Chapter 5 Impractical Magic
Impractical Magic
Sage threw out an arm, trying to silence the shout of her alarm clock.
She squinted through sleep-stuck eyes to see the shadows of her bedroom, starting her day, as usual, before the birds began theirs.
She couldn’t exactly call herself a natural morning person, but it was worth it for that precious hour of solitude at her desk, with nothing but the sunrise and the first stirrings of the world to disturb her.
She felt around for the button, half expecting to hear the glass of water topple into the tower of books on her bedside table.
But her hand kept hitting against…nothing? Her eyes flew open.
“Oh, for the love of…Not again,” she half grumbled, half roared, an arm flying over her eyes. “Rotten, confounded stuff!”
Sage had awoken five feet above her bed, levitating in mid-air.
The edges of her duvet trailed over her body and still weren’t even touching the fitted sheet.
Mal watched from the armchair next to the wardrobe with an amused look that made his whiskers twitch.
Sage bicycle-kicked the blankets furiously off her body and did her best to push back down against the cushiony air below, but nothing budged.
She threw her head against the pillow, also hovering neatly below her, and huffed.
It was the third time this week that she had levitated in her sleep.
And, okay, perhaps nothing too dangerous had occurred as a result, and it did seem to be her magic merely having a laugh at her expense, but she was waiting for the morning that it dropped her suddenly and broke a bone, or she at least developed a nosebleed from the altitude.
It wasn’t until she properly woke up, shedding the last few stubborn cobwebs of her dreams, that she could feel herself start to drift back down.
After a few minutes of muttering to herself about inconvenient, petulant incantation, tapping her fingers while thinking of everything else that she could be doing instead, the ceiling finally began to fall away and her back grazed the mattress again at last.
Once out of bed, she threw open the curtains and squinted at the bright trace of gold that frilled the edges of the lilac dawn clouds.
The trees of Port Sylvan had turned a marmalade orange recently, and shadows as dark as ripe blackberries were inked across the lawns, where traces of night still clung.
“Another glorious morning,” she grumbled and yanked the curtains closed again.
Thoroughly unimpressed with the day thus far, Sage bundled up her blankets and lobbed them in an angry ball at the headboard before shuffling her way to the shower.
She reached out to turn it on, but she startled through a lazy yawn.
The sound wasn’t right. A jolt of magic snapped around the shower head and a steady flow of purple berry-scented bubbles was raining down where the water should have been.
“You have got to be…” Sage mumbled to herself. With no choice, she slid inside and stood cross-armed and scowling under the lavender froth. Utterly ridiculous. She did not have time for this nonsense.
At the bathroom mirror, she managed to gather her uncontrollable hair into some kind of slightly less uncontrollable half-up braid.
But a few rogue tendrils began to quiver, a couple of them bending into sharp angles that resembled angry lightning bolts.
They had a tendency to curl themselves into shapes that reflected her mood and she flattened them angrily.
Another crackle of crimson magic and a selection of spotted red toadstools sprouted from nowhere between the braid.
These were soon followed by a smattering of white baby’s breath flowers and a handful of dark red berries.
Sage grimaced as she swiftly removed them. Far too whimsical.
Her toothbrush tapped itself impatiently against her shoulder.
“Yes, yes, I’m getting to you. Give me a bloody moment,” she told it crossly, snatching it and shoving it under the tap. She had never brushed her teeth so furiously.
Her grip tightened on the edge of the sink when the reflection looking back at her suddenly rippled like water.
Between blinks, toothbrush hanging out of her mouth, her face in the mirror transformed for a flash, the reflection turning dark and stormy, if only for a fraction of a second.
But before she could rub her sleepy eyes to confirm the vision, any sign of a ripple had smoothed to glass again.
Waking up in mid-air apparently did strange things to your mind.
“Well,” Sage warned, loudly and sternly, “if that’s how you’re going to play it today, then let the games begin.
You meet me in an absolutely foul mood, no thanks to you and your twisted sense of humour.
I will make sure that you don’t see so much as a coffee-reheating spell for the rest of the week. And let that be a lesson to you.”
It wasn’t often that Sage acknowledged her magic so directly, and whenever she did, it was usually to chastise it back to where it was supposed to go.
Into the dark, silent and still, where it belonged.
When she pictured the thought, it felt as though she were telling a younger version of herself to be quiet, to sit quietly in the corner and to behave.
Which, in turn, made her feel a terrible combination of guilt and sadness and only made the magic kick up even more of a fuss in return.
But it was how it had to be. She knew no other way.
She chucked her toothbrush back into its pot and huffed.
There was a knock at the bathroom door.
“Sage? Pray tell, are you quite all right in there?” Maggie called from outside.
It was enough for Sage to catch herself and wonder whether she had in fact crossed the bridge over to insanity as she looked back into the mirror.
Moving reflections, visions of her younger self, bubble showers—all of it was harebrained.
“Fine, Maggie,” she sighed.
It had to be said that, as a strict introvert, living in a cottage constantly inhabited by a literally housebound ghost was not always appreciated.
Often, Sage found herself longing to be alone—really alone—in her own home.
They had long ago established boundaries as a priority, and most of the time, Maggie was very considerate of Sage’s privacy, and Sage of hers.
But Maggie’s endlessly caring nature and her perpetual loneliness also meant that she could be something of a busybody. Such was roommate life.
“I’m glad of it. Only, I thought I heard you talking to someone. Pardon me, madam.”
Sage slipped on her dressing gown and opened the door to find Maggie leaning her ear against the wood as she held a tea tray stacked high with glistening buttered crumpets, a cup of tea the perfect shade of fawn brown and a generous bowl full of autumn fruit that gleamed like rubies and garnets.
Sage reached for a crumpet and took a bite.
Immediately, the melted butter soothed her sharpest edges.
“Not someone, Maggs. Something. I was just telling my magic that it needs to wind its neck in today. Otherwise, we’re going to have a problem,” she said sternly.
Maggie’s brows shot up. “Causing you grief through the night again? You should have woken me.”
“There’s nothing for you to worry about,” Sage said, flapping the mere idea away. “Leave it with me; I have it under control.”
The answer was a reflex, given whenever she showed the slightest crack that a rare someone was astute enough to notice.
But as she whirled like a tempest back to her room, a thick twist of dark burgundy roses and emerald vines appearing from nowhere to weave their way around the banister as she passed, Sage wasn’t so sure she believed it herself.
Her magic was answering something. Or calling out. Whether it could be blamed on the October air or whether it was something more, one thing was indisputable: It was desperate to escape.
Twenty minutes later, steam billowed from the brass spout behind the counter at the Hedgehog House.
The coffee machine whistled loudly, whipping up warm milk to pour over treacly espresso.
Sage, through bleary eyes and a mop of hair that was already fighting back against her attempts to control it, swore she’d never seen such a beautiful sight as the café owner, Bridgey Potts, secured the lid and handed over the cup with a knowing smile.
“Hazelnut, of course. It’s on me—for bringing the outsiders past the stall yesterday and making me a few sales. Always appreciate it, Flower.”
Sage mumbled something that she hoped conveyed thanks to the Hedgehog House barista.
It would be at least three hot sips until words started to form properly.
Bridgey’s accent was so thick that even the other locals struggled to understand her sometimes, but Sage had just about mastered it, thanks to daily (often multiple) stops for caffeine.
“Late night, was it, ey love?”
“Something like that. Our new exhibition is finally opening this week, so there’s a lot to finalize. Before I knew it, the night had run away with me while I was reading.”
“Not like you,” Bridgey replied with mock surprise, then chuckled, her ruddy round face shining.
Motherly and gentle, but with an absolutely filthy laugh, she had been the town’s official supplier of cups of tea and coffee for as long as Sage could remember.
Her wispy cropped curls were somehow reminiscent of an actual hedgehog, and she always wore a knitted shawl around her shoulders.
“Can’t wait to see it all come together.
Got my ticket, haven’t I? I’d offer you a croissant to perk you up, but Cas came in ten minutes ago and took the lot. ”
Sage’s face dropped. “Of course he did.”