Archwizard

ONE

Gas. Clutch. Gear. Steer. I repeated the process over and over in my head as I raced along the road. I can't believe I had agreed to a race with Stan, and with a stick shift too. It's not that racing isn't fun but I know next to nothing about driving stick shifts and crashing is starting to look inevitable with every passing second.

This is so not the way I want to spend my summer, I thought to myself, being stranded on the north pole is way better than what I'm experiencing right now. I was planning on staying in New York for the summer after a long stressful first semester at NYU as a freshman before a letter arrived from Blake, my sweet but sometimes imposing paternal grandfather, that I am to get on the first plane available to Krestwick, easy as pie since the family has its own array of private jets. I considered refusing for a moment but concluded that will just be futile, besides I have to attend Firewalt for my third year of wizard training. Now it's two weeks into summer and Firewalt is not opened yet because of some 'renovations'- Not that I see anything that needs an update in that school- and I'm stuck racing for the foreseeable future.

I rounded a bend and saw my half-brother's car up ahead, that's a welcome change. Now, I just have to work on getting ahead of him and, of course, not crashing and killing myself in the process- Should be easy, don't you think?

I was about to get to him when a wall of thick fog suddenly appeared on the road. "Come on!", I shouted, "He's using magic now?" I know we're a big family of wizards but, certainly, using magic in a competition, even if it's private, is against the magic users code, if something like that does exist.

"Well, if they ask me, he started it first", I added for my own benefit before sending a blue light flying into the now tunnel-like looking fog, causing it to dissipate. I saw that Stan's car had slowed down a bit. Apparently, my foolish specimen of an half-brother must have thought I'd be stuck in the fog for a while. Well, he's about get the shock of his life.

I stepped on the gas a little bit more forcefully than necessary and began to gain on him. I waited until I had gotten close enough before sending a wave of cold air towards his car, turning one of the wheels into a large chunk of ice. I shot past him just as he begun to spin wildly across the road- Eat my dust, Stan.

Actually, that might be hard to achieve seeing that the road is all tarmac and no dirt, still feels good to say it though.

I raced harder as I saw the finish line but suddenly the road started getting slippery and I knew my half-brother might not be as out as I thought. I managed to force myself across the finish line at almost the same time as Stan- I think I won although it's hard to be sure in the midst of all that commotion we just caused.

"I won the race, right?", I asked grandpa Blake as I got out of the car and jogged towards him.

"I can't say", he replied, "I was so worried about you two not killing each other to see. You were supposed to be racing, not dueling".

"He started it", I said and pointed accusingly at Stan who was just making his way towards us- Kinda lame of me to act like that but he deserved it for what he did.

"I casted an harmless spell but you responded with that ice bit, you could have caused me to crash, do you know that?", he replied and took an angry step towards me.

"Boys, stop it", said grandpa Blake and stepped between us before the confrontation got to the 'I punch you in the face' phase, "You guys did more damage to the race course than to yourselves".

I turned to look at the course and saw that our magic had really done a number on it, cause of many misspells. Stan and I gave grandpa Blake a sincere apology nod, we might not agree on many things but we're definitely on the same page in the 'No destroying things' book.

"Can't you just cast a spell that will repair the road?", asked Stan.

"I can but I won't", replied grandpa Blake as he turned to walk away, "If I keep solving every problem myself, what will be essence of hiring helpers then? Come on, the girls are waiting".

The girls grandpa Blake was referring to were Victoria and a friend of Stan's, her name was Igraine or Yvette, I can't recall although she had told me her name about a thousand times before but I'd forgotten it in almost the same count- Doesn't speak highly of me or my memory, I know.

The thing was, grandpa Blake suggested that since the magic schools were not opened yet, they were all undergoing 'renovations' at the same time although I think there's more to the story, we can invite our friends over. I decided to invite Victoria, she's my girlfriend and I had not had enough time to spend with her since we live many continents apart and I have the University to worry about too. I wanted to add Kendra to the list but she and Victoria didn't mix well last year and although they seem to get along pretty okay now, I think it'll be best not to involve them too much with each other just yet, don't you think?

Stan, on the other hand, had chosen to invite the girl whose name I always seem to forget but that isn't what rubbed me wrong about her. She attends Blackhead, as in the best magic school for dark wizards- Seriously, where did Stan know her?

"Please tell me you saw the race and that I won", shouted Stan although we were almost close to them, he must have done it just to get on my annoyed side- Sly as always, brother.

"We couldn't see much from the house but I think Troy won", said Stan's friend much to his dismay.

"You see, Igraine said I won", I said with a big smirk at him but stopped short when everyone started shooting me confusing looks.

"What?", I asked when the looks were becoming somewhat creepy.

"Who's Igraine?", asked Victoria with an 'Are you for real?' expression on her face.

"I'm Yvette", she said with a smile as she always do every time she tells me her name.

"Well, you have to agree that Yvette and Igraine sound pretty alike", I replied in the same way I always do after every time she tells me her name.

"How does Barbecue sound for dinner?", asked grandpa Blake all of a sudden, changing the subject as he always do after the name confirmation conversation between Yvette and I.

We stopped all of a sudden , stared at each other and began to laugh, we just repeated the same thing we've done over a thousand times this summer. Well, I might not be having a Bora Bora experience but it's summer and I'm with my loving grandfather, always getting on my nerves half-brother, beautiful girlfriend and a girl whose name I have a knack for forgetting. There's only one thing that can crown it all; Magic.