Capture

by Melissa Darnell

  So Dad had spent the last few months pounding the lesson into my head instead.

  "But what happened to Damon won't happen to you because you understand, don't you?" Dad’s tone and the way he was staring at me made the words sound more like a warning than a reassurance.

  I felt old, weighed down by something invisible on my shoulders and back as I shut the closet door. "Yeah, Dad, I understand. No matter what, fit in."

  "That's right." He reached out and ruffled my hair as I passed him on my way out of the room, even though we were both six foot two and he had to reach up to do it. Then he shut the door behind us both.

  I returned to my room. But going back to sleep was out of the question. Somehow, I had to learn how to control the magic inside me. Otherwise, my secret would be blown in no time. And then I’d wind up in an internment camp too.

  Okay, so Damon's room and the public libraries were out. Probably the big bookstores had already gotten rid of all their magic books too by now. But what about small bookshops? The ones in the small towns might have reacted quickly to the government’s new anti-magic stance. But the ones in the big cities might not have.

  I pulled up the Internet, did a quick search, and found four independent bookshops in the Dallas/Ft. Worth metro area, which was only a couple hours' drive away. Surely one of them still had something about magic.

  I didn't risk looking up their book catalogs online, though. Dad had told me a long time ago how all Internet activity was rerouted through NSA servers housed in the AT&T building in San Francisco. By now, they would definitely be tagging all searches for magic-related keywords. And maybe even arresting people based on it.

  I would just have to go to the bookshops in person and see what I could find.

  “Hey, kiddo, where you headed to in such a rush?” Mom called out from the kitchen as I tried to jog past.

  I grabbed onto the kitchen doorjamb to stop myself. My sneakers squeaked on the tile floor in protest. “Oh, just headed into town.”

  It wasn’t a complete lie. I just wasn’t saying which town.

  “Okay.” Mom glanced up from the blender she was filling with chopped greens, probably for yet another wedding she was catering for, and frowned. “Are you feeling all right?”

  “Sure. Why?”

  “Because you haven't gone out with any of your friends after school all week, and you look terrible this morning. Are you coming down with something? Maybe you should get some breakfast before heading out.”

  “I'm fine. I'm not hungry. I’ll grab some coffee later.”

  “Mochas aren’t breakfast. Come here.”

  I groaned. “Mom—”

  She snapped her fingers then pointed at the floor beside her as if I were a puppy in need of obedience training.

  Grumbling, I gave in and walked around the granite and oak island that took up most of the room, feeling like a kindergartner again as I stopped before her for inspection.

  She slid a hand under my hair to test my forehead. “Hmm. You feel okay. But maybe you ought to drink some orange juice to boost your immune system, just in case.”

  “Mom, I feel fine.”

  Her lips pursed. “Are you sleeping well? You've got such dark circles under your eyes.”

  I tried not to wince. “I said I was fine.”

  One perfectly waxed eyebrow arched in doubt. “At least have a glass of orange juice. Or I could make you a quick smoothie if you want.” She reached for the blender as if to dump out its contents into a nearby bowl. Or maybe use those green and orange contents to make me a liquid breakfast.

  I darted around the island to the fridge, grabbed the orange juice from inside, and chugged down a few long gulps of acid straight from the carton, nearly wearing it when her gasp of disapproval tried to make me laugh.

  I dragged my coat sleeve across my mouth and managed half a smile. “Good enough?”

  “Ugh. Do you have any idea how disgusting that is? I swear, I must have raised you in a barn and didn't know it.”

  I shoved the juice carton back into the fridge then gave her a quick kiss on her cheek. “Later.”

  “Speaking of, don't be late! Remember, your curfew's midnight.”

  “Aw, come on, Mom!” I yelled out from the foyer, my hand on the front door’s handle now. “I'm eighteen now. I'm going to college soon. You going to be there to tuck me in at midnight too? Two o'clock at the earliest.”

  “Keep being such a pain in my butt and you’ll never live to see college. Midnight and not a minute later or I take the keys.”

  “Fine,” I grumbled for the sake of getting out the door sometime this year.

  I eased the heavy wrought iron, glass and oak front door shut behind me, then jogged across the front lawn to the circle drive where my pride and joy waited.

  Even though I was in a hurry and worried about hiding the magic that now felt like a curse running through my veins, I still felt a flash of joy as I climbed into the cab of my new baby, which my parents had just given me in August for my eighteenth birthday. The gleaming white Ford F-150X Super Cab Hybrid was the single coolest personal truck I'd ever seen, complete with voice-activated heads-up display, twelve CD changer music system, a 4-wheel drive system that I had yet to manage to get stuck in the mud with, a super extended cab big enough to handle the entire Raiders basketball starting team, computerized back up and parallel parking assistance, and a towing package with a computer sensor to help overcome wind or bumpy roads while towing up to eight thousand pounds. So far, I'd only used the tow kit to help pull some of the Raiders basketball team's wimpier trucks out of the mud. But Dad had promised we'd get to try out this feature for real with the family boat next summer before I went off to Yale.

  In the meantime, I was enjoying the fact that nobody else in East Texas probably had a truck like mine yet. Dad had to pull in some private favors to get one of the first hybrid personal trucks off the assembly line for my birthday last August. He liked the “green effect” it added to his political image. I just liked the freedom it gave me. Its electric/gas hybrid fuel system with increased battery storage meant I no longer had to ask the parents for gas money or explain why I'd put so many miles on it already. All I had to do was plug it in every night and it was ready to go another 100 miles the next morning without using a drop of gas.

  Thankfully, it also had a GPS, making it easy for me to get directions to the bookstore.

  If only girls like Tarah came with some sort of GPS to help us guys navigate their minds.

  The first two bookshops were total busts. Not even a Harry Potter book in sight, so they must have already cleared their shelves of all magic related books, both fictional and nonfiction. And the third shop came with its own set of problems, namely a group of loud protestors out front that had drawn the attraction of a local news crew.

  I debated skipping this shop entirely. The last thing I needed was for my face to show up on the news right now. But with only one other bookstore to check after this one and the odds so high against its having anything on magic to help me, either, I decided to risk it. If I pulled up my hoodie and kept my face turned away from the cameras, nobody should even notice me much less recognize me.

  I parked around the corner from the street the shop was on, shoved my hands in my pocket, and slowly joined the edge of the group shouting and holding posters saying things like “Save Our Country!” and the words “Demon Worshippers” with a big red circle and a line through it over them. A few feet away from them, a smaller knot of people shouted back, calling them bigots. Gleefully shouting right back into their faces was some idiot with shaggy blond hair that could have been Kyle, but I couldn’t be sure because all I could see from this angle was the back of his head.

  Even more reason to keep my head down, avoid being recognized by anyone, and get in and out as fast as I could before this turned into a full scale street fight.

  I eased around the arguing protestors, gradually getting closer and closer to the shop’s front. Finall
y I was able to grab the door’s handle.

  One of the protestors, a big bear of a guy, grabbed my shoulder. “Hey, you’re not going in there, are you?”

  “Got to,” I shouted back over the noise. “I need a book for school, and they’re the only ones who’ve got it.”

  I pulled free of his grip, reached the entrance door, and managed to open it just enough to squeeze inside.

  As soon as the wooden door shut behind me, all hint of the crowd outside cut off. The peace and silence within was almost shocking in its contrast. After only a minute, I could feel the knots releasing in my shoulders.

  I could feel something else, too. The tiny hairs at the back of my neck and arms stood up. It was like sensing a storm coming in the distance, with that promise of energy and power.

  This place didn’t just hold books on magic. Someone was actually doing magic here.

  I walked up and down the aisles, trying to figure out how everything was organized. By subject, apparently, since it obviously wasn't by author.

  I checked every bookcase, every single shelf from top to bottom and end to end.

  Nothing about magic.

  But there had to be something. Anything. Even a beginner book on magic for kids.

  I went down the stacks again, slower this time, even looking behind the books in case the magic ones were hidden.

  Nothing.

  "Can I help you find something?" The woman's voice was warm, the tiniest bit raspy, and with a hint of some foreign accent I didn't recognize. She had kind eyes. They reminded me of my mother for some reason.

  Was she a Clann member? She wore a loose, flowery dress made out of something that flowed light as smoke every time she moved. No black clothing. No spiked jewelry. No makeup at all, much less the heavy black rings around the eyes like Tarah's friends preferred.

  Then again, Tarah didn't look like a Clann member either.

  Maybe I should just thank her and get the heck out of there.

  And then what would I do? Keep holding the magic inside and pray it wouldn't leak out of control anymore?

  Sure, because that had been working so well.

  I straightened up, took a deep breath, and joined her at the front counter. "I feel something…special here. And I need help with something like that."

  She froze and glanced down at the goose bumps on my forearms below where I'd pushed up my sleeves. After a long pause, she nodded. "I think I have what you need. Come with me."

  I followed her past the counter and down a short hall towards an open doorway. She entered the room then turned to watch me.

  At the threshold, energy crackled over my skin. If static electricity could form a wall, this was how it would feel. I leaned into the wall and it gave way.

  Some sort of magical safeguard? But for what? The room was plain, with floor to ceiling, unfinished pine shelves on all four walls. No pentagrams, runes or otherwise witchy-looking symbols anywhere. Even the stuff on the shelves looked like boring textbooks and office supplies.

  And yet…the room seemed to pulse with its own heartbeat.

  "You are looking for a book to help you learn how to control your magic?" she asked, almost snappy in her business-like attitude now.

  I started to answer her, then hesitated. What if this was a trap? She seemed all right, but what if the government was using her to get to others with magical abilities?

  She watched me, a knowing look in her eyes.

  Then again, maybe she was wondering the same thing about me. I could just as easily be an undercover agent sent to entrap her.

  “How do we know we can trust each other?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “I know I can trust you. The front door has a spell on it that will not let anyone through with evil intentions against me.”

  But that only answered half my question. “And how do I…”

  “The same way you decide to trust anyone else in life. Either you do, or you don’t.”

  Or you can learn to trust your own instincts, her voice suddenly whispered inside my head, making me jump. She smiled.

  Okay, that was more than a little creepy.

  But she was also right. Either I trusted her or I didn’t. If I didn’t, I’d have to try to find help somewhere else.

  “Okay, I guess I'll have to trust you. Now what have you got that can help me get rid of this curse?”

  She frowned. “Magic is a gift, not a curse. Surely your parents explained this to you.”

  "My parents didn't tell me anything. I'm having to figure this all out on my own as I go.”

  Her eyes flared wide for a second then narrowed. “That must make you an outcast then. I am not supposed to help you."

  "I'm not an outcast. I'm not anything. I just have these...things that happen sometimes that I don't know how to control. Please. I don't want to become like those Phillips brothers." The words blurted out of me unplanned, but too true to take back. "I just need a way to fix whatever's wrong with me."

  She stared at me. Finally she sighed. “There is nothing wrong with you, only different."

  "I watched that Simon Phillips interview. Is it true that the magic's like a muscle that will atrophy if you don't use it?"

  She nodded.

  "Then why does mine seem to be getting stronger not weaker? I swear I try not to do anything, but..."

  "Because right now you are still in the early years of gaining your abilities. And during those years the energy inside you is too strong still. You must first learn how to ground off all that excess energy. It is like asking a muscle in your leg to relax and get smaller while you hit it with electricity from a taser. Get rid of the energy first, then the muscle can relax enough to do as asked."

  “Okay, fine. How do I do this...grounding stuff?”

  She walked over to scan a row of books. "You are…in high school?"

  "Yeah. A senior."

  She selected one of the books and closed her eyes. Holding the book with both hands, she took a deep breath, and that electric sensation brushed over my arms and the back of my neck again. Then she sighed, opened her eyes, looked at the book's cover, and smiled.

  "It is ready for you now."

  "Ready for me?"

  She turned it so I could see the cover. World History: An Open View. It looked like a regular, modern day history textbook. "A disguise spell."

  A disguise. I looked around the room in sudden curiosity. "So everything in here—"

  "Is disguised as well, yes."

  I spotted a jar of pencils and pointed at them. "Even those?"

  "Wands. In disguise."

  I took a step in that direction.

  "Oh no, not for you. They are strictly for twelve and thirteen-year-olds in need of help to direct their intentions. You're far too old. You would look like a grown man riding a bicycle with training wheels still attached."

  An unexpected sense of disappointment shot through me. A wand would be pretty cool to wave around, especially one that was disguised.

  Would I have gotten a wand as a kid if I'd grown up in a Clann family?

  My gaze landed on a stack of printer paper on the shelf nearest the door. "And that? Is that like magical spell paper that you write out invisible spells on or something?"

  She glanced at the paper then headed for the doorway. "No, that's printer paper."

  I followed her out to the check out counter. "So how do I read this book?"

  "Watch and see. But first, forty dollars please."

  I gave her cash. No way was I dumb enough to use a credit card for this. As she accepted the money, I hesitated. If this was a setup, right about now was when the authorities would come busting in to arrest me.

  But no one came into the store.

  I let go of the two twenty dollar bills. As she put it in the cash register, her mouth twitched, as if she were trying not to laugh.

  "The disguise spell only works once the book changes ownership," she explained as she reached for a plain white plastic bag from under th
e counter. Then she handed me the book. More static electricity arced up my arms. "The book only reveals its true self to its owner at first."

  I glanced down at it and froze. "I…see what you mean." What had once been a brightly colored, modern looking school book was now covered in aged red leather with glowing gold lettering. Inside, the seemingly new pages had turned yellow with age as well and were now filled with hand written and drawn text and sketches.

  "Even if you read it in public, no one else will see its true nature until you choose for them to by saying 'revelattio,'" she said. “Say it again and it hides itself once more.”

  "That's a good idea."

  At that, she flashed the brightest smile yet. "Thank you. I thought so too. Much better than the size changing spell others use."

  At my confused look, she explained, "An old fashioned idea, so witches on the run could swallow all their books like pills before fleeing."

  And then what, barf them back up later?

  Disgusting.

  I looked around again, wondering.

  She laughed. "Don't worry, that's a new copy."

  I smiled, but it was short lived. I'd lucked out big time today in finding this place. But what if I needed more help, more books and supplies eventually? Would this store even still be here? Would she?

  "You know people are protesting outside your shop, right?”

  “Yes. They are misguided souls, listening to the fear and negativity within them. They don’t know how to be positive and follow their bliss.”

  I wasn’t so sure. Both sides looked pretty happy to be getting in each others’ faces out there. “You should be careful when you leave. Do you have a back exit you can use? Maybe some friends who can help protect you? You should call the cops too. They look like they’re about to start fighting.” I hesitated. “If you want to close up early, I could walk you to your car.”

  Her smile grew. “They will not harm me. But thank you for your offer. You have a kind soul.”

  Still I couldn’t leave. Didn’t she understand how dangerous the situation was? “Have you seen those people? They look crazy. Are you sure you’ll be alright here?”