Until one crazy freelance journalist came knocking, there were only two kinds of people on Salem Island: vile criminals and the family of grim reapers who kept them in check.

— FROM “A LITTLE GIRL’S SCARY BEDTIME STORY” BY VICTORIA NAMELESSCHILD, WINNER OF THE WIZARDING PRIZE IN LITERATURE & GRIMOIRES.

The little girl smiled up to her ears as a crooked stick she held in one hand, etched in runes, caused the wooden flying contraption to sway and bob towards her at a gentle pace. She walked backwards, out of the storage unit and into the garage’s hull.

“It’s like a magnet!” Maddie said.

Of course, she knew that couldn’t be. She’d done her reading—there wasn’t an ounce of metal on commercial broomsticks since the Pre-sorcery Era, and this trainer was standard issue; so what caused this phenomenon? Maddie knew the answer-but-not-quite. It was mystia. The crux of all her questions unanswered—that elusive force the little girl couldn’t wrap her head around.

At her insistence, Mr. Mechanic had shown her the broomstick’s serial number ending in 007. Maddness liked to know these things. It was a hobby hardly worthier of praise than checking for the expiry date on a milk bottle. But the little girl found it thrilling. How much could she gleam from so little?

“Of course it matters, Daddy! Which breed of mystian fauna produced the milk? What pasteurization technique did the dairy farmers use? You should have your pentacles’ worth.” She reasoned with her father once as he wiped a milk mustache off her face.

Little things like that mattered to Maddness Burnswitch. She felt like an actual auctioneer appraising an item as her fingers traced those numbers etched onto the broomstick, a smile tugging at her lips.

Crafted in Year Seven of the Sorcery Era. Around the time Vintage Spell Craft became mainstream—a style popularized by Atticus Wonderhoff’s apprentices after the professor’s death in Year Zero, Maddie thought. That’s only 293 years old... common, but collectible for cultural significance, right?

Maddness believed that was an accurate appraisal of the trainer model considering she’d inferred cues from a stubborn serial number etched onto the ‘stick on a production line over two centuries earlier.

But Maddie knew nothing of the broomstick’s worth in pentacles, which real auctioneers determined in ‘quotients of efficiency as a measure of permanent axial flux,’ whatever that meant. The little girl rolled her eyes. Her grandfather had told her that what made a collection unique lied in what the collector considered valuable. One man’s treasure and all that—still, she was curious.

The library’s Spell Craft section, as far as she’d explored (and she’d turned the place upside-down), had either children’s books filled with silly anecdotes and analogies she’d grown bored with or advanced tomes heavy with theory she couldn’t possibly glean meaning from beyond memorizing the words. There was nothing in-between Maddie could sink her teeth into. She had a feeling that was intentional and that her grandmother had a hand in it.

Grandma has a terrible sense of humor, she thought.

Maddness felt a gentle tug in her small hand as a non-contact force drew the crooked stick she held toward the wobbling broomstick.

“Try holding the flight stick straight up, young heiress, see what happens,” Mr. Mechanic said.

The little girl nodded at him and did as he said, facing the contraption.

It was a trainer model for children and boomers. This type of broomstick had countless variants depending on the manufacturer, but they all typically had a fixed orientation, with pedals, handlebars, seats, and wheels—entirely made of wood and wood extracts. Maddie knew the leather in the seats was from tanning yellowdwarf bark. The trainer she’d picked was a cross between a unicycle and a tandem bike, with the iconic broom head sticking out of the bottom seat (functioning as a counterbalance and rudder).

Maddness stood exactly ten meters away from the wobbling broomstick. There were ethereal, wisp-like graduations on the garage’s floor—like holograms—marking every meter, centimeter, and inch of the distance.

The little girl’s hazel eyes widened as the trainer model’s wheel lifted off the ground by a few inches when she held up the crooked stick. Runes etched onto its surface shimmered as she did.

“Now, still holding it up, point the stick towards you as far as your wrist allows.”

“Sure!”

As Maddie did, the broomstick’s wheel and pedals rolled midair, and the amorphous broom head’s bristles swished in motions that appeared solid in one instant and fluid in the other.

Then the contraption levitated towards her in a straight line. The little girl’s eyes lit up and her cheeks hurt, but she couldn’t stop grinning. The contraption stopped at the three meter mark; a large screen up on the garage’s wall then displayed a time: one-point-five seconds.

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Mr. Mechanic recorded the time, then said,

“Okay, that was good. Now point the flight stick toward the trainer model.”

“Still holding it up?” Maddie asked.

“Yes. And remember to keep your extended arm parallel to the ground. Move only your wrist.”

As the man demonstrated with a stylus, the gears and hydraulic flexors inked onto the skin of his toned arm worked like clockwork in orchestrating the fluid motion. Maddie nodded and as she followed Mr. Mechanic’s instructions, the wheel and pedals rolled backwards—returning the broomstick to its initial position; it didn’t move further back, but the wheel and pedals kept spinning midair.

The little girl extending her wrist as far as she could manage didn’t make them spin any faster.

Maddness furrowed her brow. Mr. Mechanic didn’t say so, but as she returned the crooked stick in her hand to its normal position (ninety degrees about the ground and her extended arm), the wheel and pedals stopped, but the broomstick remained levitating in the air.

The time again read: one-point-five seconds.

It stopped! Why? Maddness thought, her brow scrunching as she gazed at the crooked stick she held in her hand. It looked like any old stick, save for the runes (and they were just fancy doodles with glitters). How does it work?

“Okay, young heiress, now step back five more meters.”

Maddie’s mind raced. She looked at her extended arm like she was seeing it for the first time. The little girl took a sharp breath, then let go of the stick and it fell to the floor. As she did, the runes on the crooked stick stopped shimmering and she saw the broomstick make a delicate descent. Maddness’s lips parted. There was an itch in her brain she couldn’t quite scratch.

“Young heiress?”

What would Daddy say? ‘Put it into words,’ she thought.

“The flight stick’s affecting the trainer model’s, um, ‘permanent axial flux’ somehow, isn’t it? How? Why is it this stick? Would a pencil or a wooden ruler do? Does it have to be wood? And why does it only work when I’m holding onto it?”

Mr. Mechanic smiled, saying,

“Keen observations were made. What we have here is a mystian field. All things, including you and I, can influence it under certain conditions, but some things naturally affect it more than others, like a flight stick, broken off the branch of a yellowdwarf tree. As for how? It is not my place to say.”

Maddie rolled her eyes. She’d heard that excuse so many times, it just annoyed her now. But at least she was learning something.

“So, this is some kind of wand? Can I cast spells with it?”

“That’s correct. A flight stick is a type of wand, but it’s not primed for casting spells.”

Maddie’s heart leaped. The little girl thought, Some wands can cast spells, but others can’t? Amazing! How does that even work? Why would that even work?

Of course, Maddie knew better than to ask those questions. But her curiosity got the better of her. Maddness remembered her pranayama, alternating her breathing through each nostril, then in a monotone voice, she asked, “How can a wand not cast spells? Sounds like a dud.”

I have to thank Ms. Yogi later, Maddie thought.

Mr. Mechanic narrowed his dark eyes as he looked at Maddie, amused. The little girl’s expression feigned disinterest, and he heard almost no excitement in her voice, but Maddie’s eyes kept darting to the crooked stick on the floor.

Mr. Mechanic then said, “Some wands merely interact with mystian fields, not change them. But that doesn’t make them duds. They’re quite useful—the broomstick trainer’s handlebars and pedals are good examples.”

Maddie's eyes widened as she realized Mr. Mechanic had given her a crucial clue.

“Does that mean I need to change mystian fields to cast spells?”

“I’m afraid it’s not my place to say, young heiress.” Mr. Mechanic replied, smiling. “Now, how about we get on with the service? You don’t want to keep the Lieutenant General waiting too long, do you?”

Maddie’s heart sank. She was so close! But Mr. Mechanic avoided giving her a direct answer, telling the little girl she was on the right track. She wanted to probe him further, but also couldn’t wait to go flying with her grandfather.

“Okay.”

Just wait, Oxie, Maddness thought as she picked up the crooked wand and the contraption wobbled up. I promise I’ll make sense of it all. And then…

***

A stunning woman with pale skin and long, dark, silk-like hair fitted the upholstery in a white, posh convertible. She watched as a little girl, about twelve-years-old, with olive skin and short curly hair gave directions to a levitating contraption that looked like a cross between a unicycle and tandem bike (a broom head sticking out of the bottom seat), with a crooked stick she held in one hand.

“Thank you, Mr. Mechanic! I can’t wait for the drag race!” Maddness said, as she ran out of the garage and the levitating contraption followed, stopping when she peeked back in. “Oh, and, um, thank you, too, Ms. Tailor. Daddy might not say it, but those seats look really pretty. I know he’s gonna love them!”

The woman looked away, carried on with her work. Madders Burnswitch would love this? What did the sheltered princess know about the Warden?

“Why do you keep ignoring the little witch?” Mr. Mechanic asked in one of those forgotten languages from the Pre-sorcery Era. Common Sorcerertongue was a hassle, but that Eastern Witch dialect he knew intrigued the little girl was pretentious as shit. He relished the relief.

Who still speaks that way?

“Why do you keep humoring her?” Asked the woman as she fitted the stubborn center console upholstery. “She isn’t as talented or well-trained as Maddox was at her age. Why bother?”

“I’ll admit, he was a prodigy. But she’s eager to learn and experiment. Give her that, will you?” said Mr. Mechanic. The man admired the woman’s ass, then cupped the flesh through loose-fitting robes. “Still, his… loss set us back several years.”

The woman smiled and wiggled her ass at his familiar touch; bit her lip, but then she frowned as she looked over her shoulder, saying, "Move on. That ship sailed and sank miserably, with a fool at the helm. She’s of little use to us. You’ll only inspire the Warden’s ire should he learn what you’re plotting."

“Plotting? That’s a dirty word. I’m merely giving the little witch hints that aren’t in direct violation of the terms of my parole,” Mr. Mechanic said, “It won’t hurt to earn her favor now. She’ll eventually replace him, after all.”

The woman yelped as Mr. Mechanic’s hand reached lower. She turned to face him, her eyes first on his lips, then his dark gaze.

“What, with her brother’s unfortunate… condition? I’d say we have until her Burning.”

Mr. Mechanic whispered, “We can take our time, then.”

The man drew her close at the waist. Their lips met, and she moaned through the kiss.

***

To be continued.