true,” I said, striding forward. “I was there. The guy was being a jerk. Rowan just asked him to apologize.”
“Excuse me, Miss Rivera,” Mink said, turning his impish gaze on me. “But a lot of other people were there that night and they are corroborating Mr. Knightley’s story. Rowan lost control, grabbed him by the throat, and was about to bite. It seems only your calming presence was able to save Cruise’s life.”
Then he winked at me, a corner of his mouth twitching as if he were coming on to me.
My skin crawling, I turned away. “Dean McIntosh, you know Rowan. You know he would never do something like that.”
Mink was the one to answer. “She also knows that Truman Knightley, father of the victim, is on her Board of Regents.”
Oh, shit.
“None of this is Charlie and Rowan’s concern, Mr. Mink,” the dean said, coming around her desk to usher us out of her office. “Now, students, please do not worry about this. It will all be sorted out. Rowan, your father would like to see you as soon as he returns from his trip. He’ll be in touch. Miss Rivera, please stay out of trouble.”
She pushed us out of her office and magically shut the door.
Rowan and I stood in the hallway, frozen. I felt as though the whole building had fallen on top of us and was crushing us with its weight.
I put my hand on his arm. “Rowan, I… I’m so sorry.”
He nodded but kept his eyes on the tile. “Thanks.” He stared at the floor for a long moment. “I’d like to… be alone for a bit, Charlie. I’m sorry. I’ll call you later.”
He took off without waiting for me to respond. I watched him leave, a tornado of emotion threatening to wipe me off the face of the map.
Sighing, I reached into my bag, pulling out the compass, the source of all our distress.
“Why won’t you work?” I whispered, flicking it open.
As I did, light from the exterior doors hit the compass lid. Something I hadn’t noticed before gleamed back at me. I tilted the lid toward the light, peering in.
An inscription!
A type of spell perhaps, though some of the letters seemed obscured by time and rust.
Whatever it was, it felt like a lifeline, a clue to unlock the cage around us. Tucking the compass safely back in my bag, I ran off to find Disha.
Chapter Seven
FALL SEMESTER
EARLY SEPTEMBER
I found Disha just where I had expected, at a cafeteria table strategically positioned behind an elegant wooden column.
“Hey!” I said.
She jumped away from her textbook, putting a hand to her chest. “God, you scared me. I thought you were Bridget. She was after me earlier, and that girl is like a bloodhound.”
Disha was still at odds with her roommate. Despite all efforts to guide her attention elsewhere, the girl kept harassing Disha, driving her crazy with her over-friendly attitude and nosy questions, to the point that Bridget had started feeling kind of stalkerish, and Disha was now hiding from her.
I sat across from my friend and set my bag on the floor. She was wearing a jean miniskirt, layered tank tops, a choker necklace, and a pair of suede booties, her luscious curls flowing past her breasts. So gorgeous it was impossible not to be a tad jealous. I mean, come on. Who had a figure like that?
“Like I told you before,” I said. “You’re welcome to crash in my room anytime.”
“You’re my BFF, Charmander. I wouldn’t do that to you. She’s persistent and would come looking for me. Then there would be two miserable witches, not just one.” She sighed. “Besides, it’s my punishment, not yours.”
She still believed the dean had assigned Bridget to be her roommate as punishment for tackling Nurse Taishi while I kidnapped Rowan last semester. But if that was the case, they would have partnered me with Satan. I’d done much worse, and instead, I’d ended up with a room all to myself. This was nothing but bad luck.
“The girl is certifiable,” Disha said, jumping into a tirade. “Have I told you that she does spells in her sleep?”
“Really? Like what?”
Disha’s hands fluttered all around. “She levitates, sends bees buzzing around her head, does her homework.”
“In her sleep? Sweet… how do you do that?”
She rolled her eyes. “Everyone knows that’s a waste of time. You end up with nonsense mixed with your school work. Your dreams get in the way.”
I sighed in disappointment. Wasn’t magic supposed to make things easy?
“Exactly the way my dreams keep getting in the way of my earplug spell,” she complained. “I can’t keep it going all night. The spell turns off whenever I have a particularly vivid dream, and that’s when Bridget’s nighttime craziness wakes me up. It happens almost every night. It’s miserable.”
“That sucks.”
She held up a finger, letting me know she was really on a roll and was going to vent it all. “And she always has that girl, Ava Marie, hanging around, lurking in the doorway like some waifish charity case. Do you know she never says a word, but how could she when Bridget never shuts up? And yet, she manages to haunt my doorway, watching me, sneezing and making it rain on my carpet. What a pair!”
“Sorry, Disha. I had no idea.”
“Of course, you didn’t,” she snapped. “All you think about is Rowan.”
“Hey, speaking of Rowan.” I lowered my voice and leaned in closer.
Disha rolled her eyes.
“You know the compass he found in the lake…?” I asked.
She nodded, resigned to my one-track mind. “Did it… do that thing again?” She put a hand over her heart and made a tapping motion.
“No, not again,” I said, “and he’s all beat up about it. I hate to see him like that.”
“I warned you,” she said, though not unkindly.
When I’d told her that the compass had made Rowan’s heart beat and he hoped there might be a way to reverse his transformation, she’d advised me not to let him get his hopes too high. Sure, there were legends about vampires becoming human again, but they weren’t true. No one had ever made the trip back, she assured me. But still…
“Legends carry a grain of truth sometimes
,” I said. “The compass did make his heart beat. I felt it, Disha.”
She sighed and peered at me with huge, sad eyes.
“I’m not making it up,” I insisted.
“Are you sure? You’d just had a brush with death and were in shock or something,” she said. “Maybe you imagined it.”
“No, I didn’t. There’s something about the compass. I can feel its power. And…” I paused, pulling it out of my bag, glad for the seclusion of our table, “I found something. Could be a clue. See…” I pointed at the inscription on the lid.
Disha examined the compass for a moment, then glanced back at me with a frown. “See what?”
“The inscription. It’s damaged, but I was hoping you could help me figure out how to reveal it.”
“What inscription? There’s just an old carving, Charlie.”
I shook my head. “No, look,” I pointed at the letters. “That’s a t and an e. Then something followed by a p or… it could be an f.”
“You’re seeing things,” she said. “There’s nothing there.”
We stared at each other for a long moment, then we glanced down toward the cuffs at my wrists.
“Unless…” Disha let the word hang.
My cuffs let out a quick flash of light. We exchanged shocked glances, then jumped to our feet in unison.
“Your room,” Disha said, gathering her books.
I stuck the compass back in my bag, and we tore toward the exit. We’d barely taken three steps away from the table when we noticed Bridget and Ava Marie, sitting nearby.
“What the hell?” Disha said under her breath.
Ava Marie’s eyes dropped to the floor while Bridget stood up. “Hey… um… have you been over there this whole time? I was looking for you… earlier, I mean.”
Disha growled, practically baring her teeth and stomping around the redhead, who had likely been eavesdropping this entire time. Anger stirred in my chest, but I felt more pity than anything else. Bridget just seemed so clueless.
“Excuse me,” I said, skirting around her and following Disha.
“More than half the school signed the petition, did you hear?” Bridget said, fast at my heels.
“Yeah, I heard,” I lied, hurrying along and trying not to panic. That petition was bad news, and I didn’t want to think what it could mean for Rowan. The parents, the regents, the students, they were all against us.
I stepped outside into the bright afternoon and spotted Disha making a beeline for our dorm. I hurried after her, stubborn Bridget still trailing behind me.
“But they weren’t counting on all the new students,” Bridget kept going, undeterred by the fact that I was blatantly trying to ignore her—not that her news wasn’t interesting. I just had bigger fish to fry at the moment.
“About twenty werewolves, twelve vampires, and three succubi registered this week and Ava Marie is our first elemental,” she informed me, nodding to her. “Macgregor Underwood is clever, but not that clever. He thought no witches or warlocks would want to bind themselves to ‘Lessers,’” she made air quotes, “but he wasn’t counting on all the families with skeletons hidden in their closets. He thought he was suddenly the only one with his own skeleton. Naive, if you ask me. Oh, and by skeletons, I mean vampires, werewolves, whatever.”
What she was saying sounded terribly close to what Rowan had said about his dad’s logic behind letting non-wizard students in. Did the entire Academy feel the same way? Was Dean McIntosh in on it? I wanted to believe they were being open-minded and accepting of all Supernaturals, but maybe I was wrong.
“It’s not like anyone is in danger,” Bridget continued. “My brother and Rowan wouldn’t hurt anyone, right? Look around… students playing soccer, witches going—”
I came to an abrupt stop and whirled on the determined chatterbox. “Bridget...”
She peered at me with alert green eyes, her red curls shining in the sunlight.
“Look,” I continued. “I appreciate your interest in Rowan, but we’re good.”
“For now. But what if Bash Mink gets his way, and they kick out all the new students? Ava Marie and my brother are worried and Rowan should be, too.” She gave me a hard look. “Mink’s behind all this, you know?”
That made sense, but right now, I had problems of my own to deal with. Disha was right. This girl just couldn’t take a hint.
“Bridget, listen—”
“Oh,” she pointed toward my cheekbone. “You have an eyelash.”
I paused, frowning. She began twirling her fingers. A small current brushed my face, swooped down, then snuck inside my shirt, making my arm hairs stand on end. I shrieked, pulling on my T-shirt and peering at my breasts. Everything looked as it should. Thank, God!
“What the hell, Bridget? Why are you putting spells on my chest?” I exclaimed.
“Make a wish,” she said, beaming.
“Huh?”
“Make a wish,” she repeated. “When an eyelash falls, you put it on your chest and make a wish. I was just helping you out.”
I’d heard of people putting the eyelash on the back of their hand, then blowing it away before making a wish, but this? If anything, it would probably cause chest hair to sprout all over my boobs. Gross.
“All right,” I said, trying but failing to contain my irritation. “I think Disha and I would like a little privacy, now. Just… um… let us be, okay?”
Her big smile deconstructed in slow motion until her lips formed a downward arch that made me feel like a total jerk.
“I’m sorry,” I said, then walked away, shame burning on my cheeks.
I could tell Bridget meant well, but she was seriously stressing me out. I had enough to deal with already. When this was all over, I would—
“It’s okay, Charlie’s Angels,” Bridget said behind me. “Just let me know if you need help with that compass.”
Chapter Eight
FALL SEMESTER
EARLY SEPTEMBER
“I take back everything I’ve ever said to defend Bridget. She’s actually as annoying as you told me,” I said as I burst into my room and found Disha waiting for me, sitting on my unmade bed. I walked to my desk, set my books down, and gently touched Trey’s urn in greeting.
I proceeded to tell Disha what had happened, while I tried to contain my frustration and forget the icky feeling of her spell snaking over my bra. That girl was just odd and that was saying something considering we went to a school for Supernaturals.
“Does she need the Ewok treatment?” Disha proposed. “I have the spell memorized. A week should do the trick.”
I knew she wasn’t serious, but I briefly contemplated it. Then again, hearing gibberish for a week might send Bridget over the edge.
“Anyway, we’re not here to talk about my annoying roommate,” Disha said, wiggling her fingers toward my bag.
“Right,” I said, retrieving the compass and placing it on Disha’s extended hand.
“So I was thinking… some items have similar magical wavelengths, and maybe your cuffs and the compass are kindred spirits.” She looked up through her dark eyelashes. “Like you and I.”
We exchanged a complicit smile.
She continued. “That might be why you were able to see it at the bottom of the lake, and why you can see an inscription and I can’t. That, or your crazy-ass cuffs are at it again.”
“Either way,” I said. “What do you think would be the best way to reveal the message?”
She turned the compass this way and that. “It’s pretty damaged, but it could probably be restored by someone who specializes in antiques.”
“What?! Disha, we have freakin’ magic, and you’re suggesting we go about this the regular way. Why would we do that?”
“Well, first off, we’re no experts,” she explained very slowly as if I were a toddler, which I guess, magically speaking, I was. “I’m sure one of the faculty would know exactly what spell to use to glean the inscription from this rusted mess, but would you trust th
em not to take the compass away?”
Before I saw the inscription, I’d been willing to go to Dean McIntosh, but now that there was renewed hope, I wasn’t sure that was such a good idea anymore. And there was no faculty member I trusted not to go squealing to the dean as soon as we showed up, magical item in hand. Not after last year.
Disha went on with her answer to my question. “Secondly, if we try a random spell, we run the risk of rendering the inscription less readable, at best. At worst, we might destroy the compass altogether. That’s why someone who specializes in antiques seems the safest bet.”
“But where are we going to find someone like that?” I asked. “I sure don’t know anyone.”
“I do,” she said. “A friend of my parents.”
Of course, I rolled my eyes.
She rubbed her chin, her red-tipped fingernails lightly scratching her smooth, tan skin. “It will probably cost a small fortune, and she would likely tell my parents about it, so…”
“Yeah, not an option.”
We stared at each other, then nodded.
“Random spell it is,” we said in unison.
I flexed my fingers. “All right, what do we try? A revealing charm is the most obvious.”
“I doubt it’ll work,” she said. “It’s too basic, but go ahead, try it.”
I walked to my desk, placed the compass on top of it, and took a deep breath. Subvocalizing the charm, I made a fist, then slowly spread my fingers open. Tension filled the air as I released my magic. When it had dissipated, I leaned over the compass. I hadn’t really been expecting the charm to work, but I was still disappointed.
I tried again.
“Verba revelare.” I said the charm out loud for more effect.
Still nothing.
Disha nodded knowingly, but, to her credit, didn’t say I told you so.
“I think,” she began, tapping her temple, “fire might work, but if we overdo it, we could end up with a charred scrap of metal.”
“Fire?” I said, doubtfully. I’d never tried a fire spell. They weren’t particularly encouraged in the classroom, for obvious reasons. And, with my cuffs, I was liable to set the entire building ablaze.
Supernatural Academy: Sophomore Witch Page 6
