Senior Witch, Fall Semester

by Ingrid Seymour

  God, this was going to be an exhausting year.

  We walked into the office and I shut the door, pressing my back to it in time to see Rowan weaving a cloaking spell.

  “These spells will be illegal soon if they aren’t already,” he muttered as he wove his fingers in intricate patterns.

  “How can you do magic?” I said, watching him. His body was more slender than I was used to but still muscular and lithe like a cat’s.

  He finished and twisted a ring on his middle finger. “I’m drawing from this, but it won’t last forever.” His eyes flicked up to mine, and I had the impression he might ask if he could draw from me again, but he let the moment slip past.

  “How are you holding up?” he asked, running a hand through his overlong hair.

  I shrugged. Two years ago, I would’ve spilled everything, the times with Nyquist where I wanted to kill him, the moments when I thought I might fling myself from the closest window, the way I couldn’t sleep because of what I’d done to Kiana. The crushing, suffocating guilt.

  “I’m okay,” I said. “You?”

  He shrugged. “It’s not hard to be a rock star. Kind of fun, actually.”

  “Lucky you,” I said sarcastically.

  He caught my snark and instead of firing back, his face took on the expression of concern I was used to seeing from him. “Charlie, if there’s something wrong—”

  “Everything’s wrong,” I blurted before reeling it back in again. “But I’m handling it.”

  His expression was dubious. “I’m here to help.”

  “Did you know the girls are all being moved. Housed in the Alumni Hall. I haven’t even been over there, but I’m sure it’s awful.”

  “I heard,” he said. “We knew it was going to be bad.”

  “You saw the new rule book?”

  He picked up a paperweight from the dusty desk. “Parts of it. I know the drill. Warlocks from the right families with the right connections are good. Everyone else bad.”

  “Pretty much.”

  His eyes lifted. “Nyquist likes you, though. He put you in charge of all the women on the first day.”

  “Great,” I said. “A megalomaniac and murderer likes me. Can’t wait to write that on my resume.” Swallowing hard, I realized suddenly that I might cry. It was all too much. Whirling to face the closed door, I fisted my hands, letting my nails bite into my flesh so I could feel something other than terrible.

  Fingertips brushed my shoulder. “Hey. You don’t have to do that.”

  “Do what?” I said into the door grain.

  “Hold it all in. Hide it. This is me.”

  “I don’t even know who you are,” I said, staring at the whorls in the wood.

  “Yes, you do,” he coaxed, placing his hand on my back. The gentle touch was so soothing. I leaned into it.

  Then, without thought or reason, I turned and slipped my arms around him.

  The feel of his Lawson body was unique and exquisite like embracing someone I’d just met, but I focused on the gentle stroke of his fingers down my back. How I’d missed him holding me like this. All those aching nights alone. I’d told myself I didn’t need it. That I didn’t need him. But, clearly, all that self-talk and reasoning had been empty. Even the anger I’d felt toward him for all the time he spent with the subversives, keeping secrets from me, seemed to melt away.

  His arms were so strong, circled around my back, anchoring me here and now. Nothing could hurt me right now and my cares seemed a million miles away. I breathed out, rustling his hair.

  “You feel different, but the same,” I murmured.

  “I’ve missed you so much, Charlie,” he said in a deep whisper, one thumb drawing circles on my lower back. “I can’t tell you how much.”

  A knock on the door sent us apart.

  “Charlie, are you in there?” Disha asked from the other side of the door.

  I straightened, self-conscious even though we didn’t have anything to be embarrassed about. Then, I opened the door.

  Disha stood on the other side, two dozen girls behind her. All their eyes darted over my shoulder to see if their beloved Lawson had been tarnished.

  “There you are,” Disha said, eyes large. “And Lawson Rush.”

  “In the flesh,” he said with his normal swagger. He held a hand out for Disha to shake as if they’d never met, then slipped through the crowd. “Pardon me. Business to attend to. But, I’ll see you later, eh… What was your name, Love?”

  “Charlie,” I said, faking annoyance.

  “Right.” Lawson winked and shot finger-guns my way.

  The act was going to be the death of me, but at least now I knew my Rowan was underneath it all.

  He parted the crowd, slipping through grabby hands, and left a trail of sparkling kisses in the air before exiting the building.

  “A bit much?” Disha whispered to me.

  “You have no idea,” I said. “What’s up?”

  “Come on. You have to see this.”

  Disha pulled me out of the Administration Building and down the steps. At the bottom, she gripped my shoulders and worked her magic, transporting us with her spell all the way to the Alumni Hall. Girls milled out front, their bags strewn across the crumbling brick steps. Some talked on their phones. Some cried. Others spoke in loud voices with lots of angry finger waving.

  “It’s bad, huh?” I asked.

  Disha’s face was livid. “You can’t even imagine.”

  “Let’s see it,” I said with a sigh.

  She stomped up the stairs with me in her wake.

  I’d never been inside the Alumni Hall, but it truly was the most outdated of the buildings on campus. Parquet floors, low windows, and drop-ceilings made it obvious this was a 1980s construction job. The place even smelled old, thanks to its musty carpets and drippy, water-stained ceiling tiles.

  The front entryway was clogged with girls and bags. Some stared up at me as I passed as if I could somehow remedy this situation. I gave a weak smile and continued down the dim corridor.

  “Here,” Disha said, extending an arm into a dimly lit room.

  The space was a long, narrow, low-ceilinged rectangle filled with metal bunk beds. They ran in rows of seven or eight and extended to the back wall. It reminded me of pictures I’d seen of summer camps, or, worse, women’s minimum security prisons.

  “The rest of the rooms are the same,” Disha said. “They’ve turned every available space into this.” She waved her arm around as if she didn’t have words.

  I wondered how I could help my very rich friend see that there were worse things than dated decor and uncomfortable sleeping arrangements without making her feel like crap. The old “I used to be homeless and slept in a warehouse” routine might not float right about now. Instead, I settled for expressing my surprise.

  “Shit!” I exclaimed.

  “Yep,” she agreed. “Should I call my dad?”

  I shook my head. “There’s not much he can do that won’t draw attention to us and make things worse. We’ll have to make do.”

  “Are you serious?” she asked, eyebrows disappearing into her wilting hairdo. “We aren’t criminals. This is ridiculous.”

  “Amen!” a girl who’d been listening to our conversation said. “Let’s protest.”

  “Yeah!” several other girls shouted, jumping up. Soon, a crowd was around us, talking all at once. The words “revolt,” “mob,” and “protest” were shouted more than once.

  This was bullshit. They were right. But, as the dean’s female liaison, it was up to me to quell this before it began. As much as it pained, I had to put a shine on it to stay in Nyquist’s good graces.

  I placed two fingers to my throat and projected my voice over the crowd. “Ladies, ladies, let’s calm down. Can I talk for a minute?”

  They stopped shouting and turned to me. I took a deep breath and thought about what I needed to say before continuing.

  “I know this situation seems awful. It is pretty a
wful, but there has to be a good explanation for it. Our administration doesn’t want us to suffer.”

  “Yes, it does!” someone shouted. A few others agreed.

  I swallowed hard. “That can’t be right. Many of us are daughters, nieces, or granddaughters of the men in charge here, right?”

  There were a few murmurs of agreement.

  “I’m sure this is really a matter of safety. I have it on good authority that this building is the easiest to defend if there is an attack.” Lies, all lies.

  A few girls nodded.

  “And, the men are at the entrance, ready to be the front line of defense. Don’t you want to be safe? Don’t you want to make sure you can sleep in peace? Plus, we’re witches. A little thing like uncomfortable beds can’t stop us, right? We can make it better.”

  Speaking those words made my throat raw and my chest hurt. What I wanted to say was, Screw the patriarchy. Let’s burn those dorms down. Instead, I bit my lip and waited to see their response.

  “Um, we can clean it up with a few spells, make it really cozy,” I added.

  “We shouldn’t have to,” one rich-looking girl complained. “Our parents are paying plenty in room and board. Besides, we are not maids.”

  A group of them nodded in agreement, glared at me, then left the room. But some, far too many, stayed back, eager for the chance to use their magic—especially the freshmen.

  My speech had worked. And I hated myself even more.

  When I turned, Disha stared at me the way I’d stared at Lawson, like she had no idea who I was.

  Maybe I didn’t know who I was, either.

  “Whatever,” she said, turning from me. “I’m going to claim a bunk before the good ones are taken.”

  She’d barely taken a few steps when a commotion sounded outside the room. Bridget burst through the entrance, her red curls forming a crazed halo around her head.

  “This is utter crap,” she yelled. “This will not stand. We are strong feminist witches who can fight for themselves and will not let a bunch of misogynistic apes treat us like this.”

  The girls who hadn’t bought my speech crowded behind Bridget, arms up in the air, chanting their agreement, while the ones who had started getting situated stopped what they were doing and focused on Bridget.

  Crap! She was about to undo what I’d accomplished.

  I started in her direction. “Hey, Bridget, maybe we—”

  “Let’s take the fight to Nyquist,” she went on, completely ignoring me. She was deep into one of her euphoric crusades. “Follow me!” she demanded, turning on her heel and leading all the irate students out of the room. The rest followed, if only out of curiosity.

  I rolled my eyes to the ceiling. “Why?” I asked whoever was listening, then ran after my psychotic friend.

  Chapter Twelve

  FALL SEMESTER

  LATE AUGUST

  “Bridget, wait!” I exclaimed, trying to push past all the girls who were packed in the hall. Several yards ahead, Bridget’s cloud of red hair darted to and fro. She was totally ignoring me.

  When we got outside of the building, I ran around Bridget’s loud supporters. Tempers had already been high. It hadn’t taken much for her to get the female students riled up again. They only needed a few signs reading “Off with their heads!” to complete the look.

  Finally, I made it to the front and blocked Bridget’s path. She stopped, her green eyes so wide they seemed ready to roll onto the lawn. She was seriously amped.

  The rest of the girls also stopped, seeming unsure of what to do without their leader. Good. if I could convince Bridget to chill, maybe the others would go back inside.

  “Bridget, what are you doing? This is not safe,” I said, speaking in a calm, reasonable tone.

  She had some trouble focusing on me, and when she did, she didn’t even seem to fully recognize me. It reminded me of the time Disha drank that alertness tincture. Had Bridget gotten her hands on some of it? Either way, she became so intense when she was mad. She was wearing a long tie-dye dress that I was sure came straight out of Irmagard’s closet, adding to her disorienting appearance.

  “Get out of my way, Charlie,” she said through gritted teeth.

  Well, at least she could still remember my name through all her fury. She had been through a lot, most recently getting snatched by M.L.E. when she dared speak against Nyquist. But clearly, she was not the type to give up. I didn’t think this would get her into as much trouble as before, but she might end up expelled for instigating unrest.

  “Bridget, the dean already has it in for you,” I whispered close to her ear. “He’ll expel you if you cause trouble.”

  “Let him try,” she said, jutting out her chin. “My parents are so lawyered up. That old fart can’t touch me.”

  “Bridget, I—”

  She put a hand on my shoulder and pushed me aside. “You can stay out of this if you’re too chicken to fight, but don’t get in my way.”

  I grabbed her by the wrist, but she yanked it free, throwing me a death glare that almost singed my eyebrows off. Then, she marched forward, starting a chant that the other girls echoed with gusto.

  “We want proper dorms. We want proper dorms!”

  Disha stepped next to me, looking exhausted. “What now?”

  I shook my head at a loss for words.

  “You can’t really blame her,” Disha said. “I’m actually considering joining her. This is bullshit.”

  “Please don’t.” My voice sounded tired even to my ears.

  I considered what to do next. Should I worry about this protest? Or should I just let it run its course and see what would happen? Would Nyquist blame me if I didn’t do anything? Probably.

  Either way, the best I could do was ingratiate myself with him, look as if I was on his side every step of the way, all while I tried not to puke in disgust at my own actions.

  I heaved a heavy sigh. “Can you transport me to the front of the Administration Building? I should get there before Bridget does.”

  Disha shook her head and, looking resigned, grabbed my hands. In a blink, we were transported back where we’d come from. We landed on our feet in front of the steps, only stumbling a little bit. Disha had really improved the landing.

  A girl with jet-black hair and intense green eyes who had been headed inside jumped and blinked at us in surprise. When she recovered she said, “Wicked. I want to learn how to do that! When do they teach you?” By the way, she was looking at us with near reverence, she had to be a freshman.

  “My friend, Disha, can tell you all about it,” I said. “I need to…” I hooked a finger toward the building’s entrance.

  Disha rolled her eyes. “Go ahead,” she said, then turned to the girl with a proud smile. “They actually don’t teach you this spell. You have to learn it on your own,” I heard her say as I hurried up the steps and through the door.

  Inside, it was much cooler, which was a relief. I let my eyes adjust as I walked slowly through the large foyer. A few more students were in line, waiting to get to the desk to ask about their room assignment. Now that the space wasn’t so crowded, I could see that the person manning the desk was a severe-looking man in a sweater vest and horn-rimmed glasses. I’d never seen him before.

  Hurrying forward, I turned down the corridor that led to Nyquist’s office. I passed in front of the door that used to belong to both Mcgregor and Bonnie Underwood. The black-lettered decal on the glass read “Dean of Admissions,” but there was no name under it. Had they appointed someone to fill the vacant spot yet? They probably had—I didn’t think Nyquist would leave a post like that unattended. Maybe the information had been in the welcome packages that never arrived. I really needed to get my hands on one of those.

  As I went, I rehearsed what I would tell Nyquist as well as the expression that would accompany my lies. I decided that acting freaked out would be my best option. He couldn’t expect me to control a mob of pissed off witches.

  When I reached
the door with the plaque that read “Dean Raymond Nyquist,” I shook myself, took a deep breath, and barreled through the door.

  “Dean Nyquist, I need your help. There’s—”

  I froze.

  The flickering images of a young girl reflecting against the bookshelves to my right stole the words out of my mouth. The oversized image of the girl was smiling and waving a hand in the air.

  At first, I almost screamed, thinking it was some sort of ghost or apparition, but thankfully, I managed to bite my tongue and take a closer look.

  With a flick of Nyquist’s hand, the image faded, then disappeared. I’d barely had a second to look at it, but it was imprinted in my retinas like the quick flash of 4th of July fireworks.

  Something about it had been terribly familiar, and that was making the image stick.

  Nyquist stood up from his chair and glared at me over his wide desk. He looked seriously peeved. I blinked, trying to focus on the moment, but my mind kept going back to that night when Rowan’s mother had played a movie-like sequence of his high school graduation. That same night she’d been pretending Rowan was not on campus visiting her in secret. The images I’d just seen had possessed that same quality, which must mean they were Nyquist’s memories, right? But if so, why had they seemed so familiar?

  “What possessed you to barge into my office in this way?” Nyquist demanded. “Don’t you know you’re supposed to knock?”

  “Uh… Sorry. So sorry,” I said, remembering to don a freaked out expression. “But I wanted to warn you, Dean Nyquist. The female students have organized in protest about their new… accommodations. A large group of them is headed this way. I tried to stop them, but they wouldn’t listen. They are angry, and I fear for their safety.”

  Nyquist’s annoyance at my barging in was quickly deflected. I could tell by the way his gaze slid away from me and went over my shoulder as if he expected a stampede of pissed off women to push into his office.

  He froze on the spot, a primal sort of fear entering his features. He was scared, terror-struck by all the estrogen-ridden creatures headed his way. I almost laughed. He’d killed people and he was scared of a few pissed off women? I had to literally bite the inside of my cheek not to start laughing.