ees, everyone in that room except the doctor and Halima was crying or

consoling, but the doctor had grief in his eyes.

“Hassina... is dead.”
A cry of sorrow filled the room.

A few weeks later, Halima and a few other people gathered at Yainen Park,
all dressed and draped in black. Wails and cries were everywhere as the
priest spoke.

“Quibila Hassina was a kind, smart, beautiful spirited woman, who always
looked on the bright side,” the priest spoke into his microphone, “she was
loved by many, hated by few, and will be forever. Though Hassina is dead,
she lives forever in our hearts.”

Some people lingered at the grave, Quibila stayed the longest, so Hassina
waited for her mother in the same seat.

At 6 o’clock, Quibila stood up from the patch of grass next to Hassina’s

grave. She walked closer to Halima and sat next to her.

“Halima. I don’t know what could’ve caused such a hatred for Hassi in your
heart,” she started, not looking at Halima, “but at least. Pity me and her
child. I’m old and I’m going to die soon–”

“Mom, if you speak of your death one more time, I’m leaving.”

Quibila nodded.

“At least...pity her child. She was only three months old when her mother
died. For all we know she could’ve watched it... she could’ve watched her
mother get stabbed...”

“And what do you suppose I do?”

“Let us take care of her... together.”

“Mother, you always have some wild ideas,” Hassina was about to refuse,
but looking at her mother’s sunken eyes and downcast face, she agreed,
“But this one is a good idea.”

And that is how they ended up taking care of Quibila Khepri , who was also
called Khepri .

Khepri grew slower than other children; she was shorter than most of
her friends, but her black, clean hair was far longer than most of them. It
reached her waist and went a little lower.

She was skinny, and coffee skinned, with a thin face, and brown,
beady eyes, and pointy ears the doctors diagnosed as a rare deformation.
However, her hearing was very good, better than most, and her memory
was sharp, but her eyesight was less than average. By the time she was
eleven years old, she had perfectly established what she would and would
not put up with.

She would not put up with cowardice, or attack your enemy while their
back was turned. However, she loved the smell of fresh, spicy hotpot, horror
movies, filling her rubber boots with rain and her socks getting soaked and
her feet getting cold. But most of all, she loved her grandma. Her grandma,
in her opinion, was greater and better than any other woman to ever walk
this planet. Her grandma was so beautiful; she could enter a pageant and
win against all those professional models. Her grandma was kinder than any
princess in a fairy tale. And her grandma was braver and better than any
hero, fictional or not.
 One cold morning in September, Khepri was awoken by a cold, loud
voice which she immediately recognised as her aunt’s. She never liked her
aunt; she felt her aunt was mean and reluctant to do good things for others.
So she pulled on her purple satin nightgown and took to the stairs, skipping
four steps at a time.

“Good morning, Aunty Halima,” she said shortly, looking into Halima’s cold,
blue eyes.

“Good morning, Hassina.”

Halima was one of the very few people who called Khepri, ‘Hassina’, and she
never really liked that, she only liked it when it was her grandma.

“Your grandma is out on the front porch,” Halima said sharply.

“Thank you,” Khepri smiled, “who were you talking to?”

“Someone on the phone,” Halima said in English, raising the phone from the
cushion next to hers.

Khepri spoke in Keiya while she was in Medra, she never spoke English, but
she could read, write, speak and understand it fairly well. She nodded at her
aunty, and skipped outside to greet her grandma.

She hugged her grandma, who was wearing a red gown with a flower
pattern, and her usual silver locket around her neck. She was eating a
mango.

“Good morning, Hassina!” her grandma hugged.

“Hello, grandma!” Khepri squealed as her grandma tossed her a mango from
the bucket of mangoes next to her, “why is Aunty Halima here?”

“She’s coming to see you off to your first day of Middle School!”

“What do you mean?” Khepri asked, “Like real school, like to go to the
building? Not home school anymore?”

“Sadly, yes,” grandma sulked, “I didn’t get a middle school education so I

can’t teach you anything...”

“What about aunty?” Khepri asked, desperately, knowing that school with
Aunty Halima would be hell, “She could teach me!”

Grandma pouted. “She has to go to work...”

Khepri felt like a raindrop fell into her lungs. And it was the coldest raindrop.
It was so cold; Khepri thought she was getting sick. She didn’t like grandma
being sad, so she faked a smile and hugged her.

“It’s ok, grandma, I’ll go,” Khepri smiled.

“Oh, my darling Hassina, you’re always my sunshine.” Grandma smiled.

“I love you too grandma,” Khepri smiled, “I’m going to go get dressed now.”

Khepri sulked all the way up to her bedroom and flopped onto the bed with a
thud.

‘I don’t wanna go...’ she thought, ‘there must be a way out...’

When she had finally finished thinking, she pulled on her sweatshirt, her
black skinny jeans, and her peeling sneakers and sprinted outside, to Demine
District, and knocked on her best friend, Hona’s (called Hanna), door.

But instead of the tall, round faced girl to answer the door, she was met with
her mother.

“Hello, Mrs. Chaia!” Khepri said, with a smile.

“Hello, Khepri,” she smiled back, “If you’re looking for Hanna, she’s gone off
to school, and she’ll be home in six hours...”

“Oh...” Khepri sulked for a moment, and then raised her head, “ok, bye!” And
she then she sulked all the way back to her house and slept without eating.

The next day was bad as the previous, Khepri had just arrived, and she
felt that raindrop grow into a lake of icy, freezing water. She felt like she was
about to throw up. She was assisted into the room by the principal. She
stood at the front of the class and the teacher asked her to introduce herself.

“Hello,” she started boldly; after all, she wasn’t the shy kind of person, “My
name is Khepri, Quibila Khepri, nicknamed Hassina.”

“Good,” the teacher said, “class, you can now ask Khepri questions.”

“What do you like to do?” said a short girl at the front of the class who was
so small; Khepri expected a squeak, not a human voice from her.

“I like to sing,” she started, “but I like piano more.”

The class was filled with “oooh’s” and “ah’s”.

“Can you play piano?” said a male voice.

“Yes,” Khepri said, proudly, “I am a master at it.”

The class was filled with applause. Khepri beamed.

“Ok, class, turn your pages to page four hundred and twenty six.”

The rest of the day was boring; Khepri made a new friend, she stood
up to some bullies who were picking on a first grader, she called them
“Immature” and told them to “Act your age, not your shoe size.” But as she
rode home on her bike that day, they confronted her, smoking weed.

“Well, well, well...” said the first and the tallest of the three, “If it isn’t little
Miss. I-like-first-years! What happened to your ears, are you an elf?”

“Leave me alone, Bapel–” she snapped coldly.

“How about no?” she said, cornering her.

And then Bapel did something she would regret. Bapel pinned her to the
ground, and kicked her really hard on the road side.

When they were done tormenting her, Khepri got up only to stumble back to
the ground and knock her bike over. She got up. She was going to hit her. She
pulled out a piece of metal from her bike basket; it looked strong, like a
crowbar, only it was bent into a circle. The end of it was sharp, like glass. She
hesitated and smacked Bapel in the head with it, and she started bleeding
freely. Within four minutes, she had fainted. Khepri backed away, grabbed
her bike and rode home.
 As she got home, she flung her bike, and barged into the back door,
ignored her grandma’s greetings, hurried to her room and locked the door.
Her room was bright, the sunlight from the glass wall poured in like rain. Her
closet was strange, she had guns she had found in her parent’s old trunk,
which was in grandma’s room. She was forbidden to ever touch that trunk,
but one day, when she was home alone with Aunty Halima, temptation and
boredom got the best of her and she stole the guns. She pasted the names
of people she hated onto that gun, vowing to kill them or make them pay
with the gun she pasted their name on. She grabbed the gun, scribbled
Bapel’s name onto a piece of paper, applied glue onto the back of it, and
parsed it onto the second of the four guns. She slumped into her bed,
waiting for regret to sink in. It didn’t take long; it never did. She was
distracted for a moment by a squirrel she could’ve sworn said, “Damn it,
she’s home already!” Before she knew it, she was crying silently. She did not
want to ever go back to that school again. She knew the teacher was going
to tell her grandma, and her grandma would be furious, which would break
her heart. And that is exactly what happened.

Three months passed, and she had become used to the school and its
taunts. Bapel’s gang beat her up sometimes; but she never cried in school,
she didn’t want to show that it hurt her in any way; that would hurt her
pride. If she was bleeding, she would bleed and not cry. If she was in pain,
she would never wince, or show any sign of weakness. Twice she had
fainted; Emily had to take her home. She never dared tell her grandma, she
would report to the school principal, and then she'd be named a snitch, a
mama’s girl, and everyone would know that her mom and dad were dead,
and she lived with her parents.
 But things got worse. One day, she rode home, and sprinted into her
living room. And there she saw it, grandma was lying on the floor, tossing
and turning, and vomit was on the carpet.

“Grandma, what happened?!”

“C-call Halima...”

“Call Aunty Halima?” Khepri asked, quickly.

Grandma gagged again. Khepri ran to the phone, and tried to dial Aunty
Halima’s number, but her hands were bleeding through the bandages
around them, so openly and freely, making her hands frail, and the telephone
dripping with blood. And before she knew it, all was silent.

“G-Grandma?” Khepri ran to her grandma, tears in her eyes.

Khepri’s eyes widened. That icy lake had now become a frozen ocean in her
lungs, and it was colder and more freezing than it had ever been. Grandma’s
body grew cold; Khepri put her ear on grandma’s chest to listen for a
heartbeat that was nowhere to be found. Quibila had died.

That night, she took the locket off grandma’s body and wore it around
her neck. Khepri lay on her grandma’s body, crying. She hated herself for not
telling grandma about Bapel, if she had, she would’ve been free from their
beatings, and her hands would not have been so frail... She hated herself for
caring about being called a snitch; she hated herself for being afraid of
people knowing about her parent’s death. She hated herself for letting
grandma die.
 A few weeks later, it had finally sunk into her brain that grandma was
gone; she would never see her again. She stopped going to school, and
stayed at Aunty Halima’s house. She had turned fully quiet and barely ate.
She never went outside because it reminded her so badly of grandma, she
hated mangoes, she hated Bapel, she hated herself, she hated her life, she
hated anything that had to do with herself or reminded her of grandma, not
because she hated grandma, but because she had failed to help her stay
alive.

People came over to console Halima, who was clearly in a bad state,
she loved her mother, and people knew that, people knew that perfectly
well.

A private funeral was held for Quibila, only Halima, Khepri and Quibila’s
three best friends.

Deep in her heart, Khepri knew it was her fault all these people were crying,
in fact, in her opinion, she had killed grandma.

Two more months had passed, and the Medran New Year’s
celebration was held. Khepri helped Aunty Halima set up the decorations,
but she was sure Halima knew she wasn’t going to celebrate this year.

After the celebrations were held, Halima’s boyfriend, Chiango, came

over. He was a drunkard and a womanizer in Khepri’s opinion. He hit and
insulted Halima, which made Khepri want to go grab the guns in her trunk
and shoot him, but she was aware of the regret that would bring, so she
abstained. So Khepri left the house, dragging the dog, Keito, on a leash with
one hand, and her briefcase with her most prized possessions; her guns,
grandma’. She was wearing a salmon hooded sweatshirt dress, her not-so-
clean hair almost reaching her bottom.

She sulked all the way to the dock, she had had enough; she had been
filled to the brim, so she got onto a boat and rode out into the lake. She did
not know where to go or how to get there, she just wanted to get out; she
just wanted to be free from her horrible past, from her memories, from her
life in Degema, from everything.

She rowed absent mindedly, until she reached shore. It was a forest, a
thick, dense, dark and wet one. Just where she needed to be. Alone, no one
but animals and grass, and hopefully no humans.

It began to snow, Khepri wanted to bury herself in the sand and

suffocate, but she soon grew hungry. Now she hates hunger. She rose up;
she was too hungry, too alive to bear it anymore.

She waddled like a penguin in ski-pants in the snow, cuddling Keito

and her hair wrapped around her body like a blanket.

She went deeper into the forest, and night came closer. But then,
Khepri heard a loud buzzing noise. Light appeared slowly, and Khepri
panicked.

“What if it’s the police?” she thought.

So she ran deeper into the forest. But the buzzing sound only grew
louder and clearer. She ran, until she finally found it; a fleet of tiny, glowing
lights, following each other in a single file. They were fireflies. For the want
of anything better to do, she followed them. And she never regretted it.

They led her all the way to a crowded village, the people there clearly
weren’t Medran, they looked American; some of them were blonde,
brunette, but Khepri didn’t have time to dwell on these things. She was
soaking, hungry, dirty, broke, full of regret, lost and heartbroken.

“Where are we, Keito?” she asked, “we’re not in Degema anymore...”

She waddled to the back of a heated hut, and cuddled Keito,

wondering how her life would’ve been if she had just told grandma about
Bapel and her gang...

She was wondering how she got there.

“How did I mess up so badly?” she asked herself.

She cried herself to sleep that night.

When she woke up, she cleaned her face that was covered with
dribble. She was starving, so she braved entering the hut. She saw people
entering it, so she reasoned it was a restaurant or a bar.

Inside the hut, there were four tables, two of which were empty. She
went to the counter, and asked subconsciously in Medran, “May I have
something to eat?”

The man looked puzzled.

“What?” he replied in English.

“I need something to eat,” she said, in English.

“Oh!” he said, comprehension dawning on his face.

She shared her egg soup with Keito, who slept a few minutes later,
and burped silently. The waiter came to her with a check. She needed fifteen
dollars.

Obviously, she didn’t have fifteen dollars, so she offered to work at the
restaurant. The chef agreed. The cleaning maid, Rhonda, handed her an
apron, a brown skirt that went far down from her knee. She wore a white
puffy, satin shirt. Then, she washed dishes in the kitchen. She loved washing
dishes, as you could be as absent minded as you wanted if you were careful
enough.

She finished washing early, as there were barely any people in the
restaurant, except a regular, old man who was blind as a bat.

At night, when Khepri was sitting, her head buried in her arms, she
heard loud whispering and muttering.

“It will take long before struggles leave, it will take long...” the voice echoed,
“seven times will pass, and as you have chosen to flee, seven times
struggles have been reduced, now come to me, my child, and let your tale
begin, for there is more than an unlucky child, hiding within.”

At first, Khepri thought she had just imagined it, but the voice grew louder
and clearer.
 She sat up straight, and followed the voice. It led her to the women’s
bathroom. It was flooded with water, and in here the voice was at its
loudest. Khepri turned to the mirror. It was beautiful and old fashioned, its
rim was encrusted with red rubies. She leaned in closer to the mirror and
pressed her ear against it. The voice seemed not only to be whispering
anymore, but shouting.

Khepri pulled away from the mirror, and her eyes widened.

A hand, old and sickly and gray, was now sticking out of the mirror,
holding a piece of glass.

“Take it, child,” the voice cried, “it will lead the way...”

So she took it. And just then, the world seemed to melt downwards,
and Khepri’s stomach did some nasty back flips, and she landed on her
bottom on a hard, cold rooftop.

“W–What?” Khepri said, not knowing what had just happened.

Khepri looked down. It was a village, with people all clustered together
on the streets, children pressing their noses on glass panes to stare at what
looked like giant spoons, and animals turning into humans randomly. Khepri
blinked and rubbed her eyes. It was all real, not a dream, or a hallucination.
She slid down from the roof, and fell to down but landed on her feet. She
glanced around, then turned to the building she had just fallen from. She
looked at the roof. At the top of it, was a mirror, just like the one in the
bathroom of that restaurant.
 Khepri looked around at it, and then turned to the ground. There was
water in the gutters, and it reflected her face. Her black, 4A hair was braided
into a long, voluptuous bob at mid-back length. Her almost invisible freckles
had now turned very visible, and now she had side bangs.

She touched her hair, then her face, then ran to the fountain to get a
better look. Her clothes had now also changed; she was now wearing a
single sleeve dress. Her cheeks were red and rosy, in her opinion, she looked
quite beautiful. She looked at her hands they were brown and clean, her nails
were no longer filthy, and she smelled like lavender perfume.

While she was marvelling at her sudden change of fashion, a little cat,
dripping and meowing loudly came out from the fountain.

For some reason, the people ran and screamed in terror. But Khepri
picked up the cat, though she was sore afraid of it, and dried it in her new
skirt. The cat purred.

The crowd began was suddenly filled with ‘ooh’s’ and ‘aaah’s’, which
reminded Khepri of her terrible first day of school.

The people began to close in on Khepri, and some even yelled at her.
Khepri was frightened, she was moving backward slowly and–

SPLASH!

Khepri landed in the pool, drenching herself and the cat in the cold
water. People tried to help her, but before she could pull herself out, a loud
trumpet noise sounded. It was followed by a loud voice.
“MAKE WAY FOR HER MAJESTY, LORD MOSUIEN!”

The crowd backed away from the fountain, and revealed a carriage, with ten
horses pulling it, and in bright, bold printing on the front of it,

“LORD MOSUIEN 3”

And from the side door, a woman came out, she was wearing a teal
ball gown, a glimmering, golden crown on her head and a staff in her hand.

The crowd prostrated at her appearance, all except Khepri were bowing.

“Hello, my dear!” she said, holding a hand out to Khepri, who took it, and was
being pulled out of the water, “who are you?”

“Quibila Khepri,” she said, wiping her face with her sleeve, the cat hiding
behind her legs.

“Well, Khepri,” the queen said, taking her by the shoulder and beckoning her
to come along quietly with her into the carriage. When they got in, she
continued, “I’m Queen Mosuien the third. You, however, are a very, very
special girl, do you know that?”

“Uhm– I–” Khepri stammered, not knowing what to say.

“It’s about time you came back,” Queen Mosuien said, dropping her staff on
the seat, “how did you get here?”

“I– I don’t know–”

The queen looked quite puzzled.

“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Mosuien asked, “Did you just wake up
and find yourself here?”

“N–No, I uh– sort of–” Khepri stammered, and then began to narrate what
happened before she got there.

“Ah, I see...” Mosuien smiled, comprehension dawning on her black face, “the
teleport mirror at Bhatia’s?”

“Teleport mirror?” Khepri asked, “I thought teleporting wasn’t even real!”

“It is, Khepri,” Mosuien smiled, “how do you think you came all the way from
Degema to Yenagoa in three hours?”

“I- I’m in Yenagoa?”

“Yes, actually,” Mosuien started, “you’re in Chaeya, you teleported three

times, you see, the first time, from Degema, Medra to Canada, the second,
from Canada to Armada, which is a state in the United States of Bohland,
from Armada to Yenagoa, which is where you’re at right now!”

“But how come I only felt the last teleport, and not the first two, and what
were those fireflies doing trying to get me to follow them?”

“Fireflies?” Mosuien looked shocked, “Khepri, did you feel any differences
when you followed them?”

“Y-Yeah,” Khepri answered, “it was like I didn’t have a choice...”

Mosuien looked aghast. She closed her mouth then re-opened it.
“You didn’t feel anything in the first two teleports because you were coming
into magic,” Mosuien explained, changing the subject, “but when you go
from magical place to magical place, you feel it because you’re a part of it.”

“I–I’m magical?”

“Precisely,” Mosuien said, pulling out a hand fan and beginning to flick it up
and down, generating air, “you’re a tri-ling.”

“P– What?” Khepri said, not knowing if this was an insult “h-how? I- I’m not
a t-tri-ling! I’m a human!”

“Oh, really?” Mosuien turned to Khepri and compressed her fan, “then how
can you turn into objects or animals? Are you bewitched?”

“T-Turn into o-objects?” Khepri said in utter disbelief, “impossible!”

The queen gasped, and the carriage stopped.

“HOW DARE YOU USE THAT WORD IN MY PRESENCE?!” Mosuien roared.

“W-What word?” Khepri asked, shocked.

“The ‘I’ word!” Mosuien replied.

“The ‘I’ word?”

“The ‘I’ word.”

“What’s so bad about t-the ‘I’ word?” Khepri asked.

“It’s a disgusting swear word. I’ll pardon you because you didn’t know, but if
you say it one more time, there will be consequences.”
Khepri gulped.

“So, how does that transforming thing work?” Khepri asked, trying to ease
the tension.

“I thought you’d never ask!”

Mosuien pulled out a white stick. It was decorate by golden dots and lines,
and it sparkled.

“This, Khepri,” Mosuien proclaimed, “is a wand! You say the spell you want to
use, and point it at the thing you want to apply it to.”

“Whoa...” Khepri’s eyes opened wide.

“Tartanus teacup!” the queen cried, and Khepri felt herself squish and a little
tickling sensation erupted in her stomach. She had turned into a tiny teacup.

“Whoa!” Khepri said, but was shocked as her own voice had grown squeaky
and high pitched, “how?!”

The queen chuckled and flicked her wand, conjuring a teapot. She poured
some tea into Khepri, who was now very compatible with that action, and
sipped from it, her little finger stuck outwards.

It felt ticklish to be drunk from, Khepri’s face was pasted on the side of the
teacup which was now her body, and she was laughing furiously.

When the queen had drunk her fill, she set Khepri down and with a flick of
her wand said, “Selvio Khepri!” And Khepri was immediately transformed
back into a scrawny, bony girl. The only difference was that tickling
sensation had not left her, but it had softened.
“Why do I still feel weird?”

“First time jitters. We’re off to my castle; you’ll get a wand of your own.”

Khepri smiled.

Forwarl Castle

Forwarl Castle was a gorgeous castle, made of cement and covered in

flowers; it seemed to be the source of all the summer.

“This,” Mosuien said as they stood in front of the castle, “is my home.”

“Wow...” Khepri said as they walked into the huge hallway, “must be nice to
have such a beautiful house...”

“Well,” Mosuien said, as they entered into a room with shelves and drawers
and a single vanity, “you are welcome to it anytime. My home is your home.”

“R– Really?!” Khepri said, the tickling in her stomach growing bigger.

“Absolutely!” the queen smiled, and began to rummage through a cabinet,

“hold on, I’m trying to find a wand for you...”

The queen pulled out a black wand with a cut at its tip.

“Hmm...” the queen examined the wand, “oak, ten inches, Taurus...”

“What do you mean, Taurus?” Khepri inquired.

“Oh, every wand is charted using star signs.” Mosuien said flatly, examining
the wand closely.
“Oh...” Khepri said, not really understanding but not wishing to ask too many
questions.

“Try this one.”

The queen tossed Khepri the wand.

“Sit in front of the vanity,” the queen said, smiling.

Khepri walked to the vanity and sat on the stool.

The mirror in the vanity revealed a face. It was a grey one, with black eyes
with no whites. There were no teeth, in fact it was like a talking mask.

“Here is the chosen one... the one chosen by fate to close the abyss... the one
chosen to liberate the people from black magic...” the mask said, “you will
need a willow wood wand.....Capricorn....”

The queen lunged to the drawers and withdrew a wooden wand with a
swirling golden string around it and quickly gave it to Khepri .

“Ah....” the mask said, “the three fates have spoken about your future... they
say... your task is a brutal, traumatizing task... so I grant your wand
enhancement, so that when times seem tough, your power will lie in your
wand.” And the mask subsided.

The queen covered her mouth.

“T– The three fates?” the queen’s eyes widened, “Khepri , where is that black
cat?”

“Back at the place where I was when we met–”

The queen let out a sigh of relief. A maid stepped into the room.

“You called, your majesty?”

“Oh- Yeah, give Khepri here a cleaning up for supper.” The queen conjured up
a chair and slumped onto it, then continued, “Khepri , go with her, she’s your
governess.”

“Come along, Khepri .” The maid took Khepri by the hand to a room full of
clothes. Khepri had never seen so many clothes in her whole life.

“Pick something out, anything you seem to fancy...” the maid said.

Khepri walked in. She picked out a white, long gown that had puffy, long
sleeves, and it was so long, it passed her feet by one foot. There were no
shoes in the wardrobe, in fact, no one in the castle except the queen wore
shoes.

“Stunning. I think glasses would look good, but you’re not bespectacled...”

Khepri smiled awkwardly.

“Well, be gone now, I have many chores to tend to, go outside and play with
the birds; they love company, or go to the library and take a book.”

“Miss, where is the library?” Khepri asked, as she left the room.

“It’s Narcissa to you, Khepri ,” the maid announced, “the library’s down the
hall, pick something informative, no need to go jam-packing your brain with
fantasies, well, all fantasies are informative, as this country was built on it,
but just pick out something... like a text book.”
 Khepri nodded and skipped into the library. For some reason, the
library reminded her of Keito, who was still in the restaurant, probably alone
and hungry, and not knowing that his human had teleported to another
country.

Khepri calmed herself, she knew the chef and Rhoda were there, they
might find something for Keito to do, they’d take care of him...

She walked isle by isle, looking for something that looked text book-like and
school-ish, but fiction and non-fiction seemed to be all the same...

She finally settled for a book called, ‘A How to Guide To: Summoning.’
She learned about a potion, the Summoning Potion, also known as
Aclamerta Sentauri, and what was needed to make it. She stole away into
the stores which had taken her thirty minutes to find, but she couldn’t take
anything, as Narcissa found and chased her out and gave her a serious
telling off. She took eight other books, ‘A How to Guide To: Materialistic and
Animalistic Transformation’, ‘A Guide to Mythical Creatures’, ‘Magical Runes
Identification’, ‘Viotto’s study; the Magicometer’, ‘The Monstrous Beings
Called Witches’, ‘Ancient Bohlandian Rituals; Brutal or Beautiful’, ‘The
Mysterious History of Bohland,’ and ‘The Dussarth Foundation’.

She learned how tri-lings worked and what they were, and how
mythical creatures were actually real creatures that non-magical people
(called ‘oomans’) saw, but couldn’t believe they saw, and how gory olden day
rituals were.

She slumped into bed that night with a mind so full and a heart so
happy she had completely forgotten about her life in Degema, but she
wondered about what that mirror had said; was it all a bunch of rubbish?
Was she actually supposed to close up the abyss, defeat black magic, and
restore some sort of stolen peace? In short, was she the chosen one?

The next day was quite dull, a few of the queen’s friends came for
lunch, they were as snobby as the queen was, except the sixth, a redhead
who had a Mohawk and wore ripped skinny jeans with her crown around her
wrist like a bracelet, who slurped down tea like she hadn’t had water for
days, and had no British accent, but a Scottish one, and she reminded Khepri
of a pirate.

Khepri sat on the stairs of the garden out back, where doves came and
picked the grain on the steps, one spoke to her, but she wasn’t surprised but
amazed for she had read about it in a book, she had a wonderful
conversation with the ginger gat that bathed in the sunshine, his name was
Clement, he preferred fish over milk, he hated dirt stuck between his toes,
and told fascinating stories which Khepri wrote about in her notebook.

“One afternoon,” Clement yawned, in his Irish voice, “I saw the biggest
butterfly... it was so huge, it was bigger than both my paws combined... but it
flew away, and my heart broke. Mistress gave me a fish, but I didn’t eat it
because my heart was broken.”

“Do you ever see the butterfly around here?” Khepri asked.

“Har’ly.” Clement rolled over and flopped on his belly, “And whenever I do, it

flies away before I can take a se’ond glance.”

“Oh no...” Khepri said, and tried to pick him up from the pedestal where he
sun bathed, but he growled, so she continued awkwardly, “that must be
quite frustrating...”

“It is, in fact,” Clement said in such a voice, Khepri thought he was crying, “I
love that butterfly more that I do catching mice.”

Khepri read more books and practiced spells with her wand, she tried
to turn a dove into a duck, but it only turned half duck half dove, so she
turned it back.

She met a new boy in the village, his name was William, he was a
redhead with blue eyes who loved to fish, he taught Khepri , who wrote
about it in her notebook. He told her about Dussarth, which was a school
that magical beings went to when they turned eleven.

“It’s closed now,” he said, “but it’ll be opened up by September.”

Months passed, and September came in all its glory, leaves of orange
and yellow made Clement look invisible, and carriages pulled up in front of
every house that eleven year olds were in.

“Oh,” Khepri begged Mosuien that evening as she knitted Clement a sweater,
“You must let me go, Mosuien, William will be going, I really want to go!”

“Listen, Khepri ,” Mosuien said without turning from her knitting, “we’ve
been over this, you’re doing home school!”

“But I don’t want home school!” Khepri said, in contrast to when she was
begging for it, “I want real school! Dussarth School!”
“I’ve said it a million times,” Mosuien said without looking up still, “no!”

Khepri groaned and lay on her back with her legs up in the air to look at the
new black loafers she had now been allowed to wear, then got up and
stormed out, and slammed the door and cried all the way into her room.

She fell on her pillows and cried silently. The door creaked open. It was
Narcissa.

“Khepri ,” Narcissa said calmly and walked to hug her, “please don’t cry... I
know how much you wanted to go to Dussarth but please, your moth- I
mean, the queen, wants the best for you, and the best only... she- she has
her reasons...”

“I got everything I wanted since I got here...” Khepri sniffed, “Why not this?
What’s so bad about Dussarth?”

“I dunno,” Narcissa said, stroking Khepri ’s long brown hair, “I went there
when I was eleven... it was awesome...”

“Tell me about it...” Khepri begged.

“Oh, well, I remember when I turned fourteen there was a wonderful gala.”
Narcissa narrated, “I went with my best friend, because no one had asked us
to the dance. It was awfully fun...”

Khepri put her head on Narcissa’s lap. Narcissa kissed her forehead.

“Don’t mind it, Khepri . I’ll try and talk to her for you.”

But Khepri had fallen asleep.

The next day, Khepri met her tutor.

“Khepri , this is Mr. Ryan McClure, your home school tutor,” the queen’s
personal assistant, Bailey Broadwick said.

Khepri said a swear word in her head.

“Mr. McClure,” Bailey continued, turning to the tall man with black shoulder
length hair and a purple eye, “this is Khepri , she was taken in by the queen
and she is practically like her child.”

The man held out his hand to Khepri , gesturing a shake. She was reluctant
at first, but Bailey shot her a nasty look and she complied.

The first class was Math.

“The Bohlandian language, Grendi, has its own set of letters and numbers,”
Mr. McClure said, pointing his cane towards the board at the word
‘Mathematica’, “Mathematica, is the word for Numeracy, or more commonly
known as Math. It’s pretty simple, adding, subtracting, dividing and
multiplying, it’s the same as before, but only the symbols are much
different.”

She spent an hour trying to write the symbol for ‘six’ in Grendi properly, she
swore it looked like a bending flamingo.

Grammatica (the Grendi word for grammar) was worse. She almost slept
when he began to talk about the pronunciation of ‘denra’ (DEHN-raih), the
Grendi word for dog.
 While he talked, her mind would drift off to William, she knew he was
surprised when he found she wasn’t going. She was depressed for she knew
she wasn’t seeing him again till December.

The end of the day was dull and gray, and Khepri didn’t want to speak
a single word to Mosuien, or the Cat, she only talked to Narcissa, who told
her tales of Dussarth, and described it was; the most beautiful castle in the
whole world. More beautiful than in any cartoon, or in any dream, because it
was inspired by them. Magic whizzed and whirred around, so it was
impossible for any intruders to break in.

For three days she had dreams about Dussarth, about she and William
in Mathematica, and about the Enchanted Park with the Fountain of Dreams,
the more she grew sick with desire to go there.

Until one day, she actually got sick. Migraines more serious than any
other headache, flooded her body. The Royale Doctor, who was also the
Sorcerer in Charge, named Mr. Elvis Haddlemere said “It’s because you’ve
been thinking about something so hard for too long.”

She lay in bed, and Narcissa would come and sing the Dussarth
Anthem to her multiple times before she slept.

One night, Khepri lay awake in her room, suffering from some kind of
insomnia, and decided to take a walk around the dimly lit castle...

She walked and skidded around the halls and then she heard some
voices. It was the voice of the Mr. Haddlemere and the queen. She followed
them. They led her to the sitting room. She pressed her ear against the wall
to listen better.

“You must let her go, your majesty,” he said, “It’s only prophecy, you don’t
want the fates coming here, I- I can sense it- they’re angry already, y- you’re
delaying their plans-”

“–YOU THINK I DON’T KNOW THAT?!” Mosuien roared, “That’s why I’m
keeping her here, my sister always devices these horrific plans.... I- I love her
too much to let her suffer that- that horror story...”

“Well, the fates are angry already, Mosuien,” said the dull voice of Bailey
Broadwick, “You know very well that this disease is no home sickness, the
girl hated her home, you know that this disease is by none other than the
fates.”

There was a silence. Then a sigh.

“Fine. I’ll let her go. But the school year’s already started, has it not?”
Mosuien asked, obviously looking for any reason to not comply.

“You’re the queen.”

So the next day Khepri packed her things in her suitcase, then Narcissa
came to her room, holding a black trash bag, accompanied by barking.

“Keito?” Khepri thought.

And a brown bloodhound sprung from behind Narcissa’s leg and onto Khepri
’s chest, kissing her furiously.
“Keito!” Khepri laughed, wiping the dog saliva off her face, “Cissy (the new
nickname for Narcissa), h-how?!”

“Flew back to Randy’s on a unicorn, Mosuien sent me. I also have your
briefcase!” Narcissa tossed the black trash bag to Khepri , and she scarpered
inside it, and pulled out her leather briefcase.

“Be careful with those guns, they go haywire at Dussarth.”

Khepri smiled, and tucked the briefcase into her suitcase and then zipped it
up.

Clement came into the room, and sat on the bed.

“Tell ‘er, Narcissa, yuh can’ take dogs to Dussarth.”

Khepri suddenly got a little sad.

“Sadly, it’s true.” Narcissa said, noticing the sad expression on Khepri ’s face,
“But you can still take cats!”

So Khepri went to Dussarth, and Clements went with her.

Dussarth School of Sorcery

Dussarth indeed was the most beautiful castle one could ever dream
of. They had arrived there at night, the sky was brightly lit by a million stars,
which she knew to be the dreams of little children, and whenever there were
starless nights, it meant that there were many dreamless sleeps, or very
many nightmares. There was magic constantly whirring around Dussarth,
like shooting stars. At the very highest tower, there was a beam of light
shooting out, and it was illuminating the sky and scene around it. Lanterns
floated in the sky, and the forest around it was dancing in the breeze. A man
in a teal, satin robe came out and bowed.

“To what do we owe the pleasure,” he asked, “your majesty?”

“Well I’d like to make one more student spot,” Mosuien replied, and turned
to Khepri , then turned to the man, “for her.”

“Oh, yes, my queen,” he bowed, “right away!”

He took Khepri ’s suitcase, and she followed him into the castle. The inside of
the castle was more magical than the outside. The walls had moving
paintings, the floor was cleaning itself, and the flowers were snoring in
harmony. He led her to a wooden, bolted, and knocked on the door three
times in a special rhythm. It swung open.

A figure was standing at the window of the room, and he was drawing
different constellations with his wand, and sending them into the sky.

“Excuse me, Mr. Principal?”

The figure turned around quickly, swishing his blue cape; he was startled.

“Gnarley? Oh, you gave me such a fright,” he said, then rose up his wand,
causing light to shine from it, “Who’s that?”

“The queen came and dropped her off, Cormick,” Gnarley announced, “said
she was making room for one more student. But she’s not been given a
uniform or anything of the sort.”

“Wait till the morning, then.” Cormick yawned and turned back to his window
sill.

“Yes, Mr. Principal.” And Gnarley grabbed her arm and led her upstairs to
another bolted door.

He pulled out a key and turned the lock, and the door swung open to a spiral
staircase. They climbed the stairs making Khepri ’s suitcase make a thudding
noise with every step, and jolting a sleeping Clement in a cage awake.

“Nasty baby Hollenmyre,” he muttered under his breath, thinking that Khepri
couldn’t hear him, “queen’s swine. Who are you to disturb my sleep, a filthy
tri-ling?”
Khepri pretended she didn’t know he was talking about her.

At the end of the staircase there were three more bolted doors. Over one
door there was a plaque that on which was written ‘girls’ in cursive, on the
middle one written ‘parlour’ and on the left one that said ‘boys’ in big, bold
capital letters.

“Alright, go in!” Gnarley snarled and pushed open the girls’ door to reveal a
spacious room that was divided into two parts; a library, and a bedroom with
twenty to thirty beds that were spread out by ten inches. People were
sleeping in the beds.

Gnarley slammed the door shut, startling Khepri and two other girls awake.

One screamed.

“WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN HERE?!” the second one
bellowed, waking up the rest and making Khepri knock over a vase which she
luckily caught, “ANSWER ME!”

“I- I’m Khepri , and- um, I’m new here-”

The girl let out a sigh of relief.

“Impossible. Dussarth is closed to new students,” another girl in glasses

said.

“Y- Yeah but t-the queen dropped me off-”

The room was suddenly filled with laughs.

“Don’t make me laugh, the queen? What a nice lie.”

“No, actually, I’m not lying-”

“Where’s the proof?” another one asked.

She needed proof. So she dropped her suitcase and brought Clement out
from his cage. Then she showed them his collar. It said, ‘Clement the queen’s
cat.’ And on the very end of the sentence; there was queen’s signature.

The girls gasped.

“Are you a princess?”

“No-”

“Then what are you?”

“I- I dunno the queen’s just like- my guardian-”

The girls in the room squealed and some gasped.

“Woah, that’s hella cool!” a girl with black painted nails exclaimed.

“Well, take a nightgown and a bed, and tell us more!” a girl in blonde pigtails
asked.

So Khepri climbed into her bed and brushed her brown hair into a bun, and
scooped Clements onto the bed.

“So, tell us,” the girl in blonde pigtails squealed, “How’d you meet the
queen?”

“Well, I was at the fountain at Pagaria Square,” Khepri began, “and I saved a
cat from the fountain-”
“A Cat? Tell me you don’t have it here-”

“I don’t- why?”

“Because some people thing the fountain cat is a serial killer-” the girl with
black nails spat, “Bunch of old rubbish.”

“It is! It killed Mr. Murray!” the girl in glasses retorted.

“Mr. Murray had Trelk flu for eight years! He probably died because of it!”

“So explain the claw marks on his chair and the hairballs on the table! What
about the hole in his stomach!”

“A cat couldn’t have done that much damage to a full grown man. Be
reasonable for once, Addie. In fact with the amount of brains you have, I’m
surprised you ended up in Hollenmyre.”

Some girls gasped and others blew whistles. Khepri just sat there with her
brain whirring to understand and choose whose side of the story to believe.

“To be honest, Thalia, I’m surprised you didn’t end up in detention,

considering how much of a loudmouth bully you are.” Addie snapped.

“Okay, okay. Girls, girls, girls! No need to fight, let Khepri just continue with
her story, okay?” the girl with blond pigtails smiled.

Addie harrumphed.

“So- I uhm- the queen came- and she uhm- took me to her castle- and um
that’s how I met the queen...”

The girls exclaimed with squeals.

“My name’s Sorren,” the girl with pigtails said excitedly.

“Oh, Sorren, you’re only interested in her because she knows the queen-”

The girl looked outraged.

“I WOULD NEVER!” she bellowed.

“Uh-huh. Khepri , Sorren’s dad invented the Magicometer, so she’s like a

celebrity.” Thalia explained

“Her dad invented the what?” Khepri asked.

“You know, The Magicometer, like, the magic measuring thingy.” Addie
answered.

“Oh...” Khepri pretended she understood.

“Goodnight, girls, I’m going to bed.” Addie said, turning off her lamp.

And one by one, every lamp went out.

Mr. McClure comes to Dussarth

The next day, it was bright and covered with red and orange leaves.
Sorren showed Khepri her uniform, a white dress shirt, grey blue sweater, a
tartan, green and orange skirt that was just a bit above her knee. Dress
shoes with long socks.

First was Mathematica. Khepri did fairly well; she had learned a bit
more than the rest from Mr. McClure.

Looking around her classroom, she spotted a kid passing something to

another one. He had dreadlocks, and beautiful, pink, two inch nails. The other
one was an albino, but he had dyed his eyebrows, eyelashes, and he had
split-dyed his hair black and white. His skirt couldn’t hide the red welts on
his lap.

She soon dozed off

FIRST TIME FLYING

: PT 1

Hassina Is Dead

Halima’s hands were clenched together, her face tearless, and her
back upright, unlike those who were sitting beside her in that cold hospital
waiting room. The baby in the cot in the corner was fast asleep, and Halima’s
eyes were fixed on it. However she was absent minded. She was there
because her sister, Hassina, was now in the hospital, suffering from a
dangerous, fatal injury.

Dear reader, you are probably asking, “Why isn’t she crying then?” Let
me assure you, that not all of one’s relatives are loved like others. Halima
hated her sister; she hated her so very much. No one knew why, no one
except her, but the hatred had grown so deep, that a part of Halima, wanted
Hassina to die.

“Halima,” her mother sobbed, looking up from the seat opposite her, “why
are you so cruel to your sister that you don’t care that she is dying?”

“Mother,” Halima said savagely, “I didn’t say I didn’t care for Hassi, I simply
think she was being reckless and stupid” –she was muttering under her
breath now– “like always,” –her voice returned to normal– “and she got
what was coming to her.”

Her mother stood up angrily, her face wet with tears, and her eyes
bloodshot.

“WHAT DID YOU SAY?!” her mother roared in a fury so great Halima thought
she would breath fire, “HOW DARE YOU SAY THAT ABOUT YOUR SISTER,
SHE IS DYING IN THAT ROOM AND HERE YOU ARE, HER OWN SISTER,
INSULTING HER IN HER MOTHER AND HER DAUGHTER’S PRESENCE!”
The baby awoke with loud tears. Before Quibila could utter another word,
some of the other women had scattered to calm and sit her down, or to
soothe the baby back to sleep.

“Halima,” said one of the women who were now stroking Quibila’s shoulder,
“your mother is right. Why have you treated your sister like this? Your
mother is old; do you want her to die knowing that you and your sister hated
each other?”

Halima scowled, but before she could reply, a doctor came into the room.

“Erm – I don’t know how to say this but,” the doctor fell silent, gulped, then
continued, “When you brought Hassina over, she had no pulse. There was
nothing we could do.”

Quibila’s eyes were glistening with more tears, she had fallen off her seat
and onto her knees, everyone in that room except the doctor and Halima
was crying or consoling, but the doctor had grief in his eyes.

“Hassina... is dead.”

A cry of sorrow filled the room.

A few weeks later, Halima and a few other people gathered at Yongbing
Park, all dressed and draped in black. Wails and cries were everywhere as
the priest spoke.

“Quibila Hassina was a kind, smart, beautiful spirited woman, who always
looked on the bright side,” the priest spoke into his microphone, “she was
loved by many, hated by few, and will be forever. Though Hassina is dead,
she lives forever in our hearts.”

Some people lingered at the grave, Quibila stayed the longest, so Hassina
waited for her mother in the same seat she had sat on in the beginning.

At 6 o’clock, Quibila stood up from the patch of grass next to Hassina’s

grave. She walked closer to Halima and sat next to her.

“Halima. I don’t know what could’ve caused such a hatred for Hassi in your
heart,” she started, not looking at Halima, “but at least. Pity me and her
child. I’m old and I’m going to die soon–”

“Oba, if you speak of your death one more time, I’m leaving.”

Quibila nodded.

“At least...pity her child. She was only three months old when her mother
died. For all we know she could’ve watched it... she could’ve watched her
mother get stabbed...”

“And what do you suppose I do?”

“Let us take care of her... together.”

“Mother, you always have some wild ideas,” Hassina was about to refuse,
but looking at her mother’s sunken eyes and downcast face, she agreed,
“But this one is a good idea.”

And that is how they ended up taking care of Quibila Khepri , who was also
called Khepri .
 Khepri grew slower than other children; she was shorter than most of
her friends, but her black, clean hair was far longer than most of them. It
reached her waist and went a little lower.

She was skinny, and coffee skinned, with a thin face, and brown,
beady eyes, and pointy ears the doctors diagnosed as a rare deformation.
However, her hearing was very good, better than most, and her memory
was sharp, but her eyesight was less than average. By the time she was
eleven years old, she had perfectly established what she would and would
not put up with.

She would not put up with cowardice, or attack your enemy while their
back was turned. However, she loved the smell of fresh, spicy moimoi,
horror movies, filling her rubber boots with rain and her socks getting
soaked and her feet getting cold. But most of all, she loved her grandma. Her
grandma, in her opinion, was greater and better than any other woman to
ever walk this planet. Her grandma was so beautiful; she could enter a
pageant and win against all those professional models. Her grandma was
kinder than any princess in a fairy tale. And her grandma was braver and
better than any hero, fictional or not.

One day, sleep seemed too good to be true for a 15 year old Hassina.
Like honey being poured down her throat, slowly, sweet, but telling you that
something is wrong. Like air, she arose, her body feeling so light, it’s like she
was levitating. What’s the time? 3:00 AM, the clock answered.

And like rain, she descended into bed. But she could not sleep. Her
eyes remained open like shops before nine PM. Khepri picked up her phone
to put on some calming music, but as she opened her phone, she saw three
numbers. 8910. Curiously, she called the number. The voice came through
loud so she scrambled to reduce the volume.

“Hello, you have reached the Advanced Abilities Association. Tap 8 if you are
a joint wishing to return, tap 9 if you are a person wishing to become a joint.
Tap 10 if you are a Lord wishing to return.”

“What the fuck is this?” Hassina whispered. “Probably just some scam or
something.”

But she was compelled. Intrigued. Drawn to it. Attracted to this idea. What is
this? Setting her judgement aside, Hassina clicked 9.

And it seemed like in that moment sleep wanted her. Her eyelids closed and
her body relaxed like she hadn’t a care in the world.

Hassina woke up. But she was asleep. A dream. But she didn’t know that.
She walked around. Black smoke, white smoke, blue, pink, and gray. Stood
on pedestals. It was so silent. Nothing was heard. Hassina tried to talk but
her body just couldn’t form the words in her tongue. After a while of staring,
the smoke cleared and revealed fruits. Apples, Pomegranates, Bananas and
Oranges all in different colors. They hovered over the pedestals and before
she knew it she had eaten all of them. Then she remembered something.
Her grandmother said to never eat in a dream.