Small Magics by Erik Buchanan Page A

soup and roast beef and fresh bread and berry tarts hot from the oven. His father would be appalled, Thomas was sure.
    He had shoved the events of the day firmly to the back of his mind and bought a round for the tavern, declaring his homecoming an occasion for celebration. He demanded to know what had happened in Elmvale over last four years and listened as everyone told stories and jokes. He had to force himself to enjoy it at first, but as the evening wore on, he found himself having fun. George and Eileen told stories on each other that had Thomas gasping for air, he was laughing so hard. The innkeeper had thanked them as they left, and told them to come back the next day for fiddling and dancing. Thomas, still laughing, bowed deeply and promised solemnly to return.
    Now Thomas was staring at the mill pond where he and George used to swim years before. In the dim light of the quarter moon, the mill and the woods were shades of grey and silver. The waterwheel was still; a black shadow against the night-darkened stone of the mill. The trees stood silent; no whisper from their leaves or stir from their branches as they reached thin fingers of twig and leaf out over the pond. The wood behind them was a mass of grey shadows, barely distinct and fading to black after only a few feet. On the edge of the pond, a single large stone, the perfect size and shape for jumping from, sat anchored, half in the wood, half in the water. There was no breeze to ripple the pond, and the smooth dark surface reflected the moon and stars back to the sky. Thomas stood at the edge of the water, feeling the pleasant warmth of the evening fading with his friends’ laughter. The creatures of the woods began making their night sounds again as the three friends fell silent, filling the gentle air with a sonorous buzz.
    “We should head home,” said Eileen, after a time.
    Thomas snorted. “Wish I could.”
    “You’ll go home tomorrow.”
    “Why not tonight?” Thomas demanded. The pain that had been simmering since dinner boiled over, “Why shouldn’t I be home tonight? I used to live there, didn’t I?”
    “You still do,” said George.
    “Then why can’t I go home?!”
    “Shhh!” Eileen said. “You’ll wake the entire village, you will.”
    “Or worse,” said George, “my father.”
    “We’re too far from the village to wake anyone.” Thomas lowered his voice as he said it, though. He squatted on his haunches and turned his eyes back to the water. George sat down on the ground to one side of the stone, Eileen on the other.
    “I used to sneak out here at night to swim.” Eileen said. “The pond looks so black when you’re above it, but once you’re underneath, the moonlight turns everything silver.”
    “What?” George leaned back and raised his eyebrows at his sister. “What would Mother say about that?”
    “About the same as she would have about you and Thomas, if she’d caught you.” Eileen said tartly. She looked back at the pond. “Sometimes I’d just sit out here and watch the moon dance on the pond when the wind blew.”
    Thomas took a deep breath, willing his anger and frustration down. It sank back, still lurking beneath the surface, but not so overwhelming. “Did you sneak out often?” he asked.
    Eileen shook her head, smiling. “I didn’t want to get caught. Besides, if you do something special too much, it isn’t special anymore.”
    Thomas nodded. Silence fell again, but not as heavily as before.
    Eileen was the first to break it. “What’s the city like?”
    Thomas thought about it. “Noisy,” he said. “The first thing you notice is the noise. There’s thousands of people moving around all the time, though not so much at night, and they all make noise. The people there don’t know each other well enough to care about each other, so everyone treats everyone else as a stranger.”
    “And you like it there?” asked George, sounding rather unimpressed.
    “Aye, I do.” He let his weight sink