Frivolous Magic

by Kimbra Swain

  “It’s totally not worth it,” Marley said as she stepped out of the shadows from the student union.

  “They are like a gang. Leave them alone,” Shawnna begged.

  “I’ll come back with my boys,” Jamarcus warned. “I’ll get that apology.” Shawnna tugged on his arm. Pulling him away from the fight just as Dakota stepped out of the administration building.

  “You don’t know half of what you think you know, Shawnna,” he said.

  “See. I told you. It’s like a fucking harem. Lacey’s tribe,” she sneered at me.

  “You and me, Stanwick. I owe you,” Jamarcus said to Braxton before he walked away with Shawnna wrapped around his muscular arm.

  “Fuck. I told you. Are you alright?” Brax said, turning to me. He ignored our friends who approached us slowly, except for Dakota.

  “I’m fine. I need to talk to him for a minute,” I said.

  “Oh, okay,” Brax said.

  “I got your back, brother,” Isaac said, giving Brax a fist bump.

  I heard them talking about the confrontation as I walked to where Dakota stood. He looked down to the concrete sidewalk as I approached.

  “I wasn’t running from you,” I said.

  “Your text said you didn’t want to talk to me, so why are you here?”

  “Text?”

  He held up his phone and showed me the text I hadn’t sent.

  “No, no, no, no! I didn’t send that! I decided not to send it,” I protested, pulling out my phone. The message sent notification appeared when I swiped it to life. “Kota, I never meant to send that. I was upset this morning because you moved. I didn’t intend on sending it.”

  “It’s okay. You typed it. Part of you meant it. You are absolutely right. I had no right to come in there and kiss you like that. It won’t happen again. In fact, I just put in all my information to transfer out this semester to the University,” he said.

  “No,” I whispered. “No, Dakota, how are you going to afford that?”

  “I’m not dumb. I got a scholarship,” he said.

  “No, I didn’t mean. I mean. Crap. Really? You are leaving?”

  “Yep, right after midterms. My advisor negotiated with the professors at the University for me to take the same ones there,” he explained. “You won’t have to see me three times a day anymore.”

  “I don’t want you to leave,” I said as tears welled up in my eyes. I tried not to cry. Men had told me that women use tears as a weapon, but I swore that this was genuine sadness. Not a manipulation.

  “Goodbye, Lacey,” he said, then walked away.

  Floored. I was absolutely floored. My stupid self should have deleted the message, but somehow it had sent. I shook my head and forced myself not to throw my phone.

  “Hey you,” Marley said. “He told you, huh?”

  “Yeah. Did you know?” I asked.

  She wrapped me up in a hug. “Of course, I did, but you didn’t want to talk about it, so I never mentioned it.”

  “I didn’t mean to send the text,” I said.

  “It isn’t about a text, Lacey. He sees you with Braxton, and somewhere he got the idea that you’d be better off with Stanwick.”

  “This sucks.”

  “Yeah, it does,” she replied, releasing the hug. I wiped away my tears and looked over to Brax. He watched us carefully even though Grant and Isaac kept talking to him.

  “He may be right though. Brax has always liked you, Lacey. I just don’t think we ever thought he’d give up his fortune for you,” Marley said.

  “He didn’t give it up for me,” I corrected her.

  She laughed. “You, my sweet friend, are blind. I love you, but you are blind.”

  “Why?”

  “The day you met him. Do you remember?” she asked.

  “Of course, I was sitting in the student union drinking coffee when he invited himself to sit at my table. I was waiting on you, but there was no getting rid of him. I figured he was just a big flirt,” I said.

  “Very true. He is, but he said that you didn’t know who he was or what his name meant, but you were so nice and funny,” she said.

  “That isn’t love,” I protested.

  “I’m not saying it was then, but it made him look at his life differently. He’d never seen himself as anything other than Clanton Stanwick’s son,” she said. “Maybe you gave him the idea that he didn’t have to be that.”

  “Why are you so much wiser than me?” I asked, wiping away my tears.

  “I’ve slept with more men,” she quipped. We both laughed.

  “I said wise! Not experienced,” I jabbed at her.

  “Same difference,” she replied. “Don’t you have class?”

  “Not now. Brax and I were going to get lunch,” I said.

  “Can I come?” she asked. “Or is it a date?”

  “It’s not a date.”

  “Cool.” She said wrapping her arm with mine and dragging us back to the guys. “Lacey and Brax are going to lunch. Want to go with us?”

  “Wait, you are going?” Brax asked. I rolled my eyes at him, and he grinned.

  “Sure. I invited myself, and I’ve invited them now,” Marley replied.

  “I’m up for it,” Isaac said.

  “I’ve got to go to the computer lab. Maybe next time,” Grant replied.

  “Is that the computer lab that Zuri works in?” Marley asked.

  Grant scowled at her. “No.”

  “Liar. While we are getting everything out in the open, why don’t you just admit to what we already know?” Marely prodded him.

  “We aren’t dating. Just having fun,” he replied. “And I’ve got to go.”

  “Don’t want to be late for fun,” Marley said. I poked her in the ribs. “Ow!”

  “Leave him alone,” I chided.

  “What? I didn’t do anything,” Marley replied. Devil woman.

  “Let’s go eat,” Isaac said. “Marley you can ride with me.”

  “I’d rather take the bus with your driving record,” Marley replied.

  “Come on,” he said. “It’s not like it would be the first time you rode with me.”

  Marley stopped in her tracks. Braxton’s eyes widened, and I gasped. No one ever got as smart with Marley as she did with everyone else. Bravo to Isaac.

  “What did you say?” she huffed.

  “You said we were getting everything out in the open,” he laughed. “Come on, Marley.” He winked at her and she stomped ahead of us. Brax and I tried to keep our laughs to ourselves, but it wasn’t working.

  “Leave me alone, Isaac Denton! You are a womanizing, baseball hitter,” she sputtered.

  “I hit home runs, baby,” he quipped.

  We couldn’t hold back the howls any longer.

  “They might be perfect for each other,” Braxton whispered in my ear.

  “Or kill each other in the process,” I replied.

  “It would be fun to watch,” he said.

  “I agree.”

  “Shut-up!” Marley overheard us and stomped her foot.

  “Pitch that fit, baby. You look gorgeous when you get all worked up,” Isaac continued.

  She spun and stuck her finger in his face. “Shut your pie hole, Isaac!”

  “Mmm, pie,” he said. She shoved him.

  “I’m not eating with this monster,” she said. “I’ll call you later, Lacey.” She rushed off into the student union.

  “Isaac,” I scolded him.

  “I’ll go get her. Smooth it over,” he said, chasing after her.

  We watched him run into the building.

  “They are totally going to fuck,” Brax said.

  “Totally,” I replied.

  “Braxton!” a man’s voice rumbled. Behind us, a man stood beside a limo parked at the curb.

  “Fuck,” Braxton mumbled. I’d never met his father, but I knew exactly who he was. He had the same handsome features as his son, but with a dusting of salt and pepper hair. He wore a dark suit with a
navy tie. A large man stepped out of the front of the limo to stand with him.

  “Your father?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Stay here. I’ll be right back,” he said. I grabbed his hand.

  “No, I’ll go with you,” I said, knowing he might need the moral support. Besides, Brax had made a big decision in his life. I felt it was the right one. Someone needed to defend him. Heaven help his father if he crossed a southern woman.

  “Lacey, I appreciate it, but there is no reason you should be dragged into this,” he said.

  “I’m going with you,” I repeated.

  A smile crept around the edges of his mouth. “Okay. I warned you,” he said, as we walked toward his father. “Hello, Dad.”

  “Get in the car, Son. We need to talk,” Mr. Stanwick said.

  “Dad, this is Lacey Ashcraft, my friend. Lacey, my father, Clanton Stanwick,” Brax said, ignoring his father’s rudeness.

  “Nice to meet you, Sir.”

  “Are you the hussy that decided she knew what was better for my son than I do?” he asked.

  “Dad! Stop!”

  “I got this,” I said, letting go of Braxton’s hand. “If I was a hussy, it wouldn’t matter. Because your son deserves to be loved and appreciated for who he is and the decisions he makes on his own. You should be proud of him.”

  “Proud of throwing his life away?”

  “Proud of him for being the kind of man who sits in a hospital room with a friend who is sick when she needed him. Proud of him for getting an old lady’s groceries because she can’t drive. Proud of him for making his own damn choices in life instead of those that are handed to him on a silver platter,” I spouted.

  “You know nothing about the world, little girl. It’s going to eat you alive. Braxton, get in the car,” he said.

  “I’m not going with you, Dad. I love you and Mom. Lacey is right. I’m making my own decisions now,” Brax said.

  “You will regret this,” his father growled as he climbed back into the limo. The large man got in the front and they drove off. When I looked back at Braxton, he was shaking.

  “You okay?”

  “I’ve never stood up to him before,” he muttered. “How did you? Why did you?”

  “I might be mild mannered, but don’t fuck with my friends,” I said.

  After a quick lunch, Braxton dropped me off at the natural sciences building. He offered to go into class with me, but I knew he had his own business class to attend. Taking a deep breath, I walked into the auditorium. With a quick look over the students, it wasn’t hard to see Dakota sitting in his regular seat. I had to make a choice.

  I could stand up to a billionaire overbearing father, but not an ex-lover.

  “Suck it up, Lacey,” I said as I made the move to sit with him. Just before I got there, another woman slipped into the seat next to him. I hadn’t seen her in the class before, but I didn’t pay much attention to anyone else.

  I took the seat nearest him but back a row. He looked back at me, then at the woman next to him. I shrugged, then the lights dimmed as our professor began to run through slides of rocks. Someone once told me that geology was one of the easier sciences, but it was also the most boring.

  When the lights clicked back on, the woman sitting beside Dakota jerked her hand back to herself. His hand remained open where hers had once laid in it. A heavy feeling settled in my stomach and a bout of nausea threatened to make me puke.

  “Please prepare for the test,” Professor Abilia said. A teacher’s assistant passed tests out at the end of the row. We each took one and passed it. While at lunch, Brax helped me go through the questions. He’d taken geology before so he already knew the answers. I hurried through the test, turned in my paper, and never looked back as I ran out the door. The closest bathroom was down the hallway.

  Just as I reached the door, the hallway darkened.

  “No! Leave me alone!” I shouted.

  A figure in a hood stepped out of the wall ahead of me. It was taller than Ajax. I turned to run only to find another one behind me. This one had a small frame like a woman.

  “No,” I shouted again. “Stop!”

  “Come with us. It will be a lot less painful if you do,” the male said.

  “Get away!”

  “It’s good that you are afraid. You should be, but it’s too late now,” the woman said. She lowered her hood to show me the face of the woman who had been sitting with Dakota. She held up a bloody knife. “He didn’t even fight me. You’d broken him enough that I just shoved it in without effort.”

  “NO!”

  When I turned back to the man, he was right in front of me. I pushed my hand toward him like I was going to push him away, but a blast of wind came from it, throwing him down the hallway. His body rolled to a stop.

  “Reckless, foolish girl. You can’t use magic to save yourself. It only draws more of us to you.” She cackled as she slowly approached me. I lifted my hand, and without the chant, my purple circle appeared. My blood surged through my veins as my heart pounded.

  “Stay back,” I warned her.

  “You don’t even know what to do with that thing,” she said, lifting her hand. An arcane circle appeared above hers. A sparkling black mass with tendrils of lighting flashed around inside of it. “One day, if you survive, you can truly use that magic properly, but I don’t think you will survive. When the Master sees you, he will devour you.” She reached back and threw her circle at me. The flashing black ball of smoke and lightning barreled toward me. I threw my hands in front of me in a defensive measure. The purple of my circle expanded into a shield in front of me.

  The mass of blackness hit it, shoving me backwards. The purple shield began to crack as she moved toward me.

  “Please, help me. Someone help,” I muttered as the blackness consumed my circle.

  I saw her flinch, then two robed arms stretched out to mine. The strong hands of a man wrapped around my wrists. I felt an electricity flow through me as the purple in my circle began to pulse and push back the attack.

  “You cannot stop us,” the woman said, but she wasn’t talking to me. “You are not strong enough.”

  “I am for now,” the man’s voice rumbled behind me as the last bit of her circle was destroyed by mine. She walked through the wall nearest to her without a word.

  I tried to turn back to face the man who had saved me, but he held my wrists tightly.

  “Ajax?” I asked.

  “My name is Zeth, but I know Ajax,” he said. “He warned you that they would come.”

  “Who are they?” I asked.

  “I suspect that they were Beldame. Dark sorcerers and witches that consume power, but they aren’t the only ones that will hunt you. If you want to survive, then you should come with us,” he said. “I’ll take you to Ajax.”

  Shaking my head, I tried to say no, but the words wouldn’t come out. The man released my wrists as he backed away. When I spun around, he was gone.

  “Lacey?” I heard a voice from the other end of the hallway. Dakota stood there with his backpack.

  “Kota, you’re alive,” I muttered. He walked toward me quickly.

  “You look pale. Sit down,” he said, guiding me to a bench along the wall. “What happened? Of course, I’m alive.”

  “I saw something,” I said.

  “You are shaking. What did you see?” he asked.

  “Who was the woman sitting with you?” I asked.

  “I didn’t know her,” he replied. “I’m sorry she took your seat.”

  “You held her hand,” I said quietly as other people passed us in the hallway.

  “What? No, I didn’t. I wouldn’t do that in front of you,” he said. “You must think the worst of me.”

  “You are leaving school. I didn’t send the text, Kota. I don’t know how it made it to you, but I swear I didn’t.”

  “I think it’s for the best if I do leave. For both of us.”

  “For you. You didn’t even ask what was best f
or me,” I said, standing up. I wobbled on my feet.

  “Are you going back to him?” he asked.

  “Who?”

  “Brax.”

  “I’m not with Brax,” I said. “Besides, it’s none of your damn business.”

  “Just like who I hold or not hold hands with,” he said with a distant cold look.

  I took a couple of steps away from him, then ran. I was a coward and didn’t feel like fighting him anymore. It was time to move on.

  As I sat at the bus stop waiting to go home, a young girl who didn’t look old enough to be in college sat down next to me.

  “Hello,” she said cheerfully.

  A strange feeling rolled over me like someone was watching me. I stood up and turned in a circle, taking in my surroundings.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “Um, yeah. Just felt like someone was watching me,” I said.

  “People are always watching. They look at me funny, too.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “I’m too young to be here. You gave me the same look.”

  “I just thought you were out of place, not too young. I’m sorry to offend you.”

  “You didn’t do it on purpose. The truth is I am much older than I look.”

  “What’s your secret?” If she was going to talk, I was going to make small talk back.

  “Magic.”

  I started coughing because she said it so matter of factly. “Sorry, bug.” I pointed at my mouth, but from the look on her face, she was completely serious.

  “You might as well not believe me, but it’s true. There is a whole world of magic out there. It can make you look younger. It can save someone’s life. It can be stolen.” She laid her small, cold hand on top of mine. I felt the shift immediately. Something moved between us. Jerking away from her, I landed on the grass next to the bench. An evil smirk crossed her face. “New magic feels so good.”

  I scrambled to my feet and took off running toward the library behind me. Several people jumped out of my way as I raced down the sidewalk. Looking back over my shoulder, the young girl was gone. When I got to the steps of the library, I stopped to catch my breath. My heart pounded in my chest. A burning sensation rattled in my lungs as I fought off panic.

  “Are you okay, Miss?” a young man about my age asked. He had dark green eyes and sandy blonde hair.