by Ponce, Jen
I held out my hand and formed a ball of magic there. Okay, it was more an amorphous blob, certainly not on par with Arsinua’s skill or my own daughter’s elegant little sphere. It was raw power, yanked straight from the Source of all the Slip’s magic, unfiltered, undistilled. Arsinua’s magic came from being born in Midia, where magic was as ubiquitous there as gravity was on Earth. The longer she stayed here, the more magic bled away from her. Except, perhaps, now that she lived with me, her magic was no longer bleeding away. Perhaps I was supplying her with it, the same way I was giving my children abilities. Well, child. Liam hadn’t said much. Did he have an ability he hadn’t talked about?
“Do you think it came from me, or their time in Midia?”
She was going to shrug again. Seeing my gaze, she refrained, but didn’t offer any answers.
“What’s Midia?”
Liam answered. “That place they took us to. The place with the body parts on tables and that creepy chick with the purple hair who kept feeling our arms and measuring our heads.”
Ah yes. The woman who told me she’d been in line for one of my kids’ heads. I’d killed her in my battle with Ravana and so far I hadn’t had any regrets about that death. “Listen, there’s a lot to talk about and I’m hungry. Can we go fix dinner and talk while we eat?”
“What are we having?”
“How about pigs in a blanket, and some veggies and fruit?”
“Pigs in a blanket?” Arsinua made a face.
“Oh, you’ll like it. They aren’t actual pigs. You use hotdogs.” Bethy grabbed her hand and dragged her into the kitchen. I stayed behind with Liam, who was staring at his phone, his thumb working the screen.
“You okay?”
He nodded.
I sat on the arm of the couch, and looked over his shoulder. A picture of a man with a mouth in his belly looked back at me. “He’s ugly.”
“Yeah. Look at this one.” He scrolled down for a bit, then held up his phone to show me a giraffe sticking out its tongue. “Dad would like it.”
“He did have an unhealthy obsession with giraffes, didn’t he?”
Liam chuckled. “Yeah. Like those socks? And that tie he wore, then forgot he had on when he met with his boss?”
I smiled. Tom had been so mortified. Then, the next day his boss gave him a framed giraffe print and a raise. None of us thought the raise was from Tom’s tie, not really, but that was the story from then on. “Come on, we’d better get in there before they make the pigs all wrong and put cheese in all of them or something.”
“Ew.”
“I know.”
He got up and slipped his phone into his pocket. “There’s a lot to this, isn’t there? I mean, it’s not just about Dad and stuff. Arsinua and Jasper are part of it, aren’t they?”
Wow. Even though I knew my kids were smart, they never ceased to amaze me about how savvy they were. “Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell us?”
“It’s a long story. Seriously, a long story. And through it all, all I could think about was keeping you guys safe. And safety, to me, was keeping it from you. I didn’t even understand it, how could I then explain it to you?”
He nodded. Stared at his toes. “It’s going to change everything, isn’t it?”
“It already has.”
When the hotdogs were baking, we sat around the counter and ate from the vegetable tray I’d picked up that weekend. The kids seemed to eat more vegetables when they could get them themselves and eat when they felt like it.
“Are they going to come back? The people who killed Dad?” This from Liam, who was drawing in his ranch dressing with his broccoli. “That’s where you went before Christmas, wasn’t it? To find them?”
How much should I tell them? How much did they need to know? I was tempted to lay it all out for them, but I was worried it would scar them, or tempt them to try to avenge their father. “Yes and no. I went to take care of other things that were becoming threats, but I didn’t get to them directly.” Kroshtuka and the Meat Clan had been working to end the slave trade in Midia and between worlds. They’d had more success with stopping the Theleoni than I had, but we both worried that they had only truly succeeded in driving them more underground. There were hooks everywhere. The rogue witches used the one close to them because it was convenient but who was to say they couldn’t just pick up operations somewhere else? Yeah, it wouldn’t be an immediate threat to me and my own anymore but they were still taking people and letting them die so they could cut them up and use them. That was just wrong.
“So the lady who killed Daddy is still out there?” Bethy’s voice wobbled, and I knew she was feeling scared, because she called Tom Daddy instead of Dad.
“Yes. But I have friends working on finding her.” Liam looked impressed, and I lectured myself that it wasn’t good my kid was approving of my bloodthirsty nature. “It’s complicated. And I’ll tell you guys what’s going on because I think you should know, and because knowing will hopefully make you careful and keep you safe.”
“Maybe I don’t want to know,” Bethany said.
“Maybe you don’t, but I do, so shut up.”
“Liam, seriously. Stop it. You too have been at each other’s throats all week. What’s up with that?”
Liam shrugged. Bethy’s lip edged outward into a pout. She said, “He keeps having nightmares.”
He hit her on the arm and I stood, stepping between them. To my son, I said, “Tell your sister sorry and give me your phone. You’re banned for a week from electronics of all kinds.”
He slapped his phone in my hand and rose with a screech of the barstool on the linoleum.
“I didn’t say you could leave.”
“Yeah well, maybe I am anyway.”
“Two weeks.”
He kept walking but stopped when I upped it to three weeks. His shoulders were hunched up by his ears, and anger radiated from him. “She said she wouldn’t say anything.”
“I’m sorry.” Bethy’s voice wobbled. “I was worried. You didn’t have to hit me.”
For a moment my son trembled, his entire body taut. Then the anger drained from him and he sagged against the door jamb. “I can’t sleep. And when I do I see crazy shit.”
I bit my lips to keep from correcting his language. Lord knew I used enough of it myself. Deep breath. “What kind of crazy things?”
He stared hard at the baseboard as if hoping the answer was written there. Something easy for him to say. “It’s a group of people. Like carnies from the movies. Or gypsies. You know, traveling in wagons? Bright colors. Strange pictures on the sides. One of wagons was green, and had shiny scales on it, and a picture of a mermaid. Except, the mermaid had teeth.” He blushed, and I knew, just knew he was talking about Quorra. When I met her, she’d been walking around topless, and her boobs were unforgettable. I looked away before he could see the inappropriate and highly out-of-place grin that threatened to undo the conversation.
When I’d gotten myself under control, I said, “And what else?”
A shoulder rose and dropped. “I don’t know.”
“Tell her about the girl.” At Liam’s glare, Bethy stuck out her tongue. “What? You going to hit me again?”
“What girl?” I asked, though I knew that too.
“Just a girl. Her name is Sharps. We talk.” He looked agonized, as if I were threatening him with death if he didn’t say more. “I mean, I know it’s just a dream but we talk. She feels real.”
Another deep breath. Should I tell him she was real? That I had met her? That she’d saved me and I owed her one? That her awful brother had stolen her away before I could get her safe? But of course, my son read the expressions on my face.
He straightened away from the door. “She’s real? And the ... the mermaid too?”
Shit, shit, shit. And more shit. “Yeah.”
The look on his face was one of pure delight and terror, all mixed into a worrisome stew. “She needs help.”
I knew that. Her brother w
as a psychopath and, if I wasn’t mistaken, a child molester.
“No, seriously, Mom. She’s in trouble. Last night we were talking, and suddenly this booming voice started screaming at us. It ripped everything to shreds, and the last I saw of her, she was wrapped in black tentacle thingies. They dragged her away.”
***
I pulled Liam into the living room with me, and away from Arsinua and Bethy. Once we were seated on the couch together, I asked, “Did you see it? Any idea what it looked like?”
“No. I told you it was a voice.” Liam tipped his head. “You know what I’m talking about.” A statement, not a question.
“Yes. That thing visited my Dream too.” And hurt someone I was coming to care about. “Wow. A lot to take in, isn’t it?”
He didn’t answer right away. He grabbed a couch pillow and tossed it into the air, caught and tossed. Each time it went a little higher, a little bit closer to the ceiling fan. I opened my mouth to ask him to stop when he said, “Another world. Mom.” His eyes were shining.
I smiled despite my worry. “Yeah. I guess our stories were true.”
“Except there aren’t aliens.”
I thought of Nex and his pale head and hanging intestines. “Er. There might be things that would qualify as alien.”
He studied the pillow, tracing a finger over the design on the front. “We can’t go there, though, right? Cause we’ll die.”
“Well,” I said, then shut myself up. Of course, he heard it.
“What?” He sat up. “What, Mom?”
I sighed. “There are berries you can eat. I’ve heard they keep you from dying. Seriously, kid, the place is dangerous.”
“Mom. Omaha is dangerous.”
I nudged him with my toe. “Omaha doesn’t have four foot tall spiders and fleshcrawlers with mouths full of teeth and people who think it’s okay to grab humans and let them die, then cut them into pieces.” I bit down on my tongue. Too much info, Dev. Way to be a good mom.
“John Wayne Gacy. BTK. Manson. We have crazy people here, too.” He sat forward. “I thought it was impossible for spiders to get that big. Gravity keeps them small and the oxygen levels.”
“Midia is run on a whole other set of laws. And yeah, they are that big.”
Most magnificent creatures on Midia.
‘Yeah, yeah,’ I said to my own inner giant spider. ‘You’re kick-ass.’
Yes. Kick ass, Neutria said, drawing out the words as if tasting them.
“You okay?”
I blinked. “Yep.” Not telling him about Neutria. Not yet, anyway. Despite his blasé attitude about the whole thing, I worried it would catch up to him all at once and knock him over. “We all need to have a conversation about how to keep each other safe.”
He rolled his eyes, but whatever he was going to say was cut off by a knock on the door. I tensed. Every time I had a knock on the door, someone was standing on the other side who would get me into more shit. I wasn’t sure it was a good idea to answer it, but Arsinua was already down the hall.
“It’s an older man,” she said, then gasped. “I don’t believe it.”
“Who is it?”
She stood away from the door, her face ashen. Her mouth moved but nothing came out. I peered through the peephole, expecting monsters.
“Dad!” I shot a look of, ‘Are you crazy?’ at Arsinua and then swung open the door.
Dad spent most of his days in the mountains of Colorado. I didn’t know if he fancied himself Grizzly Adams or Bear Grylls or he was just a guy who liked to be alone in nature. Either way, I let him yank me into a bear hug that made the breath whoosh out of me.
“What are you doing here?” I grabbed his duffle as he came in, dropping it against the wall before I shut the door. I locked the door and set the alarm out of habit.
“I gotta have a reason to visit you, do I? Maybe I came for the grandbabies.”
I snorted. “They aren’t babies anymore, Dad.” I tucked a stray piece of hair behind my ear. “Dad, this is my friend, Arsinua. Arsinua, this is my Dad, Morgan Fletcher.”
She clutched her hands together, as if holding herself back from touching my dad’s face to see if he were real. My dad kept his smile in place though I could see he was a bit perplexed by her reaction. Finally she shook his hand and when she did, her face cleared. “Nice to meet you.”
I stared between the both of them, unsure what I missed.
Arsinua smiled brightly at me. “I’ll let you two catch up.” She left before I had a chance to ask her what the hell was going on.
Dad’s whiskers had grown to Santa Claus proportions and he tipped his head back to itch at his hairy neck.
“Hey Grandpa,” Liam said. “How long do you get to stay?”
“Meh. A week maybe. Can’t turn down a chance to see my kids all in one place.” He hooked an arm around me and squeezed. “I’m sorry I didn’t make it to your Dad’s funeral,” he told Liam.
My son nodded. “It’s okay.”
“Can I get something cold? It’s fricking humid here. Don’t know how you stand it.” He nudged the duffel across the floor to Liam, who picked it up with a grunt.
“Take it to the guest room,” I told him as I guided Dad into the kitchen. Arsinua was already fixing a tray of bite sized sandwiches and had a pitcher of lemonade on the counter, ice cubes bobbing in its pink depths. “You didn’t have to—”
“Please, sit,” she said to my father, her eyes pinned to his face like one of the pope’s biggest fans.
“Thank you.” My dad’s eyes slid to me and in a flash I knew what he was thinking.
I sighed.
“So. How long have you and my daughter been together?” He reached for the pitcher but Arsinua got there first, pouring the drink into a glass for him. He thanked her again.
“Several months now,” said Arsinua, clueless and still making ‘I adore you’ eyes at my dad.
“Arsinua.” She ignored me. I said her name twice more before she deigned to grace me with a glance. “He thinks we’re a couple.”
“A couple of what?” Arsinua pushed a plate toward him.
“You mean, you aren’t?” Dad grabbed a sandwich bite and popped it in his mouth.
“She and Travis are dating.” I grabbed a sandwich off my dad’s plate, since it looked like Arsinua meant them only for him and I was hungry. “What is wrong with you?”
“She’s just being friendly,” my dad said around his snack.
“He looks just like Bran the Forsworn.”
A grin blossomed on Dad’s face. “Now that sounds rather adventurous.” He puffed out his chest. “For I am Bran the Forsworn, conquerer of the ages.”
I was saved from more drama by Bethy. She squealed when she saw Dad.
There was much hugging and I love yous, then Bethy turned to me. “Can I go over to Lissa’s? Please?”
“Have your phone?”
She patted her front jean’s pocket. “Check.”
“Ok. Be back by seven.”
She one-arm hugged me. “Thanks Mom!” And out the door she went. I watched out the kitchen window until I saw her disappear into Lissa’s house, then turned back to the action at the counter.
Arsinua was frowning. “Perhaps. But it’s just a remarkable resemblance.”
“What did this Bran do? Not too often modern people get stuck with such grandiose names.” He’d cleaned his plate and had somehow convinced Arsinua to make him another sandwich. She was slathering mayo on a slice of bread as she spoke.
“He was a Council member, keeper of the Omphalos, and Great Ward of the North. He saved our cities from the incursion of the Wilds more times than any of us kept track of, and he held more magic in his hand, than I have access to in my entire body.”
“Uh. Arsinua?”
Dad shushed me, his eyes gleaming. He always did love a story. I didn’t know what Arsinua was thinking, telling him about magic and her world. I hoped he’d buy that she was pulling his leg, or things could get we
ird. I had enough on my hands with my children and the runaway magic. I didn’t need a curious parent digging into the business.
She looked down at the knife and bread in her hands, and her face flushed red. “Oh.” Her startled gaze flew to mine, eyes wide.
“Well go on,” my father urged. “What then?”
She licked her lips and swiped at the bread, though her movements were jerky. “He fell in love with a Wydling woman. It was forbidden, considered by many to be a challenge to the Council itself. He was tried and sentenced to death, he and his bride. They fled into the Wilds before the sentence could be carried out.” Her teeth sunk into her bottom lip as she laid the bread on a plate and piled slices of ruby red tomatoes and gleaming onion before adding ham and roast beef. “They sent mercenaries after them and those mercs always came back, drained and defeated. Eventually, the Council declared him dead and his name was wiped from existence.” She laid the last slice of bread on top of the stacked cold cuts. Silence stretched.
Dad drummed his fingers on the counter. When Arsinua stayed silent, he prompted, “Well?”
She blinked. “Well?”
“That can’t be the end of it.”
She stared at him, the mayo covered knife in her hand forgotten. “Well, it is.”
Dad slapped a hand on the countertop. “If that were true, how would people know about him? His name was wiped from existence. Okay. Then how do people pass on the stories about him? Listen, I may be an old guy but if I’m going to be mistaken for some cool dude in a story, I don’t want it to be a crappy story.”
“Dad, she doesn’t know you very well. She might think you’re serious.”
“I am serious.” He leaned in and tapped a finger on the counter. “Why is he important?”
A glance at me, a shoulder shrug. “Some of us hold him up as a hero. He was the first witch to suggest that our control over the magic would destroy us and he fought for change. He predicted that people would get desperate and would start stealing humans for power. He was right about many things.” She cut the sandwich into half and slid the plate to him, a tentative smile on her face. “Anyway, that’s just a story.”
Dad spun the plate around a few times until he found the perfect side to his sandwich, I guess, then picked it up. “‘The Council tried to wipe the name of Bran the Forsworn from the minds of the people, but Bran’s legacy would never die. His memory kept the small flame of hope alive in the breasts of a few rebels who would not accept the status quo.’”