Ravenspell Book 1: Of Mice and Magic Read Free Page A

yellow tint. Because of her strange color, her mother named her Amber.
    And in three weeks, tiny Amber began to play with other pet shop mice.
    Now, a week to a mouse is like a year to a human, so Amber grew quickly. Each day, Barley Beard urged her to test her magical powers.
    But as far as Barley Beard could tell, Amber had none. “Don’t worry,” Barley Beard tried to soothe her. “Just put your trust in the Great Master of Field and Fen.”
    Amber sat for hours that night, snuggled in a corner, peering through the glass wall toward the fish tanks and the frog terrariums. She wondered what purpose her life really served. There was none that she could see.
    On the shelf above her, the fancy spotted mice raced about in their elegant mouse habitat, exploring brightly colored tunnels. They often called out, “Wow, I found another yogurt chip in our gourmet feed. Too bad you brown mice don’t get any.” Then the other spotted mice would laugh and shout down to the brown mice, “Say, why don’t you get out of your cage and come up to play on our exercise wheel?”
    What will I ever do? Amber wondered. Is this all that there is to life, burrowing in my wood shavings, trying to find a clean place to sleep?
    She wanted to be special, more special than even a spotted mouse. She wanted to believe old Barley Beard. But it was clear to her that she had no magical powers. She couldn’t free herself, much less the rest of mousekind.
    * * *
    But that morning, Amber’s mother was embraced. Barley Beard was taken a day later.
    By then, all of Amber’s brothers and sisters had gone, and though there were still plenty of pet shop mice in the cage, Amber felt uprooted, completely alone.
    She longed to be free of her dull surroundings and only hoped to be embraced.
    * * *
    All week long, Ben coddled the monitor lizard. He took baths with it and found that the lizard, whose name was Imhotep, loved to dive and thrash his tail. Then Ben would take Imhotep out, dry him with a blow dryer, and they would watch cartoons beneath a special lizard lamp.
    Ben made sure that Imhotep got plenty of water to drink and kept him warm.
    And late in the afternoon on Ben’s birthday, March twenty-sixth, his mom told him, “Hop in the car. We’re going to the pet shop.”
    Though Noah’s Ark Pet Shop was only three miles from his home, this was the first time that Ben had ever been allowed to go inside . He immediately felt drawn to the hedgehogs that rooted in their sawdust, merrily grunting.
    But his mother marched him to the back of the store, handed him a dollar, and said, “Ugh, pick a mouse.”
    “Which one?” Ben asked.
    “Any mouse,” his mom said. “Just buy it, and put it in a bag. I don’t want to see the horrible thing.” She sneezed and covered her nose. “I’ve got to get away from these cats before I choke.” She took off running.
    “A mouse,” Ben whispered. “I never thought of getting a mouse.”
    But it made sense. Dad had said that if he showed that he could be responsible, he could get a small pet. And what was smaller than a mouse?
    He imagined what fun he could have. He could hold it and pet it and carry it to school in his lunchbox. He’d let it run around his room while he did homework.
    It wouldn’t eat much, and no one was allergic to mice. A mouse could be a wonderful pet!
    Ben peered into the cage. Dozens of fine mice burrowed in the wood shavings, drank at the feeder, or raced around playing tag.
    They were plain brown with beady black eyes. A cage nearby had white mice with brown spots, but they were two dollars each. Ben didn’t have enough money for a fancy mouse. The ones he looked at were only fifty cents.
    He finally noticed one mouse that was different, the smallest of the lot, sitting in the shavings. It had a yellow tinge to its fur, and it folded its paws across its belly. It peered right into Ben’s eyes, as if it had been waiting all of its life for Ben to appear.
    “May I help you?” a