The Crystal Mirror Read Online Free Page B

see what Claudia was staring at. A large patch of river water was bright red. The colour stretched across to the opposite bank and several metres downstream.
    Laney swallowed. With all the other things that had happened last night, she’d forgotten that she’d stumbled into the river and seen a weird colour spread into the water. But why wasn’t it washing away?
    She pushed back her hair. “I wonder what happened to the river – it looks weird.” She tried to sound like she didn’t care.
    Claudia swung round and frowned. Her eyes had bright golden rings circling the black pupils.
    “Your eyes are the same!” gasped Laney. “They’re gold like mine.”
    “What? Show me your eyes!” said Claudia.
    Laney slowly took off her sunglasses.
    “You’ve changed,” said Claudia. “Wow! I didn’t think that was possible. I thought you were stuck halfway somehow. These last few weeks I couldn’t work out if you even knew that you were making things happen. Then you busted the water fountain yesterday and I bet you did this too.” She jerked her head at the stained river.
    Laney opened her mouth to speak but didn’t know what to say, so she just nodded.
    “Did you change last night?” Claudia carried on. “You must have done. You weren’t Awake when I saw you on the bus yesterday.”
    “What do you mean, awake?” Laney struggled for words. “I don’t get it. I know I must have powers– all the things that happened yesterday…”
    “You’ve put us in serious danger of being discovered. Talk about drawing attention to yourself! Why can’t you be more careful? Just look at this water.”
    “I’m not
trying
to do anything!” Laney was stung by her words. “Tell me what’s going on.”
    “Haven’t you guessed it yet?” Claudia’s eyes widened. “Seriously?”
    Laney swallowed again. “If you know what’s happening to me – just tell me, please!”
    “I’m surprised you haven’t worked it out.” Claudia looked at her pityingly. “You’re a faerie.”
    “What? A
faerie
!” The world seemed to tilt sideways for a moment. “Are you joking?”
    Claudia gave a half-smile. “I’m totally serious. You’ve just Awoken into your full powers. That’s why your eyes have turned gold. You’re a faerie. Just like me.”
    The air around her trembled for a moment and then a dark girl with an amber dress stood in her place. It was Claudia. Except it wasn’t quite Claudia. Her skirt shimmered at the edges and behind her curved a pair of long, pale wings. Her skin looked luminous, as if it was lit from inside.
    “Wow!” said Laney. “That’s so… Can you make yourself change like that just by deciding to?”
    “Yes. We have a human form and a faerie form.See?” The air shimmered around her and suddenly there was the everyday Claudia.
    “I had wings last night, but then they vanished,” said Laney.
    “You’ll get used to changing into faerie form when you want to. It just takes a little practice.”
    “But aren’t faeries…smaller?”
    “No, we’re not,” snapped Claudia. “And even if no one else told you, you must have realised that something was going on around here. Some days I’m surprised all the humans don’t notice. Of course, if you turn the river red, that doesn’t
exactly
help.” She turned back to look at the weird stretch of crimson water. “The cats told me about it and I thought straight away it might be you.”
    “The cats told you?”
    Claudia nodded. “Dizzy tells me everything.”
    This was another confusing thought to add to the swarm in Laney’s head. Claudia talked to cats and they were both faeries…
    The relief was huge – she wasn’t the only one who was different. But at the same time, she’d imagined having powers that no one else had and that had been pretty exciting.
    And who else was in on this secret? A picture of Jessie Weir’s face popped into her head. No. She couldn’t be. Surely a faerie would be nicer.
    “Are there other people who are