Divine's Emporium

by Michelle L. Levigne

  "When Angela thinks someone needs to be here, she'll open early or late or on Sundays." Diane shrugged. "You know Angela."

  "Actually, I don't. I've been meaning to rectify that, but..." He looked around again. "I'll check back tomorrow. Maybe both of you will be here then. Thanks." He turned to head for the door.

  "You're welcome." Diane watched him go out the door, then she slumped over her book again.

  "What's with this guy?" Maurice asked, knowing she couldn't hear or answer him. "It's not like you to get swayed by a pretty face." Or was that part of the magic he had wrapped around him? "Angie-baby, get back here!"

  Angela walked in twenty tense minutes later. Maurice heard the back door open and he leaped from his nest on the top shelf to fly to her. He nearly ran into Diane, who had scooted around the counter and ran to the back room to meet Angela.

  "You are never going to guess who came in here! Troy Richards," she said, before Angela could even take her coat off.

  "What did he want?" Angela paused, her hand on the doorframe.

  Maurice saw a flare of power in the frame and caught the instantaneous burst throughout the whole house. It was more sensed than seen, felt in the part of him that manipulated magic, like the after-image of a lightning strike.

  Angela turned to him, her eyes wide with questions, her mouth flat in concern.

  "Yeah, you still feel it, don't you?" Maurice said. He settled on Angela's head, chilled from the breeze that impeded the melting of the snow under the hot afternoon sunshine. "Who's this Troy Richards guy, anyway? Diane sure looked happy to see him. He's not a friend of yours, is he?"

  Troy has never come into the shop, but I've met him around town at various events, Angela responded, her mouth still a flattened line. She took off her coat and gloves and hung them up by the door. He's a good man, a self-made millionaire, involved in several charities. Now hush so I can talk to Diane. I can't carry on two conversations at the same time.

  Maurice shut up, mostly because he was surprised at Angela's response. He knew for a fact she could carry on four conversations at the same time. Whatever she sensed, whatever vibrations from the inimical magic Troy had brought into the shop, it had unsettled her.

  "He was looking for a book," Diane said, leading the way back to the main room. "A rare book. He specifically asked about your special room."

  "Not the special, special room, I hope," Maurice muttered.

  There were several book rooms at Divine's Emporium. One was downstairs, where people could come in and browse through old and used books. The second was on the third floor, and was the one Diane had told the visitor about. Angela kept it locked and only let people in by appointment, with supervision. The third was on the fourth floor, next to the attic that held the magical paintings and other objects that were benign in their own right, but dangerous if they fell into the wrong hands. The books in that room were magic, in and of themselves. Some had been given into Angela's custodianship, to preserve and protect them. Some were there to protect the rest of the world.

  Maurice was pretty sure he and Angela were the only ones who knew about that special book room, but then again, he hadn't been around Divine's long enough. If anyone else would know about the special book room, it was Diane She was a trusted friend as well as the only clerk who took receipts to the bank and negotiated sales for big, expensive items while Angela was out of the shop.

  "When is he coming back?" Angela settled down at the little white wrought iron bistro table in the coffee shop portion of the room. She let Diane fuss with the cappuccino maker under the counter, and frowned at that invisible spot in mid-air, thinking so hard Maurice could almost hear the whirring and buzzing inside her head.

  "Probably tomorrow. I gave him our open schedule." Diane shrugged and settled down with two frothy mugs.

  "Did he give you any clue what kind of book he was looking for?"

  "No." She frowned and paused on the verge of sipping.

  Maurice? Did he do anything to her?

  "Not a thing. If he had, I would have gone after him. Hey, he should have known I was there, if he was working magic. That means all the magic was just..." He came in for a landing on the hanging basket planted with spearmint that hung on the wall over the bistro table. "The protective spell must have reacted to magic he was carrying with him. There was no active magic--just reaction. Like if I was carrying a protective charm and it set off an alarm, know what I mean?"

  Yes. Angela sipped at her cup. So he was carrying something that had negative magic attached to it, but he wasn't using it. The question is therefore what the magic was meant to do, and if it was controlling him, or if he was merely being used to carry that magic in here, through my protective barriers.

  "Don't think much of those barriers if they let him through."

  If Troy was an innocent courier, the protective spells would tone down to avoid hurting him. Which means... Well, if I have enemies, they know the protective spells enough to know how to get around them.

  "And that makes the problem doubly bad trouble," Maurice snarled. "Don't you worry, Angie-baby. I'll watch out for Diane. You concentrate on zapping the creep."

  Angela smiled slightly as she sipped at her cappuccino.

  * * * *

  Troy returned the next day. Again, Maurice felt the straining of the shield as it protected the house. He understood now why it would let an intruder in, and why Troy wasn't burned or stung as a warning to stay away.

  Angela was busy in the clothing room, advising Jo on clothes for a business trip. Choosing the right clothes for sightseeing and formal dinners was probably a big thing, but couldn't Angela feel the house's reaction to the inimical magic Troy brought in with him? Diane, who was currently helping a gaggle of girls from the orphanage pick out enough candy to make Willy Wonka sick, wouldn't sense anything.

  "Well, duh, why should she worry when I'm here?" Maurice snarled, and zipped down the stairs to the entryway. It pleased him a little that Troy rubbed at his temples and looked around as if slightly dazed. Maybe the house did resist his entrance, despite the fact the guy was an innocent dupe.

  Sometimes being ignorant and innocent wasn't a valid defense.

  "How come you're carrying the magic? And where is it?" Maurice muttered, and came in for a landing on Troy's shoulder. He reasoned that the best way to keep track of the intruder was to stick with him as close as possible.

  The next thing he knew, his entire body tingled and his wings felt slightly singed, like he had flown too close to a flame. He blinked and tried to focus his blurry eyes.

  What had happened? What was he doing a second ago? He lifted his head, and it immediately throbbed like he had tried to pump boiling oil into his skull through his ears. Moaning, he felt his ears, afraid he would find the points singed off. His eyes chose that moment to focus, and he saw Troy going up the stairs--but the stairs were upside down. What the heck?

  No, Maurice realized. He was upside down. Hanging upside down in the chamomile plant Angela kept by the door to purify the air. The leaves had caught him...when something zapped him and flung him off Troy's shoulder.

  Troy headed upstairs and nobody knew. Groaning, Maurice rolled over, scrambling to grab hold of the chamomile leaves before he slid off. If his wings were singed useless, he was going to be in big trouble. He doubted he had enough magic to teleport himself upstairs.

  "Thank you," he muttered, breathing out a sigh of relief when a test flap revealed his wings still worked. They just felt stiff and prickly like sunburned skin. "Don't fail me now." He took a deep breath and launched himself from the hanging pot. One thing in his favor--he didn't have to take each step and each turn of the switchback stairs going up through the center of the house. He could go straight up.

  He caught up with Troy on the third floor landing. He settled down on the newel post and watched. Okay, so how come the guy just stood there, staring at the wallpaper?

  Suddenly Troy staggered forward and went to his knees.


  "Whoopsy daisy!" Maurice almost reached out to try to help him, but he had learned his lesson the hard way. "What's wrong, fella? Maybe whatever zapped me got you in the backwash?" He was in no mood for pity, and he didn't feel guilty over feeling some satisfaction that Troy had suffered from whatever magic had scorched him.

  Troy turned around and half-crawled, half-staggered to the newel post where Maurice perched. He rubbed his eyes, hauled himself upright and looked around. One foot swung out like a pendulum, aiming for the stairs leading up to the fourth floor, but Troy didn't move. He swayed a second time, and grappled at the banister when it looked like he would pitch headfirst down the stairs.

  "Interesting." Maurice grinned. Hey, Angie-baby, are you up to playing Miss Marple? It was useless for him to shout--his vocal chords were too small to project enough to reach Angela in the clothing room.

  I prefer Kinsey Milhone or Eve Dallas, she responded after a moment. I assume Troy is here? Where is he?

  About ready to pass out on the third floor. I landed on him and whatever did a bug zapper routine on me drained him, too. I got the feeling there's some magic guiding him, but it isn't strong enough anymore. Okay, there he goes. Time for a strategic retreat, I'm guessing. Discretion is the better part of valor and all that claptrap.

  Maurice followed Troy down the stairs, his wings spread for gliding. He used the faint air currents in the stairwell, floating in lazy circles and keeping his eye on the intruder.

  As he followed the staggering intruder past the doorway to the main room, he saw Angela guide Jo to the counter and keep her and Diane busy. Troy nearly sideswiped a wooden display rack on his way out the front door. Maurice perched on the friendly chamomile plant and watched through the sidelight window as he stumbled to his Lexus. The house's protective net barely reacted as Troy passed through it the second time. Definitely, whatever had scorched him had affected Troy as well.

  "Who weaves a spell so badly that it drains you when it zaps your enemies?" Maurice groused as he fluttered into the main room. He twisted to the side at the last minute as Jo swept toward the door, accompanied by Diane. They were talking about Ken and the business trip. Jo had a smile on her face that was nearly as bright as her eyes.

  It had to be pretty nice to be in love. Maybe when he got a little older, maybe in another fifty years, he would see about courtship. The problem was that most of the girls he had known as a child in the Fae enclaves either hadn't focused on him when puberty hit them, or the ones who had targeted him as potential husband material had been downright scary.

  He agreed in principle with Need --the emotional and mental and physical binding that occurred between two Fae when they paired up. It guaranteed that, with a little attention and effort, that romantic zing lasted forever and kept both the husband and the wife satisfied and happy to be shackled together. He just wasn't ready to take the plunge and have it happen to him, personally.

  "Someone who weaves badly either doesn't care about his minions." Angela leaned both arms on the counter and stared at the front of the shop as if she could see through the walls and watch Troy leave. "Or, he doesn't know what he's doing in the first place. Which might give us a clue as to the type of book Troy is looking for."

  "Umm, speaking of which, what kind of books do you have up there in the forbidden room?" He landed and took a perch on a leg of the dragon holding up the Wishing Ball.

  "Forbidden room?" Angela snorted delicately. "Not exactly forbidden. More like ill-advised." She finally tore her gaze away from the far wall and whatever she saw that had nothing to do with the physical world. Her mouth tightened and she nodded once, sharply. "Next time Troy comes in, let him go wherever he wants. Don't stop him. Let's see what he's after. Or what his master is after."

  "Okay, that sounds like a plan. Just one question. What if he finds what he's looking for? And what if that magic that's guiding him around has the ability to teleport him, even leapfrog dimensions, and take the book or whatever you have upstairs out of here, without having to go past us? I assume we'll be right outside the door, waiting to see what he grabs, right?"

  "Oh, very right. And the answer is that I will adjust the net protecting the house. It will let Troy and the magic he carries in, with less resistance. But it will let no one and nothing out again unless I personally give permission."

  "Roaches check in, but they don't check out," Maurice whispered, resisting the urge to whistle in appreciation for this ruthless side of her. Angela's gaze met his, and he saw the same mischievous, vengeful streak in her that he knew Asmondius wanted toned down in him. A heartbeat later, they were both laughing.

  * * * *

  Angela nearly gave Lanie a heart attack, three days later, when she announced she wanted to attend that month's Star Trek club meeting and see what fun she had been missing out on. Maurice thought of several dozen smart remarks about Angela in the Star Trek playground, starting with the female crew uniforms from the original series. He wondered if Angela had stepped out of her usual routine specifically to lure Troy and whatever magic he carried--and which most likely controlled him--into visiting the shop after hours.

  "You're sure this is okay?" he said, as Angela closed up the shop two hours earlier than usual that night, and prepared to go out front to wait for Lanie to pick her up in her Jeep.

  "Me playing Star Trek, or leaving the shop unguarded?" Angela gave him a serene smile and swung her cape around her shoulders. "It's not unguarded. You're here."

  "Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I've been getting a taste lately of just how limited my magic is." Maurice followed her out the front door. It proved just how uneasy he was with the whole arrangement when the sound of the door closing of its own accord, and the locks clicking into place without Angela touching anything, made him leap high enough to brush his head against the lamp hanging from the porch roof.

  "You're fully recovered from that brush with Troy's magic, and you haven't done any magic for quite a while. All I want you to do is watch. And call me when Troy shows up."

  "Yeah? How?"

  "Use my pager."

  "You don't have--" Maurice stopped short and shook his head in disbelief when Angela pulled a small pager from her purse and showed it to him. He didn't doubt that the twin to it, with Angela's number already entered in it, had just appeared on the counter by the Wishing Ball. "Okay, boss. Have a good time. You do know how to do the Vulcan salute, don't you?"

  Angela chuckled and waved to him as Lanie's Jeep turned the corner and headed toward the house. He had the unsettling suspicion that she was looking forward to this uncharacteristic night out. He decided he envied her. Maurice liked playing Star Trek, himself, but it wouldn't be much fun if nobody else could see or hear him. Maybe when he got his size back and got rid of these wings, he would stick around Neighborlee for a while and really get to know the people he had been following around and spying on.

  He flew around the back of the shop and tapped a window that constantly sparkled with the presence of a magical slit in reality. The glass evaporated and he flew into the back room of the shop. A heartbeat later, the glass reconstituted.

  What was Holly doing tonight? He hadn't visited her dreams in more than a week, and he felt as if he had broken a date and abandoned her. When Angela got back from the meeting, he promised himself he would check in on Holly's latest dream. In the meanwhile, he could at least watch what she was doing tonight through the Wishing Ball.

  Twenty minutes later, Maurice had assembled his sofa, brought in a thimble full of diet cherry cola, a dark chocolate kiss to counter the intoxication, and for dinner, two sandwiches made with oyster crackers, pimento cheese spread and tuna salad.

  "Dinner and a movie," he muttered, as he tapped the Wishing Ball and focused his thoughts on Holly. "How about we make a date for dinner out when I'm a free man? Does that sound good to you, kid?" Holly's smiling face appeared in the curved surface of the Wishing Ball, nodding in response to something a little pigtailed red-haired g
irl said to her. "Yeah, thought you'd like that."

  Maurice finished his sandwiches and finished off his first thimble of diet cherry cola while he watched Holly close up the library for the night and head over to the Neighborlee Arts building, to the Star Trek meeting. She was greeted with waves and smiles by most of the group, despite coming in late and interrupting what looked like an intense discussion between the club leaders, who were sitting at a folding table at the front of the room, and the rest of the disparate membership. There had to be thirty people in the room.

  Now was a good time to get a refill. He flew upstairs to Angela's kitchen. She had conjured up a tiny tap, like someone would insert in a beer keg, that he poked into his cans of diet cherry cola. It let him fill his drinking thimble and preserve the carbonation as long as possible. By limiting himself to no more than two thimbles of the intoxicating liquid each day, Maurice could make a can last almost a week.

  "Yep, I'm definitely a cheap date," he announced as he flew back to his seat in front of the Wishing Ball and set his thimble on the counter in front of him.

  As if in response, the protective net around the house flared. Maurice hissed, feeling as if something fragile had been ripped down the middle. The feeling vanished, but he knew better than to assume whoever or whatever had come up against the protective net had gone away. He glanced at the grandfather clock in the corner of the main room. Not even eight o'clock. Troy hadn't waited long to take advantage of Angela leaving the shop unguarded. Then again, he could have no idea what time she planned on returning, so he had to act fast.

  A faint, reddish glow appeared in the far wall, where the door only became visible at Christmas, to let the tree be brought in. Maurice stared, his mouth dropping open, as the door appeared. Smoke flickered around the edges, as if the magical fabric of the door had been scorched just like he had been.

  The door swung open and Troy Richards lurched into the room. He barely got all the way inside before the door slammed shut and vanished. The burned smell and wisps of smoke hung in the air as mute evidence to what had happened.