Faire Exchange: Chapter 1

Jeremy learns magic is real.

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Jeremy had never believed in magic. He'd stopped believing in Santa and the Easter Bunny when he was five, never made wishes on his birthday cake, and never saw a magician as anything other than a character he could play in a video game. Now that he was ten, he figured he was too old to even try believing in stuff like that.

By the end of the day, he would wish he'd never heard of magic.

This was the day the new exchange student arrived.

Everyone in fifth grade was buzzing. All they knew for sure was that the new kid would be a girl from somewhere far away. France? Russia? Zimbabwe? Who knows? Everybody had their own questions they wanted to ask her.  Gregg had wondered what her favorite food would be. Marcus wondered what her country's music was like. Jeremy wondered why she started at such an odd time—three months into the school year.

Mrs. Horn had said a week ago that she knew as much as they did.

In just a few minutes, they were going to find out.

The bell rang, and everyone took their seats. But something was off.

"Where's Mrs. Horn?" someone said. She was usually here long before the bell.

There was murmuring and whispering, but then the door opened, and everyone dropped silent.

Mrs. Horn walked in. She said nothing, only gave the kids a nod and a smile on her way to the board.

A girl walked in behind her.

She had bright purple hair and ears that pointed up like knives. A green cloak hung off her shoulders, and golden fringe lined the skirt and sleeves of her dress. Jeweled bracelets jangled on her wrists.

Was this somebody's idea of a prank? Wasn't she a week or so late for Halloween? Jeremy knew she'd be different, that she wouldn't necessarily look or act like everybody else. But just what was she an exchange student from? An anime convention?

The girl stood with dour eyes and crossed arms in front of the class while Mrs. Horn wrote her name on the whiteboard.

—Tsarina Algruent.

"Good morning, boys and girls," Mrs. Horn said. Her voice shook a little as she spoke. She must have felt the same surprise as everyone else. "I'd like you to meet your new classmate, Miss Tsarina Algruent." She pronounced the first name with the ts and the last name without the u.

Something in what Mrs. Horn said put a twitch in Tsarina's brow.

"Now I know she… looks a little different," Mrs. Horn said, "but I know you'll help her feel as welcome as any of your other friends. Do you have anything you'd like to say, Miss Tsarina?"

"Yes," Tsarina growled. "I am no Miss. My father is the Duke of Frangont and respected all over the realm of Faerie. You will address me as Lady Rina, or you will address me not at all."

Everyone stared. No one had ever spoken to Mrs. Horn that way. She was such a kind teacher that no one ever wanted to.

Mrs. Horn went quiet for a moment. "All right, Lady Rina. I'll just remind you that's not how we speak to each other in my class. Do you have anything else you'd like to tell us about yourself?"

"I have nothing to say to any of you."

Jeremy looked around, and everyone was clearly seeing what he was seeing, hearing what he was hearing. Hardly anyone moved.

Mrs. Horn said, "In that case, you can go sit down now, Lady Rina. You can put your… cloak… in locker number twenty. You'll be sitting behind Jeremy Vlachos."

Jeremy hunched his head down. That desk had been empty since school started, and now this stuck-up ray of sunshine who was hanging a cloak in her locker was going to be there every single day. With a girl like that around, he wasn't going to have a moment's peace.

She lowered herself into the desk.

"All right," Mrs. Horn said. "Since you're new here, Lady Rina, you don't have to worry about any work today. You can sit and watch and get a feel for everything. Now, time to start Math. Everybody turn your textbooks to page 78…"

And Mrs. Horn talked about fractions and decimals, while she and everyone else tried to pretend there wasn't a girl in the room pretending to be some kind of elf princess.

After five minutes, everyone knew she wasn't pretending.

That was when Martin Caesar screamed.

He'd jumped out of his seat and begun jumping around, pulling at something on his nose. At first, the other kids chuckled. Jeremy's heart sank listening to it. Martin was his friend, and frankly pretty chubby, and now everybody was laughing at the fat black kid dancing around.

"What is going on?" Mrs. Horn marched across the room. "Martin, please calm down."

"It… won't… come… off!"

Rina was the only one not watching, or even laughing. But she did smirk.

And her hand was glowing, almost like a hot stove. Was anybody else seeing this?

Mrs. Horn managed to get Martin to stand still and pull his arms away.

A daisy had grown on the tip of his nose.

Mrs. Horn tugged at it, and Martin screamed. "Ahh! It hurts! It hurts!"

"But how did it—?"

"That'll teach you to touch my ear, you fat pooka," Rina said.

Jeremy tensed up with anger. He didn't know what a pooka was, but Rina had no right to talk about his friend like that.

"Rina…?" Mrs. Horn stood with her hands on Martin's shoulders. The poor guy had tears in his eyes. "You did this?"

"Excuse me?" Rina said, twisting around. "What did I say?"

"I'm sorry, Lady Rina. I don't know how you got it on there, but you're taking it off and apologizing to Martin."

"No." Rina's fingers began to glow hotter.

Mrs. Horn looked like a deer in headlights.

"Martin," she said, "I think you better go to the nurse's office. Jeremy, you want to walk him down there?"

"Yeah, sure." Jeremy sprang out of his desk, took Martin straight out the door. The sooner the two of them got away from Lady Rina, the better.

Poor Martin. He had to keep both hands on his nose to keep anybody in the hall from seeing the daisy. His tears smeared all over his pudgy cheeks.

"Man… all I did was touch her ear," Martin said. "I didn't think it was real. What if this never comes off?"

"It'll be okay," Jeremy said. "There's gotta be a way to get rid of it." He ran his finger on the petals. "Geez, did it actually grow on?"

Martin nodded. "I can even feel the leaves when you touch them."

"So she's actually magic. I can't believe it. Magic's actually real." As he stepped through the hall, Jeremy realized he now lived in a very different world than he did this morning. "You think the principal knew she could do that?"

"How should I know?" Martin said.

"But if he did, maybe he's got a way to reverse it. Come on, we're going to his office."

"But we're supposed to go to the nurse, remember?"

"Yeah, but if Mrs. Horn doesn't know anything about what's going on, what do you think the odds are the nurse doesn't either? But Mr. Newell's gotta know."

So Jeremy steered Martin to the principal's office. The receptionist, Ms. Fried, was typing on her computer, with a second grade boy seated on the bench beside Principal Newell's door. Whatever that kid had done, it couldn't have been as big a doozy as this.

Ms. Fried looked away from her computer. "May I help you boys?"

"Yeah, we need to speak to Mr. Newell right now. Show her, Martin."

With a great deal of hesitation, Martin lowered his hands, showing Mrs. Fried the flower on his nose.

"This… looks more like a job for the nurse."

"No, we really need to speak to Mr. Newell," Jeremy said. "That new exchange student did this."

Ms. Fried's neck stiffened. She stood up, stepped out from behind her desk, and slipped into Mr. Newell's office.

She came out a moment later with Mr. Newell. Another second grader walked out behind him, and sat down next to the first one. The two glowered at each other.

"Don't tell me there's already been an incident," Mr. Newell said. "Where is she?"

"Back in class, sir," Jeremy said. "Here's what she did to Martin."

"Okay, but why come to me? Why not the nurse?"

"Because he thinks you might know a little more about what's going on than we do," Martin said. "Sir."

"I appreciate the vote of confidence, but I haven't exactly been provided with a lot of information, either. If they'd just taken their time instead of blindsiding us—"

"Excuse me, sir," Jeremy said, "but who's They?"

"The people behind this exchange program, that's who. Whoever it was in Faerieland that suddenly started sending kids to us, and oh yeah, revealed they exist. The superintendent only told me on Thursday, he found out Wednesday, and even the President of the United States got it sprung on him Friday before last. The elves, or whoever they are, just dropped this in our lap, and I've been feeling like a chicken with my head cut off. And she did that?"

Martin nodded.

"There's another problem," Mr. Newell said. "They gave me a packet about her—and all about her powers—and they didn't give us any clue how to deal with it."

"But there's gotta be something!" Martin said. "I can't spend the rest of my life with a flower on my face!"

"No… No you can't." Mr. Newell pulled out his phone. "Paula, do you have the number they gave us?"

"Sure, right here." Ms. Fried handed him a piece of paper.

He ticked the number into his cell, sent the call, and waited.

"Hi, this is Sherman Newell, at Northport Elementary. I'm calling in regards to Tsarina Algruent, and I was hoping someone there could help. She seems to have… done something to one of my students." He listened. "He has a flower growing on his nose.

"I'm not sure. What do you mean by 'bangle'?

"No, we never received anything like that. Believe me, I checked."

Jeremy and Martin listened as well as they could. Was this 'bangle' something that could help?

Mr. Newell nodded along. "All right… All right. Thank you. Now, what do you need me to do?" He furrowed his eyebrow. "Really? If you say so." He stuck out his arm and touched his finger to the flower on Martin's nose. "Done. Now, what do I—"

A bolt of lightning shot from his phone, up one arm, down the other, to the tip of his finger, all in one instant. Mr. Newell stood there in silent shock.

The flower dropped off of Martin's nose, into the palm of his hand. He started rubbing his nose. "Oh, thank you thank you thank you."

"I—it worked. Appreciate it." Mr. Newell hung up his phone, then wiped his forehead with his sleeve and checked the screen on his phone. "Not even damaged…"

"Mr. Newell," Jeremy said, "Who was that you were just talking to?"

"Someone at the home where Tsarina's staying. They rented a house on the bluff, and they have kids of theirs at schools all over town."

"A whole house?" Jeremy pictured it overgrown with vines and dragons. "Okay, so… what's the bangle they were talking about?"

"It's an armband we were supposed to get along with Tsarina's packet. If we had one, we'd be able to suppress her magic if she got in trouble."

"And you didn't get one?"

"It must have gotten lost in the shipment. I'm very sorry. On the bright side, they're working on getting us a new one."

"When'll it get here?" Martin hadn't taken his eyes off the flower.

"Not for another few days. I'm sorry. I know this is unacceptable. They didn't sound happy with this either. Until then, I guess just stay on Tsarina's good side."

The boys both sighed. "All right," Martin said.

"Thanks for the help, Mr. Newell," Jeremy said.

"Any time." On his way back into his office, Mr. Newell glanced at the two second-graders on the bench. They both gave a start, and one squealed, "We'll be good!"

Jeremy and Martin headed back to class. Martin still carried the flower in his hand. Already it was starting to wither. "What're you going to do with that?" Jeremy said.

"I don't know," Martin said. "I mean… It still feels like a part of me. What am I supposed to do with it?"

Jeremy had no idea. He'd never had plant life grow off of him before. Maybe bury it somewhere? Right now the best he could think was to hope Mr. Newell was right, and all they had to do was not make Rina angry. None of them had ever dealt with an elf girl before. No one had. Maybe—hopefully—they just needed to get to know her a little better.

They made it back to class and found it full of the same thick tension as before. Mrs. Horn was puttering on about Math, staring at the board, while Rina was making a paper bird fly around the room.

So on second thought, maybe they'd gotten to know exactly what they needed to.