Much Ado About Magic

by Mette Ivie Harrison

  Bee shrugged. “You’re arrogant. You think there’s no chance I can get away. And also, you get off on me scratching your eyes out.”

  Well, she wasn’t wrong there. “Bee, if that’s true and you end up disappeared, then where is my fun?”

  “Oh, you can find someone else, I’m sure. There are so many girls in the world and I’m just one. You’re a demi-head of the Paduan clan; they’ll be falling over themselves for you. Even with that face.” She put a hand up to it and brushed it along my nose.

  I wished she would stop doing things like that to drive me crazy. Pretending she was going to tell me she still loved me and kiss me. She knew how to make me do whatever she wanted. She was that smart. If she really wanted to pull off something like this, just for for the fun of it—I still didn’t believe that she’d done it because she cared about money or what she could buy with it—she could do it. But she still wouldn’t do it like this. This was too sloppy. Bee wouldn’t have gotten caught. Not hours afterward, anyway.

  “There is no one in the world like you, Bee,” I said, and there was a moment when I thought that she had to believe me, that she’d melt and let me kiss her for real, and say that everything was forgiven, and we could fight this together. And win.

  But it was only a moment.

  “You Paduans really know how to lie, don’t you?”

  “What?” I threw up my hands. What did I have to do to make her believe me? “Call Sarah,” I said. “Right now.” I pointed at her cell phone. “At least give her the chance to take some measures to protect herself.”

  “Like what? You can’t escape from the World Council. No matter where we tried to run to, they would get us. Wouldn’t they?” she asked me.

  “Give her some warning, at least.”

  “So she can say her goodbyes? Is that it? You think I will be easier to seduce if I think I’m going to disappear forever?” She put a hand on her top and pulled it off over her head. She had a lacy bra on underneath and I nearly choked when I saw her in it.

  I had to think. Had to keep thinking. We were in danger. She was in danger. She needed to be—

  She turned and put her arms down.

  She was doing it again, a part of my brain thought. This was not going to end well.

  “No one wants to die never having had a boyfriend. Never having kissed him all over.” She came closer to me and put a hand on my shirt. She undid the top button and slid her hand inside.

  I made some kind of sound. A good sound, a sound I would like to make again, sometime.

  Then she ripped the buttons of the rest of shirt.

  I didn’t care.

  She put her chest next to mine.

  I could feel her hot skin on mine. I could feel her heart beating.

  “You like this?” she asked.

  “Ung,” I said. This was not what was supposed to be happening. I should be talking to her. Helping her. Not this.

  “Is this what you came for?” she asked.

  I put my lips on her bare shoulder.

  I’d kissed girls before. I won’t say how many because a gentleman doesn’t. But it had never felt like this before. She had me in such a state that I didn’t know which way was up, except that whatever direction she was in, that was where I was going.

  She said, “Do your truth spell.”

  I heard the words but it took me a full minute to figure out what they meant.

  “On yourself,’ said Bee. “I want to watch you do it. I don’t think you can fool me. But if you think you can, then it will be you against me. My wits against yours. The way it always has been and the way it always should be.”

  She had me in a position where I couldn’t say no. I nodded. It was about all I could do to get my head to move up and down and then stop. I was working hard to also keep my tongue from hanging out like a dog and panting at her.

  She stepped away from me.

  I goggled at her.

  “Oh, yeah, just a second.” She grabbed her shirt and put it back on. “I just wanted to make sure I had your full attention.”

  She had it all right.

  “Oh, and there’s your shirt,” she said, handing it to me.

  I buttoned the top button back up, but the rest hung around me, useless. I noticed that Bee had to pull her eyes away from me. That gave me hope. It wasn’t exactly a declaration of her faith in me, but at least she thought I was hot. I’d take what I could get from her at this point.

  “Do the spell, already,” she said.

  “You trust me to do it on me and not on you?” I asked.

  “You said you already believed me. Now you have to make sure I believe you.”

  “And if I just say some random words and pretend?”

  She shook her head. “I’ll know. I may not be a Paduan, but I know truth when I hear it, Ben. Don’t mess with me. It won’t turn out well.”

  I hadn’t been planning to mess with her, but I wanted to make sure she knew it.

  I took a breath and started chanting the spell, directing the magic back to myself. It was hard to do with her watching me like that. I’d had people in the clan watch me as I did the spell on myself that first time when I was eight, with everyone in the clan watching me. That was a long time ago. I had been terrified, though I’d tried to act cool.

  But I hadn’t done the spell on myself since then. Most Paduans don’t do the spell on themselves ever again, in their whole lives. It’s not fun. It’s like a rite of initiation, a hazing to get into a fraternity.

  And it was even harder to do than I remembered, with Beatrice right in front of me. I flubbed up in the middle and had to start over again. “Sorry,” I said, first. “Nervous.”

  She watched me, wide-eyed and nodding, while I did it right the second time around.

  It made me think about how things between us were the second time around, too.

  And then the spell took over, and I wasn’t as much in control anymore. I remembered this feeling of looseness, like I wasn’t all the way inside of my body anymore. It was a little like getting drunk, a little like kissing Bee’s shoulder, and a little like sleeping, all wrapped up into one.

  “Ready,” I got out, though the words were slow.

  “That’s it?” asked Bee. “That’s you under a truth spell? You seem almost exactly the same.”

  I think that was actually a compliment from Beatrice, which was a rare thing. I hoped I didn’t forget that when the spell faded. “I mostly tell the truth,” I said.

  “I suppose you must,” said Beatrice. She looked at me and I looked back at her. It was a long moment. It was like having dirty glasses and then cleaning them. The world looked suddenly brighter and closer.

  “Tell me about John. What is this video he has on me and Sarah?” asked Bee.

  I told her about it, in minute detail. The way John had smelled when he brought up the video on Pedro’s computer. The dim lighting. The reactions of Pedro and Claudio.

  “Claudio doesn’t believe in Sarah anymore, then? He thinks she’s guilty?”

  I nodded. “I’ve never seen Claudio so angry before. He did love her. This is a harsh blow to his pride.”

  “But not to his heart?” asked Bee.

  “To his heart, too,” I said.

  Bee leaned into me. I could feel her fingertips on my wrist. “I want to kiss you,” I said.

  She drew back, her eyes narrowed. “I didn’t ask you about that.”

  “‘S true,” I said and puckered my lips. I guess I was pretty easy to evade, and if I had been able to be embarrassed at the time, I would have been. But it’s only after the truth spell wears off that you realize what you’ve done and how other people will look at it.

  “I love you,” I said, then, kissing the air wetly just above her nose.

  She pushed me away. “Right, thanks. You’re like a puppy dog,” she said.

  “If I’m your puppy dog, I don’t care,” I said.

  “Um, back to the video. You say Sarah and I are in it. Th
at it was unmistakably us. That’s why Pedro and Claudio decided we were the ones to go after. But why didn’t you? If the evidence was so good, why did you still come here? If you do still trust me like you say you do?”

  “Because I know you,” I said easily. It was so easy to say the truth under the spell.

  “You know me?” echoed Bee.

  “I know what you’re like. You don’t care about clothes. That’s what you—-or whoever it was—was buying in the video.”

  “You’re basing everything on that?”

  “That and I don’t believe you would try to steal a spell from someone else and get him into trouble with the World Council.”

  “Even if I wanted to hurt you? Or Pedro?” asked Bee. “I was pretty pissed at both of you, not long ago.”

  I shrugged. “Still not what you would do. You’re too classy for that. You’d make sure we were hurt, but not disappeared.”

  She smiled a little at that. “Now tell me something that you would never say if you weren’t under a truth spell,” she added. “Something to make me believe this is all real and not some part of an elaborate joke.”

  I didn’t think hard, because you don’t, when you’re under the spell. “I’ll never stop loving you,” I said. “No matter what happens. If you disappear, I’ll never love anyone else. You’re my match, Bee. You’re the only girl who could complete me. I’ve been waiting for you all my life and when I found you, I couldn’t even see the truth, right in front of me—probably because I was afraid of how much you would mean to me and how much you would be able to hurt me if you ever left me.

  “You’re right about Paduans there. We’re as stupid as anyone else when it comes to love. Maybe stupider, because we think we’re so smart. I need you. I need you to tell me the truth when no one else will dare to. I need you to make me see the truth when it’s standing in front of me.” I breathed in the happy sense that you only feel only the truth spell, that you have done everything possible, and so can rest.

  “Nope,” said Bee after a moment. “Doesn’t do it. Sorry. Good try and all that. But I don’t believe you. Try again.”

  I stared at her. “I’ll tell you what my first tattoo said.”

  “A tattoo? I didn’t know you had a tattoo.”

  “I’ve had them removed since,” I said. “But the first one was a tribute to Miley Cyrus.” I didn’t blush or feel embarrassed. I was trying to think of things that would embarrass me later, after the spell was over.

  “Really?” Bee had a funny look in her eyes. “When does this start fading?” she asked.

  “You believe me?” I asked, relieved.

  “I think I do,” she said, and sounded surprised. “Although if you think you’re not going to be teased about that tattoo, you are crazy.”

  “As long as you’re the one teasing,” I said.

  “I’m tired of you like this. I like you better when you don’t give me everything I want.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because the truth can change,” she said, as if that had just occurred to her. “So even the truth can’t be relied on, not really. Only people. And maybe love.”

  Over the next hour or so, the spell faded. I stayed with Beatrice, though we didn’t say much to each other. I knew the spell was gone when I felt like I’d been hit by a train. And then thrown into a freezing cold lake without knowing how to swim. And then attacked by piranhas.

  Beatrice leaned over and kissed me lingeringly the lips, then pulled back and held my gaze with a smoky look that made me melt.

  “Wow,” I said.

  “And is that the truth?” she asked.

  “What do you think?” I said, and reached for her chest.

  “Not a chance,” she said, and pushed me away. “We have work to do.”

  That we did.

  Chapter 17: Bee

  I called Sarah and told her to come over immediately. I didn’t want to talk to her over the phone about something like this.

  Ben said the video looked absolutely real, not photoshopped. “Maybe they found look-alikes or something?” he asked. “Like stunt doubles on TV?”

  I thought about it for a moment. “Someone who looked that much like me and Sarah? I don’t think you can find people on demand like that. It’s not like I have an identical twin. I don’t even have a sister.”

  “You’re right. You’re always right, oh wise Beatrice,” said Ben.

  I kissed him for that.

  The doorbell stopped me.

  I pulled away from him and put a finger to his chin. “You’re going to get into a lot of trouble over this,” I pointed out.

  “Yeah,” said Ben. “So?”

  “You could leave now and give yourself some deniability or whatever it is they call it.”

  “No,” said Ben. “Not a chance.”

  “I don’t want you to disappear, too,” I said.

  “Good. Because it’s not going to happen. Not to either of us. You’re not going to get rid of me, no matter how annoying I get.”

  “And I’m sure I will regret that at a later date,” I said. But I couldn’t regret it now. How could one guy go from so infuriating to so adorable in a matter of minutes?

  The doorbell rang again and I ran to get it before my parents. I did not want to try explaining this to them. They would not understand. They would just lecture me about not appreciating how much effort they had put into getting into the Hero clan and how likely it was that they would still be in it if I got disappeared by the World Council.

  “Hi, Sarah. How are you doing?” I asked at the door. But it was obvious already how she was doing. Badly. Her eyes were bloodshot and her lips were pinched together.

  “Did you hear anything new?” she whispered to me.

  I nodded. “I’ll tell you about it in my room.”

  She started when she saw Ben. I swatted him. “Sit down,” I said. “And be quiet.”

  “I hear and obey, Mistress,” said Ben, his hands up high.

  I nudged my way to sit between his legs and when I looked at Sarah, her eyes were wide and uncertain.

  “It’s all right,” I said. Then I let out a long breath. It wasn’t all right and I didn’t know if it ever would be again. I told her about the video that Ben had seen.

  “But that’s impossible,” said Sarah. “We weren’t even in that store.”

  “Are you sure? I don’t remember where we were. I wasn’t sure if we had any proof of that.”

  “I know exactly where we were,” said Sarah. “We went to Macy’s first, about forty-five minutes. Then to Skinny Jeans. Then to Socks and Stripes. Then to the food court. And at eleven, we headed home.”

  I was impressed with her memory. “What time was the video stamped?” I asked Ben.

  He thought for a moment. “I think it was 10:22.”

  “We were at Skinny Jeans,” said Sarah with certainty.

  “I wonder if they have a video of that,” said Ben. “That would prove there’s a problem with the other video, at least.”

  “They can just say that the video proving we’re innocent is a fake,” I put in. Even though we knew it was the other one.

  Ben seemed stumped by that.

  “Where’s Claudio?” asked Sarah. “Why isn’t he here?”

  I had skipped the part about Claudio and Pedro deciding we were guilty.

  “Uh, he and Pedro think you two are guilty,” said Ben.

  It wasn’t the most tactful or gentle way to put it. I elbowed Ben in the stomach when I saw the tears gathering in Sarah’s eyes.

  “Uh,” said Ben.

  “Sarah, we’re working this out,” I put in.

  “It won’t matter. Everything will be ruined by then,” said Sarah. “And I’ll never love anyone else ever again.”

  “I have a plan,” said Ben. “I think it will give us some time to prove you are innocent, and at the same time, it will make Claudio see how wonderful you are, Sarah. He will regret not believing in you.”

 
“Does this plan have anything to do with stringing him up by his toes and torturing him slowly with acid?” I asked, because Sarah was still streaming tears.

  “No,” said Ben. “Although I can arrange that later, if you are still interested. Maybe not the acid part. I’ll have to leave that to you. I don’t know where to buy it.”

  “And clearly I do?”

  “I didn’t say it,” said Ben.

  “But you were thinking it,” I pointed out.

  He shrugged and put an arm around me.

  I turned back to Sarah. “If anyone can figure a way out of this mess, it’s Ben.”

  “Does that mean I’m the big, strong secret agent?” asked Ben.

  “Not so much on the big and strong,” I said.

  “But smart, as least?”

  “You’re going to smart if you keep distracting me,” I warned him.

  He put up his hands and pulled away from me.

  I pulled him back. “The plan,” I reminded him.

  “Right. This is it. You and Sarah disappear.”

  I stared at him. That was the plan? “Uh, I don’t get it. We’re going to disappear if we don’t do something to prove ourselves innocent. How is disappearing the plan?”

  Ben’s mouth twisted. “Because you disappear yourselves. You don’t wait for the World Council to do it.”

  “But—won’t they know that we’re not really gone? I mean, they’ll know if they didn’t disappear us.” Even if they weren’t known as the smartest clan, surely they could figure that out.

  “They may think the Heros did it, since you’re an embarrassment to the clan. Or the Arragons, for revenge. It could take a while for everyone to believe the denials. In the meantime, you’ll go totally quiet to keep safe.”

  “So how will we prove we’re innocent?” I asked.

  “I can handle it,” said Ben. “We’ve got to get this sorted out in a matter of days.”

  “I’ll have to tell my parents the truth,” said Sarah.

  “That’s the one thing you can’t do,” said Ben.

  “But—they’ll think—it will ruin them.”