Fatou spots Holly and approaches in the dark. She seems busy, and hurt. The giant book under her arm was suspicious. There but for the grace of Kipp go I. As Holly approaches the door to the barn, Fatou clears her throat.
She's still carrying her flute case. Even in the dark, Fatou's neon mint and hot pink windbreaker suit stands out. She inclines her chin toward the barn. "Horseshoe?"
Holly jumped as Fatou speaks, her flashlight going over to her. she felt silly when she did. no one else had an accent like Fatou's
How the f&+~ did she know. Holly thought Not any of your business She said, trying to manuever the book so it was less obvious.
"It is not important... I spoke to Marty. He says the circus is in eastern Europe fighting Baba Yaga." That sounds like I'm crazy, right? Is that just this morning jumbled up into another symptom of paranoia? Steve said he saw it.
Just shut up about the circus, g@@+~$n it! Holly shout-whispers at Fatou they're gone! we're still here, but they're gone. I don't know why you want them to be back, but I just want to move forward Holly said, unsure how truthful she was being.
Fatou keeps her distance. "You have a totally different idea of what moving on means. Good luck. My own experiences with... equestrianism... have not ended happily. If... if you ever need help, Holly. If things get gnarly... Nothing would stop me from helping if you ask. I'm sorry I have lead you to believe otherwise."
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What the f*+@... equestrianism...
Like I would need Your help. Go back to getting high and pregnant, or whatever it is you do now. Holly says, angry? tears in her eyes.
Fatou takes a half step back. "Zut alors, I have gotten too good at lying." She doesn't seem to realize she said that out loud. Her hand goes to her empty cigarette pack. She doesn't even remember smoking. "Okay... I'm sorry." Fatou turns to leave.
The party has broken up and your friends wait for you, holding tokens for their own spells. They look to Holly to begin.
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Holly has Raven start a flame, and divides the nessesary reagents so each of them have enough for their respective curses. she writes down the incantations for each role out on notebook paper.
she takes the caster's place, in front of the fire, for the first ritual, the one on Maggie. Spirits of Fortune, hear my plea, abandon she who has wronged me. As the shattered mirrorglass, let her fortune become morass. From here to when I I send thee away, let her rue this unhallowed day. and with that, she sends the "burning" reagents into the flame, and takes the bundle containing the hair, and washes it in the smoke.
Your friends make similar curses, wishing ill fortune or sickness on those who harmed them.
That night, you have a strange dream. Red eyes watching you in the darkness. You can’t move from your bed. Then blinding pain and a feeling of cold washes over your body.
You wake from your nightmare drenched in sweat, but no other signs anything is wrong.
The next morning, though, you feel quite ill and can’t stomach your breakfast. Still, you’re hoping to see Max at school so you don’t tell your parents that you vomited your cereal almost immediately and rush out the door. It’s a gloomy, rainy day and by the time you reach school you feel itchy and awful, barely concealed under your cheerful demeanor.
Holly and Maggie, you’re the first ones to class. The desks are pushed together to form groups of four.
Maggie, if you’re trying to cover up how bad you feel, that’s grit vs. Holly’s brains roll.
Otherwise, what do you do?
Pale and sore in her throat, Maggie slumps over her desk. "God, I feel bad. I must have caught some bug yesterday. You feeling alright, Hols?"
She pops a balsamic candy in her mouth, hoping to restore a sembalnce of normality to her voice at least.
Almost the moment the sweet syrup from the dissolving hard candy hits your stomach you feel your stomach flips. Are you having an allergic reaction to something? The same thing happened with your froot loops. Could it be...sugar that's making you sick?
I'm fine holly says curtly, glowering at Maggie. Let see her Charm tall, pale and Goth-y with this curse on her... she would lift it after she got him.
Steve was too anxious to go to bed, and his mother was out on a trip, again. He fell asleep watching TV, and woke up, about an hour late, from the TV that was still on. He wolfs down his breakfast, scribbles down what he can recall from his conversation with Marty as "notes," and runs out the door, hoping to get to second period on time.
Fatou draggs in. Between a late night arguing with ma, and marching band practice, she didn't get much sleep at all.
Maggie goes even paler and sweaty, hurrying to the bathroom to puke acrid bile. I can't even keep sugar down? What the hell did I catch?
After washing her face, she goes to Holly for a moment before darting out, holding her stomach and grimacing. "Could you please tell the teacher I'm going to the nurse? I'm royally beat up. Thanks, sweetie."
Yeah. Holly says grudgingly
Either of you guys get research done yet? Holly asks, putting her notebook with the library notes out. A few pages of notes on Koshchei.
Yeah, brains is good.
You head over to the school nurse, a sour woman with a hideous mole. You look awful dearie. What’s wrong?
Fatou watches Maggie run out, then gives Holly an inquisitive look which flicks to apologetic, then she looks away and down. She seems... numb.
When Holly asks for notes, she pulls a tattered folder marked 'Baba Yaga' from her bag and drops it on the desk. Then she looks at it, rolls her eyes and exchanges it for another folder marked 'Koschei'. "Old notes... Totally not academic, but there's a bibliography in the back."
Steve is still a little uncomfortable, but tries his best to push it from his mind for now. He's still panting from having run all the way to school.
"Yeah, here's what I've got," Steve says, and takes a crumpled piece of paper out of his pocket. He reads aloud from the rushed notes he took from his recollection of the conversation:
"Russia. Warlocks summon Baba Yaga. Use spells. Solomonars are group of wizards. Aren't in Russia right now."
"It's not much, but it's a start, right?" he asks hopefully.
Holly picks up the sheet Steve puts down, and puts it back down a moment later well... some of that was vaguely connected to Slavic folklore. Except that you used the present tense, and are referring to fictional thongs as if they exist. said the girl who had cursed her friend yesterday fortunately, it looks like Fatou already basically wrote the report for us. she said, getting out a new sheet of paper and opening the bonder.
Holly is far to preoccupied with finding max later, and seeding Maggie earlier, to notice anything weird from her tablemates. uhh, can you believe Maggie? The one cute goth boy in town, and she tries to make a move on him before I can.
Fatou rests her head on her hand. "Who? I didn't know any local guys were into that."
"'iunno" groans Maggie. "I've got nausea and can't keep anything down, I even threw up a single candy."
The new kid, just moved in. Max. Holly said Hope he's in a few of my classes
The nurse clicks her tongue. That's no good at all. Something you ate, maybe? You're looking terribly pale.
"I didn't eat anything weird, though, and my parents were alright. Maybe I caught some kind of bug yesterday evening? I went for a stroll."
She nods. Could be. Well...you're not throwing up now, and it's probably not contagious. Go ahead back to class.
"Well, they exist, in Russia right now. I mean..." He tries to make eye contact to appeal to Fatou to bolster his position. He suddenly begins to wonder nervously if Fatou might have intended to keep the meeting with Marty a secret.
"Oh," says Fatou, "are you trying to get him to ask you to the dance?" She looks over at Steve. "Reality is relative..."
Holly flips her notebook to a blank page,a nd writes Ix-nay the agic-may alk-tay, and slides it over to steve for a moment.
Yeah, before Maggie swooped in, all charm and smiles. I don't even care about the dance that much, but he seems cool. Holly pouts
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Right after she is mentioned, Maggie enters the classroom, definitely not all charm and smiles. Pale and sickly, she falls on her chair and slumps over the desk, moaning iambic pentameters. "O, I die, Horatio. / The potent poison quite o'ercrows my spirit. / Something, something, he has my dying voice. / So tell him, with th' occurrents, more and less, / Which have solicited. The rest is silence."
Having arrived a little late, Steve didn't know Maggie was at the nurse; and though he knew he didn't understand what she was saying, he didn't notice her bad condition. "So do you have any research, Maggie?" he asks obliviously.
Maggie raises her head, an inch, eyes drooping. "I've got what was discussed the other day / by Holly and me, through old and dusty tomes / the tale of one who Death never could touch / the wizard of the Rus, Koschei by name. / It is folklore, although it's but a tale / whether it will suffice, I do not know."
Holly continues trying to separate the useful from the crazy in Fatou's notebook, but she pauses momentarily. what about you, Steve? Did you find a picture book to research from?
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"Hey, lay off." Fatou manages to express mild annoyance at Holly through the morning fog. "You don't see me asking if anyone made you breakfast this morning, or meddling in your extracurriculars." She nods at Maggie. "We play the hand we're dealt, even when it's the Tower."
Then, as if she weren't in the middle of instigating a fight, she leans in and points at a place in her notes. "This part about Mr. Polanski has since been proven false... Not that we would use it. Not unless you'd like to meet Dr. Weiss..." Fatou proceeded to re-apply some licorice lip gloss.
Steve snorts. "I sorta did an interview. I showed you my notes from it. I will use my preliminarly research to find out more," he answers, trying to call to mind the steps on the handout the teacher had given for conducting research.
Holly scowls I guess that almost counts She utters, before turning back to Fatou and I've been ignoring the stuff about real people. I thought it might look bad if they appeared in our report about a fictional character. thought you had learned that lesson by now.
Fatou deflates with a sigh. "That's why I said to mostly use the bibliography." Licking her lips, she looks off across the room at the window.
Steve gives yet another snort when Holly calls someone a "fictional character," but he doesn't speak. He didn't know who they were talking about—maybe he hadn't gotten to that yet in his research?—but he was still pretty confident that Holly was wrong.
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"There's something in your words that I don't get / But I'm quite too beat up to mind right now. / I'll have a look at the bibliography / And then we'll write some pages on Koschei. / I've found that old folk tale I told last day / I think it's worth a mention in our work."
You know, it's kinda sad. All he wanted was someone to talk to, and it got him killed. holly says, quietly I wonder how many "bad guys" were like that, when you heard their side.