EXCERPT:
CHAPTER 1
I am a DESECRATION
“I don’t really matter. I’m only a girl.”
“You did not just say that!” My best friend worked her neck in classic Izzy-style. Her eyes, green at the moment, glinted with outrage. The shaking of her head caused unruly red curls to escape from underneath the hood of her cloak.
“Well, it’s true,” I argued back. “We’ve been through this so many times, Izzy. You know the guys are the ones that count. They’re the magic wielders and we…just aren’t. We’re the mothers and the party planners.”
“Ha! You’re hopeless, Addie.” Izzy shook her head. “You only see yourself as a future wizard breeder. I refuse to buy into that way of thinking.”
“It’s the way it is,” I said with a sigh, because it was our reality and it just wasn’t going to change.
Izzy huffed. She began pacing back and forth in the glorified broom closet that was our favorite school hideout, her feet clacking against the concrete floor. There wasn’t a lot of room, but Izzy made the most of the space she had. I knew my friend was only starting to get riled up.
“Adriana Marquesa Victoriana Evangelista, it’s your birthday, too!” She speared me with a glare. “Don’t you watch norm television? Wizards are stuck in the dark ages, and you know it! At least norms make an attempt at equal rights for women, but wizards don’t even try, and I am tired of it.”
I had a moment of paranoia. What if our little hideout in the school basement had an eavesdropping spell? I looked around the tiny room—not that I’d be able to see a spell even if there was one.
With relief, I remembered my other best friend, Hugo, had promised there wasn’t any magic in the room. Izzy and I were probably safe. Besides, no one ever came here. Even the norm janitors didn’t use this room anymore. I sighed and plopped down on the industrial-sized overturned bucket, one of two that served as our seats. In between the buckets sat a wooden crate that made a good card table or a place to set our lunches. Izzy and I had spent many lunch breaks in this small, dingy room. It wasn’t anything to look at and it smelled faintly of ammonia and mildew, but it meant privacy, which was a precious commodity to both of us. Living in a wizard keep was how I imagined it would be in a norm college dormitory—people everywhere, all the time.
I pressed the button to unlock my lunchbox. The intricately scrolled golden case, imbued with magic, opened like a flower blooming. A silver thimble-sized sphere morphed into a mug of steaming hot cider, and the bronze cylinder lengthened and folded out to reveal Chicken Cordon Bleu with steamed broccoli. Yum!
“Hello! Knock-knock! We’re talking, Addie!” Izzy waved her hand in front of my face. “And you know I’m right.” She gave me a half-smirk.
“Izzy, you have to be more careful about what you say!” I shot her a stern look. My lunch forgotten, I ran my hand over my own cloak, pulling it tighter around me as if it would somehow protect me from Izzy’s sacrilegious and dangerous opinions. It wasn’t as though I hadn’t heard them all before, but lately she was so passionate about everything. It was starting to make me question things. And questioning wizard society wasn’t a prudent pastime for me. I was the daughter of the High Chancellor. My father didn’t appreciate or, more accurately, tolerate anarchy of any kind.
“Hello again, Addie. I keep losing you today. I was saying that Hugo has told us we’re safe in here.”
I could have argued that we couldn’t know for sure unless he checked the little room every day, but I didn’t bother.
