PRIYA

Tonya lined up outside the Loon Lake University registrar’s office. Courses had already started, and she had been trying for weeks to get out of a third-year physics class and into the first-year English class she was supposed to be taking. How did these screw-ups happen? Torn between defying her parents and attending University of Toronto, or relenting and going to Loon Lake, she had waited until the last moment and chosen her courses in a rush. She was so flustered she had clicked the wrong selection and now the course she wanted was full.

It wasn’t a long lineup, but it was moving so slowly she would need a haircut soon. Breakfast was hours ago. Tonya’s stomach grumbled for lunch. She shouldn’t even be here except the computer system had mysteriously rejected her password and wouldn’t allow a reset.

She had tried phoning and email but couldn’t get a reply from anybody. When things got this messed up, Aunt Helen always said, “face-to-face is best.”

Aunt Helen’s preference for face-to-face wasn’t completely innocent. As a child, Tonya’s parents had kept her aunt’s powers secret. It wasn’t until the summer Tonya went to work in her aunt’s Herbal Healing Shop that the clients told her everything. One lady credited Aunt Helen with changing her life in grade six. A mean girl bullied her every day so one night, Aunt Helen had charmed the neighborhood dogs to howl under the bully’s window and keep her awake all night. The next morning at school, when she threatened to keep doing it, the bully promised to reform.

Too bad Tonya’s family were Purists, the strictest of Loon Lake’s magic factions. Like the Trads, they kept magic from outsiders, but they also forbade its study. It was a rule her aunt chose to ignore.

Aunt Helen could have charmed Tonya up to the front of the line. Tonya sighed. After their aborted dinner, her aunt hadn’t answered texts or calls. Mom admitted she was seeing specialists but would say no more. Ever since Aunt Helen insisted on kissing her and giving her that pendant, Tonya suspected the worst.

Ahead of Tonya, a girl with shiny black hair streaked with purple raised her hands over her head and posed, as if she just finished a gymnastics routine. Next, she put her hands on her hips and thrust back her shoulders like a comic book hero. When the girl started conducting an invisible orchestra, Tonya couldn’t help but ask, “What are you doing?”

The girl turned, revealing a pretty, brown, heart-shaped face, nestled in a mane of black and purple curls. “I’m claiming my power. You must see this Ted Talk.” She held her phone out to Tonya. “Women lose marks in school and fail in business because they get meek around assertive men.”

“Hmm,” Tonya wasn’t that interested in the video, but she was fascinated by a girl who wasn’t embarrassed to do crazy things in public.

“I’m Tonya.”

“Priya.” She reached out and shook Tonya’s hand like they were grown-ups which, Tonya supposed, they were.

“What are you in for?”

“Huh?”

Priya grinned. “What are you studying?”

“English and History.”

“Whose history?”

“Local history.” There was a three hundred-year-old schism between the founding families of Loon Lake. History class would be an excuse to visit City Hall’s archives and read about the feuding, in the words of the individuals who started it.

“That sounds absolutely fascinating.” Priya chuckled.

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Tonya didn’t blame her. To an outsider, the history of Loon Lake must sound yawn-worthy.

The line snailed forward. “So, what should I take instead?”

“Take Feminist Theory in Popular Culture, with me.” On her phone, she showed Tonya the course description.

“That’s a second-year course.”

“I’m a quick study. I just have to convince the registrar.” She smiled.

Tonya caught herself envying Priya’s perfect teeth and striking looks. Her clothes were straight out of a Gothic novel, all black chiffon and Victorian lace. Definitely not department store stuff. If university was going to be a new beginning, Tonya wanted interesting friends like her, people who didn’t remember her eating lunch alone in the high school library.

The line moved, and it was Tonya’s turn, but Priya was taking different subjects. Their paths might not cross again for weeks.

“Wait, after this, do you want to go for lunch?”

Priya flashed her perfect teeth. “Thought you’d never ask.”

“How about Mackenzie Cafeteria?”

“Sure.”

Loon Lake University grouped students according to their passions and vocations. Students interested in native studies and the environment were housed in one college. Future leaders and politically active students lived in another. Nursing students shared space with students interested in science and agriculture.

“What’s your major?” Tonya asked Priya as she walked her bike along the path back to the dorms.

“Fine arts.”

“So, you’re at Mackenzie too.”

“Top floor,” said Priya.

“I’m on the third.”

Tonya left her bike on the rack outside and entered the main floor cafeteria, watching for her roommate, Lynette. With lecture halls on the second floor, and their dorm room on the third, she was always running into her. With her cool new friend in tow, Lynette was the last person she wanted to see.

As they lined up with their trays, Tonya checked for messages from her parents or Aunt Helen. Both numbers went straight to voicemail. That was unusual for Dad but not for Aunt Helen. For good measure she sent them each a text. Why weren’t they responding?

The line moved forward, and she handed the cashier her meal plan card. After lunch she would try again.

“One thing about Mackenzie,” said Priya as they sat at a table, “if I sleep in, I can go downstairs and catch my first lecture in my PJs.”

“No tromping through snow.” Tonya knew too well what to expect from winter in the region. It was one of the reasons she had wanted to study in Toronto. At least her parents had insisted she stay on campus.

“So, tell me about Loon Lake, local girl.” Priya smiled encouragingly.

“It’s a pretty little city.”

“Picturesque. What else?”

“The Village of Loon Lake is hundreds of years old.”

“Any original buildings still around? I’d love to take some pictures,” said Priya.

“The new part of town is much nicer. Have you visited the farmer’s market?”

“Who wants to photograph vegetables? I want to visit Loon Lake Cemetery. The city website says there are tombstones 300 years old.”

“What’s so great about that?” Tonya didn’t like the way Priya’s eyes lit up when she said cemetery. There were good reasons to keep outsiders from getting too interested in that place. “Anything else you want to see?”

“There’s this tall log cabin on Kenny Road. I saw it when I drove in from Toronto.”

“That would be my aunt’s Herbal Healing Shop.”

“We could visit both.”

“It’s just a boring store.”

“With interesting architecture.”

“If you like log cabins we should go to the Ice House. They used to cut blocks of ice out of the lake in the winter and store them in sawdust all summer. It’s more authentic than the store.”

Priya took a bite of her veggie lasagna before she answered. “I should warn you, when somebody tells me not to do something, that’s exactly what I want to do.”

“Then let’s hit the cemetery, right after lunch.”

“No way!” Priya laughed. “I have class. In fact,” she checked her phone, “I’m almost late. What’s your number?”

Priya stayed long enough to add Tonya’s contact info before rushing to class. The moment Priya headed for the staircase at the opposite end of the building, Tonya called her Dad.

No answer. Not good.

With the weird way her family wouldn’t discuss Aunt Helen’s illness, Tonya feared her Mom was protecting her from something she considered worse than disease—magic.

Between classes, Tonya called Loon Lake Hospital, but Aunt Helen hadn’t been admitted. Tonya rode her bike west through campus and cut through the cemetery, coming out through a small break in the tall, wrought iron fence opposite the shop. She crossed the small field between cemetery and store only to find the closed sign posted. Tonya knocked but nobody answered. She tried phoning, but her aunt’s mailbox was full. It seemed Tonya wasn’t the only one who couldn’t reach Aunt Helen.