The Legend of the Eight: The Gifted

20: Thirty-Six Graves

TWENTY: THIRTY-SIX GRAVES
FEBRUARY 19
NICOLE BRADLEY

AFTER ONLY FOUR DAYS AT the old boarding house, Nicole was beginning to lose her mind. Removed from the outside world with seven others was enough to make anyone mad, after all. The low temperatures outside kept everyone in and large as the house was, it was beginning to feel incredibly cramped.

At first, the group had the brilliant idea of using their time in isolation to work with their magic—figuring that if Dark Wizards were coming after them, they should at least know how to defend themselves—but it only took one antique lamp to crash and shatter for them to agree it was probably a bad idea. The magic lessons disbanded shortly after.

Frustrated because she thought they were sitting ducks until they learned to use this all-powerful Eight Magic, Nicole decided the next best thing to practicing magic was reading about it. So she went to the library.

There, she dove into Eva the Alchemist's grimoires. In one was the spell she used to protect the house and it was much more complicated than a simple abracadabra. According to her notes, Eva created the spell herself nearly twenty years ago—shortly before Bartemius killed her.

"What are you reading?"

Logan had joined her on the couch and looked over her shoulder at the spell book.

"Is that Eva's?"

Nicole nodded. "She created the protective charm over the house. How incredible is that? I didn't even know wizards could create spells!"

Logan's icy eyes narrowed and he leaned forward to get a better look. "They can't," he said. "Not usually. Not without some incredible source of magic."

"Well, she was an Alchemist," Nicole argued. "Aren't they supposed to be full of magic?"

"Not enough to create something like Purgatory. For that, you need something big."

He made a gesture to the book as if to ask, "May I?" and Nicole passed it to him. He skimmed the spell's notes quickly and she thought he was about to explain how Eva did it when he looked up with two fear-filled eyes.

"Get everyone," he told her. "They need to hear this."

Nicole wasn't sure what Logan read that scared him so badly but she nodded and gathered the others back in the library. They stood around, waiting for Logan's findings, and as they did, Wil groaned. She mumbled something about breaking into a liquor cabinet with Drew—apparently they'd almost gotten into it before Nicole interrupted them.

"Wil," Kate snapped at her twin. "I hardly think the way to thank someone for providing us a safe hideout is by drinking all of their alcohol."

"She's dead," Wil fired back, rolling her eyes. "I hardly think she'll mind."

"So why call us in here?" Drew asked and Logan's face flushed. From what Nicole had picked up about the Rogers boy, he was never very comfortable on the spot. He preferred to blend into the background instead.

"This is about the spell that protects this house," said Logan, his ice blue eyes racing across the page of the grimoire.

"Okay," said Phoebe, who was twisting her light brown hair into a braid. "And?"

Logan looked up. "And thirty-six wizards were killed here."

"Thirty-seven if you don't get to the point," Wil threatened with a casual roll of her eyes. "Why do we care?"