Chapter 6

"My, my, Dodie doesn't waste his time," Kim says mockingly.

"Neither do you, I hear. Breaking into human's houses at night."

"Only with honourable intentions, we wanted to give a lady a valuable item," Nate says.

"Not that she appreciated it."

Spending a day with Dodie truly mellowed her, otherwise, there is no explanation for why she isn't mad at them anymore. Or maybe it's the attention. Dodie is sweet to her, but the way the twins are looking at her – that's something else. She feels greedy, she wants more of it but tries to play it cool.

"Well, I wasn't so certain about your intentions after everything."

"You gave Dodie the benefit of the doubt," Nate shrugs. "Although, he is just as misfit as we are."

"We just want a fair game," Kim says.

"A game?" Julia asks. "What are we playing at?"

  "It's just a saying," Kim says evasively but Julia has a feeling he hides something. "So, nice show you had at your house yesterday. Pretchen magic, that was powerful."

"Pretchen magic?" Julia asks. "What is that?"

"That's a list of the spells one old witch did centuries ago," Nate says. "Some refer to it as a dark magic but it's just really intense. And it's hard to control the consequences. We are big fans because Pretchen was one of the few witches who wrote spells that could be used by all species. Most of the other spells foxes had to adapt for its magic. What, you used it not knowing what it was?"

"I"- Julia feels like an idiot, now that she's not in a destruction mood anymore it seems stupid to risk that way. Why wasn't she more reasonable then? Why was she so stupid? "Well, basically, yeah." She decides to tell the truth, be bold. She expects judgment but Kim's eyes just lit up with a gleam.

"Brave," he says.

"I feel like you might be our person after all," Nate says and Julia feels like her head is dizzy, approval making her melt.

"It was nothing," she says, drunk with their admiring gazes. "Just an accident."

"I don't know, considering what other people say about you-" that instantly makes her fall from her cloud of bliss.

"What do they say about me?"

"That you lure boys to your bedroom with a potion," Kim whispers dramatically. "Or at least that you try."

Julia feels sick but surprisingly enough they do not look disgusted or outraged, just amused.

"Hey, nothing wrong with getting what you want." Kim pokes his elbow at her side. The touch makes her shiver. At this moment, she almost wishes she was the person they thought she was. The confident, calculative woman who knows what she wants and goes after it. But her story is much more dull, and she can't fool them.

"It wasn't like that," she says quietly. "The potion-it wasn't my idea at all." 

"But were you not caught with it?" Nate asks.

"I was-but," she almost stops herself but the three of them are looking at her impatiently and they are listening, they want to hear her side of the story. No one else wanted to listen to her, to find out what really happened, not even her mother. The others were sure she was lying or they just didn't care. They didn't want to give her a chance to defend herself, what would they do for fun then?

"I didn't do it for me. Mandy was in love. It was this guy, a senior, and he couldn't care less. She was into him for more than a year. When she finally told him about her feelings, he rejected her." Julia still remembers that night. It was rainy and Mandy showed up at her door soaking wet and sobbing. She cried for hours and there was nothing Julia could do to soothe her. Mandy said she didn't want to live without him, she just couldn't, and it was so not like her that Julia was actually a little bit scared for her. The next day, her friend seemed to pull herself together and Julia even thought she got her crush out of her head until Mandy mentioned the potion.

"She was a mess, she was totally broken. She decided to hex him, to make him love her at all costs. I-we were friends, so I decided I should help. I thought that was my job as a friend you know." Right now it seems so silly but younger Julia really believed in Friendship. She believed in being at your friend's side no matter what. "So I helped her. We met at the library that day because Matt was always hanging out there after the training. We calculated everything. We figured he would have been thirsty after the training so the plan was for Mandy to go talk to him and offer him a drink. But she chickened out and asked me to do it." It was the last time they spoke as friends and Julia still can see Mandy's thrilled face, she was looking like a child in anticipation of a present, hopeful and agitated, fingers crossed. In moments like this Julia felt herself much older than Mandy and felt a need to protect her soft naïve friend from the whole world. Turns out, she was the naïve one. 

"And you got caught?" Dodie asks, impatiently. His expression is a mix of pity and terror and for a moment, Julia thinks how much this open and alive expression reminds her of her former friend and it makes her feel resentful towards him. It's the quiet ones that surprise you, not that anyone would ever call Dodie quiet but she means this word in a broader sense. Those who play nice, those who do not close their soul, might seem safe but they are the most dangerous ones. 

"Not by teachers," Julia says. "But it was almost as bad." Sans the expulsion obviously. Matt figured out the was a potion in his drink. He was smart enough. He didn't snitch but he wanted an explanation. Mandy denied she had anything to do with it and she – I don't know she probably got scared or something – she started telling anyone who would listen that I tried to lure Matt. She tried to spread this gossip so hard that eventually, even my mom heard of it. Someone's parents even came to the school board and demanded an investigation but luckily Matt told them it was just a rumor. Headmaster even made Matt say that he doesn't have any complaints publicly."

Julia had big hopes for the day of Matt's little speech. She thought her good name would be restored.

"It didn't help though. My classmates still hated me. I don't even know if they believe what Mandy says."

"Why so much fuss about stupid love potion?" Kim asks. "They wear off quickly." It brings memories of the last night back and Julia is angry.

"It's kind of an assault," she says.

"Why?" Kim asks. "Everyone did that in Gata. All the time."

"It's against the free will."

"Why?" Kim asks. "It doesn't make you do anything, just makes you attracted to someone."

"It makes people feel what they didn't ask to feel," Julia argues.

"For like half an hour or so. It's just like a flu. I can't believe what you wizards turned into. Whiney babies. Oh, our new headmaster is the same. Don't do this, don't do that, it's scary scary dark magic."

"Well, isn't it?"

"Just because there are idiots who abuse it doesn't mean it's bad," Nate says firmly. "You just have to be smart, that's all. And learn to protect yourself. In Gata, everyone knew a counter spell by the end of the first school week."

"If they detected a spell in time," Dodie corrects him. "Remember how Tony dated Lea for weeks? It took an eternity for him to figure out."

"If he's an idiot that's his problem," Nate says. "And he didn't figure it out, you told him."

"Well someone had to."

"No one had to. It's his job to take care of himself."

"Cynical," Julia says. She's not sure if she agrees.

"Is it? Why would you fall in somebody's arms without asking yourself whether it's real? It's a magic world we live in. It's built on illusions."

"They taught you well in Gata," Julia mutters. Nate smiles at her.

"Oh, they did. Wanna see?"