Sarah arrived back at Professor Thorn’s classroom minutes before Rosemary’s private lesson finished. Rosemary felt a lot more confident on her own than she did before the lesson, enough to eat dinner with friends her own age rather than with her seventh-year friends. She was happy to have a chance to play catch-up with Lilith, Samantha, and Mika — and even to talk with Ricky, Tom, and Jesse again. She also felt confident going around on her own within the confines of Hemlock Tower. Still, everywhere else, Sarah still insisted on accompanying Rosemary.

  The next day, Rosemary had another lesson with Professor Thorn at the same time. Again, he cast the capture spell on Rosemary, who diverted it by forming an energy ball. This time, however, he told her to not yet throw the ball at the gong. Instead, he cast the capture spell another two times, and each time Rosemary added to the energy in the ball. When she finally did throw it, the gong rang louder than it had in the previous lesson. The whole process was repeated until Rosemary could concentrate five castings into one ball. Professor Thorn explained to her that if she threw a ball like this at her assailant, it would knock him out.

  After this lesson, the Professor assured Sarah that Rosemary no longer needed a constant escort around school. Sarah still accompanied Rosemary from the classroom to her check-in at the infirmary — but after that, she let her be on her own.

  The next day, there was no private lesson with Professor Thorn, as Rosemary had her regular classes to attend — and he had his own regular classes to teach. Of course, Professor Thorn insisted that three or four more private lessons were still needed for Rosemary’s safety, but that they were not as urgent as the first two — and as such, they could wait until it was again the weekend.

  Things were going well in Rosemary’s other classes too. The first Tuesday of the month, in Ouranourgy class, Professor Feng announced that there were specialists visiting Misty Peaks to administer the Broomstick Certification Exam, and that any student who passed the test would be licensed to buy a regular flying broomstick free of the special features and restrictions of the instructional grade ones. She introduced Mr. Windward, one of the visiting specialists, and explained that each class, she would be calling the names of a few students, and that those students were to place their broomsticks in their lockers and follow Mr. Windward to the testing area. As their last names were close to the beginning of the alphabet, and Professor Feng saw no reason to defer them, both Rosemary and Lilith were part of the first group that was called — Scott Ashford and Tina Baker being the other two.

  Mr. Windward escorted the four selected students to the Northern Enclosure, a vast walled area north of the rest of the school. Just north of Lumière Tower, a tent was set up where he instructed the selected students to wait for their turn to be tested.

  As she waited her turn, Rosemary felt the adrenaline pulse into her system. While Scott and Tina were being tested, she distracted herself by chatting with Lilith — but when it finally was Lilith’s turn, she was left with only Scott and Tina, whom she hardly knew. They still assured her that she had nothing to worry about.

  “It really isn’t that hard,” said Scott, “and you’re one of Feng’s top students! You’ve really got nothing to worry about.”

  “That’s right,” said Tina. “You’ll do great.”

  Nonetheless, Rosemary’s heart was beating in her chest when Mr. Windward finally came into the tent with Lilith and called Rosemary’s name.

  She was still jittering when Mr. Windward handed her the testing broom in front of the panel of three other specialists. But as soon as she was in the air, she had the instructions from Madam Crane, the chair of the panel, to distract her from her worries. Even though Madam Crane was seated at a table on the ground, Rosemary could hear her voice as clearly as though she were right with her on the broomstick several yards in the air. As she flew through the air, through hoops and around obstacles, her anxiety became less intense. Still, only after she landed and Madam Crane informed her that she had passed the test was Rosemary finally calm.

  * * *

  That afternoon, after lunch, was Warding Basics with Professor Thorn — not a private lesson, but the regular class with the rest of Professor Hathaway’s homeroom. After that, she went to the infirmary for another check-in. When she finally got back to the Common Room after her stop by the infirmary, she saw Lilith in a spinning embrace with one of the fourth-year boys that she had seen before but never spoken to. She walked up to Lilith, somewhat confused, but wishing to speak to her.

  “Oh,” said Lilith, as soon as she was on the ground, “this is my brother, Andrew. Andrew, meet Rosemary Corbin.”

  “Nice to meet you,” said Rosemary, extending her hand.

  “And nice to meet you,” said Andrew, shaking Rosemary’s hand.

  “Rosemary was all worried before the test,” said Lilith.

  “Why?” asked Andrew. “Wasn’t she ready?”

  “Oh of course she was,” said Lilith. “She just gets that way sometimes — worried.”

  “So I take it she passed,” he said.

  “Of course!” said Lilith.

  “Well, congratulations on your broomstick certification,” said Andrew.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “It’s been a while since I saw my sister,” Rosemary said to Lilith, as soon as Andrew had gone off to hang out with his friends and she and Lilith were seated.

  “How old is she?” asked Lilith.

  “A grade behind me,” said Rosemary.

  “So she’ll be here next year,” said Lilith.

  “That depends,” said Rosemary, morosely. “Only if she’s a witch.”

  “Oh yeah,” said Lilith. “Your family are mundies. But hey, her older sis is a witch, so maybe she is too!”

  “Maybe,” responded Rosemary with a half-smile. “Anyway — I guess that tonight when I speak to my parents, I’ll see if they can bring her to the mirror.”

  “That sounds like a plan,” said Lilith. “So your parents know about your change?”

  “Not really,” answered Rosemary, glumly. “But they’ve been worried about me ever since they heard of what happened last weekend, so I got to call them — which means that I’m going to have to dress as a boy when I do.”

  “Or, you could tell them about your change,” suggested Lilith.

  “Yeah,” Rosemary smiled wryly. “If I want to get in trouble with them.”

  “Maybe they’ll surprise you,” said Lilith. “But yeah, if you’re not sure, then maybe hold off on that for a bit and come up with a plan what to do if they don’t take it well.”

  “Like what?” asked Rosemary.

  “I’ll get the guys together and we can talk about it,” Lilith offered. As she said it, Rosemary could see her start to glow with a peculiar aura.

  “What’s that glow around you?” asked Rosemary.

  “Excuse me?” asked Lilith.

  “You have this silver glow around you.”

  “Oh this?” asked Lilith, as the aura began to slowly fade. “I’m not sure. We should ask Professor Hathaway about it tomorrow at homeroom. But let’s right now talk about you. It’ll take at least a few days to come up with a plan. Probably more. So tonight will you be OK talking to your folks looking like your — old self?”

  “I suppose I don’t have a choice,” said Rosemary. “It’s going to suck, though. For one thing, I’m not used to dressing like that anymore. And if someone sees me on the way to the booth dressed like that — they could really get the wrong idea.”

  “Well,” said Lilith, “that is something that I think we can do something about.”

  * * *

  Rosemary and Lilith talked for a bit and came up with a plan.

  After dinner, Rosemary went to her new dorm room that she shared with Sarah and quickly changed into the very outfit that she had worn on her first day out as her true self before Halloween — the outfit that included a pink tracksuit and a blue T-shirt with a large, sparkly rainbow printed on it. Then, she got out her satchel. After making sure that it was empty, she put in it both liquid hairdressing spell vials — both the one for a boy’s hairdo and the one for a girl’s hairdo. With those vials and nothing else in her satchel, she went out the door.

  As soon as she got to the correspondence-mirror booth, she closed and locked the door. Then, she took out the vial for the boy’s hairdo and dripped one drop from it onto the top of her head. Within moments she had, again, the short hair of a boy. She put the vial back in the satchel. She then took off her tracksuit jacket and put that in her satchel as well.

  After that, she took out her orbis card. “I hope this works,” she said to herself, before tapping the card on the orbis. She then put the card up as the mirror glowed red. As soon as the mirror’s glow turned green, indicating that it was ready for her to select her call destination, she said: “Naphtali and Miriam Corbin, Oak Ridge, Tennessee.” Moments later in the mirror, she saw not her own face, but those of her parents.

  “When did you get that shirt?” her mother asked as soon as everyone was through exchanging greetings.

  “Oh this?” said Rosemary. “Amy and her friend Lacy gave it to me.”

  “You mean Amy from the bookstore?” asked her mother.

  “Yes,” answered Rosemary.

  “Looks a bit girly,” said her mother, “but then again, you never were into manly things like other boys.”

  “Are you enjoying school?” her father asked.

  “Yes,” assured Rosemary.

  “And are the other kids treating you well,” asked her mother, “even when you wear shirts like that?”

  “Yes,” said Rosemary. “Most of them are. Of course, there’s one girl, Melissa Langford, who’s mean about it. But she was mean even before that. And when she gave me trouble, my friends stepped in and didn’t let her. Especially Tom.”

  “You mean your roommate, Tom?” asked her mother.

  “Yes,” answered Rosemary, deliberately neglecting to mention that Tom was no longer her roommate.

  “By the way,” said her father, “we are a bit concerned because we heard that there was an attempt to abduct you.”

  “There was,” said Rosemary, “but they’ve done things in my dorm to make sure it doesn’t happen again. And I’m getting special lessons from Professor Thorn on how to protect myself.”

  “That’s good,” said her mother, “but we’re your parents, and we’re still going to worry when things happen to you.”

  “I know,” said Rosemary. “But I like it here — a lot. I used to hate school, but I don’t hate it anymore.”

  “That’s important to know,” acknowledged her mom.

  “Is Serena there?” asked Rosemary.

  “No,” said her mother. “She’s at a friend’s.”

  “How is she?”

  “She’s doing very well,” said her mother.

  “And we all love you very much,” said her father.

  “Oh,” said her mother. “What do you say that instead of going back to Oak Ridge during winter break, we instead go up and visit Rafi and Elisa?”

  It wasn’t super-common for Rosemary to see Uncle Rafi, Aunt Elisa, and their children — but it was still more common than it had been until they had moved to the United States about five years before. Rosemary’s parents had made that same move a few years before she was born, and as such she didn’t see relatives all that often. Even her grandparents weren’t able to visit every year.

  “Okay,” said Rosemary, smiling.

  “Wonderful,” said her father. “It’ll be great!”

  “Yes it will,” said Rosemary. “Oh by the way, I passed my Broomstick Certification today.”

  “Broomstick certification?” asked her father.

  “Yes,” said Rosemary. “It’s a test we have to take in order to be allowed to buy regular broomsticks. I mean, regular flying ones. The one I got before school was specially designed for instruction.”

  “How are they different?” asked her father.

  “Well,” explained Rosemary, “they have this dial so that as you learn you can go from using words to command the broom all the way to commanding it with your mind. And I think they can only fly in certain places meant for teaching.”

  “And the regular ones can fly anywhere?” asked her father.

  “Yes,” affirmed Rosemary.

  “Where do you get them?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” said Rosemary.

  “Isn’t there a danger that someone will see you?” asked her mother.

  “They teach us how to make sure that doesn’t happen,” explained Rosemary.

  They continued talking for a few more minutes. Then, they all exchanged their “I love you”s, said their goodbyes, and ended the call. Rosemary got the tracksuit jacket out of her bag and put it back on. Then, she took out the liquid hairdressing spell vial for the girl’s hairdo and dripped a drop of that on her head. She waited just a moment for the hair to grow out again. As soon as that was done, she put the vial back in her satchel, unlatched and opened the door, and left the booth.