Page 36 of Reluctant Witch (A Course in Magic #2)

36

Dan

Everyone in the very crowded infirmary turned to look at them when Dan walked in, holding tightly to Axell’s hand. Dan forced back his anxiety and asked, “Bad time?”

The chief witch, a morally gray Scotsman Dan would have liked to avoid, stood beside the headmaster. Walter had some coldhearted attitudes, and Dan realized that most of them had already come up against that viciousness. The old witch wasn’t a bad guy in an out-to-get-you sort of way, but he didn’t seem particularly concerned with the consequences of his actions or decisions on others.

In stark contrast to the older witch, Sondre’s expression was uncommonly cheerful, and Dan had to hope that it was because he and Maggie were solid. Despite Dan’s initial hesitations about the headmaster, he continued to be fond of the man.

Axell, however, tensed as the headmaster looked at them.

“He can wait elsewhere,” Sondre started.

“Sorry, but no.” Dan squeezed Axell’s hand. “I’m here for your experiment, but if you want me here, he stays.”

Walter raised two furry brows. “And when did anyone decide you made decisions in Crenshaw? I don’t recall that meeting. Does anyone here?”

Dan let him growl a moment. Then he said, “Plan B is to send the both of us back to the other world. You can’t summon my magic to test. You can drain it from me, or you can ask. If you’re asking, that’s my condition. He stays at my side.”

Axell squeezed his hand when he paused, reminding him that no matter what happened here, he wasn’t alone.

“I did things at your order, and I wasn’t pleased.” Dan glanced at Sondre and Prospero. “You lived with the consequences, but I lived with the guilt. Not cool.” He took a deep breath before adding, “I did other things—helping Dr. J and Lord Scylla—that were cool. I’m tired of people ordering me to do what they think. This is my body, my magic.”

Sondre gave him an approving nod. Scylla did, too. The doctor’s expression was unreadable, and Prospero looked contemplative.

The chief witch made a noise like a snort before he muttered, “Always so sassy when they come into their own.” He pointed at Dan. “We’ll have a little chat later, Mr. Monahan.”

“I’ll look forward to that, Chief Witch.” Dan’s voice didn’t crack or wobble, despite feeling like he might throw up from anxiety. He wanted this world, this life, this future, but he was done with other people trying to tell him right from wrong when their own compasses were so incredibly skewed. Dan understood justice and ethics. He thought about them constantly.

“Right, well, the plan is that you drain Allan’s magic,” the doctor suggested, pointing at the former cohead of House Dionysus. “Allan here participated in the attempted murder of Lord Scylla. Typically, we’d talk to the head of House Grendel, but…”

“I turned it down,” Sondre filled in.

Dan gave him a surprised look.

“If we could focus,” the chief witch snapped.

Dan walked closer to the bound man. “Can you”—he looked at Prospero—“calm his mind or something?”

“I could. I will not.” She smiled viciously. “He’s lucky I don’t make him think he’s being tortured.” She leaned close to the man’s face. “You do deserve to suffer, Allan. I wish you’d remember why. I wish I could drop you off in the worst imaginable place for you. I could look into your mind to figure out what you fear.…”

“Enough,” Walter barked.

Dan reminded himself that evil was relative, that he had no reason to be afraid of her, but he was also genuinely hoping to never ever deal with her again. “Right, well, you all need to back up. I’m barely figuring out how to give magic boosts, so draining them… I’d hate to drain the wrong witch.”

He very carefully did not look at Prospero. The scary Victorian seemed more like Crenshaw’s enforcer than an average witch, so maybe fearing her was normal. Maybe they all did, but no one admitted it aloud.

To Axell he whispered, “I need my hand free to do this.”

Axell released his hand. “I believe in you, but if you want to just go back over to the regular world, we can.”

Returning to the other world would mean facing cancer, because the magic would be gone, but more importantly, it would mean losing this weird, wonderful world of witches. Dan shook his head. In a steady voice he said, “Let’s do this.”

Dan pushed past the others to stand beside the bound man’s bed. “I’m not completely sure what to do,” Dan admitted.

“Think of taking magic into you,” Sondre told him, sounding rather teacher-ish. “You drain from other sources and repurpose it. You’ve been doing it all along.”

“Do you remember when we had the class on illusions, Monahan?” Scylla started to sit upright, and Prospero was there in a blink to shove pillows behind her.

Ellie, who had been silent, looked at them, and in the next moment Scylla’s bed had reshaped itself into a modern hospital bed with a controller to raise and lower both the head and foot of the bed. “That ought to help,” she said mildly.

Maybe the others didn’t realize the wonder of an electric bed working sans electricity. Dan was impressed, though.

I want that kind of control, he thought. And power.

After one last glance over at Axell, who smiled encouragingly, Dan went inside himself. He wasn’t sure how else to explain it, but he felt like he was traveling in a vast castle-like building, but it wasn’t like Crenshaw Castle. The halls were brightly lit, and the rooms were mostly unlocked doors.

On some level, he realized he was inside his own essence. His spirit or soul or energy or whatever one wanted to call it. He looked out of a large window into the field outside. Multiple glowing shapes in different hues hovered there. One had a solid cord that was tied into Dan’s castle. Axell. Surprisingly, another thready path twisted past several glowing shapes to a tall figure. Sondre!

And for a moment, Dan looked at the others and thought, I could take some of that. It was probably the first time he realized what Axell had truly meant when he said Dan was hungry or compared him to a wolf. There was a ravenous craving in him that wanted to consume and take.

That’s my magic. It takes.

Later, Dan would ask how others were siphoned before they were sent back to the nonmagical world. For now, he concentrated on not reaching out to the witches his mind saw as glowing shapes.

“Allan. Focus on Allan.” Prospero’s voice echoed through the castle of his mind, sending chills over him at the thought of her entering his mind.

Dan turned his attention to the writhing, glowing shape that looked like it was levitating. It was flat where the others were standing. He reached out… not quite hands but a magical extension of them, as if they stretched like a pour of energy creeping toward the blue glow that was the prone witch.

As soon as Dan’s energy touched the shape that he knew as Allan, his magic shifted, like a creature left off its leash finally. He felt like an invisible mouth extended from him, biting at the energy and swallowing it down in gulps.

And the more he consumed, the more he wanted.

He felt guilt at the thought of taking. He always felt guilt for taking, for wanting, for craving.

But I’m allowed. They want me to do this. They brought me here to do this.

And so Dan let go of his self-restraints and let himself take that glowing magic into himself as he refilled the reservoir that had been depleted by everyone’s demands.