Chapter Text
Ch 1
15-year-old Marvin Mannix goes to Fredericksburg High School and has no friends. He wishes he could be part of something bigger, a team.
One day, after school, he receives the news from his parents that his grandfather, Mark, passed away.
Ch 2
Marvin sees the trip to Baltimore for the funeral as a temporary escape from school.
Ch 3
Marvin and his parents arrive at Mark's house in Baltimore.
It was a big old house at the end of a winding road. It had a big, green, grassy yard, which was surrounded by an iron fence, with a big oak near one side and a birdbath near the other. In the front and center of the fence was a gate, beyond which a stone walkway led up to the veranda of the two story manor, where a porch swing hung from above...The house was built over one hundred years ago…
Marvin's stern aunt Marissa (Mark's stepsister) is the only other surviving relative. She found a blue box belonging to Marvin, given to him by Mark when he was 5 years old. One of the items inside is a silver key of unknown origin that Marvin found on the porch of his home one day.
Ch 4
Marvin, his parents, and Marissa go out to eat at a restaurant called Moonstone. Marissa behaves suspiciously.
Ch 5 & 6
After the funeral and reading of Mark’s will, Marissa leaves in anger. Marvin discovers a hidden door in the guest room, covered by a bookcase. With no key to unlock it, he chops a hole through it with an ax, then quickly hides the evidence and pushes the bookcase back in front of the door when his dad hears the noise.
Ch 7 & 8
After his dad leaves, Marvin climbs through the hole in the secret door and up a flight of stairs to a secret attic, discovering the McMagicspell Book of Phenomena , a slew of magical ingredients, a silver box, and a talking pigeon. The pigeon, who gained the ability to speak from a spell cast by Mark (and whose voice sounds the same as Mark’s), tells Marvin his family's magical history. Marvin names him Abey, for "Attic Bird".
"The McMagicspell legacy managed to survive for hundreds of years, until about eighty years ago, when something terrible happened.”
“What happened?" Marvin asked, sounding concerned.
"It was at the time when your great-grandmother and great-grandfather, Margaret and Marshal McMagicspell, lived together in Scotland with their two-year-old son, Mark. Somehow, the town found out about the magic they possessed and accused Margaret of being a witch.”
"What did they do to her?" Marvin asked Abey.
"They burned her at the stake…
“Marshal fled Scotland with his son, and with every magic item he owned."
"And he came here to America," Marvin said…
“That's right," Abey confirmed. "right here to Maryland, right here to Baltimore, right here to this house... And just to be safe, he changed their last name from McMagicspell to Mannix. His wife had gotten killed because of the magic, and he would not risk anything happening to him, or worse, to his son. But since it was a family tradition that has lasted for so long, he realized he could not rightfully disown the magic altogether. So, he put it all here in the attic and locked it, only using it when he absolutely had to.”
Abey reveals that Marshal married an affluent American woman named Mary who was secretly a witch, with a daughter named Marissa, also a witch (and therefore evil, apparently). Somehow Marshal managed to keep the McMagicspell magic hidden from them their whole lives, his son Mark being the only other person to ever know about it, though Mary and Marissa both had their suspicions, and secretly coveted the McMagicspell power.
Abey reveals that Marissa killed Mark, to Marvin’s shock and dismay.
Ch 9 & 10
Marvin determines that the house was willed to his parents, not to Marissa, and therefore the magic should be safe from her clutches. Marvin discovers that his parents don’t know about the McMagicspell lineage, or the family’s magical gifts. He also deduced that his parents are already planning to leave Fredericksburg and move into Grandpa Mark’s house. Abey shows Marvin a recipe in the Book of Phenomena for a magical brew that makes things stay clean and dry forever. He tries it out on one of his dirty shirts.
Ch 11
Marvin mixes another brew from a recipe in the book that makes the door to the attic disappear (blend in with the wallpaper around it). He paints the gooey purple substance onto the door in the shape of an M, which makes the door vanish, only reappearing when verbally instructed to do so. No key was ever found to unlock the door, so he removes the doorknob with a screwdriver, so as to not have to climb through the hole every time. Abey finds out about the silver key in Marvin’s blue box and suggests he tries it on the silver box in the attic. The box opens, revealing five necklaces: five gold chains with gold M’s attached. Marvin puts one on.
Ch 12 & 13
That night being a full moon, Marvin wakes up at midnight and discovers he has the power to move objects with his mind, also known as psychokinesis, or PK. He seems unable to lift objects that are too heavy. The powers derive from the necklace, but Abey warns Marvin against putting more than one on at a time.
Marissa enters the house in the middle of the night, discovers the secret attic she suspected existed, but Abey shouts at her in Mark’s voice, convincing her he’s a ghost. Marvin, hiding in the attic’s large fireplace, adds to this deception by using PK to throw objects off of the shelves lining the walls and hit Marissa with them. She flees the house in terror, waking up Marvin's parents, who are left mystified by her behavior.
Ch 14 & 15
Abey promises Marvin he'll watch the house and use his "ghost voice" should Marissa come back. Marvin and his parents drive back to Fredericksburg for the big move.
"It's like we took our house and Grandpa Mark's house and ran them through a blender. It's weird."
Once settled in, Marvin's parents send him to a new school called Falstaff Academy.
(Author's note: although it doesn't specify anywhere in the text, the only way Falstaff Academy makes any sense being such a small school in Baltimore is if it's a private school, which seems unlikely to be something Marvin's parents could afford, unless it was explicitly stated in Mark's will that some of the family's inheritance would go towards sending Marvin to private school.)
On his first day, a student named Sheldon throws spitballs at Marvin in Algebra class, then gets yelled at by the teacher for it.
Two girls named Courtney Mancina and Annette Hunter befriend Marvin at lunch. They compliment his necklace, and he offers to give them two of the other four he has that look just like it (even though M isn't one of Annette's initials, she just doesn't want to be left out).
Ch 16
Abey worries that Marvin is making a mistake, sharing the McMagicspell magic with nonmembers of the family. He gives the M necklaces to Courtney and Annette the next day at school as promised.
"Cool," Courtney said. "Now I can show everybody my favorite letter."
Marvin's mom gets a job at Moonstone and his dad joins the Baltimore police force.
Ch 17a
The next day at school:
"Say, I meant to ask you guys in Algebra," Marvin said, "have you noticed anything unusual happening lately?"
"Oh, why yes," Courtney said. "Annette had terrible gastric pains earlier today."
Annette hit Courtney's arm with the backside of her hand. "I did not! Shut up!
He tells them to wear their necklaces all the time, but of course he doesn't say why.
Marvin's parents let him know they'll be working late. He tells them he'll ask someone for a ride home.
Sheldon throws a water balloon at Marvin after school, and he retaliates by using PK to make Sheldon trip and fall.
A sophomore named Kirk befriends Marvin...and that's where chapter 17b will begin.