SpellShocked (SpellShocked Saga: Book 1)

Chapter 5 - Power Overflowing

"Who are you calling boy?!" Zac yelled, standing up so quickly that his chair was pushed back onto the wall with a bang that made both of my parents jump. Madame Thornton, however, did not react. She simply smiled mockingly and said, "Sit down, boy," spit flew from her mouth when she spoke, "Before I make you sit down."

Zac opened his mouth to snap back a retort, but I grabbed his arm to stop him. He glared at me, but I just shook my head and muttered, "Not now Zac...please.?" He continued to stare down at me at me for a few seconds before throwing himself down onto the chair, arms folded, glaring daggers towards Madame Thornton.

It wasn't that I didn't agree with the way Zac was acting - honestly, I was just as pissed off as he was - but I didn't want him to start anything for two reasons. One reason was that at least one of these people could use magic and that was not someone you wanted to start a fight with. The other, more important reason was that I really wanted to know why these people were here and what they know about my power. So, while I was just as angry as Zac, I held back my emotions.

I turned to face Mr Beck when he coughed slightly, "Perhaps we should just all take a deep breath and count to ten, hm?" He had a soft, relaxing voice, and his words seemed to be laced with a hint of humour that matched his ever-present grin. Madame Thornton's glanced towards him briefly before facing forward again and glared at the wall between Zac and I.

"To answer your question, Mr Richards," Saul said tersely, "We normally intervene within minutes of an Awakening to mitigate any potential damage caused by unregulated magic and to explain the Gift to the young sorcerer who has developed it."

"Then why didn't you intervene yesterday when I stopped that bullet?"

"Bullet?!" my mom shrieked, sitting forward suddenly. Her horror was quickly mitigated when all three set of eyes from the strangers turned on her. Her eyes widened and she sat back quickly, lowering her head and gripping my dad's hand once again.

"I'll explain later mom, I'm fine," I said impatiently. I looked pleadingly towards Saul.

"We intervened by wiping your presence at the scene from the memory of everyone who was there, as there was always a chance that they saw you conjure the ward." Saul explained, "But we did not contact you immediately due to the...unusual nature of your Awakening."

"Unusual? What the hell does that mean?" I exclaimed, becoming increasingly exasperated and worried.

Saul sighed and looked towards Mr Beck, "You are much more adept at dealing with young sorcerers, would you please explain the nature of the Awakening and the Gift to our young ward please, Mr Beck?"

Mr Beck's grin broadened, "Gladly." He shuffled his chair closer towards me and stretched out his open hand, "Christopher Beck, Master of Evocation. You can call me Chris, if you'd like." I took a second to process his words - Master of Evo-what now? - before I cautiously reached out to shake his hand. I only just noticed that there was some kind of strange tattoo on the back of Mr Beck's right hand when I gripped it in a handshake: it was a circle with three lines inside of it, sort of in the shape of a V with another line coming out of the middle of the letter.

"Okay, so magic." he said after dropping his hand before I could get a good look at the marking, "It's a fairly complicated subject but I'll just run through the basics with you for now, okay?" I nodded my consent.

"In general, magic, or the Gift, starts to appear around the time of puberty; I won't go the biology of how that works, just know that the hormones released by the body during puberty triggers the generation of magic within your body. We call this The Awakening."