Jaci Dawn

Everyone stared at Ella’s hand writing. Deke broke the long silence.
“So, my wand is legit?”
Richard looked up at him and smiled. “Yes, Mr. Smith. Your wand is yours. It is not the stolen talisman.”
Aric nudged him hard with his shoulder. “Way to go, Deke.”
Ella punched him. “Twerp.”
He smiled as he reached out and picked up the wand. “You guys don’t know how terrified I was that this was stolen. I was so scared.”
“You should’ve trusted us,” Gran growled.
“At least been open,” Billie grumbled.
Ella looked over at them. “Guys. Don’t be mean. We’re all scared.”
“Says Miss Brainiac who never believed in magic, anyway,” Billie spat out. “How scared can you be when you think it’s all logic and programming?”
Ella’s jaw fell open. She blinked.
Gran stood up and nodded, “I’m with Billie. Trust is a big deal. Ella, you’re just so stupefyingly naïve. Twerp could have saved us a lot of pain.”
“How?” Dish snapped. “What if he’d told us? It wouldn’t have changed anything. We were still trapped in a house with white coats coming after us. Deacon figured out a way to save us. He transported all the attic to the cabin, and then to here. The talisman is still in there, somewhere. And, just a point – we haven’t used magic since we met Kitsune. Ella has been a good leader, not a hot head like some people I could mention.”
Kyle coughed. “Guys. I’m with Dish here. Nothing changes how we got here. It’s not Deke’s fault. He’s just a dude who found something and when everything came down, he got scared. I have secrets, too, and I never told anybody.”
All eyes turned to him. He blinked. “Not like a talis- whatever. I just moved here, remember? I… Um. I’ve been lonely. I mean, Deke and Aric are nice, but some other kids haven’t been. And there was this old lady down the street who was really nice. She gave me flowers to take to my mom. And one day she handed me something that wasn’t just a flower. She gave me a wand. I thought it was a mistake and I tried to give it back to her. She just smiled and said, ‘Troubled times, young man. You think about what you want.’”
“So you just took a supposed magic wand from some old lady?” Gran was incredulous.
“Cool,” Dylan said.
“Not just any old lady,” Kyle replied. “Miss Sophy. I used it to make myself a great big bear. I thought when I was a bear that I’d lost the wand, but when I crossed into this house, it was in my hoodie pocket.” He pulled out an ornately carved wand with a crystal tip
“They arrested her,” Aric added. “Deke and I saw it.”
Richard and Natalie exchanged glances. “They thought the arrested her. They arrested her pet canary. She is at one of our other safe houses.” Richard held out his hand, “May I look at your wand, Kyle?”
“Sure.” Kyle held it out, but when Richard reached for it, it pushed him away.
“Interesting,” he said.
“May I?” Natalie held out her hand. The same thing happened.
“Whoa. What if I look at it?” Deke asked.
Again, and again, the wand refused to go to another person. Kyle finally shrugged and put it back into his pocket. “Guess it doesn’t like anyone else.” He looked abashed.
Richard was stroking his chin. “I shall have to ask Miss Sophy what she did with this particular wand. She’s a gifted wand maker, but this one is certainly unique in that it refuses to be handled by anyone other than you, Kyle. No one can steal that from you.” He smiled at the awkward teen.
Gran was trying out the different wands, not paying a lot of attention to anyone else, when suddenly he grew a moustache and beard. Billie happened to look over at him as it happened, and she screamed. Everyone looked.
“Your face!”
Gran jumped, turned beet red, and immediately reversed the spell. “Um, I found the magic one.”
Natalie put her head down between her hands. “Teenagers.”
Richard guffawed. The rest of the room soon joined him, including Gran. The only one who did not laugh was Horace, as he was perched on the back of a chair, trying to sleep. He opened his eyes and gave everyone a baleful stare, which set them off again.
Ella leaned back against the sofa, holding her sides. It felt so good to just laugh and be relaxed! She glanced over at Dish, who had better color this morning and who was engaged in a little game of boyish fisticuffs with Gran, laughing all the while.
They finally gained control of their outburst, and it was suggested that they bring the items out from under the sofa, one at a time, restore them to size, and examine them to see if something was hidden somewhere. They were going with the theory that whatever had been stolen, had been hidden in the Peabody attic, and so everything had to be looked at.
The stacked chairs were first, but were quickly eliminated. They were prank chairs used during parties at the Peabody house. The holiday decorations were also dismissed. The items were sent back to the Peabody attic as they worked. The first trunk enlarged and opened, held old lace, handkerchiefs, linen tablecloths, baby clothes, an ornate box of fine silver, an old sable coat, a mink shawl, and two well-preserved black dresses in the 19th Century Victorian style, as well as their petticoats, and one gentleman’s suit, including a beaver top hat.
“Oh, Mom always brings these out for our big feasts,” Ella exclaimed. “Fine china, the best silver, napkin rings, tablecloths, placemats…” she fondly refolded each item after it was inspected. “The baby clothes were grandfather’s.”
“It’s all sentimental items,” Natalie muttered. “Nothing magic.”
“The trunk itself must be magic.” Dylan ran his hand along the contours of the trunk. “How old is it, El?”
She glanced up from the baby clothes she was refolding. “It’s been in the family a couple hundred years, at least.”
Richard made sipped on a cup of tea. “The spell on the trunk is most likely what included it in Deacon’s spell cast.”
Ella set the hat down on the top, and looked at it. “Yes, definitely. I never thought about it before, but Mom always packed it without a care as to how things stacked, and yet the lid always goes down, and nothing is every squashed. You’d think I would have noticed that before.”
The second trunk was slightly more interesting, filled as it was, with all the stage props from Mr. Peabody’s youthful acting career, and some of his early medical implements. Nothing jumped out as new or so unusual that it fit the definition of what they were looking for. The third trunk held costumes and some larger props, and was – yet, again, dismissed.
“That’s it, I guess,” Ella said, flopping down on the sofa next to Billie, who still looked grim.
“No, there are two more items.” Deke retrieved the sewing mannequin and the free-standing mirror.
“I’ve never seen that mirror before,” Ella frowned. “Have you, Aric?”
“It was in the attic.” He shrugged. He was bored. “Right, Gran? Deke?”
“Right.”
“Huh. Guess I don’t get up there much. What’s the body-thing for?”
Billie rolled her eyes. “Don’t you know? It’s a costume-fitting model.”
“It’s for sewing,” Madison volunteered. “My mom sews – she likes working with her hands. You can adjust the bust and waist, and you hand the blouse or skirt over it to make adjustments.”
“Cool.” Deke eyed the mannequin.
“The mirror is certainly beautiful.“ Natalie ran her hands over the ornate, dark wood. She fingered the carvings. “Such detail in the flowers.”
Billie stood and looked at herself in the reflection. “Looks like me.” She shrugged.
Natalie looked at herself on the opposite side. “I don’t look like a rabbit, thankfully.”
Deke sighed and sat down next to Ella. “Guess there wasn’t anything special in your attic.”
“It’s all special, Twerp.” Ella got up and walked over to look at her self in the mirror.
Ella walked around the mirror and looked at the other side. She gasped. “That’s another place! Like I’m looking into an office!. Gran and Dish tried to peer over her shoulder, but all they saw was their own reflection.
“Psyche!” they said, joshing her.
“No! I’m not joking! It’s an office. Richard, can you see it?”
Richard and Natalie, and everyone else took turns looking, but noone could see the other place. Ella had to pull herself away from it. “Can we make it little again? I don’t want to look at it right now. I feel sick.”