Free T*Witches: Building a Mystery by Randi Reisfeld, H.B. Gilmour

Shnorer ordered Eddie.
     
    "I can't!" the bully raged.
     
    "Liar, liar, pants on fire," Madison chanted. She was wearing a fluffy white sweater in which she looked far more like a guinea pig than a rat.
     
    "Shut up! You blind or something?! Just look." Eddie pointed to his legs—then realized, just as Alex and Cam did, that he could move his arms, that they'd somehow unlocked. He looked at his feet. They were still twisted into a position that qualified him for Ripley's Believe It or Not.
     
    But he could wriggle his toes. And then flex his ankles. And finally, straighten his legs. "Thanks," he whispered to Alex and Cam, and scrambled to his feet.
     
    The twins looked at each other, stumped.
     
    Neither of them had set the boy free. They turned to stare suspiciously—Alex at Mr. Shnorer, who was hauling Eddie and Dylan to the principal's office, and Cam at Madison, who was grinning a triumphant, hamster grin.
     
    The homeroom bell rang and kids were suddenly dashing off in all directions. "I'm going to try to bail Dylan out," Cam told Alex. "We'll... talk later."
     
    "Deal," Alex agreed, taking off down the other end of the hall.
     
    "Alexandra, Alexandra!" Madison came bustling after her. "Are you going to team tryouts this afternoon?"
     
    "I don't think so," Alex said over her shoulder, then rounded the corner and crashed into Cade.
     
    "Guess you aced your fitness test." He held her at arm's length and laughed.
     
    "Huh?" was Alex's brilliant response.
     
    "You know. They check you out in the gym," Cade explained. "See how far and fast you can go on the treadmill before you fade. Monitor your blood pressure. I'm scheduled for today, last period."
     
    "Oh." She came back to her senses as best she could, considering Cade's nearness and the delicious aroma of soap and old leather drifting from him. "Cam and I did it yesterday—"
     
    "You must have passed with flying colors," he teased.
     
    "Oh, please, Alexandra. Say yes. Please, please, please." Madison caught up with them. "I'm going out for volleyball," she squeaked, looking up at Cade. "But there's basketball, softball, soccer—"
     
    "Soccer's Cam's sport," Alex said.
     
    "Oooo, then do volleyball with me. Please, please, please. I'll be your best friend."
     
    "Tempting as that offer is—" Alex began.
     
    "That'd be cool," Cade cut in. "Then I'd get to see you at the gym. I mean, if you're trying out for a team, and I'm there taking my fitness test. Catch you last period, okay?"
     
    "Sure," Alex agreed.
     
    "Hooray!" Madison squealed, jumping up and down between them.
     

    The rest of the day passed slowly for Alex. Dylan showed up for English grumbling about Mr. Shnorer. Luckily, Mrs. Hammond was out of the school for the morning so he and Eddie were scheduled to see her later in the day. By then, Dylan figured, he could round up enough kids who'd seen what had happened to prove he hadn't done anything wrong.
     
    During class, Alex studied Mr. Shnorer, worked so hard at reading his mind that she wound up with a killer headache. All she got out of the tawdry teacher were a bunch of questions like, What am I doing here? and Why me? And, reacting to students' wrong answers, he'd silently ranted, Think, you toad! It's a metaphor, moron, metaphor!
     
    Once, Alex caught him looking at her and heard him decide, That one is trouble. None of which helped her figure out whether the bozo was Thantos's evil messenger. Definitely not, if she was supposed to feel drawn to him.
     
    Madison was waiting outside math, Alex's last subject before the tryouts. "Ooo, I am so majorly psyched. Aren't you?" the quivering girl gushed, taking three little steps for every one of Alex's and still not quite keeping up with her. "That we'll be on the same team all term. And with your mojo, we'll totally win every game. And if you showed me how you do it, then, in case you got sick or whatever, I could, like, mojo for you. Then Marble Bay would never lose and everybody'd