In which I search for my little brother and
move in
My magic lessons flew by quickly. I
could practically see the calendar pages flipping by – but only seven.
I can now make myself invisible for as long as I want, make a toaster
come to life, turn someone into a fish, frog, or savage, man-eating, mutated
bear, use my mind to write on paper, morph, and much more.
Morphing was easy. WAY easy. You
just imagine yourself as a black and gold-red, full-grown, paint and – ta da
– you were one good lookin’ horse.
At first I freaked out. Try
drawing a sketch of a horse – and planning to enchant the picture – when
suddenly you have giant, jet black hooves and the paper disappears from your
sight. It’s even worse when the
desk splinters open and suddenly you feel the urge to start running around the
room.
And poop on the floor.
Remberence had to grab me by my mane and whisper in my pointed gold ears,
“Okay, here we go… Think “human.” Think human Luella.” The
next thing I knew, I was drawing that stupid horse again.
“Luella,” Remberence now said, “Your brother has gone missing for
too long now…”
I frowned and said, “And I have never heard such silence in one
thousand years.”
He grinned for a second then returned to his serious gaze, “Ella…”
“JK, LOL, ROFL,” I responded tartly, tossing my hair like a
cheerleader. “You know I’m
kidding.”
“Yes I do,” he replied. From
his expression I could tell he was thinking I
know you very well. “You get
to lead the search – your class schedule starts tomorrow, Monday.
The search starts now.”
I morphed into the proud mare and stamped my foot on the tile, then said
in my girl voice – coming out of a horse, “To be or not to be…
That is the question.”
“Right-ho, Mr. Ed!” Remberence cried through his black wolf snout
that had formed around his nose and mouth. “’Tis
nobler in the mind – I’ll suffer!”
“The slings and pointed flying objects of frownie faces,” I continued
as we trotted down the hall and began the search of my kid brother.
“Sammy! Get over here, you
brat! We’re wasting time and
energy searching for you!” Me, of
course. A few deer looked up and a
fox giggled.
I reared up as Danica slithered over.
I am never gonna get used to
that. Her red scales stood out
in the green grass although her yellow-white scales blended in with an area of
dried up grass.
“Don’t crush me, I am
wasting time and energy for you and your annoying little – ”
Dani started.
“FOUND HIM!”
Three cheetahs zoomed out toward the woods where an excited bloodhound
had just called out, brown ears flying. Two
ravens and a peregrine falcon dived from the air to the coniferous woods at the
edge of the field, to keep an eye on him, and I took off in full gallop, finding
Scarlett next to me the whole time.
“I am gonna crush him like a bug,” I neighed wearily.
She was silent.
We roared past trees, listening… and hearing.
The cheetahs were murmuring not so far off, “I gotta slow…” and
“I mean, Krissy’s watching from above…”
One of them smirked. We shot
toward the cheetahs’ voices and managed to catch some of their scent.
“We’re on it.” Scarlett.
The cheetahs screeched to a stop and sat down for a rest at the sight of the red
chestnut crashing through the trees.
I heard something. And
smelled ‘human,’ too.
Scarlett’s mouth quivered, “Let’s cut him off right… here!”
Scarlett and I leaped over a stream and found my blond brother screaming,
“ANIMALS DON’T TALK! THEY
DON’T! THEY DON’T!”
“Sam, slow down!” I cried, trees shooting past me, streams gushing
beneath me. I could catch up to him,
but I didn’t want to crush him under my hooves or trip over him.
“Lue?” He said hopefully and glancing back, tripped backwards over a
rotting log.
I morphed back, quick as a wink thanks to Remberence’s teachings, and
grabbed my brother’s wrist with a steel grip.
“You do NOT know how embarrassing this is.”
He gaped and then in an attempt to start running again groaned, “My
knee!”
I bitterly snapped, “Piggy back,” and forced him to hop on my horse
self. He was still in a dazed shock.
Scarlett and I sauntered back calling through the woods, “We have
him.” And
are going to KILL him!
Back at the castle Mimmy sent Sam to Sherry, the nurse, if you forgot who
she was.
“Luella, you are ready to start your classes and move into one of the
dorms?”
“Mmm,” I replied with a nod.
“Ok.” Mimmy’s room was
bright green, this time. And I mean
neon all over the walls, shelves, carpet, and desk.
She began shuffling through papers written in green ink until she pulled
out a map of the castle. “Here is
the Hoofed Mammals dormitory… And here is the closest enchanted door.”
I nodded weakly. “To get to
your classes, call out the teacher’s name, pronounce it correctly.”
I noticed her gray hair was pinned back with a green clip when she gave
me a pitiful smile, “And good luck!”
I smiled just as lamely. “Bye.”
I showed myself out.
When the door slid open I found a whole bunch of chatty, 8th
grade, “hoofed” girls.
“He is so not your species!” “Hot
pink antlers are all the rage with the cute little 6th graders!”
“You know Krissy? She gets
on my NERVES! Literally pecks
‘em!” and “OMG OMG OMG OMG!” flooded the room.
Brunettes, blondes, red heads, black-haired girls, and deer were bustling
around in a mad, noisy fashion.
“New girl!” A blonde
stampeded over, “Aren’t sheep the coolest things ever?!”
“And pigs!” Another girl shrieked.
“Don’t forget goats!”
“What about camels?! Cool,
right?”
I pushed through the crowd, “I prefer horse, paint to be exact.”
The mob grew silent and a tall girl muttered “No…” under her
breath. “I’m Dawn, and
apparently the one to announce that you have to share a bunk with,” her voice
shrunk, “With Vera.”
I saw Scarlett in the crowd: she was biting her fully lip-glossed lip.
On cue a girl with purple hair spiked up in a mohawk glanced over from a
top bunk. She had piercing black
eyes and a crooked nose. She had
small lips that opened and howled, “What do you want, you –”
“I’m taking your bottom bunk, OK?!” I growled.
I was that punk, goth, emo kind of person, too, at school. “Just deal
with it, Spikes. And move all your
junk, too.” I kicked a
skull-covered knapsack off the bottom bunk.
For a moment Vera just stared, mouth open wide.
When she didn’t speak I snapped, “Are you
gonna move? Or am I
gonna move you?!”
She stared a little longer, beady eyes scanning me up and down.
Finally she rolled over in her bunk, subserviently, and I shoved her
stuff off my bed. The other girls stared at me and then burst out cheering,
throwing pillows and feathers into the air, and butting their horned heads
together – if fully or partly morphed. I
couldn’t help but grin as I high-fived some deer and a cow along with Scarlett.
In the dorm, there was a black TV, black radio, and a bunch of tan-wood
dressers, two dressers at the end of each bed.
The room was painted a plain white, the carpet also tan.
I found my stuff magically in my dresser already along with some books on
magic I had never seen before.
Once everyone was settled in and/or down, we turned the TV on began to
watch Charmed.
“I’ve seen all of them,” Dawn announced proudly, “The season’s
over ya know.”
We watched silently all through all the KFC
and Budlight commercials then, “Change it to Spongebob!”
Somebody had cried after the episode was nearly over.
A chorus of “Yeah” echoed around the room.
We changed the channels for two hours, girls going in and out of the
room, before I resigned to my book, The
Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd. I
got through two pages before I couldn’t concentrate anymore, with the girls
chatting feverishly, so I began to talk, myself.
“Scarlett, what classes do you have?” I unbraided my hair and let it
poof out in a tangled mess. We
compared schedules and found them identical except her “elective” was
different from mine. I had
“Market” and she had “Field.” I
observed my classes and learned to pronounce the teacher’s names.
Watch out enchanted doors – here
I come!
Then I went into the empty bathroom and showered.
The shampoo said “For witches ready to release their inner beauty,”
but I didn’t feel like I had released anything.
The shampoo clumped my hair up, but when I rinsed it came out pretty
nicely. I used my own soap and then,
after my shower, I changed into my PJs. It
was ten-thirty.
Dawn, who appeared to be the leader, flipped her brunette hair back into
a pony tail and said, blue eyes gleaming, “I’m going to sleep now.”
The other girls agreed automatically and a girl with silver highlights
turned the TV off. The room grew
dark instantly and soon I was asleep.
