(Ethan, POV)
The afternoon was strangely quiet.
I was sitting under the exact same tree that had practically become my personal spot at the Salvatore School, my back resting against the thick trunk while a cool breeze rustled the leaves above us. At this point, I was seriously considering carving my name into it.
Ethan's Tree.
It actually had a nice ring to it.
Penelope was sitting next to me on the grass, legs crossed, with an ancient leather-bound grimoire open on her lap. A few loose pages were scattered around her, covered in symbols, notes, and words weird enough to make me suspect she was secretly trying to summon Satan.
Meanwhile, I was staring at a small rock about two meters away.
I raised my right hand toward it.
"Alright..." Penelope said, watching closely. "Again. But this time, stop trying to force it."
I glanced at her sideways. "I'm not forcing anything."
"You have the expression of someone trying to strangle the rock with their mind."
I looked back at my hand. "Maybe the rock deserves it."
Penelope rolled her eyes. "Ethan."
"Fine, fine."
I took a deep breath. That was probably the hardest part of magic for me. It wasn't the spells. It wasn't the pronunciation. It wasn't even understanding where the energy came from. It was the control.
My entire life, whenever I wanted to move something, I used force. If something was heavy, I pushed harder. If someone hit me, I hit back harder. Magic apparently didn't work like that. According to Penelope, the more I tried to impose my physical strength onto it, the more unstable the spell became—which explained the small fire I almost started a few days ago.
I focused my eyes on the rock.
"Phasmatos Motus."
The familiar sensation rushed up my arm—neither heat nor electricity, but something in between, a strange pulse running beneath my skin, gathering in the palm of my hand before extending out toward the rock like an invisible thread.
The rock trembled. It began to rise. A few inches, then more, until it was hovering almost at chest level.
A grin spread across my face. "Now we're talking."
Penelope peeked over her grimoire. "Don't get cocky."
"I'm not getting cocky."
My hand twitched—just a little, but enough for me to feel the invisible thread slip. The rock shot off to the side as if it had been fired from a cannon.
CRACK!
It slammed squarely into the trunk of another tree several meters away, ripping off a chunk of bark before disappearing into the bushes.
Silence.
I stared at the tree. Penelope stared at the tree. Then, she slowly turned her head toward me.
"...You were saying?"
I lowered my hand. "Okay. Maybe I got a tiny bit cocky."
She let out a snort. "Your problem is that you have way too much raw power and zero delicacy."
"That's basically the story of my entire life."
"Yeah, I noticed."
I glanced at her sideways. "You're pretty rude."
"I have to be."
There wasn't much arguing with that.
Penelope turned her attention back to the grimoire and started writing something on one of the loose sheets beside her. I leaned over slightly to get a look. She immediately blocked part of the page with her arm.
"No."
I raised an eyebrow. "No what?"
"No reading over my shoulder."
"I wasn't doing that."
"Ethan, you were literally hovering your head over the paper."
"I was stretching my neck."
"Sure."
I kept watching her for a few more seconds before turning my attention back to the courtyard. A few students were scattered across the lawn in small groups. Some were studying, others were practicing spells, while a group of werewolves further away was playing football.
A few days ago, seeing all of this would have felt completely insane. Now? Somehow, it was starting to feel normal. Which was probably the weirdest part of all.
I looked back at Penelope. She still seemed completely focused on whatever she was writing.
"What are you doing anyway?"
She didn't even look up. "A spell."
"Very insightful."
"A spell I'm creating on my own."
That caught my attention. I shifted a little closer to her. "You can just... create spells?"
"Of course."
I stared at her. "You said that like it's common knowledge."
Penelope finally looked up. "Ethan, spells weren't handed down to witches on stone tablets from the sky. Someone had to make them."
I stayed quiet for a moment. "Point taken."
She gave a smug little smirk before returning to her notes. "Most witches just use existing spells because they're tested, reliable, and have a much lower chance of blowing something up."
I slowly raised my hand. "Speaking from personal experience, blowing things up is surprisingly easy."
"I know. I've seen you practice."
"Ouch."
Penelope ignored me. "But creating a spell from scratch requires understanding how magical intent works, how energy flows, what anchors the spell, what feeds it..."
She tapped the tip of her pen against the paper, hesitating for a second before continuing.
"And I'm working on something... interesting."
I leaned in again to look. This time, she let me. The page was completely covered in circles, runes, patterns that looked like math equations, and several lines written in Latin.
I didn't understand a single thing.
"So, what is this supposed to do?"
Penelope took a deep breath, as if carefully choosing her words. "Technically, it's an amplification spell. A sort of self-sustaining magical resonance."
I blinked. "Right..."
"Every time someone says my name, the spell absorbs that intent—that recognition—and converts a fraction of it into magical energy."
I stared at her.
One second. Two. Three.
"Penelope."
"What?"
"That sounds evil as hell."
Her mouth dropped open in indignation. "It is not evil!"
"Every time someone says your name, you get more powerful?"
"Yes."
"That literally sounds like the origin story of a dark witch."
She shoved my shoulder. "I'm serious!"
"So am I!"
I couldn't hold back a laugh. "Think about it. Ten years from now, I'm gonna hear stories about a terrifying immortal witch sitting on a throne while thousands of people chant 'Penelope Park' to feed her powers."
Penelope narrowed her eyes at me.
I deepened my voice dramatically. "Speak her name... and she shall grow stronger."
"Shut up."
"Fear her name."
"Ethan."
"For with every whisper—"
She smacked my arm with the grimoire.
"Ow!"
I burst out laughing while she tried—and miserably failed—to keep a straight face.
"You're an idiot."
"I'm just saying, that is a deeply suspicious kind of magic."
"It's just a theory!"
"That's exactly what every villain says before the human sacrifices start."
"There won't be any human sacrifices!"
"Not yet."
She punched my arm again.
"Okay! Okay!"
I threw both hands up in surrender, still laughing. Penelope shook her head, but I could see a tiny smile tugging at the corner of her lips.
"For your information, the spell wouldn't steal anything from anyone," she explained. "Names carry intent. Recognition. Identity. I'm just trying to use that as an anchor."
I lowered my hands. "So someone says 'Penelope,' and somehow you feel it?"
"If the spell works correctly."
"From anywhere?"
"In theory."
I looked at her for a few seconds. "...That's actually pretty cool."
"Thank you."
"Still creepy."
The glare shot back instantly.
I smiled innocently. "But cool."
Penelope shook her head again before returning to her grimoire.
I looked toward where the rock had vanished into the bushes. Spell-crafting. Magical bonds. Werewolves. Vampires. Imprints. A few weeks ago, my biggest problem was trying not to break someone's jaw for annoying me at school. Now I was sitting under a tree while a witch casually explained how she planned to turn gossip into magical steroids.
My life had gotten weird as hell.
And somehow, I was starting to like it.
A strange wave of heat began rising in my chest.
At first, I thought it was just the sun hitting differently, but the sky remained overcast and gray, without a single sunbeam in sight.
I rubbed the back of my neck. I was sweating.
"Man, it's hot as hell out here," I said, pulling at the collar of my shirt.
Penelope looked up from her grimoire, frowning. "Hot? Ethan, it's like fifty degrees out. I'm literally wearing a jacket."
"Seriously? Because I feel like I'm sitting inside an oven."
She stared at me for a second, far too serious to be joking. "You don't have a fever, do you?"
Before I could answer, she was already on her knees in front of me, pressing her palm against my forehead.
Her expression changed instantly.
"Ethan. You're burning up. Seriously, what is this?"
"What?"
My own voice sounded distant, like it was coming from somewhere else. The lawn began to spin slowly. I tried to focus on Penelope's face, but the edges of my vision were going dark, as if someone were pulling curtains closed from both sides at once.
"Ethan?"
Her voice didn't sound close anymore.
"Ethan!"
And then, everything went black.
"Someone help me, please!"
Penelope held Ethan's body as best as she could, her arms trembling under the weight, trying to keep him sitting up while shouting for help. The group of werewolves playing football on the far end of the lawn dropped the ball and immediately bolted over.
The first to arrive was the largest of them, dropping to his knees beside her. "What happened?"
"He said he was hot, I went to check, and he's burning up—I don't know what to do—"
The werewolf touched Ethan's forehead and recoiled instantly, as if he had brushed against something blistering hot.
"Shit. He's way too hot. Let's get him inside. Now."
He lifted Ethan off the ground effortlessly and started moving quickly toward the school, Penelope right behind him, practically running to keep pace.
The news spread fast across the grounds. Within minutes, a small group had gathered outside the room where they had laid him down—Lizzie, Josie, Alaric, a few of the werewolves, and Emma, one of the teachers, who had gone in first and shut the door behind her.
Outside, Lizzie paced back and forth. "Does anyone know what this is? He got here like two weeks ago, and now he's suddenly combusting?"
"Maybe it's a wolf thing," one of the bigger guys guessed, crossing his arms. "Like... a phase, or whatever."
"He's not a werewolf," Josie said softly. "He's a witch."
Nobody had an answer to that.
Inside, Emma held her hands hovering over Ethan's chest, eyes closed, whispering something in Latin quiet enough to be nearly inaudible from the hallway. Alaric watched closely, arms crossed, tense.
After a long moment, Emma opened her eyes—and frowned.
"This doesn't make any sense."
"What?" Alaric asked. "What are you seeing?"
"Nothing. There's nothing wrong with him. No curse, no infection, no botched spell. According to my magic, he's... perfectly healthy."
"He's burning with a fever, Emma."
"I know what I'm seeing, Alaric, but the spell doesn't lie. Whatever is happening to him, it's natural. It's part of him."
The door swung open, letting in the murmur of voices from the hallway. Lizzie was the first to speak, indignant.
"What do you mean 'natural'? This looks like anything but natural."
"I've never seen anything like it," Emma said gravely. "I only know what the magic is telling me. And it's telling me this belongs to him. That it's part of what he is."
Hurried footsteps echoed down the corridor. The door was pushed open with force.
Hope stopped in the doorway, her eyes locking straight onto the bed—onto Ethan.
"What happened to him?"
3 WEEKS LATER...