by Tanya Huff
Way to go, Allie.
Charlie fully approved of kicking the coals every now and then to see what flared up. Kind of surprised her that Allie’d taken a poke at it, but maybe all she’d needed was a little distance from the family. Charlie was a big believer in distance. Not many Gales were.
Stepping over a broken slab of sidewalk, she thought about finding a park and sliding into the Wood-incognito, no music-just to see if it was safe. But then she figured Allie’d be a bit pissed about having to retrieve her car if it wasn’t, and she didn’t really want to have to get her ass home from Prague or Cairo anyway. Couldn’t afford to get her ass home from much farther than where she was right at this moment given the smoking state of her credit cards.
It cost a small fortune to fly from Rio to Calgary. Who knew?
So it looked like she was stuck in Calgary for a while.
Having that choice made for her bothered her a lot less than it should. Maybe her mother was right. Maybe she was ready to settle down. Or at least stay in one place for a while, which-in no way, shape, or form-needed to mean the same thing. Give the band a couple of gigs to shake down, and she’d see about getting her other instruments from home.
“All right.” At the Beetle, she shifted the gig bag to her other hand, and wrestled the key into the passenger side door. “First thing on the agenda, wheels.” This thing made her want to play Simon and Garfunkel, circa “Sounds of Silence.”
Bent nearly double to buckle the seat belt through the gig bag’s straps, Charlie heard what sounded like wet sheets flapping in the wind. A quick check determined the Beetle’s soft top had not come undone. When she straightened, squinting upward, following her ears, it looked as though a triangular section of the stars had disappeared.
“Well, hello, darkness,” she muttered and had just enough time to realize the sound and the blank space in the night sky were connected when she smelled sulfur.
She dove for cover as a line of red/orange light bisected the night.
An appliance store across the street went up in flames.
SEVEN
“But the dragons are searching for the sorcerer, right? So they might have thought Charlie…”
“It doesn’t work that way, Michael. Sorcerers have a power signature for the same reason the store does. The family uses power, we don’t hold it.”
“I know that.”
“Then you know they couldn’t have been targeting Charlie.” Allie glanced toward the bedroom where Charlie was still asleep and snoring. Snoring musically, but definitely snoring. She’d called in the fire and stayed to give a statement before heading home and giving a significantly less edited statement there.
“Yeah, and I also know that your family doesn’t believe in coincidence.”
“I never said it was a coincidence that Charlie was there when the store burned, I just said they weren’t targeting her. Not the same thing.” She opened the fridge door to put the butter away, saw the blueberry pie, and wondered if Auntie Jane thought she was stupid. The thing had more charms than blueberries.
“So if it wasn’t coincidence, what was it?”
“Something else, obviously.” She closed the door a little harder than was necessary.
“Oh, that’s mature, Allie.” Michael’s voice had picked up an edge. “I thought we didn’t keep secrets.”
Sighing, she turned to face him. “We don’t.”
“So tell me what’s going on with the dragons.”
“They’re hunting the sorcerer!”
“Well, they fucking suck at it!” Michael grabbed his tool belt off the arm of the couch and stomped out of the apartment. Gran’s charms kept him from slamming the door but only just. The definitive click of the latch rang in the silent apartment.
Allie frowned. Silent?
“Someone sounds less than gay this morning.” Charlie, in turn, didn’t sound happy about being awake. “And when I say less than gay,” she added, squinting in the spill of light as Allie came into the bedroom, “I mean really fucking cranky. Call Brian. Tell him to come and pick up his boy.”
“It’s not about Brian.” Allie sat on the side of the bed and pushed a bit of indigo hair off Charlie’s face.
“Allie, sweetie, it’s entirely about Brian. One, Michael’s been around family all his life. He doesn’t need that shit explained. Two, the only time you guys ever fight is if there’s a third party involved. And, three, he hasn’t been laid in days, so it’s no wonder he’s cranky. Call Brian.”
“I’m not getting involved in this.”
“As if.”
“Not this time.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I’ve got errands to run before I pick up Rol. Go back to sleep.” She bent and kissed Charlie’s forehead to speed the healing of the scorched skin, then slid off the bed.
The mirror showed her holding a crying baby. Allie half thought she saw a lashing tail poke out of the diaper, but Auntie Vera had called to warn her about Auntie Jane’s pie-not the charms, the pastry-and the vitriol distracted her. When she looked again, nothing.
Allie found Joe sitting in the food court in North Hill Center, drinking a coffee and being ignored by a belligerent-looking representative of mall security who clearly did not believe in leprechauns even if they had a Mark’s Work Wearhouse bag and a new dark blue Henley.
“Got a minute?” she asked, sliding into the seat across from him and tracing a charm on the table that had the security guard glaring through her as well.
“Could,” he said carefully. “Why?”
“Did you know there was a sorcerer in the city?”
His eyes widened. “No way, really? Those guys attract trouble like shit attracts flies. You got a sorcerer, and next thing you know you’ve got all kinds of nasty stuff pushing through the cracks trying to take them out.” Jerking his head back, he stared up at the exposed ductwork and the ugly orange light fixtures. “Is that who they’re after, then?”
They were not perched in the ductwork, and Allie only checked to be thorough. “Yes, that’s who they’re after.” She licked dry lips. “It was his guy who threatened you.”
Pale skin blanched. “With the Blessed rounds?”
“Unless there’ve been more threats you haven’t told me about.”
“No.” He rubbed a thumb over the back of his hand, tracing the charm. “This is beyond not good. I mean, if a sorcerer’s pissed at me, I need to be getting out of town. Now.”
“It wasn’t about you, it was about me. About the family. We…” Destroy sorcerers where we find them was more than she wanted to admit to. And not currently accurate anyway. “… don’t get along with sorcerers very well, and you’d just spent time with me. In Gran’s store. But you’re safe now,” she added quickly as Joe jerked away from her. “I talked to him and…”
“You talked to him? To the sorcerer?” Joe’s Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat. “About me?”
“No, I talked to his shooter about you, and it won’t happen again.” Seemed like a smart idea to keep the identity of the shooter to herself since Joe and Graham were definitely going to be interacting. “You’re safe, you have my word.” She frowned. “Okay, you’re safe from the shooter, and I’m well aware he’s not the only danger in town.”
The new key on the old brass key chain she’d taken from the store had fallen to the bottom of her messenger bag and it took a moment to rummage it free. She’d barely thought of Joe all day Sunday given the whole sorcerer thing, and Charlie was right. Had been right. Was still right. Given everything that was going down, Joe needed a little more commitment from her. She laid the key chain down between them on the table. “There’s no reason for you to wait outside in the mornings. Or whenever. I’d feel better if you slept in the apartment, even though I don’t know that anyone’s actually after you,” she added hurriedly seeing his expression, “but that’s your choice.”
Joe stared down at the key and then up at her, pale skin paler still, although she hadn’t
believed that possible. “Do you know,” he began. Shook his head. Pushed his hair back off his face with fingers that trembled slightly. “Stupid. Of course you know. Put a key in a cradle to keep a baby from being stolen by fairies. Give a key to a changeling, lock him in place. Give him a place. This is more than just a way to open a door. This is… It’s… For me…”
Allie put one finger on the key and pushed it toward him, the tie that linked her to her family throbbing in time to her heartbeat. “I know.”
“Really?” When he looked up, hope made his eyes as Human as she’d ever seen them.
“Yes. Really.” Choosing to live unrooted was one thing; being forced to it was something else again. Allie couldn’t make it right that Joe’s people had used him as currency to buy the few years of amusement a mortal would provide in the UnderRealm, but she could give him a place and people to stand by him. Or occasionally in front of him. Barely breathing, he swallowed once, Adam’s apple rising and falling in the thin column of his throat. Then, finally, he placed his fingertip beside hers and nodded.
“Good.” She glanced at her watch and stood. “I’ve got to get to the airport.” A step away from the table. A step back. “Joe…”
He paused, key halfway to his pocket.
“The sorcerer and I have come to a sort of agreement-mostly involving not doing much of anything to each other-but he did give the order to have you threatened, so if you want to… you know, not, because I didn’t kick his ass, I’d understand.”
Ginger brows drew in so far they almost touched over Joe’s nose. “You could have kicked his ass?”
“By myself? No. But I could have called the aunties in.”
“You still could?”
“Yes, but…”
“You’re playing the long game, then.”
Allie thought about that for a moment. “I guess I am.”
“Then we’re good.” Joe closed his fingers around the key. “More than.”
“Thank you.”
On the way out, Allie took a moment to ask the security guard for directions and sketched a charm on his tie just below the cheap brass tie clip. Moods were easy to adjust, and she saw no reason he should make everyone suffer for his.
Roland’s plane got in on time. He pulled back from her welcoming kiss, gently brushed an eyelash off her cheek, and frowned slightly. “You’ve changed since the last time I saw you.”
Allie snorted. “Rol, last time you saw me was during ritual and you weren’t exactly at your most analytical. And you’re second circle, so it wasn’t like you were paying a lot of attention to me. And it’s only been a week and a half. And you only just got here.”
“All valid arguments, but…”
“Roland!”
They turned together as a tiny, dark-haired woman with a brilliant smile and abundant curves crossed the terminal toward them. She stopped in front of Roland; not so much in front that she was obviously ignoring Allie but enough that it was clear where her attention lay.
“I just wanted to say once again how much fun it was to travel with you and I hope we get a chance to see each other again while you’re in Calgary. You have my number?”
“I do.”
“Good.”
The heat barely masked in her eyes brought Allie forward half a step. Roland started as though he’d actually forgotten she was there.
“Sandra, this is my cousin, Alysha. Allie, Sandra had the seat beside me and we ended up having to share a screen-the plane had the little ones on the seatbacks and hers refused to work.”
“Pleased to met you, Sandra.” Allie smiled, and the other woman blinked. “Thanks for taking care of him for us.”
“My pleasure.” But she sounded uncertain.
“Sorry to cut this short, but airport parking… you know?”
“Yes. Of course.” Frowning slightly, she held out her hand. “Good-bye, Roland.”
Small tanned fingers disappeared inside his. “Good-bye, Sandra.”
Allie smiled again then turned to lead the way out to the car.
After a few steps, Roland fell in beside her. “It wasn’t like that,” he said after a few steps more.
“She wanted it to be.”
“I wouldn’t have called her.”
“Now she won’t mind as much.”
“As much?”
“Hey, you’re still a hunka hunka burning legal love, I couldn’t change that.”
He laughed as they stepped outside. “Like I said, you’ve changed. A week ago, you’d have ignored her.”
“Maybe.” Roland was David’s age, so she might have trusted him not to stray. “But I’m the only family you’ve got out here.”
“Charlie left?”
“No, but Charlie’s… Charlie.”
As the silence extended, Allie couldn’t figure out what Roland needed to think about because it was a family truism that Charlie was Charlie and the rest of them would just have to cope.
Finally, he nodded, said, “True,” somewhat anticlimactically, then added, “the aunties want me to pump you for information. They think you’re hiding something.”
“Do they?”
“They’re certain of it.”
She sighed. “Wait until we get to the car and we can talk.”
“I can’t believe you’re hiding this from the aunties!”
Pedal to the floor, Allie roared onto Deerfoot Trail. “The aunties would only make things worse.”
“That’s not…” He paused, quiet for a moment, one hand gripping the handle built into the dash, knuckles white. “Probably,” he agreed at last. “But that’s not your call.”
“Oh, yes, it is. They sent me out here to deal with things, and I’m dealing.”
“Auntie Catherine left you the store, but you chose to come out here and deal with things, Allie.”
“And I’m dealing.” When Roland opened his mouth to argue, she turned on the radio. When he sighed and reached to turn it off, she grabbed his wrist. “Wait. It’s the local news. I need to hear it.”
“… third fire of the night at Web Wizards on Broadway. Although the fire marshal’s office has yet to issue an official statement, an unidentified source confirms that arson is suspected.”
“Web Wizards,” Allie repeated, sliding the Beetle back into the righthand lane when a hole opened between a transport and an elderly Buick.
Roland turned the radio off as the weather report began. “Allie, we need to discuss you hiding a sorcerer from the aunties.”
“Not now, Rol. I’m thinking. And I’m not hiding him, I’m merely letting him remain hidden.”
“That’s a bad defense.”
“Seriously.” She took her eyes off the road long enough to glare at him. “Thinking.”
Charlie looked up from her guitar as the apartment door opened. “Auntie Meredith called while you were gone, Allie. If I’m still being bounced out of the Wood, they want me to grab a plane and head home so that I can take one of them traveling and they can kick shadow butt. I reminded Auntie Meredith that since the shadow was tied to your song, I was right where it didn’t want me to be and planned on staying. Besides, it took them too damned long to pony up, and I just signed with a band. She told me to quit. I told her you needed me. She asked for what. I said you’d met a guy. That seemed to shut her up although there may have been cackling. Hey, Roland.”
Leaving his suitcase at the end of the sofa, he bent and kissed her. “I see you’re still working the punk look.”
Tucking a strand of indigo hair back behind her ear, Charlie rolled her eyes. “Punk has been over for a long time. I’m thinking of dying it red, though. Red’s hot for country.”
“What country?”
“Not country geographically; country musically. Oh, yeah. Allie…” She twisted to watch Allie cross the apartment. “… Joe showed up. He’s out back helping Michael.”
“And Joe is…?” Roland asked.
“Allie’s leprechaun.”
“He’
s not my leprechaun,” Allie protested, heading into the bedroom for her computer.
Charlie’s snort carried clearly though the open door. “You gave him a key; in what way is he not yours?”
“I didn’t say he wasn’t mine,” she muttered as she grabbed the laptop and flipped it open. “I said he wasn’t my leprechaun. I gave him a key, he’s on the edge of family now.”
“The edge at the foot of the rainbow.”
“Let it go, Charlie.” Laptop balanced on one hand as she came back into the main room, Allie frowned down at the screen. “Please tell me girls-withguitars.com isn’t what I… Eww.” It took three tries to hit delete. She didn’t know a lot about guitars but that couldn’t be good for the instrument. “Get your own computer if you’re going to surf for porn!” she snapped, sitting down at one end of the big table and clearing the cache.
Roland wrapped an arm around his backpack as Charlie looked at it speculatively. “Don’t even think about it.”
“I can’t afford a laptop. I have to buy a pickup truck.”
“Because you’re playing country music now?” His right eyebrow rose. His left remained neutral. “It’s not like you to buy into stereotypes.”
“Everyone else in the band has a pickup truck!”
“If everyone else in the band…” Roland frowned. “Uh… Wait, I’ve got it. If everyone else in the band dyed their hair red, would you?”
Charlie snickered. “Way to miss your save, dude. Allie! What’s the anti-country music vehicle?”
“Don’t know, don’t care. Buy a bicycle. Look at this…” When her cousins crowded around, she pointed at the screen. “These are the Calgary Yellow Pages on-line. Nothing comes up for sorcerer, but when I search for wizard, the first three-Appliance Wizard, Blizzard Wizard Heating and Air Conditioning, and Web Wizards-all caught fire last night. The dragons are trying to flush him.”
“Looks like,” Charlie nodded.
Roland turned to stare. “By burning down businesses with the word wizard in the name?”
“Hello! From the UnderRealm,” Charlie reminded him, flicking his ear. “They know less about how the world works than you do.”