Free Miss Mabel's School for Girls by Katie Cross Page A

attack. The jittery stress felt like it would age me ten years in a single night.
    Each attempt to find the impression of the magic turned out fruitless and frustrating. The sting of a gash on my cheek reminded me to keep my arms in front of my face as I walked if I didn’t want to risk running into the sharp ends of the trees. When a pinecone fell on my head, I whacked it away with a growl and a curse. It flared into a fireball on the ground, reduced to cinders in seconds.
    Miss Mabel had planned this on such a horrid night, of that I had no doubt.
    A cracking sound in the trees caught my attention. This time the noise wasn’t loud, just a quiet breath of wind that didn’t belong in the stillness. I groped forward to investigate, blind. A bulky silhouette leaked through the night. At first I thought of a misshapen tree.
    No, it was Michelle.
    Her legs trembled, tense and unmoving. A flicker of light came from the darkness. It started as a meandering dot and slowly grew. Then I noticed something glowing in her shaking, outstretched palm.
    My breath faltered. A glowworm. Michelle found or produced a glowworm to draw her butterfly in. 
    “Brilliant,” I whispered to myself. “She’s got everyone fooled.” 
    I didn’t wait around, struggling backwards. Despite not being able to see, I started to run. My ankle twisted once, and I almost ran headfirst into a tree.
    Pausing only long enough to scoop fistfuls of dirt in each hand, I blundered on, repeating the incantation under my breath and letting the powder drift behind me. I tripped over a root and slammed into the ground with a thud that paralyzed my chest. The impact ricocheted through my ribs and down my spine, numbing my leg for a moment. I rolled onto my back with a gasp and struggled to breathe.
    A thin trail of dazzling blue powder caught my eye.
    Instead of fading into the sky, it stretched out, heading the opposite direction. I forced myself to my feet with a moan. Of course the revealing spell worked now that I’d almost crippled myself.
    The glittery mist ended at a wall of rock that gave way to a cave with clammy air. A muted glow came from the back and illuminated a corner. Hope filled my heart. What else would light up a cave in this dead forest?
    The corner turned into a room of glowing sea-green butterflies. Their wings fluttered. 
    All of them were my butterfly.
    Nothing is ever what it seems.
    My jaw dropped. How would I find mine amongst hundreds? Michelle could be on her way back by now, butterfly in hand, trophy in her triumphant bag.
    A summoning spell. Of course.
    I cast it without thinking. Seconds later the ocean wall turned into a fluttering mess of sapphire and emerald. 
    “Wait,” I said, stepping back too late. “Wait, no!”
    Boiling out of the wall with their filmy wings, they bolted towards me as one, sweeping around me in a tunnel of color. Light and wind tossed me, forming a tight cocoon. My hair danced around my face and eyes.
    “Stop!”
    They flew back to the wall, lining it with their shimmering wings as if they’d never left.
    One butterfly remained behind, settling on my shoulder. She waved her wings, an exact replica of another one on my knuckles. The sight of the hundreds of butterflies almost brought me to my knees. Too many.
    A winner is by no means a winner, who does not win it all.
    A third butterfly came within a few inches of my face. Her gauzy wings whispered while she hovered there, bobbing up and down, sprouting an idea in my mind.
    Who does not win it all.

Overpowering
    O ne of the first lessons Papa ever taught me rose from the depths of my mind.
    Overpowering another spell is one way to stop the magic, or channel it into a different direction. It takes concentration, and, depending on the magic used, power. Keep in mind that not every spell can be overpowered.
    “Follow me,” I told them after casting a following incantation. They would obey as a group. The real test of my power came when I tried to find