The Witch Hunter's Gauntlet by Bret Schulte Page A

collected bunches of those kids from other schools all over the country. There are four quarterbacks in our dorm alone. There are going to be massive power struggles to prove who is the best of the best.”
    “Well, I think the title of most popular girl is already taken,” Zoey said , pointing to the far end of the cafeteria where Tiffany Summers and her groupies were sitting.
    Sam watched as Zack not-so- gently pushed another boy aside and sat down next to Tiffany. An unholy alliance was forming over there. Her life was about to get infinitely more difficult.
    “Well , that’s not good,” Zoey said, clearly reading Sam’s thoughts.
    “I know.” Sam hoped that the shiver going up her spine was due to her being completely soaked.
    She knew it wasn’t.
    “Do you really think she is still after you?” Lucas asked.
    “Maybe not her, but someone wrote LOSER thirty-seven times on our door this morning,” Sam said. It only took her a second to wipe them off the dry erase board, but it was not a fun way to start the day.
    “Bummer,” Lucas said between bites.
    “I cannot believe that Tiffany and Zack are friends.” Sam rested her head in her hands.
    “Why not? It is a strategically beneficial relationship,” Natch said in that condescending voice of his. “He gets to hang with the popular girl and she gets to jump-start her failing career with a live performance in fabulous Las Vegas.”
    Sam was not connecting the dots on that one.
    “What are talking about?” she asked.
    Natch set his fork down on his tray. “Well, his parents do own the Camelot casino in Las Vegas. I’m sure Zack can sweet-talk them into letting her perform there.”
    Sam was dumbfounded.
    This must have been obvious to anyone looking at her because Lucas said, “You didn’t know that? Aren’t they family? I mean I know you’re not close or anything. But I think if I had a relative anywhere in my family tree that owned a casino I’d be all over it.”
    “But how would you know, if you didn’t know?” Jerry asked, pulling himself away from his butterscotch pudding.
    “Good point,” Zoey added. “Besides it isn’t like he goes around bragging about it like a normal person would. Or at least I haven’t heard about it. How did you know?”
    “The Camelot is where they held the Gameco National Video Game Championship,” Lucas said. He seemed to sink a little lower in his seat as he said it.
    “Wait a minute,” Zoey said, pointing sharply across the cafeteria at Zack. “He was a finalist at a competition held in his parent’s own casino?”
    “I’m surprised he didn’t win,” Natch said flatly.
    “Thanks a lot.” Lucas looked up and to the side the way some people do when they are trying to remember something. “I don’t think he cheated. He is actually pretty good.”
    “Yeah, didn’t he actually beat you twice last night?” Natch asked with a mischievous look on his face.
    Sam couldn’t believe her ears. “Have you been hanging out with Zack?”
    Lucas held his hands up in surrender as he spoke. “Listen. I know you don’t get along with your cousin. I don’t like him either. But my parents couldn’t afford for me to come here, so to pay off part of my tuition I have to let Dr. Zhang hook electrodes to my head while I battle Zack on Hyper-Urban Assault for some sort of crazy psychological study about how video games affect eye-hand coordination and strategic planning and problem solving and blabbity blah blah blah. So me, Zack, and a couple other people play games after class a couple times a week.”
    “You could have told me that before,” Sam said. She would have understood.
    “Yeah well, it is a little embarrassing. Plus, I am actually getting bored of video games, which is really traumatic for me,” he said. His mouth smiled, but his eyes didn’t.
    “Tired of smooshing poor innocent turtles and storming the castle to rescue the princess?” Zoey asked playfully.
    “You haven’t played a video