Wizardmatch

by Lauren Magaziner

“I . . . I did?” She looked down at the snakes—but they were just as visible as ever.

  “Just for a few seconds. Before you threw this little tantrum. I deserve a trophy.”

  “You?” Lennie scoffed. “I’m the one who did it!”

  “And it was all thanks to my teaching methods,” he said, uncoiling the snakes from around her limbs, one-by-one. “Without me, you would have gotten NOWHERE. Therefore, it is I who deserves a trophy, a plaque, a medal, a certificate, a cookie, a round of applause, and a standing ovation.” He bowed. “But now, the ultimate test.” Uncle Humphrey extended a hand to her.

  Lennie sucked in a deep breath and grabbed his hand. She invisibled, and so did her clothes, but Uncle Humphrey did not. If you truly believe that you would have been the best Prime Wizard, she told herself, then you can do this ONE LITTLE THING.

  Uncle Humphrey flickered for just a moment. “Don’t worry. We’ll work on that,” he said. “We’re going to practice every night until you can keep me invisible for at least ten seconds. I believe in you.”

  “WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!” Lennie howled into the sky. She danced around the trees. She jumped up and down. She wanted to cry and sing and whoop all at the same time.

  “Do you know what this means?” she kept saying over and over to Uncle Humphrey. “I’m going to be the strongest Pomporromp! Other than Poppop!”

  “What am I, chopped liver?”

  This was what she had trained for her whole life. This was what she dreamed of!

  Michael could keep her mom as a trainer; Lennie had a way better tutor now. She was about to double lap her brother. And Uncle Humphrey, unlike the rest of her family, believed she could.

  Take that, Mom! Take that, Poppop! TAKE THAT, WIZARDMATCH!

  Ooey Gooey Icky Sticky Double-Dog Dare

  In the morning, Michael shook her awake. “Lennieeeee. Lennieeeeee.”

  “Erghhhh,” Lennie groaned. She had been out training for most of the night, finally sneaking back into her room around dawn.

  Michael began massaging her head. Though, it was really more like nudging her head with his fingers. “Are you mad at me?”

  “Right now? YES!” she said, rolling over.

  “Why?”

  “You’re waking me up early.”

  “Oh.” He paused. “Are you mad at me for other stuff?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like the time you continued to ask me questions when I was trying to sleep!”

  “Are you mad at me about Wizardmatch?”

  She sat up, finally, and rubbed her bleary eyes. She was surprised at the question—and even more surprised that she didn’t have an answer. Was she mad at him?

  “I think . . .” Michael hummed. “You’re jealous.”

  “I am not jealous!” Lennie said.

  “Jelly like the Jelly Floor!” Michael accused.

  Her face grew hot. “I AM NOT JEALOUS!”

  “That’s what Mom says.”

  “Mom doesn’t know anything.”

  “Mom is smarter than you! She has a masters plus fifteen!”

  “You don’t even know what that means!” Lennie said.

  “Neither do you!”

  Lennie gripped the edge of her bunk bed. “YOU ARE SO OBNOXIOUS!”

  Michael frowned. “You were a better sister before Wizardmatch!”

  Lennie hopped off the bed and stormed out of the room. Even though she was barefoot. Even though she was still in her pajamas. Even though she didn’t even brush her teeth. She stomped along the cold floor, storming, fuming.

  She shuffled around the ramp. Poppop liked to poke people not on skateboards, but let him try to poke her right now. She’d come at him with the bite of fifteen Fluffingtons—

  “You do not know who you’re dealing with!” snarled Julien, a few floors below her.

  “Who cares?” Ethan shouted back.

  Lennie turned invisible and crawled to the edge of the ramp—a perfect angle where she could spy. Julien, Ethan, and Bo were in a three-way standoff, aggressively scowling at one another.

  “I just don’t understand,” Ethan said, his face sour, “how you won the first test. You and your dad have always acted like you’re hot stuff, but you’re not so great.”

  “That’s not what Poppop says,” Julien said smugly.

  Ethan took a menacing step closer. “And when your dad said I was a two-bit haircut—”

  “Shave and a haircut . . . two bits!” Bo sang.

  “He didn’t say anything that wasn’t true!” Julien said, standing on his tiptoes to be even with Ethan.

  “Let’s all calm down,” Bo said, gnawing on his sleeve.

  “You’re not going to eat that are you?” Ethan said.

  “Your powers are disgusting,” Julien said.

  They both looked at Bo like he was contagious.

  “Mother says I am a rare bird.”

  “More like birdbrain,” Julien said. “No offense, but you can’t possibly hope to win against me.”

  “Maybe he can’t, but I can!” Ethan said as his hair began to morph into spikes.

  “Whatever, Mr. Haircut.”

  “I like these nicknames! Call me Mr. Birdbrain!” Bo said brightly.

  “It was supposed to be an insult, Bo!” Julien said.

  “Up there!” Ethan said. “Lennie’s spying on us!”

  Ooops! She was so absorbed in their fight that she didn’t even realize her invisibility ran out.

  “Come down and face us! Don’t spy like a creep!” Julien called out.

  “If you don’t want someone to hear, then don’t fight in the hall!” she said, hands on her hips.

  “Did I hear something?” Julien said, swiveling up the ramp toward her, Ethan and Bo close behind. “Must have been no one. No one important, anyway!”

  Lennie folded her arms. “I could magic circles around you!”

  Julien smirked. “If you’re so good at magic, why weren’t you picked for Wizardmatch?”

  “Leave me alone!”

  “You’re going to be leaving, not me!” Julien said with a toothy smile. “When I become Prime Wizard, I’m not going to allow bummers to visit the estate. So take a long last look around.”

  Lennie clenched her hands into fists. “You can’t ban me from the castle!”

  “The Prime Wizard can do whatever he wants.”

  “Or she!” Lennie said.

  “He.” Julien smiled. “It’s always been a he. It always will be a he.”

  Lennie flushed with rage.

  “If you’re really so special, Lennie, why don’t you prove it?”

  “What’d you have in mind?”

  “Follow me.” Julien smirked, rolling away on his skateboard.

  Lennie whistled for a skateboard of her own and zoomed after her cousin. She bent her knees, skating so close to Julien’s tail that she could have knocked him off his board. Ethan and Bo drifted a few yards behind.

  Lennie skateboarded around and around the castle, down the ramp. She didn’t know where Julien was taking her, but he finally slowed down at the twenty-second floor. The Jelly Floor.

  It oozed and dripped and glopped and glooped. The hallways glistened with purple jelly; it bled out into the skateboard ramp, like snail slime.

  “I dare you,” Julien said, pointing to the hallway, “to go onto the Jelly Floor!”

  Ethan gasped, and Bo hid behind his hands.

  “No way!” Lennie snorted. “I’m not stupid! If I go in there, I’ll get stuck!”

  “Chicken!” Julien replied. “I double-dog dare you!”

  “Oooooooooh!” Bo and Ethan chorused.

  “It’s a double-dog dare,” Bo said, his eyes as wide as saucers. “You can’t say no to that!”


  She peered into the hallway ahead of her—floor, walls, and ceiling all lined with jelly. It was glistening. Taunting her. I’m going to glueeeee you to the wall, it seemed to say. I’m going to tangle your hairrrrrr! I’m going to get stuck in your armpits and knee-pits and elbow-pits!

  She had no doubt she’d get stuck in the jelly. But she needed to prove she had what it takes to be a Prime Wizard. That even if she didn’t have the look, she had the guts.

  “Well?” Julien said.

  Lennie’s heart raced, and she took a step closer. She was disobeying her mom. She was breaking the rules. But it felt good to break the rules, especially since in the past few days, the rules had been breaking her.

  She took a deep breath. I can do this.

  She lifted her foot and took a step toward the jelly—

  WHOOSH!

  She went flying backward—tumbling back into Julien—like an invisible rope had yanked her.

  “WHAT ARE YOU KIDS DOING?” bellowed Poppop Pomporromp, waving his magic staff at them, the rubber ducky sitting atop gazing at them with blank plastic eyes. Fluffles skidded to a stop next to Poppop.

  “Lennie was going into the jelly, sir!” Julien said. “I tried to stop her!”

  Lennie gaped at Julien. “That’s not—”

  “It’s a very good thing I happened to pass by at the moment!” Poppop said. “If I didn’t pull you back, you would have been stuck in there! You know, the last time someone went in, they were glued for a whole week! And I don’t have time or energy to deal with this type of misbehavior when Wizardmatch is going on!”

  Lennie glared at Poppop. But he barely noticed as he turned his attention on Julien. “Oh, Julien, my dear boy, I can’t wait for you to dazzle us again in the next test. I already know you’re going to do very, very well in this competition,” he said with a wink.

  “Yes, sir!” he said.

  Poppop nodded, satisfied. “Ethan, I’m looking forward to your performance, too. And, er, Bo. Uh . . . good luck. Come, Fluffles. Let’s go.”

  Poppop stormed off, swinging his magic staff around as he skateboarded down the ramp.

  Fluffles didn’t follow. Instead, he walked up to Lennie. “I think you lost this last night,” he said, dropping something at her feet. It was her sweatshirt string—the string she’d used to distract him!

  How much did he know? Or did he only suspect? Heart thrumming, she looked at Fluffles—he had a suspicious gleam in his yellow eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said coolly.

  Fluffles squinted at her—then, without another word, he followed Poppop down the ramp. Once Fluffles was out of earshot, Julien grinned widely. And Lennie wanted, more than ever, to wipe that smile off his smug little face.

  “See? Like I said, I visit here all the time. Poppop and I are really close. I’ll always be his number one. Have fun playing catch up,” he said to Ethan and Bo. “And you won’t be playing at all,” he said, as if Lennie needed any further reminder.

  “GO AWAY!” Lennie roared.

  He laughed as he skateboarded up the castle.

  Lennie waited until Julien, Bo, and Ethan had gone before she let out a scream that echoed all across the Jelly Floor.

  As she rounded back up the ramp, she thought only of Uncle Humphrey and their plan to destroy Wizardmatch. For the sake of every family, the sooner she ended the competition, the better.

  A Plan

  At midnight, Uncle Humphrey set a grizzly bear loose in the borderlands.

  It was all part of her training, learning to stay invisible while she was constantly moving and dodging danger. She danced around the clearing, doing spins, leaps, cartwheels, hurdle jumps, stomach crawls—all while keeping away from the angry bear and remaining completely invisible.

  “Good!” Uncle Humphrey said, from his tree bough. “Now keep moving—FASTER!”

  She crouched down to catch her breath and recharge her power.

  “CAREFUL! THE BEAR IS COMING!” Uncle Humphrey said.

  She hopped up and ran. Just in time: The bear swiped the spot where she had been standing.

  “DUCK!”

  She ducked.

  “CHICKEN DANCE!”

  She invisibly chicken danced.

  “Excellent,” Humphrey said with a satisfied nod.

  That little praise was all she needed to feel her spirits soar and her energy boost—even when her magical energy ran out, she wasn’t tired. She was only ready for more.

  They kept training for an hour or so—and as the night wore on, she felt more and more comfortable holding her power under extreme stress and avoiding a bear attack. Then, Uncle Humphrey lured the bear away from the clearing by hovering a ball of water—with a wriggling salmon inside—away from the trees.

  When the bear was gone, he had her try to transfer her invisibility to him while running and hopping and moving. She wasn’t as good at making her great-uncle completely invisible—sometimes he flickered back into sight, and sometimes she drained out too soon—but her muscles ached, and her skin tingled, and magic swelled inside of her. She took that as an improvement.

  When she was soaked with sweat, too sore to even move, Uncle Humphrey finally called for her to stop. She sat down with him on the floor of the forest.

  “So what now?” Lennie asked. “How are we going to bring down Wizardmatch?”

  Uncle Humphrey tossed her some chips. “Yes, yes, good question. To rid the world of Wizardmatch, we are going to have to get rid of the Prime Wizard position.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean . . . we won’t have a Prime Wizard. The whole Pomporromp family can share Mortimer’s power. Equally.”

  “That’s an option?” Lennie asked. “But . . . if the power can be shared, why hasn’t anyone done it before?”

  “Because Prime Wizards are selfish,” Humphrey spat. “They want to hoard power for themselves—and then pick a pupil who’s going to hoard power. And so on and so on and so on. People who have power never give it up voluntarily.” Uncle Humphrey paused. “But just because it’s always been done a certain way doesn’t mean it’s the right way.”

  Lennie twisted her ponytail around her finger, deep in thought. It seemed like this was one of those things that went on for generations—something that was so entrenched in tradition that it was nearly impossible to fix the problem. But they had to fix it. “So how are we going to convince Poppop to change his mind?”

  “Convince?” Uncle Humphrey scoffed. “We’re not going to convince him. We’re going to do it for him. By taking his staff.”

  “Taking his staff?! But . . . but isn’t that dangerous? What would that even do?”

  Uncle Humphrey sighed. “Your powers lie dormant in you. When you become Prime Wizard, your magic gets activated—like a little jolt of lightning that awakens all of your powers, whether or not you are holding the staff. The magic staff amplifies those powers, but it’s not all the staff can do. If you or I touch the staff, it would increase our powers, as long as you or I were holding on to it. Haven’t you ever wondered why Poppop won’t let anyone else handle the staff?”

  She thought back to that time she confronted Poppop in his bedchamber. “Poppop told me it was really dangerous. That I shouldn’t touch it. It could burn my eyeballs out.”

  “AN INSIDIOUS, BALD-FACED LIE!” Uncle Humphrey said, and his voice was as steely as a silver filling. “He just doesn’t want anyone to have amplified powers. But if we take the staff, we can use it to share Mortimer’s powers evenly among the whole family. We’ll make everything equal. I just need you to get me to that staff.”

  It seemed like a complicated task. “How do we get it? What do we do?”

  Uncle Humphrey’s downturned mouth suddenly curled up into a smile. “This is why I am so excited about your powers, Lennie. You will transfer your invi
sibility to us both, and we will borrow Mortimer de Pomporromp’s staff when he’s not paying attention.” He closed his eyes and took a deep, satisfied breath. “I will finally be able to right the terrible wrong that was done to me when I was a child. And to you, of course. Together, we will stop Wizardmatch.”

  She jumped up to give him a high five, and he sent a burst of air to clap against her palm. “It’s time for you to go back to the castle,” Uncle Humphrey said.

  She wasn’t ready to go back—she never was. But she sighed. “All right.” She gathered her jacket and looked at the opening of the clearing. There, between two trees, a familiar pair of yellow eyes stared at her from the darkness.

  Fluffles had been watching them.

  AFTER HIM!

  Lennie and Fluffles stared at each other for a solid second. “FLUFFLES?!” she cried.

  “IT’S SIR FLUFFINGTON THE FOURTH TO YOU!” he screamed.

  Then he ran.

  “That’s Poppop’s guard cat!”

  “AFTER HIM!” Humphrey cried, and he and Lennie charged. They jumped over fallen logs, ducked under booby traps, and hopped around the ground as cautiously and quickly as they could. Lennie was running faster than she ever had before—faster than any drill she’d ever done. Her legs ached, but she pushed forward, behind the cat who was quick as a breeze.

  They followed the sound of Fluffles’s swift pads on the ground. But he was getting away! They were so close to the border of Poppop’s property that Lennie could feel the air thinning.

  Suddenly, the earth in front of them shot up—a giant wall erupting from the ground. It blocked Fluffles’s exit. Panicked, the cat scampered around, unsure of which direction to run.

  And that’s when Humphrey turned the ground beneath Fluffles’s paws into putty. Fluffles’s legs sank into the earth, and Humphrey hardened the ground again. Fluffles was stuck.

  “HELP!” Fluffles screamed. “INTRUDER! TRESPASSER!”

  “Shhhhhhhhhhh!” Lennie said. “Fluffles, keep your voice down!”

  “I AM A GUARD CAT, SWORN TO PROTECT THE PRIME WIZARD POMPORROMP, AND I WILL NOT BE SILENCED!”