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by E A Foley


  As Iris readied to step through her doorway, a knock sounded in the Gallery of Doors. She dismissed her doorway and sent half her mind to the Gallery. Nimbus was waiting for her. He stared off to the right at something.

  “Hey!” Iris said and drew his attention to her.

  Nimbus held his arms out and Iris walked into them. “I called you, but you didn’t pick up.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh! You were the unknown Pacific number. I never answer those. They’re always scammers. I’ll add your number to my phone. How’d you get mine?”

  “Cirrus,” Nimbus said with a light chuckle.

  “Right, duh,” Iris agreed. The answer had been rather obvious.

  “You’re done with classes for the day, right?”

  “Yeah. I missed the bus, so I was hanging around the library.”

  “Want to come over to my place?”

  “That would be wonderful. Let me make sure there are no magic users around and I’ll be there in a few. I’ll call you if I have to head home first, okay?”

  “Sounds good. See you in a sec.” He caressed her cheek and smiled at her before taking a step back and toward his door.

  Iris waved and exited the Gallery to rejoin both halves of her mind. She searched out any nearby magic users once more but only found a few of her friends who were still in class. Iris requested and stepped through her tiny door. Once the residual magic faded she shimmered into her human self. She glanced around the small apartment. Nimbus wasn’t there.

  “Nimbus?” she called.

  “I’m in here,” he called back.

  Iris headed toward where his voice came from. He sat at his desk in his bedroom. Iris stopped at the doorframe and leaned on it with her right shoulder. He stared at her. His eyes roved her face. They softened. As did his lips. There was something serious, but welcoming about his look. Iris focused on his eyes. A light shone through. It and his current expression reminded her of the picture in Cirrus’s room. An amused chuckle built in her throat. She contained it but couldn’t keep a smile from blooming on her face.

  “What?” he asked.

  “You’re planning something, aren’t you?”

  “What gives you that idea?”

  “That gleam in your eye. It’s the same as in the picture of you and Cirrus in Cirrus’s room.”

  “Ah. Well, I’m not planning anything. Just thinking how beautiful you are. How lucky I am.”

  The smile faded from Iris’s face. She swallowed. He encompassed her in a hug a second later.

  “Don’t dwell on the negative. Focus on the present. The positive.” He kissed the top of her head. Squeezed her to him tighter. “I love you. I . . . I will always love you.”

  Iris got the impression he changed what he’d planned to say. She let it go. A glow spread through her body as he held her. Comfort was the only way her mind could describe the sensation. Iris let Nimbus hold her for a few more minutes as her mind ran through dozens of scenarios in which she could lose him. Her desire to do something resurfaced.

  “Nimbus?”

  “Hm?”

  “Will you help me determine how Jaden and his followers can conceal themselves from us?”

  “Of course, love.” He gave Iris one final squeeze and released her. “How should we start?”

  “We need to figure out what it’s like to not sense another magic user.”

  “Too bad we can’t grab someone and analyze that ability.”

  “Yeah,” Iris said distractedly. Her mind immediately went to Brett. She dismissed the thought with disgust. Brett may not know what he wanted at the moment but she was sure if he found out about Nimbus, he’d go straight back to his dad. That was the last thing she wanted for him.

  “What if we just start by going to different rooms and trying to conceal our magic from each other?”

  “It’s as good a place to start as any,” Iris agreed. She turned and headed into the living room without a second thought—glad to be doing something and hopeful their combined efforts would provide quick results.

  Chapter 17

  Iris sat in the middle of the couch. She folded her legs underneath her and focused on her own abilities. Tried to discern what she emanated to other magic users—how they knew what she was. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. She’d become too used to her powers being visible.

  She let her mind wander. Thought about Brett in high school. She hadn’t an inkling he was a magic user until he decided to share that fact with her. Then he could conceal himself from her as he chose.

  Iris tried to bring forth her memories of Brett from high school. Of the magic users in the Hotel Mar from what was only a few days previous on Earth. The only thing she could think of was their inability to hide their powers from her when they used them or when she had physical contact with them. She didn’t realize how lost in thought she’d become until Nimbus called to her from his bedroom.

  “Any luck?”

  “None. You?”

  “No,” he said from the living room entrance. “I’ve been trying to recreate what I felt at the Hotel Mar, but haven’t been successful. Why don’t we take a break?”

  “Sounds good to me.” Iris uncrossed her legs. They hurt as the pressure they’d been under disappeared. She looked at her phone. She’d been at Nimbus’s for almost an hour.

  “You add my number to that yet?” Nimbus asked as he headed toward the kitchen.

  “No. Thanks for the reminder.” Iris opened her phone app and created a new contact for Nimbus’s number. The sound of things getting pulled from cupboards and the soft clunk of a pot being placed on the stove brought her attention back to him. “What are you doing?”

  “Making you dinner,” he said as he added water to a pot.

  “You don’t have—”

  “I want to,” Nimbus said over his shoulder as the fast ticking and small whoosh of the stove igniting filled the momentary silence.

  Nimbus stopped what he was doing and turned to face her over the high counter separating the kitchen from the living room. “I want you in my life. Need you in my life. What we had on Gemina Terra was surreal. I can sense your awkwardness when you’re around me now. I’m not sure what caused it, but I will do everything in my power to make it disappear.” He smiled, glanced over his shoulder at the stovetop, and turned back to her.

  “I want to be in a relationship with you, Iris. A real relationship. And part of being in a relationship involves having dinner together. Going on dates. Talking about normal, non-magic stuff.”

  Iris heard water bubbling in the pot on the stove. Nimbus turned away from her and continued cooking.

  “Spending the night?” Iris asked after a few moments of silence.

  “You will always be welcome to spend the night.” He flashed her a quick, soft smile.

  Iris got up from the couch and walked to the kitchen. “What can I help with?”

  “Nothing. Why don’t you take a seat?” He paused from dicing onions and gestured at one of the bar stools on the living room side of the high counter.

  Nimbus wiped his hands on the towel thrown over his shoulder, grabbed something out of a side cupboard, and placed a wineglass in front of Iris. “Red or white?” he asked.

  “That depends on what you’re cooking.”

  “Butternut squash risotto.”

  “Then whatever white you plan to cook with will be fine.”

  Nimbus pulled a bottle from the fridge, opened it, and poured two glasses. He placed the bottle back on the counter, picked his glass up, and held it out to her.

  Iris picked hers up and clinked it against his. “Cheers,” she smiled before taking a sip.

  “Here’s to . . . what do you think? We’ll call it our one-week anniversary? Give or take. Make New Year’s Eve our first date?”

  “That’s a much more pleasant way to remember New Year’s Eve than anything else that happened. I think I can agree to that one.”

  “
Good.” Nimbus’s phone chimed. He glanced at it and turned to add rice to the sautéing onions and oil. “Can you let Cirrus know you’re here, please? He’s asking if I’ve seen you. I take it you didn’t tell your roommates you were coming over, did you?”

  “No. I was completely distracted. I’ll text them now.”

  Iris wrote At Nimbus’s for dinner. Probably staying the night. And hit the send button.

  “He says hi and enjoy. That smells amazing,” she added.

  “Sautéing onions always do,” he agreed.

  Iris opened her music app and pressed play. “Any requests?”

  “I’m an alternative guy. Not the stuff that’s half-pop. The stuff that’s more hard-rock.”

  “Perfect.” She let the station it was already on play. “Now that I know we have similar music tastes, what do you like to eat?”

  Nimbus and Iris asked and answered dozens of questions they posed to each other all evening. She found it very easy to talk to him. Though the bottle and a half of wine probably helped. After dinner they sat hip-to-hip on the couch. Iris leaned into Nimbus’s chest and folded her legs next to her on the cushion. Nimbus put on an old movie but kept the volume low enough for them to keep talking. The conversation was slowly taken over by more frequent kisses until Iris stood and led Nimbus to his bedroom.

  Iris formed her mini-doorway to Nimbus’s every afternoon that week. They spent a few hours trying to conceal their magic from each other with very little success. Every so often, Nimbus disappeared but when she told him he’d managed it, he couldn’t retain or replicate his results. Iris had even less success. She simply could not conceal her powers from Nimbus at all.

  When they became exhausted or Iris got too frustrated to continue—Nimbus was always game to keep working—they’d stop and get to know each other a little better. Sometimes she spent the night at his place and sometimes they’d go to her place for dinner with her roommates before crashing in her room.

  She felt they’d started their relationship off backward, but were catching up quickly. Their friendship status blossomed and every time she saw Nimbus, Iris’s eyes shimmered to shades of blue and purple. Happiness started to build in her life as the second week of the quarter came to a close. Jaden hadn’t attacked Nimbus since their first day back. With his ability to travel between Davis and his place through his faerie-sized doorway, Iris relaxed about anyone’s ability to detect Nimbus’s magic.

  Besides Nimbus being safe, so was Rowen. Someone was always with him, so Jaden didn’t even have an opportunity to attack his former best friend. Furthermore, Brett hadn’t popped in on Iris unexpectedly in days. The quarter was going better than she expected. Even better than she’d ever hoped. The only thing that would have made it perfect was figuring out how to conceal her magical abilities from another magic user. Iris’s lack of success depressed her. She decided she needed a break from concealment magic. Needed to take her mind off her failures by trying something new. More. She needed a success. Any success.

  Iris spent the weekend contemplating what she should try. She longed to go for a drive and figure it out but knew her subconscious would take her out of the city limits of Davis while she thought about her magical problems. A walk was out of the question. The weather was terrible. Rain with high winds that made it impossible to carry an umbrella. Iris contemplated going to Nimbus’s, but he said he needed to do some prep for his upcoming semester and she didn’t want to distract him.

  By the time Monday came, Iris hadn’t come up with an answer. She was lost in thought on her way to her lab shift between classes when someone bent down and spoke in her ear.

  “What’s it like? Gemina Terra?”

  Iris was glad for the sound of rain bouncing off the pavement and her umbrella. Hoped it meant no one heard Brett’s question. “Why do you want to know?”

  “I just do.”

  “It’s beautiful. What the Earth should be. No wars. No famine. No humankind to screw it up. It’s pristine. And I intend it to stay that way,” she added and stopped to look at Brett.

  He bent down to stay under her umbrella. Iris raised it a few inches to give him enough room to stand up straight. She wasn’t sure why she decided to accommodate him within her confined space.

  “Thanks,” he gestured toward the umbrella. “And the magic there? Is it different?”

  Iris creased her brow and stared at him. Took a moment to give herself enough time to analyze his aura before answering. It fought itself. She decided to give him an actual answer rather than a snarky response.

  “It’s closer to nature. And flows freely throughout everything. It isn’t hiding there—isn’t afraid to show itself.”

  Brett looked down. He didn’t speak as he nodded a few times and took in what she said. Something caught his attention. He looked off to his left. Shrugged as though answering some question she asked, sneered at her, and left without a word.

  Iris glanced after him then scanned the area he’d looked to. She tried to locate what spooked him but with the rain and everyone wearing hats or using umbrellas, she didn’t see anyone of note. Iris reached out with her powers. They found nothing. She shook her head and resumed her walk to the lab. A glance at her watch told her she’d be late. The rain would be a good enough excuse.

  Two hours later, Iris locked up the lab and headed toward the bus terminal. She pulled her phone out and shot Nimbus a text.

  I need a night off. See you tomorrow night?

  Sure thing. Love you.

  Love you too. She texted before putting her phone away. She stopped. Had no desire to go home. Iris changed the angle she took across campus and popped into the women’s restroom at the Silo. There was a line. She sighed and continued through the building to the bus terminal. Made it on the bus just as the driver completed his last call.

  Thankfully, her roommates weren’t home when she walked in. It gave Iris enough time to drop her backpack in her room, change jackets, and become a five-inch-tall faerie. She pulled a thimbleful of power into her being and requested her double doorway form in front of her. Iris stepped through her door and waited long enough for her residual magic to subside before transforming back into her human self. She thought for a few moments on what she wanted to do. Her mind went blank.

  After staring at nothing for what seemed like forever, Iris said, “Screw it,” to the empty, snow-covered meadow and drew power into her being.

  She did the first thing that came to her mind. Focused on connecting to the full force of both the power flowing through Gemina Terra and the Earth. Her body balked at the two sources of power. They were two raging torrents fighting for the right to claim the space for one.

  The flows turned violent. Tried to rip her apart. Iris closed her eyes. Allowed the power to course through her body as it saw fit. She stopped trying to control it. Stopped pulling it into her being. Accepted what flowed into and through her.

  Iris took several breaths and focused inward. Waited for the two powers to find a point of harmony rather than dissonance. The powers settled. Became a single flowing river she could access. With one final breath, she opened her eyes.

  The world seemed more vibrant. Sharper. Like when she was in her true form as a faerie. She wondered if it was an effect of the power from Gemina Terra. It gave her pause. Made her think about what she could do with both powers. Magic on Gemina Terra maintained a closer relationship to nature than it did on Earth. If she focused her requests on the elements, she could have a greater effect on the natural world of the Earth.

  Iris decided to try it but wondered what she should request. Weather came to her mind first. She dismissed it. Was already adept at creating rain and didn’t feel like adding to the layer of snow surrounding her. She looked around her meadow. With the white blanket-like covering, she couldn’t tell if anything needed significant healing, and she didn’t want to destroy the entire meadow to practice healing. Her eyes fell to the ground. An earthquake. She’d never attempt one. Always thought i
t’d take too much of her powers.

  Decision made, Iris formed and focused her request. She sent her mind deep within the crust of the Earth. Searched out tiny fishers. There were none close by. She expanded her search. Delved deeper. Found a small crack that led to a larger one which in turn led to a fault line. Iris smiled. She concentrated on her request and funneled the power she received from both planets into it. Pulled more power into her being. Expelled it as fast as possible.

  Seconds passed. The Earth remained motionless. The plates immobile.

  Iris increased her efforts. She doubled the speed of her continual magic use. Intensified her request.

  Tension built in the Earth. It had nowhere to go. The plates shifted. Centimeters. No more.

  Iris dismissed her request and closed her body off to all power. A weight like she’d never experienced before descended on her shoulders. She dropped to her knees, panting. Fell forward onto her hands. They stung as they sank through the snow to land upon the frozen ground.

  “Messing with the Earth like that is not advisable. Think of the damage you could cause. I thought you were all about protecting and saving, not death and destruction.”

  Chapter 18

  Morrigan’s katana made contact with Iris’s throat. Pressure on the blade drew her chin up. She had to find the strength to support her own head. Waited for her vision to return from the blackness that now filled it.

  It had been stupid to come back to the meadow Morrigan helped find for her. Of course they’d come looking for her here. Iris waited in trepidation for Jaden’s voice to follow. If he arrived, there’d be nothing she could do about it. She was almost as drained as she’d been when she arrived on Gemina Terra after her stay at Jaden’s castle. Perhaps more.

 

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