Chapter Text
Despite their individual circumstances, all four of them broke the pellet at the same time.
Evan swung his head to and fro, to no avail. Light swimmed over his vision in a thick mist, swirling and pouring around him. It covered everything else, even the natural light of the sun that had been beating down on his back just moments ago. For a moment, no sound could be heard, nothing except the white void. Standing inside of it, he felt weightless. If Evan wasn’t sure that he would be pulled to the world beneath theirs when it was his time to rest, he would have thought he had died. Then, a soft shimmer started around him. Slowly, the star-like sparkles grew from a distant spray of splattered light to a strong stream of illuminating colours. It circled him in a certain shape, he realised. A spiral.
Just enough time passed that Evan thought his luck might be changing. This was too beautiful to be wrong. Then, a couple of the stars flickered. Spinning his head to them, he caught others doing the same. The white smoke audibly crackled like the groan of a tired earth, and tiny rivers of black smoke started to roll down the white nothingness with a hiss. It looked like the void was bleeding, and bleeding fast. Soon, there was inky darkness around him, and the stars had exploded into empty cavities of shadow. Instinctually, although Evan should know that his touch was poison, he reached out to where the dots had smiled at him. The shadows screamed, and the inky void coated his hands with a thick sludge that smelled of metal. Evan screamed back.
And then he blinked.
The sun was back. Not as strong as it had been a second ago, in fact, the pressure in the air seemed to be completely different, like a sudden weather change.
Above him, the skies were infinitely blue with a few sparse clouds that looked soft and unfamiliar in the landscape he was used to. The air didn’t feel as heavy.
When Evan blinked again, he caught sight of the branches that reached up into the sky- branches that definitely hadn’t been there before. Through the time he had spent in the library looking for which species of native flora were edible, he could tell this branch did not belong in America at all. His eyes jumped back down to the earth and what was in front of him. In front of a large, archaic tower stood an old man with a large white beard, monocle, and purple robes with stars on them.
The man smiled at him as their eyes met.“Oh my! I do hope the journey wasn’t too much of a scare,” he began, and then cleared his throat. “Well, that is the last of our latest students! Hello, everyone. My name is Merle Ambrose. I am the headmaster of the Ravenwood School of Magical Arts.”
“What the fuuck…” Evan turned his head to the side as another voice hissed. He took a defensive step back as he realised how close he was standing to three other people his age. This was already turning into a greater risk. However, the person that had just spoken didn’t seem displeased, despite her words. In fact, her metal jewellery were jingling against each other as she jumped up and down in excitement. The guy next to her, who was in full sports gear, seemed likewise filled with a mix of shock and excitement, based on the way his mouth had been frozen agape.
The last one was the one to make him jump, as she silently pulled out what Evan might guess to be a phone, and it let out a large flash. Oh god, had it broken? Had Evan contributed to that?
“I can’t help but notice that none of you are wearing your robes. Were there any issues in acquiring them?” The man questioned softly.
“Robes? Wait, are we dressing up? Like the real thing?” It was the girl with the phone who spoke first, after her eyes had flitted between everyone standing there.
Like Evan, the two other people turned their heads to the girl as she spoke, and properly processed her presence for the first time. A nagging but familiar loneliness chewed on Evan as both of their faces twisted into looks of recognition and he remained clueless.
“Oh shit, you’re the girl who-”
“-Sam!”
“-almost got killed by that big bird. Live!”
She smiled. “Oh no, we came to an understanding after we talked it out. It was the one who gave me the letter, actually, and- Oh!” she broke off as her eyes trailed to the other girl. After a big hug, they seemed to have a bit of a reunion, and Evan was questioning whether or not he was accidentally intruding until the girl turned back to the strange man. “Sorry, this is a cool moment and all, but I’m still not going to pay for a school uniform.”
“Oh!” The strange man looked almost as bemused by her behaviour as they were of him. “I assure you, no fees have to be paid for the basic set of robes, and you may customise your clothing as you wish. Usually, students are more than happy to show off their new school after they have been sorted.”
The sporty-looking guy perked up at that. “Freebies? I didn’t get anything like that! Did you guys?” he looked at the others, who gave confirming ‘no’s.
Shit, they were talking to him! Evan shaked his head just in time to be considered a normal reaction.
The man stroked his beard. “How peculiar. You should have received the available options after you had sent in all of your forms.”
“Wait, wait, backtrack!” requested- what had the girl called her, Dream? “You said something about being sorted? Like, maybe, sorted into four different houses based on our strengths? That kind of sorting?”
“Four houses? No, there are seven schools at the Ravenwood School of Magic,” he corrected, frowning. Then, his eyes flashed with understanding. “Ah! Could it be that you weren’t given the proper forms to fill in at all? Tell me, have you been sorted yet?”
Slowly, they all shook their heads.
“Oh dear! That is quite out of the ordinary. We will have to get that ready along with your orientation when the first introductions are out of the way. Gamma, would you be so kind and help them out? I sense an explanation is in order.” The man turned to the side, but all there was was a grey owl dressed in similarly strange clothing.
“Helloooo!” the owl hooted in a human-like voice, immediately drawing everyone’s attention. “My name is Gamma the owl, and I am quite pleased to meet you.”
“The owl fucking talks.”
“Wizards learn spells from one primary school of magic out of seven, which we will introduce to you soon. They test their spells by summoning fantastic creatures and duelling! To become a master wizard, you must learn every spell in your class. Wizards love to duel! The more spells, the better a duelist you will become.”
“We reached out to you because we could sense your potential to magic. We expect great things from you, young students!” the man winked.
Evan’s head was starting to spin with the influx of information and what it could mean for him. What it could mean for the curse. Maybe he would even dare hope for a solution.
And just as he thought those words, the ground began to rumble.
In the blink of an eye, the pleasant summer sky had given way to dark clouds. A rumbling thunder arrived exactly as the sky was split by flashing lightning, announcing the coming spray of raindrops. A dark feeling settled in his gut as a presence emanated from the tall tower ahead. The others must have been able to feel it too, feel the icy tendrils of watchful eyes trail over them, because in the corner of his eyes he could see how all of them were looking at the same window. Evan hoped he wasn’t the only one to see the flickering of a shadowy figure.
With a few startled flaps of the wings, the owl on the pedestal flew into the air and almost dropped his hat. “Whooo?”
Not again. Not now. Shame and dread twisted his insides, and he barely dared to glance over at the shocked faces of the kids his age. Fear was still a way off, but the baffled excitement had frozen into a careful unease. Already , Evan thought. I’m ruining this already.
The wizard’s gaze was unreadable beyond a composed determination. His gaze was trained at the window, seemingly not minding the droplets covering his monocle. When the owl had flown to his side, he turned to them with a still cheery voice. “How odd! Come along, young wizards. Let’s investigate the matter! Meet me in the tower!”
Without looking to see if they would follow, he made his way over to the door and entered the building. None of them moved at first, frozen by the sudden change of pace.
“So, we goin’?” asked the guy in sports gear, turning to them with a raised eyebrow.
“That seems incredibly dangerous,” Evan blurted out, more unwilling than ever to face whatever demon shit he had managed to attract this time. He didn’t want to drag these people into it.
Gamma, who had returned to his spot on the pedestal, puffed up his feathers and sent a glare Evan’s way after he had spoken. It didn’t look very intimidating under those glasses, if anything it looked a bit silly, but Evan still felt a little bad. “Yoooou’d best follow the headmaster. Yoooou're safe with him!” he hooted.
Right. It could talk. And not in the creepy way that animals usually talked to him.
“To the tower!” the owl urged them.
The girl with the phone (Sam?) crossed her arms with a thoughtful frown. Her eyebrows were deeply creased, as if closely considering something.“Yeah, this feels pretty similar to those warnings about ‘stranger danger’ and being taken to a second location… but if it’s for the cont -”
“Are you kidding me? This is our chance! Of course we’re going!” the other girl cut in, and then she was halfway to the door before any of them could argue.
“Dream!” The phone-girl followed after her.
The guy looked at them enter, sent Evan a look then sprinted in the same direction. “Well, if we’re going, we might as well go as a team!”
The door clattered as the three of them entered the building. The rain patters against Evan’s bare arms and had drenched his T-shirt. He let himself stand there in the rain for one second, watching the puddles grow over the mosaic path and contemplating if it would be safer for everyone if he ran the other way. But this was his chance to get rid of the curse. And… those people had smiled at him.
This was most likely going to be a trap, and that was in the best case scenario.
Evan hurried to join them.
A warm light illuminated the room, but it only worked to make the man on the other side stand out even more. His face was pale, his hair black, and his clothes were colorless. Shamefully, Evan recognised his similarity to the figure that everyone was glaring at.
Next, he saw the two large creatures in front of the man. Their skin was covered by sickly green scales, and their orange wings looked bat-like where they spread out behind them. Shit. Evan caught the eye of one of the creatures and pressed his back to the door as the eyes went from ‘following orders’ to bloodlust.
At least he didn't recognise them. Maybe that was a selfish thought, but not even the guilt could push away the relief Evan felt that this evil was maybe not from him.
When Evan was through the door, it seems like he had just missed the beginning of a conversation. The headmaster’s face was torn with contempt in the direction of the man.
The monsters took a couple steps towards them, and the headmaster waved his staff. “Hurry along, young wizards! Take this deck of spell cards and deal with those creatures while I tend to Malistaire himself.” In one of the overstuffed bookshelves behind them, a deck of cards began to glow and slid down from the shelf, spilling out on the floor.”
The man, called Malistaire of all names, tapped his staff into the ground. “Don’t be so sure of yourself, old man!” The creatures’ eyes began to glow, inky black.
The headmaster’s voice was grim but reassuring as he turned to them. “Run up and confront them! Be brave, I will guide you.”
Who the fuck did this guy think he was? This was a dangerous situation, and they had no kind of preparation for whatever this was. They weren’t stupid, just because they were young. In a situation like this, you were meant to run away and-
Mother fucker.
Fire flashed in Dream’s eyes. She scurried over and scooped up a couple of the cards on the floor, and then stepped into the ring with only a moment of hesitation. Just a couple steps in, the room flashed, and the wooden ground was illuminated with runes and symbols that had not been there before. Even as she stayed unmoving, she squawked as her feet were pulled into a smaller circle.
Thankfully, the same things happened to the monsters, and they were now a safer distance away from her. In between them, the floor spun in a mist-filled spiral.
The girl showed her teeth in a smile that was as much adrenaline as it was terror.
“Quickly! You must choose a spell and use it to attack one of Malistarie’s henchmen.”
“How?!” she cried, fumbling with the cards. Yet, without waiting for an answer, something calculating was hidden in her eyes, as if she could see something they could not. Slowly, she pulled up one of the cards and held it out in front of her. Her hand trembled, and the card turned into magic dust.
It apparently triggered something, because suddenly there was a glowing arrow at the floor pointed at the monster, and it traced a blue symbol of light in front of it. Snowflakes appeared in the air, and disappeared just as quickly when the creature touched the symbol. Instead, the whole ground between them froze over in an icy landscape. A giant beetle with limbs made of ice and frost appeared out of nowhere, and charged towards Dream. A glistening frozen ray was let out, striking her right in the shoulder. She staggered backwards, covered in frost, but remained stuck in the circle.
The ice disappeared, and the arrow moved. When the other creature attacked, summoning some kind of giant crab, she held her arms up to guard herself from the blast.
Her friend from before gasped, and the sporty guy swore. “Jesus christ!”
Dream didn’t react yet. The arrow was pointed to her, and she slowly raised her hand into the air like the others had done. A red flame was drawn in front of her, and little cinders licked at fell at her feet when she pushed forward and a tiger made out of nothing but flame and fire flew forward to defend her. It roared, and singed the creature on the right.
“Oh my, you’re hurt!” called the Headmaster.
“I’m fine!” She wiped away some snow from her clothes. “It doesn’t hurt, not like real pain. It’s, uh, kind of like if you could feel pain in dreams?”
Giving her a glance over, her words hold some truth. She doesn’t have a big gash where the crab attacked, but her clothes have torn and frost coats her shoulders. The damage must not be entirely physical, or there were some other magic bullshit preventing them from being hurt. Good bullshit, for once.
He nodded, as if he expected that answer, but continued. “Yes, but watch out for your health. You can only take so much until the power of the duel is broken, and you are defeated! Likewise, you will only be able to cast a limited number of spells before you tire out. If you ran out of energy here, you would be at the mercy of…” he shook his head. “Where were we? Right! Attack his henchmen again!”
“Not alone, you aren’t!” At that point, the two other kids seemed to have grown sick of watching from the sidelines. The two of them grabbed a random card from the ground each, and ran forward into the circle. Like before, something invisible and beyond their power grabbed hold of them, and shifted them into a ring each.
However quick they had acted, it had been a little too late to prevent the next two attacks from hitting home. Still, when there was a slight lull to the battle, the two of them did the same thing as they had seen Dream doing, and held up a card each. Evan thought he could heard the guy mutter “what the fuck does this mean” under his breath.
The attacks kept coming. Malistair’s bousting was tuned out in favor of the fight on hand. It wasn’t looking great for Dream, and Evan found himself holding his breath as crackling waters that looked way deeper than it had any right to be covered the central place. Evan nearly threw himself thoughtlessly into battle when the fin appeared, but it had finished its bite before he could move.
Dream dropped to her knees, coughing water that didn’t exist. Even though the next enemy didn’t attack, she couldn’t gather herself in time to make an attack on her own. She tried to heave herself up, but lost her balance and had to take a break. She looked significantly worse for wear than before.
He was all the more thankful for the other people there. Her friend, with a look of vengeful care, had a couple of tiny leaves fall at her shoulder as a green leaf symbol appeared in front of her. What she summoned didn’t bring a powerful roar, or a terrifying crackle, but the smell of daisies on the wind, and a pristine unicorn. It stepped closer, looked Dream in the eyes, and curtsied a bow. A soft glow covered Dream as she did the same. She let out a relieved sigh, and the signs of wear and tear had mostly disappeared.
Getting up again, it was clear her fire was back. Although, that Malistaire guy was clearly not very happy about it. “Foolish creatures!” he spat, and continued to reprimand and threaten the monsters- anything to damage his opponent further.
“Maybe they would fight better if you didn’t talk to them like that, you know?” Sam called, visibly beaming with pride and satisfaction after her successful interaction with magic. Evan fully understood the sentiment; his jaw had dropped at the natural display of magic. A magic that was built so deeply on the intent of care, not harm.
“Don’t give him ideas!” chided the guy next to her, just as he too was tracing some symbol. It was hard to make out what it was supposed to be until the very end, where it might have resembled a scale. With a flash of light… nothing happened? Evan leaned forward. Nothing appeared in the stage between them, but… there! There was a small floating shield circling around Dream.
She gave it a puzzled stare. “Uh, thanks?”
“It’s a balanceblade!” The headmaster explained. “It will make your next attack more powerful- which reminds me! I think I’ve got it. Young student, take this card, it will take them both out at once.”
Evan is suddenly pulled out of his stupor as the man now gestured at him . Suspicion raises his hackles, and he defensively holds up his arms and pushes the card back. “No!”
“No?”
“No!” Evan reaffirms. There was some magic shit going on with those cards. Evan couldn’t trust them. Still, it was selfish of him to just sit at the sidelines and do nothing. He had to help somehow. He pressed his hands into fists and threw himself forwards, ready to start swinging-
Being pulled by an invisible force was a strange sensation to experience, even if he had seen it happen before him several times at that point. The ring caught him, feeling both like being bound by ropes and like a protective sphere around him. Little twinkles of energy surrounded him, and it felt like his mind narrowed in on what was in front of him. It was like he could just tell how well off these creatures were. Liquid energy was starting to run in his veins.
The headmaster blinked, then promptly refocused on Dream. “No matter. Young wizard, you take this instead. I will give you the pips necessary- the power you need to cast this spell.”
Dream grinned wide, and reached out. “Gladly!”
The next hits couldn’t shake her. When it was her turn, she seemed a little more confident in drawing the glyph of fire. Though, not even she had expected it when the ground started to rumble, and the sky opened up and spit out two gigantic rocks with long tails of flame. They flew right into the two creatures, who curled to the ground at the blow. With it, the magical glow disappeared from their eyes, and they faded along with the twinkling air around Malistairs staff.
The runes grew dull and dark, the circle disappeared from their eyes, and they were released.
Dream was immediately jumping up and down. Her legs were shaking, but there was no mistaking the unhindered excitement on her face. “We did it! That was so cool !”
“Fuck yes!” The sportsguy pumped his fist into the air.
“Excellent work”, the headmaster praised with a nod. “Now, let me see to Malistaire… I’ll show him, threatening new students before orientation no less!” Motes of light and frizzling energy were traveling from his hands to his wand.
Malistaire looked away. “Another time, old man… I have what I came for.” He breathed out, and a lock of dark smoke snaked out of his nostrils and mouth. Quickly, it started to escape the floorboards underneath him, swallowing him like a hungry fire. “And now, I’ll take my leave of this wretched place.”
The smoke covered him, and he was nowhere to be seen when it wafted away.
“He’s gone, and none too soon. What sinister goal brought him here? Hm…” The headmaster said to himself, then once again shook himself out of his thoughts. “Oh, let me restore the damage you took. There, there.”
He had an apologetic look in his eye as he worked. “Well, look on the bright side! There is no teacher quite like experience, and orientation can’t possibly make you nervous after this encounter. Congratulations! You all took to it very quickly, I must say.”
Evan didn’t meet his eyes. Hopefully, he would get a moment to speak to him alone soon, so that he could ask some questions about his predicament.
The headmaster swirled his staff before he continued to speak. “Although you did very well with these borrowed spells, you must have a wand and spellbook of your own.” Flying from the shelves came 4 gilded books, bound in a deep wine color and golden embellishment. They flapped their pages like wings and stopped in front of them. 4 decks of cards soon did the same, but simply being carried down in a cloud of sparkling dust. “No young wizard should ever be without them! Here you go.”
Really, Evan shouldn’t be taking anything right now. He hadn’t contributed, and he would be leaving soon anyways. He couldn’t afford to pay any fees if he managed to damage the items before he returned them. Still- he softly held out his hand for the book to land on. A sense of wonder managed to purvey him.
“Before I move on, I should say that your courage today has been very impressive. And very promising for your studies, if you will face your homework with half the same zeal!” he chuckled to himself. “But now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a mountain of duties to attend to right now, including readying your enrollment. So if you don’t mind waiting for a moment or two, I’ll pop back to my office and straighten up.”
The doors burst open, letting fresh air and sunlight in. No rain clattered against the ground, only a few peaceful puddles were left of the storm from earlier. Flapping his big wings came Gamma, this time carrying a satchel of some kind. When he dropped it on the floor, rolls of paper with some kind of wax seal fell out.
“Great idea, my friend!” The headmaster gave Gamma a pat. “You may all take this time to fill in the proper forms that will sort you into one of the houses, so that will all be in order when the paperwork comes to it. I’ll summon you when things are presentable. So many books and papers to tidy up… where did I put those forms… See you soon!”
The man threw up his staff in a surprising display of agility for his seemingly old age. It floated in the air, releasing a ball off light that circled him. The light expanded, flashed over him, and he disappeared along with the owl.
Empty, peaceful, and with sunlight pouring in, the tower room looked to be a completely different place. Now, you could actually see the endless rows of books on the walls with peculiar titles, symbols, or no markings at all. Seeing the aging cobble of the wall, and taking the time to hear the creaking wooden floor underneath them, the room felt properly real. This whole situation started to feel properly real. What were they doing ?
The four of them exchanged looks.
“So… What are you guys’ names?”