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Player Name: Ro
Player LJ: terza_teabeef
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Series: Sabrina, the Teenage Witch
Name: Sabrina Spellman
Age: 18
Gender: Female
Appearance: Sabrina is a girl of average height, about 5'6" or thereabouts. She's a natural blonde, with blue eyes and a friendly smile. She's on the edge of being considered thin, though her body has some meat to it (for lack of a better way to describe her). All in all, appearance-wise there's nothing too remarkable about Sabrina. She could be considered pretty by some, at the very least pleasant to look at, but there's no "wow factor" when first meeting her.
As for her attire, Sabrina tends to dress well enough to reflect the current fashions, though she usually will choose slacks and a blouse to a skirt. She favors blouses over t-shirts, will wear both jeans and nicer pants, and has an assortment of shoes. There's no one color she wears more than the rest, though solids over patterns are the norm.
Personality: Sabrina is an ambitious, out-going young woman, who tends to have a perky attitude towards life. She is optimistic, for the most part; she's intelligent, and she's active in her school community. Academics mean a lot to her, and getting a "C" on a paper is equivalent to failure. While she only has a few close friends in school, based on her overall accepting personality, it's hard to understand why this is, exactly (though a lot of it has to do with the head cheerleader Libby taking an immediate dislike to her, and also the fact that Sabrina's particular character happens to fall under that type of trope). These are some more basic statements about the type of person Sabrina is.
When she turned sixteen, she discovered her magical powers; ever since, we often see Sabrina land herself in sticky situations that inevitably she tries to solve with magic. More often than not, if Sabrina can, she will take what seems to be the easy way out, though in the end it usually turns out that magic is not the final situation to everything. Sabrina grows frustrated often when things don't go smoothly, and will turn to her aunts, or if it's a problem she's unwilling or wary of making them aware of, to Salem Saberhagen. She depends a lot on both her aunts' presence should she come across a problem she cannot solve herself, and her magic to undo the obstacles in her path.
Labeled a "freak" by her rival Libby, Sabrina does live up to the title on occasion, usually when she's trying to hide a magical occurrence from her mortal friends. She is very aware of the consequences should a mortal discover her secret, and so will usually be forced to come up with crazy explanations on the spot. They usually don't make much sense and her delivery is never quite convincing; it often leaves the mortal confused, and if they don't like Sabrina, suspicious as well. However Sabrina is always more concerned with fixing her magical mishaps than with her acting skills, and once the problem has been diffused, she is able to calm herself, slow down, and offer a more acceptable explanation to the confused mortals in her life.
Sabrina is susceptible to different types of obsession: grades, spending, a special one involving pancakes, appearance; whatever the "moral of the week" is, the lesson is usually learned through and by Sabrina. She is a (mostly) normal teenager with many of the typical teenage concerns: she worries about fitting in, worries about her grades, her future, her schooling in general, hankers after a car and the "freedom" that comes with it, thinks about her boyfriend and their relationship, etc. She still has a lot to learn about the world, and about herself. While she is a fairly well-developed young woman at this point of her life, there are still many things she has yet to discover about herself.
Though with her faults (particularly around the holiday season), Sabrina is mostly given over to generosity. She is made happy through helping others, and often uses her magic to try to make her friends' lives easier. She's also idealistic at times, believing in the good and effectiveness of her actions to make the world a better place. Not to say she's an angel by any means, for as nice as Sabrina can be with her friends, she is not unfamiliar with the concept of revenge, and has on many occasions taken out her frustrations with the likes of Libby or Mr. Kraft with the help of magic. She can be manipulative as well, though usually under the counsel and with the encouragement of Salem.
Particulars: Academics ☄ Sabrina is an overall good student, but the subjects she does best at are mathematics and the sciences. She also enjoys journalism, and is the editor of the school newspaper, as well as being a member of the science club. Creative writing, however, Sabrina has found through experience, is not her strong suit, and it bothered her when she realized this (courtesy of the first C she ever received). She likes to be good at everything; not to be mistaken with boastfulness, she doesn't gloat about her accomplishments, but she does like to be recognized for her academic excellence every now and again.
Magic ☄ With the point of her right index finger, Sabrina can do just about anything...at least, she could, ever since her sixteenth birthday. But magic has its own rules by which she must abide, and she is constantly learning what they all are. There are also more complicated ways in which to perform magic that a finger point won't accomplish: she can concoct various brews to create just desserts, for example, and incantations are sometimes necessary for certain spells. Precision and accuracy are key when performing magic; just thinking something won't make it be so, though sometimes thought isn't even required for a spell to be cast, as Sabrina learned her second day of witch-hood, when she turned the head cheerleader into a pineapple!
While there are various rules on how to use magic, there aren't so many rules when it comes to witches' magic use in general. While Sabrina, and most of the Spellman family, use their fingers to cast spells, there are other witches who pull on their earlobe, or intone Latin for every spell they cast, as a few examples. Even the way to flourish one's finger may differ from person to person; for Sabrina, however, a simple point is all it takes for most spells. Another difference is the magical "residue" left behind once a spell is cast. For Sabrina, when she casts a spell, it often comes with a sprinkling of goldish sparkles; her Aunt Hilda, on the other hand, always casts a spell with a puff of smoke, and her Great-Aunt Irma's magic is often accompanied by icicles. While it's not certain, though most unlikely, that mortals can see this spell residue, it's what one might call a witch's signature, and distinguishes one witch's magic from another. Other witches have the ability through a certain spell to determine which witch cast a spell: this is important, for most witches, when they cast a spell automatically seal it, making them the only one able to undo it. A witch may undo another's spell, but only if they know the exact nature of the original spell cast.
A note on incantations: there doesn't seem to be an exact rule for when these are necessary, though there are many in the Book of Magic, and whenever Sabrina needs a magical solution to a problem, she will usually go to the book, and more often than not, the spell she'll find will be an incantation of some kind. All incantations are of a Dr. Suess rhyme variety; most of them are not very good rhymes, however. Specificity is especially important when making up one's own incantation, otherwise a spell won't work exactly as the caster intended: for example, in one novel, Sabrina cast the spell "fur that walks is fur that talks" on All-You-Can-Cast-Day (a day on which all witches can cast any spell they want, and will then be erased from the memory of all mortals); the spell was Sabrina's gift to Salem, with the intention of allowing the cat next door to speak; unfortunately, because her spell was too general, it gave all mammals the ability to speak. Because of this, incantations are a tricky business, and Sabrina has had various problems result from poorly worded spells.
I've described the how; now for the what: what exactly can Sabrina do with her magic? While it's mostly true that the possibilities are endless (she can conjure up her own wardrobe, her meals; she can cast spells that enhance her own abilities, or somehow alter the environment around her) there are limits on what she can, and for what she should use her magic. In matters of love, rule of thumb is that the "mortal way is the magic way", as Aunt Zelda puts it. That's not to say love potions and love spells don't exist, they're just largely frowned upon. And while it's quite possible to use one's powers on mortals, whether as charity or in malice, that too is something not usually encouraged (at least, not by witches who make their home in the mortal realm). Turning back time is a no-no without the Witches Council's approval, and there are several spells that are off-limits to an underage witch; once they earn their witch's license, however, that is no longer an issue. Taking over the world (well, more like attempting to) is a magical offense punishable by witches law, the sentence being one hundred years as a cat, or other familiar animal. Beyond these (and some other) restrictions, however, magic usage is without limitations.
One last note in regard to magic: for witches, many "sayings" are quite literal when applied to them. Being stuck in a bad mood really can happen, clouds over one's head really do appear, etc. They are a very literal group, though it never ceases to catch Sabrina off-guard.
Spellman Family ☄ The Spellman family has a number of quirks that Sabrina inherited along with her magic. The family secret she had to solve in order to obtain her witch's license was that "every member of the Spellman family has a twin"...and it just so happens that in all witch sets of twins, one is evil while the other is good. Lucky for Sabrina, she is the good twin from her set -if she wasn't, she'd be spending her days in prison in the Other Realm Twin Cities. Another odd (and frustrating) Spellman "inheritance" is an addiction to pancakes. No Spellman can eat pancakes without giving in to an all-consuming need to eat more and more pancakes. They'll quickly show the pounds in pancakes they've consumed, and the only way to wean one's self off the food is with a special sort of syrup. Better to not risk the temptation.
An invaluable Spellman heirloom that Sabrina received was the Book of Magic. Rather rare, it's a source she would be lost without; though her aunts teach her many things about magic, Sabrina on her own learns from the book as well. While quite helpful in many ways, not all the spells in the book are all that they seem to be, and come with side effects that render the original spell rather less effective than she would like, so the book must be used with caution.
Woo hoo ☄ Something of a catchphrase of joy for Sabrina; in one episode, after her evil twin Katrina switched places with Sabrina, one of the tests her aunts put to her to determine whether she was their rightful niece was to say "woo hoo", for there is a particular, special way that she alone can say it.
Canon History: Note: The writers completely failed at making this timeline make sense; Sabrina turns 16 at the beginning of the first season, so supposedly she is a sophomore in high school; however, they give us four seasons of high school, with each season representing a school year - this is clear, as each season has its own Halloween and Christmas episode. There is no possible way that with Sabrina's smarts, she was held back and was forced to start high school at 16, and there's also other evidence that lets the viewers know the first season is not her freshman year of high school. Yet there is no arguing with the fact that there are four season and therefore four years of high school, so please bear with me and suspend common sense for this history.
It is because of the timeline nonsense that I say she is about 18 years old, since she's seventeen in both seasons two AND three. So, with that in mind, I give you the history portion of this application.
Born in early September to Edward and Diana Spellman, Sabrina was their only child. During her childhood, her parents divorced, and for a time she lived with her mother; her father Edward was constantly abroad, as he worked for the foreign service (or so she was told). The summer before her sixteenth birthday, however, her mother was offered an archeological opportunity-of-a-lifetime in Peru, and so Sabrina moved to Westbridge, MA to live with her father's sisters Hilda and Zelda.
That year, her birthday happened to fall on her first day at her new high school, and it was that morning her aunts decided to play a practical joke on her, telling her she was, of all things, a witch! Laughing it off, Sabrina went to school, met a friendly girl named Jenny in her chemistry class (where she unknowingly brought a frog back to life), met the pretentious cheerleader Libby Chessler (from whom she earned the title of "fuh-reak"), and locked eyes with the dreamy, though some-what out-of-it, Harvey Kinkle. When she returned home that evening, she and her aunts celebrated her birthday...only for them to continue the lame witch joke, giving her a "book of magic" with a hologram of her father inside. Though she was able to hold a conversation with the moving talking picture of her father, she was still unwilling to believe her aunts.
That's when the cat talked. Running up to her room, too confused by everything, she tried to hide from the truth. But the truth followed her in the form of the floating magic book, and after a talk with her father in the book, she came to accept that she was, indeed, a witch. Half-witch, to be precise, for while the Spellman side of her family were witches (the blanket term for both magical males and females), her mother's side was mortal. It's because of her mortal half that only now had her powers awakened; it was also because of a decree put out by the Witches Council, that half-mortal witches, once they gain their magic, are forbidden from seeing their mortal parent...or else the parent would be turned into a ball of wax. As her father was in the "very foreign service", the most stable place for Sabrina to learn to use and control her magic was at her aunts' home.
After accepting her witch-hood, Sabrina spent a good part of that evening attempting basic magic: that of turning an orange into an apple. All she produced were pineapples, unfortunately...though the training came in handy the following day at school, when she pointed quite forcefully in Libby's direction. A ping, some sparkles, and the most popular girl in high school was suddenly a pineapple. Her aunts managed to sort that mess out, however Sabrina was certain that her high school life was over after that incident. She asked her aunts if she could use her magic to redo the day over, but they told her the only way to do that was by appealing to the Witches Council. Sabrina, with nothing more to lose, and certain that her high school reputation was shot if she didn't try, went to the Other Realm (through the convenient portal in the linen closet) and asked for a chance to relive that day. Denied, she returned home resigned to her fate as a freak for all her high school days.
But when she went to school the next day, she discovered that through some miracle, the day was the one she wanted to redo! She didn't know that her Aunt Hilda, who used to date the head of the Witches Council had gone back and forced them to turn back time. She did know, however, that she liked being a witch after all.
That year, Sabrina spent her time adjusting to her new school and her new powers, and finding the balance between the two worlds. Some of her adventures and mishaps included making a batch of truth sprinkles and bringing it to school, accidentally causing the baby she was sitting to become a full-grown adult (and all while she and Harvey were supposed to be studying for a test together), cloning herself on Halloween so "she" could attend the biggest party of the season, creating dates out of man dough, vacationing in the Pleasuredome with her Aunt Vesta, and turning Libby into a geek. Sabrina also cheated with magic in a kung fu competition, brewed a cauldron of just desserts for an ornery math teacher, literally got stuck in her own bad mood, and took a ski trip on Mars.
During this year, she also developed a close relationship with Harvey and Jenny, and sometime before February, she and Harvey started dating. On Valentine's Day, the two went out on a date, and Sabrina intended to kiss Harvey sometime that evening; sadly before the date, her aunts warned her that the first kiss between a witch and a mortal would turn the mortal into a frog! Since Sabrina was only half-witch, there was a chance that wouldn't happen, and she took it. Unfortunately her witch side won out, and Harvey was turned into a frog. Only by testing their love, and only if it roved to be true, would turn Harvey back into a mortal. Sabrina underwent the tests and passed, so Harvey was restored (though she had to kiss his froggy self in order to do that); the incident taught her the difficulties of witch-mortal relations, but it also gave her a new appreciation for her and Harvey's relationship - after all, it was true love, wasn't it?
The rest of that year was as eventful as the beginning: Sabrina found herself resorting to posing as Libby to get more support for a charity she was in, cast a soap opera spell on her high school, shrank to Thumbellina size when she herself was "feeling small", and finished off the year with a trip to colonial Salem, where, through a reenactment, was accused of being a witch, followed by an incident where she was, for a time, engaged to marry the troll Roland and was locked up in his tower, until Harvey came to her rescue.
The next year, when Sabrina turned 17, she discovered that she had to study to obtain her witch's license; she was assigned a Quizmaster (which is what she ended up calling him the whole time she knew him) who would appear unannounced to test her magic. When Sabrina failed to dedicate time to studying the witch's license handbook (shaped, of course, like a hand), she was sent off to a boot camp for witches...the same weekend there was a dance at the high school Sabrina had promised she'd go to with Harvey. Sabrina managed to escape the camp and went to the dance, only to be forced to leave early (and without one of her combat boots). Once her time at the camp was through, though, she returned home, and a year full of surprises (mostly in the form of her Quizmaster showing up without warning) was just begun.
The vice-principal, Mr. Kraft, this year seemed to take a disliking for Sabrina, so much so that he ended up visiting her home, where he met and fell for her Aunt Hilda. Sabrina, seeing an opportunity to get Mr. Kraft out of her hair, managed to set them up, and so, that year, Sabrina's aunt and vice principal dated...which had its pluses for her, and minuses (such as seeing him around after school hours). Another major change occurred at the beginning of the new school year was the loss of her friend Jenny, who had moved away, it's presumed. Sabrina soon befriended a girl named Valerie Birkhead, a new student to Westbridge High.
Some notable events from this year include the evening Sabrina was unfortunate enough to babysit her cousin Amanda, who ended up turning her into a doll for her troubles; Sabrina's very own gender-bender in an attempt to understand guys better; getting the opportunity one Friday the 13th to share her witchy secret with Harvey and Valerie; and reverting the vice principal back to a toddler's mentality. On Christmas, Sabrina filled in for Santa Claus after he injured himself trying to help her work off a bad case of selfishness. Sabrina came down with "finger flu" for the first time, and accidentally "sneezed" her magic into Mrs. Quick (her math teacher) during her illness. She and Harvey had a run-in with a beanstalk, and a mortal-eating witch at its top, and they got a taste of talent when Sabrina and her friends entered the high school battle of the bands competition. A bad case of sun spot activity and an unfortunate run-in with Libby switched their personalities, and nearly got Sabrina turned into a cat, when under Salem's "careful guidance" she plotted to take over the world. She also got to face her fears (...literally...) when she got a bad case of stage fright and tried to get rid of it the magic way.
During a school field trip to Disney World, Sabrina was forced to brew a potion instead of have fun with her friends (the potion being an important part to getting her witch's license). Another task for those aiming to get their license was community service; Sabrina, not liking the idea of washing old witches, got tricked into working at the Other Realm rumor mill with another half-witch named Dashiell. They both made up rumors about their mortal friends, not knowing that rumors about those in the mortal realm actually come true! In order to undo the rumors she wrote (including one about Harvey being pregnant, an unloved, homeless Libby, and a love affair between Mrs. Quick and Mr. Kraft), she had to make up a scathing rumor about herself. However more complicated than showing the school her false teeth was the budding attraction between her and Dashiell...which didn't get resolved until the beginning of the next school year.
When the next school year arrived (though curiously enough, not her birthday), Sabrina took the final test - that of choosing between her mother and her magic - and passed (the correct choice being her willingness to forfeit her magic, rather than give up her mother for forever), she finally got her witch's license! Only not. There was a catch: she had to solve the family secret first. Through the year, she was visited by various family members, all of whom said they were coming to discuss the family secret, and only ever got around to leaving her a material clue that would spell out the secret once she had all the pieces. And while eager to get her license, Sabrina first hat to choose between Dashiell and Harvey; in the end, she cast a spell that forced the two boys to face off, like in a Western (complete with proper outfits to fit the theme). She found her answer, not when the two pulled their guns on each other, but when her first relative came for a visit at just the wrong time. Sabrina told her as much, which angered the witch, and when she got anger, someone got slimed. Sabrina, only having time to save one of her suitors from the horrible green slime fate, jumped in front of Harvey, hence choosing him over Dashiell.
As per usual, this year was filled with magical mistakes and amusing accidents, and then some not-so-amusing happenings, such as the time Harvey and Libby were "married off" for a class project, and jealous Sabrina hired a private detective (none other than Roland, much to her chagrin and detriment) to spy on them. He used his magic to make it appear as though Harvey was cheating on her. The truth eventually came to light, but not without causing Sabrina and Harvey a bump in the road of their relationship.
Other incidents include the time Sabrina tempted fate and her Spellman genes by eating pancakes, which turned her into a one-track-mind addict: only after an intense detox off the floury breakfast food did she return to normal; there was also the time Salem bet Sabrina, Hilda, and Zelda in a poker game, which he lost (badly); the experience wasn't a complete disaster though, as Sabrina was allowed to drive the Porsche. A far worse experience was the time she and Salem flew up Libby's nose and landed in her brain.
All the while these adventures took place, Sabrina was working on the family secret, eager to be a legal witch at last. However the family visits couldn't be called a particular joy for her, not when one visit with cousin Susie (with a face to rival that of the Wicked Witch of the West...and yet possessing the soul of a saint) turned Harvey into a beast to teach Sabrina a lesson on inner beauty, or when another set of relatives ended up being some pirates her aunts had forgetfully kept locked in the basement, or when a great-aunt, disturbed from her sleep, sent the Spellman house an invasion of poppies (which, just like in Oz, but the three witches to sleep themselves). But when she had all but the final clue left, Sabrina learned that she and her family were holding a reunion down in Hawaii! It was the perfect place to escape to, though Sabrina was not allowed fun until she solved the secret. When she received the final clue (a ball of string), it only took a comment from Salem ("That's not string, it's twine! ...can I play with it?") for her to discover that "every member of the Spellman family has a twin!"
Once the secret was solved, she met her twin, Katrina, her twin in every way except the part where they shared the same parents. The excitement of meeting her twin was cut short, however, when the two were put on trial to discover which witch was the evil witch, and which witch was the good witch. Sabrina won the question section when she showed compassion to an apparently-lost dog and completely misheard the question, but she lost the "life in review" portion, as they chose to show most of her messy spells (including the time she turned Libby into a pineapple). Sabrina was found to be the evil twin, and Katrina was instructed to push her into a volcano. Katrina obeyed, which shocked the judge, for no good twin had ever had the heart to actually push their twin to their doom (though Hilda did come close, it was said). Sabrina was found to be the good twin, and the rest of the vacation went smoothly.
Come the following September, Sabrina celebrated her eighteenth birthday, and got a surprising gift from her father: a place to stay with him in Paris with his new wife and her son. Sabrina at first declined, as she didn't want to leave Harvey nor her aunts, but Valerie had moved to Alaska with her family, a loss that was only marginally helped with the fact that Libby had been sent off to boarding school for her senior year. The school year took an immediate nosedive when Harvey's best friend Brad returned to the school. For some reason, the guy was exceptionally cold to Sabrina, and he gave her strange vibes. When he and Harvey started hanging out together, cutting into her couples time with him, she felt very lonely. Her best friend gone and her boyfriend preoccupied...Sabrina expected some sympathy and love from her aunts, but was disappointed on that front as well. Unable to deal with her loneliness, Sabrina ran to her father's home in the Eiffel Tower, thinking the change would solve her problems. It didn't, and so she returned to her home in Westbridge, where she found all her loved ones had been miserable without her.
Not long after the school year began, Sabrina was given another witch her age to assist in getting her witch's license. Her name was Dreama, and she had long been out of practice with her magic. She was also quite new to the mortal realm, so Sabrina found herself with many things she needed to teach the incredibly klutzy girl.
Her charge to teach Dreama grew even more complicated when she discovered that Brad was an (unconscious) witch-hunter. Constantly he grew suspicious of anything that seemed out of the ordinary with Sabrina, and if he ever declared her (or Dreama) a witch, she would be turned into a mouse for one hundred years!
Outside of school, Hilda acquired a clock shop and Sabrina found a job at a coffee shop, where she also found Josh, her manager and crush. He was in college, and throughout the year showed an interest in Sabrina, so much so that one night, after she helps him study for an English class (which she prepared for with a bit of magical assistence) he stole a kiss after he walked her home. Unfortunately, Harvey saw, and so her job at the shop and her friendship with Josh caused tension in their relationship.
Brad too became a source of contention between them: Sabrina knew why Brad had a distrust of her, and as a result, she was wary around him. Plus, she just didn't like the guy; he was competition for her. He took Harvey's time from her, and he competed with her for the yearbook editor position. The situation came to a head on a ski trip Sabrina and Harvey were going to spend with his parents up in the mountains. Harvey was supposed to drive them up there, but at the last minute plans changed and Brad drove them up inside. It was snowing, however, and they got lost. Sabrina found what ended up being an abandoned watchtower in the woods, and they took shelter inside, until the thing fell over. She had resisted using her powers up until that point, but was forced to use it then to save their lives. Brad nearly outed her at that, and she was almost doomed to be Salem's plaything for the next century, but luckily her aunts found them just in time, and managed to use the only prevention method against witch hunters (besides magical abstinence) - the moonlight makes them forget any suspicions of magic.
There was no one to stop him sometime later, though, when he very nearly saw Dreama conjure up a drinking fountain at school, and the next thing Sabrina knew, her student was on all fours and had whiskers. Aunt Zelda luckily knew of a way to remove the witch hunting gene from Brad's DNA; doing so would also restore Dreama. The operation was successful, and so took one big worry off Sabrina's mind.
Another big issue looming in Sabrina's life, besides boys, besides her magic: this was her last year of high school (finally), and college was a definite certainty for her. Harvey, on the other hand, told her he was considering becoming a mechanic after high school. Worried for his future and concerned that he had no desire to go to college, Sabrina doused him with Ambition (a product she bought from a friend of Hilda's). But then Harvey became too driven, and ignored her, so she realized that she couldn't meddle in Harvey's future, that he had to want to go on his own.
And he did, aiming to go to Boston College. Sabrina really wanted to go to Adams College, but on the week of prom, she got accepted to the Other Realm University (Aunt Zelda's alma mater), Emerson (the college Josh went to), and Boston College (as did Harvey). Each one seemed to expect her to go to their school, and when she talked to Aunt Hilda about her dilemma, she suggested backpacking across the galaxy, just as Hilda had done. Suddenly, Hilda was planning Sabrina's trek among the planets, and she was more confused than ever.
It was at this point that Salem told Sabrina that she had been accepted to Adams College, the one she really wanted to attend. But fearful of disappointing Aunt Zelda, Aunt Hilda, Harvey, and Josh, Sabrina didn't think of what she wanted and, torn between who to please, she literally split into four Sabrinas, one to please each person she was afraid to let down.
→ deviations
Crux: Salem didn't tell Sabrina about her Adams acceptance; instead he offered her the usual advice: consult the magic book to help solve her problem.
Tangent: Sabrina did so, eager to find a spell that would help her choose who to please, but after looking under D for decisions, P for pleasing, and even H for help, she found nothing that would make her decision for her.
At this point, Salem recalled a place he'd heard of once awhile ago: Soeldei. Sabrina tried to find it under the Ss, but then Salem told her to look under B, for beginning. She found the entry for Soeldei, and read the following description:
Though vague, Sabrina was intrigued. And after all, she needed help selecting her next path, her next "beginning", as leaving high school is often equated as an end. She pressed the space in the magic book that was indicated...
And that is how she found herself on a dock by a ship bound for Soeldei. With nothing else to lose, and hopeful that what she would find there could help her find the answers she needed, but was too afraid to discover on her own, she boarded the ship.
Allegiance: Hierophance
Reason: A faction that acknowledges and accepts magic doers would appeal to her, for keeping her magic a secret would be lonesome. If she could freely cast spells by joining this faction, she'd sign up for that. Her magic means a lot to her.
→ sample The day couldn't go any worse, was the thought in Sabrina's mind when she returned home that afternoon. Three tests, a pop quiz she was totally not prepared for, a mystery lunch no one would ever want to solve, and then Dreama nearly got caught doing magic by Brad when she opened her locker with a pull of her ear. That situation was even worse by the fact that Principal Kraft missed the rouge flying locker door by mere inches. That had not been an easy cover-up, and neither the witch-hunter nor Mr. Kraft fully believed Sabrina's hasty explanation of rusty hinges and Dreama's surprising arm strength.
No, the day couldn't get any worse, she was certain of it. Harvey was coming over later to help Sabrina with the newspaper, and she looked forward to the alone time with him. The day better not get any worse than it already was.
Collapsing on the couch for a spell, Sabrina thought too soon. The moment she sat down, Salem jumped up on the table behind the couch. "The aunts are at the clock shop," he told her. "Sending the Curies back."
Sabrina let out a sigh of relief at that. "Oh, good, 'cause Harvey's coming over later, and I do not need anything more going wrong today."
"Bad day?"
"Don't get me started-" she began, only to be cut off by a doorbell ring.
"Looks like Harvey's here," Salem observed. She got up from the sofa and opened the door, smile on her face...which promptly fell when she saw who had tagged along with her boyfriend. "Hi Harvey...and Brad," she said, mixed look of confusion and disappointment on her face.
"I told Brad that you needed help with the newspaper and he offered to come along," Harvey explained as he stepped inside the Spellman foyer. By the look on Brad's face, Sabrina could tell that he did nothing of the sort, that Harvey dragged him along, most likely in an attempt to get his best friend and girlfriend to get along. He followed Harvey inside the house, looking about him with a suspicious look on his face, as though he expected something "weird" to be lurking somewhere in the house. She may have lost Libby, but Brad was a pretty horrible replacement for her. If the two ever met, they'd both have one thing in common: they both thought Sabrina was a freak like no other.
Gathering her bookbag, the three teenagers were almost on their way to the dining room, the only table in the house big enough for organizing the newspaper layout when her aunts returned home. Unaware that there were mortals in the house, they were in the middle of an intense discussion: listing all the reasons the reasons they were glad to have the Curies out of their hair at last.
"-you know what that pig, Pierre, did before he went back into the clock?" her aunt Hilda was saying when she and Zelda walked in. Sabrina cringed, though her aunts saw Brad and Harvey just then and thankfully cut off their conversation.
Brad had heard enough to tickle his witch hunter gene, and he frowned at Hilda's words. "'Into a clock'?" he repeated. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Sabrina laughed nervously and tried to wave his suspicion away with a nonchalant wave of her hand. "Oh, it's, ah, code for...something," she explained, not sounding very convincing. "Y'know, like 'going back into the clock' probably means going back to work. I'm sure that's what she means." Brad raised an eyebrow at this, but didn't question her (he did, however, turn to Harvey and mutter, "Your girlfriend's weird" to which Harvey simply shrugged and gave him a lopsided grin).
Surely the day couldn't get worse than this, Sabrina thought again, sliding open the dining room door.
And then she heard the telltale thunderclap that always accompanied a linen-closet arrival. A moment later, half a dozen Other Realm police officers stormed down the main staircase and stopped in front of Salem Saberhagen, the family familiar and "hardened" criminal. "Salem Saberhagen, you're under arrest and have a hearing in the Other Realm immediately," said one officer, while another picked him up. With three witches and two mortals watching on with open mouths, the six policemen disappeared back up the stairs and a second thunderclap announced their exit.
There was only a few seconds of shocked silence before Brad turned on Sabrina. "Was your cat just arrested?" he accused her. "And did they come from upstairs?!"
Only one way to handle those questions: LIE.
"Right, my cat was arrested, and I'm really Abe Lincoln," she said sarcastically, even as she tried to give her aunts a "Help Me!" glance. From behind Brad, they merely shrugged their shoulders, similar looks of anxiety on their faces. She was on her own with this, was she? "No...no, that wasn't an actual arrest: they didn't read him his Miranda Rights, for one," she pointed out, laughing. She stopped and grimaced when she noticed Brad was neither amused nor convinced.
"They're...they're part of an acting troupe my aunts are in, and tonight they're rehearsing here! Salem was just a fill-in for someone who had to call in sick?"
"Nah," Brad shook his head, disbelief not leaving his frown. "Nah, I know what I saw, and that was not acting. And what was up with the thunder? It's not raining outside."
"Special effects!" she squeaked. "And hey, just because they're not professionals doesn't mean you should insult their acting. They're much better than they were five months ago," she added defensively.
Just then, Sabrina caught her aunts gesturing to Harvey and Brad, then pointing urgently at the stairs. Oh, right, Salem was arrested. For what? No, that wasn't important; first she needed to get the mortals out of the house.
"I gotta go," she said, changing the subject abruptly. "The actors are missing some props and need me to pick them. So thanks for stopping by Harvey, Brad!" she added a rushed smile as she ushered them out the door.
"What about the newspaper?" Harvey asked before Sabrina closed the door on them.
"Tomorrow," she replied hastily and shut the front door.
"I hate that house," Brad said, as inside that house, Sabrina and her aunts hurried into the linen closet to find out what Salem had done this time.
Player Name: Ro
Player LJ: terza_teabeef
→ character information
Series: Sabrina, the Teenage Witch
Name: Sabrina Spellman
Age: 18
Gender: Female
Appearance: Sabrina is a girl of average height, about 5'6" or thereabouts. She's a natural blonde, with blue eyes and a friendly smile. She's on the edge of being considered thin, though her body has some meat to it (for lack of a better way to describe her). All in all, appearance-wise there's nothing too remarkable about Sabrina. She could be considered pretty by some, at the very least pleasant to look at, but there's no "wow factor" when first meeting her.
As for her attire, Sabrina tends to dress well enough to reflect the current fashions, though she usually will choose slacks and a blouse to a skirt. She favors blouses over t-shirts, will wear both jeans and nicer pants, and has an assortment of shoes. There's no one color she wears more than the rest, though solids over patterns are the norm.
Personality: Sabrina is an ambitious, out-going young woman, who tends to have a perky attitude towards life. She is optimistic, for the most part; she's intelligent, and she's active in her school community. Academics mean a lot to her, and getting a "C" on a paper is equivalent to failure. While she only has a few close friends in school, based on her overall accepting personality, it's hard to understand why this is, exactly (though a lot of it has to do with the head cheerleader Libby taking an immediate dislike to her, and also the fact that Sabrina's particular character happens to fall under that type of trope). These are some more basic statements about the type of person Sabrina is.
When she turned sixteen, she discovered her magical powers; ever since, we often see Sabrina land herself in sticky situations that inevitably she tries to solve with magic. More often than not, if Sabrina can, she will take what seems to be the easy way out, though in the end it usually turns out that magic is not the final situation to everything. Sabrina grows frustrated often when things don't go smoothly, and will turn to her aunts, or if it's a problem she's unwilling or wary of making them aware of, to Salem Saberhagen. She depends a lot on both her aunts' presence should she come across a problem she cannot solve herself, and her magic to undo the obstacles in her path.
Labeled a "freak" by her rival Libby, Sabrina does live up to the title on occasion, usually when she's trying to hide a magical occurrence from her mortal friends. She is very aware of the consequences should a mortal discover her secret, and so will usually be forced to come up with crazy explanations on the spot. They usually don't make much sense and her delivery is never quite convincing; it often leaves the mortal confused, and if they don't like Sabrina, suspicious as well. However Sabrina is always more concerned with fixing her magical mishaps than with her acting skills, and once the problem has been diffused, she is able to calm herself, slow down, and offer a more acceptable explanation to the confused mortals in her life.
Sabrina is susceptible to different types of obsession: grades, spending, a special one involving pancakes, appearance; whatever the "moral of the week" is, the lesson is usually learned through and by Sabrina. She is a (mostly) normal teenager with many of the typical teenage concerns: she worries about fitting in, worries about her grades, her future, her schooling in general, hankers after a car and the "freedom" that comes with it, thinks about her boyfriend and their relationship, etc. She still has a lot to learn about the world, and about herself. While she is a fairly well-developed young woman at this point of her life, there are still many things she has yet to discover about herself.
Though with her faults (particularly around the holiday season), Sabrina is mostly given over to generosity. She is made happy through helping others, and often uses her magic to try to make her friends' lives easier. She's also idealistic at times, believing in the good and effectiveness of her actions to make the world a better place. Not to say she's an angel by any means, for as nice as Sabrina can be with her friends, she is not unfamiliar with the concept of revenge, and has on many occasions taken out her frustrations with the likes of Libby or Mr. Kraft with the help of magic. She can be manipulative as well, though usually under the counsel and with the encouragement of Salem.
Particulars: Academics ☄ Sabrina is an overall good student, but the subjects she does best at are mathematics and the sciences. She also enjoys journalism, and is the editor of the school newspaper, as well as being a member of the science club. Creative writing, however, Sabrina has found through experience, is not her strong suit, and it bothered her when she realized this (courtesy of the first C she ever received). She likes to be good at everything; not to be mistaken with boastfulness, she doesn't gloat about her accomplishments, but she does like to be recognized for her academic excellence every now and again.
Magic ☄ With the point of her right index finger, Sabrina can do just about anything...at least, she could, ever since her sixteenth birthday. But magic has its own rules by which she must abide, and she is constantly learning what they all are. There are also more complicated ways in which to perform magic that a finger point won't accomplish: she can concoct various brews to create just desserts, for example, and incantations are sometimes necessary for certain spells. Precision and accuracy are key when performing magic; just thinking something won't make it be so, though sometimes thought isn't even required for a spell to be cast, as Sabrina learned her second day of witch-hood, when she turned the head cheerleader into a pineapple!
While there are various rules on how to use magic, there aren't so many rules when it comes to witches' magic use in general. While Sabrina, and most of the Spellman family, use their fingers to cast spells, there are other witches who pull on their earlobe, or intone Latin for every spell they cast, as a few examples. Even the way to flourish one's finger may differ from person to person; for Sabrina, however, a simple point is all it takes for most spells. Another difference is the magical "residue" left behind once a spell is cast. For Sabrina, when she casts a spell, it often comes with a sprinkling of goldish sparkles; her Aunt Hilda, on the other hand, always casts a spell with a puff of smoke, and her Great-Aunt Irma's magic is often accompanied by icicles. While it's not certain, though most unlikely, that mortals can see this spell residue, it's what one might call a witch's signature, and distinguishes one witch's magic from another. Other witches have the ability through a certain spell to determine which witch cast a spell: this is important, for most witches, when they cast a spell automatically seal it, making them the only one able to undo it. A witch may undo another's spell, but only if they know the exact nature of the original spell cast.
A note on incantations: there doesn't seem to be an exact rule for when these are necessary, though there are many in the Book of Magic, and whenever Sabrina needs a magical solution to a problem, she will usually go to the book, and more often than not, the spell she'll find will be an incantation of some kind. All incantations are of a Dr. Suess rhyme variety; most of them are not very good rhymes, however. Specificity is especially important when making up one's own incantation, otherwise a spell won't work exactly as the caster intended: for example, in one novel, Sabrina cast the spell "fur that walks is fur that talks" on All-You-Can-Cast-Day (a day on which all witches can cast any spell they want, and will then be erased from the memory of all mortals); the spell was Sabrina's gift to Salem, with the intention of allowing the cat next door to speak; unfortunately, because her spell was too general, it gave all mammals the ability to speak. Because of this, incantations are a tricky business, and Sabrina has had various problems result from poorly worded spells.
I've described the how; now for the what: what exactly can Sabrina do with her magic? While it's mostly true that the possibilities are endless (she can conjure up her own wardrobe, her meals; she can cast spells that enhance her own abilities, or somehow alter the environment around her) there are limits on what she can, and for what she should use her magic. In matters of love, rule of thumb is that the "mortal way is the magic way", as Aunt Zelda puts it. That's not to say love potions and love spells don't exist, they're just largely frowned upon. And while it's quite possible to use one's powers on mortals, whether as charity or in malice, that too is something not usually encouraged (at least, not by witches who make their home in the mortal realm). Turning back time is a no-no without the Witches Council's approval, and there are several spells that are off-limits to an underage witch; once they earn their witch's license, however, that is no longer an issue. Taking over the world (well, more like attempting to) is a magical offense punishable by witches law, the sentence being one hundred years as a cat, or other familiar animal. Beyond these (and some other) restrictions, however, magic usage is without limitations.
One last note in regard to magic: for witches, many "sayings" are quite literal when applied to them. Being stuck in a bad mood really can happen, clouds over one's head really do appear, etc. They are a very literal group, though it never ceases to catch Sabrina off-guard.
Spellman Family ☄ The Spellman family has a number of quirks that Sabrina inherited along with her magic. The family secret she had to solve in order to obtain her witch's license was that "every member of the Spellman family has a twin"...and it just so happens that in all witch sets of twins, one is evil while the other is good. Lucky for Sabrina, she is the good twin from her set -if she wasn't, she'd be spending her days in prison in the Other Realm Twin Cities. Another odd (and frustrating) Spellman "inheritance" is an addiction to pancakes. No Spellman can eat pancakes without giving in to an all-consuming need to eat more and more pancakes. They'll quickly show the pounds in pancakes they've consumed, and the only way to wean one's self off the food is with a special sort of syrup. Better to not risk the temptation.
An invaluable Spellman heirloom that Sabrina received was the Book of Magic. Rather rare, it's a source she would be lost without; though her aunts teach her many things about magic, Sabrina on her own learns from the book as well. While quite helpful in many ways, not all the spells in the book are all that they seem to be, and come with side effects that render the original spell rather less effective than she would like, so the book must be used with caution.
Woo hoo ☄ Something of a catchphrase of joy for Sabrina; in one episode, after her evil twin Katrina switched places with Sabrina, one of the tests her aunts put to her to determine whether she was their rightful niece was to say "woo hoo", for there is a particular, special way that she alone can say it.
Canon History: Note: The writers completely failed at making this timeline make sense; Sabrina turns 16 at the beginning of the first season, so supposedly she is a sophomore in high school; however, they give us four seasons of high school, with each season representing a school year - this is clear, as each season has its own Halloween and Christmas episode. There is no possible way that with Sabrina's smarts, she was held back and was forced to start high school at 16, and there's also other evidence that lets the viewers know the first season is not her freshman year of high school. Yet there is no arguing with the fact that there are four season and therefore four years of high school, so please bear with me and suspend common sense for this history.
It is because of the timeline nonsense that I say she is about 18 years old, since she's seventeen in both seasons two AND three. So, with that in mind, I give you the history portion of this application.
Born in early September to Edward and Diana Spellman, Sabrina was their only child. During her childhood, her parents divorced, and for a time she lived with her mother; her father Edward was constantly abroad, as he worked for the foreign service (or so she was told). The summer before her sixteenth birthday, however, her mother was offered an archeological opportunity-of-a-lifetime in Peru, and so Sabrina moved to Westbridge, MA to live with her father's sisters Hilda and Zelda.
That year, her birthday happened to fall on her first day at her new high school, and it was that morning her aunts decided to play a practical joke on her, telling her she was, of all things, a witch! Laughing it off, Sabrina went to school, met a friendly girl named Jenny in her chemistry class (where she unknowingly brought a frog back to life), met the pretentious cheerleader Libby Chessler (from whom she earned the title of "fuh-reak"), and locked eyes with the dreamy, though some-what out-of-it, Harvey Kinkle. When she returned home that evening, she and her aunts celebrated her birthday...only for them to continue the lame witch joke, giving her a "book of magic" with a hologram of her father inside. Though she was able to hold a conversation with the moving talking picture of her father, she was still unwilling to believe her aunts.
That's when the cat talked. Running up to her room, too confused by everything, she tried to hide from the truth. But the truth followed her in the form of the floating magic book, and after a talk with her father in the book, she came to accept that she was, indeed, a witch. Half-witch, to be precise, for while the Spellman side of her family were witches (the blanket term for both magical males and females), her mother's side was mortal. It's because of her mortal half that only now had her powers awakened; it was also because of a decree put out by the Witches Council, that half-mortal witches, once they gain their magic, are forbidden from seeing their mortal parent...or else the parent would be turned into a ball of wax. As her father was in the "very foreign service", the most stable place for Sabrina to learn to use and control her magic was at her aunts' home.
After accepting her witch-hood, Sabrina spent a good part of that evening attempting basic magic: that of turning an orange into an apple. All she produced were pineapples, unfortunately...though the training came in handy the following day at school, when she pointed quite forcefully in Libby's direction. A ping, some sparkles, and the most popular girl in high school was suddenly a pineapple. Her aunts managed to sort that mess out, however Sabrina was certain that her high school life was over after that incident. She asked her aunts if she could use her magic to redo the day over, but they told her the only way to do that was by appealing to the Witches Council. Sabrina, with nothing more to lose, and certain that her high school reputation was shot if she didn't try, went to the Other Realm (through the convenient portal in the linen closet) and asked for a chance to relive that day. Denied, she returned home resigned to her fate as a freak for all her high school days.
But when she went to school the next day, she discovered that through some miracle, the day was the one she wanted to redo! She didn't know that her Aunt Hilda, who used to date the head of the Witches Council had gone back and forced them to turn back time. She did know, however, that she liked being a witch after all.
That year, Sabrina spent her time adjusting to her new school and her new powers, and finding the balance between the two worlds. Some of her adventures and mishaps included making a batch of truth sprinkles and bringing it to school, accidentally causing the baby she was sitting to become a full-grown adult (and all while she and Harvey were supposed to be studying for a test together), cloning herself on Halloween so "she" could attend the biggest party of the season, creating dates out of man dough, vacationing in the Pleasuredome with her Aunt Vesta, and turning Libby into a geek. Sabrina also cheated with magic in a kung fu competition, brewed a cauldron of just desserts for an ornery math teacher, literally got stuck in her own bad mood, and took a ski trip on Mars.
During this year, she also developed a close relationship with Harvey and Jenny, and sometime before February, she and Harvey started dating. On Valentine's Day, the two went out on a date, and Sabrina intended to kiss Harvey sometime that evening; sadly before the date, her aunts warned her that the first kiss between a witch and a mortal would turn the mortal into a frog! Since Sabrina was only half-witch, there was a chance that wouldn't happen, and she took it. Unfortunately her witch side won out, and Harvey was turned into a frog. Only by testing their love, and only if it roved to be true, would turn Harvey back into a mortal. Sabrina underwent the tests and passed, so Harvey was restored (though she had to kiss his froggy self in order to do that); the incident taught her the difficulties of witch-mortal relations, but it also gave her a new appreciation for her and Harvey's relationship - after all, it was true love, wasn't it?
The rest of that year was as eventful as the beginning: Sabrina found herself resorting to posing as Libby to get more support for a charity she was in, cast a soap opera spell on her high school, shrank to Thumbellina size when she herself was "feeling small", and finished off the year with a trip to colonial Salem, where, through a reenactment, was accused of being a witch, followed by an incident where she was, for a time, engaged to marry the troll Roland and was locked up in his tower, until Harvey came to her rescue.
The next year, when Sabrina turned 17, she discovered that she had to study to obtain her witch's license; she was assigned a Quizmaster (which is what she ended up calling him the whole time she knew him) who would appear unannounced to test her magic. When Sabrina failed to dedicate time to studying the witch's license handbook (shaped, of course, like a hand), she was sent off to a boot camp for witches...the same weekend there was a dance at the high school Sabrina had promised she'd go to with Harvey. Sabrina managed to escape the camp and went to the dance, only to be forced to leave early (and without one of her combat boots). Once her time at the camp was through, though, she returned home, and a year full of surprises (mostly in the form of her Quizmaster showing up without warning) was just begun.
The vice-principal, Mr. Kraft, this year seemed to take a disliking for Sabrina, so much so that he ended up visiting her home, where he met and fell for her Aunt Hilda. Sabrina, seeing an opportunity to get Mr. Kraft out of her hair, managed to set them up, and so, that year, Sabrina's aunt and vice principal dated...which had its pluses for her, and minuses (such as seeing him around after school hours). Another major change occurred at the beginning of the new school year was the loss of her friend Jenny, who had moved away, it's presumed. Sabrina soon befriended a girl named Valerie Birkhead, a new student to Westbridge High.
Some notable events from this year include the evening Sabrina was unfortunate enough to babysit her cousin Amanda, who ended up turning her into a doll for her troubles; Sabrina's very own gender-bender in an attempt to understand guys better; getting the opportunity one Friday the 13th to share her witchy secret with Harvey and Valerie; and reverting the vice principal back to a toddler's mentality. On Christmas, Sabrina filled in for Santa Claus after he injured himself trying to help her work off a bad case of selfishness. Sabrina came down with "finger flu" for the first time, and accidentally "sneezed" her magic into Mrs. Quick (her math teacher) during her illness. She and Harvey had a run-in with a beanstalk, and a mortal-eating witch at its top, and they got a taste of talent when Sabrina and her friends entered the high school battle of the bands competition. A bad case of sun spot activity and an unfortunate run-in with Libby switched their personalities, and nearly got Sabrina turned into a cat, when under Salem's "careful guidance" she plotted to take over the world. She also got to face her fears (...literally...) when she got a bad case of stage fright and tried to get rid of it the magic way.
During a school field trip to Disney World, Sabrina was forced to brew a potion instead of have fun with her friends (the potion being an important part to getting her witch's license). Another task for those aiming to get their license was community service; Sabrina, not liking the idea of washing old witches, got tricked into working at the Other Realm rumor mill with another half-witch named Dashiell. They both made up rumors about their mortal friends, not knowing that rumors about those in the mortal realm actually come true! In order to undo the rumors she wrote (including one about Harvey being pregnant, an unloved, homeless Libby, and a love affair between Mrs. Quick and Mr. Kraft), she had to make up a scathing rumor about herself. However more complicated than showing the school her false teeth was the budding attraction between her and Dashiell...which didn't get resolved until the beginning of the next school year.
When the next school year arrived (though curiously enough, not her birthday), Sabrina took the final test - that of choosing between her mother and her magic - and passed (the correct choice being her willingness to forfeit her magic, rather than give up her mother for forever), she finally got her witch's license! Only not. There was a catch: she had to solve the family secret first. Through the year, she was visited by various family members, all of whom said they were coming to discuss the family secret, and only ever got around to leaving her a material clue that would spell out the secret once she had all the pieces. And while eager to get her license, Sabrina first hat to choose between Dashiell and Harvey; in the end, she cast a spell that forced the two boys to face off, like in a Western (complete with proper outfits to fit the theme). She found her answer, not when the two pulled their guns on each other, but when her first relative came for a visit at just the wrong time. Sabrina told her as much, which angered the witch, and when she got anger, someone got slimed. Sabrina, only having time to save one of her suitors from the horrible green slime fate, jumped in front of Harvey, hence choosing him over Dashiell.
As per usual, this year was filled with magical mistakes and amusing accidents, and then some not-so-amusing happenings, such as the time Harvey and Libby were "married off" for a class project, and jealous Sabrina hired a private detective (none other than Roland, much to her chagrin and detriment) to spy on them. He used his magic to make it appear as though Harvey was cheating on her. The truth eventually came to light, but not without causing Sabrina and Harvey a bump in the road of their relationship.
Other incidents include the time Sabrina tempted fate and her Spellman genes by eating pancakes, which turned her into a one-track-mind addict: only after an intense detox off the floury breakfast food did she return to normal; there was also the time Salem bet Sabrina, Hilda, and Zelda in a poker game, which he lost (badly); the experience wasn't a complete disaster though, as Sabrina was allowed to drive the Porsche. A far worse experience was the time she and Salem flew up Libby's nose and landed in her brain.
All the while these adventures took place, Sabrina was working on the family secret, eager to be a legal witch at last. However the family visits couldn't be called a particular joy for her, not when one visit with cousin Susie (with a face to rival that of the Wicked Witch of the West...and yet possessing the soul of a saint) turned Harvey into a beast to teach Sabrina a lesson on inner beauty, or when another set of relatives ended up being some pirates her aunts had forgetfully kept locked in the basement, or when a great-aunt, disturbed from her sleep, sent the Spellman house an invasion of poppies (which, just like in Oz, but the three witches to sleep themselves). But when she had all but the final clue left, Sabrina learned that she and her family were holding a reunion down in Hawaii! It was the perfect place to escape to, though Sabrina was not allowed fun until she solved the secret. When she received the final clue (a ball of string), it only took a comment from Salem ("That's not string, it's twine! ...can I play with it?") for her to discover that "every member of the Spellman family has a twin!"
Once the secret was solved, she met her twin, Katrina, her twin in every way except the part where they shared the same parents. The excitement of meeting her twin was cut short, however, when the two were put on trial to discover which witch was the evil witch, and which witch was the good witch. Sabrina won the question section when she showed compassion to an apparently-lost dog and completely misheard the question, but she lost the "life in review" portion, as they chose to show most of her messy spells (including the time she turned Libby into a pineapple). Sabrina was found to be the evil twin, and Katrina was instructed to push her into a volcano. Katrina obeyed, which shocked the judge, for no good twin had ever had the heart to actually push their twin to their doom (though Hilda did come close, it was said). Sabrina was found to be the good twin, and the rest of the vacation went smoothly.
Come the following September, Sabrina celebrated her eighteenth birthday, and got a surprising gift from her father: a place to stay with him in Paris with his new wife and her son. Sabrina at first declined, as she didn't want to leave Harvey nor her aunts, but Valerie had moved to Alaska with her family, a loss that was only marginally helped with the fact that Libby had been sent off to boarding school for her senior year. The school year took an immediate nosedive when Harvey's best friend Brad returned to the school. For some reason, the guy was exceptionally cold to Sabrina, and he gave her strange vibes. When he and Harvey started hanging out together, cutting into her couples time with him, she felt very lonely. Her best friend gone and her boyfriend preoccupied...Sabrina expected some sympathy and love from her aunts, but was disappointed on that front as well. Unable to deal with her loneliness, Sabrina ran to her father's home in the Eiffel Tower, thinking the change would solve her problems. It didn't, and so she returned to her home in Westbridge, where she found all her loved ones had been miserable without her.
Not long after the school year began, Sabrina was given another witch her age to assist in getting her witch's license. Her name was Dreama, and she had long been out of practice with her magic. She was also quite new to the mortal realm, so Sabrina found herself with many things she needed to teach the incredibly klutzy girl.
Her charge to teach Dreama grew even more complicated when she discovered that Brad was an (unconscious) witch-hunter. Constantly he grew suspicious of anything that seemed out of the ordinary with Sabrina, and if he ever declared her (or Dreama) a witch, she would be turned into a mouse for one hundred years!
Outside of school, Hilda acquired a clock shop and Sabrina found a job at a coffee shop, where she also found Josh, her manager and crush. He was in college, and throughout the year showed an interest in Sabrina, so much so that one night, after she helps him study for an English class (which she prepared for with a bit of magical assistence) he stole a kiss after he walked her home. Unfortunately, Harvey saw, and so her job at the shop and her friendship with Josh caused tension in their relationship.
Brad too became a source of contention between them: Sabrina knew why Brad had a distrust of her, and as a result, she was wary around him. Plus, she just didn't like the guy; he was competition for her. He took Harvey's time from her, and he competed with her for the yearbook editor position. The situation came to a head on a ski trip Sabrina and Harvey were going to spend with his parents up in the mountains. Harvey was supposed to drive them up there, but at the last minute plans changed and Brad drove them up inside. It was snowing, however, and they got lost. Sabrina found what ended up being an abandoned watchtower in the woods, and they took shelter inside, until the thing fell over. She had resisted using her powers up until that point, but was forced to use it then to save their lives. Brad nearly outed her at that, and she was almost doomed to be Salem's plaything for the next century, but luckily her aunts found them just in time, and managed to use the only prevention method against witch hunters (besides magical abstinence) - the moonlight makes them forget any suspicions of magic.
There was no one to stop him sometime later, though, when he very nearly saw Dreama conjure up a drinking fountain at school, and the next thing Sabrina knew, her student was on all fours and had whiskers. Aunt Zelda luckily knew of a way to remove the witch hunting gene from Brad's DNA; doing so would also restore Dreama. The operation was successful, and so took one big worry off Sabrina's mind.
Another big issue looming in Sabrina's life, besides boys, besides her magic: this was her last year of high school (finally), and college was a definite certainty for her. Harvey, on the other hand, told her he was considering becoming a mechanic after high school. Worried for his future and concerned that he had no desire to go to college, Sabrina doused him with Ambition (a product she bought from a friend of Hilda's). But then Harvey became too driven, and ignored her, so she realized that she couldn't meddle in Harvey's future, that he had to want to go on his own.
And he did, aiming to go to Boston College. Sabrina really wanted to go to Adams College, but on the week of prom, she got accepted to the Other Realm University (Aunt Zelda's alma mater), Emerson (the college Josh went to), and Boston College (as did Harvey). Each one seemed to expect her to go to their school, and when she talked to Aunt Hilda about her dilemma, she suggested backpacking across the galaxy, just as Hilda had done. Suddenly, Hilda was planning Sabrina's trek among the planets, and she was more confused than ever.
It was at this point that Salem told Sabrina that she had been accepted to Adams College, the one she really wanted to attend. But fearful of disappointing Aunt Zelda, Aunt Hilda, Harvey, and Josh, Sabrina didn't think of what she wanted and, torn between who to please, she literally split into four Sabrinas, one to please each person she was afraid to let down.
→ deviations
Crux: Salem didn't tell Sabrina about her Adams acceptance; instead he offered her the usual advice: consult the magic book to help solve her problem.
Tangent: Sabrina did so, eager to find a spell that would help her choose who to please, but after looking under D for decisions, P for pleasing, and even H for help, she found nothing that would make her decision for her.
At this point, Salem recalled a place he'd heard of once awhile ago: Soeldei. Sabrina tried to find it under the Ss, but then Salem told her to look under B, for beginning. She found the entry for Soeldei, and read the following description:
- Soeldei: island city reachable to all who seek it. Good with beginnings.
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Though vague, Sabrina was intrigued. And after all, she needed help selecting her next path, her next "beginning", as leaving high school is often equated as an end. She pressed the space in the magic book that was indicated...
And that is how she found herself on a dock by a ship bound for Soeldei. With nothing else to lose, and hopeful that what she would find there could help her find the answers she needed, but was too afraid to discover on her own, she boarded the ship.
Allegiance: Hierophance
Reason: A faction that acknowledges and accepts magic doers would appeal to her, for keeping her magic a secret would be lonesome. If she could freely cast spells by joining this faction, she'd sign up for that. Her magic means a lot to her.
→ sample The day couldn't go any worse, was the thought in Sabrina's mind when she returned home that afternoon. Three tests, a pop quiz she was totally not prepared for, a mystery lunch no one would ever want to solve, and then Dreama nearly got caught doing magic by Brad when she opened her locker with a pull of her ear. That situation was even worse by the fact that Principal Kraft missed the rouge flying locker door by mere inches. That had not been an easy cover-up, and neither the witch-hunter nor Mr. Kraft fully believed Sabrina's hasty explanation of rusty hinges and Dreama's surprising arm strength.
No, the day couldn't get any worse, she was certain of it. Harvey was coming over later to help Sabrina with the newspaper, and she looked forward to the alone time with him. The day better not get any worse than it already was.
Collapsing on the couch for a spell, Sabrina thought too soon. The moment she sat down, Salem jumped up on the table behind the couch. "The aunts are at the clock shop," he told her. "Sending the Curies back."
Sabrina let out a sigh of relief at that. "Oh, good, 'cause Harvey's coming over later, and I do not need anything more going wrong today."
"Bad day?"
"Don't get me started-" she began, only to be cut off by a doorbell ring.
"Looks like Harvey's here," Salem observed. She got up from the sofa and opened the door, smile on her face...which promptly fell when she saw who had tagged along with her boyfriend. "Hi Harvey...and Brad," she said, mixed look of confusion and disappointment on her face.
"I told Brad that you needed help with the newspaper and he offered to come along," Harvey explained as he stepped inside the Spellman foyer. By the look on Brad's face, Sabrina could tell that he did nothing of the sort, that Harvey dragged him along, most likely in an attempt to get his best friend and girlfriend to get along. He followed Harvey inside the house, looking about him with a suspicious look on his face, as though he expected something "weird" to be lurking somewhere in the house. She may have lost Libby, but Brad was a pretty horrible replacement for her. If the two ever met, they'd both have one thing in common: they both thought Sabrina was a freak like no other.
Gathering her bookbag, the three teenagers were almost on their way to the dining room, the only table in the house big enough for organizing the newspaper layout when her aunts returned home. Unaware that there were mortals in the house, they were in the middle of an intense discussion: listing all the reasons the reasons they were glad to have the Curies out of their hair at last.
"-you know what that pig, Pierre, did before he went back into the clock?" her aunt Hilda was saying when she and Zelda walked in. Sabrina cringed, though her aunts saw Brad and Harvey just then and thankfully cut off their conversation.
Brad had heard enough to tickle his witch hunter gene, and he frowned at Hilda's words. "'Into a clock'?" he repeated. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Sabrina laughed nervously and tried to wave his suspicion away with a nonchalant wave of her hand. "Oh, it's, ah, code for...something," she explained, not sounding very convincing. "Y'know, like 'going back into the clock' probably means going back to work. I'm sure that's what she means." Brad raised an eyebrow at this, but didn't question her (he did, however, turn to Harvey and mutter, "Your girlfriend's weird" to which Harvey simply shrugged and gave him a lopsided grin).
Surely the day couldn't get worse than this, Sabrina thought again, sliding open the dining room door.
And then she heard the telltale thunderclap that always accompanied a linen-closet arrival. A moment later, half a dozen Other Realm police officers stormed down the main staircase and stopped in front of Salem Saberhagen, the family familiar and "hardened" criminal. "Salem Saberhagen, you're under arrest and have a hearing in the Other Realm immediately," said one officer, while another picked him up. With three witches and two mortals watching on with open mouths, the six policemen disappeared back up the stairs and a second thunderclap announced their exit.
There was only a few seconds of shocked silence before Brad turned on Sabrina. "Was your cat just arrested?" he accused her. "And did they come from upstairs?!"
Only one way to handle those questions: LIE.
"Right, my cat was arrested, and I'm really Abe Lincoln," she said sarcastically, even as she tried to give her aunts a "Help Me!" glance. From behind Brad, they merely shrugged their shoulders, similar looks of anxiety on their faces. She was on her own with this, was she? "No...no, that wasn't an actual arrest: they didn't read him his Miranda Rights, for one," she pointed out, laughing. She stopped and grimaced when she noticed Brad was neither amused nor convinced.
"They're...they're part of an acting troupe my aunts are in, and tonight they're rehearsing here! Salem was just a fill-in for someone who had to call in sick?"
"Nah," Brad shook his head, disbelief not leaving his frown. "Nah, I know what I saw, and that was not acting. And what was up with the thunder? It's not raining outside."
"Special effects!" she squeaked. "And hey, just because they're not professionals doesn't mean you should insult their acting. They're much better than they were five months ago," she added defensively.
Just then, Sabrina caught her aunts gesturing to Harvey and Brad, then pointing urgently at the stairs. Oh, right, Salem was arrested. For what? No, that wasn't important; first she needed to get the mortals out of the house.
"I gotta go," she said, changing the subject abruptly. "The actors are missing some props and need me to pick them. So thanks for stopping by Harvey, Brad!" she added a rushed smile as she ushered them out the door.
"What about the newspaper?" Harvey asked before Sabrina closed the door on them.
"Tomorrow," she replied hastily and shut the front door.
"I hate that house," Brad said, as inside that house, Sabrina and her aunts hurried into the linen closet to find out what Salem had done this time.