I smile. Again. Penny makes my cheeks hurt. “Don’t make a scene,” I whisper back.
4
PENELOPE
Too thin. He looks too thin.
And something worse … scraped.
Simon always looks better after a few months of Watford’s roast beef. (And Yorkshire pudding and tea with too much milk. And fatty sausages. And butter-scone sandwiches.) He’s broad-shouldered and broad-nosed, and when he gets too thin, his skin just hangs off his cheekbones.
I’m used to seeing him thin like this, every autumn. But this time, today, it’s worse.
His face looks chapped. His eyes are lined with red, and the skin around them looks rough and patchy. His hands are red, too, and when he clenches his fists, the knuckles go white.
Even his smile is awful. Too big and red for his face.
I can’t look him in the eye. I grab his sleeve when he comes close, and I’m relieved when he keeps walking. If he didn’t, I might not let go. I might grab him and hold him and spell us both as far away from Watford as possible. We could come back after it’s all over. Let the Mage and the Pitches and the Humdrum and everyone else fight the wars they seem to have their hearts set on.
Simon and I could get a flat in Anchorage. Or Casablanca. Or Prague.
I’d read and write. He’d sleep and eat. And we’d both live to see the far end of 19. Maybe even 20.
I’d do it. I’d take him away—if I didn’t believe he was the only one who could make a difference here.
If I stole Simon and kept him safe …
I’m not sure there’d be a World of Mages to come back to.
5
SIMON
We practically have the dining hall to ourselves.
Penelope sits on the table with her feet on a chair. (Because she likes to pretend she doesn’t care.)
There are a few younger kids, first and second years, at the other side of the hall, having tea with their parents. I notice them, children and adults, all trying to get a look at me. The kids’ll get used to me after a few weeks, but this’ll be their parents’ only chance to get an eyeful.
Most magicians know who I am. Most of them knew I was coming before I knew myself; there’s a prophecy about me—a few prophecies, actually—about a superpowerful magician who’ll come along and fix everything.
And one will come to end us.
And one will bring his fall.
Let the greatest power of powers reign,
May it save us all.
The Greatest Mage. The Chosen One. The Power of Powers.
It still feels strange believing that that bloke’s supposed to be me. But I can’t deny it, either. I mean, nobody else has power like mine. I can’t always control it or direct it, but it’s there.
I think when I showed up at Watford, people had sort of given up on the old prophecies. Or wondered if the Greatest Mage had come and gone without anybody ever noticing.
I don’t think anybody expected the Chosen One to come from the Normal world—from mundanity.
A mage has never been born to Normals.
But I must have been, because magicians don’t give up their kids. There’s no such thing as magickal orphans, Penny says. Magic is too precious.
The Mage didn’t tell me all that, when he first came to get me. I didn’t know that I was the first Normal to get magic, or the most powerful magician anyone had heard of. Or that plenty of magicians—especially the Mage’s enemies—thought he was making me up, some sort of political sleight of hand. A Trojan 11-year-old with baggy jeans and a shaved head.
When I first got to Watford, some of the Old Families wanted me to make the rounds, to meet everyone who mattered, so they could check me out in person. Kick my tyres. But the Mage wasn’t having any of it. He says most magicians are so caught up in their own petty plots and power struggles that they lose sight of the big picture. “I won’t see you become anyone’s pawn, Simon.”
I’m glad now that he was so protective. It’d be nice to know more magicians and to feel more a part of a community, but I’ve made my own friends—and I made them when we were young, when none of them were overly fussed about my Great Destiny.
If anything, my celebrity status has been a liability for making friends at Watford. Everybody knows that things tend to explode around me. (Though no people have exploded yet—that’s something.)
I ignore the staring from the other tables and help Penelope get our tea.
Even though we go to an exclusive boarding school—with its own cathedral and moat—nobody’s spoiled at Watford. We do our own cleaning and, after our fourth year, our own laundry. We’re allowed to use magic for chores, but I usually don’t. Cook Pritchard does the cooking, with a few helpers, and we all take turns serving at mealtimes. On weekends, it’s help yourself.
Penelope gets us a plate of cheese sandwiches and a mountain of warm scones, and I tear through half a block of butter. (I eat my scones with big slabs of it, so the butter melts on the outside but keeps a cold bite in the middle.) Penny’s watching me like I’m mildly disgusting, but also like she’s missed me.
“Tell me about your summer,” I say between swallows.
“It was good,” she says. “Really good.”
“Yeah?” Crumbs fly out of my mouth.
“My dad and I went to Chicago. He did some research at a lab there, and Micah and I helped.” She loosens up as soon as she mentions her boyfriend’s name. “Micah’s Spanish is amazing. He taught me so many new spells—I think if I study the language more, I’ll be able to cast them like a native.”