Ritual of Magic (Academy of the Damned Book 2)

by Veronica Shade

  “Cool,” Zoey says. “We can be study buddies. You can help me.”

  I scoff as we gather all our stuff and head out the door. “I’m sure you’ll be the one helping me. You’re like a little genius or something.”

  “Not really,” Zoey says, taking quick strides to keep up with me. “I mean, I made straight As at my mundane school, but I wasn’t anything special. I never skipped a grade or anything.”

  “That’s still pretty good,” I say. We follow the stream of other students heading down the main staircase to the dining room. “I never made straight As.”

  “It’s not hard,” Zoey says. “You just have to tell the teachers what they want to hear.”

  We get separated in the line for breakfast as we pick up trays and head to the buffet. At first, I’m afraid Zoey isn’t going to be able to get anything, short as she is. But, as usual, she surprises me with how comfortable she is using her air powers. The cereal and milk fly over the other students’ heads and into her bowl, along with a glass of juice and a banana. I’m so wrapped up in watching her, I haven’t managed to get anything by the time she is done and looking for a seat.

  I shake my head as I grab a muffin and a glass of milk. She really is so clever and seems mature for her age. But growing up with only one parent will do that to a kid. I had to grow up too fast, too.

  We eat quickly, then I show Zoey to her first class before heading to my own. For some reason, I feel ridiculously proud to be walking into the third-year classroom even though it’s exactly where I am supposed to be.

  “Hey! Whittaker!”

  I look to the back of the room and see Jaxon Kane waving me over. Krista and Ivy are already sitting with him. I practically skip across the room and take a seat next to them.

  “We actually have a class together,” I say, followed by a dramatic fake-scream of excitement. Since I was catching up last year, I didn’t have any classes with people who were my own age.

  “How’s the kid?” Krista asks.

  “What kid?” Jaxon asks.

  “Madison has a new roommate,” Ivy says. “A little girl who Ms. Brewster took in.”

  “Zoey Rhee,” I say. “She’s thirteen and her parents are both dead, so she didn’t have anywhere else to go, no other witch family, so, yeah, Ms. Brewster admitted her so she wouldn’t be lost in the system.”

  “That was nice of her,” Jaxon says. “It can be scary out there all alone for a witch.”

  “Tell me about it,” I say, thinking about the circumstances that led me to La Voisin. I thought I didn’t need help or training or other witches. That I could learn all I needed on my own. But I had been so very, very wrong.

  I’m glad to be here now, and I wish I had seen the value in coming here long ago… Oh well. Can’t change the past. I need to focus on moving forward.

  “All right, everyone,” Ms. Laurent says as she enters the room. At least, I assume it’s her since I’ve never seen her before. “I am Ms. Laurent, your new air mentor, and I’ll be taking over the history-based classes as well.”

  I sit up and pay attention. I love history. It was another reason I had clicked with Ms. Boucher: she encouraged me to explore and reexamine the past.

  Ms. Laurent seems harried, like she just rushed in from out of town and is running late. She clears her throat and tugs on her blazer as she prepares to speak.

  She looks older than Ms. Brewster, which means she must be really old since witches don’t age like mortals. We aren’t immortal, but we don’t really show our age like normal people. Her outfits seems a little dated, too, like something from the 70s with a frilly shirt, her skirt past the knee, nylons, and loafer-type shoes. Her glasses are way too big for her face and kind of boxy.

  I can’t help but feel embarrassed for her. She probably hasn’t been in front of a classroom in a really long time and thinks teachers still dress this way. I hope no one discourages her, though. I think her retro-style is actually pretty badass. She rocks the look well.

  “—the essay will be due at the end of the semester,” she is saying, and I realize I wasn’t paying attention.

  I glance over at Jaxon’s notebook to see what I missed, but he hasn’t written anything down.

  “Any questions?” she asks.

  I tentatively raise my hand.

  She nods to me. “State your name, please.”

  “Madison Whittaker,” I say.

  “Oh,” she says with…is that…disappointment in her voice? We just met. Surely not. I must have misread her tone. “What do you want?”

  “Umm…about the essay,” I say. “Are you going to hand out or email the assignment to us?”

  “I just said it,” she says. “Why would I email it to you?”

  A couple of students snicker, and I do my best to not blush.

  “I just have a bad memory and want to make sure I don’t forget anything,” I say.

  “Don’t worry,” she says. “We will talk about the paper throughout the semester, especially you and me.” She then opens her book to begin her lesson.

  I look at my friends and mouth especially me? Why me?

  The others shrug and open their books. I realize I missed the announcement for what page to open to and lean over to Jaxon to see that he is on page seventy-eight.

  “Ms. Whittaker,” Ms. Laurent says, “must you use my class time for flirting?”

  “I wasn’t flirting,” I say defensively.

  “Then what were you doing?” she asks.

  I open my mouth to say I was just asking for a page number, but then I realize that would be admitting I wasn’t listening. I slouch down in my seat and mumble, “Flirting.”

  The class bursts into laughter, and Jaxon smiles, sitting up a little taller.

  “Please save it for outside the classroom, Ms. Whittaker,” Ms. Laurent says, then returns to her book.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I say as I turn to my book as well, my face now good and hot and surely red as a beet.

  So much for making a good first impression.

  Thankfully, the rest of my classes go smoothly since I already know all the teachers and my friends are in the same classes as well. I feel like this is how the classes should have been going for me the whole time. I feel more like I belong here now, like I’m making real progress as a witch. Someday, I might even be happy again. But I know that’s going to take time.

  During lunch, I sneak away for a bit of me-time. Everything has been so rushed and busy since I came back, and now I have to share my room with someone else, so having time to myself is rare; I just need a few minutes to breathe.

  I cross the wide green lawn of La Voisin’s extensive grounds and make my way to the secret grotto. I don’t know if it’s really secret or hidden, but for some reason, no one else ever seems to come here, and I haven’t told anyone about it. It’s just my place. Where I come to be alone or study or read or think or whatever.

  And, okay, for some bizarre reason I can’t explain, I like hanging out with the statue hidden here.

  As I step down into the mossy and shaded grotto, I freeze.

  The statue has moved.

  I am one hundred percent certain that the statue is now facing the door, when before he was always facing the center of the grotto. His face also looks more worried than before. The last time I saw him, I was sure he was smiling. Not like a big goofy grin, just the edges of his lips turned up, like he was glad to see me.

  I look around, but I don’t see or hear anything. There are no footprints on the floor. I step into the grotto and look around the statue’s base, but I don’t see any marks that would indicate the statue has been moved.

  I take a breath and step back. I know that if I tell anyone, I’m going to sound crazy, but this time, I know the statue moved. It’s not some poor vision through the rain or imagined slight variance. This is noticeable and undeniable.

  I take out my phone and flip through the photos, only to be disappointed when I don’t find any of the statue to com
pare with to prove he was moved.

  I turn the camera on and take a few snaps. This isn’t the first time I have suspected that the statue was moved. But in the past, it was far more subtle. This is too much. Someone has been here. But even if they have been, why would they move the statue? I’ve been here countless times, and while I have touched the statue before, I have never felt the need to move it. That just seems weird and rude.

  Help them, Giselle had told me. Well, her ghost did.

  I still don’t know what she meant by that. Does it have something to do with whoever is moving them?

  First things first, I need to prove to myself that the statues are moving. With evidence this time. After I’ve established that, then I can worry about who might be responsible for moving them and why.

  I mean, wouldn’t it take a lot of energy to move a human-sized marble statue? And how could they change his expression? It doesn’t make any sense.

  Unless the statue moved himself.

  Part of me wants to acknowledge that as a reasonable idea. After all, this is a school for magic. But another part of me knows how that sounds, and again, I don’t have any proof that I didn’t imagine it, so I need to rein in my whims until I document more.

  “I know I haven’t been here in a while,” I tell the statue.

  It might seem weird, but it helps me work things out in my mind to talk to him. I guess it isn’t much different from people who talk to their pets. At least, I hope it isn’t.

  “But I’m finally caught up on everything,” I go on. “I’m officially a third-year student in third-year classes. Awesome, huh?”

  Of course, he doesn’t agree, but he doesn’t disagree either. He’s stone still. Like a statue.

  “Giselle crossed over,” I say. “At least, I’m pretty sure she did. So she’s not here to help me figure out how to, like, help you or whatever. So, if you could give me more information or something, some kind of direction, that would be really great.”

  Nothing happens.

  I sigh and look around the grotto. There has to be a reason why he seems different. The rest of the grotto looks the same. I go outside and walk around, but nothing seems out of the ordinary. When I go back inside, I look at the floor and scrape my foot along the ground, roughing up some of the moss. If he had been moved, there would definitely be scuff marks on the floor. I turn back to the statue.

  What if there is a lever or something that opens a secret door? Like they push the statue to the right and a door in the floor opens up? That would explain why it seems to have moved, if they didn’t push it back all the way. And maybe the face just looks different in the new position because of light and shadows hitting from different angles now.

  I step up to the statue to give it a try. I take his hand, and the world around me shifts. It’s suddenly dark. Like night, but everything is hazy, wavy. Like I’m underwater.

  I gasp, but I can breathe. I look around and realize I am in the grotto. But the statue is gone. There are no pedestals. I hear voices coming, so I step through one of the other doorways and wait.

  I see the statue as a human. He enters the grotto with someone else, but I can’t see the other man’s face.

  “—telling you,” statue man is saying. “We can’t trust her. We need to tell my mother what we’ve learned.”

  I strain to understand his strange accent. He is speaking English, but it sounds more…British, perhaps? I’m not sure. They are dressed in old-fashioned clothes, too, like from colonial days.

  “But she is the coven leader,” the other man says. “She wouldn’t lead us astray.”

  “Would I?” statue man asks. “You and I have been through everything together. Brothers to the end, right?”

  He holds out his hand, and the other man shakes it. “Brothers to the end.”

  There is something familiar about the other man’s voice. Like I’ve heard it before. But I can’t place it.

  “Come on, let’s get out of here,” statue man says.

  I step into the grotto to follow them, but as I do, the statue man turns around, and we make eye contact.

  I gasp, and it is daylight again. My hand is still holding the statue’s hand. I jerk away.

  “What the hell was that?” I ask, even though I know he won’t answer me.

  I rush out of the grotto and head back to the school.

  Chapter 4

  “Try again,” Ms. Brewster says.

  “I can’t.” I lean my hands on my knees and huff. “I’m trying, but I don’t know how.”

  “Yes, you do,” she says, her voice even, but I sense some irritation. I don’t blame her. I’m irritated with myself. “If you have flown once before, you can do it again. You just have to tap into that part of yourself that made it possible.”

  “I hear you,” I say, “but I don’t know what part of me that is. When it happened, it was so…in the moment, you know?”

  “That’s just an excuse.” Ms. Brewster crosses her arms. “The ability to use and control your powers is inside of you at all times. It doesn’t come and go. You are a witch. That is both who and what you are. You control your powers—they don’t control you.”

  I chew on my lower lip. I know she’s right. After all, isn’t that why I’m here? My powers were out of control and caused the death of my boyfriend. I’m here so no one will ever fall victim to my powers again. I nod.

  “How can I tap into that?”

  “There is only so much I can ‘teach’ you,” Ms. Brewster says. “I loathe that word, actually. As I said, all of us have our own powers, our own abilities, and the path to using or controlling them lies within each of us. I can only guide you on your path as you learn to become one with your powers.”

  “Become one?”

  “Think of your powers as…another person living within you,” she says. “Right now, you and your powers are at odds with each other. You want to do one thing while your powers want to do something else. You need to learn to work together toward the same goals.”

  “But when I use low-level magic, like opening a portal or creating a potion, I don’t have to do that,” I say.

  “You do,” Ms. Brewster says. “You just don’t realize it. Something small like opening a portal is not at odds with that your powers desire, so you are united in your cause. But you don’t simply will a portal to open. What do you do?”

  “I…take a deep breath,” I say, trying to remember. Opening a portal through a mirror is so easy, I hardly think about the steps needed to do it. “I say a chant or spell. I touch the mirror.”

  “Why do you take a deep breath?” Ms. Brewster asks.

  I shrug. “I don’t know,” I say. “Just seems like the right thing to do before performing magic.”

  “Why?” she prods.

  “I don’t know,” I say.

  “Then why do you do it?”

  I shrug, and she sighs.

  “Can you open a portal without taking a deep breath first?”

  “I…I don’t think so,” I say. “I don’t know that I ever tried.”

  “When you take the breath, what else are you doing?”

  I open my mouth to respond, but she raises a hand to stop me.

  “Don’t say you don’t know. Really think about it. Imagine you are doing it. What else is happening?”

  I take a deep breath and close my eyes, imitating what I would do to open a portal.

  “I…I am calming myself,” I say. “Emptying my mind, slowing my heart rate. I am concentrating on the task I want to accomplish.” I feel the calming spirit come over me I usually feel before opening a portal.

  “Connect to that sensation,” Ms. Brewster whispers. “Reach out to it. Talk to it. Touch it. Ask it what it wants.”

  Her words are distracting, so I tune her out. I invite the stillness to take me over, to continue calming my body and mind. I feel something like…tentacles…tendrils of smoke…rivulets of water running from my heart through my body. The sensation runs from the top o
f my head to the tips of my fingers, down my legs to my toes. It is soothing, comforting. It feels good, but it feels like an invasion as well.

  Who are you? I ask silently.

  I hear something like a rustling sound. I concentrate on it and realize it’s a bunch of voices. I focus, and they begin to slow down and separate.

  I hate this class.

  I wonder why Mom didn’t answer the phone last night.

  I really want dessert.

  I’m so lonely.

  Does she know how I feel?

  I gasp as I realize that the voices are coming from the school. It’s like I’m hearing what everyone is saying. Then, one voice is louder than the rest, and I recognize it.

  She’ll never be ready.

  My eyes pop open, and I look at Ms. Brewster.

  “What?” I ask. “What did you say?”

  “I was just guiding you,” she says. “Encouraging you to reach into yourself. Why? What happened?”

  I shake my head, trying to understand what happened. “I thought you said something about me not being ready.”

  Ms. Brewster flinches. Surprise? Shock? I’m not sure. She’s back to her emotionless self almost instantly.

  “Well, of course you aren’t ready for anything,” she says. “We’ve barely scratched the surface of what you are capable of.”

  I nod. It makes sense. But if she didn’t say that, did she think it? Did I read her mind?

  My hand goes to my mouth. That’s exactly what I did. I was reading or hearing her thoughts. I heard all their thoughts.

  I look at the school looming behind Ms. Brewster. I wasn’t hearing my classmates talking. I was hearing them thinking.

  But that’s supposed to be impossible. There’s no such thing as psychic powers…or so I’ve been told.

  “What’s wrong?” Ms. Brewster asks me. “You seem troubled by something. Did you see something while you were connecting to your powers?”

  “I don’t know,” I say, shaking my head with an awkward smile. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to see or feel or think. This is all so strange to me.”

  Ms. Brewster nods. “There are no wrong answers,” she says. “Each spiritual journey is unique.”