This time, the noise from the crowd was almost deafening. I cheered along with them, as did Ellie and Amy. After all, I was absolutely here hoping that Sara was going to be declared the champion.
“Now, let me begin by bringing in tonight’s competitors. Our first competitor, from the coven of Dione, everyone give a warm welcome to Lightning Lisa!”
A second light appeared on the stage, illuminating a blonde woman dressed in black from head to toe. The effect was stunning, her blonde hair looking, well, like a bolt of lightning against the dark sky. I imagined that was probably the effect she was going for. I had met Lisa a few times, and she was quite nice. She was also very competitive and quite good on the broom, but I had to admit, Sara was really just a step above her.
“Next, from the coven of Titan, give a warm welcome to Aquaria!”
The crowd burst into cheers once more as yet another light appeared, this time with a woman wearing a blue crop top and matching leggings standing in it. Her brown hair was topped with a golden crown, and I couldn’t help but shiver slightly when I saw Karen Voda’s face. After all, she looked almost exactly like me, and I slunk back into my seat as much as I could. Karen was in all likelihood my half sister, and the most visible proof that I was from the coven of Titan.
She was also the competitor currently tied with Sara for second place.
“Now, from the coven of Tethys, and your current broom competition leader, let me introduce The Bulldozer!”
The roar when Derek was announced was so loud the seats began to shake. He waved up at the crowd, a confident grin on his face. I had seen Sara take him on before, and while she was the better broom rider, he was more skilled at casting spells to defend against other competitors. Still, with Sara’s advancements in spellcasting, I wouldn’t have been surprised if they were pretty neck and neck now.
The nerves in my stomach grew. I knew what was coming next. “Finally, from the coven of Jupiter, and currently tied with Aquaria for second place, give a warm welcome to Broomarella!”
The three of us were on our feet, stamping and cheering as the last light turned on, revealing Sara to the crowd. She was dressed in her regular outfit for broom riding—a magically enhanced catsuit in a deep green color that had bolts of lightning running up and down it before disappearing. It looked amazing, and Sara looked amazing. Her red hair was tied back, and she waved at the crowd, a huge grin on her face. She looked confident, and she looked ready. This was definitely a good sign.
“Now, you’ve met the competitors. Are you ready to see where they’ll be competing tonight?” Eli asked, and all of the lights at the center of the stage suddenly disappeared, casting everything into darkness once more.
The crowd shouted again, Eli keeping them excited, and after about fifteen seconds, all of the lights came on. I gasped as I looked at the floor of the stage.
A few minutes ago, the center area had been no more than simple hardwood. But now, it couldn’t have been more different. A giant volcano rose up from the bottom of the stage in the center of the stadium, reaching up to about where we were sitting. Molten magma slid slowly down the sides of the black rock, and two black dragons flew around the mountain idly, slowly beating their wings.
In the air surrounding the mini volcano were a number of hoops. I knew that Sara and the other competitors all had to travel through the hoops in order, and whoever made it through all of them first was declared the winner.
I couldn’t help but notice that one of the hoops was directly above the hole at the top of the volcano. This was not going to be an easy day for these four competitors.
I also took the opportunity to look around the crowd for the first time. Every single seat in the stadium was full. There were lots of blues, reds, and blacks from people cheering for the other competitors, but I also noticed a whole lot of people wearing coven of Jupiter green. After all, inside the stadium, magic wasn’t permitted. It would have been too easy for somebody in the stands to use magic to impact the competition results, so the entire stadium was warded to prevent any sort of magic being used outside of the stage area. That meant no magical signs, no magical fireworks in the color of a certain fan’s competitor, nothing like that. So instead, people dressed up in the color of their coven and let their allegiances be known that way.
I spotted quite a few people from the coven of Jupiter. Lita wasn’t too far away, sitting with another couple of witches and wizards in different colors; I assumed they were the heads of Lisa’s and Derek’s covens. The head of the coven of Titan wouldn’t leave Kilokilo, I knew that much. Directly across from us but sitting toward the bottom of the stadium were a number of other people that I recognized from Western Woods. There was Estelle Thurman, which surprised me, and her mother. Jomund, the dragon shifter who had knocked me off my broom and came by to apologize about it later. Leon, the head of security that Rosa Lynn had fired, and Michael, the wizard who worked at the gym who had dated Sara for a few months. Sara’s mom was with a few other family members who had decided to forgo the friends and family section—their red hair gave them all away—and looked like she was going to throw up at any minute. Kyran was sitting in the top row at the far end of the stadium. He looked around casually, saw me looking at him, and nodded his head. I sent him a text telling him to get over here, that he was absolutely welcome in the friends and family box.
He replied that this was a moment for Sara and her friends, and that he was happy where he was. I knew Kyran wasn’t a big socializer, so I let him be, but I was glad he was here.
There were a few others I recognized from Western Woods but didn’t know their names.
“Now, let’s bring out the competitors,” Eli’s voice boomed from some unknown origin, and suddenly Sara and the others appeared, flying on their brooms, circling around the stadium and waving to the crowd as everyone burst into cheers once more. At this rate, when the competition was over, everyone in the crowd would be all cheered out.
For my part, I felt all of the nerves hit me like a giant punch to the gut. I sat down in my seat and began wringing my hands as I watched Sara fly around. I thought about all of the people back home in Western Woods who were undoubtedly watching this on TV, all of Sara’s family, all of the bullies who had made fun of her in school because she couldn’t cast spells properly. I thought of Diane, and how Sara was doing this for her, and I really, really hoped that she was going to do her best. That was all one could ask for; that Sara just do her best.
“Competitors, please come to the far end of the stadium in preparation for the race to begin.”
This was it. The final broom competition of the year. It was about to get going.
Chapter 20
As soon as the horn blared to let the contestants know the competition had started, they were off like shots. All four of them went straight through the first two hoops together, at the base of the volcano, but then as they reached the third hoop, a burst of flame shot from the mouth of one of the dragons. I gasped in worry, but all four competitors were adept enough to avoid the flame, each flying in a different direction to get away.
Derek pulled out his wand and shot an extra flame toward Lisa, whose hair caught fire. She didn’t notice for a second, but when she finally realized what had happened, she didn’t miss a beat. Pulling out her own wand, she muttered something and a blast of water came out from it, dousing her hair, which was now a solid two inches shorter than it had been a moment ago.
The small delay was enough to find her behind the other three competitors, however, all of whom were now speeding through the fourth hoop.
I couldn’t decide whether or not I wanted to watch. On the one hand, I wanted to see everything that happened. But on the other, if something happened to Sara, I didn’t want to see it. Was she going to win? Was she going to lose? I just needed to know, either way.
No matter how much I wanted to pull my eyes away and just cover them, however, my brain kept them trained on my friend.
The three m
ain competitors were now flying straight up into the sky, toward a hoop high above the seats we were sitting in. From there, they would have to go through more hoops in a circular pattern high above us before diving back down toward the hoop just above the volcano’s lip. Seeing how the track worked, I realized they were all going to have to go into the volcano. That was insane. It couldn’t work that way, could it?
Still, I was getting ahead of myself. Derek was in front, Karen just behind him, and Sara was a couple yards back from her, but gaining inches here and there. In terms of pure speed, Sara was by far the best of this group. By the time the three of them reached the hoop in the sky, Sara had crept ahead of Karen. She pulled out her wand and cast a spell, sending a bolt of thunder toward Derek, but he turned at the last second and it missed.
He turned to see who had cast a spell against him, and he grinned. Pulling his wand out himself, he muttered something and a shield appeared in front of Karen and Sara. Sara pulled up hard on her broom, avoiding it at the last second, but Karen didn’t quite manage it. She hit the shield and let out a yelp as her broom was forced off-course and she began falling from the sky. She gripped the broom with one hand and managed to climb back onto it before reaching the ground, zooming back in the direction she came, but now finding herself about as far back from Sara and Derek as Lisa was.
As they circled around high above the stadium, Sara and Derek swapped spells cast at each other. For my part, I was so proud of Sara. All of the spells she was casting seemed to be correct; there was no look of surprise on her face when something weird happened with her spells. But she and Derek were both too skilled, each one managing to dart from side to side to avoid the spells cast by the other, all the while slipping through each hoop in the correct order, making sure to stay on track to win.
The dragons chased after Sara and Derek, spinning around them and occasionally shooting fire from their mouths, but they were no match for the two expert riders who seemed to view these additional obstacles as nothing more than mere annoyances on their quest to be the best.
The two of them eventually did the complete circle around the stadium, and the next hoop they had to go through was the one that would send them straight through into the center of the volcano.
I held my breath, every single ounce of my energy focused on Sara. She had to make it through this. She just had to.
A gasp rose up from the crowd as the ground beneath us began to tremble while both Sara and Derek flew nose-down toward the hoop. Suddenly, the volcano exploded, shooting lava high into the air directly at Sara and Derek.
I let out a shout of surprise and jumped to my feet. Derek had darted out of the way, but the tail of his broom had caught fire, and he spun out of control, plummeting toward the ground while barrel rolling over and over. He regained control of his broom and swooped back up, so close to the ground he had to lift his feet to avoid hitting them.
Sara, however, wasn’t quite as lucky. The lava had enveloped her completely, and tears sprung to my eyes. She had to be ok. She just had to.
I looked at the other girls. Tears streamed down Ellie’s face, while Amy was whispering something. Praying to Jupiter, probably. The entire crowd was silent as the lava spewed out of the hole. Then, a second later, it dissipated. The hoop the contestants had to go through was still there, and Sara was just going through it, surrounded by a sort of bubble that must have protected her from the lava.
How on earth had she managed to cast that spell so quickly, and so well? She was absolutely amazing.
The stadium roared to life as everyone realized that Sara had just burst into the lead. She sped through the hoop at an angle that meant she didn’t have to go into the volcano afterward, sliding between the hoop and the crater’s entrance, and then continued through the path. She was almost home free.
I spotted Derek swearing as he made his way back to the hoop, but he was so far behind now, there was no hope. Lisa and Karen had caught up and passed him in the time it had taken him to regain control of his broom, and he found himself in a distant last.
When Sara crossed through the finish line and was officially declared the winner, fireworks exploded. Fireworks that couldn’t be heard over the sound of the crowd. Or maybe it was just the sound of my screaming. I jumped up and down, Ellie, Amy, and I all crowding together in a huge group hug.
She had done it! Sara had done it. With Karen crossing through second, Lisa third, and Derek desperately trying to make his way past Lisa at the end but failing, Sara overtook Derek for total points in the competition and was the overall winner.
Lightning rained down above the crowd—the fact that there was no accompanying thunder confirmed that it was magical—as Sara did laps of the crowd, waving at everybody, a huge grin on her face for all to see. I could see her looking around, and as soon as she spotted us, she waved even harder, starting to laugh.
I blew kisses at her as Ellie screamed out her name. I couldn’t believe it. She had actually won. I knew she had it in her, I had known it the entire time, but to see it actually happening was something else. I couldn’t have been more proud of my friend.
The two dragons had shot celebratory fire into the sky and then landed on the ground next to the other contestants and shifted back into their human forms, cheering as Sara started lapping the stadium in celebration.
Sara took out her wand and tossed it into the crowd, where it landed in the middle of a group of witches, the one who caught it holding it up proudly for Sara to see. Sara laughed and gave the lucky witch the thumbs up sign.
It was all so amazing I barely noticed the commotion on the other side of the stadium. Someone screamed, and people in the area began to move around in surprise. The scene caught my attention and I looked over just in time to see that Michael, the employee from the gym who had dated Sara a while back, had tied a rope to his seat and was scaling his way down to the arena floor.
“Oh no!” I shouted as he grabbed his wand. A gasp came up from the crowd, and I looked over at everyone else. The dragon shifters were in the middle of a conversation with the other three contestants. They were on the other side of the volcano from Michael, anyway. There was no way they would be able to see that Michael had jumped onto the stadium floor.
“What’s he doing?” Ellie said, grabbing my arm as she noticed the same thing.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But I don’t think it’s good.” Even though he was a decent ways away, I could see the expression on Michael’s face. I had seen it on a few people in the past. He was looking to murder someone. And he was staring right at Sara.
There was no time for security to get there. Even if the shifters made their way into the arena now, Michael already had his wand raised.
“Sara!” I shouted as loudly as I could, but it was no use. She couldn’t hear me over the crowd, and she had just thrown her wand away.
And Michael was already muttering a spell.
Chapter 21
I didn’t know what to do. I froze. Amy had her wand out and was muttering something, but nothing was happening. Of course it wasn’t. The stadium was hexed so that spells wouldn’t work, apart from on the stage floor.
But there was nothing else to do. Nothing else to try. We were too far away to do anything else.
Titan, help me, I called out silently. As if I was moving in slow motion, my body began to act almost of its own volition. I grabbed my wand and pointed it at Michael.
“Titan, lord of water, protect this witch from harm.”
The energy that burst forth from my wand was so powerful it knocked me backward into the seat. Two huge rays of light emanated from my wand. One of them rushed toward Sara, transforming itself into a large rectangular shield that blocked the spell Michael cast. The other sped toward him. He saw it at the last second, his mouth opening wide as he was enveloped into the ball of energy.
The stadium was silent; every single eye in the place was on me.
“How…how did you cast that spell?” Amy fi
nally asked in a voice so small it was almost a whisper. “Magic doesn’t work in here.”
“I don’t know,” I replied truthfully. I had absolutely no idea what had happened.
I looked over as a bunch of shifters—security workers—rushed toward Michael. He was still trapped in the pulsating ray of light from my spell, and as they approached, with Eli making his way over as well, the ray suddenly dissipated, allowing them to arrest Michael and take him into custody.
Sara was safe.
She flew over toward me. “Tina, what happened? Was he going to kill me? He was going to kill me, wasn’t he?”
“But he didn’t. And you know what? You’re the freaking champ, Sara! You did it!”
She let out a laugh. “To be honest, it hasn’t quite sunk in just yet. Listen, I have to go. But thank you. You have no idea how much I appreciate what you just did for me.”
Sara flew off, and I looked around. Most of the people in the stadium were still staring at me, and a sudden need to get out of the spotlight overtook me. I rushed back into the private room, with Ellie and Amy following after me. We were the only people in there; everyone else was outside in their seats, watching Sara’s celebration.
“Do you really have no idea how you cast that spell?” Amy asked, and I shook my head.
“I really don’t have a clue. I just knew I had to save Sara, and I asked Titan to help, and the next thing I knew, that spell happened.”
“That was one of the most powerful performances of magic I have ever seen,” Amy said. “The energy that emanated from you was like nothing else.”
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