Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 115432 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115432 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
Because God forbid, it brought attention to our house.
“It’s fear,” I whispered to myself as I pulled into the driveway and then the garage. However, the moment I parked, I felt something—no, someone. The tingle of magic looming in the air. I knew that magic.
It was my other little stalker.
* * *
Smiling, I hopped out of my car, glancing around to see where she could be hiding, and the moment I stepped to the right, I felt a tingle to my left. So I jumped left and then right, shuffling my feet before I dropped to my stomach and looked under my car.
“Magdalena!” I called out at her and snapped my fingers, the cloaking spell she’d used breaking and revealing my eight-year-old neighbor, with a freckled face and brown pigtails, staring right back at me with her big brown eyes.
She grinned. “Morning, Dru! Why won’t you call me Mags?”
“Because I love your full name. It’s cool. Do you know what would also be cool? If you didn’t try playing magical tricks on me first thing in the morning,” I said back to her.
“It wasn’t trying to trick you. I wanted to show you!” she replied as she crawled out from under the car in her school uniform. “It took you three more minutes to notice me this time. I’m getting stronger.”
She was right. Then again, my mind was a little preoccupied this morning.
“It’s good you are practicing, but what do the elders say about doing magic like this,” I said, flicking her forehead.
“Ouch,” she grumbled, rubbing her head then pouting at me. “I don’t know. All the elders ever say is no. No. Practice more and no.”
I bit my lip to stop from laughing as her face bunched up in annoyance. Again, she wasn’t wrong.
“Dru, can you teach me, or can I come out on hunts—”
I put my hand over her lips, silencing her as I bent down to eye level. “Magdalena, you can’t just talk about stuff out in the open. How many times do I have to tell you?”
Her shoulders drooped, and I took my hand off her mouth. “It’s not fair. Why do we have to hide everything? Magic is so cool!”
I remembered feeling like this. “I know! The coolest,” I whined back. “But it is also scary to people who don’t have it. And more people don’t have it than those who do have it. That’s why we have to be careful.”
“You sound like the elders now.” She huffed, crossing her arms. “And my mom. Dru, you are boring.”
I frowned and poked her stomach. “I am not!”
“Are too.”
“Am not!”
“Are too.” She stuck out her tongue, and I flicked my fingers in her face, sending a little wind of butterflies right in front of her. She gasped, backing away and grinning. “Cool! What’s the spell for that—”
“Magdalena?”
I popped back up, standing tall with my hands behind my back to hide the evidence of my magic. However, the older, brown-haired woman, with a furrowed brow and a birthmark on the left side of her cheek, would not be so easily tricked.
“Good morning, Mrs. Reyes. How are you?” I asked with a bright smile.
She looked me over with a frown. “Fine,” her voice flat as her sharp gaze drifted to her daughter, who was now trying to hide behind me.
“Magdalena Varela Reyes, you are going to miss the bus. And if you miss the bus, I’m going to make you walk—again.”
“Bye, Dru!” She ran from behind me as if she were a cheetah, making sure to wave to her mother as she cut through our lawn. However, she missed a step, slipped, and rolled.
I bit back a snort. “Hmm.”
“I’m okay,” Magdalena yelled as she got back up and ran again.
“What am I going to do with her?” Her mother loudly exhaled before she turned back to me. “Maybe I should ask your uncle, seeing as how you also saw fit to join her this morning instead of correcting her.”
“I—”
“Save it for the meeting,” was all she said as she walked back to her house.
Dammit.
Regina Reyes was one of the elders. We called them elders even though Mrs. Reyes was only in her early forties because…well, because there weren’t that many witches left of the older generations. Fighting an eternal war against vampires tended to cut our life spans a bit shorter than we’d like. Maybe that was why she’d chosen to have Magdalena so late in life. Because we were neighbors and because of how close Mrs. Reyes was to my uncle, I’d known Magdalena all her life. She was like a little sister. And she had no problem acting like it, either, always popping up either in my room or my car. But since I didn’t have any real siblings, it didn’t bother me. I actually looked forward to seeing her hopeful and excited face.