was getting us nowhere now; everyone was shouting, trying to make themselves heard, and it wasn’t until Carl’s booming voice sounded out, louder and angrier than I’d ever heard it, that the room went finally quiet.
As it did, I saw both Hilda and Violet’s eyes slide out of focus briefly, just as Marge’s had. Thank goodness for Amelia’s timing.
“That was a terrible thing to say,” said William, staring hard at Violet. “You must not have a very high opinion of your grandchildren to say that, even after everything they’ve done in the last three weeks.”
“Nothing like that is going to happen,” said Nicole, looking close to tears now, and Jessica put her arm around her.
“Of course not,” said Peter. “The whole place is forbidden from using magic, and there’ll be enough decent people there so that we can protect ourselves if they do try anything. You people just worry too much.”
“All part of being a parent, mate,” said Carl. “You’ll understand in due course.”
“I’m not having kids,” said Peter, and I could tell he was actually thinking more about the process of conceiving rather than the parenting aspect of it—typical Peter.
“Enough of that,” said Marge. “Okay, you kids can go to this—this party of yours, but you’re to be back here at 11 o’clock, on the dot, alone and completely sober. If you’re not, you won’t know what’s coming to you. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” we chorused.
“That’s 11, on the dot,” said Mum. “We’ll be waiting up.”
“Righto,” I said. We all moved away from the table, desperate to get back to our room now that the job was done.
We shot upstairs, noticing that the kitchen had gone rather quiet in the aftermath of the shouting; perhaps the adults no longer wanted to talk to each other. We went straight into our room.
“You in, Amelia?” hissed James as he went to shut the door.
“Yeah,” she whispered, appearing from thin air once the door was closed.
“Brilliant,” said Peter, sinking onto his bed. “Brilliant, Amelia. I don’t think we had a hope in hell of getting them on side without you.”
“I don’t think so either,” said Amelia, smirking. “Most difficult ones I’ve dealt with so far, and I thought Serena’s were bad. Oh well.”
“Thanks a lot,” said Felicity. “Er—perhaps we should hang up here for a while. I’m not sure I want to be in their company right now.”
“You guys okay with those conditions she set?” Amelia asked.
“I’d prefer not to have to worry about being back by 11,” said Nicole. “But we should be thankful that we’re at least allowed to go out.”
“I can do something about the time too, if you like,” suggested Amelia.
“Like what?” we all asked.
“Like put a spell on them so that they’ll need to go to bed early tomorrow night,” said Amelia, her lip curling. “So that they won’t be able to check on you when you get back. I’ll have to come back to do it though, so I can get your dads as well.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” said Jessica.
I agreed, but it made me feel slightly uneasy. We had already achieved the near-impossible by getting permission to go, but this somehow felt ten times worse. What if something did go wrong? Our parents would be asleep, and we wouldn’t be able to count on their help. But then, I told myself, if something went wrong with the Hammersons, I would hardly be going to Mum and Marge for help—they wouldn’t be any good in a battle of magic. In fact, we would probably do better than them, after our successive victories over Moran.
“Cool,” said Amelia. “Well, I’d better go. I believe Daniel is in need of my assistance.”
And she vanished into thin air once again.
Chapter 7: The Party
Tension filled the two houses on Friday night after the confrontation with our mothers, where the adults seemed not to want to talk to each other, and none of us wanted to be around them long enough for them to possibly change their minds. Dad and Charlie came home as cheery as ever, as per usual on Friday afternoons, but it didn’t take long for the mood of the place to get to them too. But there was a different tension come Saturday morning. The adults seemed to have accepted the inevitable by this stage, and were becoming normal again, but the six of us were torn between excitement and extreme nerves. Whatever we said to each other, we couldn’t deny the fact that what was going to happen tonight could—at best— be a good night out. At worst, it could be fatal.
Due to this, it was impossible to relax or settle to anything during the day. James attempted to get us doing homework, but it simply didn’t work. We therefore spent the day just talking about the party, and how we would handle ourselves if anything did go wrong. We also put some time into deciding what the hell we were going to wear that night, eventually settling on the only formal attire we had. The girls were in a better position, having more things to choose from, but they would have preferred to have had the chance (and the money) to go shopping for something suitable. They did, at least, go out to the town central in the late morning to get their hair done.
Marc sent us another SMS around lunch, reminding us of the time of the party, and also reminding us that he wanted a meeting at 6 o’clock that evening. He said nothing about where to go or what was to be discussed, so I could only assume we were to use our phones to get there. All he said was not to eat beforehand, so either he was planning on feeding us or we’d get food at the party. James was rather uneasy about that idea.
“What if their plan is to poison us?” he asked.
“I might give mine to Hignat to taste test first,” said Peter grimly.
The girls returned around half past 2 with the news that Amelia had already dropped by our house to take the Light Crystal from my top drawer, as well as put the spell on the rest of the family to make sure they went to bed early that night, which they broke to us out of earshot of any of the adults. Despite this, however, our mothers had plenty to say to us when we left the house that evening. It had been James’s idea to let them see us leaving the house, so that they wouldn’t be suspicious about how we were getting past them without their knowing.
“Remember what we discussed last night,” Mum said, following us to the door.
“Eleven on the dot, alone and sober,” said Peter in a bored voice. “No need to worry, Mum; we’ll make you proud of us.”
“Not that you aren’t already,” added Jessica, earning herself a scowl from the pair of them. They obviously didn’t want to admit she was right.
“Be careful,” said Charlie. “Don’t let your guard down. We’ll be waiting up to hear how it went.”
“Righto,” said Nicole, containing her smirk with difficulty.
We finally managed to get out of the house at 5:50, fighting the urge to jump with joy. In spite of whatever danger was facing us, it was still a massive achievement for us to get out of the house this late at night, and with permission. We went around the corner into Napoleon Road, where we would be out of sight of any of our parents, and waited for 6 o’clock. We all held our phones in our hands, unsure exactly what this was going to feel like, and kept glancing down at our watches as 6 o’clock ticked nearer…
“Ten … nine … eight,” said Peter, his eye on the second hand of his watch. “Here it comes…”
“How do we know Marc’s watch isn’t on a different—” said James, but he never had a chance to get the rest of the sentence out.
Before