Mystery in Magic-The Vanishing Amulets

Mystery in Magic- the Vanishing Amulets

Hi !!! I’m Rachel. I thought that magic, genies and mystery didn’t exist until me and my twin brother’s birthday…....

I woke up one day in my town, New York, and realised I had turned 11. I laughed out loud and kicked my twin brother Zackery awake. Zack has slightly thick eyebrows and cinnamon brown hair, just like me. He has a slim, muscular but nerd-like appearance. For me, well, I’m Super duper amazing. Get it? Amazing. I have cinnamon brown hair till my elbows and curious black-brown eyes. I’m slim and looooove sports, unlike my twin Brother. Sorry. Wasting time. Let’s go back to the story. Zack turned over, moaning, and murmured,” I WISH time could turn back to tomorrow….”. As soon as he said WISH, I moaned and scratched my right thumb, right where my birthmark was. It was itching so bad!! “ I really WISH my thumb would stop itching!!” I exclaimed out loud. Well, well. Maybe my brother got my itchy-birthmark disease after all. He yelped like an injured dog and started sucking his right thumb (he has a birthmark there too, just like me. It’s really annoying that I have the same shaped birthmark on the same thumb as him). I looked at him, and he looked at me. Without hesitation, my brother cried, ”Rachel! I think we might have caught the deadly disease!!!! Did you wash your hands?? Where you eating raw stuff?? Oh noooo! What if we die!!!!”.You see, my brother is a very troubled boy who cares about only health and non-germ people. Poor boy. So, after a few minutes of calming him down, we dressed and headed down to our birthday party.

When we arrived downstairs, my poor brother nearly threw up. Everyone we had invited was frozen on the spot, even our parents. The smell of the neat pasta on the table, the omelette our mom was flipping on a pan were all silent and still. We could even see the hot steam frozen in midair, coming from the soup. My friends, Amy, Lucy and all the others were in mid-laugh, each in different motions. If it wasn’t this situation, I could have laughed when I saw a cue with people lining up in need of the bathroom. At first, we thought it was a joke, but when we saw a drop of water frozen in midair, we couldn’t do anything but to accept the truth. I was about to say, ‘am I dreaming?’ when we heard footsteps on our front door. Seconds later, I saw our uncle Sean coming through the door. “ Well, well,” he grumbled, gazing at us carefully, and placing the two presents wrapped in sky blue and dark blue on the dresser.”The time has come to tell you the truth.”

My mom always told me that uncle Sean was related to her, but I know better. He’s actually this reeeeeaaaaaally old weirdo that my mom’s family had known for a long time. Even though he really isn’t a relative, were forced to call him uncle. Why??? Anyways, when Sean(I always call him Sean) entered, I felt an invisible force pulling me and my brother in a chair, and when I was glued to the chair hard enough, I noticed a glint of excitement in Sean’s eyes.

“I can’t believe it, ”I whispered, an hour later. “Are you out of your mind? How can magic and genies be real?”. “You’ll see” Sean replied. He clapped his hands twice, and everything turned black.

When my vision turned to normal, I woke up in a totally blue room. My brother was next to me, still in unconsciousness. I rubbed my eyes and pinched myself, wondering if I was having a nightmare. Ouch! I flinched. Maybe I wasn’t in a dream after all. Suddenly, I heard a strict voice up above the doorless blue room.” Are you Rachel Glinchly?” the voice asked. “Yes, I am. Who are you and what do you want with us?”I asked, gripping my brother’s warm hand tightly( seriously, I don’t actually hate my brother. Don’t tell him that). It was a shame he wasn’t awake at that time. The voice replied, ”Welcome to genie school, Rachel and Zackery Glinchly.”. And with that, a blue mist surrounded us, whooshing us away to genie school.

Hi!! Nice to meet you again! As I mentioned, that’s how my brother and I figured out we were genies and the birthmark on our thumb was actually a genie bite. It was SUPPOSED to itch when someone cried WISH and we could grant wishes with that thumb(or magic). Oh, and when we were at genie school, time in the normal world stops. I think that's actually really cool. My main genie power is water, and my brother’s is wind(It’s actually really annoying because he wakes me early every day with a gust of wind). Anyway, we had lots of fun in genie school until our power storing amulets began vanishing. You see, an amulet contains most of a genie’s power, so if lost, genies are powerless except for a small portion of their natural power. So, let’s begin.

One normal night in genie school, me and my friend, Crystina(Crystina’s an Oracle, not a genie.Something similar, but Oracles tell the future and they don’t need amulets)were giggling together in my bed, talking about my brother’s mistakes in class. “Hey, remember when Zack spilt frog’s poison all over himself in Brewing class?” Crystina whispered, giggling.” I hope….” she began to say, and suddenly broke off. Her usually brown eyes were turning green. “Oh no! Not again!” I cried, desperately, tugging Crystina’s arm. But it was no use. Crystina began to chant, green smoke coming out of her body. “ This month the enemy of all shall break free from the top genies spell, and thee shall gain power. One by one the genies shall lose their power, while only one shall break the curse. Thee shall grow while others shrink. Only one shall break the curse!” she chanted. Without warning, the blue smoke cleared, revealing a fainted Crystina sprawling on my bed. I produced some water out of thin air and sprayed it all over Crystina. The poor girl came to life again, choking and gasping for air. As soon as she had gulped down large amounts of air, she cried at me angrily,” Hey, what was that for?!”.”Sorry.” I grumbled, controlling the water back into my hands again. After she had left, I began pondering what she had predicted. Something about someone escaping and getting more power. What did that mean? Confused, I couldn't sleep. I was worried, very, and couldn’t seem to close my eyes. At one in the morning, I finally fell asleep.

The next day, I woke up, forgetting Crystina’s prediction. I stumbled into my wardrobe and ordered the invisible light helpers to dress me up in a bright blue t-shirt, loose turquoise hoodie and dark blue jeans. Today was Sunday, so we could dress into regular mortal clothes. I sneaked down the stairs of the water power genies dormitory and scrambled down the hall to the wind genies one. As soon as I had opened the door, the alarm blazed. Bzzz!! Bzzz! Bzzz! Thinking that my brother was hurt, I flung open the door, broke through a crowd of wind genies, and ran to my brother’s bed. My brother was on the floor, still in his pyjamas and close to crying, the poor boy. “What happened?” I cried in alarm. “My amulet vanished!” Zack keened. Something popped into me as soon as he cried that out. ‘One by one the genies shall lose their power.’. Did that mean…..! Suddenly the alarm bell rang again. Bzzz! Bzzz! Bzz! The sound was coming from the animal genies dormitory. Not again!! I grabbed my brother's hand, shoved him into his wardrobe, and after forcing him to wear green jeans and a blue long sleeve shirt, we ran down the stairs to the animal genies dormitory. Every animal genie was yelling and running around in alarm. “What happened?!!” I shouted.”Penelope started the alarm! We don’t know what happened!” cried a little boy holding a dog. I started walking around in search of Penelope’s room. The bad thing about the animal genies dormitory is that their hall is a maze made out of nature with birds flying around, dogs barking, fish spewing water and cats meowing. My poor weak brother was still shocked, so I asked a fish where my friend, Penelope was. (By the way, I can speak to underwater creatures.)It replied,” I’m not really sure miss, but I heard stuff from other fish that Miss Penelope’s room was in the end part of the maze. Just follow the shallow trails of water. It might be better for the wind genie,” it flapped its fins at my brother “to ask those flying watchamalits, I mean sorry, birds.”.”Thanks!” I whispered to the fish.

I dragged my brother back and forth, right and left, through the maze. But it didn’t seem to stop. Desperately, I stopped and confronted my brother.” Zackery Glinchly, we have to figure out what happened to Penelope! Please, wake up!” I conjured some water and splashed it on Zack. He finally spluttered, “Huh? How did we get here? Who set off the alarm again? Rachel? What happened?”. Duh. I had just explained and told him everything and there he was, asking me what had happened as if I was dumb. “Mr, Penelope is in trouble! That’s why we’re here! You need to ask a bird where she is!”I cried annoyed and slightly worried.”Penelope? Did you say, Penelope? Ummm, actually, you go without me. I’ll just hang around here….”. Omg. My brother is really a wind brain sometimes.” Zack, I know that you like her and do awkward things in front of her, but that doesn’t make you not save her!” I shouted, now really annoyed. “Whatever. Fine. I’ll go by myself, ”I glared at him while walking forward, pretending to know the way while having no idea which way led to Penelope’s room. My Brother sighed, ”Rachel, you really are annoying sometimes.”. ’ More likely that you are’ I thought as I saw him approach a bird.

Zack whispered something to a pigeon, and it cried noisily back. He nodded grimly and returned. In a few minutes, we had passed the maze and found Penelope’s room. The door was locked, and I was starting to get angry. ‘Wretched door,’ I murmured under my breath as I sprayed wave after wave of water at the door. After a few minutes of useless shouting, banging, and spraying, my brother piped up.”Rachel, that's why you were horrible at logic and riddles sometimes..” he remarked and sighed. I was about to spray some water at his boasting face when he sighed, ”I think I can open the door.”. I hesitated and uttered, “Well, if you know the answer, get on with it, know it all.”. He grinned and cried, “Parrot, elephant, never bird, elephant, lion, owl, parrot and elephant. Open the door of this animal genie.”.

The door creaked open, and we entered. “How did you know?” I asked, incredulous. “I saw my friend saying animals that started with every word of his name. I figured out it would be the same for Penelope, too,” Zack exclaimed, smirking. Before I had time to say something, there was a muffled cry inside the wardrobe. We scrambled towards the wardrobe and we were immediately splashed by loads of water. Poor Penelope was tied inside, probably suffocating inside the wardrobe. We untied her and for a moment she just sat there, a terrified look on her face. finally, she spluttered,” someone took my amulet.”.

Tonight in the Great Banquet Hall, the oldest genie teachers held a meeting. It was about the missing Amulets and closing the school. Just in case I forgot to tell you about the banquet hall, it was a huge gigantic enormous place where you could eat and dine every day. Every morning the six looooooong tables ( standing for water, wind, fire, earth, animals and oracles ) and the staff table were filled with every breakfast imaginable. The staff table was located at the very front, facing the students. The walls were high with velvety banners each standing for one of the genie elements hung in the air. At dinner, another table appeared, for desserts. The dessert table was located at the very edge, and at night, the Great Banquet Hall was illuminated with live sparkling lights like candles in midair. The first time I saw this hall, my mouth nearly touched the floor. Anyways, I was on my way to the potions lab when I overheard a hint of conversation. The headmaster, Ganbledorch who was four hundred and seventy-two years old was whispering, “I think all these missing amulets are a problem. Six in one day! There must be something or someone in the school that are stealing the amulets. One from each dormitory and three missing in the wind’s dormitory. I think the school is dangerous now. Even if we don’t close the school, we must find the thief and return the amulets to their owners…..”.Professor McGieniyo sobbed,” All these years of working here….there wasn’t a single problem with amulets or powers...now the school might close forever…”. Before long, I heard the invisible professor I.P. talking to McGieniyo in her soothing voice. No one knew what the professor looked like, or what her real name was, but one thing was clear. She knew how to calm people. I thought about the more recent disappearances. Not daring to hear more, I ran across the smaller hallway. I felt a lump in my throat as my eyes started burning.

A few weeks later, the school totally forgot about the missing amulets, except for the people who were the victims. I felt bad for them, and as all the other genie’s amulets began vanishing, one by one, I felt sure that it wasn’t long before my amulet and everybody else’s started disappearing. In order to prevent the school from closing, I had to do something. But I had no idea what to do.

The next day, I woke up in my sunlight filled dormitory. I checked my watch. It was still four in the morning, and I was wide awake. Who had woken me up? Yawning, I got out of bed and dressed. Now that I was awake, I wasn’t able to go back to bed again. I was bored, so, quietly, I dressed, secured my amulet around my neck and hurried down the stairs. Not making a sound, I tiptoed past the blue carpets, the pillows and armchairs, homework table and velvety blue candles and curtains to the door. The door made a creaking sound and asked in its wheezy voice,” password?”. “Fly away” I replied. The door opened. I jogged past the paintings in the hallway, went through a small hole in the wall that was covered by red curtains, a shortcut I had found that led straight to the wind genies dormitory. I ran up the stairs and in a blink of an eye was standing right in front of the wind genies door. “ a gust of wind please,” the door groaned, as usual. I blew straight into the keyhole. The door sighed approvingly. “Welcome, Glinchly.”. I climbed up the boy’s dorm. Suddenly I couldn’t help it. I burst into a fit of silent giggles when I saw Zack’s sleeping posture. I conjured up a small glass of water and splashed it all over him. He woke up, startled, and when he saw me, he said something that made me so angry that steam came out of my years.” Hey you!” I shouted while summoning more water into my hands and splashing it all over him.” I’m gonna tell mom when we get home!”. “Ok, ok, fine” Zack said and did a flicking gesture as if swatting a fly. He looked down at his still wet pyjamas and bed sheets. He sighed. “I sometimes forget that I can’t dry myself with a blast of warm wind. I’m freezing.”. All of a sudden the joke didn’t seem so fun anymore. I tugged at a strand of my cinnamon brown hair, and as cheerily as I could, whispered,” c’mon. Let’s go and have some breakfast.”.

After breakfast in the Great Banquet Hall, Zack and I said our goodbyes and went to our classes. Today was Monday, so the Wind genies had harnessing class with professor McGieniyo and we had magical creatures class with Mr.Maxwell. When we had a class, we had to put our amulets in our bags in order to harness powers in a hard way, but the bags and the students' musn’t be separated. In magical creatures class, we trudged out to the grounds and sat on the warm grass. The day seemed perfect. The smell of fresh green grass and bark from the forest around the school pleasantly We were studying Horntwigs, twig-like creatures that lived on trees and ate animal tusks or horns. The fascinating thing about Horntwigs was that they could save dead plants and make them live again. We were supposed to do a diagram, and I had barely finished labelling the Horntwig’s mouth when the gate opened. There was a teenage girl, maybe thirteen or fourteen with long glossy black hair and fair skin. She had an upturned nose and long eyelashes. She kinda looked like one of those bullying cheerleaders. Behind the girl there was Gambledorch. He looked a bit nervous for some reason, and as soon as Mr.Maxwell set eyes on the girl to Gambledorch’s expression his face turned curious and a bit scared as if to say,’Who is she and why is she doing here? She looks intimidating.’. Gambledorch muttered something that sounded like,” Giving a quick tour of this new student…”. Then after a blink, he was standing next to Mr.Max and whispering something. When Gambledorch realized we were moving, he muttered, ”oops!” and clapped his hand once. A second later he was standing where he was before he had stopped time. I was sure that he had stopped time for everyone else and talked to Mr.Max about something because that explained the sudden movements of Gambledorch that nobody noticed and the change of Mr.Max’s expression. Mr.Max was nodding grimly. All of a sudden he made a hooting sound with his mouth and all the Horntwigs and the horns they were munching on disappeared. “Class dismissed for today. This shall be all.”. Some students, mostly boys, cheered that the class had ended early, but others, including me, were worried. “Who do you reckon is that girl?” I asked my fellow wind genie, Selestina. “Dunno,” she said.”But she looks cool.”. I had a feeling of suspicion. Why had Gambledorch seemed worried?

Tonight at the Great Banquet Hall, there was a loud chatter about the new girl. The food smelled wonderful, full of any dinner you could think of. Pork, chicken, beef, salads, rice balls, spaghetti, pizza, chews, soup, noodles, fish, and much MUCH more. There was even dessert. The Banquet Hall looked like a cosy warm cottage full of food to celebrate an occasion. As soon as I smelled the food before even touching it my mouth started to water. However, nobody seemed interested in dinner, even in the chocolate marshmallows. They were all busy talking about the new girl. Usually, when it came to newbies, I was really excited, but today was different. There seemed to be a cold in that girl. I met Zack and as soon as he sat down he started talking nonstop. “Did you see the new girl? She’s really nice and looks beautiful. I hope she likes me. Which genie could it be? I really wish she could be a wind genie. Then I cou - “, ”Zack, will you please zip?! I’m suspicious of her. I don’t know why Gambledorch looked worried. So, can I please eat peacefully?!?”I cried angrily. The instant I said that I knew that I had been too harsh on him. “Fine,” Zack muttered angrily, ”fine,” he glared at me. “ if that’s what you want, I’ll leave you alone.” he packed his bag, carefully picked up his tray and marched off to the wind genie’s table. I banged my fist on the table. That annoying boy! Why did it always have to be me? People were watching me, and I felt my anger rise as some whispered behind their hands. Had I caused such a racket? No. Is it normal for siblings to fight? Yes. then why where all are those people staring at me? Maybe they thought Zack was my boyfriend. I glared at them and whisked off to my dormitory.

A few days had passed since Zack and I had the fight. Over the past few days, more amulet attacks had been happening than ever. The new girl, Piperine turned out to be an oracle, which was a relief to me, though Crystina always had a hard time with her. “She’s like a bully” she always said whenever we met between classes. Everything seemed normal except when the attacks happened. Zack wasn’t waiting for me to run along the corridor to find out who’s amulet was missing. In fact, I hardly saw him at all. A friend of mine who was a wind genie told me that he always kept on avoiding me. Today, I was thinking about Zack and seething while walking to lunch when I realised I had forgotten my bag. I turned around just as Piperine emerged, grinning and holding my bag. “Thanks,” I said holding out my hand. Piperine grinned and ran down a smaller and darker hallway. I realised she was stealing and ran after her. Why was she doing this? Surely she wasn’t… at that moment, I arrived at the end of the hallway. Pipeline was panting, her long hair falling out of her loose ponytail. “Hey, new girl! What are you doing? Give me back my bag!” I shouted. I was really hoping that a prediction was going to happen soon so that Piperine would faint. I was about to snatch my bag out of her hands when she held out her palm in front of me as if she wanted me to do a hi-five. A blast of wind came out of her hands and knocked me down. The force sent me flying to a small window, and the window shattered. Luckily, I wasn’t injured much, just small scratches all over my head, arms and hands. Wait, was that really a blast of WIND?!?! How come she had wind genie powers when she was a powerless oracle?

I turned around, just as Piperine started summoning fire into her hands and making an alarming fire barrier wall so I couldn’t get through, and then she disappeared. I struggled to my feet as a bag, my bag, in fact, materialized next to me. I immediately crouched down search of a stolen object. Na, it couldn’t be. Surely Piperine hadn’t stolen my….. Amulet!! I stood up, seething. Now I figured out who was the amulet thief it explained everything. This month the enemy of all shall break free from the top genies spell and thee shall gain power. One by one the genies shall lose their power while only ONE SHALL BREAK THE CURSE. Thee shall grow while others shrink. ONLY ONE SHALL BREAK THE CURSE. Piperine was ‘the enemy of all’ and the reason Gambledorch had seemed worried was that Piperine had gained power enough to attend school without restraint. ‘And thee shall gain power’... It made sense that Piperine was stealing other genie’s amulets to get power and be invincible. Everything else made sense too, except the part when Crystina predicted, ’only one shall break the curse’.

I turned around, ran down the stairs and arrived at the ground floor. I knew it was hopeless, but I really wanted to think without anybody bothering me. I sped down the grass and slowed down in front of the Lake. I sat down, and I tried to swallow the lump that had formed in my neck. The sun was bright over the lake, making it shine. The castle-like school loomed over where I was standing, making a huge shadow. The trees in the forest were as silent as ever. I was gazing out, thinking about nothing much when a thought hit me. What if Piperine had used my amulet to take refuge in the lake? Maybe I could try breathing in the lake too. Without hesitation, I jumped inside the cool dark waters.

You’ll probably be thinking,’ whoa, Rachel that’s so insane! If you don’t have your amulet how are you going to be able to breathe?’. Yeah. I know. But the very first thing we learn about genie school is that even if a genie doesn’t have their amulets, a bit of their natural power will survive. Luckily, I wasn’t my Brother, so I dived. So, reckless me dived into the lake recklessly. It was really hard breathing without my amulet. I sank while experiencing for the first time in my life what it felt to drown. My heart was beating faster and faster as if it was about to burst! I wanted oxygen. No. I needed oxygen! I looked around at the dark green weeds and corals. Something must be helpful! Frantically I kicked upwards. I was nearly at the surface. Any moment now! But I never reached the surface.

Something was dragging me, down under…. I wriggled and kicked, but it was no use. I could feel my eyes drooping, my body getting heavier and heavier….

Suddenly I felt myself connect with something. Something hard and small had touched me, and the moment it did, I felt a burst of energy. I could breathe! I gasped in great gulps of air, (or water, whatever.)turning around. I knew who it was before looking at her. It was Piperine! I summoned all my willpower. Bam! Piperine was knocked clean off her feet with the force of a wave. I couldn’t help but grin. “Why, you little!’ Piperine screeched in my mind. She was sending me mind speak. I sent one back, still grinning. Anger blazed in her eyes as I caught a glimpse of amulets in her pack before Piperine zipped it close. But there was one amulet she hadn’t put inside her pack. I stared at her. She was wearing my amulet! I snatched at it trying and failing to get it off her neck. She whirled around, grabbed at so, reaching inside her pack and after holding it tightly in her hands, closed her eyes. What was she trying to do? Maybe that was her sign of giving up. I smirked. I knew it. Told you! No one could resist a glare from my beautiful face! I was about to pry my amulet off her neck when I heard a commotion behind me. A school of fish and sharks were heading in my direction! I soon realised she had been holding onto an animal genie’s amulet. ‘Thinkers and stealers always win. You should have been on my side.’ Piperines voice rung in my head. I glared and closed my eyes, waiting for the attack to come. But it never came. Instead, I heard a terrified scream behind me. The creatures were attacking Piperine! One shark pushed Piperine’s pack and my amulet. I rummaged in her pack and found just the thing I needed; a banishment potion. I opened the cap in Piperine’s direction, making the water let the potion glide towards her. As soon as the potion touched her, she disappeared in a flash of light. Leaving only bubbles behind.

I summoned some force and let the water push me back into the surface. I was dry even though I had been in the water. Water genies are like that. I smiled, carrying the pack. Maybe everything would turn back to normal at school. Maybe even for me and my brother.

The End