Soul Fire

3.1

As soon as they entered their room and closed the door, Bloom slumped onto the closest couch. She grabbed a blanket and wrapped it around herself before putting her head in her hands. "They're gonna kick me out."

"They won't. Griselda is all talk but no bite." Stella said, casually lounging across a nearby chair. She inspected her fingernails in the light of a nearby lamp.

"She kicked you out." Musa interjected, plopping herself down besides Bloom.

"Not helpful." Stella hissed. "Look, Bloom. You're gonna get up tomorrow morning, and go to class, okay? And if nothing happens, we're just gonna assume you're staying. Okay?"

Bloom groaned. "Fine." She stumbled to her feet, clutching the blanket and holding her braced arm against her chest. "I'm taking Advil and going to bed." She trudged into her bedroom, the blanket trailing behind her.

The next morning, the girls did exactly as Stella said. They got up for their 8 a.m. classes and got ready like it was any other day. The other girls in the room were excited about starting their classes, but all Bloom could think about was that she could be evicted at any moment's notice.

And if she wasn't, would that somehow be worse?

Could she go home and have a normal life? Was her power truly gone as she'd suspected? Or worse, what if Stella was wrong, and Bloom truly was a witch? Would she have to leave the friends she just met and get thrust into a new school when she wasn't even sure if she had magic? Would she turn out like the three witches that attacked her?

Bloom sighed as she sat in her first class of the day. She should have been excited, but she just felt hopeless.

"For those of you who haven't met me yet, my name is professor Wiskies." A small man stood on the desk, barely more than three feet tall with long pointed ears and brown hair. Bloom couldn't help but think that her professor reminded her of a leprechaun, and the red clover that was pinned onto his lapel didn't help convince her otherwise. "My magic manifests as metamorphosis, the art of changing the way you look." In a flash, the small professor disappeared. Right where he was once standing, Griselda sat across the desk, one leg crossed over the other and her head resting in her hand.

Bloom couldn't find a single thing out of place in the imposter Griselda that would cue her into the illusion. They even spoke like Griselda. "Though not all of your magic will manifest as shapeshifting, you can manipulate your magic to allude attackers, whether it's through optical illusion by manipulating light..." they motioned to Stella with a look that was much too kind to have come from Griselda.

Stella leaned over to Bloom and whispered, "The real Griselda would have tried to snap my head off already."

Bloom hid her smile by casually bringing her relaxed hand up to her cheek and tilting her head to the side.

The professor continued, "Or disorienting someone with noise," Griselda motioned to Musa.

"Or, we even have a faerie of illusion in our midst." The professor said, drawing the class' attention to a dark haired girl in the front. Bloom couldn't see her face from where she sat, but she saw the tips of her ears get so red that Bloom was certain the faerie was in full-fledged blushing mode.

The imposter Griselda disappeared, and was replaced once again by the professor. Bloom wondered if that was really his true form.

"But for most of us," he said, winking again at the faerie of illusion, "that's some pretty advanced magic. Right now, we will be focusing on creating illusions with ordinary objects."

Professor Wiskies snapped and a small figurine appeared on everybody's desk. "Faeries wield a type of magic called raw magic. You all draw power from something specific, like an element, for example, and that will be the default, and strongest, manifestation of your magic. But raw magic can theoretically be wielded into anything." He hopped up to a student's desk and faced the class. "It can be used to create optical illusions, for example. These illusions are called glamours. I want each of you to really try to focus your magic on changing the color of the figurine on your desk. Pull gently, and mold it to create a coat around your object." He hopped down and made his way up to the side of the room and leapt up onto the windowsill gracefully. "You'll have to visualize. Go ahead and give it a try."