Even in a world full of magic and wonder, no one can escape dealing with very human problems.
Claire, the outspoken witty new kid mermaid is fearful of being alone and separated, and just wants a group of friends to call her own. Elora, the wild on...
Claire silently made her way out of the hallway, making sure to avoid Nick's line of sight. She hid herself in an empty broom closet and unzipped her backpack. The black raven flew out and balanced on the tip of a broomstick. "Abelle?" Claire asked, amazed at the creature that stood before her.
The bird squawked back and nodded.
"Nick did this to you?"
Another squawk.
"We gotta go to Volk—"
Abelle flew up into the air and cawed rapidly. Her wings flapping about with disorder. She didn't want to see the headmaster. The ward he placed on her should have prevented any kind of enchantment, so the fact that Nick was able to get past his ward would raise more questions than it answered.
"Okay okay, no Volk."
Abelle calmed down. She sighed. She needed to tell Claire to bring her to Mystic, but how? She jumped down from her perch, grabbed the notebook from Claire's bag and tossed it on the ground, hoping it would open to a page with all of their magical colored writing. With a bit of luck, it did, and Abelle pecked down at the notes written in a pale blue ink—Mystic's note taking color.
Claire nodded reluctantly. She picked up the notebook and let Abelle hop back into her backpack.
Like an unwinnable game of hide and seek, Claire wandered around the school looking for Mystic. She checked Elora's dorm room, the dining hall, the library, and the Living Lobby. Mystic was nowhere to be found. It took over an hour to finally track Mystic down by word of mouth after asking several students around the school if they had seen the curly-haired girl.
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Elora rummaged through the cabinets in the freshman potions classroom while Lily sat on the nearby stool waiting. Vials and test tubes filled with bubbling liquids spread across the tables in an unruly pattern. Elora was looking for answers.
"You don't have to do this," Lily said as she balanced a glass vial between her slender fingers.
"This morning you looked at Abelle like she did something horrible. Like it was her magic residue on the Nightmare. Maybe it was! So, if we just grab some of Abelle's spellwork, then you should be able to compare—"
"So this is what you dragged me down here for? You told me we were gonna work on extra credit. I wouldn't have come had I known you were using me as some trace-magic bloodhound." Lily jumped down from the stool and headed for the door. "I told you to drop the conversation before. I don't want to dwell on it anymore."
With the last tube out of the cabinet, Elora brushed the dust off her palms. "Look, I didn't mean to shift the blame to Abelle this morning. I'm just trying to figure out all the plausible explanations."
"El', you realize despite how much Abelle may make it seem like her life is perfect, she has never had it easy here. Especially since her entire family has gone to Venefica and left a legacy in some way. How would you feel if your part in that kind of a legacy was incapacitating your friend in your freshman year?"
