The following Wednesday were the elections for the first-year Student Council representatives. All the other year groups had had their elections at the end of the prior year. The first-years, however, hadn’t been at Misty Peaks at that time, so they had to elect their representatives now in homeroom.

  Much to Rosemary’s chagrin, Melissa was elected as the representative. Ricky, however, was elected as the alternate.

  “I can’t believe they picked such a brat as the representative!” she exclaimed to Tom that evening when she was unpacking the day’s school supplies.

  “Brat?” asked Tom.

  “Yes,” she said, and explained to him the run-in she had had with Melissa at Merlin’s Book Cove while shopping for her school supplies that summer. “And what’s this ‘sprouter’ thing she keeps calling me?” she asked.

  “Oh, that?” said Tom. “That’s a totally uncool thing to call a first-generation witch or wizard. It’s used by losers who think y’all just sprout out of nowhere.”

  “And they picked someone like that to be in Student Council?” complained Rosemary.

  “Hey hey,” said Tom. “It’s just the start of the first year and nobody hardly knows anybody. So they picked someone with a name they know. But she’ll get to the Student Council and find out it ain’t all about bossing people around. And who knows? She might even quit halfway through, which’ll make Ricky the rep.”

  “Maybe,” said Rosemary, unconvinced.

  “And worse come to worse,” said Tom, “by next election, people’ll know what a loser she is. No way she’ll be re-elected.”

  * * *

  The following Sunday, Rosemary was sitting in the common room studying ‘The Amazing World of Enchantment’. In Professor Hathaway’s enchantment class, the lecture was still focused on the witches and wizards of the Bronze Age, but Rosemary was reading ahead to the part about the Ink Revolution of the fifth and fourth centuries before the Common Era. Prior to this time, most magical conduits were styli. Witches and wizards used these magical styli to etch their spells on wood, stone, or even bone. A few magical staves existed, but they were extremely limited in their function and nowhere near ready to displace styli. Yet in the pre-Hellenistic era, many of these cultures began replacing their magical styli with magical pens and started writing their spells on parchment — among them, her own Hebrew culture, along with most other cultures of the Near East. It was also in this time that Celtic mages began making improvements to magical staves — though still not bringing them to the point of being able to become the dominant conduits.

  Rosemary sat reading about all this, engrossed in what she was learning, when she heard someone ask, “Can I join you?”

  She looked up and saw that it was Mika. “Sure, sit down,” she said.

  Mika Suzuki sat down at the table, across from Rosemary. “I’ve been wondering for a while,” said Mika, “where do I know you from?”

  “We’re both in the same homeroom,” answered Rosemary, “and we both live in Hemlock Tower.”

  “Yeah, I know that,” said Mika. “But you seemed familiar already when we first got to school.”

  Mika had Rosemary’s undivided attention, so she laid her book down on the table. “You looked familiar to me, too,” she agreed.

  “But where from?” asked Mika.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did you go to Camp Starwillow?” asked Mika.

  “Camp what?” asked Rosemary.

  “Camp Starwillow?” repeated Mika. “You know, summer camp?”

  “Never heard of any Camp Starwillow,” said Rosemary.

  “Really?” asked Mika. “I thought every young witch and wizard wanted to go!”

  “I didn’t know magic is real till this summer,” explained Rosemary. “I’m the first witch in my family.”

  “You mean wizard, right?” said Mika.

  Rosemary thought for a moment, and then quickly answered: “Yes, I mean I’m the first wizard in my family.” All the while, thinking to herself, “That was close.”

  “So anyway,” said Mika, “if you’re first-generation, then we obviously don’t know each other from there.”

  “No we don’t,” agreed Rosemary.

  “So, how do you like it at Misty Peaks?” asked Mika.

  “I like it a lot,” said Rosemary. “Definitely better than Dogwood, where I went before — and I’m pretty sure it’s also better than Wheaton Middle School, which I would have gone to if I didn’t get invited here.” As she said that, Mika’s face slowly shifted into an open-mouthed expression of realization.

  “You went to Dogwood Elementary School?” she asked. “In Oak Ridge, Tennessee?”

  “Yes,” said Rosemary. “Heard of it?”

  “Yes,” answered Mika. “I’m from Oak Ridge too. I went to Juniper. So if we weren’t magical, we would have both gone to Wheaton.”

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  “Okay,” said Rosemary. “Maybe we’ve seen each other somewhere around town.”

  “Yeah,” agreed Mika. “That’s got to be it.”

  “Glad we figured that out,” said Rosemary with a smile.

  “Me too,” said Mika, getting up out of her chair, preparing to walk away. “Anyway,” she continued, “congratulations on getting the harpy feather for your core. I think that’s pretty neat.”

  “Thanks,” said Rosemary, picking her book back up, “and I’m sorry if that had anything to do with what happened to you in ouranourgy the day before.”

  “What could that have had to do with it?” she said, almost laughing.

  “Because the smell that came with that wind,” explained Rosemary, “it’s the same as that smell from the dying trees where the harpy found us.”

  “Say what?” asked Mika, sitting back down.

  “Nobody told you?” asked Rosemary.

  “Told me what?” asked Mika.

  “We went off course,” said Rosemary, “because I wasn’t having any luck getting a core. Then we got to this place where the trees were dying, and there was this nasty spell. And the harpy swooped down because it thought it was our fault. And it didn’t believe us until Samantha set off a spare summoning chip.”

  “And then?” asked Mika.

  “Then it believed us,” explained Rosemary. “And after I told it everything, it gave me a feather for my wand. But I think I remember reading that harpies can make a lot of wind with their wings — and the wind that knocked you off your broom smelled just like those trees.”

  “Well,” said Mika, after thinking for a moment, “that might be where the wind that hit me came from. But that was before you went over there. You couldn’t have had anything to do with it.”

  “I didn’t cause it,” agreed Rosemary. “But you got knocked off your broom — and I’m the one who got something out of it. I made my wand with a core that you should have.”

  “No,” said Mika. “The harpy gave it to you. Besides, I kinda like having a lynx dragon whisker in my wand.”

  “That’s good to know,” said Rosemary.

  “That said,” noted Mika, as she got up out of her seat again, “I wonder why my Lilith and Samantha never told me anything about this. They’re my roommates. They shouldn’t keep something like this from me.”

  She walked away, leaving Rosemary to puzzle for a few minutes. Was she causing Mika distress by insisting that Lilith and Samantha couldn’t tell their own roommate the secret of her identity? But on the other hand — could she trust Mika with that knowledge?

  * * *

  Over the next few days, as oblivious as Rosemary tended to be with regard to subtle social cues, even she could tell that Mika’s relation with Lilith and Samantha was strained.

  “It’s my fault Mika’s mad at you,” she confessed to Lilith and Samantha Monday afternoon.

  “No it isn’t,” said Lilith. “People argue sometimes. It doesn’t have to be someone’s fault.”

  “She found out about the smelly trees,” said Rosemary, “and that it could have had something to do with the wind that knocked her off her broom.”

  “We know,” said Lilith, “and she’s mad that we didn’t tell her about it. But she’ll get over it.”

  However, as the days went by, Mika getting over it was not even close to how Rosemary would describe things. Mika even started shunning her own roommates whenever she could, and hanging out with Rosemary instead whenever possible. At one point, Rosemary told Mika flatly that it wasn’t Lilith and Samantha’s fault that they hadn’t told her about the diseased trees, but Mika simply didn’t accept that.

  Finally, Friday, after Professor Thorn’s Warding Basics class, Rosemary got Mika alone — which wasn’t at all difficult given how strained Mika’s relation with her roommates was.

  “Mika,” she said, “Lilith and Samantha had a really good reason not to tell you about the trees.”

  “I can’t see any good reason they could possibly have,” Mika insisted.

  “You can judge that,” said Rosemary, “after I tell you what the reason is. But you have to promise not to tell anyone. Well, you can tell them because they already know — but nobody else.”

  “Okay,” said Mika. “I promise.”

  “Come with me,” said Rosemary.

  Together, the two of them went out onto the wall walk and headed in the direction of Morgan Tower. That gave them relative privacy, as Hemlock Tower, where the other students were headed, was located in the other direction.

  Eventually, Rosemary sat down with her back against the battlement. Mika sat right next to her.

  “So what do you want to tell me?” asked Mika.

  “Well,” said Rosemary, “they were keeping a secret about me. I told you that the reason we were there was because I wasn’t having luck getting a core.”

  “Were you?” asked Mika.

  “No I wasn’t,” said Rosemary. “But the reason is, every time I had to tell one of the creatures my name, I told them the name everyone in school calls me — the name my parents gave me. And each time, the creature ran.”

  “One moment,” said Mika, “they ran when you said your name is Simon Corbin?”

  “Yes,” answered Rosemary. “Because it’s the name my parents gave me — but it’s a name that doesn’t fit me. So they, the magic creatures, sensed I wasn’t being true when I said that that’s my name.”

  Rosemary nervously ran her hands through her hair and then buried her face in them.

  “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want,” said Mika.

  “Yes I do,” said Rosemary, lifting her face out of her hands. “I need to tell you.” She breathed heavily for a moment and then continued. “Anyway, I knew the name that does fit me, but I couldn’t tell any of the creatures that name, because I was afraid to say it in front of Lilith and Samantha — and Clara.”

  “Okay,” said Mika, not seeming sure where this was going.

  “But then we got to the harpy,” Rosemary explained. “And the harpy thought we were draining the trees. And it only started believing us when Samantha set off a summoning chip. And when it asked for my name, this time I had to give it my real one — the one that fits me. Because if I didn’t, it wouldn’t just mean not getting a core. The harpy would tear me to shreds. So I told it.”

  “And what’s the name?” asked Mika.

  “Well, you know the other day,” asked Rosemary, “when I said I’m the first witch in my family — and you corrected me to ‘wizard’?”

  “Well, you’re a first-generation,” said Mika. “You’re new to the magical world. It’s okay if you mess words up like that sometimes.”

  “Thing is, I’m not a wizard,” said Rosemary.

  “Sure you are,” said Mika. “You wouldn’t be able to go to school at Misty Peaks if you weren’t.”

  “Are you a wizard?” asked Rosemary.

  “Well, I’m a witch,” said Mika.

  “Me too,” said Rosemary.

  “Really?” asked Mika. “Then how have you got everyone thinking you’re a wizard then? I mean, wouldn’t the school know?”

  “You see,” said Rosemary, “I was born in a boy’s body — so my parents gave me a boy’s name, because they thought I was a boy. But it never felt right for me — because it’s not who I am inside. Inside I’ve always been a girl. And the morning after we made our wands, I cast a somamorphy spell on myself, and since then I’ve been physically a girl too. But I can’t let people know.”

  “One moment,” said Mika. “That day when we were making our wands, and Samantha called you Rosemary — and Lilith said this thing about it being because you like the herb. That’s your real name. Your girl’s name, is it? Rosemary?”

  “Yes,” answered Rosemary. “But you can’t tell anyone. Except Lilith and Samantha, because they already know.”

  “I won’t,” said Mika, getting up, “but we’ll have lots of fun when we get back to Oak Ridge.”

  “Actually, my parents don’t know,” said Rosemary.

  “Well,” said Mika, “if you plan on keeping the transformation, they’ll eventually find out.”

  “Yeah, I know,” said Rosemary. “Girls turn into women. I’ll tell them. I just need a bit time.”