Seriously Wicked by Tina Connolly Page A

seemed like weird emotions for Sparkle to have about a cute new boy. She couldn’t be picking up on his internal demon somehow … could she?
    “You’re probably too busy adjusting to your new school,” Sparkle said. “Besides, we’ve already booked a band, I’m afraid. Miss Crane is prepared to approve their lyrics.”
    “ Prepared to,” said Miss Crane. Her fingers gripped the edge of the piano lid, her voice quavering as she tried for firm . “But first I need them, or we’ll have no band at all.”
    “Lyrics?” said Devon. “I wrote our lyrics. I could recite them right here.”
    Reese glanced at Sparkle. “Well … Couldn’t we…?”
    “ Reese ,” said Sparkle. There was a tone in her voice that usually Reese would’ve obeyed instantly.
    But mortal junior Sparkle versus the magnetism of an immortal elemental force?
    Reese stared up at Devon, who winked/not winked at her again. “I’m unbooking them,” she said dreamily but firmly. “Pop Pop isn’t even part of the school. We’re supporting the new boy’s band.”
    Devon grinned lazily. “Can’t wait to perform for y’all.”
    Reese sighed moistly and the other girls squealed. Miss Crane beamed and moved in for those lyrics. Even Benjamin joined the admiring mob.
    I groaned, grabbed one more spider roll, and snuck out of the room. Left the squealing behind me.
    What on earth was I going to do now? Devon was supposed to complete three tasks—none of which I was sure he should complete—so we could get the demon out before it ate his entire soul and owned Devon forever. The sooner we could get the tasks done, the sooner the demon would be gone—and every minute might count.
    But maybe the newly confident Devon wouldn’t want the demon out of his soul. A demon could make a boy with stage fright into a star.
    That was a nasty thought.
    There was a tug on my backpack and it turned out to be Jenah. “Okay, that A Lunch was full of win,” she said. “Did you see Sparkle’s face when Reese disobeyed her? Hey, so what do you think about the nose job rumors with Sparkle? It definitely looks different, but everyone knows it’s just her living with her grandfather or something, and god knows what he does, but it no way involves piles of cash and anyway, what kind of doctor would perform a nose job at her age? That’s a mystery, I tell you.” Jenah with the auras straightened out was giddy with relief.
    But me, I felt like a ton of bricks. Maybe it was my backpack. At least, something was weighing me down.
    “Okay, spill what’s wrong,” said Jenah. “I’m trying to cheer you up, but something’s wrong and I’m betting some part of it has to do with Devon. And no, I don’t know how he changed his hair that fast, but I expect there’s a sink in a boys’ bathroom covered in black dye. Look, you’re not even thrilled about getting rid of that awful Pop Pop. Hey, over here. Talking, talking, me.”
    We stopped at our locker and I thumped my backpack to the ground. I didn’t feel any lighter. I traded out my books for the American history text and Jenah grabbed a lime-green hair streak and clipped it next to the highlighter-yellow one.
    “You’re always trying to help people out,” Jenah said. “And you like Devon. Why’d you suddenly change your mind about helping him?”
    “Does he look like he needs our help?” I said.
    “No,” admitted Jenah. “His aura sure was different. All purple-black.” She watched me stare into the hairy depths of the locker. “Cam,” she said. “What’s wrong?”
    A billion things welled up inside me but I couldn’t say any of them, because they all traced back to the witch in my life.
    Devon’s demon.
    The destruction of the school.
    The dragon’s loneliness.
    “I don’t want to buy pig’s ears ever again,” is what finally came out.
    “Okaaay,” Jenah said. She studied the air around me, like she did when she was looking at her invisible auras.
    I could never figure out if she