The Sorceress's Tree

Chapter 28

Apparently Riley had missed a bunch of drama at lunch that day when she went into her charms classroom. Luke hadn't made it to class and both Chelsea and Nathan whom she also shared the class with had seemed a bit unnerved. Luke ended up arriving to their class during the last ten minutes. As soon as the bell rang, Chelsea intercepted Luke before he could reach Riley, practically dragging him off down the hall to talk before their next class.

"What was that about?" Riley asked as she glanced over at Nathan.

"Chels is just being nosy," Nathan sighed.

Riley nodded, walking along side Nathan as they headed to their next class together. Neither Chelsea or Nathan had wanted to talk much about what happened, but all the other students had been talking in hushed whispers about something Morgan did to that Derek guy from her Magical History class. Luke had ended up intervening between the two and the three had spent the last two hours with the Headmaster.

As Nathan and Riley walked to class, Jasmine met up with them. "Hey, guys!" Jasmine grinned. She looped her arm through Nathan's on habit as they walked.

"Hey, Jazz!" Riley grinned.

"Jazz, have you heard anything?" Nathan asked as he glanced down at her.

"Morgan was sent home with a three day suspension. If she had attacked anyone else, she'd probably would have been expelled," Jasmine sighed.

Riley frowned, glancing over at her friends. Attacking someone didn't sound like Morgan. That Derek guy must have really pissed her off.

"Personally, I think that guy deserved it," Nathan grumbled, "I thought they had expelled him after that April incident."

The couple continued walking forward, leaving Riley behind. They were completely lost in their own conversation. Riley sighed as she contemplated what happened. She followed them into Spellcasting, surprised about the amount of students who had already trickled in. Luke and Chelsea followed in behind her, heading up the auditorium based lecture hall to the third row of steps right in the middle of the classroom. Jasmine and Nathan had ended up taking a seat behind the two. Since Morgan wasn't going to be returning to class that day, Riley sat down in the open seat on the other side of Jasmine.

The Derek guy was the last to enter the classroom just as the bell rang. He caused a whispered frenzy as he walked past all the students in the classroom finding a seat in the back corner next to some hoodie guy. He looked like he had stuck his finger in a wall socket with singed eyebrows and a frizzy mess of brown hair. Riley couldn't believe that Morgan had actually electrocuted the dude. Even more spectacular was the fact that he had survived such a spell.

"Mr. Fitzgerald, please try to be more timely," Spell-master Keaton snapped.

She was young and fairly attractive with sandy brown hair and brown eyes. Derek only smirked as he glared back at the Spell-master. After scolding Derek, Spell-master Keaton began her lecture.

"Today, we are going to work on dueling. I have assigned pairs for everyone. You all should know the rules, so I won't go over them again."

The Spell-master was wrong. The others in the class may know the rules, but Riley had no clue what these rules were. She gulped, hoping not to be called first so she could watch and learn. Leave it to her crappy luck that the exact opposite happened.

"First, we have Luke Noble and Riley Towers!"

Luke grinned as he jumped up from his seat, strolling to the front of the classroom. Riley gulped as she hesitated following Luke completely forgetting to grab her wand as she took a stand across from Luke.