by Brian Knight
Katie gave Penny the look, a thing Penny had first experienced at Dogwood School last fall, when Katie had shared her father’s long-held grudge. It was withering, and when directed at you it made you feel about a foot tall. “Fine. If you don’t want me to come over I can find something else to do.”
“No, I want you to come. I just don’t want you to get grounded.”
“Oh come on, who’s going to tell him?”
Penny did a quick mental checklist of people she knew were coming to her birthday party, not that many really, and had to admit Katie had a point. Still …
Penny shrugged. “It’s a small town.”
Katie rolled her eyes. “You don’t have to tell me that.”
Despite the risk, Penny was happy Katie was coming over. “I’ll see you later then.”
There was a muted knocking at Katie’s door, and she peered over her shoulder a final time. “Gotta go.”
And just like that Penny was staring at her own reflection in the strange little oval of glass. To her surprise, she was smiling.
It was beginning to feel like a birthday.
* * *
Penny arrived downstairs to find Susan putting the finishing touches on her birthday breakfast. Penny simply stood in the kitchen doorway for a moment, goggling at this unexpectedly domestic scene.
“Susan, you’re late for work.”
Susan turned in surprise, a momentary look of guilt on her face, then she smiled.
“Look who’s awake!” She scooped the last of the freshly cooked bacon onto a plate, then dropped her tongs into the sink and rushed toward Penny with open arms. “No worries. Jenny’s covering for me.”
Penny had to brace herself, the urge to retreat from Susan when she swooped in almost too strong to deny without her morning coffee. She’d lived with Susan, her mother’s childhood friend and Penny’s godmother, for almost a year now, but she still wasn’t used to Susan’s open and outspoken affection. Penny and her mother’s small household had been a quiet one, where love was an assumed thing, never openly exhibited. With the late Diana Sinclair, public displays of affection were limited to hand holding when crossing a busy street and the occasional, almost businesslike, love ya kiddo.
Penny accepted her morning hug with good grace, even offering a clumsy return pat on Susan’s back.
“Honestly, Penny, you’re so spoiled,” Zoe said. “She was about to bring you breakfast in bed.”
Penny tried to picture Susan climbing the ladder to her attic bedroom one-handed, with a heavily laden breakfast tray, complete with the usual morning cup of black coffee, balanced on the other, and was glad Susan hadn’t tried.
“Actually I was hoping Zoe would take pity on me and volunteer,” Susan said, and when Penny reached for a plate of waffles on the counter next to the stove, Susan blocked her path. “No you don’t.”
“Seriously?” Penny asked when she tried to step around Susan and found herself blocked again. “I can help.”
“You sit down,” Susan said, pointing at the table, where Penny’s coffee waited.
“Come on, Susan, I know how to feed myself.”
Zoe slipped behind her and hauled her back toward the table. “Just go with it, Penny. It’ll be over before you know it.”
So, you’re in on it too, Penny thought, glaring as Zoe forced her into her seat.
“Don’t be such a baby,” Zoe said, interpreting the look. She pointed at the steaming coffee. “You know that stunts your growth don’t you?”
“Ha-ha-ha,” Penny said, though without much feeling. Zoe loved her short jokes.
Penny didn’t think quitting coffee would help her gain height. She’d been born prematurely, an emergency roadside birth after an automobile accident, and was pretty sure she was forever doomed to a life of the vertically challenged. Zoe, on the other hand, was a budding Amazon, the tallest girl in their grade. Penny had tried her hand at tall jokes, to which Zoe was unfortunately immune. They only made her smile smugly.
Before Penny had half-drained her cup, the table was set and Susan was lighting a single candle in the center of a stack of waffles.
“Please don’t sing,” Penny begged. It was bad enough she’d have to sit still for a round of “Happy Birthday to You” at the party. She didn’t need it at breakfast.
Susan watched her for a second, her smooth brow wrinkling as she frowned. “Okay, Penny. I better get to work anyway.”
She swooped in for a quick, one-armed goodbye hug and patted Zoe’s head before marching out of the kitchen. A few seconds later the front door creaked open, then closed.
Zoe kicked her under the table.
“Ouch … what?”
“You are so rude! What’s your problem?”
“I don’t ….”
Zoe interrupted her. “She was just being nice and you hurt her feelings.”
“What … no!”
“Yeah, you did,” Zoe said, but she sounded less angry than confused now. “She tries really hard, and she’s so sweet to you.”
Penny said nothing, only stabbed at her waffles. Suddenly she wasn’t very hungry.
Zoe finally dropped her penetrating stare from Penny’s face and started to eat. “Aren’t you happy here?”
“Yes,” Penny said, finally looking at Zoe. “I’m just not used to all the attention.”
“I could get used to it,” Zoe said and laid her fork onto her plate, as if her appetite had gone off to look for Penny’s. “I could so get used to it.”
Penny’s face flushed with embarrassment, both for Zoe, whose disastrous birthday party was obviously still fresh in her memory, and for herself. Zoe was right, she had been rude. She didn’t want to hurt Susan.
“Well … what am I supposed to do?”
“You don’t have to do anything. Just stop being so ...,” Zoe searched the kitchen’s ceiling, as if looking for the right word. “So skittish. Every time she hugs you, you look like you want to run away. Just let her be nice … and try to be grateful.”
“I am grateful,” Penny protested again, now cutting even more furiously at her waffles.
“Then show her you are.” Zoe spoke this last in a small voice, as if afraid of angering Penny again but determined to make her point.
Penny didn’t reply for several seconds, couldn’t reply. She knew the right words, but saying them would be too embarrassing. Thankfully, Zoe seemed as ready to change the subject as she was.
“Grandma said I could spend the night again if I wanted … if it’s okay with you and Susan.”
Penny thought this was Zoe’s way of asking how much trouble she was in.
“That would be great,” she said, and when Zoe looked at her again, she smiled. “Guess who’s coming over later?”
Zoe’s expression leapt from cautious to curious at once. “Who?”
“Kat,” Penny said, feeling a little better about herself when Zoe broke into a grin. “Michael’s bringing her over.”
Zoe’s chin dropped and her already deeply tanned skin flushed almost bright red.
“He is so cute!” Zoe flushed a little darker before turning her attention back to her breakfast, seeming determined to keep her mouth busy with breakfast until she could trust it not to say anything else embarrassing.
Penny faced her own breakfast and found her appetite returned. She’d forgotten to blow her candle out, and it was burning low, the wax spreading to fill the closest squares.
I’ll make it up to Susan, she resolved.
She blew out her candle and began to eat.
* * *
Michael West’s old Jeep climbed the steep driveway to Penny’s house just before noon, throwing up a rooster tail of dust in its wake.
“There she is,” Zoe said, standing on her tiptoes on the top step of the porch and shading her eyes. A moment later she was shrinking back toward the wall and looking like she wanted very much to melt into it. Penny took her place on the steps and walked down to meet Katie when her brother pulled to a
stop.
“Hi, Red!” Michael grinned and waved from the driver’s seat. “Hi, Zoe!”
Penny waved back and turned to see Zoe give a feeble little wave of her own. There appeared to be something very interesting on the floor between her feet.
He leaned close to Katie, spoke to her for a moment, then straightened up behind the wheel as she climbed out. He made a loop at the end of the driveway and gave another wave as he drove away.
“Happy birthday!” Katie shouted over the roar of the departing Jeep and ran to meet Penny.
The moment Michael’s Jeep was out of sight Zoe joined them, the bag with their book and wands hanging from her shoulder. “We ready?”
Katie looked from Zoe to Penny and smiled. “Yeah. I’ve been ready.”
“And about time too,” said a voice from behind them, and they turned in unison to find Ronan scrambling out from under the porch. “You’ve been away too long, young Miss West.”
He emerged and shook the dust off his fur, then ran on ahead of them, pausing only once to turn around and give them an impatient bark.
“Has he always been such a creeper,” Katie asked, “or just since I met him?”
Chapter 3
Making the Circle
Ronan shadowed the girls all the way to the hollow but kept his nagging to a minimum. He stuck closest to Katie, extolled the virtues of self-confidence and positive thinking. His pep talks had become increasingly manic, and when Katie’s father finally put his foot down and forbade her from coming to Penny’s house, Ronan had lost his temper and shouted in a language Penny had never heard before. Even without knowing the language, Penny got the gist of his rant and was pretty sure it wasn’t nice.
Now that Katie had returned, he seemed more determined than ever to help her get past her block. Penny was intent on helping her as well. Part of it was simply craving to learn more, to do more, but most of it was the growing certainty that Ronan was preparing them for something. He had said as much after their fight with the Birdman.
This isn’t a game. You have a serious purpose.
He still wouldn’t tell them what that purpose was, but his changing demeanor brought his warning back to her mind.
Penny had been off in her own little world, not paying attention to where she was walking, and nearly tripped over Ronan.
He barked in irritation or humor, sometimes it was hard to tell the difference. Zoe and Katie had drawn ahead of them while she was daydreaming.
“How much longer until you have to be back?”
“We have a few hours,” Penny said. “Susan’s picking up stuff for the party after work.”
“Yes … your birthday party,” Ronan said. “Happy birthday, Little Red.”
Penny groaned and rolled her eyes, but it was a show. The nickname didn’t bother her like it used to. She didn’t think she was fooling him, either; Ronan was very good at reading their moods.
“Do you still carry the mirror around with you?”
The question caught Penny by surprise. She’d been expecting more of his grumbling about Katie’s lack of progress and her, Penny’s, responsibility to make things right with Katie’s father so she could resume her practice on a more regular basis. The last time he took this line she’d reminded him, a bit shrilly as she recalled, that she’d never even met the man and that his grudge was against her dead mother and an aunt she’d never even knew existed until the previous summer.
That had shut him up. Temporarily at least.
It still seemed weird to her that her mom and Katie’s aunt used to be friends, but she was getting used to the idea. That old connection had raised other questions in her mind and a suspicion she hadn’t dared to bring up with Ronan yet. She knew what his answer would be: more infuriating silence.
She patted her pants pocket. “Right here. We all carry them.”
She expected more words of caution from him, and he surprised her again.
“Good,” he said and actually nodded approval before resuming his trot. “Keep them with you at all times. It’s important for us to stay in contact, especially with Kat in trouble.”
Penny jogged to catch up. “Have you got them all now?”
She knew he’d been snooping around Dogwood since last fall, trying to track down all of Tovar’s missing mirrors.
“It’s impossible to know without another look in the Conjuring Glass.”
“You know where it is,” Penny said, catching up to him. She could see the top boughs of Aurora Hollow’s willows ahead. As always she looked for the crown of the big tree, the strange one growing at the edge of the creek that ran through the hollow, but she didn’t see it. After some botanical research Zoe had identified it as a Fraxinus excelsior, a type of ash common in Europe but certainly not in Washington State. She had no idea how a European ash had ended up in Dogwood. From inside the hollow, that tree seemed colossal, reaching into the green canopy toward the sky.
“Tonight maybe. I would like to be sure.”
“It’ll be like a slumber party,” Penny said, and laughed when Ronan turned back to her and rolled his eyes.
A few seconds later they were at the downward path into the narrow canyon that hid Aurora Hollow from the rest of the world, and Penny followed Ronan.
* * *
Zoe and Katie already had their wands out and pointed into the fire pit when Penny joined them.
“You’re too tense,” Zoe said, grabbing Katie’s wand arm and giving it a little shake. “You gotta relax a bit.”
“And what,” Katie asked sourly, “let The Force flow through me?”
“What’s The Force?” Ronan asked, pausing at the creek’s edge.
“I’ll tell you what The Force is,” Penny said, “if you tell us what we’re preparing for.”
Ronan didn’t respond to Penny’s bait. He leapt across the creek to the stone ledge on the other side and vanished into his cave.
“Way to go, Little Red,” Katie said, wrenching her arm free of Zoe’s grip with a look of irritation. “You pissed him off.”
“You’re not relaxing,” Zoe snapped.
“He’ll be back,” Penny said, unconcerned.
She kind of hoped he was annoyed though, at least a little. Ronan was still keeping stuff from her, stuff about her, and she was beyond annoyed about that.
“Why do I need to relax?” Katie asked, turning her irritation back on Zoe.
“Because it’ll help you face your fears,” Ronan answered from the mouth of his cave.
All three girls turned to face him, startled by his sudden reappearance.
“I’ve let you fight this alone for too long, Kat,” he said, and he sounded almost mournful. “I didn’t want it to happen like this.”
“Didn’t want what to happen?” Definitely exasperated now. Definitely not relaxing.
“I hoped you would be able to conquer your fears alone,” Ronan said. “But you haven’t, and you won’t ask for help. I didn’t want to be the one to drag them into the light.”
It was a long moment before Katie could speak. She regarded him with something like horror.
Penny met Zoe’s eyes and saw her own confusion mirrored in them.
“Don’t,” Katie whispered. “Please.”
“What is he talking about, Kat?” Zoe tucked the black wand into her pocket and walked to Katie’s side.
Katie flinched when Zoe put a hand on her shoulder, but her eyes never left Ronan. “How can you know?”
“I know,” Ronan said, and he sounded regretful, ashamed of himself. “But I don’t know what.”
Katie watched him, her cheeks glowing in embarrassment. Penny saw the wand rise in her shaking hand, and for a moment she though Katie was about to attack Ronan. Instead she held it over her shoulder and Zoe took it from her.
“You have to tell us, Kat.” Ronan stepped to the edge of his stone shelf and dropped onto his belly. “Tell us what happened.”
“It’s nothing,” Katie said. Her astonishment seemed to
have evaporated. Her voice was brisk now.
But Penny saw that it was something. It was hurting Katie to even think about it.
“Tell us, Kat.”
“Ronan, why are you doing this?” Penny marched forward and stopped between them, so Ronan would have to look at her. “You’re upsetting her!”
“Because I have to,” Ronan said, and stood again. “Because she shouldn’t have to face her fears alone. It was wrong of me to let her try for so long.”
Zoe’s stunned expression was slowly hardening, her mouth pulling into a thin line of disapproval. “Leave her alone.”
“No. I won’t … I can’t.” Ronan paced further down his stone ledge, peering around Penny to catch Katie’s eyes again. “And Kat knows I can’t.”
Penny turned to face Katie and saw her anger slipping away as quickly as her astonishment had. In the past minute she had run the emotional spectrum from shock to anger and now to embarrassment.
Katie looked skyward. Penny thought she was struggling not to cry, but when she faced forward again, her eyes were dry.
“He’s right,” Katie said. “There’s something I need to tell you about.”
* * *
They were sitting around the fire pit, Penny across from Zoe and Ronan across from Katie. The wands lay atop the book in an open chest at the roots of the big ash tree.
Katie stared into the dead fire pit, seemed to search for something there. Whatever it was seemed to elude her, and after a minute of expectant silence she sighed and looked up at all of them in turn. Her eyes finally settled on Penny.
“You’re kind of a firebug aren’t you?”
Penny’s first impulse was to deny this—this wasn’t supposed to be about her!—but the expression on Katie’s face stopped the denial before it left her mouth. Her words may have sounded like a question, but they had been a statement of fact. Her expression said so. Her unblinking eyes, the defiant set of her jaw allowed no doubt.
Penny gulped, then nodded.
“I knew a girl like you a long time ago,” Katie said, talking to them all but still watching Penny. “Her name was Samantha … Sam. She lived down the street from me, and she had the coolest tree house. Her dad built it for her, and we used to play in it for hours. We even spent the night in it a couple times.”