Read Online Gooseberry Bluff Community College of Magic: The Thirteenth Rib (Kindle Serial) by David J. Schwartz - Free Book Online Page A

Several of the latter seemed to have parties going on onboard. As Joy locked her car she noticed a group of kids wearing gear from Arthur Stag College on a nearby boat; one of them waved at her, and she waved back, wondering if it was one of the kids who had crashed her first lecture.
    She crossed the street to the row of brick buildings opposite the pier. The second building from the right had a couple of neon beer signs in the window and the inscription The Mandrake hanging below the second-floor windows.
    Once inside she saw that the second story no longer existed; the remnants of its wood floor were embedded halfway up the brick walls, now open all the way to the high rafters that supported the building’s roof. Brown faux-leather booths lined the wall to her right, with tables filling the front left side up to the point where the long, polished bar took over. The place was hung with black-and-white photos of the town — at least, Joy assumed it was the town — and people Joy had no way of recognizing, any more than she could have recognized the patrons filling most of the tables in the place.
    “Hi,” said the hostess. “Are you here for dinner?”
    “I’m meeting someone — the reservation should be under Hector Ay?”
    “Yes! Right this way.”
    The hostess’s aura belied her cheery air; she was beset with anxiety over something. But it was none of Joy’s business. There was no good way to tell a stranger that you were worried about them because you were able to see things about them that they hadn’t chosen to tell you. Joy had made a rule for herself, that unless someone’s aura indicated that they were about to hurt themselves or someone else, she kept what she saw to herself.
    The hostess led Joy to a booth where Professor Ay was already sitting. He stood as she approached and shook her hand. Joy took note of his dark, tousled hair, his thick mustache, and the alternating reds and yellows of his aura. A driven man…but also a worried one.
    “Good to see you again,” she said.
    “Thank you for meeting me.” He motioned for her to have a seat and waited until she had before sitting back down himself.
    “This is an interesting spot,” she said. “I haven’t seen much of the town yet.”
    “Yes. I believe this was the offices of the local newspaper until the flood of 1965. When I first came here it was vacant, but then they shut down the culinary department at the college and Chuck decided to use his severance to open this place.”
    “Chuck?”
    “Yes. He was the head of the culinary department. They used to be in charge of the cafeteria at Gooseberry Bluff, before the state decided they could make more money by giving franchises to Subway and Pizza Hut. So now this is the place to get good food in town.”
    The waitress came by and asked if they wanted drinks, never looking up from her pad. Her aura was familiar, dominated as it was by dark gold. “Margaret?”
    Margaret May looked up. “Professor! I’m sorry, I just got on shift and I’m all — oh! Professor Ay!” The smile Margaret gave Hector was a bit more enthusiastic.
    “Hello, Margaret,” he said. “I didn’t realize you were working here.”
    “I just started this week. Can I ask you? I tried that aversion spell you talked about? From class? I put it on the door to my bedroom, and now my roommate is talking about moving out, and I’m worried that I cast it too strong, you know? I didn’t mean for that to happen. Also my cat is avoiding me, but sometimes she’s just kind of a snot, so that might be totally unrelated.”
    “Cats and aversion spells can have some bizarre interactions,” Hector said. “Sometimes they cancel each other out. Have you tried removing the aversion?”
    “I did, but we didn’t have any mustard powder, so…”
    “You used yellow mustard, didn’t you?”
    “Brown, actually.”
    “Well, I don’t know what sort of counterspell that might have turned out to be. I recommend you go back and