Magic University Book One: The Siren and the Sword (14 page)

“You okay?”

He looked up to see Lindy standing in her doorway, staring at him. “Jeez. How long have you been there?”

“Couple of minutes. You seem a little out of it.” She looked at him. “Do you need a protein bar or something?”

“I just drank something caffeinated.”

She shook her head at him sadly. “Jeanie and I just ordered a pizza if you want to share.”

“Oh, um, sure.”

“Great. Hey, Jean, let’s eat out here!”

“Tell me when it’s here. I’m going to try to finish reading this chapter first,” Jeanie called out.

“Okay.” Lindy took a seat on the couch and propped her stocking feet on the coffee table. She patted the seat next to her. Kyle set his book bag down and sat.

“It’s a lot to get used to,” she said, after the silence had stretched on for a bit.

“What is?” He tried to imagine if Lindy knew what sex with Jess was like.

“Discovering magic. And they used to say they found
me
late. I was thirteen at the time. I guess most prodigies get caught when they’re much younger. But eighteen? Jeez.”

Kyle had forgotten Lindy was a prodigy. “Thirteen? How did you find out?”

“Oh, I, um...it was kind of embarrassing, actually, but I started setting things on fire.”

He felt like he was missing something. “That’s embarrassing?”

“Well, when I masturbated.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

They both broke out into laughter after a second.

“A Veritas alumna named Maggie Shipton took me under her wing. It was a bit tricky at first because they had to figure out if my parents could be told the truth or if we had to come up with some kind of other explanation or what. In the end it was decided they’d be told everything, but they’re under the same rules we are. Break the silence and it’d mean the Geas. They don’t seem to mind, though. For them it’s really not that different from having a normal kid go off to Harvard.”
Her hair was sandy brown and curled over her shoulders, and her bangs were in need of a trim. She folded her hands over her upraised knees. “Mrs. Shipton taught me how to keep the fires from happening, and a lot of other stuff, like the Geas, and make sure you eat after doing a spell...and lots of stuff.”

“Did you have a book or anything?” Kyle asked, with some longing in his voice.

“What, you mean like
Young Person’s Guide to Magic
? No. Haven’t you wondered why you don’t have an alchemy textbook? There are a lot of things they don’t trust to be written down. And making a book that can’t be read by anyone without the Sight? Well, you can make one, like the hand-illuminated tomes in the library, but it would be too much to try to extend the spell to hundreds of copies, and to expect the spell to last for potentially hundreds of years after the person who cast the spell died. So in some disciplines it’s oral transmission only, or only by recorded manuscripts in the library. No mass printing.”

“I guess Tarot’s okay because mundanes know about it already?”

“Yeah. It was already too widespread before magic went underground, and unlike a lot of magical practices that people knew about, it stayed in fashion and wasn’t forgotten.” She shrugged. “I still feel a little like I need a handbook sometimes, but let’s just say I sympathize.”

“Thanks.”

“It was especially weird right after Jeanie had her accident, but...oh!”

He watched as she jumped to her feet to get her vibrating cell phone out of the front pocket of her jeans.

“Oh yes, be right down! Jeanie, pizza’s here! Back in a sec, Kyle.” And then she was off down the stairs in her socks.

Jeanie emerged from their room with a stretch. She was wearing pink pajamas and had her hair pulled back in a pink headband. “Hey Kyle, nice to see you. You really need to straighten out what’s going on with you and Jess.”

“Huh?” He twisted in his seat to see her better. “I mean, I know I do, but...”

“She’s got a lot going on in her head and her heart. She can’t articulate it all herself, but that doesn’t mean it’s beyond your power to understand.” She sat down on the floor at the coffee table, her legs crossed. “Man, I’m starving. You guys are so lucky you have snacks in your dining hall. It’s the only drawback to being in Camella House.”

Lindy came back in then, and all three of them began devouring the pizza. Lindy ate two pieces, Kyle two, and Jeanie four. Then Jeanie sat back with a satisfied sigh. “Okay, back to work. You too, Lindykins.”

Lindy’s sigh was more resigned. “You’re right. I need it. See you later, Kyle.”

Kyle wondered just when his life would turn around so that he could get more questions answered in a day than he could think up new ones he didn’t know the answers to. Jeanie’s accident? What did she know about Jess that he didn’t?
What else could Lindy tell him that maybe no one else could about being magical? What was up with Alex? And why couldn’t he live with what a great thing he had with Jess? Why did he want more?

These are the questions that kept him awake that night as he lay on his narrow bed under the eaves, listening to cold November rain hitting the roof above him.

* * * *

The Tuesday before Thanksgiving Kyle went over to Scipionis House for dinner. The crowd was lighter already, as some students who didn’t have Wednesday classes had already left for the holiday. He averted his eyes from Frost and Candlin, who were sort of eskimo-kissing in their seats at a table near the entrance. Normally public displays of affection, even from Frost, didn’t faze him, but this one was so sugary, Kyle felt like he needed insulin. They weren’t normally so...puppy-doggish.

When he came back into the dining room with a tray laden with food, he saw Frost had gotten to his feet and was putting on his coat and had a suitcase at his side. Of course Frost was going away for the holiday. Almost everyone Kyle knew was, it seemed. Jess was going to an aunt and uncle’s house and she hadn’t wanted to bring Kyle with her—truthfully, he wasn’t sure he was up to meeting scrutinizing family members yet anyway—Lindy and Jeanie were going to Jeanie’s parents’ house, and Randall even had an invitation to go to some friends of his family’s on the Cape and was bringing his roommate, Yoshi, with him. Alex and Monica were the only two from Camella 3 West who would be around, and Gladius House as a whole seemed like it would be empty.

Kyle was just settling into a seat when he saw Alex come into the room. He brightened and was about to wave when he saw Alex say something to Frost, and Frost responding. It didn’t look like happy words were being exchanged, though Kyle couldn’t hear what they were arguing about.

Suddenly Candlin got to his feet and Kyle felt something like a wave of static electricity go through the air. Candlin spoke through gritted teeth, couldn’t have been louder than a whisper, and yet Kyle thought he heard, “Get away from him.”

Alex threw up his hands like he wanted nothing to do with them and then walked away, stuffing his hands into his jacket pockets.

Kyle watched him disappear into the food service area. When he looked back, Frost and Candlin were both gone. Then Alex emerged, all smiles.

“Hey, Ace,” he said as he slid into the empty chair next to Kyle. “What’s shakin’?”

“Nothing much,” Kyle said, finally turning his attention to his food. “Had that exam yesterday.”

“Yeah? How’d you do?”

“I think I did okay. I didn’t walk out feeling like crap, anyway, although I think I got a few things mixed up.” He speared a small meatball on his fork and twirled spaghetti around it.

“But graded on a curve, you probably weren’t at the bottom,” Alex said with a shrug. “You’ll live. It’ll get easier.”

“Will it?” Kyle asked seriously, putting the meatball down untouched. “Like it has for you?”

Alex snorted. “I’m a different case. But by the time you’re a junior, you’ll be in better shape than I am to pick a junior project. I know you will.”

“How can you say that?”

Alex shrugged. “I’m an optimist.”

Kyle waited a beat and took a bite of the meatball after all. It was tangy and soft and each bite smelled of basil and oregano. “So what is your junior project? And isn’t it for next semester?”

“Well, that’s the problem. I’m actually behind by a semester already.” He grinned as if to show how ridiculous his predicament was.

“Oh. So you’re...if it’s not done by Christmas, you’re...”

“In really deep doo-doo, yeah.” Alex continued to eat as if it didn’t matter. “The only one who can give me an extension now is Bell himself, and you know
I’m totally his favorite student ever
.”

“Stop it, you’re dripping sarcasm all over me.”

“Sorry.” But now they were both grinning and Kyle felt a little better. Not about Alex’s predicament, but at least it didn’t feel like Alex was avoiding him. Of course he wasn’t. He really was at the library every night, and no wonder, if he was this close to the wire.

After a few more minutes of their usual banter, Kyle felt comfortable enough to even ask him, “So what was that about with you and Frost ?”

“Oh, nothing much. Just seeing if maybe he could put in a word with Bell on my behalf.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Well, I don’t think he will, but it doesn’t hurt to ask. It’s not like I’ve never done a favor for him.” He shrugged. “There is the little matter of the fact that we hate each other’s guts, but, well. You never know until you ask, right?”

“You really are something.”

“Yup.” Alex took a drink from his cup. “So how are you and Jess getting on? I keep thinking I ought to start something up with Monica, you know? Then she’d sleep in my room and you could stay with Jess whenever you wanted.”

“Are you serious?”

Alex laughed. “Only a little. Monica and I used to flirt a lot, but...I don’t know. She was really overly interested in me while I was with Jess, actually, which was kind of not cool, and if I got together with her, even though Jess and I are ancient history...it would just be awkward all around, you know?”

“I don’t, actually. But I can try to imagine,” Kyle said. “As for me and Jess...I don’t know. Everything we have is great. But I keep feeling like something’s missing.”

Alex waited for him to go on.

“I always stop just short of saying ‘I love you,’ you know? Because I don’t want her to flip out. I’ve used the word a few different ways, and we’ve each expressed a lot of feelings for each other, but...there’s something about the...saying it that way...”

“The declaration of love,” Alex said with a knowing nod.

“Yeah. The declaration. And she says things that make me think she doesn’t want to hear it.”

Alex shook his head. “She just doesn’t think you’re ‘the one,’ Kyle. You have to do something to show her you are. If you want to be, that is. If she’s the one for you, you have to do something to really show her your intention to...to be with her, in a pair-bond sense. I think honestly it’s easier—almost unavoidable, in fact—when you’re having actual penetrative sex. Don’t ask me why, maybe it’s just biology, but when you’re actually fucking, you can’t hold back the declarations, and the wanting to hear them, too. Maybe it’s the heightened vulnerability. I don’t know. Or maybe it’s just that Jess is cold.”

But she’s not cold,
Kyle thought.
She’s smoldering hot.
“What do you mean by show her I’m the one?”

“Well, maybe you do need to make that declaration. But not by just blurting it out to her. If she’s really the one, have you thought about seriously courting her? Asking her to marry you kind of thing?”

Kyle blinked. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Well? Is she the one?”

Kyle sighed. “I think about her constantly. Sometimes when I haven’t seen her for a day or two, I can’t eat. It’s only through sheer force of will I am not actually living in your suite on the couch just so I can be near her every minute of every day.”

“Well, that sounds like you’re in love, all right.”

“On Halloween, I tried to figure out a way to make her dream come true.”

“Her dream?”

“I told you about this, right? About how she had a dream she’d meet her true love at a masked ball?”

“Oh, right. Oh and you thought...yeah, okay, good thinking, Kyle, but I guess what with the broom race going awry
like it did, your night didn’t go as planned?”

“No.” Kyle chewed his thumbnail thinking about it.

“You know…Gladius House used to host a masque.”

“Used to?”

“I’ve seen pictures. Everyone in masks and pseudo-Renaissance finery, a very upper-crust sort of thing, you know, so of course Gladius House was all over it. Very traditional, no one comes with dates, the masks supposedly make you anonymous, or at least give you the thrill of possibly accidentally groping someone other than your intended...but you know, it’s all about plausible deniability. She’d know it was you, of course, when you asked her to dance, but she’d see you in a whole new light...”

Kyle could picture it. He could picture it as clearly as if it were happening right in front of him, his hand in a white glove, outstretched toward hers—this would be such a far cry from the senior prom he would have been attending had he not stumbled into Peyntree Hall a few months ago. “How do I make sure this masque happens?”