First Time's a Charm

by Laura Greenwood

  "I should stay and give her an awful dare," I mutter, staring at the other girl. She really is perfect. Except that she's a bitch and roaring drunk.

  Caspian chuckles. "We can, if you want."

  I shake my head. "I wouldn't know what to dare her with anyway. This game is supposed to be fun, not used to torture people." And therein lay the difference between Ivy and me. She's hurt people, me included. And I refuse to stoop to that level.

  "Where do you think you're going?" she demands as she notices us heading for the door.

  "Home," I respond sweetly. "I've come to your party and participated in the required embarrassment, now I'm going back to my room. Caspian's coming too." I shouldn't add the last bit, but I do, enjoying the look of unadulterated anger on her face.

  We don't wait for her to respond, that would be pointless when I don't think she's going to.

  "Why has Ivy suddenly taken such a big dislike to me?" I muse the moment we're in the hallway and not surrounded by other students.

  "She hasn't always been this way?" he asks, putting an arm around me as we walk and pulling me closer to him.

  I go willingly, enjoying the comfort he's bringing me.

  "No, it only started in the past week or so." Actually, it started right around the time I began spending time with Caspian, but I'm not about to tell him that and freak him out.

  Maybe Ivy has a crush on him or something. Hopefully, they're not exes. One of them would have let it slip if that's the case. It would be a pretty dickish move of Caspian not to tell me in the first place, either.

  "So, what do you want to do when we get back to my room?" I ask, not realising how it'll sound until the words are out of my mouth.

  "We can watch a movie?" he suggests. "Lady's choice."

  "How gallant," I joke. "I'm going to find the girliest chick flick in existence and make you watch it."

  "And here was me thinking you'd make me watch Cats."

  "The musical?"

  "For research purposes, obviously."

  I chuckle. "I'm not a fan. Now The Aristocats..."

  "Great film," he says. "I used to watch it loads as a kid."

  I chortle. "And I had you pegged as more of a Bugs Life kind of guy."

  "That's one of the Pixar classics. So underrated."

  The rest of the stress from being at the party fades away. I'm glad he's holding Felix so I don't have to.

  "Change of plan. No chick flicks for you," I announce. "We're having a Disney marathon instead." And I'm excited about it, even if it seems like an odd thing to do with someone I'm dating. Or at least, someone I think I'm dating.

  "Alright, but I have one condition?"

  "Hmm?"

  "You let me run down to the shop and get some snacks first." He sounds like he's already decided that's what he's doing.

  "Only if you get me some iced tea," I counter, digging through my bag and pulling out a fiver to give to him. I'm not making the assumption he'll automatically pay for things, that's incredibly unfair of me.

  "Thanks." He takes the money and shoves it in his pocket. "Any other requests?"

  "Depends, do you like nachos?"

  "Love them."

  "Oh good. Get the stuff to make nachos then." I can nip down to the kitchen in my flat and make us some that way.

  We pause as we reach the entrance hall of the academy, and he hands me Felix.

  "I'll be up in ten minutes." He leans in and presses a soft kiss to my cheek.

  I melt. Figuratively, though if he does it again, there's a chance it'll become more literal.

  "Stay safe," I say to his retreating back. I hope he doesn't hear me though, what a lame thing to be caught saying to someone. "It's a wonder he's interested at all," I muse aloud, even if the only person who can hear me is Felix.

  "Meow."

  "Yes, I agree, let's get back to my room and you can meet your new friends," I tell him, wondering whether or not the kittens I've made are actually related. I won't know without doing some kind of DNA test, and that just sounds expensive. "Guess I'll just have to wonder about that one," I tell him.

  I think I'm going crazy. This isn't the first time I've talked to the kittens as if they'll answer. Maybe it's normal, but then again, this is me. From experience, I know it's probably something weird.

  Chapter Ten

  "Where are we going?" I ask Thomas as he strides down the corridor.

  "To the library."

  "That's the other way." I point over my shoulder. I spend enough time researching various things in there, I know where it is.

  "Not that library. The other one."

  "There's another library?" I keep pace with him easily. This is one of the times I'm grateful for being on the tall side, it means I have legs long enough to keep up with his brisk pace.

  And those legs look great in a skirt. Not that I'm wearing one today. I don't want a repeat of last time.

  "Grimalkin has six libraries."

  I blink a couple of times. "Six?" I'm tempted to pull up the digital map of campus they send to all first years, but refrain from it. I've studied the thing enough to know there's only one library marked on it.

  "Yes. The one everyone uses, the advanced library, the restricted one, and the one that only the upper-level staff are supposed to know exists." Which raises the question of how he knows about it himself.

  "That's only four."

  "There's two in the vampire part of the academy. I've never been to those ones."

  "And which one are we going to now?" I ask, already knowing the answer deep down.

  "The one we're not supposed to go to." He turns his head as he speaks, revealing a twinkle of mischief in his eyes.

  "I'm a first year, I've only been told about one of them anyway," I point out.

  I swallow down my nerves. As much as I don't want to admit it, I'm apprehensive about breaking the rules quite as much as that. Though I'm not sure what will happen if we're found. In all likelihood, we'll just be thrown out of whatever room we're found in and nothing else will happen, but I don't want to risk it. My parents would be so disappointed if I get thrown out of Grimalkin, even if they'll pretend they won't be.

  "How do you even know where it is?" I ask as we turn another corner. We're in a part of the academy I've never been to before, but that doesn't mean anything. I've not been at the academy long enough to have explored much, and this corridor appears to be empty. Not high on the priority list at all.

  "I may have accidentally overheard some teachers talking about it while I was in my second year."

  "And you just found it from what they said? That either makes you incredibly smart or them incredibly stupid."

  "Or both." He grins devilishly.

  "What are you hoping to find in the secret library?"

  He comes to a stop even as I'm asking the question.

  "Answers."

  I roll my eyes. Why are men so literal sometimes? I know he wants answers, that's why anyone goes to a library. Unless it's to make out in the back of it, but really, there are better places to go. Like a dorm room for one.

  "Why are we standing in front of a suit of armour?" Though really, I want to know why it's here in the first place. I haven't seen any more about the place. I imagine so that they don't get drunk students stealing weapons and accidentally hurting someone with them.

  "What better way to hide the entrance to a secret library."

  "You mean what more cliché way," I mutter, examining the suit for anything I can pull down. If we're going for clichés, then that's the way to open the door and get inside.

  There's something off about the suit. It doesn't look like I expect one to. After a brief pause, I realise it has a tail. Slipping to the side, I reach out and tug on it.

  For a moment, nothing happens, and I worry I'm making a fool out of myself by trying to pretend I know what I'm doing. Just as I'm about to ask Thomas what I did wrong, the grating screech of stone against stone fills the air.

  "Tot
al cliché," I mutter.

  "But at least that helps us get in there," he points out.

  "Equally, it doesn't keep it very secure from people like us," I respond.

  "No, but at this point, I'm not complaining about that. After you." He gestures towards the new hole in the wall.

  "How do I know it's not booby trapped?" I eye it up warily. If one cliché is true, then there's a chance that more of them are too, and I don't want to lose a foot looking for a book. Especially when I still don't know exactly what we're looking for and why.

  "It wasn't last time I came," Thomas assures me. "Why don't we go in together?"

  I nod. I don't want him to think I'm too scared, but at the same time, I am a little bit, and I don't want to go in there alone.

  The two of us step forward and through the arch, which turns out to be more like a tunnel than a doorway.

  "Are we just going to leave it open for anyone to come across?" I ask, glancing over my shoulder. That seems like a quick way for a secret library to become not so secret after all.

  Thomas shakes his head. "There's another suit of armour on the other side that will close it until we're ready."

  Right. Great. Sealed inside a secret room no one knows about. That sounds like the perfect way to spend an afternoon.

  "Does anyone know we're here?" The temptation to get my phone out and text Daphne is strong. Or Caspian. Just so someone knows where I am.

  "I guess not? You told your friends you were coming to meet me though, right?"

  I nod. Though Daphne will assume I meant the normal library and not this one, especially because that's what I thought I was telling her myself.

  "Are we looking for anything specific?" I'm certain the answer is yes, or we wouldn't be here in the first place, but apparently, Thomas needs a bit of prodding to actually answer some times.

  "This." He pulls his phone out and shows me a picture of a green leather-bound book. Symbols decorate the spine in what I suspect is real gold.

  "Got it. Any idea which of these shelves it'll be on?" I gesture towards the six huge bookcases that look like they've been carved straight out of an oak tree. Each. They're beautiful, stately, and more than a little bit intimidating.

  "No idea at all. It might not even be here. But this is the best place to start looking for it."

  "Right," I mutter.

  "Sorry?"

  "I'll take the bookcase on the right and meet you in the middle?" I suggest, not wanting to admit my original comment came from sarcasm.

  "Got you," he announces, going off to his side of the room and starting to browse.

  I sigh, and start looking at the books on the right. When Thomas text me to say he thought he'd found some kind of answer to my problem, I didn't expect to end up in a library searching for a book.

  I run my fingers across the spines, enjoying the feel of old leather beneath my skin. There's something so satisfying about old books, and I can't even put my finger on what it is. The whole room smells of them, filling me with a sense of calm and peace that I haven't had in the past couple of weeks.

  A lot of the titles are in languages I don't know, some of them are probably even forgotten ones that hardly anyone speaks anymore and we need magic to translate. Even then, it's only possible to translate something magically if you know how to speak the language in the first place. I think it comes down to the way magic works. We have to be able to imagine what we want in order to create it.

  There's a few that are in English though, and the titles kind of weird me out. There are several books that appear to be about necromancy. I don't even know if that's a thing these days. Of course, there are rumours that necromancers are completely different from us witches and warlocks, but I've never met anyone who claims to be one, so I don't know for sure.

  "I've found it," Thomas calls, excitement filling every word.

  Despite myself, I smile. I'm glad he found what he's after. I'll be even happier if it has some kind of answer for me in it.

  I head over to where he's sitting, noticing that he's already made one of the tables his own with a mass of books open to various pages.

  "How often do you come here?" I ask, taking a seat opposite him and looking at some of the titles. At least three of them are in Gaelic, which must mean he knows how to speak it, or is just very efficient at using a dictionary. I think the former is far more likely given he's studying his doctorate here. You have to be well rounded in several subjects to even be offered a place.

  "Most days. I don't like how crowded the other libraries get." He shudders, as if thinking about it is enough to repulse him.

  "Have you ever been caught?"

  He shakes his head. "I came close once, when I was leaving. I'm more careful about it now and make sure I time leaving and arriving while everyone is in class. Or when others are likely to be at dinner."

  "Smart." I can see how that helps him remain undiscovered. "So, what is it we came here to find, and does it help?" I don't want to be rude, but I definitely do want to get to the point. There's really no point pretending we're here for anything else.

  "I was in class the other day, and my professor mentioned a woman from the sixteenth century who came to Grimalkin and then discovered she couldn't use her magic. She was called Madeline Blackburn, if it rings a bell for you?"

  "No." I can safely say I've never heard the name before in my life.

  "Anyway, I recognised the name, but couldn't work out where. Then it hit me, it was in one of the old doctor's notebooks I'd read after finding them here. It's taken me a couple of days to find her, but here she is." He turns one of the open books around and points out where the woman's name is.

  "Why would they keep doctors' notebooks here and not in one of the other libraries?" I ask, scanning the page and trying to make sense of what I'm reading. It doesn't sound like she conjured kittens when she tried to do magic, but the rest of what she went through sounds eerily familiar.

  "Some of these are the original copies, I believe. They don't want them falling into the wrong hands. For others, I think it's a matter of subject."

  I cock my head to the side, wondering what he's talking about.

  "Look at the treatment," he suggests.

  My eyes flick to the bottom of the page. "None of the normal courses of action have helped Madeline Blackburn regain use of her magic, I suggest we perform an Unleashing," I read from the journal. "What's an Unleashing?" I ask, looking up at him and meeting his eyes.

  "That's what I didn't know. And I couldn't find anything in any of the rest of that journal that refers to it. Or any of the other sixteen this doctor wrote in his life. It wasn't until I thought to look up if he'd written anything else that I worked it out." He gives me a triumphant smile.

  "And..." I prompt. While I'm happy to give him his moment of pride, I can't stand the suspense and need to know what he's uncovered.

  "There is another book he wrote. This one." He taps the cover of the green book he'd shown me pictures of.

  "Is there something about the Unleashing in there?" I ask.

  "There's lots about it in here. And I think it might work. There's only one problem..."

  "And that is?"

  "It's black magic, Mona. Which means it's illegal."

  I sigh and lean back in my chair. "Well, that's that then. I'll just resign myself to not being able to use magic." There's a twinge in my gut ever as I say it. I don't want that to be my life, but if it has to be, then so be it.

  "I think it depends how you feel about it. No one actually gets hurt during this one."

  "But in other black magic, they do?" I ask.

  He nods. "I've only flicked through this book, but there's a lot of information about some very dark stuff."

  "Which means it never leaves this room."

  "No, it does not. But that doesn't mean we can't take pictures of the pages we want."

  I smile weakly at him. "Thank you for looking, but I don't think there's any point. If it's black mag
ic, we can't do it. We should just put the book back and pretend we never uncovered it."

  Disappointment flickers over his face. I don't think it's because he particularly wants to do black magic though. I think it's more because of his academic curiosity. He wants to see what the Unleashing would do, and if it would work.

  "That's probably just as well. We'd need three more people to do it," he admits.

  "Well, we're screwed. I don't think there are even three people who like me enough to put their lives at risk doing black magic." If I'm honest, the only person I think I can count on is Daphne, and even she'll think twice about doing something that could damage her future career. Which means I can't ask this of her, no matter how much I may want to unlock my powers again.

  "I doubt that," he counters.

  "Don't. I'm not very popular."

  "Popularity is just a good way of saying a lot of people like you a little. Not that real people like you a lot."

  Huh, I like that way of looking at it.

  "I should get going," I say after glancing at my watch. "I have class in ten minutes."

  He nods and pulls out his phone, snapping a few photos of the book. My phone vibrates, letting me know he's sent them to me. I don't know how I feel about walking around with instructions for black magic in my pocket. I guess time will tell on that front.

  Chapter Eleven

  Onions sizzle in my pan, filling the air with the sweet scent of caramelisation. I throw spices into the pan, knowing Daphne will be back in about five minutes and will likely be hungry already. It's cheaper to cook for two and split the cost, and I genuinely enjoy it, so it makes sense for me to make us dinner sometimes.

  She comes bustling in moments later, but she's not alone. I wonder if she and Heath have patched it up already. I don't know the vampire she dated very well at all, but I do know how sad she was when he ended things. If they're back together, it'll be good to get to know him properly and not just through what she says about him.

  "Smells good, Mona. Any chance of enough for three?"

  My eyes widen at the sound of Ryan's voice. I haven't seen him since potions the other day, and certainly not in a non-class setting since Daphne had revealed my crush on him. I hope she hasn't had a similar conversation with him.