5

RULES

“I didn’t mean that to happen,” Thornmallow said when the students were all seated in the dining commons. Tansy sat on one side of him, and Will sat facing him across the table. As they explained it, “Guardians stick tight, like cockleburs to clothes.”

“I didn’t mean all the snow to come and break down the wall and …” He suddenly ran out of words and stared glumly into the bowl in front of him. It was full of an earthy brown soup. Cautiously he stuck his spoon in and took a taste. It tasted brown.

“My da says nothing happens by accident,” said Gorse, who was sitting on the other side of him. “And he’d know. He’s a bush wizard. Of course you meant it.”

“Didn’t,” Thornmallow said, all his sorrow and embarrassment packed into the one word.

“Did.”

“Didn’t!” he repeated stubbornly.

“Did!” Gorse made a face at her soup.

“What Gorse means,” Tansy interrupted, “is that magic can’t happen unless it’s meant. Really meant.”

“It’s a rule,” added Will.

“Rule number five,” Gorse said, taking a taste of her own soup and shuddering. “Lizard soup again.”

“Lizard?” Thornmallow gulped and put down his spoon.

“Don’t pay any attention to old Gooey,” Will advised. “She likes to be disgusting. I have ten sisters just like her. Ignoring them works wonders.”

“Lizard,” Thornmallow whispered hopelessly, staring down into the brown soup.

“Only if you want it to be,” Tansy said brightly, shaking her finger over his bowl. “See!”

He dared another look. The soup was now bright green, the color of pond scum. That didn’t make it any more inviting. He put his spoon in again and brought it slowly to his mouth. The soup still tasted brown.

“I don’t understand.”

“Well, what did you expect?” Gorse asked. “She’s only a first-year student, after all.”

“What Gorse means,” Will explained, “is that first-year students only learn how to change the face of a thing, not the thing itself. And don’t snap, Gooey. We’re meant to help him.”

Gorse stared at Will. “I can snap if I want to, Sillyweed. I’m not his guardian—you are. I was yours, because I beat you to Wizard’s Hall by a week. That was enough.” She turned to Thornmallow. “Changing the face but not the race. Rule number one.”

Ignoring Gorse, Will said, “For example, if you wanted to add meat to your soup, you could make it appear as if there were meat there.”

“We learn to really change one part of a thing at a time in second year,” added Tansy.

Will nodded. “In second year, you could change one part of the soup to be meat and it would be meat, not just its appearance.”

Stirring her spoon in the soup, Gorse said in sepulchral tones, “Taste like meat, smell like meat, feel like meat.”

“It would be meat,” Will continued. “But you couldn’t do vegetables. Not at the same time. You can only change one part, you see. The rest of the soup would still be—”

“Brown?” asked Thornmallow.

“You’ve got it!” Tansy said. “But by third year, you’ll know how to change the entire thing.”

“You mean, then it could be meat and vegetable soup?” asked Thornmallow, so excited he put a hand on Gorse’s shoulder and stared eagerly across at Will.

“Lizard!” said Gorse, poking at a lizard that was doing a creditable backstroke across the green liquid in her bowl.

Tansy and Will stared openmouthed at it. “How could he … how could it …” Their words dribbled off.

“Well, what happens …,” Thornmallow asked withdrawing his hand. The lizard dove expertly to the bottom of the bowl and Will and Tansy both relaxed. “What happens in fourth year?”

“We graduate,” said Will.

“Graduate to what?”

“To roast beef!” Gorse replied, in such hopeful tones that Tansy and Will laughed out loud.

“It’s a matter of balance,” Tansy said. “Magic is all about keeping a balance. Big with little, dark with light, up with down, soft with loud.”

“Lizard with roast beef,” Gorse added.

They laughed again, and this time even Thornmallow joined in. But as suddenly as he started, he stopped.

“I don’t understand at all,” he said. “If I am a first-year student and we can only change the face of a thing, not the thing itself, how come I was able to call in all that snow and …”

“And break down the wall …,” said Will.

“And leave a potted plant,” added Tansy.

“And a stain,” Thornmallow ended miserably.

“How indeed?” asked Gorse.

No one remarked upon the lizard, for it had not resurfaced, and the soup was once again brown.

The four of them looked at one another for a long moment, the heat of all those questions in their mouths. Then the changing bell shattered the silence and they rose. Whatever answers they might have had were lost in the bell’s thunderous voice.