frustrated.
“Do you know what my mother meant by my destiny being great? And what do I need to learn about myself?”
Squire scrawled out the words: “ You are a witch.”
“What? No way!”
He wrote more. “ Your mother was a witch. Your grandmother is a wi—”
Before he could finish writing, a cold gust of wind blew through the trees, tearing the binder from my hands. It slammed into the ground, opening the three rings. Another blast of wind rattled the branches overhead and scattered my study notes across the grass and into the trees.
“My papers, no!” I screamed when I saw all my hard work being lost. “Freeze!”
And the papers did exactly that. They froze, some in midair, others standing on end in the grass. The wind died down as if it had never been.
“What the…?” My heart was pounding in my chest. What had happened? Had I done it again? All I’d done was yell “Freeze!” If that was magic, shouldn’t I have felt something, like a zap? And didn’t witches need spells to cast magic? Screaming “Freeze!” hardly seemed like spellcasting.
But that is just what had happened at the beach too, when Jean-Sébastien had almost ruined my cake. Only that time, I had frozen everything and everyone around me. This time, only the papers were frozen. The leaves still shook in the trees above me. Squire still bobbed around too.
Maybe I was already getting better at this magic thing without knowing it?
Squire was rushing around collecting the papers, so I turned my attention to helping him. I grabbed one of the pages that hung suspended in the air, expecting it to be rigid. But when it touched my fingers, it fluttered easily into my hand.
We gathered all the papers and reordered them in my binder. When we came to the page with Squire’s writing, he jabbed at the second-to-last line.
“You are a witch.”
“That’s ridiculous. There has to be some other explanation.”
I thought about Jean-Sébastien and his snake that had turned into a scarf. I thought about the wet and muddy cuffs on my pajamas. I sat on the grass with my knees drawn up to my chest.
I couldn’t really be a witch – could I?
Squire seemed to recognize that I needed a bit of time to think. He busied himself with collecting pinecones into a big pile.
The dream stone was warm against my chest. I held it up and scoped the moon through the hole in the stone. It was only last year that I realized that not everyone saw the moon all the time.
I had made a fool of myself in science class. The teacher had explained about the orbits of the moon and the sun and why we could only see the moon at certain times of the day and month.
“But I can see the moon every day!” I piped up. “Look, there it is, right now.” I pointed out the window.
Some of the other kids snickered. My science teacher frowned.
“Good joke, Anna,” Jean-Sébastien said as if he wished he’d thought it up himself.
I shrank back in my chair, wondering what was going on.
Now I was a whole year older and smarter, smart enough to keep my mouth shut about the odd things I see, like the moon, and my dreams about running with bears. Uncle Misha had told me that there is more to this world than what we see with our eyes or hear with our ears.
“Sometimes, we see and hear with our hearts,” he’d said. And I believed him. So while the whole science of the moon and the solar system made sense to my head, I let my heart see the moon and kept it my secret.
Maybe I really was a witch.
Squire was perched on top of his pile of pinecones. I stood and walked toward the river. Like a faithful dog, he followed me, toppling his tower of cones. He still held one in his grasp. He tossed it up and caught it again and again. I wondered if he was nervous.
I certainly was.
At the edge of La Fourche River, I raised my hands and yelled, “Freeze!”
I wasn’t sure what to expect. Maybe the water would stop like ice. Of course, that would have been impossible. There
“Do you know what my mother meant by my destiny being great? And what do I need to learn about myself?”
Squire scrawled out the words: “ You are a witch.”
“What? No way!”
He wrote more. “ Your mother was a witch. Your grandmother is a wi—”
Before he could finish writing, a cold gust of wind blew through the trees, tearing the binder from my hands. It slammed into the ground, opening the three rings. Another blast of wind rattled the branches overhead and scattered my study notes across the grass and into the trees.
“My papers, no!” I screamed when I saw all my hard work being lost. “Freeze!”
And the papers did exactly that. They froze, some in midair, others standing on end in the grass. The wind died down as if it had never been.
“What the…?” My heart was pounding in my chest. What had happened? Had I done it again? All I’d done was yell “Freeze!” If that was magic, shouldn’t I have felt something, like a zap? And didn’t witches need spells to cast magic? Screaming “Freeze!” hardly seemed like spellcasting.
But that is just what had happened at the beach too, when Jean-Sébastien had almost ruined my cake. Only that time, I had frozen everything and everyone around me. This time, only the papers were frozen. The leaves still shook in the trees above me. Squire still bobbed around too.
Maybe I was already getting better at this magic thing without knowing it?
Squire was rushing around collecting the papers, so I turned my attention to helping him. I grabbed one of the pages that hung suspended in the air, expecting it to be rigid. But when it touched my fingers, it fluttered easily into my hand.
We gathered all the papers and reordered them in my binder. When we came to the page with Squire’s writing, he jabbed at the second-to-last line.
“You are a witch.”
“That’s ridiculous. There has to be some other explanation.”
I thought about Jean-Sébastien and his snake that had turned into a scarf. I thought about the wet and muddy cuffs on my pajamas. I sat on the grass with my knees drawn up to my chest.
I couldn’t really be a witch – could I?
Squire seemed to recognize that I needed a bit of time to think. He busied himself with collecting pinecones into a big pile.
The dream stone was warm against my chest. I held it up and scoped the moon through the hole in the stone. It was only last year that I realized that not everyone saw the moon all the time.
I had made a fool of myself in science class. The teacher had explained about the orbits of the moon and the sun and why we could only see the moon at certain times of the day and month.
“But I can see the moon every day!” I piped up. “Look, there it is, right now.” I pointed out the window.
Some of the other kids snickered. My science teacher frowned.
“Good joke, Anna,” Jean-Sébastien said as if he wished he’d thought it up himself.
I shrank back in my chair, wondering what was going on.
Now I was a whole year older and smarter, smart enough to keep my mouth shut about the odd things I see, like the moon, and my dreams about running with bears. Uncle Misha had told me that there is more to this world than what we see with our eyes or hear with our ears.
“Sometimes, we see and hear with our hearts,” he’d said. And I believed him. So while the whole science of the moon and the solar system made sense to my head, I let my heart see the moon and kept it my secret.
Maybe I really was a witch.
Squire was perched on top of his pile of pinecones. I stood and walked toward the river. Like a faithful dog, he followed me, toppling his tower of cones. He still held one in his grasp. He tossed it up and caught it again and again. I wondered if he was nervous.
I certainly was.
At the edge of La Fourche River, I raised my hands and yelled, “Freeze!”
I wasn’t sure what to expect. Maybe the water would stop like ice. Of course, that would have been impossible. There
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