Page 24

But today, in every one of my morning classes, the Drakes who had so hated and abused me were being not just civil but absolutelyniceto me.

In first period, Tomas Torrez held the door open for me.In second period, Ricardo Perez picked up a pencil I had dropped and handed it back to me with a smile.He even said, “you’re welcome” when I offered him a dumbfounded “thanks.”And in my third period, Sergio Nunez actually smiled at me and asked how my day was going—and he gave every indication of really wanting to know!

By the time lunchtime rolled around, I knew that somethinghadto be up.But what?

I had no idea until I sat down with my lunch—(another cup of coffee, extra cream, extra sugar)—and saw Megan grinning at me.

“Hello, Avery,” she said.“Did you notice anythingdifferenttoday?”

I narrowed my eyes at her.

“Yes, as a matter of fact, Idid,Princess Latimer.Every single Drake I meet has been as sweet as pie to me today.Wouldyouhave something to do with that?”

Megan’s grin grew even wider.

“Yes, I did!”she exclaimed, nearly bouncing in her chair with excitement.“And I usedlittlemagic, Avery!No Blood Magic at all!”

To Megan—who has a vast amount of magical power within her—anything but Blood Magic, (which is so strong it has been outlawed by the Council of Other Elders) is “little” magic.Since she started out doing the heavy, powerful stuff first, it’s been a struggle for her to master what the rest of the magical world considers normal, everyday spells.

I sighed.

“All right then—what did you do to them?”

“It’s a ‘Good Manners’ spell!”Megan told me, her eyes shining.“I found it tucked away in this little book of spells for children that nobody had opened in about like, fifty years.”

I groaned and put a hand to my face.

“Megan, do you know what you’ve done?”I demanded.“Those Drakes you bespelled aren’t being nice to me because theywantto—you’reforcingthem to be nice and that means that inside they’re getting more and more pissed off!”

“Oh, no—really?”Megan looked at me uncertainly.“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure—because my father put a spell like that on me when I was a kid,” I told her.

“He did?”She frowned.“What happened?”

“Nothing good,” I assured her.“It was pretty much a disaster from start to finish.”

“Tell us, why don’t you?”Griffin, who was sitting on Megan’s other side, invited.“Itoldher she shouldn’t do it,” he added, shooting her a frown.

“Yes, tell us—what’s so bad about the manners spell?”she demanded.“Because it seems to be working beautifully.”

“Yes, well, appearances can be deceiving,” I told her.“Look, I was only about five or six when my father put it on me.At that age kids always speak their minds and act on their feelings.Anyway, I had a great aunt at the time that I absolutelyloathed.She was always pinching my cheek and wanting to hug me and plant these big, sloppy kisses all over my plump young cheeks.I still vividly recall the odor of her denture breath as she cooed in my ear, ‘And how’s my little man, today?’”I shivered at the memory.

“That doesn’t sound pleasant,” Griffin remarked and the others at the table—Saint was notably absent—nodded, since they were now listening in.

“Itwasn’t,”I assured him.“Anyway, like most kids that age, I didn’t like being slobbered over.So I did everything I could to avoid my Great Aunt Zelda when she came.I squirmed to get away from her grip and wiped my cheek right away, as soon as she kissed me.

“However, Great Aunt Zelda happened to be my father’s aunt, and she was the keeper of the extremely valuable and ancient family grimoire, which he hoped to inherit one day.(I found all this out later, of course.) So one day—without me knowing it—he put the ‘Good Manners’ spell on me before she came to visit.”

“And what happened?”Megan asked, frowning.“Did you break through the spell and do something even worse?”

“I was too young,” I told her.“At first I didn’t know what was wrong with me.I only knew that as much as I hated it, Ihadto sit on Great Aunt Zelda’s lap and smile while she kissed me and cooed over me.She covered my cheeks with sloppy kisses and talked about what a ‘big little man’ I was and generally made me miserable and I just had to sit there andtake it.”

“Oh, my…” Megan’s face had gone a bit pale.“Oh dear…so you weren’t reallyfeelinghappy to be with your Great Aunt, you just had topretendthat you were, right?”

“Exactly,” I said.“I think you can see where this little story is heading.”

“Tell us more,” Jalli piped up.Her three chimelings were whizzing around her head and diving down to eat the round green peas on her tray from time to time.“Did you stay under the spell the whole time?”