Ordinary Magic

by Caitlen Rubino-Bradway

  “Of course not, don’t be ridiculous. Think, Abby. If you were contagious, we’d all be ords.” She stopped and visibly calmed herself down. “That’s just people being scared. And ignorant.”

  Alexa returned to Rothermere two days later, to get back to work and clear the way for my acceptance. Before she left, she sat me down at the kitchen table (ignoring Gil’s grumbles about how necessary privacy was for the creative process) and worked up a charm. It looked like a simple, flat, silver disk, but when the sunlight glinted off it you could see the spiderweb of magic woven inside.

  When she finished, she threaded a chain through it and, with a flick of her fingers, popped it around my neck.

  “What’s this for?” I asked.

  “Protection. If anything ever happens, if you need me, you break this,” she said, tapping the charm at my throat, “and I’ll know to come get you.”

  Then Alexa—who was to thank for draining the magic out of my room—took me around the house to unhex the shower so I could get clean and the doors so I could move around and a bookshelf in case I wanted to read and one cupboard so I could get something to eat if no one was around, and everything else that I needed to use every day but couldn’t if someone didn’t help me. I knew it was a pain for my family at first—to have to use little knobs to turn on the water in the bathroom instead of just poofing the perfect pressure and temperature, and having doors open to just one room instead of whatever room it was you wanted—but nobody said anything.

  A week after she went back, Alexa called to say I was in. Turns out it was just that simple. There were a few forms and formalities to take care of, but Mom and Dad had them done inside an hour. Alexa also sent regular school supplies—a handbook, a list of school rules, tuition guidelines, that sort of thing.

  After the flurry of the school-application stuff was done, I read books (I had lots of time for that), helped in the bakery, and got quizzed endlessly by Jeremy, who was now home for summer break. It pains me to say it, but he is actually great with the school stuff. He’s really patient when we’re going over schoolwork, and he doesn’t mind if you ask questions, and he’s so into the material that it’s hard not to get interested yourself.

  Business at our bakery hiccuped a little right after my Judging, and then continued like before. But for Dad there were days, then weeks, when no one appeared at his shop. Sure, magic carpets are a luxury, but there wasn’t a family in Lennox that couldn’t afford one.

  It was around Midsummer when the adventurers rolled in, a pair of heroes on the hunt for an ord. They made an offer for me. By that time my parents had had so many offers it almost seemed natural.

  Adventurers, or treasure seekers, or traveling heroes, whatever you call them, are actually pretty common. There’s money to be made in the adventuring trade (rolling-on-a-pile-of-gold-laughing-hysterically kind of money), if you are brave enough or clever enough or just too stubborn to stop looking for whatever lost thing of untold worth someone wants. It takes money to start, but you can make it back and then some by selling things legally to museums and guilds, and even more by selling them illegally to private collectors. There are always people willing to pay for powerful objects. The kind of people who usually end up on the evening news after the Kingsmen raid their homes.

  Adventuring is one thing ords are wanted and needed for, and that they are actually good at. Sure, if you are clever, or just really hard to kill, you can probably get past the maze of curses and traps, double enchantments and protection spells, to the Legendary Artifact of Whatsit that’s imprisoned in the Cave of Despair and Darkness by the Dread Sorcerer Whosit. But you can save yourself a lot of time and trouble by getting an ord who can just walk past all that.

  This pair said they’d heard that an ord had turned up, and, coincidentally, they were looking to replace their last one. They had “a whelp” who made it through six years of enchantments and curses and dragon’s fire, only to up and fall off a cliff. Or jump, Barbarian Mike wasn’t too clear on that. In any case, they were eight months without an ord and two jobs behind, so they were willing to pay any price. Or so they said.

  Only Barbarian Mike introduced himself. He looked, well, exactly like you’d expect a guy called “Barbarian Mike” to look. Giant sword, furry bikini shorts, and all. He was adventurer good-looking—you know, the muscular, rugged, “I get punched in the face a lot” type. His companion was lean and wiry and tense, like a bowstring pulled too tight. She was very pretty in a fierce way: deeply red hair swept back from her face; sharp, dark eyes; strong eyebrows arched at a dramatic slant. Her face was bordering on sunburned, making it look like she might burst into flame at any moment.

  They knocked on our door late in the afternoon, when Mom was taking a shower and Dad was still in his shop. Barbarian Mike took a seat, but his companion just stood by the door, scowling and not saying much. (She did snap at me to get her a glass of water, and Olivia snapped back that if she wanted water, she could get it herself, and Barbarian Mike held up his hands and muttered something to his friend about “territory.”) Apparently, they were going on a mission to save the world from an evil king.

  “King Steve?” Jeremy said, incredulous.

  “No,” Mike said.

  “King Ewald, then,” Olivia said. Her cheeks were red from a long, hot day at work, and she’d rolled up her sleeves and unbuttoned her neckline. Barbarian Mike kept staring at her, which made his friend glare at both of them.

  “King Ewald’s not that bad,” Gil protested.

  “It’s not King Ewald,” Barbarian Mike said.

  “Okay, wait, how many kings are there?” Olivia asked. “There’s like—what?—nine provinces in Svarga? Right?”

  “They’re not all kings,” Jeremy informed us. “Three are duly elected regents, and currently the province of Perunovic is—”

  “Do regents count?” Gil asked.

  “They do not count. They’re called regents, not kings,” Jeremy said, shoving his glasses farther up his nose with a severe index finger.

  Barbarian Mike’s companion finally spoke. “He’s not king yet.”

  My brothers and sister looked at each other.

  “As a matter of fact, he’s eight years old,” Barbarian Mike said. “You see, there’s this prophecy—”

  “I’m guessing you didn’t hear about King Steve’s edict,” Olivia said, flipping her hair back in a practiced maneuver. Barbarian Mike shook his head eagerly.

  “He’s forbidden any and all prophecies in the Westren Kingdom. He said they’re malicious and duplicitous,” Jeremy added.

  “That’s ridiculous,” the woman snapped.

  “It’s the law,” Jeremy said.

  She rolled her eyes at that.

  “What my friend means,” Barbarian Mike jumped in, “is that we don’t have a choice. We can’t ignore this prophecy. If we want to stop this evil king—”

  “The evil eight-year-old?” Olivia grinned, a quick flash that left Barbarian Mike stunned and blinking.

  “Yes, the evil eight-year-old king,” his companion pressed on, her eyes burning into Olivia. “We need to get an ancient artifact of untold power from a dark fortress deep in forbidden territory. Our path is fraught with countless dangers, and there are evil forces that will do anything to keep us from our goal.”

  Gil and Olivia studiously didn’t look at each other as they struggled to keep straight faces.

  I wondered what kind of evil forces. In the movies the evil forces always wear long black robes and have dramatic music cues and shout things about destiny. Those kind were a lot more fun than the guys on reality cop shows; the evil forces on TV always seemed to be skinny guys who tied up their pants with rope.

  “And you figure I can stroll right into there, get this artifact, and stroll out again alive,” I said. I had to admit, it was nice to hear people talking about what I could do for once.

  And then things went downhill. Fast. When I opened my mouth Barbarian Mike and his friend exchange
d a glance. For the first time since they arrived, the woman wasn’t scowling. She looked surprised. “You let it speak freely?”

  The question wasn’t mean. It was genuine astonishment, and it was directed toward Gil and Olivia and Jeremy, who did not take it well. Olivia surged to her feet; Gil managed to catch her arms and pull her back down on the couch while Jeremy, quite calmly and for once actually sounding like a grown-up, informed our guests that they should leave.

  “You’re joking,” the woman said. She looked from Jeremy to Gil to Olivia and back again. “You’re serious? Really?”

  “I’m not going to tell you again,” Jeremy said, doing a pretty good Dad impression.

  Barbarian Mike held up his hands. “Whoa, babe! Everybody, let’s calm down. Now, we need an ord. We’ll pay double, triple, anything you want, but we need your ord. Jobs are racking up. If we don’t get an ord pretty soon we’ll be losing business to the competition.”

  “My sister is not for sale,” Olivia hissed.

  “Are you even the owners?” the woman asked.

  “The owners?” Gil repeated.

  “The legal owners of that.” She pointed at me. “The ones authorized to accept or refuse an offer of purchase. Don’t you even know the regulations?”

  “That would be Mom and Dad,” Jeremy said. Olivia shot him a savage look. “It’s true.”

  “It is true,” Gil said before Olivia could start sputtering furiously. “But you would be wasting your time. They’ll give you the exact same answer. Abby is not for sale. No ord is. According to ‘regulations,’ buying and selling children is illegal.”

  The woman shook her head, muttering something about amateurs. “Look, pretty boy, we’re not leaving until—”

  “We would prefer to make a formal offer to the legal owners,” Barbarian Mike interrupted. “Just to keep everything simple. We can wait here while you go get them.” He smiled at me. “It will give us a chance to get to know Abby better.”

  Gil put a hand on my shoulder, his fingers digging in so hard it hurt. “No thank you. Abby can get our parents. We’ll stay here with you.” He shoved me toward the door.

  Dad was in his workshop, needle flashing as he frowned over a complicated section of embroidery on a special order. “Hello, brown-eyed girl,” he said without looking up. “What’s up?”

  “They want to make a formal offer,” I finished after explaining what had been going on.

  Dad set his needle down and pulled on his mustache. He has one of those dashing pirate-type mustaches, and occasionally he still swings in on chandeliers and sweeps Mom off her feet. “Whose turn is it?”

  “It’s Mom’s, but they’re not very nice—well, one of them isn’t—and you know how Mom gets when people are mean. They’re insisting that they have to tell you their offer.”

  “You want to stay here while I get rid of them?” he asked.

  “No way,” I said. “This is my favorite part.”

  “Come on, then,” he said, putting his arm around me. “Why are they here again?”

  “They need an artifact to fulfill a prophecy and stop an evil king.”

  “They need a new story. That one’s getting old.”

  Barbarian Mike’s voice carried all the way down the hall. It held an indulgent “let me explain it to you again” tone. The kind that makes you want to do the exact opposite of whatever someone tells you to do. “Look, I get that you’re attached to the girl, but she’s not your sister anymore. She’s an ord, and ords are dangerous if you don’t handle them right.”

  Olivia started to tell him exactly what he could handle and how he could handle it when Dad charged into the living room. “What’s your offer?” The guy was huge.

  “Ten—”

  “No thank you. Good-bye,” Dad said.

  “—thousand. Ten thousand,” Barbarian Mike said.

  “No thank you. Good-bye.”

  “Twelve thousand. Fifteen.”

  “Good-bye,” Dad said. My brothers and sister were grinning.

  “What do you want? We’ll pay anything.”

  “I want you to leave.”

  The woman threw up her hands. “You people are unbelievable. I’m going to take this up with the Guild. They told us there’d be an ord. That’s our ord, we get dibs.”

  “Dibs?” For the first time ever, Dad sounded dangerous.

  “Yeah, dibs,” Barbarian Mike said. He looked at us. “You guys have an ord, how can you not know this? It’s basic procedure, man. Okay, so when an ord is discovered, if the town’s Guild doesn’t want it, they send out a call.” He pointed at me. “That’s our ord. Name your price, dude.”

  “Ellen,” Dad called. “Get the police, would you? We have trespassers.”

  The next moment Mom was there, her wet hair leaving damp blotches on her robe. She sized up the situation and took hold of me so tight I had finger marks on my arm for two days after. “You’re trying to buy my child. My daughter will be very interested to learn this.” When they glanced at Olivia, Mom added, “My oldest daughter. Who works for the king.”

  The adventurers stiffened at that. Barbarian Mike looked around at all of us and then at his companion. His face was friendly, with a slightly doofy smile, but I have been around Mom and Dad long enough to know when a grown-up is saying something without saying something. His friend looked at me. Really looked—up and down and all over—when neither of them had more than glanced in my direction before. But it wasn’t a personal kind of look; it was more the look you’d give a carpet you wanted to buy. It was a “you are nothing” kind of look. There wasn’t anything mean about it, which made it worse.

  Then she turned back to Barbarian Mike and shrugged. And Barbarian Mike smiled at us and said if that was their decision he’d have to live with it, and shook everybody’s hand, and left. His friend didn’t do any of that except for the leaving part, which we were fine with.

  Gil waited a minute and then slipped on an invisibility spell and followed after them. He was back within twenty minutes to confirm that the adventurers were out of town, heading north. That didn’t stop Mom from giving the cops a heads-up, or Olivia from burying an extra row of ward stones along the protection circle that surrounded our house.

  CHAPTER

  6

  The rest of the summer was pretty quiet—no more offers, no more adventurers. Lots of long, sunny mornings sitting in the window seat in Dad’s shop, lots of Gil muttering to himself at the kitchen table and jumping out at us when we least expected it, shouting, “Which do you like better—‘furious’ or ‘infuriated’?”

  The morning we left, it was rush-rush-rush and busy-busy-busy from the first second. Wake. Shower. Dress. (“Pants, Abby,” Mom called, a warning finger pointed at me.) Jeremy was in the middle of his annual “returning to school” panic attack, fretting over not having enough potion bottles and where had he packed his grimoire and why had he sent it on ahead instead of saving it to study on the flight? (Which was surprising because Jeremy usually has his spell book welded to his hands.) Olivia whipped up waffles for breakfast.

  It was as if I were a normal kid—a magic kid, that is, going to a magic school. And it’s not like I was truly saying good-bye; my family has a way of getting in each other’s business, no matter the odds or the distance, which is why I didn’t cry that much. Olivia—eyes fierce, voice breaking—grabbed me close until she was finally able to hiss, “I swear, Abby, if we don’t hear from you every week, I’ll drag you back home by your hair. I am so not kidding.”

  “Come on, O. It’s not like we’re never going to see her again,” Gil said, sweeping me up in a big spinning hug. “Speaking of, Abs, can I have your half of the bedroom?” Olivia smacked him. “Ow! What? It’s not like I’m trying to get rid of her memory. It’s about prioritizing my work space. I need a study.”

  “You want to share your study with Olivia?” I asked.

  “Oh no. I plan to buy her out.”

  “I’m not selling.” Olivia sniffe
d, swiping at her eyes.

  “And it’s not your house,” Dad reminded us.

  “You can have my room if I can have a cut,” I said.

  “What? Abby? I mean, I’d expect this from Olivia because she has a black, withered pit where her heart should be, but you?” Gil put a hand on his chest and did his best to look shocked. “My baby sister. Whom I convinced Mom and Dad to keep, purely out of the goodness of my heart. They wanted to get rid of you because you were funny looking.”

  “That’s not funny,” Olivia said.

  Gil ignored her. “You know, because of all the freckles. They wanted to call you Spot and donate you to the local animal shelter, but I said no. I said, let us not judge a child purely on the number of freckles—”

  I threw my arms around Gil and hugged him quiet.

  Dad shook out one of his oldest carpets on the front lawn, the green-and-gold one with knotted fringe that he wove back in college. It was just your straightforward, no-frills flying carpet, but it was the biggest one, which was important because we were doing a favor for Alexa.

  We climbed on, Mom putting me right between her and Dad, with Jeremy behind us, so they could both get to me quickly. The carpet had spells to keep everyone’s balance, and there was a shield to prevent people from falling off. For extra insurance, Dad called up the rug fibers, twisting them into a rope around my waist. If I moved too much one way or another, it tightened up like a snake and jerked me back into my seat.

  Dad murmured something, and the carpet lifted up. There’s always a moment of freefall with magic carpets when your body goes up but your stomach stays down. It’s my favorite part. The carpet picked up speed and my head started spinning as we kept going up and up and up and then—everything was perfect. The wind was rushing all around, lifting us up until we were light as frosting and twice as weightless. The sky stretched out all around us, blue and cloudless. I could see part of one moon peeking out in front of us.