On the roof of the bank, once more fully sized, the blonde was seated atop the metal cube of a tall thrumming vent, drumming her little slippered heels against the metal panels.
The oriental tucked her flag around her once again and pushed her hair out of her eyes, spitting a stray strand out of her mouth. She stepped toward the other girl, who was grinning.
The ravenhaired girl, looking up, said, “Are you human?”
The blonde tilted her head. “Is that a trick question?”
4. Introductions
The blonde said, “Wait! We have not been properly introduced!”
The blonde girl hopped down from her perch, set her feet just so, took the little hems of her miniskirt in hand, and performed a graceful curtsey, bending her back leg so far, and bowing her head so deeply that her forehead almost touched the knee of her other leg, which was extended before her, toes pointed.
She straightened up, grinning. “How do you do? Fine, thank you! A pleasure to meet me, I am sure. Are you enchanted?”
The ravenhaired girl folded her right fist into her left palm and bowed deeply, so that her hair brushed her bare toes. “I greet you, and I am honored by your greeting.” She straightened. “Please let all be well between us.”
Then, the ravenhaired girl frowned at the position of her hands. She folded her hands at her waist and bowed again.
The blonde giggled and then composed herself. “I am Elfine.”
The ravenhaired girl said, “I cannot say.”
The blonde pouted. “Did I do that wrong? Did I break another stupid rule? Let me try again! Ready?
The ravenhaired girl said, “No, I mean I don’t know.”
The other girl was not listening. “I’ll do it right this time! My family is Moth of the Ayre Moths of Ayre Sheading in Bride Parish! I am daughter of Iolanthe of Lurline, who is daughter of Ellyllon of Annwfm, who was shamefully outraged by Gwyn ap Nudd. My brother is Strephon, who was raised among mortals and married happily, whose children to this day my sisters protect. My father is Ayre Moth, who was banished to Troynovant with all his books when he won the nose from the face of Gwyn ap Nudd in a wager, his bride-price to Iolanthe’s dam.”
The ravenhaired girl merely stared in bewilderment.
The blonde continued in a rolling rush of words, “By slyness won he the game, using my cousin Arriety O’Clock as his queen, and moving her own moves, him merely resting his fingers on her and letting her draw his hand. She is a mistress of chess and once played Fynoderee of the Hairy Stockings to a stalemate and saved a town from drowning! To this day, the Nose of Nudd stands on my father’s mantelpiece, and from the snorts and wheezes, he knows the comings and goings of ghosts and other hidden things: and no storm can harm his house.”
The ravenhaired girl was impressed that the blonde did not seem to need to pause for breath.
The blonde continued. “The father of Ayre was Pururavas, son of Yla, child of Vaivasvata, and his mother was Urvashi the Golden, who was stolen from his side by the cunning of a celestial musician named Citraratha and an unfortunate flash of lightning! A similar curse parted my father and mother: an act of cruelty by Ethne the May Queen, Balor’s daughter of the Evil Eye, who despises that an elf should marry a mortal. So much melancholy has afflicted my family that my godmother, the Grail Maiden of Sarras, blessed me with the blessing that no melancholy would be left for me, and my blood is filled with sanguine and giddy humors. And so who are you?”
The ravenhaired girl drew a slow breath. “I have amnesia. There must have been an accident or something. The knowledge is gone from me. My folk and friends are lost. My life is lost. I am alone.” Her eyes stung with tears. She wiped her cheeks with the palm of her hand.
Elfine stepped forward and put her hands on the ravenhaired girl’s shoulders, peering up into the taller girl’s eyes. “Then it was good hap that you found me! I can seek what is lost and uncover evil!”
“How can you help?”
“First, I can get a name for you! What is Japanese for friend?”
“Ami.”
“Your name is Ami Nesia! Get it? Like in amnesia.”
“That’s kind of—silly.”
“Use it until I can find your old one.”
“You can? I mean, can you find it?”
The blonde stepped back and threw out her chest proudly. “I am a magical girl detective!” Then, her shoulders sank a bit. “More of a rookie, actually. And not much magic. I know the glamour to make things and people pretty. And talking to the wind. But I read about detective work in one of Daddy’s books, so I am hoping to train!”
And she spun in a circle, with her head thrown back.
The wind passed across the roof, and the ravenhaired girl shivered and hugged herself and said, “I am bruised and scraped and tired and cold and mostly naked, so if you want to help me, find me a place to stay, preferably with a change of clothes, a warm meal, and a hot bath.”
Elfine did a little caper with her slippered feet, so her pom-poms bounced. She winked and grinned and snapped her fingers. “I can put you up! Let’s away!”
5. Accommodations
The ravenhaired girl who was not really named Ami Nesia traveled down Park Avenue for at least a mile, leaping from rooftop to rooftop, with Elfine darting ahead out of sight and returning to urge her on periodically. Ami descended to the ground by sliding carefully down the side of the General Motors building and landed on East 58th.
A doll-sized Elfine flew up to her, swelled to normal size, and took Ami’s hand eagerly. “Here we are. ’Tis only a block hence!”
They went into a highrise. Elfine, pulling her by the wrist, crowded up behind a tall man in a cowboy hat who was at the door. Elfine waved at the doorman, who did not look up, but waved all three inside.
It was a titanic tower of glass. Inside was a vast open space of layered pink marble and yellow brass, reflected in walls paneled in mirrors. Escalators rose up endlessly, and a seven-story-tall indoor waterfall plunged endlessly down. They rode up two floors.
The upper lobby was a large, square space under a skylight, where a dozen upscale shops, closed for the evening, peered at the collection of sofas and potted plants.
A man in a uniform stopped them and pointed silently to a sign saying proper footwear was required. Elfine smiled at him and said, “She forgot her shoes! I was just going up to the room to get them! Can she wait here? I’ll be right back!” And Elfine pushed the ravenhaired girl into a sofa, saying, “Wait right there!”
The guard looked suspicious. Ami, feeling a little conspicuous dressed in nothing but an American flag, sat up straight, crossed her legs, smoothed back her mussed hair, and smiled at the guard. “You mustn’t mind my friend Elfine. She was attacked this evening near a club. She said I could sleep overnight on her couch.”
He said, “Guests are not allowed to go up unless escorted…” But at the moment, the radio on his shoulder squawked at him, telling of a broken window on an upper floor, so he said, “Excuse me,” and stepped away out of her sight.
Ami looked around, listening to the silence of the empty lobby. The elevator door in the mirrored brass wall opposite where she sat made a chime of noise and opened. Elfine leaned out and waved. “Over here!”
Ami walked over. “The guard said I had to be escorted.”
Elfine said, “I’ll escort you! Come on!”
Elfine pushed the button for the sixtieth floor. When the door opened, Ami saw a beige hallway with tasteful décor.
Elfine skipped down the hall. “Over here! This is the one!” She tugged on the handle and frowned. “Oopsie whoopsie! Guess what I forgot!”
Ami stepped over to the door, rubbing her feet in the carpet. The carpet was so thick that Ami paused a moment, luxuriating in the feel and the warmth of the plush fibers on her feet. She closed her eyes to enjoy the sensation. “What did you forget? Did you forget your key? Was it in your coat?” She opened her eyes when she heard no response.
Ami
looked left and right down the corridor. Elfine was not in sight.
The lock clicked, and the door opened. There was Elfine, who had gotten inside the suite somehow. In her hand was a candlestick with a lit candle. The blonde waved her hand in a large, slow arc. “Ta-DA! Come on in. I invite you over the threshold. May cure and comfort, rest and weal be thine while this roof covers ye!”
Ami stepped inside and was about to ask Elfine how she ended up on the inside of a locked door, but the sight and size and splendor of the suite of rooms distracted her.
Tall windows looked out over the panorama of the city. Central Park was spread below like a green carpet. The light from the windows and the buttery glow from Elfine’s candle shined on the polished surfaces of table and counter. There was a sunken area with chairs and chaise-lounge facing a wet bar. The kitchen was opposite the bedroom. Through an open door, Ami saw a walk-in closet that looked like something out of a department store, with special glass shelves to highlight the jewelry boxes and shoe racks. There was a separate room for a vast flat-screen television, a butler’s pantry, a foyer, a dining room with candlesticks on a wide table, and a smaller nook for breakfast.
Elfine was pouting. “You did it wrong!”
Ami gave her a puzzled look.
Elfine said, “Now you have to go outside and step over the threshold again. And when I bid you welcome, you have to call down a blessing on the house!”
Ami was not one to question the customs of her hostess. She obediently opened the door and stepped back. “What kind of blessing?”
“Slaynt Vie as Maynrys er y Thie shoh. It asks for good health and happiness on the house.”
Ami repeated the words, and bowed and said “Shitsurei itachimasu!”
“Well done and thrice welcome!” and now Elfine grabbed her arm. “You said you wanted a hot outfit, a hot bath, and a hot meal! Are you hungry? I can have the servants bring you some food. That’s how it works here.”
Ami said, “You mean room service? At this hour?”
Elfine nodded brightly. “And light comes out of these glass things. They are like lamps. They work on lightning, so don’t unscrew the glass and put your tongue in the socket. Never do that! Did you want a bath? Come here. Come here!” So saying, she tugged Ami into another room, floored in marble and paneled in mirrors, where a sunken hot tub gleamed. “The water is as warm as you like it! Use as much as you like! Do you want me to help you wash your hair?”
“No, that will not be necessary, but I thank you for the…”
But Elfine was not dissuaded, so somehow, not exactly against her will, Ami found herself luxuriating in the warmest and large tub she could imagine, with jets of bubbling water massaging her in from all directions, and with Elfine kneeling behind her, rubbing shampoo into her locks.
Elfine was chattering brightly about a family of foxes she had known on the Isle of Man and a lost cub she had helped rescue, and that led somehow into another story about the lonely cries she heard geese make in autumn, before their long journeys to far islands where Summer was rumored to reside when he departed northern lands.
“Some say the trumpet that calls Summer away is in the hands of the Hours, but Father says it is kept in a crystal closet above the stars. But from what beast could the Horn of Time be carved?”
That tale wandered into another about a penguin Elfine knew who kept the egg of his child on his feet all winter so that the child would not touch the ground and die of cold before birth while the wife went fishing and was absent for weeks at a time. “It was the season where night leads into night without dawn, and the wind came by to mock him, calling out woe! woe! And telling him that night and darkness always triumph, no matter what, for all strength fails. Isn’t that a horrible thing to say?”
Ami let this drench of words run over her without paying much attention. But then came a chime, and Elfine leaped up and ran into another room.
When she came back, she had both hands full of packages, boxes, and parcels, rustling with crepe paper. “Change of clothing! I remembered your wish! I got you some clothes and shoes! I had to guess at your size. I hope you like it! I know you probably need a red, white, and blue bulletproof bathing suit to go fight crime and stuff, but I don’t know where to get one of those. Also, no hat. I don’t know what you like in hats. Because I just met you.” She giggled and skipped out of the room. Through the open door, Ami could see her flinging open the parcels, and laying out a jacket, a blouse, and a skirt on the table along with a pair of dress shoes.
Ami rinsed and dried herself, wrapping herself in one towel and her hair in another. She looked over what Elfine had spread on the table and was a little taken aback. Elfine had very expensive tastes.
“Elfine, how can your family afford this?”
“Afford what?”
“What does your father do?”
“He thinks deep thoughts, does good deeds, and talks about old wars and lost kingdoms with his friends in the pub.”
“That’s all?”
“And he collects books, mostly.”
“Does he work?”
Elfine looked surprised. “I don’t know. I only spent this winter with him. Mother raised me. I told you my parents were forced apart. He is not allowed to see her.”
“So this is your mother’s apartment? What does she do?”
“My mother is very influential.”
“I mean, what does she do for a living?”
“Sheds influences. You know, she tells parliament when to sit, for one thing.”
“The parliament in England? She is in government?”
“Yes. She also organizes dances, allays curses, and receives petitions. Things like that. For a while she was in the same troop as Lulea of Burzee, but when Lulea exiled Nelebel to California, mother sought out Lurline of the Rhine, who is older and more powerful.”
“The Rhine in Germany? What? Is your mother some sort of royalty?”
Elfine said, “Oh, I know. I know. You are thinking the old families don’t have much influence any longer, what with how the world has changed! It is true. Nearly everything is decided at Troynovant, or Tir Ildathach, or Mommur, or Slievenamon. That is how it is back in the old country. America is different! Just look at how wonderful everything here is!” And she spread her hands and turned in a slow circle, as if to show off the lavish furnishings.
Then, she looked over her shoulder at Ami and winked. “Americans are richer than the Gnome King. Og of Glocca Morra says that the Americans grow their gold in Kentucky, which is why Fort Knox is placed there, but I say that is nonsense.” Elfine snapped her fingers, as if a bright thought had struck her. “Say! He lost his memory, too, or so I heard. The Gnome King, not Og. He lost his gold and his powers, got baptized, and married a mortal maiden. Og, not the Gnome King. He drank from the Fountain of the Water of Oblivion, which is mingled with the Mist of Everness. The Gnome King, not Og, I mean. Could that have been what happened to you? His name is Ruggedo the Red. The Gnome King never will marry anyone because he is in love with Polychrome, who is my…” Elfine screwed up her eyes and counted on her fingers. “…my first cousin once removed. Her mother, Iris of the Rainbow, is my great aunt.”
At that moment, the door chime came again, and food arrived. Ami stepped back into the bathroom to dry her hair using the blow drier she found there. But the smell of the food made her stomach rumble, and she realized how hungry she was, so she came out with her hair hanging limp and wet and black down her shoulders and back.
Elfine insisted it was proper to eat while wearing a towel, and in fact went into the bathroom, doffed her green outfit, and came out clad in nothing but a towel herself. “Now we are twins!”
It was a strange sort of courtesy, but Ami appreciated the gesture. The meal included a thick slice of salmon fried in butter and pepper on a bed of brown rice for Ami. Elfine sipped a few sips of tea and ate a spoonful of honey. Elfine also ate the mint leaf sprig used to garnish the teapot.
Fatigue c
ame as suddenly as hunger, and Ami found her eyes falling shut of their own accord before half the salmon was consumed. Elfine led her into the bedroom and tucked her in.
Elfine said, “I can step away if you are going to say your bedtime prayers! I’m allergic, you see. You didn’t say grace at the meal. Lucky for me.”
Ami said, “I’ve forgotten everything. What if I am Buddhist?”
“Then you ask Saint Jehoshaphat for help! Scootch over!”
Ami was a little surprised when Elfine, as unselfconsciously as a kitten, climbed in and snuggled up to her. Ami started to ask a question but yawned instead, and Elfine yawned back, and then they were both yawning while Elfine giggled merrily, whereupon both fell asleep so quickly it might have been a magic charm.
Chapter Three: The Three Worlds
1. Half and Half
It was past noon before the girls woke the next day. Upon seeing the unwashed dinner plates still on the table, Elfine went into the kitchenette and searched in puzzlement in the cabinets, in the microwave, and under the sink.
Ami said, “What are you looking for?”
“Cream! I forgot last night. I am always forgetting rules!”
Ami pulled open the refrigerator door. She pointed. “What about half and half?”
“I hate it when people call me that!”
“No, I mean this. Half milk and half cream. For coffee. Didn’t you buy it?”
“Nope. I hope it will do.”
Ami asked slowly, “If you have a roommate, where does she sleep? Does someone else use your refrigerator?”
“Anyone can use one of these! It keeps things cold by magic. It runs on lightning, like the lamps. Remember what I told you! Don’t they have them in Japan? A man is supposed to bring ice they cut from the lake in winter.” So saying Elfine poured some half and half into a saucer, opened the door, and set the saucer carefully on the carpet in the hall.
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