3 Chapter 2

"You're late," Tia, one of Calla's few friends and head of the gardening club hissed at her as she slipped into her chair during her first class, having arrived nearly 30 minutes late. "Didn't you get here at, like, 6?"

"More like 6:30, but I accidentally broke a pot in the greenhouse and had to clean it up." Not technically a lie. After tidying up she'd repotted the rose and carefully placed it back in her bag.

"For an hour and a half?"

"It was a big pot?" Calla offered, grinning as she gave Tia a small shrug.

"You really should start setting an alarm or something before you nap in there so you don't oversleep," Tia sighed, sliding Calla an extra copy of the class work she'd slipped for her. Their teacher had an anti-late strategy of simply not giving students the daily work if they showed up late that day. "Did you have a cool dream? Eaten by plants or abducted by aliens?"

"Aliens? No, but I dreamt I went to a magical garden and took a dead rose from a weird gazebo. Does that count?" Calla frequently told Tia about the magical things she did or that happened to her by saying they were dreams, this way she didn't have to keep so many secrets.

"Cool," Tia nodded, approvingly.

She allowed me to copy her answers from the first half of the worksheet and we worked together for the rest, managing to finish before class was over. The rest of the day was as dull as school always managed to be with the only unusual thing being a weird feeling that settled in around third period: she felt like someone was staring at her almost everywhere she went on and off throughout the day, and she chided herself not investing in a pendant or something to ward off the evil eye.

When the final bell rang and Tia ran to catch the bus, Calla took the quick moment of solitude to draw a sigil of protection on a scrap of paper and stuff it in her bag with the rose. She should have done so earlier but hadn't really been alone all day and everyone thought she was weird enough without her stuffing sigils in her bag.

"Hey, Calla." It was Xander, walking into the classroom. He didn't seem to notice what she was doing and continued talking. "The boys and I are going out for pizza. You'll be okay getting home by yourself, right? And you won't tell your grandma or my mom I made you walk?"

Calla had long since gotten used to not being invited to hang out with Xander and his friends, so this didn't bother her. She assured him she wouldn't rat him out and he hurried off before his friends came looking for him. The usual after-school-pick-up plan was for Calla to walk to the spot he normally dropped her off at for school and he'd pick her up there so his friends wouldn't see them getting into his truck together. She found this plan also helped keep her off of the jock-radar so they ended up mostly ignoring her altogether, which was nice. Certainly Xander wasn't the "ideal friend", but Calla had Tia for that.

Right now, Calla really could have used Tia. The weather outside was going to be just hot enough to make for an uncomfortable walk at this time of day and she'd really been hoping Xander wasn't going to bail on taking her home. She really should have known better but it was too late now. She didn't even have her broom with her to ride back (and grandma probably would have killed her if she'd taken it, anyways, since she's paranoid about people finding out they actually have magic). The weird feeling of being watched had also returned and she sighed, annoyed that her sigil clearly wasn't working and her walk home was going to be overly stressful.

She'd made it into the parking lot and saw a group of students gathered around what seemed like a large box from a distance. As she got closer she realized it was actually a horse-drawn carriage, which explained why everyone had crowded around it. Her thoughts echoed the mutterings and ramblings of the crowd: what the heck was a horse-drawn carriage doing here, at a high school no less.

Some kids were snapping pictures or taking videos and others were trying the door (which wasn't opening) or trying to pet the horse (which was shrugging them off). There was something off about the whole thing, something that was bothering Calla other than the fact that it was a carriage. She realized what it was as soon as the carriage driver stepped down into the crowd--which parted for him--and walked forward. There was a peculiar aura about the whole thing, including the horse and the driver. They seemed almost like some sort of illusion maybe? Or maybe it was more of an enchantment that surrounded them.

Unfortunately (or luckily?) it was Calla the driver was approaching. She became the center of attention as the driver bowed and addressed her as "Lady Calla" which sent a shiver down her spine because how did he know her name. The driver stood up and held out his hand, inviting her to ride in the carriage. She frowned.

"Yeah, no." Calla quickly turned and started walking away. Of course she couldn't run all the way home but she probably had enough stamina to get out of the parking lot and on some ground the carriage wouldn't be able to cross, at least. She figured horse-drawn carriages can't be all that fast anyways and if worse came to worse she could try to use levitation on herself (or at least her shoes) and hopefully make it to her house where Grandma would probably be able to get her down.

She decided the situation was definitely "unfortunate" when the carriage driver grabbed her arm and dragged her into the carriage, closing the door without so much as an apology, and taking off. No one had even raised a hand to help her, if you didn't count their raised hands holding their phones, recording the whole thing. And here she'd thought the day hadn't been so bad.