Alex double checked the seats in the room but saw no vacancies.
“You have much to catch up on.”
“Oh.” She placed a hand on the book sitting between her and the boy. “He’s loaning me his textbook today.”
“I see.” Professor Duvall sneered at Alex’s remote table of rejects before gliding to the front of the room.
Alex let out a breath and curled her arms around her chest. She wondered why she had chills up her spine. Then she realized the freckled boy next to her was grinding his oversized teeth. “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing,” he muttered, glaring at the teacher. “Just the witch.”
Alex didn’t think she’d heard him correctly. “The what?”
He pointed to the front of the room.
“Jade stones!” Professor Duvall’s voice rang through the vaulted rafters. “Mr. Seyferr, if you could be helpful enough to tell us how this substance affects the bodied.”
The round-faced boy on Alex’s other side began to flip through the pages of his book furiously.
“Hello!” Duvall barked. “Reuben Seyferr!”
“I …” Reuben Seyferr squeaked in a voice much smaller than he was. He itched at one of his arms. “I don’t remember.”
“You didn’t read the chapter?”
“I did. I just … ”
“See me after class.” Duvall’s voice was angrily high-pitched, but she seemed pleased that she’d embarrassed him. “Jackery Bond?”
The freckled boy lifted his chin. “Yes?”
“Jade stones?”
Jackery Bond sighed. “For humans, excuse me, the bodied, jade is often a symbol for perfection and immortality. Mesoamerican Indian masks often had the stone embedded within the representations of their gods,” he recited. “The Chinese also greatly value the stone.”
Alex was impressed. Perhaps he had memorized the entire book.
“Humph.” Duvall gave a sniff nod. “And Skye.” She refocused her attention, and her tone softened considerably. “For what do we use the stone?”
“Our doctors use it,” Skye responded in a sing-song voice. “It helps to sustain spiritual injuries in the core area.” She pointed to her hips.
Alex wasn’t sure what to think about Skye Gossamer. That morning, she had walked up to Alex in the vestibule and stared into Alex’s eyes, scrutinizing her own reflection. “You have long eyelashes,” she’d said. “That means you don’t always allow yourself to the see the things right in front of you.” And then she’d turned her heel, and her long auburn hair billowed behind her like a curtain.
“Very good.” Duvall gave a small nod of approval. She openly favored Skye over Jackery or Reuben. She waved her arm above her head in a fist and the image of a primrose yellow stone appeared, hovering in midair.
“Jackery,” Alex whispered, “is that a projection?”
“I guess you could say that. And call me Jack.”
“Where’s the screen?”
“Not necessary. There’s no technology. She’s projecting it herself. When you do see the technology here, you’ll know it.” He grinned. “Give your mind some time.”
“And the Voix,” Duvall continued, tapping her chin and eying the class. “What did you read about this mineral?”
Madison Constance raised her hand. “The Voix is found in parts of France mostly in, hold on,” she said, frowning down at her notes. “Lorraine, France, where they believe the stone helps to enlighten the user.”
“Very good,” Duvall said. “The bodied assume the stone will reveal to them some knowledge they were meant to hear, when in reality, what the Voix really does is endow the user the ability to hear spirits. What was not included in your reading is that the bodied who claim to be clairvoyant will simply keep these stones in their possession.” She gave the class a haughty look. “This was actually why the term ‘medium’ was coined by spirits, because medium means something in the middle or average. Many who call themselves mediums are nothing but average humans with no special gifts at all. Just a large stash of Voix. Legitimately gifted mediums also use the stones but only to help boost the senses of their clients.”
Professor Duvall waved her hand and the image changed to a small red-brown bracelet. “There is much magic to be found in minerals. Some more powerful than others.” She whipped her hand open, spreading her bony fingers wide. Alex watched the tiny bracelet grow to the size of a garden hose.
“This representation is a piece of copper jewelry sold by a vendor here in the states. Unbeknownst to the seller, this bracelet contains magic. It arrived here with us nearly two hundred and fifty years ago, and its powers have never diminished.”
Jack and Reuben shared a knowing look when Duvall mentioned magic. Calla raised her hand, but she was ignored.
“Do the powers of the stone diminish the more it is used?” Madison Constance asked.
“It depends on the type of stone,” Joey Rellingsworth interrupted. “Right, Professor?”
She nodded. “Most minerals are quite temperamental. Some fade with age, some fade with use.” Duvall scanned the room, still disregarding Calla. “Yes, Madison?”
“Is it true that you can divide a stone without killing the properties?”
Duvall rearranged her tangled jewelry. “Again, it depends on the stone. Often, if a stone is divided, the power will divide with it.”
The soft scratching of scribbling pencils filled the room, and Alex realized that she should probably be taking notes. She didn’t want to be on Duvall’s bad side.
“Case in point.” The projection of the bracelet grew even larger. “This piece has been tampered with, because typically with copper, you can split the stone, but it will weaken the power. Not true with this one. Other questions? No? Good.”
Calla sighed and lowered her hand.
Another image flashed in front of the class. The setting was some sort of hospital. People in blue scrubs flanked an operating table with a bench of medical tools to the side. The doctors swarmed around the patient’s head, but nothing appeared to be wrong with him.
“Is that a photo?”
Jack shook his head. “You can’t take a picture of a ghost. She’s projecting it from her memory.”
“This soldier,” Duvall said, “was attacked while accompanying an ambassador to a sister city in Russia.”
“It just looks like he’s asleep,” a boy with a pointy nose remarked.
“Very true, Mr. Darwin, but some substances are toxic to us in our spiritual shells because they are typically toxic to the brain. Copper, for instance. This solider died.”
Darwin. The boy’s black eyes matched his spiked hair just like Tess.
Duvall looked up at her own memory. “During the procedure documented here, doctors were able to successfully imprint jade within the mind of the soldier. But the effects of the copper turned out to be too strong.”
Alex began to raise her hand, but Madison Constance beat her to it. “If jade heals the core area, why would it need to be put into his mind?”
“Because when the solider was attacked, the copper was shot into the projection of his abdomen. His mind creates the projection of his core area, and therefore it needed to be his mind where the healing took place.
“Amazing, yet often unfortunate what a simple rock can do.”
The image of the bracelet began to spin.
“Almost as amazing as what the mind can do.”
“So what do you think of the witch?” Jack asked when the class was dismissed.
“She didn’t seem like a witch to me.”
“Ha! She’s not going to jump on her broomstick and ride around the classroom, is she? Everyone knows what she is, and even if they didn’t, we have our very own tenth generation witch hunter to confirm it.”