What else could he do? Could he see the future like Merlin the Magician had been able to do? He concentrated for a moment, trying to imagine what would happen tomorrow. Nothing came to him, however. Oh well, maybe that would change in time.

Would these new magical abilities increase or decrease with time? Would they go away after a day or two? Maybe he needed to use them now before they disappeared. Then again, what could he do with them?

Why would Ms. White have given him the power? Or did she have nothing to do with it? Was it only the mirror? Maybe she didn’t know it was a real magical mirror. He couldn’t imagine Ms. White helping anyone out. She just didn’t seem the type. Now, cursing the students, he could definitely see that happening.

Maybe the others had gotten magical powers as well. Maybe they hadn’t even noticed. After all, he had been lucky. What if he hadn’t said the lines three times? Maybe the others didn’t even know if they had powers. Then again, maybe they wouldn’t have any powers. After all, his sister had messed up when she said the words. That meant she probably didn’t get any powers.

Maybe the people who had felt that pressure had gotten the magical powers. When he got to school, he would need to see if they had been given any magical powers as well. Or maybe he had gotten magical powers because he had been dressed as a magician. Maybe the others had gotten some other power.

Then again, what power could Arthur have gotten? After all, Arthur hadn’t been known for any type of magical powers. Sure he could fight, but that was about it. He wasn’t even the best fighter. There were several better knights. In fact, the only thing magical about Arthur was the sword Excalibur.

As for Robert, Robin Hood wasn't known for any magical powers either. He was great with a bow, but that was about it. If all Robert got out of the poem was an ability with bows, that would be kind of sad. Oh well, he would find out when they met.

Now as for Peter, his power might be nice. After all, Peter Pan could fly and allow others to fly if he had pixie dust. Being able to fly would be so cool. Then again, maybe now he could fly if he could come up with a great piece of writing.

Shirley had always been smart, super smart in fact. Maybe she was even smarter now. That would be a great power, to be able to see and know everything Sherlock Holmes knew or was able to discover.

Now, Belle, that might be interesting. She had dressed up as a fairy or pixie. They were small and could fly. He wasn’t really sure what else they could do. Would Belle be able to fly now? Would she grow wings? He wasn’t sure what to expect from her.

Hmm, wait...could that happen? Could the mirror cause physical changes? What if someone had been dressed as a skeleton? Would that person then start becoming a skeleton? He could certainly see Ms. White doing something like that. What if she had tried to curse them, and they had ended up turning the curse into a blessing?

Yep, he definitely needed to talk to everyone today and see what happened with them. With Ms. White being involved, who knew what might have happened? Maybe she wanted something horrible to happen to them, but he had been lucky enough to have something great happen to him instead.

He was about to try something else when he heard his sister calling his name inside the house, looking for him. Realizing he had spent more time outside than he had thought, he hurried inside the house and finished getting ready for school.

While he was waiting at the bus stop, he ran through various magical sayings he could try. While it probably didn’t have to rhyme, he knew a lot of songs and poems often rhymed, so maybe that made them more powerful. One of his teachers had everyone write a haiku last semester, so he had learned about syllables.

He probably needed to make sure he followed some of those rules. Merlin then wondered if alliteration, similes, and metaphors might have some type of impact on the magical spell as well. Then again, maybe if he did things like drawing a magic circle or combining different ingredients to make a potion that could make the spell more powerful. Oh, that was a good idea, he thought. Maybe he could mix a few things like peanut butter and chocolate, say a magic spell, and when he eats the food, have the magical spell work then, sort of like when he cleared his throat.

Before he knew it, he was on the bus and still brainstorming ideas on how he could use his powers. By the time the bus had reached the school, he had made a mental list of ideas miles long to try. One of his favorites was based on Merlin being called Merlin the Enchanter sometimes. Maybe he could enchant some items as well. For example, he could make a broom that did the sweeping or a pencil that did his homework.

As soon as he reached school, he headed to where he and his friends usually met. Arthur was there already, as was Robert. Robert was doing most of the talking, with Arthur staring at a big branch, occasionally swinging it around. As he got closer to them, Robert noticed him and motioned for him to join them.

“I was just telling Arthur that this morning, I was playing around with the bow before breakfast and I kept on hitting the target every time. In fact, I hit the center every time. Isn’t that strange?”

As soon as Robert finished, Arthur said, “I know. The same thing happened to me. Well, not the same. I was playing with the sword that came with the armor when I discovered I could do tricks with the blade. In fact, I started doing things like a real ninja.”

Merlin was tempted to point out that Arthur probably should have said like a knight, and not a ninja, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort. “I know, I've been able to do a few small magic tricks as well.” He didn’t want to tell them just how much he could do. They might expect too much. Then again, even he didn’t know the extent of his powers yet.

“Oh, show me something,” Arthur said.

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Merlin had prepared himself for something like that request. He didn’t want to do anything too flashy, but he also didn’t want to do something that would seem too nerdy either. Pulling out a pencil, he tried a simple spell.

“Let these words be true,

make this pencil change to blue.

Let these words be true,

make this pencil change to blue.

Let these words be true,

make this pencil change to blue.”

The color of the pencil changed from yellow to blue before their eyes. After a few seconds, he expected the blue to change back to yellow but it didn’t. Hmm, he thought. Some effects were permanent. Interesting.

Merlin was careful to see what their reaction would be. He wasn’t disappointed either. Robert raised an eyebrow, but Arthur’s eyes glazed over in amazement. “Cool, huh?” Merlin said smiling.

Each of them nodded. “I wonder what the others can do,” Robert said.

“I know,” said Merlin. About that time, he noticed Peter was getting dropped off. Nice car, he thought. Apparently, the military paid fairly well. If he had any type of love for discipline, he might have joined the military for the money. As it was, he had no desire to wake up early and have drill sergeants yell at him.

Peter joined them. Arthur was quick to spill everything they had shared together, hoping to see if anything had happened to Peter. Merlin was more than a little annoyed with Arthur keeping their powers secret for a shorter period of time than he could hold his breath. After all, what if nothing had happened to Peter and they were giving away their secrets?

As it was, however, something had happened to Peter, and Merlin breathed a sigh of relief when Peter said, “I know. This morning, I was actually floating in bed when I woke up. I can’t really fly, but I can sort of move through the air a little. It’s amazing.”

Had he not been able to levitate as well, Merlin would have found this as amazing as Robert and Arthur. “That’s amazing!” Robert and Arthur agreed at the same time.

Merlin changed the subject slightly, “Did anything happen with your sister? Did she get any powers?

Everyone looked at Peter, waiting for his answer, “She can float too,” he said finally as if he didn’t want to give away her secrets.

Merlin brought up another subject he had been thinking about, “Do you think anyone else got any powers, or do you think it was just us?”

“I bet there were at least a few others,” Peter said. “I doubt there were too many though. Most people avoided Ms. White’s room last night. I heard no one wanted to see her, even if they did get candy.”

“I can believe that,” Arthur said. “I didn’t want to go in there myself until…” He paused there since Shirley had arrived and joined them.

Everyone again shared what had happened to them, with Peter even levitating a few inches to show them what he could do.

Shirley then said, “I can’t do a lot yet, but this morning, when I was working on some logic problems, I was able to do the one that I hadn’t been able to do all year. In fact, it was easy. I blew through the others in the book really quickly.”

“Nice,” said Arthur, although he really didn’t seem that impressed.

Not wanting Shirley to get annoyed, Merlin changed the subject, “Has anyone seen Angela?”

Everyone looked at each other and then shook their heads. After a few seconds, Shirley said what everyone else must have been thinking, “Why do you ask?”

“I saw her going into Ms. White’s room as we were leaving last night,” Merlin said. Maybe she looked in the mirror as well.”

Shirley nodded, “I remember now. If she doesn’t show up today, we know something is wrong. She hasn’t missed a day of class, ever.”

“If she doesn’t show up to school today, maybe we need to check up on her after school,” Robert said.

“That’s probably a good idea,” Shirley said, which pretty much meant that the others were going to agree with her. “We each received a power based on what we were wearing. Arthur was King Arthur and now knows how to use a sword. Robert was dressed as Robin Hood and now is amazing with a bow. Peter was dressed as Peter Pan and can now fly. And finally, Merlin was dressed as Merlin the Magician and can do magic tricks now.

“Considering that Angela was dressed as a Sleeping Beauty,” Shirley continued, “I have no idea what might have happened to her except she might have some trouble staying awake. Maybe nothing happened, but then again, something might have.”

Everyone nodded at this. After all, it did make sense. Then again, almost everything made sense when Shirley explained things. She should probably become a teacher when she got older. She couldn’t do any worse than the teachers they already had. Some of them seemed like they were learning it at the same time as the students.

“How do we get there?” Robert asked.

Shirley had the answer of course, “If we take Bus 26, we should be dropped off close to her house. I can probably convince my big brother to pick us up there and take everyone home. All I have to do is promise to do his homework for a few days.”

Sad, but true, Merlin thought to himself. She probably could do her older brother’s homework better than he could do it himself. In fact, she could probably get away with doing his college work when he got into college. He would need a scholarship like Shirley was sure to receive. While not as poor as Merlin’s parents, Shirley’s parents didn’t have a lot of money either.

“Sounds like a plan,” Arthur said. He had always liked having plans. If something was set out in front of him with a solid plan of attack, he was more likely to agree to it than to just try to wing things.

Everyone else nodded, made various grunts, or made monosyllabic responses of agreement. “Sounds good,” Merlin chimed in, not wanting to be left out, even if it was only agreeing to something he had suggested in the first place. He found it odd that Shirley had taken his idea and now everyone probably thought she came up with the idea.

After that, they broke up and headed inside. They didn’t even have to say anything. They seemed to just know that they wouldn’t share what they had talked about with anyone else. Merlin, for his part, watched the other students, trying to determine who would have been most likely to have visited the substitute teacher’s room last night. It probably wasn’t any of the shy types unless they were with someone else. It took him a while to realize he really had no way of knowing who had gone to her room.

Instead, he started concentrating on the spells he could write. An added benefit was that he didn’t have to worry about what might have happened to Angela. In fact, maybe he could write a few spells that might actually fix whatever the mirror might have done to her. With that idea, he started concentrating on healing and canceling out spells.