Hidden Magic

The Spell Book

Rosie felt her entire body freeze at the light sound of Amber’s knock at Shane’s front door.


Without a single word Shane got up to answer it, leaving her sitting alone in his small living room. She was still sat on the old, yet comfy leather sofa. She felt her heartbeat going wild with anticipation. She felt scared, more than she was ever willing to admit to them, for getting into this whole, crazy mess. Rosie was regretting it. She wished she’d just let the police handle it, let them do their job.


Rosie heard Amber’s voice travel in from the hallway. She was talking in a loud whisper, “Hi. Is she safe, Shane? Please tell me you protected her. They’re everywhere, I can feel them. They’re just watching. It’s so weird. What do they want with us? Or her even?”


“I don’t know,” Shane replied, his voice sounded so serious it made Rosie’s blood run cold. “I don’t get it either, and neither does she.” Shane sighed, and Rosie had to really strain her ears to hear him this time. “I think she can feel them, but can’t see them. She seemed really uncomfortable on the car ride here. It was like she knew, but didn’t.”


“You mean she gets warning feelings?”


“I don’t know, really, I don’t,” he said, sounding very honest. “It’s just a little strange. I think it’s just because we’re here and the spell hasn’t fully worn off yet, though I think it will soon.”


Amber’s voice dripped with guilt, “Can’t we just...peer in? I know it’s wrong, but can we risk it?”


“I don’t think that’s such a great idea, Amber. She’s certainly not a threat, she’s confused, and I don’t think there’s anything going on.”


Amber seemed to stall for a moment before saying, “Okay, I’m sure you’re right.”


“Come on then, let’s go.” 


Shane entered the living room with Amber trailing behind him. Rosie felt herself gasp when she saw Amber. She looked like her usual self, but not all at the same time. Her eyes were brighter, more of a vibrant blue, and they seemed to twinkle beautifully in the sunlight. It looked magical, and eerie. The eyes just made the rest of her transform; she looked older, but not much. She seemed to radiate power too. Looking at her Rosie couldn’t help but wonder how strong the two of them actually were.


Amber gave her a puzzled look, and then seemed to catch her reflection in Rosie’s eyes. She blushed a little, and smiled a tiny apology. In a matter of seconds her eyes returned back to their regular, pretty dark blue.


“Hi,” she said quietly. “How are you doing?”


Rosie gulped. She couldn’t get the image of those eyes out of her head. It was hard to look at her normally now. “I’m okay, thank you,” she said.


Amber nodded awkwardly. “Good.”


Shane just looked back and forth between the two of them, and then tried to suppress a giggle as he mumbled, “Awkward.”


Amber sent him a look that clearly said piss me off and I will kick your butt. Shane clamped him mouth shut tight, and pretended to lock it with an imaginary key. Amber just sent him a glare, and then turned to smile reassuringly at Rosie.


“I’m sorry about Shane; you’ll have to excuse his epic immaturity.”


“That’s okay,” Rosie said.


Amber looked her straight in the eyes. There was a moment of silence. Rosie was caught between going to hug her and apologizing or running out the flat screaming “Witch, witch. Help!”


Amber was the first to speak. “I’m sorry.” She shrugged, and let out a breath. “I never meant for this to happen. I shouldn’t have talked to you that first day at school; it was very selfish of me.”


“No, it wasn’t,” Rosie said, shaking her head in disagreement. “It’s not your fault. I promise you I’m done blaming you.” She looked across at Shane, and he nodded. “Shane told me a little about your past, and some details about your friend who died. I just want to say that I understand, and that it won’t happen again.”


Tears pricked at Amber’s blue eyes. Rosie smiled softly and held out her arms. Amber stepped forward and the both of them burst out muffled cries and laughs as they hugged.


“Wow, turn down the girly best friendy’ love in here.” Shane’s amused voice made them step apart and simultaneously scowl at him.


“You’re a something beginning with a ‘D’ and ending in ‘K’.” Amber smiled mockingly and shoved aside him. To Rosie’s surprise she walked over to the out of place looking table containing all the black bound books, which symbols Rosie had felt incredibly drawn to earlier. And still did.


After scanning the different books on the table, she picked up one with a crescent moon and a blue outline surrounding it. Amber pointed one red painted fingernail at it. “Do you know what this is?”


Rosie shook her head.


“This is a spell book,” Amber said, placing the book on gently Rosie’s lap. “It’s like the one that turned up in your room. Except that was my spell book, one of the many of my family. This one is still closely related to my family, but it belonged to Shane’s dad.”


Rosie immediately touched the crescent moon symbol on the cover. It was her first instinct. She traced the blue outlines slowly with her index finger.


“Open it,” Amber instructed.


Rosie looked up in disbelief. This girl had been going crazy the other day about that other stupid spell book, and now she wanted her to start leafing through this one?


Amber just nodded, eyes locked with Rosie. Rosie looked back down at the book and resisted the strong urge to trace her fingers across the enchanting symbol again. She opened the first page, and stopped with eyes wide.


“What the...What is this?” She asked, staring down at the foreign, intertwining words.


Amber sat down on the sofa beside her. “Witch language. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t want you to look inside the other one, you would have been so suspicious.”


Rosie nodded in understanding, and turned a few more pages. On this page there were symbols. They were all very complicated looking shapes, and were sketched onto the old, brownish, crisping paper. She stared at them, tracing her fingers around the circular lines. “What are these?” She whispered.


“Symbols.” Amber peered over the book, and Shane got up to kneel beside Rosie.


“They’re part of a spell ritual,” Shane said, tracing his own fingers across the magical symbol. He turned to the next page, where there were hundreds of words that to Rosie looked like gibberish. Shane scanned them strangely fast, and then said, “I’ve come across this one before. I think it’s a locating spell.”


“A locating spell.” Rosie chirped up, “Can we use this? I mean to find Amy?”


Amber peered closer, and then nodded. “Yeah, we could. We could locate her and then go rescue her.”


Shane looked at them both like they were mental. “No, are you kidding? Your Mum will kill you, and probably me too. And that’s not even mentioning the vampires.”


“We’ll be careful,” Amber reasoned. “Plus, we owe it to Rosie.”


Shane didn’t look a hundred percent convinced, but he nodded anyway.


Amber turned to Rosie, expression serious. Rosie gulped and gave her own full attention. Amber smiled and tapped her arm reassuringly.


“We’ll need something of Amy’s, preferably personal. Can you get something that means a lot to her?”


Rosie nodded, already knowing the perfect thing to use. She pulled out the silver charm bracelet that Amber had handed her last night. It twinkled in the light just like Amber’s eyes had done. Rosie made a mental note to ask her about that later.


Rosie held it up. “This should work,” she said with a nervous smile.


“Perfect,” Amber agreed. “Shane!”


Shane looked up; he’d starting playing a racing game on his X-box whilst the two of them had been talking. “Yeah,” he said, not even bothering to look up.


Amber rolled her eyes sarcastically behind his back, and said, “I need you to get some candles. Make sure they’re the big type though, those draw more energy. We don’t need matches.”


Shane looked up, straight at Rosie instead of Amber. He gave her a little mischievous smile and nodded. “Sure, I’ll bring the candles. No matches, got it.”


Rosie was about to ask how they were going to light the candles, but Amber’s loud voice stopped her. “I’ll take the spell book and go over the steps. We’re also going to need some sage or some other type of Earthy thing so it can help us track her. I’ll see to that.”


Rosie and Shane nodded at the same time, neither of them daring to interrupt Amber. She thought it was weird seeing Amber like this, so in control and she also seemed so clever when it came to witchcraft, like she’d studied it a lot. She probably has, knowing her mother, Rosie thought.


“So, where and when are we doing this?” Shane asked, as he raced first place through the finish line on his game. He looked up at Amber expectantly.


“Rosie’s house, tomorrow at about noon. Your Mum will be out by then right?” Amber asked.


Rosie nodded. “Yeah, she goes back to work tomorrow. Mum thinks going back to acting normal will help us deal with the grief. Well, it’ll help her, but not me, because I know the truth.”


A look of alarm flashed across Amber’s face. “Rosie, you understand that you can’t tell her about any of this, right?”


“Yes, I understand. I won’t say anything,” Rosie said. “I trust that you’ll help me, and then we can deal with some kind of explanation later.”


Shane laughed, but it wasn’t a laugh like he thought something was funny. “That’s going to be one hell of an explanation. I can imagine the newspapers now, ‘Thirteen year old girl back from the dead’.”


Rosie threw one of the sofa cushions at him. It smacked into his head, and this time he laughed for real. Rosie was too busy laughing along with Amber that she didn’t see Shane coming up behind her, hands out in front of him playfully.


He tackled her on the sofa and starting tickling her. Rosie laughed uncontrollably, she was a very ticklish person. After minutes of yelling “Stop, stop, stop”, Shane finally gave up, looking very pleased with himself.


Amber was still laughing her head off when Rosie said jokingly, “I’ll get you back for that one day. I sure hope you like sleeping with one eye open, Shane!”