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“Wait, what? Tonight?” He blanched. “I can’t have a party! I mean, you should understand, my mom doesn’t really like it when people come over—and, um, I’ve got a lot of work to do—I have to fluff her furs, iron her undergarments, I mean—” He gulped, embarrassed.
Mal ignored him. “Spread the news. Hell Hall’s having a hell-raiser.” She seemed to warm to the thought. “Get the word out. Activate the twilight bark, or whatever it is you puppies do.”
“Bowwow,” barked Jay with a laugh.
Carlos glared at the two of them, in spite of himself.
“There’s a party?” Evie asked shyly. Carlos had forgotten she was standing right next to him, and he jumped at the sound of her voice.
“Eavesdrop, much?” Mal said, snarling at her although it was obvious Evie couldn’t help it, as she was standing right next to them.
Before Evie could protest, Mal sighed. “Of course there is. The party of the year. A real rager, didn’t you hear?” Mal looked her up and down and shook her head sadly. “Oh, I guess you didn’t hear.” She mock-winced, looking at Carlos conspiratorially. “Everyone’s going to be there.”
“They are?” Carlos looked confused. “But you only just told me to have it—” He quickly got the message. “Everyone,” he agreed.
Evie smiled. “Sounds awesome. I haven’t been to a party in a long, long time.”
Mal raised an eyebrow. “Oh, I’m sorry. This is a very exclusive party, and I’m afraid you didn’t get an invitation.”
With those parting words, Mal went ahead of them into the classroom—she was in their next class too, of course (her EQ was legendary)—and left them to each other.
“Sorry,” Carlos mumbled. “I guess I was wrong, Mal doesn’t just talk a big game.”
“Yeah, me too. The party sounds like fun,” Evie said sadly.
“You want to see what I’m making?” he asked, trying to change the subject as they settled into their seats. He took out of his bag a black box, with wires and an antenna poking out from one side—the same contraption he’d been fiddling with earlier. “I made it from some old magician’s stuff.”
“Sure.” Evie smiled. “Hey, is that a power core? It looks like you’re making a battery, right?”
Carlos nodded, impressed. “Yeah.”
“What does it do?”
“Can you keep a secret?” he asked, whispering.
Evie nodded. “I keep them from my mom all the time.”
“I’m trying to poke a hole in the dome.”
“Really? Can you do that? I thought it was invincible.”
“Well, I thought I could maybe try to get a signal with this antenna here. It’s actually an old wand, and I think if I hit the right frequency, we might be able to bring some of the outside world into the dome, and we can watch something other than that hairy old beast king telling us to be good, or that channel that only sells shackles.”
“I sort of like the Auradon channel,” Evie said dreamily. “Especially when they feature the Prince of the Week. They’re so dreamy.”
Carlos snorted.
She looked from the boy to the battery. “Frequency? But how?”
“I’m not sure, but I think if I can break through the dome, we’d be able to pick up Auradon’s radio waves—you know, Internet and wi-fi signals. I’m not exactly sure what the frequency is, but I think that’s how they get all those channels and stuff.”
Evie sighed again. “What I’d give to go to Auradon. I’ve heard that everything is so beautiful there.”
“Um, I guess. If you’re into that kind of thing,” Carlos said. He didn’t care about princes or enchanted lakes or chirping animals or c
heerful dwarfs. What he did care about was discovering more of the online world, a safe virtual refuge, where he’d heard you could even find people with whom you could play videogames—that sounded like fun, as he never had anyone to play with.
There had to be something more to life than kowtowing to the cool kids, organizing his mother’s fur coats, and hiding from her tantrums.
