by L. J. Smith
When she finished anointing the group, Diana asked Cassie and Faye to join her in the center. The three of them held hands around the cauldron and candles, with closed eyes. Cassie pictured the white light surrounding not only her own body now but the whole group as one. She imagined it encapsulating them like a giant helium balloon and floating them up to the safety of the cloudless sky.
Diana finished the spell.
By the power of this ocean, wide and deep,
By the power of day, and night, and powers three,
This is our will, so let it be!
Little by little, everyone opened their eyes.
“Did it work?” Sean asked, raising his fingers up to the blue smudge on his forehead.
“How long do we have to walk around with this oil on us?” Suzan asked. “It probably causes breakouts.”
“We can go wash it off in the ocean in just a minute,” Diana said.
“So that’s it?” Faye asked, picking up the dagger from the sand and re-sheathing it beneath her skirt. “We’re invincible now? Why didn’t we do this long ago?”
“There are conditions,” Diana said.
“What conditions?” Faye asked, mocking Diana’s measured, proper tone of voice.
Diana wasn’t bothered by Faye’s ridicule, probably because she was so accustomed to it. “We’ll be safe from bodily harm inflicted by the hunters,” she said. “But the spell only protects us on the island of New Salem. If we step beyond that, we’re vulnerable.”
“So nobody leaves the island,” Adam said. “Under any circumstances.”
He glanced over at Nick, who had taken to disappearing for days at a time, but Nick ignored him.
Diana dug a deep hole in the sand to discard the remaining potion. “It also doesn’t mean the hunters can’t find us. So everyone has to be extra careful. We have to do everything we can to remain undetected.”
She stood up, wiped the sand from her hands, and looked directly at Faye. “We can’t practice magic at all. The hunters will be looking for anything out of the ordinary to find out who we are.”
“What?” Faye charged at Diana like she might tackle her to the ground. “Our magic is the only power we have. How else are we supposed to defeat these guys if we can’t use magic?”
Diana squared her thin shoulders to Faye and matched her gaze with equal ferocity. “We find them before they find us,” she said. “That’s how we’re going to defeat them.”
“Faye,” Melanie said, stepping between her and Diana. “These are my aunt’s murderers we’re talking about. You’re going to put your magic on hold, because if you don’t, you’re putting the whole group at risk. And we can’t have that.”
Cool-headed Melanie had never threatened anyone in her life, but here she was, an inch taller than Faye, ready for a fight.
Adam got between them before things had a chance to escalate. “Everyone needs to take a deep breath and calm down,” he said. “We can’t afford to be fighting each other right now.”
“No,” Melanie argued, shoving Adam’s peacekeeping hand aside. “What we can’t afford is Faye not following Circle rules when our lives are at stake.”
“Please, Faye.” Adam was practically begging her to cooperate. “No magic. Just until we figure out who the hunters are. Okay?”
“Fine. My God, you people are so boring.” Faye began walking away, toward the ocean.
“That’s not all,” Diana called out. “We also need to be on the lookout for Outsiders who are getting too close. And anyone new in town.”
Diana glanced sharply at Cassie. She didn’t name Scarlett specifically, but she didn’t have to. Then she turned to Faye. “So you need to lay off Max.”
Suzan smirked. “How can she lay off him when he won’t even let her lay on him?”
Faye looked like all the fight had been knocked out of her. It obviously bothered her that Max wasn’t falling under her spell like every other boy in school.
“Is that all?” she asked Diana.
Diana nodded. “For now.”
Faye turned and marched toward the ocean to wash her forehead clean. Her black skirt and hair flowed behind her like a dark shadow.
The next morning at school, Faye pulled into the empty parking space beside Cassie and Adam. “Is Diana here yet?” she asked, before she was even out of the car.
“Not yet,” Adam said. “What’s wrong?”
Faye looked anxiously around the school lot, at Sally and Portia gathering their pompoms and books, at a few lacrosse players playing catch, and finally at Suzan sitting on the hood of her Corolla, applying mascara.
“I can’t handle this no-magic thing,” Faye said. “I had to wait for water to boil this morning. Can you believe that? Eight minutes. Like I have nothing better to do with my time.”
“I’m with Faye,” Suzan said from behind her hand mirror. “I feel so ordinary, so unexceptional. It’s dehumanizing.”
“And on top of all that, you have a stain on your shirt,” Faye said.
“I know.” Suzan scratched at the blotch on her collar. “How do normal people get ketchup out of their clothes?”
Diana zipped her Volvo into the spot next to Faye and hurriedly pushed her door open. She was less put together than usual. Her hair was loose and wild, and her jacket was hanging half off. She had a coffee cup in one hand and a bagel in the other, which she shoved in her mouth to dig for her books in the backseat.
“See,” Faye said. “Even Diana’s a mess. We can’t live like this.”
Until this moment, Cassie hadn’t realized how much her friends used magic in their everyday lives.
Adam helped Diana with her books. “This isn’t easy for any of us,” he said. “But we have to stick with it. It’s only temporary.”
The rest of the group arrived sporadically. Whether it was purely psychological or not, Cassie noticed they all seemed a bit distressed without their magic—except Deborah, who tore through the parking lot with her motorcycle up on one wheel. Cars and people scattered from her path until she lowered the front tire down, screeched to a halt, and cut the engine.
“Where’s your helmet?” Diana asked, once Deborah joined the rest of the group.
Deborah rolled her eyes. “I’m not going to mess up my hair with a helmet when I’m invincible.”
“You may be invincible,” Diana said. “But you can still accidentally run over somebody else.”
“Then maybe they should be wearing helmets,” Faye said, which drew a sharp look from Diana.
“Please, don’t abuse the protection spell,” Diana said. “It’s not an excuse to be irresponsible.”
“You’re telling me this?” Deborah removed one of her leather gloves, then the other, and pointed at the sky. “What about them?”
Cassie noticed everyone in the parking lot had stopped going about their business and were focused on something overhead. She followed the communal gaze, just as Diana did, to find Chris and Doug on the roof of the school building.
Someone screamed out, “What are those maniacs doing up there?”
“I think they’re fencing,” another voice said.
Diana had to look away. “Please tell me they didn’t bring real swords to school.”
“Technically they’re not in school,” Sean said. “They’re on it.”
Chris and Doug sparred back and forth, swinging wildly at each other, ducking and bobbing. The crowd gasped as Doug took a slicing hit on the shoulder. He cried out, dropped to the ground, and fake blood spurted from the rooftop like a sprinkler. Their schoolmates started to scream, but then Doug jumped back to his feet with one arm hidden within his sleeve and resumed the fight.
“They’re having way too much fun with this,” Adam said.
Cassie eyed the crowd of spectators, wondering if any of them noticed Chris and Doug were impenetrable to the swords’ sharp blades. But everyone was so accustomed to the twins’ crazy antics that none of them seemed to question it.
Even Max,
who was still the talk of the school, was amused by their performance. He was standing with his lacrosse friends and the swarm of pretty girls who fluttered around him at all times. The girls had, for once, diverted their attention away from Max to watch the rooftop.
Doug slashed Chris across the chest, slitting his shirt diagonally open. It flapped like a flag in the wind. “Serves you right, brother,” Chris called out. “This T-shirt was one of yours.”
Laughter passed over the crowd in a wave. Max shook his head, stepped away from his crew, and made his way over to Diana.
“Someone should stop those two,” he said. “Before they’re both completely naked.”
Cassie observed how Max’s admirers visibly sighed at the sight of him talking to Diana. They obviously considered her competition.
“But I can’t be the one to stop them,” Max continued, leaning in close to her. “Can’t you work some of your magic?”
Diana froze for a second, but it was clear to Cassie that Max meant nothing by it. He was fixated on Diana’s eyes.
“You must have every guy in school at your beck and call,” he said to her. “I imagine if anyone can get them down, it’s you.”
Diana exhaled deeply and laughed. She self-consciously tried to smooth her hair down, but it remained beautifully tousled. “If only that were true,” she said.
“I can get them off the roof,” Faye offered, but Max ignored her.
“It’s just that if my dad catches them up there, there’s no telling what he’ll do,” Max said. “He’s not big on kids bringing weapons to school.”
“Understandably,” Diana answered, nodding. But before she could return her attention to Chris and Doug, Nick appeared on the roof behind them.
“The show’s over,” he called out, approaching the two of them like he might wring their necks.
Chris and Doug looked at each other and dropped their swords. They raised their hands in defense and backed away from Nick, edging closer and closer to the roof’s edge. The crowd fell silent. It had to be a twenty-foot drop.
Nick caught on to the trick and stood still. “That’s enough,” he said. “You had your fun. Now just come down quietly.”
Chris and Doug glanced at the crowd and then latched hands. “Never!” they screamed, and leaped from the roof, landing on a large Dumpster below.
People covered their mouths and turned away. Even Max winced, subtly turning his face in toward Diana’s as he did so. But the twins landed with a synchronized tumble. Without a scratch, they climbed down and took their bows.
Chapter 11
Cassie was in town running errands when the rich aroma of the Witch’s Brew Coffee Shop filled her lungs. Coffee, she thought. What a good idea. The Witch’s Brew was a gimmick, plain and simple, capitalizing on the town’s Salem witch trial–related history. At night it featured strobe lights and white cotton cobwebs, and was a favorite place for anyone from out of town looking for an overpriced drink with a gothic name. The locals, and Cassie’s friends especially, avoided the place for obvious reasons. But in the light of day, the Brew could almost pass as an ordinary coffee shop, and they’d just set up their outdoor tables. Cassie figured it wouldn’t be so bad if she could sit outside sipping her drink in the sun, so she looked for an empty seat.
That was when she noticed that familiar dyed red hair she knew belonged to Scarlett. She was bent over a book, reading and mindlessly chewing on a pencil. Cassie’s first instinct was to go sit with her, but then she remembered the new rule. Outsiders were off limits for now.
It wasn’t fair. The Circle shouldn’t be able to dictate whom Cassie had coffee with. But even Faye was willing to relinquish some of her personal freedom for the good of the group. And Cassie had to get to the lighthouse anyway. In lieu of being able to do magic, Melanie and Laurel were resorting to herbology to pass the time. They’d asked Cassie to bring over the flowers from a rare herb in her garden—the Plymouth gentian. Cassie felt for the paper bag containing the flowers in her tote, as if to remind herself of the errand’s importance. She turned to go just as Scarlett noticed her.
“Cassie?” Scarlett’s face instantly lit up. “It’s so good to see you,” she said. “Come sit with me.”
“I can’t,” Cassie said, scanning the surrounding area. “I only have a minute.”
“Sit for only a minute then.” Scarlett closed her book and pushed it aside.
Scarlett looked so lonely sitting there by herself. It would have been cruel to decline.
“What are your plans for today?” Cassie asked casually.
Scarlett raised her hands and looked left and right. “This,” she said. “It ain’t much.”
Cassie offered her a polite chuckle. “Thanks again for coming to Melanie’s the other day. I’m sorry I kind of lost track of you and didn’t get to say good-bye.”
Scarlett’s dark eyes radiated affection. “No problem,” she said. Then she took a long sip of her iced coffee and seemed to be weighing something in her mind or trying to figure something out.
Cassie felt like she was being examined so deeply that Scarlett could have been counting each of her pores or every one of her eyelashes, but Cassie just let her. For some reason, it didn’t make her feel self-conscious. She didn’t know why, but she wanted Scarlett to know her, and to really see her.
After another moment passed, Scarlett said, “I really like your friends. And since I don’t know anyone on the island, I was hoping to make a good impression.”
Cassie knew this was the moment where, if she were a regular girl without a Circle to answer to, she would ask Scarlett to hang out. Instead, she offered her a pathetic-sounding conciliation. “I was the new kid not long ago,” Cassie said. “And I know how brutal making friends in this town can be.”
Scarlett’s full red lips broke into a wide smile. “That’s why I’m going to guilt you into being friends with me.”
Cassie laughed. She enjoyed Scarlett’s unpretentiousness. She was just the kind of no-nonsense girl Cassie would have been friends with back in California.
“For example,” Scarlett said, “I’m going to remind you that I moved here with a single pathetic suitcase to convince you to go shopping with me.”
Cassie remembered Diana’s snarky comment about Scarlett’s suitcase and was embarrassed by it all over again. She glanced at her watch. She had another two hours before she had to be at the lighthouse. What could be the harm in going around to a few stores for an hour?
“Lucky for you, shopping is one of my favorite leisure-time activities,” Cassie said.
“Does that mean you’re in?” Scarlett asked.
“Why not?” Cassie stood up. “My errands can wait.”
Scarlett shot out of her seat. “That worked even better than I thought it would.”
Shopping with Scarlett was the perfect diversion from all of Cassie’s troubles. Since she couldn’t talk about any of the Circle’s issues, she had to put them out of her mind entirely. It was like getting to be somebody else for a few hours, somebody with normal concerns. Concerns like, Is forty dollars too much to pay for a tank top even if it’s really really soft? And Scarlett was a master shopper; she could pluck out the best item on a sale rack with the speedy foresight even a witch could admire. She somehow talked Cassie into buying turquoise-blue feathered earrings.
“These are more your style than mine,” Cassie said, just after the impulse buy.
“We can share them.” Scarlett smiled brightly. “In fact, we can share most of this stuff. That’s the beauty of being the same size.”
Cassie agreed and then suggested they unload their shopping bags into the trunk of her car before searching out the perfect summer shoes. She and Scarlett slipped so easily into friendship that Cassie forgot she was supposed to be keeping her distance from her. So the sight of Diana stepping out of her Volvo across the parking lot didn’t strike Cassie as an immediate cause for alarm. Her panic didn’t set in until Diana’s eyes met hers—first with the del
ight of a surprise encounter, followed by a narrowing, painful displeasure. Cassie had been caught blatantly defying a promise she had made to the Circle.
Diana approached them gradually. Her “Hello” sounded more like a snub than a greeting. “I see you two have been having a good time,” she said, gesturing to their shopping bags.
Scarlett, sensing the coldness in Diana’s voice, smiled politely but said nothing.
“I ran into Scarlett unexpectedly,” Cassie said.
Diana derided Cassie with her eyes. “I guess there’s a lot of that happening today.”
Cassie bit her lip but said nothing.
Scarlett shifted uncomfortably and said, “Maybe I should get going.”
“No,” Diana said. “I should.” She stepped past them toward the mall’s entrance. “I’ll talk to you later, Cassie.”
“That girl really does not like me,” Scarlett said, once Diana was out of earshot.
Cassie wasn’t sure how to begin defending Diana’s behavior. It’s not like Scarlett could possibly understand. “It has nothing to do with you,” Cassie said. “Believe me. But I’m still sorry.”
Scarlett shrugged it off. “I’ll let you make it up to me by joining me for dinner.”
Cassie was torn. She knew the right thing to do was to separate from Scarlett and immediately go do damage control with Diana, but she’d been having such a good time, and breaking off from Scarlett now would only hurt her feelings.
“How about burgers from Buffalo House?” Scarlett asked. “I’m buying.”
“I really shouldn’t.” Cassie felt for the bag of herbs in her tote and looked at her watch. But a bacon cheeseburger sounded like bliss right now. A girl had to eat, right?
“Okay,” Cassie said at last. “If you come with me to run this errand first. It’s just a quick favor for a friend. Then we can go for burgers.”
Scarlett beamed. “Perfect,” she said.
Of course, the Circle would not approve of Cassie bringing Scarlett along, but she was careful. And Scarlett didn’t ask any questions, even when Cassie insisted she stay in the car while she ran into the abandoned lighthouse with a paper sack under her arm. And since Melanie and Laurel hadn’t arrived yet, all she had to do was drop the bag onto the table and go. It took less than a minute to get in and out. And then she and Scarlett were free to race over to Buffalo House for burgers.