Chapter Sixteen: Cheaters

The school vs. school contests were two thirds athletic and one third magic - there used to be, apparently, a strictly academic portion of the contest, but it had proven too much for one day and been moved to a separate event during the summer some years before.

"Apparently, it's like a big, annoying, nerdy summer camp," Cassie said of the academic competition. This, coming from the girl who had once co-captained her school's robotics team.  Simone and I shrugged.

I'd thought about pulling my school uniform over my leotard, but it was already warm outside. Beneath the arch of the main hall, there was a slight breeze but, even then, it was hotter and muggier than it ever was at St. Circe's. The hall was large enough to house entire palm trees beneath its expanse, a long row of them along the back of the hall, and a few more just past the end of the bleachers on either side. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the feel of the breeze - any more clothing and I'd be sweating uncontrollably. Instead, I sat next to Cassie in my little crimson leotard, the smooth fabric bunching up against the crack of my butt in the muggy heat - one of the downsides to having a reasonably generous rear. I resisted the urge to tug at it. Cassie and I already had enough in the way of interested glances. Cassie handed me a program with the list of events: swimming, archery, potions.

I had my magic 'A' and 'C' cards in my little backpack, just as Simone had the 'B' cards in hers. Now, it was a matter of getting the cards into the right places. A powerful enough witch (or warlock) could magic just about anything... she could magic the whole entry hall to have an effect if she wanted to. But that was big and complicated, and would probably require something along the lines of an animal sacrifice (and not a small animal, either). We were looking for something small and focused that might be missed if the dozens (hundreds?) of sensitive magic-users in attendance weren't paying super close attention. Close attention like I was. Being small and directed meant there had to be an obvious and inanimate target for the magic. For some events, the target was obvious. In the case of swimming, not so much... the swimmers had their own suits, their own caps, and I very much doubted that our saboteur was going to curse a single swimmer or the entire pool.

As we filed out to the pool area to watch the swimming competitions, I realized then that there was an obvious target. The starting blocks. Oh well - if our starting blocks had been cursed, I had no way of knowing which would have been ours ahead of time, and our start a fraction of a second after the other teams during the team relay wasn't too obvious. Hell, I hadn't even known we had a swimming team (though it made sense), but no matter. We placed smack dab in the middle at third place out of the six women's teams. Not so bad if we were being cursed. We were sandwiched right between the Schwarzwaldakademie der Hexen (the Black Forest Academy of Witches) and Occultus Imperial Prep, places 2-3-4.

Next after that was archery, which did have an obvious target: the target. While my understanding is that men and women's archery have separate divisions in Olypmic competition, at the Winter Festival, all of the students shot at the same targets from the same distance and competed against one another. That made things easy - walk by the target, kneel down to fix my shoe, and plant the cards right behind the target. They were small, and there was a tarp behind the target, so they could be hidden easily enough. Well: one minor issue... I didn't have shoes on. I was still dressed for gymnastics.

"What are you doing?" Cassie asked.

"No shoes," I said, rubbing my little toes. "I stepped on something."

"Well let's get out of the way before they start the event, huh? I don't want you getting skewered."

I rolled my eyes. "Thanks, mom."

She'd met up with Liam earlier and discovered he was taking part in archery. Cassie was excited - beyond excited - to watch him in action. We got good seats near the front of the event and watched as the contestants got started, one student at a time taking their shots at the target to polite applause. When the first St. Circe's student was up, I felt something off - that vague sense of magic nearby and afoot. I glanced to the Occultus section but saw nothing odd happening there. I glanced to Simone, who made a subtle nod: her card had vibrated. So she quickly inactivated the curse using the card... this had a side-benefit of being much harder to detect than whatever our saboteur had just done, seeing as how we were using sympathetic magic on connected cards and our magic would only have an effect if magic at the site of the literal target (in this case) was already doing something. Our St. Circe's archer did well - 265 out of 300, whatever that meant (obviously, I am no archer)... and the Occultus section looked, perhaps, a bit worried, but otherwise unsurprised by the result. But above and behind them, I saw some frowning and muttering among the Black Forest people. Were they sabotaging us? I wasn't about to mess with the Imperial students if they weren't doing anything wrong, nor mess with the Schwarzwaldakademie until I was sure.

Eventually, Cassie's beau came up and she screamed out his name loud enough that I blushed at the attention turning our way. Liam ambled over, a half-dazed grin on his face and, like a knight of old, kissed fair Cassie's hand and accepted a lacy kerchief from her - which the judge, of course, inspected for magical or other interference.

"Did he plan that?" I whispered.

"It was my idea," Cassie whispered back. "What do you think?"

He was dashing, she was beautiful, I almost gagged. "Very... symbolic," I said. I thought it was a bit silly - but I thought that about a lot of things and, frankly, mine wasn't a very popular opinion. It was important to Cassie and I was happy if she was happy.

Liam shot a very respectable 273 - good enough for 2nd place overall and bringing St. Lovelock's up to 2nd in archery. Good for Liam. After archery was the first magical category: potions. After my early foray into anti-potions, I knew next to nothing about the art, but I didn't suppose there was much that could be done, magically, to sabotage it. Magic could, of course, sabotage magic, but it would be immediately and visibly obvious that this was what was happening. The only unwitting victims of the potion competition were... goldfish. A few drops of the potions into each tank would confirm whether the potion had the desired effect. With one potion, the goldfish quickly died and bobbled to the surface (poor fish), which was the plan... and, on several occasions, the potions killed the fish unexpectedly. That was just poor potioneering. Fortunately, Walukau had plenty of spare fish to replenish the tanks. St. Circe's again finished near the middle of the pack. The day was yet young, but we were 4th overall out of the eight schools - not great, but good enough to keep the heat off Lily if we could maintain our place. Next came crew, Cassie's event… and things got really interesting.

+++++

In crew, the potential targets for magical sabotage were pretty obvious: the shells that each team would row. Here, there was only one boat per school, so only four girls from each could participate: Cassie, Tiffany, Cecilia, and Allison Tyler (who wasn't a Big, but sure looked like one - tall and lean with plenty of tone) for St. Circe's, each with one oar. Against some mild protestation, I ran out to wish Cassie luck, managing to slip cards beneath the seats of both the St. Circe's and Black Forest shells. I think Cassie spotted the C card and, at that point, knew that something was up... but she didn't say anything. She accepted my hug and encouraged me back to the audience with a little nudge. Then the girls pushed out into the water and soon the race was afoot.

I'd seen Cassie powering across the water in the four-girl boats on several occasions - sometimes in a scull with two oars per girl and sometimes in a sweep (like now) with a single oar. On the water, in her full-body stroke, taut body flexing, she was power personified. Tiffany had experience on her and would be steering the boat's rudder with her feet, but there was little doubt who was the pure talent on the team. They blasted through the water, quickly establishing a lead that widened by the moment. I screamed at the top of my lungs and was barely even aware that I was doing it. They were so fast! Cassie was perfect! Then their boat dipped and dragged in the water, almost as if they'd struck something, and the second place boat eased past them... then the Imperial boat, and then the Black Forest boat... Sabotage!

I looked to Simone, who was in a panic - she was trying to draw halepha too quickly, and so it wasn't working. But she realized it, too. She took a breath, drew the symbol, and then activated the card - one-two, and the curse was lifted from our boat. As the St. Circe's boat picked up steam again, one of the Black Forest students... no, a teacher! One of their teachers was clearly confused by the turn of events. I nodded to Simone, who activated the other symbol on the card, transferring the effect to the Black Forest boat. The effect was pretty immediate and obvious - the boat dipped in the water and almost sank, the back wavering like a car spinning out on ice. They dipped from third place on back, all the way into the pole position, allowing even the casually-competing Sanctuary Valley Collective team to surpass them.

Meanwhile, St. Circe's was back in second place and gaining... only the Oceania Occidental team was ahead, sun-streaked Aussies cutting through the water with aplomb. They were fast, they were efficient, and even then we were catching up. But would we? They were bearing down on the finish line, Oceania ahead and St. Circe's easing forward... forward... almost. It was a photo finish, impossible to tell. The two teams eased side-to-side and congratulated one another - a good showing for either team, regardless. And when the judges announced St. Circe's as the winner, I shrieked so loud that even Harmony Yeung's expert singing couldn't match it for sheer volume. It's a good thing Dr. Clay was busy screaming from the water's edge congratulating her team or she would have warned me to save my own voice for the choral competition that night.

As the girls carried their shell out of the water, Liam Langley (yes, that Liam Langley), still in his archery uniform, ambled up and swept Cassie into a kiss to the delight of the crowd. And, I'll admit, I felt a tiny pang of jealousy there… maybe more than tiny - given my dalliance with Magnus, I had no cause for it, but part of me was sad that I couldn't be more than BFFuckbuddies with Cassie (which, granted, was still plenty). 

The afternoon proceeded with other events, sometimes two at once. I tried my hand at detecting more subterfuge, but I suppose the Black Forest people had decided against it for the moment - and it showed. Without a sabotage-curse holding us back, St. Circe's was floating pretty at #3 through the track and 'control magic' events. I eased off enough to wander away for a few minutes, locating the resort wardrobe with a clearly-uncomfortable Simone in tow.

"Do you think they're done trying to mess with us?"

I shrugged. "Maybe. Probably not. We'll have to keep an eye out... but I'm not wearing this leotard all day long, not when my competition isn't until after supper."

"You're putting on a... swim suit?"

The wardrobe was a warmly-lit, air-conditioned building among the seaside bungalows. It had the look of an upscale boutique - tasteful, artsy, and none of the items having sizes or prices on them. The attendant eyed the two of us with some suspicion and for good cause - a conspicuously short fire-haired girl in a deep red leotard and a rather tall, skinny, dark-skinned girl in a maid's uniform. We didn't look like typical resort-goers, I suppose.

"I'm considering a swim suit," I said. "If not that, then something light - it's damn hot out."

"I'm not wearing a swim suit," Simone stated.

I'd expected that - and frankly couldn't think of one that would flatter her. Instead, I held up a floral green summer dress. "If you hadn't noticed, you have the build of a fashion model - tall and very thin."

"But I'm not pretty..." she said.

I brought her into a hug. "As somebody who's attracted to chicks, allow me to humbly disagree. In fact, with a little make-up, you'd be no-shit hot. Take it from somebody who's been taking crash courses in femininity for a few months now... it'll make a huge difference."

"People will laugh at me..."

"They won't," I stated. "If they do, I'll beat them up... or have Cassie do it." That was more believable.

"You really think I should?"

"You'd really prefer to walk around all day looking like the help in a 1950s stage play?"

"That was awfully specific... but no, I guess I wouldn't. But this isn't nearly the right size... ow!"

This last bit was from my plucking out one of her hairs, long and coiled and glossy-black. She could have been a shampoo model, too. I wrapped the hair around the little shoulder strap of the dress, traced out the symbols, and watched the garment grow thinner and longer until it was a perfect fit for her.

"Now it is," I said. "But I can't teach you that trick... yet. Your ways are not our ways... yet."

After her part in helping St. Circe's standings in the festival, I was going to see to it that Lily inducted her into the sisterhood. She deserved it, the coven would be lucky to have her, and I'd have earned the sway to make it happen.

I handed Simone the dress and, still in Best Behavior mode, she stripped her uniform off right there, right in front of the startled attendant. I was too short to fit a dress over her, so Simone had to do it herself, lifting her arms and letting the loose fabric settle down before pulling the dark braids of her hair from the back. Honestly, it looked great on her, airy and flowing, even if I could see the faint shading of her dark underwear beneath it. I wasn't going to tell her about that - as a former man, I knew that it would only add to the allure of the outfit and, in a tropical paradise, visible undies were fine.

"What do you think?" she asked, looking genuinely relieved.

"I think you need sandals," I said. "And I think then you'll look great."

Then I tried on swimsuits - and I didn't strip in front of Simone or the attendant (or the other few students who'd since wandered in). After some hemming and hawing and lip-chewing, I selected a side-tie bikini with cool, colorful, southwest-inspired patterns and a sarong with matching print - the bottom itself was a bit too risqué for just walking around, so the sarong was a must. Then I added some white strappy sandals with one-inch heels. With that, I looked ready for a day at the beach. I strolled out of the changing area and presented myself for inspection.

"You're going to get a lot of attention," Simone observed.

I looked at myself in the mirror and had to agree - with my improbable figure and the muscle tone I'd recently packed, not to mention my bodyscape of almost-animated tattoos and the skimpiness of the bikini? I was going to attract a lot of looks. The translucent sarong added some modesty, obscuring the snug crotch and beyond-snug butt enough that I wouldn't feel like I was parading around in my panties, but the top was skimpier than most of my bras and put about five inches of cleavage on display, pert, jiggling, and utterly improbable on a frame like mine… as well as the faint bumps of prominent nipples. I looked away before I could get too hot and bothered by my own reflection.

"Let's hope I don't have to sneak any more cards into things..." I slung my little backpack like a purse and gave myself one last check in the mirror: all systems go. "Shall we?"

+++++

We snacked for lunch and checked in at the events, detecting no hint of further cheating since the morning's crew competition. The Black Forest teacher had either given up on cheating or was licking her wounds and waiting to strike - time would tell. As the sun dipped lower and suppertime arrived, St. Circe's was still sitting at 3rd place, one spot behind St. Lovelock's, one spot above Imperial, and all of them well above Black Forest, who were down in the basement with Sanctuary Valley (who weren't very competitive in most events and mostly showed up to have a good time). Oceania was sitting in first, just ahead of St. Lovelock's, but they were weak in the evening events and might well dip to third or fourth.

Simone and I met up with Cassie and the three of us sauntered down to the waterfront where supper was being served. Little white tables dotted the oceanfront promenade, all of them attended to by resort staff in hula getup. I was still in my bikini-sarong outfit and Cassie had changed into her own bikini - a snug, white athletic ensemble with accented floral patterns. It struggled to contain her bosom and made an exquisite show of her toned form, complete with her tattoos, similar to my own. They were a bit less ornate and extensive, if I do say so - I suppose she hadn't been punished quite so much as I had, and now we both had our witch names, so it was too late for the school to add more. As we perused the tables, Cassie held up the card - the one I'd placed in the St. Circe's shell. She had found it. But she didn't look angry.

"What's the deal with these things?" she said. "I was worried you were trying some magical cheating, but this is about as magical as a business card."

"It's anti-cheating, actually," I said. "When your boat felt like it hit something and you suddenly slowed down..."

Cassie nodded. "We thought we hit something in the water... the Schwarzwaldakademie girls, too... but the judges couldn't find anything afterward."

"That was because they tried to cheat and slow you down... I made these cards to re-route cheating curses back at them. But after we scuttled their race - almost literally - I guess they've reassessed."

Cassie frowned and squinted at the little symbols at the back of the card, probably able to ascertain their function after I'd spelled out the gist. "Don't get in trouble..."

"We're not cheating," I repeated. "We're making sure there's fair play - do you have any idea how fast you are? You would have beat Oceania by a length or more if you hadn't been slowed down. We were lucky Black Forest didn't steal your win."

Cassie pounded her fist into her palm, perhaps imagining the ignominy of a last-place finish. "Fuckers!" she seethed.

But Cassie's anger was short-lived - she soon spotted Liam Langley, the Baronet Lochlaron, 34th in line for the British Throne, and boyfriend(?) to Cassandra Petersen, and we trotted over to join him for supper. We staked out a table  under a gazebo fifty yards out from shore. The sun was almost set, sinking red and orange on the western horizon. The rocky coastline was bathed in gold, and the little rocky islets out beyond Walukau were fiery little blobs on the edge of sky and sea. I was looking forward to a good meal - but not good enough to ruin my gymnastics competition in two hours' time.

"Liam, these are my friends, Natalie and Simone," Cassie said.

Liam was dark-haired, blue-eyed, and British in the best possible way. With a confident smile, he tilted his head downward, blue eyes flicking up, and then kissed Simone on the back of the hand. Then he did likewise for me, warm lips barely brushing against my skin - as far as I was concerned, that ordering was a big check-plus for Liam since Simone was still very self-conscious and I was mostly self-conscious of being scantily-clad rather than at looking awkward.

"It's wonderful to finally meet you," he said, his voice oozing upper-crust Britishness.

"Natalie, Simone," Magnus said. He eased up behind me and leaned down, planting a kiss upon my neck. "I don't believe I've met your other friend."

"Cassie." She shook his hand demurely - Magnus was not the hand-kissing type.

"Marcus, isn't it?" Liam said.

"Close - Magnus."

"Ah, of course."

Magnus wore navy blue board shorts and nothing else, his bare torso golden-tan and taut with muscles. It made my heart pound and my loins move to see him like that. His lordship, meanwhile, had added a loose and unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt to his own getup, only partly concealing a body that was, I couldn't help but note, slightly less of a golden Adonis's than Magnus's - which still, I suppose, made him a pretty respectable specimen.

"Good show, Magnus," Liam said with a chuckle. "Fetching the affections of the second most beautiful girl at St. Circe's."

"That's funny," Magnus said, leaning back with a self-satisfied smile. "I was about to offer that exact same plaudit."

Smooth operators, those magical prep school boys.

We sat down to sup and soon Liam spotted one of their classmates wandering solitary, waving the boy over to make it three and three. That was good - Simone needed a boost of confidence. Yes, she was very thin and looked a bit out-of-place next to Cassie and I and our bikini-clad beach bodies - but she oozed 'nerd cute' vibes and was about fifteen properly-placed pounds away from model-caliber hotness, herself. The other boy was slim and blonde, maybe as tall as Simone and Cassie and not nearly so coolly confident as Liam or even Magnus. But he was cute and had the perplexed, hopeful look of a boy not accustomed to sitting at the popular table. In other words, he'd be perfect for Simone.

"Wyatt, care to join us?" Magnus asked.

Liam offered a grateful tic of a nod - he'd clearly forgotten the boy's name. Wyatt didn't wait for them to second-guess the invite, sliding in so quickly it rocked the table. He looked across the table to Simone, grinning sheepishly.

"Hi, I'm Wyatt," he said, running dirty-blonde hair back through his fingers before it could flop into his face.

I offered him my hand, which he took after a moment's hesitation. "Pleased to meet you Wyatt. I'm Natalie. These are my friends Cassie and Simone." I nudged Simone with my elbow.

"Um.. hi," Simone said, not quite making eye contact. "I'm Simone."

Not the smoothest opening gambit, I'll admit, but we work with what we have. When Magnus offered that Wyatt was captain of the math team, I burst into laughter and stopped only when I realized that Wyatt and Liam both took that for ridicule. I blushed.

"No, um..." I said. "Contrary to appearances, we're, like, the three biggest math nerds at St. Circe's. No joke."

Even Magnus hadn't known that - truth be told, we still didn't know one another all that well. We were only well-acquainted in the most physical terms. But my admission certainly opened the avenues for conversation - as soon as Wyatt got the inkling of a kindred math-nerd-soul, he opened right up. Even Liam seemed surprised by his enthusiasm and Simone's smile was maybe the most genuine I'd ever seen it. I shared a knowing look with Cassie's boyfriend. Score one for Liam and Natalie, matchmakers extraordinaire.

The six of us chatted over dinner - I had a little salad, a little shrimp linguine, and some broccoli. Nothing too heavy before gymnastics, as per Ms. Azucar's orders. Magnus was on similar orders, apparently, for his grappling match right before that. He probably didn't eat any more than me despite weighing well over twice what I did. Cassie, of course, could put almost anybody to shame appetite-wise and only restrained herself to appear ladylike in front of Liam. And Simone...

"Um..." I nudged Simone. "Simone..."

She'd helped herself to a second serving of noodles in butter cream sauce. The key there being cream - butter was technically dairy, but barely so, so it was ok. Cream was way dairy, which was a no-no for her. Simone never wanted a second serving of anything, but now she'd soon be packing on curves - exactly what she wanted, but a year or so too soon. It took her a minute to realize it. She bit her lip, looked to her plate, shrugged, and ate another bite.

"It was gonna happen eventually," she said, mouth half-full. "Sorry not sorry."

"What am I missing?" Wyatt asked.

"Curve analysis," I stated with a grin. "Right now, Simone is about to navigate her way through some very interesting vector fields."

Simone giggled. Cassie took a minute to figure out what we were talking about and then giggled. The boys, as is often the case, were clueless.

Not two minutes later, my 'step-brother' Lucian Bryce showed up and ruined supper. Magnus had just convinced me to get dessert, reasoning that I could take one tiny bite now and then have the rest after my no-doubt-successful showing in gymnastics. Then Lucian insinuated himself into our company, snide and confident as always.

"Langley, I'm surprised to see you with these people," Lucian said. He sidled up, hovering uncomfortably close to me.

"Bryce," Liam said. He pronounced it like a curse word (which I had mixed feelings about, given that it was my legal last name, too). "Since when do you care about my keeping up social appearances?"

"You might be interested to know that these two are 'littles'."

"I'm sorry?" Liam said, seeming genuinely confused. "I'm afraid you've got me at a disadvantage - what's a 'little'?"

"The lowest of the low at St. Circe's - barely better than thralls. Plus..." he put a possessive hand upon my shoulder. "This one used to be a man - and he raped my sister."

I was about to stand up and shout something very uncivil, but Magnus beat me to it, shooting up and spinning to face Lucian. They stood chest to chest, scowling into one another's faces. It was hard to tell who was the larger or more imposing of the two - it was very close.

"In case you forgot, I used to be a girl, and if you don't stop your goddamn slander, this 'girl' will beat your fucking face," he growled.

"Ooh, touchy," Lucian said. "Well, Langley, I'll leave you with your 'delightful' company."

I was shaking with emotion and on the verge of tears - purposefully or not, Lucian had pressed just about all of my trigger buttons. Magnus put a reassuring hand on my shoulder, Cassie put a reassuring hand on my other shoulder, and Liam took my small fist in his palm and patted the back of my hand.

"Don't worry about him - everybody knows he's a complete ass," Liam said. "And Cassie is an exquisite judge of character. I most definitely don't think you're barely better than a thrall."

Magnus's hand tensed for a moment - he knew that Liam had just made an uncharacteristic misstep. One that I wasn't about to let slide. I pulled my hand away from his, stood from the table, and blotted my lips with a napkin.

"Thralls are people," I said. I forced myself not to cry. "Littles are people. We're all fucking people, and we all deserve respect. You know, I think I've lost my appetite... whoever wants my dessert is welcome to it. Good evening, gentlemen."

With that, I spun on my heels and stormed off, tears finally streaming down my face. I wanted Magnus to chase after me, but it's better that he didn't - I would have said something mean and spiteful to him in the moment just to make him feel my hurt. Instead, I went out to one of the more remote tiki huts overlooking the Pacific and watched the last of the sunset, slowly losing my anger as the warm water lapped at my feet. I flicked the water with my toes and calmed my breathing, soothed by the evening breeze.

+++++

Eventually, Cassie came over and sat next to me. As tall as she was, her feet plonked right into the water and the waves lapped half-way up her shins.

"I'm sorry that happened," she said, drawing me into a hug. "Liam meant well, but he wasn't thinking... are you okay?"

"I'm getting there. I can't let Lucian get to me like that."

"It's exactly what he wants," Cassie agreed. "We should go to the main hall..."

"Why?" I asked - obviously, I'd need to be there for gymnastics, but that wasn't for like an hour.

"Magnus is grappling in the next event... so is Lucian."

"You mean... they're going to fight?"

"They might," she said. "It's a tournament."

Part of me wanted not to go, just to hurt Magnus - but that was utterly unfair, and I'd regret it later. So I nodded and walked hand-in-hand with Cassie down the white stone path, my silky sarong fluttering in the tropical dusk. We converged with a few dozen other students and faculty along the central road and proceeded into the big, arched expanse of the main hall.

There were only four remaining events for the night, and then the contest would be over and an overall victor named. Those events were: boys' grappling, magic (transformation division), girls' gymnastics, and holiday chorus to bring a festive end to the night. Not everybody was in attendance - some were already off partying the night away under the Pacific moon - but they were in the minority. The hall was mostly full, certainly over a thousand people, with another several hundred preparing to compete in some capacity.

I'd been angry minutes before, and I still was - but now I had a giddy excitement at the prospect of Magnus thrashing Lucian. It turned out not to be much thrashing, per se - it wasn't that type of fighting at all - but the matches were plenty interesting. There was a lot of action, even if I wasn't quite sure what I was watching. The grappling matches had hybrid rules - something incorporating shoot wrestling, jiu-jitsu, and judo, none of which I was very familiar with. They involved lots of ground fighting, wherein competitors tried to 'submit' one another. And, I had to admit, watching the display of sheer masculine physicality was more than a bit arousing... I'd certainly come a long way since the days of straight-as-an-arrow Martin Warner. Now, I had my feet firmly planted in both camps.

Grappling had three weight classes with sixteen competitors each, two to three competitors from each of six schools in each category. Magnus and Lucian were both competing in the highest weight class, which was 195+; I'm not sure what Magnus weighed, but it couldn't have been too much over 200. Some of the larger boys were considerably heavier, but Magnus had almost no fat on his frame. Being from the same school, Magnus and Lucian were on the same side of the tournament bracket, and so couldn't compete against one another in the final (so no climactic good vs. evil finale, per se)... but, the way things were arranged, they could compete in the semifinals, and they did. Both of them won their first matches handily, Lucian choking out a clearly less-experienced boy twenty seconds into his match, and Magnus quickly got his opponent with a 'leg lock' that didn't look painful - but apparently was, judging from the grimace on his opponent's face.

In the next match, Lucian won just as easily with a throw that slammed the breath right out of his opponent, followed by a fast arm-bar. Magnus's second wasn't so easy - the boy he was grappling with was about the same build and very technically proficient; he was, to hear the whispers and cheers of the audience, one of the favorites to win the whole thing, whereas Magnus was very middle-of-the-pack, ranking-wise. The boy nearly submitted Magnus three times across five agonizing minutes. My breath caught up in my chest, my screams of encouragement completely forgotten. Then Magnus shot his leg up and grabbed the lapel of the boy's gi... I took it for a move of pointless desperation, but apparently he knew what he was doing. The boy's arm dropped limp and then Magnus rolled him to the ground, choked unconscious by his own uniform!

Then Magnus and Lucian faced off against one another in the semifinals, and I was justifiably worried. Lucian was clearly very good and Magnus had to be gassed from his last match. It certainly started out that way, with Lucian getting on top in what looked like an indomitable stance (I was later told that Magnus had 'pulled guard', which can be a wise defensive move, especially when tired). Lucian lifted Magnus up and slammed him bodily against the mat - which the referee quickly declared illegal and checked Magnus before starting them back on their feet. Lucian approached him again, shot in, and swept Magnus back to the ground, with Magnus quickly pulling guard again. They grappled for a while, and then Lucian stood again. Realizing that he might be disqualified if he slammed Magnus a second time, he hesitated for an instant. That was all Magnus needed. He moved like an octopus, twisting out from Lucian's body and grabbing his arm. Lucian fell to the ground and rolled, trying to break the hold, pounding against Magnus's side with the heel of his palm.

"Do you tap? Do you tap?" the ref asked him.

"No, goddamnit," I heard him say.

Magnus tensed his legs and pulled harder, and then Lucian's elbow buckled. I was close enough to hear the snap of tendons popping as his elbow dislocated (I thought it was broken but was later told, to my disappointment, that it was 'merely' a dislocation and very bad sprain). Lucian gripped at his elbow, screaming, and Magnus rolled to his feet, the victor. I jumped up and down, screaming and cheering and giving the boys standing next to me quite the eyeful. My bikini top didn't leave much to the imagination and I'm lucky it didn't give up the ghost altogether. I leapt over the little partition and dashed over to Magnus, dodging around the security guard at the perimeter.

"You did it! You did it!" I said, wrapping my arms around his waist.

He nodded uncertainly and winced at some sore point of contact. "I still have to fight against whoever wins the next match in the final..."

Magnus ended up losing in the final, but he put up a good fight. The other boy was, apparently, a jiu-jitsu brown belt (which is, I am told, very advanced), and it took eight teeth-clenching minutes of strategic ground warfare for him to submit Magnus with a flying heel hook (I am told) after the third time they were stood up. I was disappointed that Magnus only took the silver, but snapping Lucian's elbow was far more satisfying than gold, at least to me.

+++++

During the wrestling award ceremony, right after Magnus accepted his silver medallion, somebody sidled up to me and whispered: "Natalie... we need your help."

At first I thought it was a joke, but turning to face the speaker revealed that it was not: Mrs. Bishop was not the type to joke. Ever. I turned to face her fully and tried to ignore her expression of reproachful disapproval; she clearly didn't care for her littles wearing so little in public. Oh well. Sorry not sorry.

"How can I help, Mrs. Bishop?"

"Tabitha McManus was supposed to represent us in the transformation magic competition but... she's gotten herself drunk, the little fool. Your friend, Marie von Schurr, suggests that you might be competitive at self-alteration. Is this true?"

"I might be," I allowed. Marie was not my friend. And, frankly, I had no idea where I stood on the skill spectrum for transformations. I could age and de-age my pinkie. I could make clothes fit. I could make myself look like Arielle Posner.

She gave my sarong a little tug. "Why did you have to wear this? It's disgraceful... but we haven't got time for you to change... fuck it."

A 'fuck it' from Mrs. Bishop was a very serious thing, indeed. I followed her out and away from the event, along to a little staging area behind the bleachers. There, we met up with seven other students and several judges. The pale man with the broad-brimmed hat - the one who reminded me of Doctor Heirophant, that strange warlock who'd unmanned me - approached and gave me a once-over.

"This is your competitor?"

"She is," Mrs. Bishop sighed.

He checked his pocket watch. "Very good. We're ten minutes behind because of this bloody primate chest-pounding... so we're going the instant things are ready."

That instant turned out to be another seven minutes. Seven minutes to ponder how I'd suddenly become the school's representative in transformation magic. It was a minor miracle that Magnus had injured Lucian as he did, because my step-brother was getting treated and wouldn't be out in time to see that I was, I hope, at least marginally competent in magic. I didn't want the Bryces to know I knew the first thing about witchcraft. Hopefully, word wouldn't get back to him that his 'step-sister' had made a fool of herself with some random half-assed transformation in front of the whole crowd. I tried, unsuccessfully, to calm my nerves.

We were prohibited from seeing what the other students were doing - it would be an unfair advantage, they said, to see what ideas the other students had come up with. Thus, I waited in the back room, wringing my hands and hearing the announcement of each student competitor and the varying degrees of applause from the crowd, between polite (a poor performance) and excited (a good one). Four students went before me - polite, excited, half-excited, polite - and then I was called up:

"Tabitha McManus of St. Circe's... oh, I'm sorry... Natalie Bryce of St. Circe's Academy will perform next."

I was escorted out to a white circle, perhaps twelve feet wide, in the middle of the floor. There I stood, in my skimpy bikini and sarong... no, scratch the sarong. Apparently Mrs. Bishop's little tug had loosened the damn thing and I'd lost it somewhere. There I was in my little bikini, fabric riding up my butt and nipping out in front of a thousand eyes. And projected upon the several large displays, in case anybody wanted a good, close look at scantily-clad, bewildered Natalie Bryce. Lots of them did, apparently. I forced myself to breathe... I'd thought about what to do and decided... if I was embarrassed about wearing a little bikini in front of everybody, why not wear something else?

I concentrated upon an idea in my head of a perfectly modest ball gown, a poofy Cindarella-style gown with sequins and jewels, gloves past the elbows and, fuck it, a tiara. I thought about how I might extrude it from my body, how I might use the sources of my own energy to form such a thing... and then I went for it. This was probably the biggest single bout of magic I'd ever tried... not terribly powerful, perhaps, but incredibly complex. My fingers swirled back and forth with a dozen symbols as I muttered their incantations under my breath. No witching jewels allowed to simplify the symbols, so I had to just go with it, mentally rotating the symbols in their myriad dimensions as I went and probably making a complete mess of everything. I heard muttering from the crowd, murmuring. I continued, saving the gloves for last, since those might interfere with my finger movements. My new apparel felt off - gauging from the crowd's silence, I'd definitely fucked it up. I probably looked like I was wearing a wadded-up snot rag. I opened my eyes and looked back to one of the big screens.

I looked like a goddamn fairy princess. The poofy dress. The sequins. The tiara. I'd even, however accidentally, given myself gossamer wings. Yeah, I guess I'd sort-of envisioned those, too. No earrings, though. I soon corrected that, popping gold and glittering sapphire onto my ears with a final elaboration. I smiled. I curtsied. The crowd went crazy... in a good way. People were jumping up and down... some of them were teachers. Even Mrs. Bishop allowed herself a smile. She showed me to one of the VIP chairs near the exhibition floor to sit with the other finished competitors.

"How the fuck is anybody supposed to compete with that?" the girl next to me muttered. She'd given herself cat ears and a tail. Very original, I'm sure.

Needless to say, I soared away with first place there and St. Circe's edged up to 2nd place overall, just behind St. Lovelock's at the top. Only two more events to go: gymnastics and chorus, and we'd do at least decently at both of those, assuming nobody cheated us out of it.

+++++

Hurdle number one of gymnastics was figurative: getting my leotard on. I'd banked on having time after the grappling match to rush back to the bungalow to change, but clearly I hadn't had time to do that, courtesy my surprise performance. I was too busy getting ogled and then applauded by a thousand people. Fortunately, Mrs. Azucar had the presence of mind to have somebody fetch my outfit. I wasn't about to strip naked in front of a thousand people (and nor would my bikini work under the garment), so I had to put the thing on *over* my bikini and then untie the top and bottom as modestly as possible. Cassie helped, with only a little finagling and only forty or fifty people gawking over the bleachers to try to get a peek.

"You did awesome!" Cassie said. "Next time, you should just make your bikini and leotard from scratch - save time changing!"

"You realize, of course, that with as much magic as there is floating around this place, I'd stand a significant chance of going poof-suddenly naked, right?"

"That's half the fun!" She winked at me and slapped my butt. "Go get 'em!"

I certainly tried. Michelle and I went early on, as the intermediate pairs performances served as a warm-up (there were no beginners - in schools with access to conditioning collars, there isn't really a such thing... anything under one year is considered intermediate, and everything over that is considered 'advanced'). We started out shakily, and I was sure we'd just been cursed - I was never that unsteady. But the problem soon sorted itself out and, whether it was my nerves ebbing or Simone de-cursing us, I was steady by my second walkover and, when I did my handsprings as a lead-in to Michelle's twisting, twirling, flipping bit, they went off without a hitch. For her part, Michelle was intermediate in name only - between her natural talent, her ideal gymnastics body type, dozens of hours with the conditioning collar, and (she was quick to add) one month of tumbling classes in kindergarten, she was only intermediate because Ms. Azucar already had four very capable girls who'd already been promised advanced spots.

I did my one last trick, a backflip into a splits, to some applause. Michelle and I wore matching leotards and had our hair in matching braided buns, her hair tawny with golden highlights and mine coppery with streaks of rose gold. She was adorable with her flush of exertion and, as much as I hated to admit it, I was enjoying myself.

After the handsprings and my flip, my part mostly consisted of stretching. Standing on my hands and spreading my legs parallel to the ground as Michelle flipped over me, doing a handstand and then lowering my feet down into a bridge, that sort of thing. Handstands certainly weren't a problem for me now. Our piece de resistance was when Michelle stood on my shoulders, I lifted my left leg straight vertically, she climbed atop my raised foot, and then she did a twisting back-flip off, sticking the landing. I hardly did anything there, but I guess it looked impressive and we got a decent score and even more decent applause - I suspect that I'd earned some fans in the audience from my transformation trick (and my before and after attire). With my impressive flexibility, Natalie Bryce's legend continued to grow.

Then it was on to the advanced girls: one girl from each school selected to perform on uneven bars, balance beam, vault, or floor routine. Each routine was staggered, such that there was only one going on at a time, one minute apiece, with only a five to ten second break between each, one-two-three-four around the room.

I had an uneasy feeling that something was wrong when Rosa Flores stumbled on the landing of her vault - a small mishap, but something she didn't usually do. Hell, I'd seen her vault a hundred times and she never did that. I had a feeling that our saboteur was back to her old tricks, albeit more subtly. Maybe trying to see what she could get away with. And I, like an idiot, hadn't taken any cards to plant anywhere. The best I could do was try to dispel whatever had been done to the equipment - and, even then, by the time I approached the floor to check, Rosa's second vault was over and the subtle effect had dissipated. Her 8.6 routine dropped down to 7.9 - maybe enough to hurt us. Four minutes later, it was Lorelei Waters performing on the uneven bars.

"Go Lorelei!" Ms. Azucar shouted. "This is your event!"

And so it was... for fifty seconds, she performed flawlessly. Toward the end, something happened at the bar and one of Lorelei's hands slipped free - she'd never done that. Even so, amazingly, she held on, completing a full rotation with only one arm on, her body tucked in. Then, a moment later, she had difficulty releasing her grip for the dismount with the same hand - something that could only be explained by nefarious magic. Lorelei released too late, flipped almost vertically into the air, and still managed to nail the landing. Almost. She did nail it, but her feet weren't positioned quite correctly. I heard the crunch, heard her cry out, and then I rushed out right behind Ms. Azucar as Lorelei collapsed to the ground, her face twisted in agony. We rushed out to see to her broken ankle - she'd landed on it exactly wrong and her whole foot now tilted at a strange angle with crimson blooming beneath the skin, clearly a break.

"We need a doctor!" Ms. Azucar shouted. We helped Lorelei, crying and moaning, off the performance area, all eyes on us for a moment.

I made a little fist, my fingernails pressing red marks into my palm. I was beyond angry - I was fucking seething. We scored 4th in gymnastics instead of 2nd or (maybe) 1st, Black Forest scored 1st - this was, after all, their wheelhouse - and Lorelei had been injured by their trickery. They'd crossed from my shit list and into the vendetta zone. They'd hurt a friend (well... let's be fair, an acquaintance). Our place on the board ticked down from 2nd to 3rd, Black Forest's bumped up to 6th... and then, on cue, it started to storm outside. We were under the repurposed hangar, of course, but the rain formed a steady rumble against the glass and aluminum of the hall's arched roof. Lightning flashed through the windows and through the open bays at either end of the building. My  knuckles were white on my fists, and I marched right over to my backpack to retrieve two magical cards to fortify our choral number.

"Natalie, I..." Simone said.

"Give me card B'-3," I said.

She sensed that now was not the time to urge restraint. Without another word, she handed it over. I dipped my finger in my own tears, pooled up at the corner of my eyes - more potent even than blood for some purposes - and traced a symbol on the back of the card before handing it back. Let it be said: cheaters never prosper, especially not when they fuck with Natalia Cadence Storm. The girls from Schwarzwaldakademie der Hexen were about to find that out.

+++++

I'm not sure what St. Circe's ever did to Black Forest, but they were up to their cheating again during our choral number - at least for a moment. Dr. Clay was understandably shaken up after Lorelei's broken ankle - I think all of us were, and I think we all fed into one another's tension. To make matters worse, I got the vague sense of something magical triggering underneath us, and it made us sing subtly off-key for all of a second. Then the effect went away - Simone activating the card effect underneath the choral bleachers.

It took the choir a minute to get its confidence back - and I like to think I helped. I was so angry that I was really belting out the notes, and uncharacteristically perfect in my pitch. If I could always sing angry, I'd give Harmony Yeung a run for her money. As it was, the girls around me picked up on my energy, the girls around them picked up on their energy, and by the time we got to 'O Silent Night', we were anything but silent. Ironically, the thunderstorm outside was really booming, too... lightning and thunder and gusts of humid air blustering in through the open arch at the building's front, but our singing drowned it out.

When it came to Harmony's solo during 'Little Drummer Boy', they tried to sabotage us again, the fuckers, but Simone was on top of it, squelching the effect as soon as she felt it. Harmony's voice soared and, when the time came a moment later, I joined in to remind her where to pump the brakes. The crowd was enraptured and I felt we'd done a good job overall.

"That'll do, girls," Doctor Clay said, ushering us from the stage. "A rocky start but a strong finish - I doubt they'll be too harsh on that."

There was every reason to believe we'd retain our 3rd place finish or even bump back up to 2nd place. Not a shabby showing in either case, despite the worst efforts of the Schwarzwaldakademie. After Oceania presented their mostly-decent holiday medley, it was time for Black Forest to do their choral bit. Well and good - we'd give them a taste of their own medicine... and that's when the shit hit the fan.

They assembled on stage and, being a generally Germanic school, decided to open with a bang: 'Ode to Joy' from Beethoven's 9th. Unfortunately for all of us, Simone activated her B-card and flung their dirty tricks right back at them... well-deserved, to be sure. Only I'd kind of supercharged the card when I enchanted it with my very-potent rage tear. They didn't sing a bit off-key or off-rhythm. They barely sang at all.

Strange and strangled noises came out of the chorus - nothing that could believably be called a 'poor performance'. Half of the members couldn't sing at all, hissing out dry rasping sounds as they tried to make any noise. The others could only hold a tune for a fraction of a second before veering wildly from note to discordant note. Their choirmaster turned to the judges and made an exasperated shrug - it was obvious that something was up. Shit... shitshitshit. We were found out.

The spooky Doctor Heirophant-looking head guy, lanky and pale with his broad-brimmed hat, glided over to the choral bleachers as the Black Forest singers scattered in confusion. And by glide, I mean literally glided - four feet off the ground, sliding over to the choral bleachers. With flick of his hand, he performed some sort of advanced detection spell and my two cards shot out and into his hand, followed by a small and clattering thing that looked to be some sort of rune stone. With another flick of the hand, the cards and the stone shot out. The cards, of course, streaked right over to Simone, and she let out a startled shriek as they approached, batting them out of the air. The teacher from Black Forest wasn't quite so quick and her rune stone smacked her square in the forehead. The stone was only the size of a pebble, but it was hurtling fast enough that it would probably leave a bruise. The crowd quickly deduced what was afoot and erupted into angry shouting and boos.

+++++

In the minutes that followed, Simone came clean and, admirably, did not implicate me. According to her story, she'd decided to undertake the anti-cheating theatrics on her own. When asked how she, a little with no access to magical pedagogy, had learned the reasonably-difficult craft, she explained that the Bigs in her class had sometimes used magic against her (true), and that she'd worked backwards from what she'd seen. That was an unlikely story, but not one that was easily disproven; it left me in the clear and made her look awesome. I was okay with that. She was awesome.

St. Circe's was in trouble, but the accusation levied against Schwarzwaldakademie was far more serious. They'd initiated sabotage against another school in multiple events, resulting in the serious injury of a student and casting question into the entirety of the festival's process. Lily told me the eventual verdict three days later: both schools would forfeit their records in that year's festival (a much bigger punishment to St. Circe's, since we were about to reclaim 2nd place and hadn't initiated the cheating). On top of that, the Schwarzwaldakademie would be placed on two years' probation, during which they couldn't post an official ranking or act as judges. That was huge. And I hear the teacher responsible for the fracas was tried before the Grand Tribunal (whatever that was) and, according to Lily, was sentenced to spending seven years as a snake as penance.

As for us students, in the aftermath of the choral debacle, the whole St. Circe's delegation was ushered to the big awning at the front of the main hall, rain pouring down in front of us, a mist of water splashing at our feet as we waited for our rides to drive us home. We didn't spend the night and part of the next day on Hawaii. I didn't get to see Magnus that night. Instead, we drove home through the rain and then through the snow, Ms. Azucar apologizing the whole time about how sorry she was.

"This should have never happened," she said. "Believe me - heads are going to roll."

In retrospect, perhaps, I should have been more nuanced in my counter-punch, but what was done was done. I returned to my own room just after midnight, tossed and turned in my own bed for an hour, and eventually drifted into a fitful sleep, mostly worried about what would befall Simone.