The Mystwick School of Musicraft Page 9

  The perfect Mystwick musician.

  It helps that we all wear the same uniforms: navy blue skirts or pants, white knee-high socks, the blue cardigan with the Myst­wick crest on the front. Though my uniform doesn’t quite fit right. They must have guessed at my measurements, or maybe they were meant for the other Amelia. The clothes are all too big, so I have to roll up the sleeves of the cardigan. And the shiny black shoes they found for me were too small, so I’m still wearing my old scruffy hiking boots, since standing to play flute for hours each day requires comfy footwear, and I’m not sure who I’m supposed to ask for new shoes.

  To escape the chaos after our orientation classes end, I go to the library. It’s a three-story building completely made of glass, so it reflects the forest and mountains on every side, blending into the landscape. The moment I set foot through the doors, my whole body relaxes.

  I can tell at once that this library is going to be my favorite place at Mystwick.

  On the first floor is regular books, and there are tons of them. I walk up and down the aisles, taking out everything I can find that might help me pass Mrs. Le Roux’s test, and a few just for fun. My favorites are stories about Musicraft, of course: adventures about spells gone wrong, biographies of famous Maestros, histories of musical incidents that changed the world—like when the Allied Military Symphony defeated the Axis Powers in World War II, or when Leif Erikson, the Viking, found North America by playing a spell he learned from a raven, or how the ancient Japanese used elemental magic to raise typhoons that repelled the invading Mongolians.

  When my arms are so full of books I can hardly see over them, I pause and look around. “Where are the spells?”

  Hearing a laugh behind me, I turn to see Miss March pushing a cart of books. So she’s the dean of students and the librarian, it seems.

  “Go upstairs,” she says. “You’ll see.”

  I leave my stack of books on a table, where I’ll pick them up on the way down. Then I race up the stairs.

  And find myself in paradise.

  Spells upon spells upon spells.

  The entire second floor is devoted to them.

  For a whole minute I just stand and gape like a stunned frog. Rows of shelves hold books of spells, spells on loose paper, spells rolled into little scrolls and tied with string, spells of every color and type, some modern, some hundreds of years old. Classical and jazz and rock and folk and genres I’ve never heard of. Spells for full orchestras and solo spells for instruments of every imaginable type. I’ve never seen so many in one place.

  I had no idea so many existed.

  When I can finally move my feet, I roam around, touching them like they’re made of the most fragile glass. I could spend a lifetime on just one shelf. There must be a spell in here for everything. And they’re just waiting for a musician to come along and bring them to life.

  Maybe if I fail out of Mystwick, they’ll let me stay as a janitor or something, and pay me in library loans. I’d do anything just to never leave this building again.

  “Amelia Bethany Jones!” says a voice. “You know, I guessed you were a library kind of person.”

  I turn and see Jai walking over, his violin case slung on his back by its long strap. “It’s not Bethany. And what’s wrong with libraries? You’re here.”

  “Yeah, but not for books.”

  “There are thousands of spells here!”

  He sighs and looks around. “And I just know they’re going to make us learn them all.”

  “Don’t you want to?” I take a deep breath and suck in that wonderful papery smell. “I’m never leaving. Never ever ever ever. You’ll have to drag me out of here with a forklift.”

  He groans. “I’m going up to the third floor. Are you coming?”

  “Are there more spell books on the third floor?”

  “Better,” he says. “There’s a computer lab. And internet.”

  * * *

  This is the first I’ve been able to contact Gran. Before I left, I made her an email account just for this purpose. I write her a quick message, telling her I’m fine, and how beautiful it is here, and about the echo trees.

  I don’t tell her about the other Amelia or the mixed-up acceptance letter or my deal with Mrs. Le Roux . . . or that my staying here is all due to some mysterious voice. No one else has mentioned hearing the echo trees talk to them, so I’m not sure it’d be a good idea to bring it up again, especially not to Gran. I’m pretty sure I just imagined the whole thing anyway. As I see it, there isn’t anything she can do to help me, and if she thinks I’m in trouble, she might even make me come home.

  What harm can come from waiting until after my two-month test before coming clean?

  After sending the email, I glance at Jai’s computer to see he’s engrossed in music videos of rock concerts, with musicians playing so hard their drumsticks break and their guitar strings snap. Rock spells usually produce illusion magic, so the air around them sparks with glittering shapes: dragons and horses and ocean waves, entire stories told through Musicraft, better than any movie. Jai watches like he’s entranced.

  “You taking a rock class?” I ask.

  “Huh?” He looks up like I startled him, then shakes his head and quickly closes the window. “Yeah, right. My dad would only die of embarrassment if he caught me in a rock class.”

  Sighing, he opens a zombie game instead and leans low over the keyboard, his tongue sticking out as he chops heads and limbs with a pixelated machete.

  Shaking my head, I open the internet and go to a website where people share Musicraft videos. Then I hesitate, my stomach squeezing.

  For a minute, I think maybe I’m not brave enough.

  But then I type quickly, before I can change my mind, and hit Search.

  She comes up right away: tall for her age, long dark hair, and absolutely perfect posture.

  The other Amelia Jones.

  There are tons of videos of her playing piano, and they all have thousands of views. Amelia Jones playing in Vienna, Amelia Jones playing for the president of the United States, Amelia Jones winning a TV Musicraft competition.

  She wasn’t just good. She was a legend.

  I’d probably have heard of her too, if I watched more TV, but I was always so focused on practicing I never had much time for it. But even still, her face is kind of familiar, and I think I’ve seen her on magazines at the grocery store checkout lines.

  There’s a pair of headphones by the computer, and I pop them on and then play one of the videos.

  Three minutes later, I realize the video ended thirty seconds ago and I’m still sitting in shock.

  The other Amelia was good. Like, really, really good. No wonder she got accepted into Mystwick. She played better than most adults, even as well as most Maestros. And though piano seemed to be her specialty, she could play dozens of instruments, all of them with the same level of perfection. There’s a video of her playing a spell that fills an entire auditorium with light, and another where she plays in a hospital ward for a sick little boy. In minutes, he jumps out of his bed, fully healed. It seems her specialty was healing spells, curing people who everyone thought were beyond hope.

  What would it be like, to have that kind of power? To be loved by so many people?

  I scroll through the comments.

  “Angel!”

  “Prodigy!”

  “A gift from heaven! The best young pianist in the world!”

  Farther down, there are newer comments, which take a different tone.

  “I’m still in shock. I can’t believe she’s gone! It’s so unfair.”

  “I heard it was murder.”

  “They say they never even found her body.”

  Those comments make me feel sick, so I go to close the window.

  But then my eye snags on something that makes me pause. I click it, and the screen fills with another video of Amelia. But this time, instead of a grand concert hall, she’s in a living room, dressed in pajamas. She’s pla
ying some kind of illusion spell on a white grand piano. Every few seconds she looks up at someone across the room and laughs, but I can’t see who it is. Finally, the camera moves just slightly to get a better angle of Amelia’s face, and then I see her.

  Darby.

  She’s also in her pajamas, so I guess they were having a sleepover or something. And Darby is waving a baton, like she’s Conducting Amelia. The illusion spell is focused on her, making her hair turn all different colors.

  I stare at the Darby in the video. She seems like a whole different person—happy, fun, even silly. She makes a goofy face, and the two laugh their heads off without Amelia ever missing a note. She follows Darby’s direction, playing faster and slower. Finally, the video ends with the pair of them standing on the piano bench and taking bows. Judging by the date on the video, it was taken just a few months before Amelia died.

  Letting out a shaky breath, I realize Jai is watching. Meanwhile, his game avatar is getting mauled by zombies.

  “I remember her now,” he says. “That’s why your name sounded familiar to me at the audition. She was good.”

  “She was beyond good,” says another voice.

  We both turn, and my stomach drops.

  Darby stands there, holding her shakuhachi case and a book of Japanese illusion spells.

  I want to say something, anything to make her feel better. After seeing what she was like before the other Amelia died, I now know how much she must be hurting. How much it changed her.

  I know what that feels like. I know what it is to wake up in the morning and think everything is okay, everything’s normal, and then you remember. You remember who is missing, and your stomach drops and the world turns gray and you want to smash your face into a pillow and scream. I want to tell her that even eight years later, I still feel that way sometimes.

  But before I can think of what to say, Darby whispers, “She was the best there was.”

  With a sigh, she turns and walks away. She passes a table where Claudia and Victoria and some other seventh graders are sitting, and they whisper as she goes by. Claudia’s running some sort of gossip ring, and loves to tell anyone who’ll listen about the tragic death of the other Amelia Jones, as if she’d been the girl’s best friend.

  “Hey Darby!” Claudia calls. “Come sit with us!”

  But Darby ignores them and goes down the stairs, looking angry.

  Turning back around, I prop my head in my hands. My stomach has sunk to the floor.

  “I shouldn’t be here,” I say to Jai.

  He tilts his head. “What are you talking about?”

  I let my hands fall to the desk, but can’t quite look him in the eye. A part of me wants to tell him the truth—that my being here is just a huge mistake—but even thinking about it makes my ears burn. If everyone found out about my secret, they’d all look at me differently. Not like I was one of them, but like I was a fraud. And coming from Jai, that look would hurt most of all. He’s my first friend here, and I don’t want to lose that.

  All I have to do is pass Mrs. Le Roux’s test in two months, and then it won’t matter anymore. It’ll be like I got in the same way as everyone else. I just have to make sure no one sees through me till then, not even Jai.

  “I just . . . don’t want to mess up. You know, like at the hotel.”

  “Ah. Well, just avoid drying spells, then.” He shrugs, his fingers jamming the keys as he navigates a zombie-infested street. “Or you’d probably burn down the whole school.”

  I punch his arm, and he yelps like his bones are broken and falls to the floor.

  “Amelia Jones has slain me!” he moans. “Have pity, have pity! I’m just a poor boy from a poor family!”

  The kids behind us all shush him angrily, and Jai stands and directs an elaborate bow in their direction, basking in their glares.

  “Ah, my fans,” he sighs, sliding back into his chair. “It’s tough being loved by so many.”

  “Dork.”

  “That’s Mr. Dork to you, Jones.” Jai grins and goes back to playing his game.

  I nibble my pencil, thinking about the other Amelia, trying to imagine what she was like, not as a celebrity or a miracle worker, but just as a person. The way Darby knew her. I wonder how she would have fit in here at Mystwick. Something tells me that even here, with all these super-talented kids, she’d have stood out. A big fish in a little pond.

  But I feel like I’m being swallowed up. Back home, I never felt that way. I could play every spell Mrs. Parrish put in front of me, I was always ahead in Musicraft class, and I practiced twice as much as everyone else. I’d thought I was good.

  Now, I’m not sure what I am, or what I have to do to fit in. This is harder than I’d ever dreamed it could be. And it feels like every move I make, I’ve got the Maestros watching over my shoulder and taking notes. Is she good enough? Is she Mystwick material? Or is she just a mistake to be erased?

  But even more importantly, it’s like I can feel my mom watching too, asking the same questions.

  Chapter Eleven

  Gone with the Woodwinds

  THE NEXT MORNING, school officially begins. My first period is homeroom, which I share with the other woodwind students, or Aeros. I get lost in Harmony Hall looking for it, and when I finally arrive at the right place, most of the kids are already there, talking and laughing. The room is long and the walls are sculpted for optimum acoustics. A picture window gives a view of the mountains and the lake. The other wall is lined with clear, fully enclosed cubicles, sort of like old-fashioned telephone booths, that I’m guessing are soundproof for individual spellwork. Every desk has an apple on it, which I take to be a nice, welcoming gesture by our homeroom Maestro, who is apparently not yet here.

  There is only one desk still empty, at the very front of the classroom, beside Darby.

  “Hey,” I say, trying to be as cheery as possible. “You were up early this morning.”

  By early, I mean the crack of dawn. Darby was gone before I even woke up, her bed made up so neatly it would make Gran cry with happiness.

  She just gives me a little nod and stares at her desk.

  Claudia wanders over and snickers. “Nice shoes, Jones. Or can I even call them that? You some kind of construction worker back home?”

  I yank my feet under my chair, but it’s too late to hide my scruffy boots. Looking around, I notice all the others are wearing the same shiny uniform shoes. Not a scuff of dirt on any of them.

  “Cut it out, Claudia,” Darby snaps, surprising me.

  Claudia laughs and picks up Darby’s apple, tossing it lightly and catching it again. “You know, it’s weird, isn’t it? You and Amelia—the other one—were supposed to be roommates, and then you get some other Amelia Jones instead. Seems like an odd coincidence.”

  “Yeah,” Darby says softly. “It does.”

  I swallow hard and lower my face, as a hot, rashy feeling sweeps from my cheeks to my toes. My hands squeeze together between my knees.

  Everyone is still talking when our Maestro arrives. Mr. Pinwhistle glares around at us, then stomps in, slamming his large bassoon case onto his desk at the front. Claudia quickly slides back into her chair.

  “I will have silence!” he says. “And when I enter the room, you will greet me with respect.”

  “Yes, Maestro,” a few people mutter.

  “What?” he says, holding a hand to his ear.

  “YES, MAESTRO,” we all shout.

  He grunts and sits heavily, his chair creaking beneath him.

  “Let’s get one thing straight,” Mr. Pinwhistle says, slapping his desk. “This is not some artsy-fartsy Musicraft camp where we sit around talking about how music makes us feel. Mystwick is for serious musicians and serious magic. There will be no crying, whining, excuses, eating, cheating, tardiness, talking out of turn, passing notes, vandalizing school property, chewing gum, stupidity, laziness, late homework, or bathroom breaks.”

  I’m not sure that last one is entirely legal t
o ban, but I don’t think now is the best time to bring it up.

  “At the end of each week,” Mr. Pinwhistle says, “you’ll be listed according to chair, based on your performance in class and on homework.” He smacks a finger on a chart by the door, where all our names are written on little cards. I notice there are twenty-six slots instead of twenty-five, and wonder if anyone else notices that an extra flute was added to the class. I sink a little lower in my chair. “First chair to last. Oh, and did I mention? Last chair gets double homework.”

  I stifle a groan. He may as well go ahead and hand me my assignment. I heard these kids play during the Planting Ceremony, so I know what I’m up against.

  Still, I’d rather play a million extra hours of practice scales than be expelled.

  Mr. Pinwhistle hands out spells to each of us, based on our instruments. Mine is an etude called Barcarolle, by Friedrich Burgmüller, which I’ve never heard of before, but it doesn’t look too difficult. It’s a yellow spell that’s supposed to “peel, unwrap, or open” an object.

  I glance at the apple on my desk.

  “Now, as any toddler can tell you,” growls Mr. Pinwhistle, “there are four types of spells. What are they . . .” He looks around until his eyes land on me. “Jones?”

  Everyone stares at me. Claudia’s eyes burn into me from one side, and Darby’s from the other.

  Ears burning, I sit up straighter and say, “The four types of spells are green, yellow, blue, and white”

  “And who will define green spells for us?” He nods at another flutist in the back. “You—who are you?”

  “I’m Jingfei.” The girl stands up and says in a clear voice, “Green spells are also known as bio spells. They work on living organisms: people, animals, plants. They affect biological processes, healing or causing growth, or inflicting pain and withering.”