Ange's Amazing Grimoire book

Chapter 1: The Amazing Book

The warm scent of books filled Ange's nostrils as she browsed dozens of old books stacked in the attic. She carefully picked up every one of them, read the title, and flipped through a few pages if it sounded interesting. After she's done with one, Ange sets it in a labeled cardboard box. She's not sending them to book-jail, she's giving them a home. At least they're better off in storage than just lying on the dusty wooden floors.

The attic was very quiet. Every movement she made could be heard, but it was still very quiet.

That was, of course, until her mother started yelling for her to come down and eat dinner.

Ange groaned, flopping herself backwards onto the floor, not caring that it's covered in dust. "Ow!" She head bumped into something, it was another loose book. Just as she picked it up and was about to examine it, the attic hatch opened up with a creak, revealing her mother's disapproving face beneath.

"Lady Dubois, would you please come down and grace us with your presence?"

Ange rolled her eyes, not saying anything when she set aside the book and climbed down the ladder. He mother was already gone by the time she reached the ground floor, probably back in the dinning room. The teenage girl dragged herself through the hallway and living room, eventually finding herself sat at the table facing her mother. Diagonally on her left sat her father, who had already started digging into the food. Ange looked down at her plate, it was filled with some sort of seasoned ham, a scoop of white rice, and a handful of vegetables. Broccoli and beans.

"So," Her mother started as she cut her serving of ham into smaller pieces, "what did you learn today with Erin?"

Ange didn't answer, she was chewing a piece of ham with half of it hanging outside her mouth. Her mother smiled, the annoyed kind. "So you've wasted another day of your life." Seeing her daughter finally have a reaction seemed to make her day.

The dining table was silent for a few minutes before Ange's father decided to contribute his opinion: "Mrs. Hemingway was smiling when she left today, I think that's a good sign."

"Erin smiles everyday." His wife scoffed at him, then without missing a heartbeat, she looked at Ange again. "Go to bed earlier tonight, we'll be visiting the school tomorrow."

Ange's fork stopped in mid-air. Her mother continued, "It's about time you got over yourself and started socializing. You're not going back to school, you're just—"

A screech pierced the tension. The noise came from Ange's chair when she stood up and pushed it back through sheer force. The girl picked up her plate and utensils, then turned and began to storm out of the dining room.

"Angel Louise Dubois you come back here." Her mother's breath intensified, her chest moving up and down rapidly with her eyes wide as a bull.

Ange stopped before leaving the room, "How is this any different?" She paused to see if either of her parents wanted to make a smart comment, but neither of them spoke up, one too submissive and the other too angry, so she just left without saying another word.

The wooden floor thumped beneath her socked feet as she arrived back in the attic. She brought her remaining food up here to finish, but she had no appetite after the incident at their table. Ange set her plate on the floor and sat next to it, her knee brushing against the book she was about to inspect before her mother's call. She laid down on her side and stared at its cover for a moment. It looked like leather, some shade of reddish brown. There wasn't a title, not even a simple illustration or symbol to indicate its contents. Ange was positively intrigued.

Most of these books in the attic belonged to her grandmother, Louise Marie. She died when Ange was four, so the girl had little memory of her. Organizing these books was first and foremost a way to de-stress, but it also gave Ange an opportunity to get to know her grandmother more. Her only memory of the kind old lady was being held in her arms and told about "the power of stories", or something like that.

Ange reached for the title-less book and turned to lay on her back. She held the book above her face and examined it closer to make sure there isn't a secret title on the spine. There wasn't. The girl let out a sigh, flipping the cover to reveal its first page. There was nothing. Well, this is still in the realm of possibilities, since there's usually a blank page to bind the book, whatever that's called. She kept flipping expecting to finally see a title page, but there was nothing. After a few more flips she realized that the whole book was empty.

"Amazing." Ange scoffed, rolling her eyes and taking a deep breath. Probably just another unused notebook. Her limited knowledge of Louise Marie included how she liked to write. She wasn't a writer . . . well, wasn't a published writer, and her daughter never saw her creations. After her funeral, Ange's mother dug up some of these notebooks, but all of them were blank. After a pretty long period of searching, she made the conclusion that her mother was mentally ill. Thus, the mystery of these notebooks were taken to the grave with Louise Marie Bernard.

The book had nothing else for her to see, so Ange set it to the side and helped herself up to her knees, then picked up the book again placed it in one of the labeled boxes.

That was when she saw a feather in the corner of the attic. It was against a wall, looked like it fell and rolled over when things were first moved up here. Ange looked at the blank notebook and the quill, making the connection that it might've been a set. She crawled over and took the quill in her hand, realizing that it had no ink left inside. Of course.

Ange then crawled back and took out the blank notebook, flipped it open, pressed the quill against the paper and imagined herself writing.

Ange was a miserable girl in a miserable family. She lived in a miserable house with miserable parents, wasting every miserable day of her life by being a miserable person.

Ange smiled at her handwriting. She can't wait for her mother to find out that she wrote in her late grandmother's notebooks. Will she be angry, or would she not care at all?

Wait a minute . . .

The girl sat up straight, squinting her eyes in disbelief. She examined the quill again, looked very close, and she's one hundred percent sure there's no ink in that ancient thing.

However, what she thought she imagined in her head was actually written down. The first page of the notebook had about one-third filled with her miserable ramblings, the jet black ink was undoubtedly present. Ange carefully ran her finger along the first word, but it didn't smudge. This quill had non-existent ink, and it dried immediately after being written down, or maybe it was always dry . . . what the hell is going on?

Ange's heart raced as her excitement grew. This was some fantasy novel material. All she'd written so far was the truth, what if she wrote something out of her own mind? Would her story come true? She gulped. Despite all the nervousness, she continued to press the tip of the quill against the page.

This day, Ange found her grandmother's notebook in the attic. Contrary to her past understanding, to everything her mother had told her about Louise Marie—the book was a grimoire.

Ange felt something in her change. It was a subtle feeling, but significant enough for her to notice. Her heart pounded as she continued.

Ange flipped through the grimoire and a particular entry caught her attention. It was a ritual to take her away from her miserable life, to take her into a fantastical world of cumulated possibilities. A world where she can belong. The only requirement of the ritual was something she already possessed: the willingness to leave her life behind.

After the last period was pressed onto the somewhat yellowed paper, Ange stopped. More accurately, everything stopped. Ange felt her world being deconstructed and reconstructed into something far closer to her ideal version of life. After who knows how long, she was able to move her eyelids. She took one last glance at the attic, then slowly closed them, embracing the comforting darkness that followed.

Chapter 2: The Amazing Grimoire

Ange stayed in the darkness for a while. She didn't want to open her eyes and realize that everything she just experienced was a delusion born from her desperation. In reality, nothing is magical and she will need to quickly finish her dinner, bring the plate downstairs, and start doing the homework Mrs. Hemingway left for her.

If she goes back, she'll drown in the cycle of meaninglessness. Every sound around her drains out as she sinks deeper into oblivion.

As strange as everything had been, Ange can feel her body. That was the one reality she could hold on to. She tried to focus and sense her surroundings without opening her eyes. It felt like she was still sitting on a wooden floor, but the air in front of her didn't have the dusty smell of her attic. There was the smell of books, or paper, in general. There might also be some herbs? There was a refreshing scent of some sort, Ange wasn't a plant nerd so she couldn't tell the exact name of it, but it reminded her of winter. Christmas.

Having gathered enough evidence to confirm that she wasn't still at home, Ange cautiously opened her eyes. She was, indeed, sitting on a wooden floor. The mysterious book was still in her hands, the quill also. Ange stood up and looked around the room—it was small and rather cramped, filled with pots of various plants that seemed to have an unnatural energy emanating from them. It felt familiar . . . after giving it some thought, Ange recalled that she had felt a similar energy surging inside her heart when she was writing in the "grimoire", specifically the parts that were further away from reality.

The pots around her sat on or next to waist-high drawers that were also made of wood. Ange walked over to one of them and pulled it open, revealing ten scrolls neatly situated in the drawer. She took one out and silently read the title on top, Impale, then put it back to where it came from. She didn't look at the others, she wanted to find out her location first.

Ange turned the doorknob and pulled it open, there was a subtle creaking noise but it wasn't unbearable like fingernails on a blackboard.

Outside the room was a corridor. It stretched pretty far to Ange's right and had many doors on both sides. She tried to open a few of them, but stopped trying after five in a row were locked.

Ange walked along the corridor to see where it leads before coming to a turn. She poked her head around the corner and observed what lied before her. There was a larger room, well-furnished, might be a lounge of some sort. Ange made her way towards that direction, finding herself in a lavish room with couches and tea tables enclosing a carpeted empty space in the center.

There was a full-body mirror on one end of the room, next to a closed door with decorative carvings on its surface. Ange drifted over and looked into the mirror, making sure she was still herself and not in someone else's body. There she was, dark brown hair that's almost identical to black flowing down to touch her shoulders, the ends a bit more curly than the otherwise straight strands. Her skin was rather pale, and she had faint dark circles under her light brown upturned eyes. Ange's lanky body was slightly hunched, her arms hugging the notebook and quill close to her chest. She wore a black tee that had a white skull and two scimitars on it, vaguely resembling a Jolly Roger, and grey checked lounge pants designed for comfort instead of formalities. Ange wasn't usually someone to care about appearances, but she would dive head-first into quicksand if some random magical stranger saw her in this outfit.

She wasn't pretty. People say so, she thinks so too. Her posture, attitude, and clothing choices certainly didn't help. Back when Ange did go to school, she was always labeled as the "weirdo" and isolated at best. At worst? Stuff would happen to her. Classmates would say things, her teachers would say things, even her parents at home would say things. Specifically her mother, but her father's silence enabled it.

As her focus lingered around school memories, muffled conversations emerged from around the corner. Ange's heart skipped a beat as she turned to face the sound. A couple of teenagers, seemingly the same age as her, walked into the lounge. They saw her, made a confused face, but didn't react much and just kept talking among themselves. The lounge now hosted eleven teens including her, the ten others all wore white ruffle blouses and high waist black pants, like they're cosplaying royalty or pirates—there's a pretty distinct difference between the two, but they sometimes share outfits in popular media.

Though if this is some sort of magical fantasy land, those characters are not completely out of the picture.

Ange observed the group a little longer, then the carved wooden door next to her started creaking open. An older lady wearing the same outfit, but with a black shoulder cape over it. Her grayish hair was tied up in a tight bun behind her head, her dark green eyes glistening with a focused energy.

"Welcome, my new pupils—" She stopped herself as her gaze wandered to Ange. "My apologies, who are you?"

Ten youthful pairs of eyes and a more seasoned one locked onto the girl who doesn't belong. Ange felt her stomach rumble with an urge to puke, but she repressed the illusion by taking a few deep breaths.

"I-I um . . . I wrote in a blank book and just . . . got here." Her arms are itchy with awkwardness, but she restrained herself from scratching her skin this time. Ange told the truth because she thinks that's the best way to prevent misunderstandings. However weird and unconceivable it might sound, she didn't want to lie and later find out that these assumingely magical people can read minds.

"A book, you say?" The woman asked in confirmation. Shortly after, she saw the thick leather notebook the girl was carrying and raised her eyebrows, not giving her a chance to respond before asking another question: "Do you have a quill with that grimoire you're holding?"

Ange nodded and held out the quill for the woman to see. She was surprised to realize that the quill looked different under the faint shade of light this lounge offered—it had a crystal teal hue that shifted from one end of the feather to another, dancing like a fairy from common folktales.

The woman was quite tall. She bent down a little to examine the quill closer, squinting her eyes as if that would make her chained spectacles a magnifying glass. After an intense moment of burning scrutiny, Ange was finally relieved from the flames as the woman pulled away.

"It looks like we have a guest student this year."

Student? Ange's heart dropped. Was this some kind of school? Unpleasant memories flowed through her brain cells and occupied her consciousness. She didn't realize that the other teens' chatter was that of excitement and curiosity.

The woman cleared her throat as a signal for the others to calm down, then turned back to a disassociating Ange, "Pupil, what is your name?"

"I-I-I didn't—"

"Speak slowly. What's the matter, my child?"

"I didn't—I didn't consent to being brought here. To a school . . . or wherever this place is." Ange blurted out hurriedly, hoping for an explanation that clarifies her not being in a school of any sort. "I just wanted to leave my life behind, n-not run into an-n-other room in hell."

The woman wasn't offended at all. Or she just didn't show it. She nodded in understanding, this exchange seemingly wasn't the first instance of reluctance she had encountered.

"The grimoire took you to the right place, it seems. Look at your peers." Ange didn't look. The woman didn't bother to repeat herself, she just continued: "They each have a reason to leave their past life behind. Your only difference with them is that you come from another world."

Ange finally looked up at the woman's kind eyes. She flinched with the eye contact, but didn't avert her gaze immediately. "S-Sorry, I'm confused . . . I thought this place was born from my imagination—"

Ange heard a laugh from one of the ten others before they were shushed by the older woman. She shook her head, "You did not create this place. However, you are right in some sense. Your imagination did play a role. The grimoire is the passage, the quill is the door. By writing your desires with the quill on the grimoire, you opened the door and travelled through the passage. As a result, you arrived here. It is my honor to be the one to receive you."

"There are other places I could've been?"

"Yes." The woman took out a pocket watch to check the time. She frowned, it looks like she was running late of whatever schedule she had. "I'd like to explain things to you more clearly, but we shouldn't take up your peers' time."

The woman put away her watch and took out something else—a small notebook the size of one's palm. The woman flipped to a pre-written page, signed a space near the bottom, ripped it out and muttered some words. She then locked eyes with Ange again, but this time the latter felt something strange. It was the tingly sensation she experienced when she wrote in the "grimoire", the energy she sensed from the plants in the room she woke up in.

Ange's body was surrounded by a miniature tornado. Her head poked out from the top, but her torso and limbs were fully enclosed in the swooshing wind. It lasted a few seconds before dying down, and by that time, her jolly roger tee and baggy lounge pants were replaced by the same black and white outfit the rest of them wore.

Now that there were more context clues, Ange realized that it was a uniform.

She was, indeed, in a school. The only comfort she can find is that it's an academy filled with magic—far from reality and untouched by its filth.