#schoolofmagic | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

escapefromarchoncastle · 4 years

Text

Chapter One – Archon Castle Is Not What It Seems

Terry trudged up the gravel path, already dreading Archon Castle was not going to live up to the promotional material. The ravens and vultures, perched like Halloween ornaments on a sprawling oak tree, looked embarrassingly fake. Bald patches of black plastic gleamed between the glued-on feathers. He should have figured. His parents had warned him. At fifteen, he was no longer a child. It was stupid to believe magic existed outside of camera tricks and CGI. Yet he held onto a fraying thread of hope, the same way he had with Santa Claus each Christmas until he was nearly in middle school.

A caw loud as a falcon’s screech startled him. He stopped at the edge of the trail and gawked up. The blackbirds had come alive. They fluttered their wings, still looking a bit mangy. They stared down at him as if they were sizing up their next meal. Terry continued walking, more slowly now, and glancing over his shoulder at each odd sound in the woods. None of the other hundred-odd kids traipsing along the same trail appeared at all spooked. They all had eager expressions on their faces, eyes wide as if they’d never seen trees in their wild habitat before.

The stone walls of the castle came into view above the canopy of evergreen trees. Terry felt his breath sucking deep into his lungs at the imposing sight. Archon Castle sat atop a black, craggy cliff, menacing and ancient. Clouds had gathered overhead. Mist swirled around. He came around a bend and trail ended at a drawbridge flanked by a pair of watchtowers. The top of a turret beyond had crumbled as if a bad-tempered giant had kicked at it. Even after studying countless pictures online, Terry still found it hard to believe such a castle existed in West Virginia of all places. It looked as though it belonged off the coast of Ireland or had come from another realm.

A large boy bumped against Terry. Terry did his best to ignore him as he bumped against him a second time. Probably Chad. Terry’d noticed him in the parking lot earlier, picking a fight with an Asian boy until his dad called him away. Again he found himself staring at the castle, filled with an uncanny sensation he was being drawn into another time and place. The walls looked so ancient. Rock had crumbled away from the narrow arrow slits. Most of the tiles on top of the watchtowers were cracked or missing. The wooden timbers used for the drawbridge must be over a thousand years old. The trail turned sharply and descended again. The castle was no longer in their view.

“Hey. You.”

Sweat trickled down Terry’s spine as he braved a glance. Chad’s eyes were locked on someone else thankfully, a small blond boy with a bad haircut. Terry froze, unsure what to do. He wasn’t one to take on bullies, but this kid was half Chad's size. Terry's hands curled into fists. His fingers flexed. He used to be the little guy everyone had picked on but he’d grown quite a bit since the seventh grade. Chad wasn’t that big; he could take him. Terry had fantasized, repeatedly, of exactly this scenario where he’d seize the bully by his shoulder, force him around, and land a hard boxer’s punch to knock him out cold.

Paralyzed with indecision, he watched Chad grab onto the boy’s yellow tennis shirt and pull it over his head. The boy went to head-butt him, missed, and plowed into a red-haired girl. Enraged, she let out a shriek and tore at both of them, her fingers like bared claws. Terry ducked away from the melee and stood on the grass verge. He was about to pull Chad off the boy when a man in long black robes fluttered up to them.

“ENOUGH!” the man roared, grabbing Chad by the scruff of his hoodie. “Any more of this and you won’t be wondering whether this castle has a dungeon.”

Chad went pale. His body quivered. Eyes bugged out, he stammered, “Y-y-yeah. S-suh-sir.”

The blond boy pulled his yellow shirt back down, smoothed his hair, and gulped as if he were staring into the face of Death. “I’m sorry mister.”

The scuffle was over. Terry’s chance at a moment of glory had passed. Disappointed and yet also relieved, he secured the strap of his backpack against his shoulder and got back on the gravel trail. The man in black was gone as quickly as he’d appeared. Chad and some of the others craned their heads around, brows furrowed, until someone pointed out a shadow slinking through the trees. The tall dark figure was moving way too fast and smoothly for it to be a person running. Terry's skin flushed with excitement––the man was flying! He was only a foot or two off the ground, but still, he was skimming into the woods like a hovercraft.

The trail veered upward again. Terry wondered if they were ever going to reach the gates. The last he’d glimpsed, the castle had looked so close and now he could see nothing again but pine and fir trees.

“Oh my God, this is Archon Castle?” a girl’s dismayed voice cried somewhere up ahead. “What a dump!”

Terry caught up with her at the top of the hill and stared ahead, dismayed. She wasn’t kidding. To say this castle was in disrepair was like saying a bombed-out ruin just needed a little fixing up. The entire western wall had crumbled to rubble. The castle still looked as if it had been built much earlier than the mid-1800s, and had been under siege for most of it.

He gulped and eyed the sagging roof of the keep. He’d seen abandoned farmhouses in better condition. The gatehouse was even more dilapidated. The tower on the left had partially collapsed. The timbers keeping the tower on the right propped up looked about as sturdy as twigs for a hermit shack. A sewer-like stench wafted into his nostrils. The stink was coming from the swampy, algae-filled moat.

“May I have your attention!” a surly voice called. Different from the one who’d broken up that fight. Everyone huddled together, keeping their distance from the figure in front of the gatehouse. He also wore a black cloak, his face hidden in the shadows of his hood. His arms were raised up high so that he formed the shape of a cross. He looked more like the figure of Death than a wizard. All he was missing was a scythe. “Once you have passed onto the grounds of Archon castle, you will be unable to leave before summer end. I strongly advise anyone wishing to turn back, to do so now.”

A boy on Terry’s left raised his hand.

“Yes?”

The boy gulped, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “Do we get a refund, sir?”

“NO.”

Terry was torn. All his life he’d dreamt of becoming a wizard. Yet his parents were practical people, who stressed the importance of having a backup plan no matter what dreams you aspired to. Although not quite ready to let go of his childish fantasies, he did have an alternative career in mind. He’d be a journalist. That way if he failed at becoming a wizard this summer, he’d have a good story to write about. His Uncle Pete said the boilerplate non-disclosure form Terry’d had to sign was bull-puckey. If he turned back now, he’d have nothing. He watched Chad whisper to the one asking about the refund.

More loudly Chad said, “Only welfare cases think ten grand is a lot of money. Let’s blow this joint!” Chad patted the boy’s shoulder and the two of them began jogging back down the trail. It figured, bullies were always the biggest wimps. Another two dozen or so followed.

“Good riddance,” a dark haired girl whispered in a singsong voice to no one in particular. “The fewer people who go inside, the higher my own chance of becoming an initiate.”

She had a point. She began striding forward and Terry followed her onto the drawbridge. A sharp, cracking sound sent stabs of terror into his chest as a plank gave way beneath his foot. He stumbled onto a sturdier plank, and stayed put until his heart was no longer pounding against his rib-cage. He looked down. Through a gap between two rotting planks, he could see rusted spikes jutting out of the algae below. He also caught sight of an odd ripple on the surface near a patch of lily pads.

“Oh my, that was close,” the girl said. She, too, was staring down at the spikes. She looked up at Terry, wide-eyed. She grinned, her face flushed with excitement. “We nearly died!”

“Um, yes,” he said for the sake of saying something. He looked up, and immediately regretted doing so. The bottom of the portcullis suspended in the archway he was passing under had spikes like iron teeth about to chomp down on them.

“What are those holes up there?” She pointed at a series of charred holes in the ceiling, each about a foot in diameter.

“Murder holes,” Terry answered. “If invaders managed to storm the gates, soldiers would pour cauldrons of boiling oil onto them.”

“What a way to go!” She made sure to avoid walking directly under any large holes the rest of the way. So did Terry. Archon Castle was definitely creepy—it felt creepy—and not in a good way like a haunted house theme park, but in a bad way like a car following at a walking pace just a few feet behind.

The girl continued along, testing her weight on each plank before stepping onto it fully. Terry followed right behind her. Being heavier, he had to be even more careful going across. He’s already had one break from under him. He glanced over his shoulder and figured they were halfway along. Several had already given and were heading back up the trail.

Terry was tempted to join them. But this might be his only chance to learn any form of magic, the only place that mysterious online message had said it existed. Real magic was supposed to be scary. In the material that had accompanied his application forms, the first line explicitly stated that this camp was not for the faint of heart. And, according to Uncle Pete, the waivers his parents had had to sign assuring Archon Castle LLC that Terry was in good health, were ironclad.

He edged forward, tensing with each step and then breathing a sigh of relief as the boards held. Rusty chains creaked. The drawbridge shuddered beneath his feet. Behind him, a voice called, “Get a move on!” They were raising the bridge already! Terry leapt along the firmest looking planks until he was safely on solid ground again. Others pressed against him as they were herded into a courtyard. The drawbridge was rising more quickly now. He watched at least two dozen kids clamber back over it with the desperation of last-minute Christmas shoppers. Fighting the urge to follow them, he reminded himself that the more people who chickened out, the fewer he’d have to compete with.

The drawbridge closed with a thud. The ground shook like a small earthquake. He even felt that same queer liquid sensation under his feet that he'd experienced back home in California a few times.

Dreading whatever he’d just gotten himself into, he turned to face the castle. And gasped. He blinked, rubbed his eyes, and gawked around in amazement. The surrounding buildings now looked as though they’d been created for a theme park they were in such good condition! The massive rectangular keep stood tall and proud, weathered just enough to assure Terry it was nearly two centuries old. The whitewashed plaster on the rambling Tudor-style buildings to his left gleamed in the noonday sun. The earlier decrepitude must have been an illusion to frighten away the weak-willed. Pride swelled him at the thought he may have passed his first test, though it deflated just as quickly.

“Form a line side by side!” a deep voice barked. A hand gripped Terry’s shoulder, icy through the thick fabric of his t-shirt. The man was an Adept, dressed in a crimson silk robe with gold stars embossed along the hem. A shadow fell over Terry and cool, slippery fabric slid down over his head and arms. He was then jerked around and shoved next to a girl in a light blue robe. The same dark-haired girl who’d been in front of him as they crossed the drawbridge. Terry looked down to see he was now wearing a similar robe.

“Why does it have to be blue?” she mumbled, bunching the fabric in her fists. On her feet she wore a pair of pink and white polka dot flip flops. “Blue is a boy’s colour.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Terry said. “My sister’s favourite colour is a light—”

“QUIET!” the same Adept who’d grabbed his shoulder yelled. “Everyone form a line.”

Terry stood behind the girl. The Adept snatched his shoulders again and made him stand next to her. “A side by side line.”

“Wouldn’t that be a row?” She jerked back as if she’d been slapped across her face, yet the Adept’s hand hadn’t moved anywhere near her. She scowled, rubbed her cheek, and glowered at Terry.

“It wasn’t me.” Terry waited until the Adept was out of earshot. “I think he used his Astral hand on you.” He tried to remember what else he’d read about Astral combat. Everything he’d brushed up on the past few weeks was beginning to blur.

“This place is awfully sexist,” she whispered and Terry nodded. Whenever that word came up he’d been trained from early childhood to nod and say nothing. “I only see ten other girls here. Fifteen at most. Though you did make a good point about blue. Cerulean is a lovely shade. And so is lapis lazuli.”

Already she was getting on his nerves. Hoping she’d take a hint, Terry fixed his gaze at the row of Adepts assembling across from them. They stood at the base of a square stone tower that dwarfed everyone in the courtyard. A portly Master Adept, in a burgundy robe covered in gold and black squiggly marks, stepped forward. He pulled back his hood. He had jowls like a St. Bernard and wisps of white hair sprung from his head in a feathery crown. “Welcome to Wizard Camp,” he said. His voice sounded like a bulldozer with engine trouble. “As you may already be aware, I am Quindalore the Querulous, Learned Master Adept of the Order of Nine.”

An Adept behind Quindalore coughed lightly into his fist. According to Archon Castle’s own website, the Order of Nine was down to seven. The fate of the missing two was unknown. According to a thread on the unofficial Archon Castle forum, one of the Order had ascended into a Being of Pure Light and Energy, while another claimed he’d run off with an underage neophyte. Terry knew what underage implied, but not neophyte, though he assumed it was equally as lurid.

“Presently,” Master Adept Quindalore said, “there are a hundred and six of you joining us today, of which three will be invited to become Initiates. Initiation is the first step on the path to becoming a wizard proper. Sixty-eight of you, so far, turned back at the drawbridge.”

Everyone chuckled uncomfortably like someone had just farted during a funeral speech. Terry glanced around, dismayed. With everyone massed together, he realised how terrible his odds actually were. Roughly two percent. Then again, if everyone was able to grasp the true odds of success in any endeavour, no one would take risks.

Quindalore continued, “During the next two months you will learn basic spell casting, rune reading, dowsing and divining, and, before anyone asks, there will be no handling any wands.”

“Do we get to summon demons?” a voice piped up. A boy around ten or eleven, with a blond pudding bowl haircut, grinned eagerly. The collar of his canary-yellow t-shirt poked from under his blue robe. The boy Chad had been bullying.

“NO!” There wasn’t much force behind Quindalore’s voice, but the volume was deafening.

Terry gulped. He had questions, loads of questions, and decided it would be wiser to let other kids do the asking.

“For the time being you will each be assigned a group number. The Adept in charge of your group will show you to your sleeping quarters. We will meet back here in precisely half an hour for your orienteering session.”

Orienteering session didn’t sound frightening; it was the sort of thing his dad did for a living. But it was the way Quindalore had said it that made the hairs of his arms stand on end.

The poppy-robed Adepts split apart. They each carried an iron cauldron hanging from the crooks of their arms with the ease of an empty picnic basket. Super-human strength would be cool to learn, Terry thought. His parents had bought him a weight set, but he kept forgetting to use them.

The Adepts proceeded to take slips of paper out from their cauldrons, pinning one to each of the blue robes nearest them.

“I wonder how they select us,” the girl next to Terry said. “We’re being assigned different numbers.” She had fine brownish-black hair that went past her shoulders and a nearly perfect profile. He hated when he noticed such things in a girl. Especially ones who got on his nerves.

Leaning close enough for him to smell the strawberry scent of her hair, she rasped, “Matching vibrational energy, do you think? Or maybe they can see auras in broad daylight!”

Terry said nothing. He had no idea what vibrational energy involved and didn’t want her thinking he was stupid. Besides, he doubted there was any deliberate selection process at all. Each adept was speeding through with the efficiency of a factory production line. Once they were done, Terry and the girl looked down, then they looked at each other.

“We’ve been assigned the same number. But it had been different Adepts who had …” She stared off, as if she’d seen the first crack in what she’d always thought was solid ground beneath her feet and was afraid to check if it was widening. Terry didn’t care; he was just happy he’d been assigned a lucky number. Nothing was luckier than seven, surely.

“Number sevens, follow me!” A female adept with close-set eyes signalled to them and marched towards a set of low stone buildings beyond the square tower. A couple of reddish horses with black manes were tied to a post near the side entrance. One of them snorted and stamped its hoof as Terry filed after the other twenty-odd kids into the building. The coolness after the hot noonday sun was refreshing but inside it was damp, dark, and reeked of manure.

They were led past a maze of horse stalls into a large, rectangular room with stone walls and a peaked wood ceiling. Sunlight slanted in through high, small windows, giving the place a subterranean feel. Here the stench of manure wasn't as overpowering, more like a room where people had been smoking cigars the night before and figured opening one window a crack was enough to air the place out. The stink was bearable.

The Adept turned on a switch next to the entrance. Floodlights attached to the wooden beams above flickered as if each of them wanted to keep hitting the snooze button before finally getting up and doing their job of illuminating the room.

“Oh no,” Terry said in a hushed voice as he looked around. Surely their beds weren't going to be ... blankets on top of bales of straw? He already knew he'd be sleeping in far less comfort than he was accustomed to. It wasn’t canopied feather beds he’d been expecting. But he was positive one of the online pictures had showed rows of hammocks, and in another he’d seen cosy little cots similar to ones in his grandfather’s summer cottage. These accommodations were what tourist brochures worldwide described as rustic, looking wonderfully quaint until you got there and discovered half the walls were missing.

He blinked and rubbed his eyes. Unlike after the drawbridge had closed, nothing changed. All the beds consisted of three bales of straw secured together with thick twine. A pair of scratchy-looking burlap blankets lay folded on top of each one. At the foot of each––he was loath to call them beds––was a slab of rough wood. No pillow, no storage box, and what if it got cold at night?

"No pillows?" the girl next to him whined.

The Adept traced a vaguely figure eight symbol in the air with her index finger.

"ALL RIGHT THEN," her voice boomed, shaking the rafters. She traced something else in the air and more quietly said, "One cot per person. Later this afternoon, leftover apple crates will be arriving for you to store your things in."

The same boy who'd asked about Demon summoning went up to her. "Which one's mine?"

"Any of them—just choose one per person," she said in the same irritated tone of voice his sister would use whenever she was waiting for some boy to call her back. “You neophytes get worse every year, I swear.”

A memory sprung up in Terry’s mind like a jack-in-the-box head popping out of its compartment. Of course, a neophyte was the level below Initiate. There were several other ranks above that. Junior Adept, Adept and Senior Adept followed, then onto more complex, important-sounding titles that rivalled those of a large bank or advertising firm.

“What’s your name?” the same boy asked. The pudding bowl haircut made him immune to non-verbal cues that would terrify other kids, Terry reckoned. With hair like that, he’d probably grown a very thick skin. If the school he went to was anywhere like Rosedale High, he’d need it.

“My friends, my parents, and my mentors, call me Natasha,” the Adept said, her shadow growing into that of a giant behind her. “To you, my little worm, I am Miss Huston. Don’t. Wear. It out.”

He quivered away from her.

Everyone else stood frozen like pieces on a chessboard. Seeing his chance at securing the best spot, Terry dodged around to the bundle of straw in the farthest corner. The rest elbowed their ways towards the remaining corners. Guarding his makeshift bed, Terry watched a fight break out on the opposite side of the room. A wiry boy was trying to push a larger boy off the spot he’d staked out. Terry sat to watch. He quite enjoyed fights, so long as he wasn’t involved in one himself.

The bigger boy held the other one away with his rod-straight arm, his body well out of range of the flailing fists. “Get lost, Mark—I was here first!” He ducked, sending Mark pitching forward. Before Mark could recover his balance another boy lunged at him, scrabbling at his shoulder and trying to get him into a choke-hold. Miss Huston waved her arms and the three of them flew apart from each other like exploding shrapnel.

Miss Huston addressed the quarreling boys. Her smile had a lot of teeth for someone with such a small mouth. “There’s nothing in the rules saying the two of you can’t share a bed. We wizards are very enlightened as far as romantic preferences go.”

“It's yours, cry-baby.” Mark gave the smaller boy a shove, then went to the cot in the remaining corner and pushed that kid out from it. Miss Huston watched, but said nothing.

"Miss," the girl with pink flip-flops said, tugging Miss Huston’s sleeve.

"What is it?" She wheeled around and glared at her as if the girl had just smeared mud on her nice crimson robe.

"Where are the girls supposed to go?"

"Wherever! It says dorms are co-ed right in the brochure! We do not assume gender at Archon Castle. We're very progressive here. At sixteen surely you're old enough to have acquired immunity to boy germs."

The girl swallowed and stared around, her gaze passing Terry without a glimmer of expectation. He wasn’t relieved though; he felt sad for her. Four other girls had chosen spots next to each other on the far side of the room from him, and they glared at her in that way girls glare at anyone who Does Not Belong. Mean girls, like his sister and her friends. The place next to Terry was still empty, so he rose and gestured at the spot he’d staked out. How could he not offer it under the circumstances. "You can stay here if you want. I ... I have a sister so ... I’m already used to …"

She kept her head bowed and went to stand on the far side of the one next to his, meeting his chivalric gesture halfway. He tossed his backpack into the corner and sat again.

"I'll leave you to settle in. We will meet back in the courtyard in twenty-five minutes, where you will be given your very first lesson. In alchemy," Miss Huston said, and left.

Terry’s burning excitement at the sound of the word alchemy was doused by the sight of the girl sitting on the edge of the bed next to his, facing away from him and sobbing. Crying was always more painful to watch when all you could see was their back and shoulders shaking uncontrollably, head turned down.

"I’m Terry. What's your name?" he asked softly. Across from them the other girls were snickering and whispering, hands shielding mouths, eyes wild with malice.

She sniffled. "Katya," she said at last.

"That's a nice name," he said, again for the sake of something to say. There wasn't much a bully could do with a name like that. It didn't rhyme with anything nasty like Terry Fairy or hairy Terry. The worst they could do was Fatya, but she was too slim for that to work as an insult.

She didn't respond, not that he had expected her too. It would be rude to ask her to stop crying, so he turned his attention to spreading the thin blankets out on top the bales. He lay down and bits of straw prodded his neck and ankles. Thankfully the robe’s fabric was thick. In half an hour he’d be learning his first ever magic. Alchemy. He imagined a laboratory full of bubbling beakers and alembics, watching in awe as mysterious steaming substances flowed through networks of glass pipes into copper stills. Alchemy.

#wizard #wizardschool #chosenone #learningmagic #fantasy #fantasy fiction #fantasyfiction #fantasy novel #magical creatures #alchemy #corruption #adventure #male protagonist #underdog #wizards #adepts #schoolofmagic #inverted tropes #books

1 note · View note

escapefromarchoncastle · 4 years

Text

Chapter Nine - Terry Sneaks Away

Common sense kicked into gear in Terry’s brain and he remained under the canvas awning. He should call his parents first. They could either pick him up here, or he could meet them in that village where they’d lunched on their way in. Or his dad could book a hotel room for him until he caught the next flight from out west. And a way to get to the airport. From his vantage point behind the courthouse on Main Street, Terry studied the road in each direction. To his left lay a populated strip of Inns, pubs and General Stores, where he could slip among the dozens of families milling about. Cellular phones and other modern gadgets were prohibited here, but once upon a time people had relied on coin phones in public places. He didn’t see any booths, but one of the inns must might have one. He cursed himself for not paying more attention during fifth-grade history. What if telephones didn’t exist in the Pioneer era.

There was only one way to find out. He headed up the street towards a log cabin halfway up the next block. A Perkins Tavern sign hung from the front, swaying gently in the breeze. At the sight of a flash of red, he froze. The robe of an Adept. He turned around and walked quickly in the opposite direction. Beyond a cluster of houses at the edge of town, the road cut through a field and into the woods. He should be able to find another village or town and call his parents from there.

After taking one last glance around, Terry hied it through knee-high grass into the safety of the forest. He walked along the grassy ridge between the two deep ruts of the lane, taking in the sweet forest smells. He was free, but now what? Already that giddy thrill of escape was fading. Reality was kicking in. He should have planned better, at least grabbed a flask of water or a link of sausages before fleeing. If he had any sense he’d head back now and just say he got lost. Unfortunately a week of drudgery and exhaustion had depleted the rational part of his brain. He continued.

Birds tweeted and crickets wheezed as the trail wound between giant evergreens. Sunlight blazed down in shafts creating a mottled landscape that made it hard for him to orient himself. The terrain grew hillier. Terry clambered up, breathless, wishing the lane had switchbacks instead of going straight up. Had they come down this same lane on the cart? He regretted dozing on their way in. Stupid, stupid, stupid. The path levelled off again. Terry spotted a clearing ahead, the sun radiating down onto golden yellow grass.

A breeze carried sounds of tinkling on metal and whickering horses. He was already coming to another village. He emerged from the forest into a field and beyond a cluster of low wood houses. He shielded his eyes from the blinding overhead sun and stumbled towards the cluster of brick and limestone buildings in the distance.

A sense of déjà vu flooded into him at the sight of the wide dirt road flanked by rickety wooden houses. Everything looked overly familiar, including the horse-drawn carriages shuttling people around and the neatly hand-painted signs. He’d seen similar log cabins and colonial style stone houses this morning on his way in. He tried to relax. He was being paranoid. These old-timey villages were bound to look the same. His parents had taken him through multiple state capitals and all of them had nearly-identical domed white buildings with Roman columns and wide marble staircases.

He wandered along the main road, his eyes landing on a sign swaying gently in the breeze. “Perkins Tavern,” he mouthed. In spite of the hot afternoon sun, his blood ran cold. He forced himself to calm down. Like Disney World in Florida, Disneyland near his own hometown in Anaheim, and the one in Europe, these towns must be copies of each other right down to the pub names. Three or so blocks farther along, he spotted a limestone courthouse and behind it a market with the same wooden stalls sheltered by cloth canopies …

… and Katya sitting bored on the stool behind half-empty bushel baskets of potatoes and zucchini.

“WHERE ARE YOU GOING!”

A shadow loomed over Terry. A fearsomely strong hand grabbed the scruff of his tunic, lifted him up off his feet, shook him like a dog worrying a bone, and dropped him back down. Terry stumbled forward onto his hands and knees. Gravel dug into his palms. Out of the corner of his eye he spotted the familiar poppy-red satin edged with gold, which filled him with a dread similar to looking down a loaded gun from the wrong end. Only when he looked straight at the adept did he see the plain brown robe.

“I—I needed to take a leak,” Terry stammered. “And c-couldn’t find where to—”

A foot to his backside kicked him forward and he sprawled onto the grassy verge. A pair of arms lifted him back onto his feet. He turned and, to his shock, Ms. Huston was dusting off her robe. Her small grey eyes narrowed almost to slits as she pointed to a whitewashed building across the road from the courthouse. “In there,” she said in a quieter, more feminine voice. “Is the sign marked ‘privy’. Did you not listen to a thing on the way here?”

“Sorry,” Terry said, not wanting to get into even more trouble by adding miss or ma’am in case he chose the wrong one. “I was looking for something spelled with two v’s, not one.”

Ms. Huston let out a cackle that reminded him of the evil green witch in the Wizard of Oz. “You are a stupid one! It’s not my imagination, the neophytes really do get worse each and every year!”

“May I go?” Terry asked, hoping his desperation to get out of her sight came across to her as his being in dire need of heeding nature’s call.

She folded her arms across her chest. A sly, cruel smile spread on her thin lips. She cocked her head. “You may. Go.”

“Thank-you-miss!” he yelled, running straight for the building she’d pointed out as if his life depended on it. It didn’t bother him that she’d called him stupid. The more Adepts thought of him as just another dumb kid, the less vigilant they’d be when he was in their sights. So far, Ms. Huston was the only one he’d interacted with. If he were smart, he’d figure out which Adepts he really needed to impress, and try to get on their radar with some impressive feet. If he were smart. Terry feared that was a mighty big if. If he were really smart he’d stay under their radar for the rest of the summer.

0 notes