The witch gathering

I quickly put on my witch outfit. I’m so excited!! This is my first Halloween as a trained witch!! My mom thinks that the costume is just that, a costume. Little does she know I’ve been practicing witchcraft. Tonight is a key moment in becoming a witch. The Halloween ritual where I get my spell book. 

“Mom! Hey mom, I’m ready!” I run out into the kitchen but mom isn’t there. “Mom?” I run into the living room and see mom lying down on the couch. “Mom, are you ok?” I ask and run up to her.

“Sorry, I’m just feeling a little sick.” She says and puts her hands on her stomach. “I might not be able to make it out tonight.” She says apologetically.

“Who's going to take me trick or treating then?”

She sighs. “You might have to skip this year. I don’t want you going out alone.” She puts her head back down on the pillow and stares at the ceiling.

I walk back to my room and flop on my bed. It sucks that mom is sick, it really does. But this ritual is the next step for me with being a witch! Once I go through it I can get my spell book and move on to the final stage of training! I can’t wait a whole year until next Halloween!

I sit up and look out my window. A strong wind blows the trees back and forth. A couple of leaves break off of their branches and dance along until they hit the ground. Then a person falls out of a tree.

I jump up and run outside immediately. “Are you ok?” I yell once I reach them. I flip them over and get a good look at their face. It’s a boy who looks like he’s a couple of years older than me. It’s a small town so I usually know everyone but I don’t recognize this person. His eyes start to flutter open and they sit up.

“Are you ok?” I repeat. “Hi, sorry about all of this but can you direct me towards the nearest witch group?” He asks.

I blink. “I’m not gonna tell you how to get anywhere until I make sure you’re ok! You just fell from a tree!”

He stands up. “Oh yeah, I did kind of do that. But still, I have to be there soon. I’m helping with the ritual.” He explains.

“Wait, you’re helping with the ritual?” I get an idea. “Can you take me?” I ask eagerly.

He looks a little confused. “You can only go if you’ve done the proper witch training,” He starts.

“I have! My mom is sick so she can’t take me but I‘m ready!” I say determined.

“Isn’t your mom gonna notice that you’ve moved up in training?” He asks.

“She doesn’t even know I’ve been training.” I reply. “She doesn’t want me to go out alone but she thinks I mean trick or treating.”

He considers it for a second then smiles. “All right.”

“All right?”

“Yeah! Why not?” He shrugs. “I’m Carlos by the way.” He offers his hand for me to shake.

“Emmie.” I reply.

“Do you have a broom? I lost mine along the way, you know, the tree.”

“Yeah I’ll go get it.” I say and run into the house. I make it to my room and grab my broom. Once I have all of my witch stuff I run out of my room. “Hey mom! I’m going out trick or treating with a few of my friends!” I lie.

“Which friends?” She asks from the couch. “Carrie, Madison and Athena.” I list off a few made up friends. It’s not that I don’t have any real friends to name, it’s just, yeah never mind. I don’t have any real friends I can name.

“Ok, have fun!” She says cheerfully. I wave and run out of the door. Carlos is standing in the same spot as where I left him.

“I’ve got a map.” I say and pull out a map that will lead us to the ritual site.

“Perfect! Lead the way.” I nod and start walking along the path.

“So where are you from? I’ve never seen you around here before.” I ask as we walk.

“I’m from out of town. They needed some extra help with this year's ritual, apparently there’s a lot of new candidates.” He answers.

“Are you sure? I’ve never seen any other witches around.” I say skeptically. I guess I could name a few people who kind of sit off to the side reading books, they might have been practicing witchcraft.

"I guess you just haven’t been looking like a witch.” He winks. “So are you a real witch? You have a spell book and everything?” He nods and puts his hand out. A spell book appears in his hands.

“OH MY GOSH THAT’S SO COOL.” I stop and stare at the book with awe.

It disappears when he clenches his hand. “You’ll be getting yours tonight!”

“Yep! My very own spell book.” I say dreamily. “I wonder what kind of witch I’m going to be. Is the book personalized based on your specialty or on your personality?”

“A little bit of both. What’s your specialty?”

“Plants. That’s what I’ve been working with the most. I’ve also been doing a bit of illusions but it’s mostly plants. How close are we?” I ask.

“You’re the one with the map.” He states. I check the map and see that we’re about a third there based on the landmarks I’ve seen.

“How good are you at witchcraft so far? It’s what, your 3rd year if you’re doing the ritual?” He asks.

“I’ll show you!” I raise my hands and show him one of the spells I know. A monster rises up out of the ground and stands in front of us. He walks forward calmly and puts his hand up to it. His hand passes through and he turns back to me.

“And you said this is one of the ones you don’t focus on that much?” He says impressed.

“Yep!” I say and the monster disappears. “I’m best at plants.” I say.

“Can I see?” I shrug.

“Sure.” I raise my hands again and a large tree pops up from the ground.

“That’s good! A lot of people can’t do multiple arts.” We walk for a bit more, me showing him a few other magic spells I know and him giving me tips.

Then we hear some footsteps behind us. “Should we hide or something?” I ask when I see his panicked expression.

“It’s Halloween, anything is possible.” He says and makes a bush for us to hide behind. A couple of people walk past.

“No, this is the right way I swear!” One girl says.

“Hey Karter, you better use an oracle spell just to be sure.” Another girl laughs.

“You know you can’t use witchcraft to see the future.” The boy who I’m assuming is named Karter replies.

“Yeah but just once? So we know that Mel isn’t leading us into a death trap.” The last boy laughs.

“I think they’re witches. Should we help them find the ritual spot?” He shrugs.

“They don’t seem like evil demons so sure.”

I walk out from behind the bush. “Hey! Are you guys going to the ritual spot?” I pause when I realize I recognize some of them. Karter is standing not looking shocked at all, the other boy and one of the girls are hiding behind him and the older girl  is looking at a map. “Aren’t you from my school?” I ask.

“Told you you weren’t looking hard enough.” Carlos smirks and comes out from behind the bush.

“Yeah, you’re Emma right?” The girl with the map asks.

“It’s Emmie, but you were close.” I correct her.

“I’m Melody. You can call me Mel. This is Karter.” She points to Karter. “Delilah and Silas over there are twins.” She points at the two people hiding behind Karter and they wave.

“This is Carlos. He fell out of a tree.” I say and point at Carlos.

“That’s a great way to introduce someone.” He rolls his eyes. “Are you going to the ritual?” Karter asks.

“Yep! Are you?”

“We’re gonna be witches!” Delilah jumps out from behind Karter and Silas jumps out from the other side.

“Mel has a map but we don’t trust her.” Silas says.

“And Karter won’t use magic to make sure we’re on the right path.” Delilah accuses.

“Magic is a gift, we shouldn’t depend on it for everything or become completely reliant on it.” Karter rolls his eyes.

“Karter’s the smart one in the group.” Mel explains.

“And yet you never listen to me.” He sighs.

“We listen to you!” Silas protests.

“Name one time.” Karter fires back.

“That one time when you told me I could have a second cookie and it wouldn’t be disgusting.” Silas says proudly.

“Yes, the one time you listened to me was about food.”

“Well I’m obviously the leader of this group so my vote is worth more than anyone else’s. I say we follow the map.” Mel cuts their argument off.

“I’ve got another map, maybe we can compare them?” I offer my map to her. She looks at them.

“Yep. They’re the same, We’re on the right path.” She starts walking again and the rest of us follow her.

“What do you specialize in?” Delilah asks.

“I do plants and a bit of illusions.”

“I’m a fire and water person.” She says.

“I’m illusions!” Silas cartwheels by.

“Is he always like this?” I ask.

“He’s the sillier of the two of us.” She smiles. “I’m still pretty crazy but he’s over the top crazy.”

Silas is currently hopping around and bugging Karter.

“I can tell. I don’t know much about Karter but he seems like the person you don’t want to bug.” I laugh.

“Karter specializes in oracle stuff, you know, future vision, reading minds, all of that stuff. You’d think that with all of that knowledge at his disposal he would realize that Silas is flirting with him 24/7. He’s oblivious.” Delilah rolls her eyes and smiles. “Although to be fair I’m not sure Silas knows that he likes him but it’s obvious to me and Mel.”

“How long have you guys been friends? I’ve never seen you together at school.”

“That’s because Karter is always reading on his own and Mel has some bad parents. They make her hang out with all of the popular kids, the kids who are mean to the rest of us. We don’t mind, she makes sure we know that she doesn’t mean anything she says when she’s with them.”

“That sounds kind of rough.”

She shrugs. “Words can’t hurt us. Especially when they aren’t true.”

“Still. That sucks to have your friend make fun of you.”

“Hey can you show me some of your illusion tricks?” She says, changing the topic.

“Sure.” I say and raise my hands. Another monster appears and Delilah gasps.

“That's really good! How do you do that?”

“Hey Delilah?” I say looking at the smaller demon I made.

“Yeah?”

“That’s not me.”

“What? Silas! Is that you?” She yells up to Silas.

The monster roars and it’s breath blows us back and we fall to the ground.

“That’s not an illusion.” I state.

Carlos is the first person to find his footing again. “Everybody get up and prepare for a fight.”

I make a couple of vine whips. I see Delilah make a couple of fire orbs and water orbs in her hands. Karter takes a step back and makes a cloudy sphere appear in his hands. Silas makes a bunch of decoys for distractions. Mel makes a ukulele appear. I wonder what she’s doing with that. Carlos pulls out his spell book and flips through it. The monster paws at the ground and charges towards us.

“Delilah! Emmie!” Karter calls out. I look over at him confused but Delilah grabs my arm and dives to the right.

“Karter’s gonna warns us who the monster is going to attack.” She explains.

“Ok.” I nod.

“Silas! Can you distract it while Emmie catches it with vines?” Carlos calls out and Silas gives him a thumbs up.

“Hey! I’m the leader here!” Mel complains.

“We have to work together.” Carlos states.

“Fine.” She glares at him. “Go ahead Silas.” She rolls her eyes. He moves his hands and his group of decoys starts to run in the opposite direction.

I make a few more vines and they start to creep towards the monster's feet. I wrap them around and it whips it's head towards me. Delilah makes a giant gust of wind that blows us out of it’s sight.

“Thanks.” I say and she smiles at me. The monster moves its feet again and the vines snap.

“We need a new plan.” Mel yells.

“Silas! The right!” Karter yells and the monster’s tail swings towards Silas. He moves out of the way before he can get hurt.

“I’m open to suggestions for plans.” I yell. “As long as we do something soon.”

“Mel, you go over and get ready to unleash a sonic blast.” Carlos orders. She nods and goes over to where he was pointing. I guess that’s what the ukulele was for.

“Silas, I’m going to need you to make a monster that looks exactly the same.”

“Got it!” He raises his hands in preparation.

“Delilah, can you control earth?” Carlos asks.

“No but I can use the other elements.”

Carlos nods. “I need you to make a giant hole in right here.” He points over to a clearing. She puts out her hands and streams of water come and lift a giant chunk of earth away.

“When the time comes I need you to make a wood gate over top of that.” He says to me.

“Ok.” I give him a thumbs up.

“Silas! Go!” Carlos calls out and Silas makes the illusion monster. The real one pauses and stares at it confused. It starts to slowly walk towards the illusion. Once it’s close to the hole, the illusion is hovering over so the real monster can’t see it, Carlos yells to Mel,

“Mel!” She strums her uke and a giant wave of sound comes out. Wow. The monster gets hit right in the face with these sound waves and falls right in the hole.

I make a bunch of horizontal trees that make a gate right over top of the hole. Carlos looks over to Karter who gives him a nod.

“WE DID IT.” Silas starts cartwheeling again and he goes around with high fives for everyone. We all cheer and give each other hugs except for Mel, who’s standing on the side looking confused.

I walk over to her. “Are you ok?”

She quickly puts her finger to her lips and motions for quiet. “I hear footsteps.” She whispers.

“The ones who sent the monster?”

She opens her mouth to say something but a group of people walks into the clearing before we have time to react.

“Guys look out!” I yell and we all group together with our magic ready.

“Don’t worry, we're not here to hurt you.” One comes out with her hands up.

“Mom?” I ask confused.

“You did great!” She smiles.

“I’m so confused right now.” I shake my head.

“Is this an illusion?” Mel asks.

“It doesn’t look like one.” Silas shrugs.

“We aren’t an illusion either. The only illusions were Silas’s and the monster you were fighting.” Another person says.

“Did you guys make it?” Mel asks angrily. “Because that’s kind of rude of you.”

“That was the test.” Carlos says.

“What test?” Delilah asks.

“You have to pass a test before you can participate in the ritual. Did none of you read the letter?” Karter puts his head in his hands.

“Um, I read the part that said come to the ritual.” Silas says and Delilah laughs.

“You proved that you can work as a team and combine the different times of magic to achieve your goal.” Mom says.

“Hey, were you a witch this whole time?” I ask.

She winks at me.

“You weren’t really sick at all!” I accuse.

“At least now we know how dedicated you are to learning how to be a witch.” She smiles. “Now are you all ready to take the next step and get your spell book?”

“YES.” Silas jumps up and down.

“Count me in!” Delilah pumps her fist in the air.

“I can’t wait to read the whole thing!” Karter says excitedly.

“This is the best moment of my life!!!” I cheer.

“Come on guys.” Mel smiles and leads our group over to follow the rest of the witches.

I have friends. I have friends and I’m about to get my spell book. This really is the best moment of my life.