the standing mirror. My new spell components belt and all its pouches hung from my waist like a gun belt. A gun belt that held the dusts and feathers and shells I would need for spell casting, rather than six-shooters.
“Looks like we’re settling things the cowboy way,” I said to my reflection. But Mother Morevna said that all witches wore these for duels. Asa would have one as well.
I reached into my pouch and pulled out a bit of white dust.
“Ventus proiectum,” I whispered, and blew the dust from my fingertips as though I were blowing a kiss. A small, very powerful blast of air scattered the papers from my desk all around the room. I smiled. I’d pick them up later.
From books of Mother Morevna’s, I’d learned to use my flame spell as a projectile, like a flamethrower, to create a whirlwind powerful enough to send someone flying into the air, and, most importantly, to create a shield of dust that stopped or slowed nearly anything. I felt completely drained and usually threw up after practice every morning, but even I had to admit that what I’d learned was pretty impressive. Why then did it feel like rabbits were running around and around in my belly?
I heard a loud noise from the hallway, a thudding, then shouting. Miss Ibarra across the hall was at it again. It sounded like she was jumping in there, jumping and shouting.
“?Ella vendrá!” She shouted happily. “?Ella vendrá esta noche! ?Ella vendrá esta noche!”
I opened my door.
About this time, I heard footsteps and turned. This time it was Mother Morevna standing there in her long black nightgown, looking like the very Grim Reaper in the dark hallway.
“Get back in your room, Sallie,” she said. “You’ve got a big day ahead of you tomorrow.”
“Why is she in there?” I heard myself ask, emboldened maybe by Mother Morevna’s newfound approval of me.
“I am helping treat her visions,” Mother Morevna said. “Now get to your room. We will discuss this tomorrow after the duel. Do as I say!”
She took a key from her pocket and unlocked the door. The shouting grew louder when she opened it. Inside it was dark, but I saw the vague shape of a young woman silhouetted against the window.
Moments later, Miss Ibarra stopped shouting. She just went silent. I stood with my eye at my door, but I couldn’t see anything in the dark hallway. I pulled the door shut, listening to Mother Morevna’s footsteps down the hall and down the stairs again. When I heard her in her room above me, I opened my door again.
“Hey,” I whisper-shouted at the closed door across the hall. “Are you all right in there?”
No answer.
“My name… er… me llamo? Or estoy?… Soy Sal Wilkerson,” I tried again, trying to remember all the Spanish I could from grade school. “?Cómo estás?”
Again, silence. I stood in the hall for a few moments more, but the woman in the room across from mine did not stir. After a few moments, I went back into my room and shut the door behind me, trying as hard as I could to focus on tomorrow or magic or sleep. But when sleep finally came, it was fitful, and tinged with the faraway smell of rain.
Lloyd Jameson sat in his chair on his front porch, trying not to think of the duel tomorrow. He spat—plink—into his peach can and went over it again, searing the guards’ and decoy guards’ posts into his mind. This was not, after all, a simple event, and he felt heavy with the weight of Mother Morevna’s expectations. Tomorrow would be the day, he was sure of it. The day he had to put an end to those thieves, once and for all, no matter how he felt about it.
It had surprised him that Sal had thought of the plan. It was so unlike the timid, guilty-looking girl he’d been helping all these years. But if he thought about it, really thought about it, he had seen how much the girl had been mirroring Mother Morevna. He’d seen her begin to walk taller, affect some of the prim elegance Mother Morevna had when she moved, had seen her begin to grow cunning.
Jameson sighed and let himself think of his own family, his own daughter back in Texas. She’d be tall like him, maybe. Blond, like Sal. Would she remember his face? he wondered. He hadn’t forgotten hers.