Tinkerbell’s entire body was still glowing as she reluctantly let me lead her back into her dorm room. We closed the door tightly, and then we were alone.
“You should have let me fight her,” Tinkerbell said.
“I think you kind of did, actually, and from where I was standing, it looked pretty one-sided.”
“You don’t know what she’s capable of.”
“Apparently, I don’t know what you’re capable of, either,” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Is there something you want to tell me?”
“Not really.”
“What was with the power show out there?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Really?”
She just stared at me blankly. She leaned against the wall and crossed her arms over her chest in an obvious move that said she didn’t want to talk about it.
“You’re not acting like the Tinkerbell I know.”
“The Tinkerbell you know is weak!” She shouted. “That girl can’t even save the boy she loves from being kidnapped by a dark fairy! I didn’t even know there were dark fairies at the school!”
Tinkerbell stomped her foot and looked away, but not before I could see a tear sliding down her cheek.
“What did you say?” I whispered.
“I didn’t know there were dark fairies here.”
“Before that.”
“I didn’t know we had them at the school.”
“Tink...”
She looked over her shoulder at me and shook her head. The tears bounced off her cheeks mixed with the shimmery glitter of leftover fairy dust.
“I love him,” she said. “I know we’re young and nobody really believes we’re old enough for this sort of thing, but...”
Her voice trailed off, but I knew it was time for me to take action. I wouldn’t be a very good friend if I let her suffer alone, but I also couldn’t let this go on any longer. It was time for us to find Peter, and there was only one person who could help us now.
Tinkerbell, Beast, Red, Wolf, Belle, and even Hook had helped us figure out what we were missing, but now it was down to the line and we needed to know how to avoid making the same mistakes the Snow White had made.
“When Snow White found Belle trapped in that glass, she didn’t ask for help.”
“That’s different.”
“Snow was afraid she’d get in trouble, so she didn’t bother turning herself in or sharing what had happened.”
“We aren’t Snow.”
“We might as well be, Tink. We need to ask for help. Peter might be stuck somewhere. He could be trapped. Who knows where a dark fairy would have taken him?”
Tinkerbell looked like she was completely torn: like she didn’t know what to say or do. I felt for her. I really did. Losing someone was never easy, but Peter didn’t have to stay lost.
We could find him, but we had to be brave enough to try.
Tinkerbell glanced at the window. The storm was raging now, and there was no way we’d be allowed to leave the dormitory even to go to the castle.
“Tomorrow morning,” she said. “We’ll go talk to Helena Hex.”
Chapter 10
The next day, I woke up and quickly showered and dressed. Wolf and Beauty had to go prep for an early class, but I filled them in on our plan of action before I went to meet Tinkerbell. She was waiting in her dorm room, but she must have heard me in the hallway because she came out before I could even knock.
“Ready?”
“Ready.”
We turned and started to head toward the staircase. I heard a noise and looked back over my shoulder in time to see Snow White peeking out of her own room. She gasped when she saw me and quickly hurried back into her room and slammed the door shut.
“She won’t be bothering us again,” Tinkerbell said without looking back.
We scurried down the stairs and over to the castle. The side door was open and we went in. The hallways were already full of students who were preparing for their busy days. There were going to be project presentations, tests, and even speeches this week, so everyone had something to do and someplace to be.
Tinkerbell and I raced for Helena’s office as fast as we could without drawing attention to ourselves. We sort of half-walked and half-jogged down the main hallway. We passed the cafeteria and I peeked in to see what was for breakfast. My stomach growled.
“No time,” Tinkerbell said.
We kept going.
Enchanted Academy was sort of a wicked maze of hallways and rooms, but we finally found the teachers’ offices that essentially guarded the way to Helena’s own office.
The doors were locked.
“It’s fine,” Tinkerbell said, wringing her hands. “It just means they aren’t here yet, right?”
“Maybe.”
I knocked on the door, just in case, but nothing happened. I tried the handle again, but yeah, it was definitely locked, and I couldn’t exactly pick a lock that was magical. You needed a special charm to open the door, which I didn’t have, but I tried mine anyway. Tinkerbell did the same.
“I wish Hook was here,” she grumbled.
Hook had this ability to create little energy balls which she could use to get into just about anywhere she wanted to go. It was kind of cool, actually, but Tinkerbell was right. As much as I didn’t want to admit to needing her help, it would have been useful.
A bell sounded and we both groaned, looking at one another.
“We have to go to class,” I said.
“I want to wait here.”
“I know it’s important that we find him, but we can’t miss,” I said. “If we do without permission, then we’ll be detained.”
Nobody wanted to deal with magical detention where you could basically be locked into a little room and be physically unable to leave.
Yeah, no thanks.
Tinkerbell took one last look at the doors, but finally nodded.
“Yeah,” she said. “I guess.”
“Let’s go, then.”
I squeezed her hand and we headed back down the hall. I had to get to my potions class and I knew Tinkerbell had a busy day in all of her own classes.
“Let’s meet at lunch,” she said when we stopped outside the entrance to my first class. “And we’ll try again.”
“Yeah.”
We parted ways and I slipped into class just before the teacher walked in. Miss Fate was one of the most kindhearted teachers I’d ever met, and I was very curious to hear what she had to say about the upcoming test. I was torn between worrying about Peter and wondering whether I was going to score well enough in a potions class to stay at the academy.
Although I’d gotten a full scholarship to attend the school, there was always a part of me that worried I would screw it up somehow.
Not being a magical student was one thing.
Failing to use science, which was essentially what potions class was, was another. There was no excuse for that.
“Good morning,” Miss Fate said. “How’s everyone doing today?”
The room was full of grumbles and complaints. Everyone was worried about what was going to happen over the course of the next week.
“That bad, huh?” She smiled gently. “Well, today’s going to be a simple day. We’re going to review some information that’ll be on the exam and then we’re going to talk about your projects.”
Allison Gator raised her hand. She was a short girl with dark hair and pale eyes. She never missed a class and she was sort of a teacher’s pet, in my opinion. We didn’t share any other classes, though.
“Yes, Allison?”
“What’s the deadline for having our projects in by?”
“Tuesday, as we discussed previously.”
“And how much of a potion’s description do you want with the project?”
“As much as you think is necessary in order to accurately describe the experiment,” Miss Fate said. She turned to the rest of us. “Your potion descriptio
n is almost as important as the potion itself. While your potion should be designed to perform a certain task, such as healing a wound or creating a rash, the description needs to get other people excited about your potion.”
Matthew raised his hand and Miss Fate called on him.
He stood up before he started to ask his question. Matthew was always really polite. In some ways, he was one of the best students in the class. Like Allison, he never missed or skipped. He was always on time and he was always well-prepared. He had long, shaggy hair though, and sometimes I got the impression that he’d rather be playing magical games than working on creating potions.
“Miss Fate,” he said. “My potion is a replica of the one you showed us the first week of class: the one you created.”
Miss Fate grinned.
“The vanishing potion?”
“Yes.”
Miss Fate seemed wildly excited by this. Her vanishing potion was actually pretty cool. It was this green liquid that you could put on any object that was less than two inches in diameter. Once the liquid hit the item, the object would disappear.
Only, it wouldn’t.
Not really.
The liquid simply gave the object the illusion of being gone. So if you needed to hide something quickly and in plain sight, you could use the potion, provided the object was something tiny: like a key or a piece of candy.
“I’m a bit confused about the requirement for the description, though.”
“What’s your question, Matthew?”
“Well, why is the description important?” He asked, scratching his head. I was a little curious about that, too. It seemed to me that the thing that mattered most was the actual product and not whether you could talk about it in a way that was interesting.
“I’m glad you asked,” she said. “When you get older, depending on the type of magical work you do, you’ll need to interact with many different people. Sometimes those people will be interested in your job. Sometimes they’ll want to know what kind of work you do. Other times, people won’t care and they won’t pay you any attention.”
Was she talking about magical jobs?
Or was she talking about my life?
“When you go into a career field, there will be times when you need to get people excited about something.”
“Like maybe you’re selling magical food,” Kasey, a curvy witch, said.
“Or maybe you need to get people to come to an event,” another student, William, added.
“All of these are valid responses,” Miss Fate said. “The point is that at some point, you’ll need to be persuasive. Your words matter. Not only does the meaning behind your words matter, but the way you say different things matters, too.”
I thought about what she said. For the project, we were allowed to create our own potion or we could replicate something we’d learned in class. As far as I knew, we were all doing replications since none of us were talented enough to come up with our own creations.
Well, except maybe Allison.
Somehow, she always seemed to stay on top of everything. It was like the class was easy for her, which I totally hated.
Magic school hadn’t exactly been an easy journey for me. Making friends was hard for me and even though I loved my roommates, I still often felt like a third wheel when it came to interacting with Wolf and Belle. They had been friends for so long before I’d come around and even once I’d joined their little dorm suite, it seemed like I would forever be the outcast just because my background was so very not-magical.
“Now,” Miss Fate rubbed her hands together and grinned. “Who wants to share their creations with the class?”
“My potion is at home,” William said.
“What about your description?”
“Sure.” He grabbed a piece of paper and moved to the front of the class. We all listened as he read his description. “Need to be sneaky? Scared of getting caught? This potion is just what you need.”
He looked up at the class expectantly, and I raised my hand.
“Jessica,” Miss Fate said.
“I liked the description. It was short and to the point, but it sounds like this potion can only be used for nefarious purposes,” I pointed out.
William wasn’t offended. In fact, he actually grinned.
“Good,” he said. “That was the angle I was going for. I didn’t want my description to be bland or to leave people wondering how they could use it.”
“That’s very interesting,” Miss Fate added. “It’s okay to choose a side when you’re working in class. You can promote your potion as being beneficial to all magic users, but if you prefer, you can showcase it as being something a little more, as Jessica put it, nefarious.”
A few other students got up and read their descriptions, but I held back from reading mine because I still didn’t know what kind of potion I wanted to share with the class.
I had a few different ideas, but somehow, every time I tried to mix a potion, it came out clumpy and weird. I hadn’t quite perfected my ability to blend potions smoothly.
Allison was the last person to share a description of her potion.
“This potion is not for the faint of heart,” she said. “Take it at your own risk.”
I looked sharply to Miss Fate, who seemed just as confused and surprised as I was.
“Is that it?” She asked gently.
“Yes.”
“Is your potion a poison?” Miss Fate raised an eyebrow.
Allison only laughed.
“Miss Fate! That would be crazy!”
“Okay,” she said. “Just as a reminder, all potions submitted must be safe for consumption, okay?” She pointed to Allison. “No poison.”
Allison frowned. She didn’t seem very happy with Miss Fate’s analysis of her potion.
“It’s not a poison.”
“Then let’s talk about some ways we might be able to modify your description to make it sound a little safer, shall we?”
“What’s wrong with my description?” Allison asked. She seemed to grow more irritated at the criticism.
“There’s nothing wrong with it, but when you describe a potion for a project like this, it’s vital that you are very succinct. You’re trying to draw people in and make them curious about what you’ve created. You aren’t trying to scare them.”
Allison looked at the piece of paper she was holding in her hands and shook her head.
The bell rang just then, and everyone started gathering their supplies and leaving the classroom. Allison tossed the piece of paper over her shoulder and it fluttered to the ground. Miss Fate had already turned around and didn’t notice, but I did.
Littering in class, huh?
Maybe I had spent too much time at a human school, but I wasn’t a big fan of people who littered. In my opinion, littering was one of the worst things you could do, and Allison was being a little too wild with her comfort levels when it came to using the classroom as her own personal space.
Everyone pushed and shoved as they tried to leave. I just sat in my chair until the rest of the room cleared out, and then I walked up front and started to head out of the class.
“Oh, Jessica,” Miss Fate said. She knelt down beside me and picked up the piece of paper that Allison had dropped. “You dropped this,” she said.
“Thank you,” I took the piece of paper. I didn’t know why, but I didn’t tell Miss Fate that it wasn’t mine. I didn’t call out Allison. More importantly, I didn’t throw the paper away. Instead, I folded it up and placed it in my pocket. Who knew when something like that might come in handy?
Okay, so I was a little bit of a hoarder, but I was also trying to do anything I could to pass school. Maybe Allison’s words would give me some inspiration later on.
At the very least, they’d help me figure out the general tone of my description, which was still something I was struggling with.
I didn’t really know how to do magical writing. My work at Millbrook High had all been,
well, high school stuff. I’d written book reports and an essay on why reading books in high school was important. I’d never been the type of person who was particularly creative when it came to words.
Put me in front of a canvas and that was a different story.
When it came to art, I actually felt like I could express myself. Art was easy. You just painted how you were feeling. You didn’t even have to do very much. The brushes and paint seemed to do all of the work for you.
With words, though.
Well, words were hard.
I left the classroom and turned to head down the hallway to my next class, but I bumped into someone.
“Excuse me,” I said, pushing past, but the person grabbed my arms before I could get by. I looked up sharply to see Beast standing there.
“Jessica,” he said.
“I didn’t know you were going to be here,” I felt a little breathless all of a sudden. He laughed and took my hand. Then he led me around a corner to a hallway that wasn’t exactly being used. He smiled as he looked around.
“What are we doing?”
“Something we should have done this morning, but I couldn’t find you.”
He grabbed the doorknob of an empty classroom, pushed it open, and pulled me inside. Instantly, he started kissing me. Beast cupped my face and pressed his lips to mine in a way that made me feel like I could fly. When he kissed me, I felt like I was on top of the world. I felt like no matter what happened next, everything was going to be okay because we were together, and that was all that mattered.
Finally, I pulled away.
“We shouldn’t be in here,” I said.
Beast raised a thick eyebrow and smiled at me with that crooked smile of his. He was such a tease sometimes. He was a little bit of a bully and a lot of a troublemaker and we hadn’t always gotten along. We still didn’t always get along. In moments like this, though, I liked to see his more wild side.
“Are you afraid we’ll get caught?”
“Yes, that’s exactly what I’m afraid of.”
“Jessica, we aren’t going to get caught,” he said.
“We could get caught,” I muttered. No amount of kissing was worth detention.
But then he kissed me again, and I realized maybe I was wrong. Maybe being kissed by Beast was totally worth getting in trouble for. Maybe.
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