“We each take a turn spinning,” he says, rubbing his hands together eagerly. “When it points to a member of the opposite sex — hoobah!”
“But there’s more of us than them,” I object.
“So?” he frowns.
“Well… I mean… at least two of them are going to have to kiss more than one guy.” Worried about Reni kissing anyone other than me.
Frank laughs. “That’s how it works, moron. We all get plenty of action.”
“Only simple kisses,” Mary interjects. “No groping or tongues, not unless both want to. Clear?”
“Of course, of course!” Frank says quickly, leering.
“We mean it,” Reni says. “If one of you breaks the rules, that’s it, end of game, you all miss out.”
“OK,” Frank sighs, rolling his eyes. “We get the message. Now, who first?”
“It’s Grubbs’s party,” Loch says.
“That’s OK,” I cough, getting cold feet. “I think Bill-E should have first shot.”
“I second the motion,” Bill-E laughs, more at ease than I’ve seen him in a long time. He grabs the bottle and spins it madly. It turns… turns… turns… like it’s never going to stop. But finally it does — and it’s pointing at Reni.
Bill-E grins. “Sorry, amigo, but the bottle decides.”
I feel my temper rise as Bill-E and Reni meet in the middle of the circle to a series of whistles and crude remarks. The bile that’s been threatening to bubble over all night forces its way up my throat. But then Reni pecks him on the lips and they both sit down. I relax, swallow the vomit and grin greenly.
The game continues. Great laughs when one of the boys spins and it ends up pointing to another boy. Lewd giggles when that happens to the girls. Most of the kisses are like the first, quick pecks. But a few are stronger, where the pair are attracted to each other — Robbie and Mary, Leon and Nina Duffy.
I get to kiss Mary twice, Nina three times (“This is getting serious,” she says jokingly), before Reni finally spins and the bottle ends up pointing at me.
“Whoo-hoo!” Frank chortles.
“Touchdown!” Charlie cries.
“Easy, tiger,” Loch grunts, smiling tightly.
Reni and I stand and walk towards each other. Reni nudges the bottle out of the way with her left foot. We smile shakily. Then kiss.
Her lips are drier than I thought they’d be, but nice. My hands slide around her back and I lock my fingers together, careful not to hug too hard in case I crack her ribs. The kiss continues. Her lips move and mine follow — this is easier than I imagined. I don’t know why I was so nervous before. I could get used to this very quickly!
Lots of cheers and whistles. I drown them out, eyes closed, feeling so happy I could burst. A warm fire grows within me, burning away the feeling of sickness, spreading rapidly through my body, squeezing out of my pores like steam. I lose myself in the hot, hypnotic kiss, unaware of anything else.
Then gasps of amazement wreck the moment.
“What the–?”
“How the hell–?”
“Oh my god!”
My right eye opens an angry fraction — what’s everybody getting so worked up about? Then I spot it. The bottle, spinning again, but not on the ground — about a metre above the floor, suspended in mid-air, floating upwards as it spins.
The bottle rises smoothly. Everyone (with a single exception) is on their feet, backing away, alarmed. Reni realises something’s wrong. She breaks off the kiss, takes a step back, sees the bottle. Her expression freezes.
Bill-E’s the only one not moving. He’s staring at the bottle intently. I think for a second that he’s controlling it, using one of Dervish’s spells. I huff myself up to roar at him. But then I catch the alarm in his eyes and realise he’s trying to stop it. I’m the one making it rise.
The bottle reaches a point about half a metre above my head, then levels out. It’s spinning faster than ever, making a small whirring sound.
“What’s happening?” Robbie shouts. “Grubbs, are you doing this?”
I don’t answer. My gaze is on the bottle. Although it’s spinning too quickly for the eye to follow, I find that I can slow the action down. The world seems to go into slow-motion around me. People’s mouths move infinitely slowly. Words reach me as though dragged through a pipe from a long way away.
“Grrruuuubbbssssss! Whaaaaattttt’sss… goooiiiinnngggg oooonnnn?”
The bottle explodes and the world speeds up again. Shards of glass shoot at me, Reni, everybody in the room, at our faces and eyes. Instinctively I bark a word of magic. I don’t know what the word is or where it comes from. But it freezes the shards in place. They hang in mid-air, dozens of tiny pieces of glass, pointing at us like a flight of mini arrows.
“No way!” somebody shouts, more excited than afraid. My friends start lowering the hands which they’d instinctively raised to protect themselves.
Bill-E stares at the bits of glass — then at me. His eyebrows are furrowed. He knows this is magic but he can’t understand how I’m doing it. He saw me do more than this in Slawter, but that enclosed area was crackling with magical energy. Many of us could perform amazing feats there. In the real, normal world, he thought – like Dervish – that I had all the magical ability of a duck.
“Grubbs,” Reni says uncertainly, touching my right elbow. “Are you OK?”
“Yes,” I whisper.
“Do you know what’s happening?” Scared, looking for reassurance, gazing at the shard nearest her face, worried it might shoot forward again.
“Yes,” I smile. Without knowing how I’m doing any of this, I wave a hand at the glass and several pieces turn into flower petals, which drop slowly, beautifully to the floor. I wave my other hand and more shards turns into butterflies. They flap away, zoning in on the light overhead. One last wave and the rest of the glass is transformed, a mixture of butterflies and flowers.
I grab one of the falling petals and present it to Reni. “For you, my lady.”
Then everybody’s cheering, clapping my back, grabbing for petals and butterflies, demanding to know how the trick was performed.
Only Bill-E knows there was no trick. Only he realises this was real magic. And only he can possibly understand and share in my sense of bewilderment and gut-stabbing fear.
→ Later. Everyone but Bill-E and me has gone to bed. I’m at the door of my room, still holding a petal. Bill-E’s facing me, eyes steady and serious. “How’d you do it?”
“Dervish has been teaching me.”
Bill-E shakes his head. “Bull. Dervish told me you don’t want to learn magic. He’s cool with that. But even if he was teaching you, that’s way beyond anything I’ve ever seen him do. Apart from in Slawter.” He looks around nervously. “Are demons breaking through? Did you tap into their power?”
“No. We’re safe here. Demons can’t cross in Carcery Vale.”
“Then how did you do it?” he presses. “Where did the magic come from?”
I shake my head miserably. “Forget about it. This doesn’t concern you.”
“I might be able to help if I–”
“I told you it’s none of your business!” Bill-E looks hurt and I feel sorry immediately. “It’s no big deal,” I lie. “This has been building up