Merlin shakes me awake. My arm subconsciously pushes him away. I was only able to get an hour of sleep last night because of the fear that Merlin might attack me in the night. My eyes barely open, only enough to get a glimpse of him. Thankfully, he has clothes on. His scarlet red hair is dripping with water. He must have taken a shower while I was asleep.
"Get up, sleepyhead. Class starts in ten minutes."
I jump up from my bed. My arms flail, trying to get the sheet off of me. "10 minutes. Why didn't you wake me up sooner?"
He looks at me, confused. "Because 10 minutes is plenty of time to get ready. Look at you. You've already got your uniform on."
I rush into the bathroom, ignoring his remarks. My hair isn't too much of a mess. A simple comb through, and I should be fine. My socks soak up the leftover water from when Merlin took his shower. It feels disgusting against my skin. There's no time for me to be complaining about it, though. I only have five minutes to get ready and five minutes to run to class.
Merlin peaks his head into the bathroom. "You look great, sweetheart. Now come on, let's get to class."
I shoot him a dirty look. "Stop calling me that."
He ignores me and instead pulls me out of the bathroom before I can finish fixing my hair.
"Hey! I wasn't finished." I remark to him.
Using his wand, he shoots a spell, and both of our bags and shoes come flying at us. He catches them elegantly with his bag slipping onto his shoulder and his boots gliding right onto his feet. However, mine simply crash into my body. I have no time to react as Merlin continues to pull me outside the door. As he yanks me down the hallway, I do my best to put my shoes on. The water from my socks soaking into my shoes.
"We wouldn't have to be rushing if you didn't wake me up so late."
He keeps his eyes forward. "And I didn't have to wake you up at all, but you're cute, so I caved."
I grumble under my breath.
Luckily, it doesn't take nearly as long as I thought to get to the academy's main building. Merlin drops me off at my classroom on the fifth floor.
"I'll be here to take you to your next class after class, alright." He lets go of my hand, which he held the whole time we walked.
I look at the many other students passing us by, giving weird glances at both of us. "I don't need you to walk me to my every class. I know where everything is."
He gives me a warm smile. "I know. I just want to be around you more." He leaves before I can respond to him.
My face feels warm. He's so annoying.
I make my way into the classroom with my bookbag close to my body. I enter through the back door of the classroom so as to not draw attention to myself. It seems that even one is only concerned with themselves. That or they are engulfing themselves in the conversations of their friends. I rush over to my desk and sit down.
Jiro hasn't arrived yet. He's probably just running late. I need to talk to him about what happened yesterday.
The further I wait for him to arrive, the more I realize that he's not coming. It's pointless for me to be disappointed, but for some reason, my heart hurts. Finally, the bell rings as the teacher walks into the classroom.
"Good morning, class." His voice is much more depressing than it was yesterday.
"Good morning, Mr. Lonte. " The class responds, startling me a bit.
Using his wand, he writes letters and eventually words onto the board behind him. In big letters, it says, 'Creation Spells.' Underneath it is 2D inanimate objects bouncing around the board.
I'm still not used to the whole magic ordeal. There have only been five times that I have seen magic being used in the real world. Most magic users are high people of nobility and don't concern themselves with the lives of someone with a low social status.
"I'm going to go over some rules before we can get started." I draw my attention to Mr. Lonte. "You can create anything that you want. Whether that be a plant or an animal, I don't care. However, I doubt any of you will be able to create something living as that is an extremely high level of magic. That being said, don't be sad if you want to do that and can't. Second, most of you will be creating inanimate objects like mugs, pens, clothes, etc. There will be consequences if any of it is inappropriate or dangerous." He pauses for a bit and looks at me.
Does he know about what happened? The High Council of Magic told me that no one would find out. No, I'm just being paranoid. His stare feels as though it's piercing into my soul. Suddenly he stops and looks at the rest of the class.
"Anyway, the class period is up for all of you to experiment with the creativity of your mind. Think about what you want to create and wave your wand in a clockwise motion two times. Then say 'cret le movre'." Mr. Lonte moves away from the front of the class and sits down at the front of his desk. The rest of the class gets to work on their spells.
I do the same, grabbing my wand from the left pocket of my bookbag. It's a trainer wand that was given to me by the school. Last they told me, I would be able to get a wand fitted for me in about two weeks. The wand is made out of maple wood and has a rough finish to it. It fits awkwardly in my hand, and if I'm not careful, I feel as though I would get a splinter.
I think about what I want to create as it rests in my hand. Nothing enters my mind. Instead, I look around at others to see what they have made. A group of girls next to me has created plush toys of a k-pop girl group. A girl sitting in front of them casts in a phone. However, it looks more like a burner phone than an expensive one. The boy and girl in front of me create a box of chocolates and paper flowers. They then hand it to each other. It must be a couple, cute.
I look down at my desk. Jiro threw nightshade at me the other day. Maybe I could create a nightshade plant and give it to him. Then again, I have no idea what the properties of the plant are. I rustle through my bag to find my botanical plant textbook. As I flip through the book, there are thousands of plants that I have never heard of before.
I stop on a chapter of the book called nightshade plants. However, it's filled with regular plants like tomatoes, potatoes, and even eggplant. This can't be right. I flip through the pages, only skimming them briefly before moving to the next page. A purple flowering plant with dark purple berries fills the page. Atropa Belladonna is a poisonous plant from the nightshade family. The dark purple or more closely black-colored berries that the fruit provides are the most toxic part of the plant. It can cause hallucinations, rapid heartbeat, convulsions, fever, coma, and even death in small doses.
I slam the book close. A few of my classmates twist their heads at me to see what caused the commotion. There must have been a different type of plant that Jiro used on me. I only was knocked out. Then again, maybe I was actually in a coma, and the doctor lady just knew how to wake me up. But does Jiro hate me so much that he would try to kill me?
"Whatcha doing with that book?" the girl that created the burner phone plops herself onto the edge of my desk.
I look up at her. "I was trying to get an idea of something to create."
She squints her eyes at me and then nods slowly. "Cool, but why do you look so worried?"
"Well, I was trying to make a plant for a friend because he likes to make nightshade powders, but all of the plants in the nightshade family don't make someone pass out."
She grabs my textbook from the book and begins to flip through the pages. It doesn't even seem like she's looking at any of the pages. Finally, she stops on a page with a plant called Matricaria Valeriana.
"Nightshade powders don't use any plants from the nightshade family. Instead, most nightshade powders use this plant." She points to the plant on the page. "About three thousand years ago, a group of plant witches experimented with regular plants. Then, they would 'breed' them with magic to make their effects more concentrated."
She stands up from my desk and grabs something from her pocket. It's a small vial of blue liquid. "Many of these witches ended up making the most basic potions and powders from their creations. They were the first magical users to create powders and potions." She sticks the vial back into her pocket and looks at me for a response.
I point to the plant in the book again. "So this is one of those plants?"
She nods her head. "Yup. The common name for it is Valeomile. It is a mixture of chamomile and valerian root. It makes you extremely tired."
"You're so knowledgeable with this stuff."
She nods her head again. "I'm a plant witch, after all."
My eyes widen. "That's so cool. What kind of magic do you do?"
"Only the basics. I know how to help things grow, and after that, it's just making powders and potions, but that isn't something you need magic to know how to do."
I grab the textbook and look at the picture closely, making sure to inspect every tiny detail of the plant. "How come you made a burner phone instead of one of these plants?"
"Well, one, it's none of your business, but two, I don't have the type of magic to create a plant. Like Mr. Lonte explained, the level of magic is something even experienced magic users can never achieve."
"How come?" I grab my wand and practice waving it around as Mr. Lonte said to.
"Organic organisms are extremely complex, and tampering with them is difficult to achieve even with magic. Creation spells are also extremely draining. Even casting something small like a pencil takes a lot of energy out of the body, so creating a living entity takes an extreme amount of energy that most people don't have."
"Oh." I look at the book one last time. Then I hop up from my chair with my wand in my right hand. "You might want to move. I have no idea how this will go." The girl gets up from the desk with a concerned look.
"You're going to try and create a Valeomille root?" She says in an even more concerned voice.
I look at her with a sly grin. "It wouldn't hurt to try."
I practice the wand motion in my hand. Two clockwise movements are easy enough. "Cret le movre." my hand makes the motion one more time. I wait for something to happen, but nothing does.
"Pffft. Hhahaha." The girl starts cracking up beside me. "I had a feeling it wouldn't work. But, of course, you have high expectations for someone who has never held a wand before now.
I grumble in a low voice at her. "Wait, just let me try again."
She waves her hand outward. "By all means, please do."
I focus on my hand—two clockwise motions. Don't forget to say 'Cret le movre'. I envision the plant in my head—a tall green stem with white flowers at the end and thick beige roots.
"Cret le movre." I flick my hand into the clockwise motion, ensuring that I do it twice.
Suddenly the room fills with a cloud of heavy grey smoke and the sound of panicked screams.