Back in The House, Riley enters frowning and explains what just happened.
"You did magic with her?" Smackle asks.
"It was crazy, so much stronger than ever before. We didn't lift just one drop of water, we lifted hundreds," Riley marvels.
"This is exactly why we need to bind the circle," Farkle points out.
Lucas scoffs, "Are you kidding? I like magic, I don't want to rely on all of you to be able to do it," He says as he walks out the room.
"Where are you going?" Smackle asks him.
"Out to have some fun. We have actual power now," He says and turns away.
Maya is standing on the edge of the town. The place where the decks and piers meet the water. People are bustling everywhere, buying and selling things at the market. She sighs and stares out at the water. Looking at blurry boats in the distance. She doesn't notice Farkle coming up next to her until he puts a hand on her shoulder. She feels the tingling.
"Maya…," Farkle starts, "I get that this is really tough for you to learn, but…,"
Maya cuts him off, "I'm sorry but I said before, this is just too much."
"Please, it's a lot to accept. We all went through the same thing. I get it's harder for you. You just met us all."
Maya shakes her head and turns back to the water, leaning on the railing, "What happened to them, why didn't anyone say anything or tell me?"
Farkle sighs, "The accident 16 years ago was about a boat. A bunch of teens went to go party on it, there was a fire, people died. Anyone that died was part of the last circle. The one of our parents."
"Was… was my dad one too?" Maya asks, her eyes starting to tear up as lightning flashes in the distance.
All Farkle does is nod, "Except, we don't think it was an accident, Maya. I think that, it must have been a spell or ritual went haywire. That the ones still alive are hiding it from us. I don't think that they bound their circle. Maya, we can do amazing things with our powers, but we won't know if we don't try."
"I get it but my mom ran from here for a reason. She didn't want me to do any of this. I didn't even know about Chance Harbor until she died," Maya says a tear rolls down her face. "Why didn't she tell me, that there was a whole other life I could have lived, instead of constantly moving and being alone?"
"That's something I don't have the answer to, Maya," Farkle tells her, "And I can't tell you that I understand. I was born here, I grew up here, I had the circle around my whole life, and I wish you had the chance to," Farkle sighs. Maya sniffles a bit as lightning flashes and thunder roars.
Down on the longest pier stands Lucas at the edge. "Please sky, rain down on us all," He says with a smile. A loud crash of thunder and lightning gets closer and he smirks, power. Rain starts to pelt on the pier, on Lucas, on the market, and Farkle and Maya. "More!" The rain comes harder and Lucas laughs loudly.
People in the market are scrambling around, running indoors, and covering themselves with bags. Squinting his eyes, Farkle looks out to the pier, "What is he doing?"
Deciding he should intervene, Farkle starts to run down to where the pier is, he is halfway across when Maya darts off, following his lead. Farkle finally reaches Lucas and screams.
"Lucas! What are you doing?" He asks coming closer to Lucas.
"Isn't it amazing? We can do this, we can make it rain just because we want it to!" Lucas replies and Farkle shakes his head.
"Make it stop, this is dangerous!" He yells.
"No, it isn't Far-," Lucas is cut off by a giant lightning boat striking a string of lights on the pier causing it to shake. Farkle screams and falls down, slipping on the soaking pier.
Lucas runs over to him, "Are you ok?"
Farkle only says, "You need to stop it."
Lucas nods and moves to kneel next to Farkle, "Stop the storm!" The lighting and rain get louder and heavier and Lucas can feel himself start to panic. "I said stop!"
"Do it!" Farkle yells at him again.
"I… I can't, I lost control! Stop this storm!" Lucas futilely yells again.
Maya walks past them to where Lucas had stood before, the strength in her walk shocking them both, her face is set still. She stands at the edge calmly and closes her eyes, "Stop it now. Make the storm stop. Now." At the calm 'now' the rain and thunder get weaker until they are completely gone. Maya turns and walks to Lucas and Farkle.
"I said you were one of us," Lucas says, astonished that she was able to stop the monsoon.
"I don't want you to involve me. This just shows me it can be dangerous," Maya states, her tone sharp and walks away, down the pier.
When she is out of ear shot Farkle looks to Lucas, "You know, I almost had her agreeing to be a part in this." He looks disappointed as he leaves Lucas standing there.
Maya sighs as she walks around her new room. Too much happened today, too much to deal with, and too much to comprehend. She pulls out her phone and scrolls through old photos of her and her mom. Maya starts to wonder again why her mom wouldn't even leave her a hint to what she should do. A sharp pain goes through her hip as she knocks into the Tv stand. A book is knocked off and Maya sets her phone down to grab it. Her face morphs into confusion when she sees one of the decorative drawers on the stand seems, no longer decorative.
Maya peaks out the window to make sure Shawn's movie is still on and she pulls off the fake piece and sets it down. Reaching inside she feels a leather bound book and pulls it out. Once she has it, she pushes the fake piece back in its spot. Grabbing the book once more, she goes over to the bed and shuffles the pages. An envelope flutters out. On the front is written, 'Maya'.
She rips it open quickly and pulls out the old piece of paper inside.
My Maya,
You finding this letter means that I'm gone and for that I am so sorry. I didn't want you to have this life. I didn't want it for myself either, but destiny's not easy to run from. I hoped that by never telling you of anything, it would somehow ensure your safety. My foolishness has done naught but put you in harm's way. You have power in you, my dear. People will come for it. They will come for you. I have no idea of the world you're going to encounter. But find your strength. And believe in yourself as I believe in you. Who you are is your greatest protection. You can't do this alone, but don't befriend the wrong people, Maya. The book will help you, please let it.
Forever, Mom
Maya wipes her face as tears roll down, threatening to ruin the letter she holds. She can't be mad at her mom, she did what she thought was right. Maya is more mad at the world. For taking away her mother, leaving her alone, with the decision that could affect her path.
"I guess this is the Book of Shadows," She whispers to herself, turning the book over in her hands as she gets under the covers. Deciding to check out a few pages she opens and flips through the pages that only contain names.
"Mom, what am I going to do?" Maya asks herself as she reads the different spells, potions, and herbs she sees in the book.
Maya walks through the halls, searching for her chemistry classroom, the last class of the day. Spotting it she hears the teacher talking and slips in. He nods to her, and she glances around the room. Lucas and Zay are sitting together, middle of the room. Riley and Farkle right behind them. Maya ducks her head when Lucas makes eye contact with her and she sits at an empty station.
"… Make sure to mix exactly 200 milliliters. Remember these can be toxic, so where the goggles and please don't do what Jeffery did a few weeks back and drink the solution," She hears the teacher finish, luckily all instructions were on a sheet of paper at the desk.
Zay pours 200 milliliters of the light blue liquid into the beaker. He sees Lucas smirk and he groans, "What?"
"Let's give these new powers a try." He says and looks at the beaker, "Fire with no flame, bring me the heat." Zay smiles largely in astonishment as the solution starts to bubble, even though there is no fire turned on.
Maya looks over and frowns, but keeps her mouth shut and turns to her own work. When it starts bubbling, despite the fact she hasn't turned the fire on, she turns to glare at Lucas. Lucas scowls and thinks, 'More' and Maya hops out of her seat as her beaker shatters
Maya is filled with rage and glares at Lucas again, his own glass cracking and setting on fire. Maya turns tail and runs out of the room, not ready to face the fact that she could have hurt someone, that she can actually do that.
"I'll be back." Farkle says and runs after her, leaving a stunned Riley behind.
Maya makes it all the way into another hallway before she stops running and just walks when she hears footsteps. Farkle falls in step next to her.
"Wait a minute," Farkle says putting a hand on her shoulder.
"Farkle, I did that, I could have seriously hurt someone," Maya says leaning her back against the lockers. "I got mad and I… I set something on fire."
"It's ok, it was an accident. This is why I am pushing so hard for us to bind the circle," Farkle tells her quietly.
"Would it really help?" Maya asks looking up hopefully to him. Farkle nods and hums confirmation. "Then, as long as everyone else is in…" Maya says, trailing off when Farkle pulls her into a close hug. Maya pats the small of his back, as her arm is being crushed.
"Thank you, Maya. This means a lot. I promise it will keep us safer," Farkle tells her, letting her go, "Here, this is my number. Message me and I'll put you in the Circle's group chat."
Maya nods and says, "Yeah, uh thanks. I'm about to say something sappy but forget it after I say it. I really appreciate you trying so hard to protect your friends, I've never had that before."
Farkle smiles at her and motions to come on. Class is settled when they get back and Lucas gives her a smirk. She glares at him and plops in her seat, waiting quietly for the five minutes that class has left. When the bell does finally go off she stands up and waits until more people clear from the room to head out.
"Hey, uh, do you want to hang out?" Riley asks coming up next to her with a bright smile.
Maya can feel her face heat up, "Yeah, sure, what do you want to do?"
"Hmm, how about we go try out some…," Riley looks around her and leans down so her mouth is right next to Maya's ear and whispers, "Magic," Riley lifts her head and Maya immediately misses the warmth it provided. Shaking her head at the thought Maya nods.
"Was that a yes?" Riley asks laughing.
"Sorry, yes. Yeah I'd… you kind of have to show me the ropes a bit," Maya admits.
Riley hooks her arm in Maya's and nods, "Not a problem. Should we go to your house, my house, somewhere else?"
"Well, I'm still kind of new. It's only like my fourth day, so I don't know anywhere," Maya reminds Riley, "But we can go to my house, Shawn mentioned this morning that he would be out until dinner time," She says smiling.
"Great, where is your car?" Riley asks scanning the parking lot as they finally reached it.
"Follow me," Maya tells her.
Maya unlocks the front door and leads Riley inside.
"Do you want anything to drink?" She asks Riley as she tosses the keys into the key bowl. "Or to eat?"
Riley smiles, "Nothing yet," She says winking at Maya.
Maya wills her face to not heat up, to no avail, "We can go up to my room," She tells her as she head upstairs. Once they get to the room Maya says, "Sorry I don't have chairs, so we can just chill in my bed."
Riley's face is the one that heats this time as she thinks of all the innuendos that Maya could have said, "That works," She says as she sits gently on the edge of it.
Maya sits down opposite to her and asks, "So is Smackle the only one who's found her Book of…?" She acting as though she forgot what Farkle called it.
"Her Book of Shadows, and yeah. She found it on accident. Both of her parents died in the incident, she lives with her aunt. So when she decided she wanted to change her ceiling fan, her aunt didn't stop her, we think she didn't know that the book was in the ceiling. Farkle was over there changing the fan and the book smacked him square in the face." When she had said Farkle got hit in the face with a sad, pitiful voice Maya burst out laughing.
"I'm sorry but I am just imagining that."
"Don't worry, you should have seen Zay when he found out, he was laying on the forest ground crying, laughing so hard, cause Farkle got a black eye," She tells Maya.
"Wow, that's, wow." Is all Maya could think to reply, "So you mentioned that Smackle lost both her parents to the boat accident?"
"Yeah, she has lived with her aunt since she was a baby. My mom died, so did Lucas' and Farkle's. Zay lost his dad. My Uncle Eric died from it as well, the others have aunts and uncles who did too."
"I'm sorry for your loss," Maya says, putting her hand over Riley's and she can feel the tingles all the way up her arm.
"It's ok, I don't really remember her at all. My dad does though, when he does talk about her, you can tell they really loved each other. He talked like she was his world," Riley says, a sad smile on her face.
"At least he has you," Maya tells her, biting her lip and Riley gives her a bright smile.
"So why'd you ask about Smackle's book?" Riley asks her.
"Oh yeah, I may have found mine," Maya tells her insecurely.
Riley's smile grows even more and she launches herself at Maya, hugging her waist, and she accidently pushes her onto her back, still hugging her. "This is great! There must be so much that can help us in it."
Maya laughs and breathes in the scent of Riley's hair 'honey' Maya's mind supplies and Riley let's go of her and sits up. "Here," Maya says grabbing the book from under her pillow, handing it to Riley.
"Maya, do you know what these names are?" Riley asks her stunned.
"No, I skipped them to look through some of the spells, why?" Maya asks her leaning over to look at the pages.
"These are names of people in the circle generation before us," She says, "This is crazy, look, they all start out with the same six last names and then grow after that. Smackle, Minkus, Matthews, Friar, Babineaux, and Hart. It's like stepping back into history with these books."
"Yeah, I didn't think of it like that before. But, do you want to try a spell?" Maya asks her and she sees Riley's eyes light up. "Let's look for one."
They shuffle through pages of many spells before Riley abruptly stops flipping and point to a spell, "Stitch, thread, and seam change from current color to the desired color," Maya reads from the page. "Let's do it!"
"Should we do it on what we are wearing now or something else?" Riley asks.
"I think cause people saw us we should do something else. Let me grab something out of the closet," Maya tells her, jumping out of the bed and to the closet. She returns moments later with a large, dark red sweater and a pink crop top with a cat on it. "Let's do these!"
"Can I have the cat one?" Riley asks and Maya tosses it to her.
"Do you want to go first, I'm still really new to this," Maya asks, sitting back down on the bed.
"Sure, remember to feel the connection you have with the object. You don't have to touch it, cause the air can be a connection to something. You just need be able to control the energy in you," Riley explains to her as she lays the shirt out on bed and closes her eyes, "Stitch, seam, and thread change from pink to purple," Maya watches as the shirt doesn't change suddenly, instead it more or less shifts from pink to purple. Riley opens her eyes and smiles.
"You can keep the shirt," Maya tells her, raking a hand through her hair.
"Thanks," Riley says softly, smiling at her in a way that matches her tone of voice.
Maya smiles and lays her select sweater out, "Stitch, seam, and thread change from red to yellow."
The sweater does the same thing as the crop top, shifting from one color to the other.
"This is really cool," Rile says, touching the sweater, "It's going to be great once we bind the circle and try stronger things."
"Like what?" Maya asks her.
"Hmm? What do you mean?" Riley asks in response.
"By try stronger things," Maya clarifies.
"Oh, well, there are spells that require an entire circle. Or ones we didn't have enough power to do before. Like, we couldn't charm things, or make potions. Because they both require the magical energy of either a very strong witch, or a fully bound circle. There are some spells that are used to charm jewelry. Anything from against fire, to an extent, and basically anything you want."
"That's… really cool," Maya says with a laugh, "You can make your own spells right?"
Riley nods her head, "Of course, Farkle actually made one because he didn't have a pencil sharpener. It was something like, 'sharpen to the point of perfection'. He said he uses it on tests so he doesn't have to stand up."
"Farkle is really a character isn't he?" Maya asks her, laughing once more at Farkle.
"Yeah, he is great though. Without him we probably wouldn't be as civil as we are in the group. Cause Zay and Lucas liked to cause more trouble than they do now before Farkle got the group to settle."
"Nice," Maya says watching Riley skim through the book further. "I should probably tell Farkle about this, huh?"
Riley looks up at Maya and nods her head. A piece of hair becomes untucked and it falls into Riley's eyes.
Riley begins to speak and Maya almost misses what she says, too focused on the piece of hair, "You know, Maya, I'm really glad that you agreed to bind the circle." She smiling brightly, her eyes twinkling.
Maya smiles back and says, "You have um…," She slowly reaches forward and brushes the piece of hair back behind Riley's ear and tucks it there. She doesn't know why but it is suddenly hard to breathe and the tingling of their magic is getting stronger every second Maya's hand is touching Riley's ear.
She doesn't know how long they have been sitting on her bed, staring into each other's eyes, but Maya knows she is drowning in the sea that is Riley's eyes. Riley on the other hand feels like she is flying through a bright blue sky as she looks into Maya's eyes. Riley isn't sure who is creeping forward slowly, but she thinks it may be both of them. They are inches apart, 'just like in the forest' Riley's mind supplies.
She sucks in a quiet breath as Maya's hand moves from her ear to holding her cheek. She slowly slides her hand up off the bed, moving it towards Maya's waist. Her fingers graze the fabric of Maya's shirt. Her hand is just about to grasp onto Maya when she heard the front door open and someone call up, 'Maya, you home?'
Riley is the one who moves back this time, a crimson blush working its way up her neck and to her cheeks. She can tell Maya has a blush as well, even as she calls down to Shawn, saying she is and that she has a friend over. Riley almost misses the shocked look on Shawn's face when he sees it is her that is over, almost. It almost doesn't make her feel like something is wrong.
Farkle is pacing in his room, Smackle is sitting on his bed deep in thought as well, and oddly enough Zay is there as well, sitting on the beanbag chair next to the bed.
"What do we do?" Farkle says as he stops pacing and throws his arms down, "And why don't I know what to do? I know everything," he says even more exasperated than before.
Zay cringes internally (and a bit externally) and sighs, "I could talk to him," He suggests.
Smackle and Farkle both frown at that, "We have to do this together, and you know he won't take just one of us seriously. And need I remind you Zay, you are the one who came to us for help," Smackle notes.
"Yeah duh, cause Lucas could've hurt someone today. You said binding the circle would help, and all this wild magic around is making me queasy. So I'm down. Lucas is a problem, like I said." Zay stands from the beanbag chair.
Farkle groans and glares at Zay, "Yes, thank you, we still don't have a way to convince Lucas do we?" He asks, glaring harder when Zay smiles.
"Actually, we might," Zay tells them, "Doesn't Lucas like Riley, and she is very persuasive."
All three of them glance at each other, uneasy, knowing this may be the only way to get the circle bound.