Page 17 of Uncharmed

Chapter Eight

CHANGE OF PLAN

‘ I can fix all of this.’

Annie sounded a little shriller than she’d intended as she walked the same twenty paces over and over.

She had herded Maeve sharply away from the school and guided her by the shoulders down a quiet residential road.

Removing evidently-more-out-of-control-than-realized teenage powers from a busy scene seemed like the first priority.

Annie knew exactly what came next, but was avoiding it for as long as celestially possible.

Selcouth needed to know about this. Maeve, meanwhile, was still unable to look away from the orange in her hand and had been babbling away frantically ever since.

‘I can’t believe I did that...Did you see it?’ Maeve said, stumbling over her words.

‘Which part?’ Annie replied, still pacing. ‘The accidental transfigurative magic on a non-wicche? The spontaneous sorcery fire? The low-level earthquake in a sleepy village in northern England?’

‘This magic stuff...It’s crazy! Or am I crazy? Is this really happening?’ Maeve removed her glasses and rubbed at her eyes.

‘You’re not crazy, sweetheart,’ Annie said, softening slightly. ‘But you are a little out of control, to say the least.’

‘That was...that was...’ Maeve looked as though she were about to profusely vomit at any moment, so Annie rubbed her back gently to try to bring her back down to earth.

‘I don’t mean that in a bad way,’ Annie carried on. ‘No need to worry. It’s all easily fixed and I can fix anything, trust me. It’s kind of my specialist subject. You haven’t done anything wrong. We can just...’

‘That was the coolest thing that has ever happened in the entire history of the universe.’

Annie stumbled back as Maeve burst into overjoyed laughter and leapt into the air, brandishing the orange as though it was a victory trophy.

‘I knew magic was going to have its upsides, but oh, wow, this is unbelievable. Can I turn the whole lot of them into fruit? In fact, fruit is too good. Why did I go for an orange when I could have turned Jessica into anything?’ Maeve was talking at superhuman speed, laughing frantically in between sentences as the adrenaline coursed through her.

‘Can we try it again? A newt? How about I turn her into a scabby pigeon or a bin?’

Annie sighed and threw her hands onto her hips.

‘No bins. No pigeons, rats, raccoons or whatever else you might be inclined to conjure,’ she said, listing the options off on her fingers.

‘Setting fire to the curtains at home we can handle, but accidental transfigurative incantation and almost wiping out a canteen full of kids was not what I had in mind for us on this mild October afternoon.’

‘You’re being dramatic,’ Maeve said, sagging a little and mirroring Annie’s unimpressed body language. ‘I didn’t hurt anyone. I just...orange-ified her a bit.’

‘A bit?’ Annie said, eyes pointedly fixed on the very fully formed orange. ‘Maeve, you threw fire. Actual sorcery fire, from the palm of your hand no less.’

‘Sounds pretty impressive when you put it like that,’ Maeve said, unable to hide a proud smirk.

‘Oh, it would be extremely impressive – if you were intentional in your magic use. But there’s nothing impressive about chucking it around willy-nilly. You’re supposed to control your magic, not the other way around.’

Maeve shrugged indignantly. ‘Maybe I don’t actually need any help with magic at all. Seems like it’s working pretty well to me.’

Annie scoffed, remembering how this feisty girl had seemed like such a gentle wallflower on first impressions.

‘Don’t go getting too big for your boots, young lady.

’ She immediately hated how adult she sounded, using the phrase ‘young lady’.

She was the young lady, wasn’t she? When did this happen?

She shook back her curls to clear her head. ‘Uncontrolled magic is not cool.’

‘Yes, you seem like someone with her finger on the pulse of “cool”,’ Maeve said acidly. ‘They deserved it,’ she added as she pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

Annie, having witnessed the way they’d treated Maeve, found she couldn’t exactly argue with that.

‘Maybe they did...But it’s not just about a one-off dabble in Incantation on your school bully.

There’s the small matter of risking the exposure of wicchekind, Maeve.

Do you know how tricky it’s going to be to wipe so many memories of your escapades back there? ’

Maeve chewed at her bottom lip, then huffed. ‘Okay, maybe I didn’t think about that part. Luckily, that lot would never even consider the possible existence of magic. They’re all far too boring to think big. Don’t stress about it. They’ll just see it as more proof of how weird I am.’

Annie exhaled loudly, tapping her foot as she began to think. ‘Maeve, not to be a total bore, but I am going to have to tell the coven about this. They’re not great fans of anomalies in the magic system and you certainly are a rare one.’

‘Is that your polite way of calling me a pain in the...’

‘I think it’s the best thing to do here,’ Annie spoke loudly over her, hoping that assertiveness would give the illusion that she knew what she was doing. ‘I’m not sure they realize quite how haywire your magic is. She’s not going to like it, but...’

Annie paused for a moment, wriggled her shoulder pads back into place and closed her eyes in concentration.

A crackle of magic popped between her fingers and, moments later, Morena appeared like a storm cloud in front of a flowering red rhododendron to their right.

Maeve stumbled back into the bushes with shock, hand flying to her mouth.

‘Shit!’

Morena squinted slightly at the brightness and, once she’d adjusted to her new location, stared stony-faced from Annie to Maeve and back again.

‘Thank you for that most bracing welcome, Miss Cadmus. I shall be sure to greet you in the same way next time our paths cross,’ Morena said as she adjusted her cloak over her crisp shirt. She turned her attention to Annie with raised eyebrows. ‘Well?’

Annie rushed to her. ‘Morena, you know I would never, ever request a summoned transference from you unless it was absolutely necessary.’

‘I should hope not. And to this universe-forsaken realm, of all of them? This had better be very, very good, Andromeda.’

‘It’s more the direct opposite.’ Annie hesitated. ‘I fear this may be very, very bad.’

‘I know you,’ Maeve interrupted as she approached Morena with a pointed finger, the orange-shaped Jessica clutched in her other hand. ‘You bought me that big old book for my birthday, with your small sister.’

‘Yes, I’m rather like a fairy godmother in that way, aren’t I?’ Morena’s mouth pursed so tightly that her lipstick turned to a small circle. ‘Except you would never catch me dead in that atrocious uniform. Andromeda, what exactly is the quandary here?’

Annie froze, unsure of where to start, then gave a breathy laugh. ‘Honestly, you’re never going to believe it...’

‘I set the canteen on fire, cut the power, caused an earthquake and then turned Jessica into an orange,’ Maeve interrupted, handing the piece of fruit over to Morena.

Morena didn’t move for a moment, then with a resigned sigh took a pair of glasses from the inside pocket of her cloak and placed them on the end of her nose.

She accepted the orange to examine it in fine detail.

‘Andromeda, do you mean to tell me that this citrus fruit is in fact a non-wicche student?’

‘Like I said, she deserved it,’ Maeve muttered under her breath.

‘She’s not entirely wrong about that,’ Annie said, glowing when she received a small, secretive smile from Maeve for her camaraderie, which almost made the whole thing worth it.

‘And, looking back, it was a rather impressive series of events, if not an ideal one. We may have quite a special witch on our hands.’

At that, Maeve beamed.

‘A special witch is of absolutely no use to me if she is going to give Selcouth days’ worth of complex and dreary memory reset work. Not to mention the fact that teenagers are particularly tricky to magically manipulate, what with all the hormones flying around,’ Morena drawled.

‘What can I do to help?’ Annie asked, a hand to her forehead. ‘Morena, it’s all my fault. I should have removed Maeve more quickly, as soon as I sensed that things were going south. My intuition was a little...squiffy at the school.’

‘Squiffy indeed. Miss Cadmus, will you excuse us for a moment? Take your orange for a walk,’ Morena said, handing Jessica back. Maeve wandered a few paces away with a sniff and a scuff of her shoes against the pavement.

Morena turned to Annie with a flourish of her cloak.

‘To be frank, Andromeda, the most helpful thing that can be done about this mess is to swiftly remove Miss Cadmus. Not only is it highly dangerous to her, particularly if there seems to be some sort of affinity towards fire of all things,’ she tutted.

‘But there remains a huge exposure risk until her powers are under control.’

‘I can take her to my house?’ Annie offered, but instantly regretted it.

It was a habit of hers, suggesting solutions that she then prayed would not be accepted.

She thought of her bathroom, stocked to the rafters with highly potent potion ingredients, not to mention her midnight Splendidus Infernum ritual, which, for all she knew, could run amok with an unpredictable magical presence in the vicinity.

Plus there was Karma, who hated spontaneous visitors and would have to be bribed with inordinate amounts of custard.

Annie felt a tidal wave of relief when Morena shook her head.

‘Absolutely not. London is far too populated. And neutral ground is a better choice, given the unpredictability of her powers. Selcouth will provide emergency accommodation for the two of you.’