History of Magic (Ember Academy for Young Witches Book 2)

by L. C. Mawson

  She just kept frowning. “Amy... I thought you would be scared of me. That you wouldn’t want anything to do with me after I admitted that I’d bitten Kristen.”

  “Oh, that? You thought I would be scared of you over that? I already knew that you were a Vampire, Natalie. And you’d already gone to great pains to get me to see you as a monster who might attack me at any moment.”

  “Yes, but you didn’t know that it had happened before.”

  “And now I do. I still don’t think you’re a monster. I mean, you made a mistake. And every time you’ve gotten close to biting me, you’ve pulled away, so it’s not a mistake I fear you repeating.”

  Natalie shook her head. “I might have pulled myself away from you those times, but I hadn’t known you for that long. The girl I bit... Amy, she was my best friend. And if you and I get closer... I’m afraid that I’ll struggle to control my feelings, and that I won’t be able to pull myself away.”

  “Well, she might have been your best friend, but you bit her when you two were kissing. Which is also the only time you’ve gotten close to biting me. And I’m dating Willow right now, so there’s no danger of us kissing.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “You know that Elves generally aren’t monogamous, right?”

  “Well, I’m not an Elf,” I said with a shrug as I finally got out of bed before turning to give Natalie a small smile. “I really care about Willow, Natalie, so you don’t have to worry about us getting close enough for you to take a bite.”

  I decided not to mention the fact that the memory of Natalie’s kiss still made me light-headed.

  That wouldn’t have been fair to either of us.

  Natalie smiled. “Okay, I guess you’re right.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  The day’s training was, thankfully, straightforward and uneventful.

  At least, it was for me and Charlotte, and we made it through the trial at the end of the day without too much strain.

  But a few more girls left, and I realised just how much the original group had thinned out.

  I decided not to dwell on that fact. It felt too much like a reminder of the enormity of the task before us.

  And stressing about it likely wouldn’t help.

  Not when it would be just as likely to send my magic haywire as to help me focus on controlling it.

  I was about to head back to the changing rooms with Charlotte when Lauren approached.

  I just glared at her before storming past, hoping that she got the message and left us alone.

  She did not.

  “Hey, Amelia, I just wanted to talk.”

  I didn’t stop, despite her attempt to jog alongside me.

  “I wanted to apologise.”

  I did stop at that, though my glare didn’t lessen.

  I supposed that, if she did really want to apologise, I should hear her out.

  Maybe she’d had a change of heart and realised how terrible she was being.

  I doubted it, but I supposed that it was better to find out than keep ignoring her.

  She smiled as she realised that I’d stopped. “I really am sorry, Amelia. I didn’t really consider the fact that you’d grown up with Humans, and so would have Human sensibilities. I should have been more thoughtful and not said things that you would take so seriously.”

  I rolled my eyes at her non-apology. “You shouldn’t be sorry for offending me. You should be sorry for hurting my friends.”

  “I didn’t hurt them. And if they were hurt, they must have incredibly thin skin. It’s not my fault if they can’t handle hearing the truth.”

  I shook my head, storming past her once more.

  “It’s clear that you don’t get it,” I said, meaning them to be the last words I said to her.

  But Lauren didn’t seem happy with that, shifting in front of me to block my way. “Look, I’m trying to be nice here. I like you, Amelia, and I want you to do well, but you never will if you keep letting your friends drag you down. It doesn’t matter how good you are, I heard the Amazons talking. They’re not going to let you pass the trial next week, and it’s pretty obvious why.”

  I frowned. “They won’t ‘let’ me pass? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “I think you know exactly what it means. But if you tell anyone I spoke of this, I’ll kill you. I’m risking my neck here, Amelia. But you wouldn’t listen to me before, so maybe this is what you need to realise that you’re wrong here.”

  She shifted away, and I just stared at the empty air where Lauren had been standing moments before.

  “Ah, okay,” Charlotte said, as if she had just realised something.

  “What?”

  “She has a crush on you. That’s what this whole thing has been about.”

  “What?” I stared at Charlotte in disbelief, sure that she had to be wrong.

  She shrugged. “Why else would she only be picking on the girls that she thought you fancied? And she’s right, she’ll be in real trouble if you let anyone know that she told you what she overheard the Amazons saying.”

  “Well... I suppose... But she’s a bigoted bitch.”

  “Yeah, and she seems willing to do pretty much anything to change your mind about that.”

  “Anything except changing her attitude.”

  Charlotte shrugged. “Well, I didn’t say that she was smart.”

  I groaned, shaking my head. “This is the last thing I need to be thinking about... Come on, we should go to Sarah and find out exactly what this means.”

  WE ENTERED THE INFIRMARY to see Sarah with her wand out, examining Mr Stiles.

  She didn’t look up until we were right next to her.

  “Done with the Amazons for the day?” she asked.

  I nodded. “Yeah, but... Lauren tried to speak with us. She said that the Amazons don’t intend to ‘let’ me pass the final trial. I know that they don’t want me to pass, but this sounded...”

  “Like they might try to directly interfere?”

  I nodded.

  “I’ll go and get Esme.”

  “I’m not supposed to talk to her outside of the training grounds.”

  “I know, I’ll be careful.”

  I nodded once more as Sarah shifted out, returning a few moments later with Esme.

  “What’s wrong?” Esme asked.

  “Lauren said that she overheard the Amazons saying that they won’t ‘let’ me pass the final trial.”

  Esme sighed. “I was afraid of this. I’ve had my suspicions about how Dana intends to proceed for a while. But fear not, Amelia. If she interferes with the trial, I will expose her.”

  Sarah frowned. “Esme...”

  As soon as Esme was looking at her, Sarah switched to talking with her hands.

  I frowned, some of the signs feeling familiar, but they went too fast for me to parse.

  Right. Freya and Sarah had always talked in British Sign Language when I was little.

  But I’d never picked up more than a few of the signs, and that was years ago.

  Esme and Sarah continued to sign for a while, with Sarah looking more and more exasperated, while Esme remained calm.

  Eventually Esme turned back to me. “Don’t worry, Amelia. She won’t get away with this.”

  At that, she shifted away.

  I turned to Sarah. “What were you two arguing about?”

  She shook her head. “It’s nothing. If Esme thinks this is the best course... then this is the best course. Now, come on. We should get back to training. You’ve got the hang of healing magic, but let’s see how you handle it under pressure.”

  Charlotte frowned. “You’re going to teach us combat healing?” This time, she spoke with her hands as well as her voice.

  Sarah focused on her hands and relaxed more than I had seen her do before.

  “Sorry,” Charlotte continued. “I didn’t realise you were relying on captioning glasses.”

  “I’ve gotten good at hiding it in my old age.”

  “Y
ou shouldn’t have to.”

  “Well, no, I shouldn’t. And I don’t at home, or with friends. But working with the Amazons? It’s dangerous to show weakness.”

  “Being Deaf isn’t a weakness.”

  “No, it’s not, but I’m also young for a Witch. And held in suspicion for my former connection to Queen Freya. I can only help Esme if the rest of the Amazons have no reason to exclude me. If I can be the kind of Witch that they expect an Amazon to be. No matter how difficult that is.

  “But we were focusing on combat healing, weren’t we?”

  “WHAT WERE ESME AND Sarah arguing about before?” I asked Charlotte as we finally left the infirmary.

  “Sarah worries that Dana won’t be easy to expose. That whatever she does to interfere with the final trial will be too well hidden, and that even if she does slip, enough Amazons want to examine you that they will uphold the failure.”

  I tightened my jaw as I strode forward.

  “You don’t seem as upset as I’d thought you’d be,” Charlotte said.

  “Because I know exactly who I need to go to for help.” I paused, realising that it was probably time to tell my friends about my dreams. “The curse Maria Brown used on me... Something about the curse and us trying to free her coven has tied us together. I can talk to her when I go to sleep.”

  “Amelia, that’s...”

  “I know how dangerous it is. How dangerous she is. But we need help, and she can give it.”

  Charlotte frowned. “And you’re sure that we can trust her? You were wrong about her before.”

  “I know. Which is why I don’t trust her now. Not implicitly. But I don’t think she wants the Amazons to take me, so I trust her to help with this.”

  Charlotte took a moment before nodding. “Okay, but I’m going with you.”

  “You are?”

  “Yes. I want to know exactly what kind of help we’re getting.”

  “But I only go there when I sleep.”

  “I know. I think I can bridge the connection to include me. And I’m sure Natalie won’t mind swapping rooms for the night.”

  I grimaced, not sure that I was happy about telling Natalie and Lena.

  Charlotte was practical. But the others...

  Well, Maria had attacked Natalie, and Lena wore her emotions on her sleeve.

  I wasn’t sure that either of them would be able to put their feelings aside for the sake of practicality.

  But they were my friends, and I hated keeping secrets from them.

  WE ARRIVED BACK IN my room to see Lena already there.

  She immediately moved over to Charlotte. “Hey. Something told me I should be here, so I’m guessing you have something important to say.”

  Charlotte smiled. “You’re really in-tune with the Soulbond right now, huh?”

  Lena shrugged, smiling back. “I’m always in-tune with it.”

  Natalie folded her arms. “So, what’s the problem?”

  I sighed. “It looks like the Amazons are going to actually try to sabotage me during the final trial. We need extra help, so Charlotte and I are going to ask Maria Brown.”

  Natalie’s eyebrows went up to her hairline. “How?”

  I gave her an apologetic look. “I may have been connected to her when we cast the spell together. I’ve been seeing her in my dreams. At first, I thought they were just that, but she told me things that only she would know.”

  “And you didn’t say anything?”

  “I... I asked Esme if she could help me break the bond, but she thought it was best that I keep it. She thought Maria could help if things got worse, which they now have.”

  “That still doesn’t explain why you didn’t tell any of us.”

  “Well, like I said, I just thought that they were dreams at first. And we’ve been busy.”

  Natalie gave me an unamused look. “She’s dangerous, Amy.”

  “I know that! But we don’t have much of a choice. If you have another idea, then tell me, but right now, I’m out of options. I can’t risk failing this trial, Natalie.”

  She gritted her teeth, clearly not happy with the situation.

  But she didn’t continue to argue.

  Lena turned to Charlotte. “You want to try to tap into the dream as well, don’t you?”

  Charlotte nodded. “I’ll be there during the trial as well. I could be able to help.”

  “Okay.” Lena turned to Natalie and placed a hand on her shoulder. “We should head back to my room. I’m guessing these two will both need to be in here tonight.”

  Natalie nodded, though she paused on her way out of the room, turning to me.

  “Just... promise me that you’ll be careful?”

  I nodded, the concern in her gaze stealing my breath.

  Natalie kept my gaze for another moment before turning and leaving.

  Lena didn’t follow her, however, turning to me herself. “Have you told Willow about these dreams?”

  “Not yet. I didn’t want to worry her. But I’ll tell her.”

  Lena nodded. “Okay,” she said before turning to leave the room.

  I turned to Charlotte as soon as the door closed behind them. “So, what do we do?”

  “I set up a spell to link us, and then we go to sleep. You should put your pyjamas on, and I’ll set up the spell.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Charlotte’s ritual took about an hour to set up, and she was more the ‘do not touch my things’ kind of person than the ‘yeah, actually, I could use a hand’ type.

  So, I just sat on my phone, trying to focus on anything other than whether or not this would actually work.

  But, eventually, she seemed happy, and we settled down to sleep.

  And awoke in Maria’s tower.

  “Huh.”

  I turned to see Charlotte beside me.

  “I thought it would be spookier. Maybe underground.”

  “All of my underground hideouts were found and sealed.”

  We turned to see Maria giving us an appraising look.

  She turned to me. “You managed to bring someone with you this time? Impressive.”

  “I didn’t do anything,” I said. “It was Charlotte’s spell.”

  Maria turned to Charlotte with a smile. “Of course. There isn’t really a spell like this available, so you must have made your own. You always did have a knack for spell composition. It’s a shame that Gail never let me set up that advanced class.”

  Charlotte blushed a little. “Well, it wasn’t that hard. Just a variant of a dream stone charm, made into a ritual, rather than a charm.”

  “Don’t sell yourself short, Charlotte. Not many Witches would have even thought to do that.” She placed her hands on her hips. “But I’m assuming that you’re not just here to prove that you can be.”

  “No,” Charlotte said. “It seems that the Amazons are willing to go to any length to have Amelia fail in the final trial. Including sabotage. We need to figure out some way to stop or expose them.”

  Maria hummed in thought for a moment. “Well, if you think exposure will be enough to stop them, I could show you how to make a listening device. But if you aren’t sure that the scandal will be enough, you will need something stronger to stay safe.”

  I shook my head. I didn’t want to know what Maria meant by ‘something stronger’, but I was sure that it was something I wanted no part in. “A listening device would be fine. Assuming that it’s actually a listening device and not another device to trap someone’s life force.”

  Maria sighed. “I promised you that I wouldn’t make you hurt anyone. As much as I might think that the Amazons deserve such a fate for how they’re treating you – and the political system could certainly use the shake-up – I won’t betray you like that again.”

  I nodded as Maria went over to the bookshelf on the far wall and picked out one of the tomes before flicking through to one of the middle pages.

  She looked between us before handing it to Charlotte. “You’re more
used to this kind of magic than Amelia, and there can be no room for mistakes.”

  I tried to ignore the twisting in my gut at her words.

  They weren’t personal. She was right, Charlotte had more experience here.

  I just wished that acknowledging that didn’t hurt so much...

  Maria approached with a sympathetic smile and I realised that I was grinding my teeth.

  “You’ll get there in time, Amelia. And even if you don’t, it says nothing about your value as a Witch.”

  I sighed. “Of course, it does. If it didn’t, the Amazons wouldn’t have these trials.”

  “The Amazons are wrong.”

  I shook my head. “You don’t get it, Maria. I’ve spent my whole life with people telling me that I’m stupid. I worked so hard to become the best in my class to prove them wrong, and it didn’t help. It just turned ‘you’re stupid’ into ‘you should know better’.”

  “And you think that people didn’t say the same about me?” She snorted, shaking her head. “Amelia, people thought that I couldn’t be taught. That I would have to be locked away or killed to keep my magic from going uncontrolled. But they were wrong.”

  “Just because they were wrong about you doesn’t mean that they were wrong about me.”

  “That’s not what I meant, Amelia. They were wrong that anyone cannot be taught. You need to meet people where they are. To help them, and guide them, and it is work that takes patience. But it is always worth it.”

  I looked over to Charlotte, who was going through the book.

  “You know, I thought that your entire goal at the school was just getting me to help you lift the curse from your coven, but it looks like you were actually a good teacher to other students, too.”

  She shrugged. “I gravitated to you and Charlotte because you needed it most. The school was already looking out for children who were failing classes, but you two? You needed help that no one else could see.”

  “Because we were good enough in class to fly under the radar.” I gave her a bittersweet smile. “You know, it meant a lot that you were willing to tutor me. That you cared. Finding out that it was just because you needed my power...”