“Won’t you be there?” Zwaantie asked.
“Oh no. Lock-ins are for the young and adventurous. Most married couples do not attend.”
“But Candace wanted to go.”
“She’s barely married. I imagine she won’t even consider it next year.”
Zwaantie followed Sage out of the room. She still didn’t understand how most of Stella worked. Even if they did allow magic in Sol after she and Leo were married, she wanted nothing to do with the Ticker and the pressures it brought.
Chapter 32
The Potions
They slept late the next day and spent most of the afternoon in the spa. They ate an early dinner in Sage’s room, and the dresses were delivered just as they finished eating.
Zwaantie was excited for this dress. She’d loved the way it felt and looked when she’d picked it out. She unzipped the bag and frowned. It wasn’t the dress she’d chosen.
This one had a corset in bright red, but was striped with black. The top of the corset was heart shaped and covered in black lace. Along the bottom was a short, but poufy black skirt. It was beautiful, but where was the one she picked out?
Sage held up her own. It was almost identical except the colors were reversed.
“These are not the dresses we chose,” Zwaantie said, still trying to understand what happened.
Sage snorted. “Of course not. Everyone saw those on the Ticker. I ordered these after we got back from shopping. We needed something completely unexpected for your grand entrance. What do you think?”
“It’s short and very revealing.”
“I know. That’s the point. No one will expect you to step out in that. Everyone will be talking about you. It’s perfect.”
“Why did you get a matching one?”
“Because we’ll make our entrance together. Ari will have a black vest and red pants. We’ll look incredible together.”
Zwaantie changed in Sage’s closet. The dress fit well. She wished for a second Phoenix could see her, but then remembered he never loved her. Zwaantie’s face fell when she looked in the mirror.
Sage snuck up behind her. She looked stunning in her own dress. “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.”
“You look sad.”
“I’m fine. We need to get our hair done before we leave, right?”
Sage gave her a frown. “Yes.” She drug Zwaantie out of the room. Zwaantie was grateful Sage allowed the change of subject.
They visited the beauty mages who painted Zwaantie’s lips a bright red and made her hair a deep black, but when she swung it back and forth, red flared from the end. The mage did something with her eyelashes that made them appear nearly an inch long. The whole effect was a little disconcerting.
Ari met them in the entry hall.
“What in hades took—” He stared at Zwaantie.
He looked at Sage for a second, opened his mouth to say something, and then closed it.
Sage laughed. “You’ve left Ari speechless. Leo doesn’t stand a chance. Come on, we need to hit Party Potions before we go.” She handed Zwaantie a cape.
“What’s this?”
“No one sees our dresses until we get there.”
Ari stayed close to her as they walked outside and climbed into a carriage. Ari sat across from the both of them and glared at Sage. “Did you have to pick a dress that was so revealing?”
“Since when do you care what I wear?” Sage asked.
“It’s not you I’m worried about. It’s Zwaantie.”
“Why?” Zwaantie asked.
Ari scoffed. “Everything about the way you look screams ‘I’m hot, and I’m not scared to flaunt it. Oh, and I’m too good for mere mortals, so don’t bother.’ Which I suppose is a good thing. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t fools who won’t try. You need to be careful tonight.”
The carriage stopped in front of small shop that glowed green. Ari climbed out and held his hand out for Zwaantie and Sage. Then held open the door.
The shop was bright with colored lights, but tiny and perfectly square. Narrow shelves lined each wall from floor to ceiling, except for a spot in the corner with a long black curtain covering a doorway. Tiny bottles filled every shelf. In the middle of the room sat a counter with four bar stools and a tall blonde woman on the other side. She was arguing with a ragged looking man who slumped on one of the bar stools.
“I don’t have what you want. I told you before, nothing in here is habit forming or dangerous. Go somewhere else.” Her voice was hard, commanding, but the man didn’t seem to care.
“Then do you at least have Painfree? I’ll take anything. My potion maker disappeared last night, and I don’t know where else to go.” He pulled at his greasy hair.
“I don’t do medicine either. This is a place for party potions.”
The black curtain moved, and a tall bald man stepped out. His shoulders were wide, and his arms were the size of melons. He grabbed the scruffy man by his bicep and pulled him out the door. He nodded to Ari as he passed.
As the door thudded shut, the tall and willowy woman came out from behind the counter. She wore a long green dress that trailed on the floor. She came forward and gave Sage a big hug.
“Sagie. And Ari. It’s so good to see you. I suppose you are here because of the lock-in. We’ve been busier tonight than in a long time. But don’t worry, Max will keep out anyone until you leave. What a pleasure to have the new princess,” she said, turning to Zwaantie. “I hope you are enjoying your stay in Stella.”
“Yes, very much.”
“I’m Xandria. It’s nice to meet you. Come sit.” She pointed to the chairs.
Sage started talking as soon as they sat down.
“We’ll all need Cool and Awake. I want Giggle and Black Wings, large.”
Xandria pulled out bottles from under the counter and then moved over to the shelf on the right and reached up to grab a bottle from the top.
Sage didn’t open the bottles.
Xandria looked at Ari with a wicked glint in her eyes. “What’d you think of Lover Clone?”
“That was a nasty bit of revenge. I finally went home and hid in my room until it wore off.”
Sage giggled. “It was hilarious. And what was even funnier was when I looked at him, I saw Corvus. I got all nervous and shy around him, even though I knew it was Ari.”
“Why did you hide?” Zwaantie asked, confused.
“Party potions create illusions. Good ones. If you take Lover Clone, anyone who looks at you will see his or her lover instead of you. So, if I took it tonight, I imagine I’d look just like…” He paused and looked at Xandria.
“Like Leo.” Zwaantie finished for him, getting to the point.
“Exactly. Now you can imagine the trouble this would cause. If you saw Leo kissing or flirting with another girl, you’d be mad, right?”
“Yes. I suppose.”
“Well, I got yelled at, slapped, and spit on all in the period of an hour. I won’t be taking that one again.”
Xandria laughed. “You deserved it.”
His eyes sparkled. “You knew what you were getting into.”
She shrugged. “Yes, but that doesn’t mean I couldn’t exact a little revenge. You can go look in the back room and pick out a few potions if you want.”
“Well, consider the revenge exacted. No more potions that put me through hell please. And I’m not interested in the back room tonight. I’ve got to keep an eye on my sisters.”
“Suit yourself. What do you want?”
“Dry, Touch Me, Soul Mate, and Truth.”
“Oh yeah,” Sage interrupted. “I want Lie.”
Everyone turned to Zwaantie.
“What do you want?” Xandria asked.
“What do these do again?”
Sage and Ari started to speak over one another. Xandria shushed both of them. “Seriously,” she said. “Being with them is like being with overgrown children. All my potions do one of three things. They eith
er act on you, how people see you, or what you see. Most of them are illusionary, but a few do other things.”
She held up a bottle. “Cool will make sure you don’t get hot. That’s important at the lock-in. Awake will keep you awake. Black Wings will make it appear as if Sage has wings. She won’t, but everyone will think so. Giggle will make her laugh at anything anyone says. Dry prevents sweating. Touch Me makes people want to touch you. I wouldn’t recommend that one for you. Truth makes it so you cannot speak anything but the truth, and Lie is the opposite.” She turned to Sage.
“I don’t think you should do Lie tonight. If this is Zwaantie’s first time in a club, she’ll need you to keep her out of trouble, and if everything you tell her is a lie, that will be hard.”
Sage frowned. “I guess.”
“Wait a minute, so if Ari takes Touch Me, and I don’t want to touch him, will it make me want to?”
Xandria gave a low chuckle. “No, nothing that sinister. Everyone wants to touch Ari, but most won’t because that would be weird or awkward, but with something like Touch Me, it removes that inhibition. It allows you to touch him without fear of being rejected. If someone took Touch Me that no one wanted to touch, it wouldn’t work.”
Zwaantie thought through the potions again. This was incredibly bizarre.
“What’s Soul Mate?” Zwaantie asked. It was the only one they ordered that Xandria hadn’t explained.
Ari grimaced.
“Ari’s obsessed with finding his one true love. Soul Mate creates a glow around that person. He takes it every time there is a party or they go to a club, and he has yet to find her.”
“It’s pretty unreliable. A lot of people take Glow, and so I can’t tell if they are glowing because they are my soul mate or because of their own potion. But it certainly narrows the field.”
“You have thousands of potions in here. How can I even begin to tell you what I want?”
“Anything is possible. Tell me your wildest imaginations, and I probably have a potion that can create it.”
Zwaantie wanted Phoenix to love her again. A potion couldn’t do that for her.
“Glow sounds good. And I’ve never danced in public before. I want to be uninhibited. Not embarrassed.”
“So, Cool, Awake, Glow, and Total Confidence.” She placed four small bottles in front of Zwaantie.
Zwaantie drank all four of them. The first had no flavor, but the blood in her veins cooled almost immediately. The second tasted strongly of coffee, and the third was fruity. Total Confidence was odd. It was minty with a hint of strawberries and chocolate.
They left Party Potions at half past ten.
“Why are we going to a party so late if the magic stops at midnight?”
“That’s what’s cool about a lock-in. Potions still work, and they use gas lanterns from Sol to light the place up. The really awesome thing is the music is natural, not enhanced by magic.”
Zwaantie had never felt more comfortable in her life. Maybe Ari was right. Maybe she did belong here.
Chapter 33
The Lock-in
They arrived at the building lit up with multicolored lights around eleven. People were everywhere, all dressed in elaborate costumes. Nearly everyone glowed. The carriage stopped in front of a guarded, roped path up to the door.
“You ready?” Ari asked.
Zwaantie let out a breath. “No.”
“We’ll let Sage get out first. Then, we’ll wait for the shouts to die down before we step out.”
At home, everyone bowed, but here it looked as if they were about to be mobbed. Sage stepped out, and screams erupted.
“It’s the princess!” a girl screamed.
“Sage!” someone else called. Sage paused and dropped her cape.
Zwaantie peeked out the door and watched Sage wave to those who lined the path. She hugged a couple of girls and kissed another on the cheek. Sage grabbed the hand of a young man and pulled him under the rope that kept people out. He was all smiles as she tucked her arm into his elbow, and they escaped into the building.
“Why did she just pull that guy in from behind the ropes?” Zwaantie asked.
“They aren’t going to the party. They are probably all having their own parties nearby, but they come to watch those with invitations. Sage just allowed him to come into the party. She does it every year.” Ari waited for another few moments for the crowd’s cheers to die down. “It’s time.”
He stepped out, and young women screamed his name. He turned and offered his hand. Zwaantie took it, and cringed at the bright lights shining on them. She tucked her arm into Ari’s, and he put his hand over hers.
“Breathe. You’ll be okay,” he whispered.
She hadn’t realized she’d been holding her breath. She smiled wide and waved to the crowd.
“Zwaantie!” a few of them yelled. She fumbled with the tie around her neck and dropped the cape. There were a few whistles and catcalls.
They walked to the door, and Zwaantie tried to ignore the noise. Ari left her at the door. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”
She spun around and watched him dash out. He approached the rope at the same place Sage had been. He chatted with the people there, gave a few hugs, and helped a girl cross over. They strutted to where Zwaantie stood, the girl beaming from ear to ear.
Ari took Zwaantie’s hand with his free one and pulled both of them inside. They found Sage waiting near an interior door. The girl Ari had brought in squealed when she saw Sage, but she flung her arms around the boy.
“Thanks for letting us come in,” the boy said after he extracted himself from the girl.
“Don’t mention it. Have fun,” Ari said.
The couple disappeared down the hall.
“That was clever. Grabbing his girlfriend,” said Sage.
“You know I try. Come on. Let’s go have fun.”
They entered a large open room with an enormous crowd. The music beat a hard rhythm in Zwaantie’s head, and it made her want to move. Ari stopped her and spoke loudly into her ear.
“Remember most of what you see is an illusion. Don’t get caught up in what someone looks like. Also, don’t take offense if someone says something rude. They might’ve taken Lie or Insult. People do it to be funny. If you’ve done this before, you hardly even notice, but since this is your first time, you need to be careful. Kids in our kingdom grow up having illusion birthday parties, so they won’t understand if you don’t get it.”
Zwaantie nodded and thought she should be nervous, but wasn’t. Must’ve been the Total Confidence. She followed Sage onto the dance floor, and immediately they were moving with a hundred other bodies. The music was completely natural. A large stage had been set up on the far side of the room with a few dozen musicians, and drums lined the walls. The feeling was exhilarating, but the whole experience was odd. No one was dancing with another person, yet none of them danced alone either.
Then the music changed, and suddenly everyone broke into partners. She found herself in the arms of a man whose skin was blue and who had eyes that sparkled like crystals. He smelled of sweet strawberries, and his voice was musical.
“You are the princess. Welcome.”
Zwaantie giggled, more out of habit than anything else. The touching still bothered her, and this stranger had Zwaantie in what her mother would call an inappropriate embrace.
“Thank you.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Have you ever been to a party like this before?”
She shook her head.
“Well then, let me explain how this works. This dance is called the Lovers’ Chance. We change partners every time you hear a bell ring. In the old days, before the vipers got bad, this used to be the last song of the night. Whoever’s arms you ended up in, that’s who you went home with. Now they do it several times a night. It’s fun and allows you to get to know a lot of people.”
The bell rang then, and he spun Zwaantie away into the arms of a guy who didn’t say much. He growled
a couple times, and Zwaantie was grateful for the bell ringing again. This time she ended up with Ari.
Zwaantie smiled up at him, glad to be with someone familiar.
“Having fun?” he asked.
“Yeah. It’s different.”
She was very aware of Ari’s hand on her hip, the way his eyes sparkled when he looked at her, and his gorgeous smile. She wondered what it’d be like to kiss this unreachable man. Would it mean anything? He’d already told Zwaantie he wouldn’t commit to anyone. She’d be signing up for a one-night affair. Yet, still she wondered.
Then a long bell rang. Ari let her go and backed up. Sage came up to them smiling wickedly with a group of four girls who all looked identical. They had the palest of skin and bright black hair, red lips, and rainbow colored eyes.
“You two looked cute together. By the way, this is Lizzy, her illusion is so neat. I want to try it next time.”
“What is it?” asked Ari.
“There are four Lizzys, but only one is real. All four will do the exact same thing at the exact same time. Watch.”
Lizzy spun in a circle, and so did the rest.
Ari pulled Sage away and whispered something in her ear. She frowned and shook her head. Ari scowled. Zwaantie couldn’t take her eyes off him.
“It’s so nice to meet the famous princess,” said the four Lizzys.
“Thank you.”
“You know, I dated Leo once. He’s a good sort. Do yourself a favor, though. Don’t sleep with Ari.”
Zwaantie immediately dropped her gaze. “I have no intention of sleeping with Ari, but why?”
“Because that was my mistake. One night with Ari, and Leo just didn’t compare. Which was a shame because before that I was happy with him. And I wasn’t the first girl to dump Leo after spending a night with Ari.”
Poor Leo. Why would he leave her with Ari when that had happened to him? The music changed again. An extremely fast, extremely loud beat.
Behind her, Sage yelled. “Lizzy, what color is Zwaantie’s glow?”
“Yellow.”
“See,” Sage said to Ari.
Ari shook his head and stomped away. Sage grabbed Zwaantie’s and the real Lizzy’s hands. “Come on, this is the girls’ dance.”
Stella and Sol Box Set Page 33