It wasn’t an exaggeration, either, or one of those things that romance novelists said. The man wasn’t very tall. Probably just on six feet. His shoulders weren’t massive, though they were decently straight and square. And his body wasn’t muscle-bound, rather long and lank, like the statue of a renaissance shepherd.
The face, on the other hand, was aristocratic – longer than it was broad, with an aquiline nose, well-shaped mouth, and broad soft eyes like brown suede, all of it framed in golden brown curls and a neatly shaped golden brown beard.
He wore jeans and a sweat shirt and looked like a college student who had accidentally wandered in to ask for directions or to see if he could use the restroom. But even though the sweatshirt read, in garishly golden letters “Magicians do it enchantingly” he wore the broad platinum ring of a magus major. Which meant he was the sort of magician kings and presidents hired. And more than wealthy enough to buy the whole store, if he wished, the room at the back included.
Ausenda dropped her book. “How...” she found her voice failing and called herself several kinds of stupid, even as she coughed to clear her throat and tried again, “How may I help you?”
He smiled widely. “I’ve come... in search of the fire in the heart.”
She knew what the words meant. It was just the first of the long sequence that a shopper had to go through to gain admittance to the little door behind Ausenda. And yet, the words themselves made her jump a little, and she told herself she was a fool and a total idiot. Fortunately, she was fairly sure her expression hadn’t changed at all. She shook her head slightly and said “I’m sorry. Not today. My father isn’t here.”
He came closer. She could smell his scent – pine with a hint of something spicy. “Why do you need your father?” he asked. “Can’t you scan me yourself?” and he smiled, showing very even teeth.
Ausenda shook her head regretfully. “No magical power at all, you see. I’m just a mortal.”
“Ah,” he said, as though doubting it. “But you’re a Cuorefueco, aren’t you?”
She shrugged. “Just a throw back,” she said. “It happens.” And then, defiantly, as though it helped explain everything, “I’m studying to be an accountant.”
“Ah,” he said again, and for a moment stood there, smiling at her, as though expecting her to give him the punch line to a joke he couldn’t quite get.
But Ausenda could not explain it any better than she had, and she wasn’t about to try. She’d heard the question many times, in many forms, since she was six, when her grandmother had despaired of finding any talent in her and had given up on teaching her. And there was no explanation for it. Yes, she was a Cuorefueco, and her mother came from one of the oldest lines of witches in Italy as well. Her ancestresses had foretold the future to Caesar himself.
And yet Ausenda, neat and small and not bad to look at, was perfectly normal. A perfectly common girl born of a magical family. And the problem of it was that no normal man would marry her. Her family would scare her. And no sorcerer would have her – or rather they would, for the name and the business, but she knew they’d always see her as handicapped and she didn’t want to be pitied by the man she married.
“Well, my best wishes, then, signorina, for your accounting career,” the brown haired man said, and bowed a little, in an old fashioned, courtly gesture.
The door chime tinkled, and he was gone.
Ausenda looked at her book and frowned, wondering why he’d smiled so teasingly as he left. Perhaps he still thought her lack of power was a joke.
***
“Gone, Ausenda. The Heartbeat ruby is gone. Who did you let in, luckless girl?”
Father in a temper was not easy to take. He was a small man and as self-contained looking as Ausenda herself. In his dark, well cut suit, he looked like a diplomat or a chief executive. Not someone who should stand there, hands clasped to his distinguished graying hair, face flushed with panic. “Who did you let in?”
“To that room?” Ausenda asked, putting her book away and picking up her purse. “No one, Father.”
“Someone you must have let in. The Heartbeat ruby is gone. Who was here? Who came? What customers?”
“No one,” Ausenda said, then remembered the smiling man, with the brown curls. “Well, someone came in, but only one person, and he wasn’t a customer.”
Her words so managed to surprise her father that he was quiet for just a moment, and into that quiet, she said, “At least, he couldn’t be, because he wanted into the small room and I told him I didn’t have the authority to open it.”
“And yet you must have opened it, Ausenda,” Father said.
She knew that was true. Only a family member could open that lock. But she also knew she hadn’t. “But I didn’t, Father.”
“Did you let yourself be mesmerized? Did you open it while hypnotized?”
“No father. I didn’t look at his eyes long enough for that, and I didn’t stare at any jewel for him, and he didn’t give me anything to read or...” She stopped and faltered.
Her father sighed. “You were reading your trashy romances again, weren’t you?”
“Yes, but–”
“Did you buy it used?”
“Yes, but–” She said, reaching for her purse.
Before she could get it, her father had, and he’d pulled out the battered little paperback. He dropped it just as quickly on the floor, and stepped on it. “It’s dripping with mesmerizing magic, Ausenda.”
“I’m sorry... I couldn’t... I can’t see it.”
‘Yes, but you brought it into the shop. When you know you can’t see. This was a planned theft. Organized.”
Ausenda thought of the man’s teasing smile. An outlaw? A rogue magician? A thief? She couldn’t believe any of those. But then, no one was asking her to believe. The facts spoke for themselves.
“Well... I’m sorry. Was it worth... much?”
Her father looked at her as if she’d wounded him mortally. “It’s not how much it is worth,” he said, falling into a chair behind the counter and putting his face in his hands. “It’s charmed jewelry, Ausenda. Charms are stupid. They tend to be very literal. The average witch, the way she’d spell jewelry... well... spell it for wealth and the poor buyer would end up suffocating under paper money while the armored car passing through is emptied. But your mother... your mother doesn’t spell things that way. Her charms are still flexible, but they work. They work well. Her charms in the hand of a dishonest man...”
Ausenda might not be a witch, but she had enough imagination to picture that. Her hair stood on end. “What was Heartbeat spelled to do?”
Her father shook his head. “I don’t know. Your mother did it just last night, before she fell ill. It’s a large ruby, shaped like a heart and set as a pendant on a chain. I don’t know what she meant it for. Could be for anything. Healing illness of the heart or... anything.”
What healed heart defects could also cause them. “Can you call the police?” Ausenda asked. “Or... the arcane detectives? Can you?”
But her father looked up, his eyes burning dark, “What good would it do us if he’s a sorcerer and he covered his tracks. You must find him, Ausenda. You’re the only one who saw him. It’s next to impossible, but since you saw him and had contact with him, you might be able to follow his power.”
Ausenda nodded. “Right. I’ll got a fortune teller and I–”
“No,” her father yelled. “No fortune teller. You must do all the arcane work yourself. Half of these witches, around here, are onto something shady. You must do the search yourself.”
“But father, I have no power.”
“I don’t really care, girl. You lost the jewel and you must find it. Think of what that man might do with it.”
***
Ausenda stood, outside the shop, the cold wind biting through her grey wool skirt suit. There had to be a way. There had to be something she could do. Her father said she couldn’t go to a fortune teller. And that was true. An
d she didn’t have magic – oh, her grandmother had been furious at her and said she had magic and was hiding it, but that was just because grandma refused to admit any of her descendants might be born without magic.
But there were things, after all, that even normal housewives did. Magic so simple even the normal could do it. What she needed was a junk shop. One of those places that sold tarot cards and tea leaves and what not to those completely devoid of power.
***
Minutes later, she was sitting in her small studio apartment looking at the tea leaves at the bottom of the cup, while she looked up in the small book she had bought, which showed her the configurations of the leaves and what they meant.
She swirled the three tablespoons of liquid left in the cup around, and frowned at the results.
There were the oval shapes that she knew meant love, but what could that have to do with the situation at hand, she didn’t know. And besides she felt as if the tea leaves were being snide. She’d liked him very much, but it was far from love, and if he was a crook...
She swirled the tea again, and wondered where the man was and who he was. This time, the shapes that came up were what her grandmother had called airplanes. A little cross with the side arms a little bent. The man had either traveled recently or was about to travel. Both could be true. Perhaps he was hastening home to give a heart attack to his rich uncle. Perhaps... But let’s assume no. Let’s assume he had traveled here. That made sense, at least if he really was a magus major. She had never seen him before, and magicians of that rank. were known – and respected – in the region where they lived. Which of course made one ask how he could be a crook. But then again, who could explain the quirks of men. She thought of his smile. He might very well be in it for the adventure. He seemed the type. Right.
For now she’d assume that ring was real. And she’d assume he was in town for a short time, maybe just to steal the ruby.
Her school friend, Jack, worked for the arcane crimes lab unit at the police department. She couldn’t tell him the ruby was missing – well, at least if she didn’t feel like being skinned alive by her father. But she could – and would – ask him about any new magus major in town. People above a certain level of power always registered with the police, in case their power caused disturbances on magically operated machinery.
She got him with the first ring of his private number. His rough, low voice calmed her some. They’d been friends since elementary school and if Jack hadn’t been snagged by a first class witch in the last year of high school, Ausenda would have taken him, difference in power or not. “Jack, it’s Ausenda. Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Just a question. Is there a new magus major in town?”
“Why? Is mama trying to bring someone over for dinner again?”
Ausenda opened her mouth to protest, closed it, put on her most bored, petulant tone, “She says he’s aunt Maria’s first husband’s sister’s grandson and that he’s a magus major, but I don’t even know his name or if he’s single, or...”
Jack chuckled. “They’re never going to give you an out till you marry, you know? You should have married me while you could.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she said. “Missed my chance. How is Erin?”
“Fine. And the twins, they’re so big. And starting to talk. Just yesterday, little Tristan– ”
Ausenda listened for a moment to the adventures of Jack’s twins whom the proud father called the redheaded monsters. When she could get a word in edgewise without offending him mortally, she said, “So, the magus.”
“Ah, him... His name is Zeus. Zeus Olympius. Don’t laugh. Nice Greek family up New York way, and the parents clearly had a sense of humor.”
“Okay... and what does he specialize in?”
“Ah... well, that might be why your mom has an interest. He works for the government. Spelling currency.”
“Why would my mother have an interest in that?” Ausenda asked, even as she wrinkled her brow, wondering why someone who worked for the treasury department would need to steal a ruby.
“He makes it so that the currency can’t be copied or counterfeited or altered. From there to spelling charms...”
Yeah, it was a step, and the question remained why he would need to get a jewel spelled by someone else. Unless, of course, he wanted to commit a crime with it and didn’t want the magic traced back to himself.
She must find him without delay.
***
Sometimes the best magic was no magic at all. Ausenda had spent half an hour on the phone calling the best hotels in Chicago. He might be under an assumed name, but being a magus major might make that difficult. There were only a couple dozen of them, nationwide. The ring couldn’t be removed, though it could be spelled invisible. But their power couldn’t be hidden or damped. And there was a whole protocol they had to follow, while traveling, to avoid causing greater trouble. So chances were he was lodging under his very distinctive name.
The bet paid off. At the seventh hotel, the famed Four Seasons she struck gold. Mr. Zeus Olympius was indeed renting a room there, but he had absented himself for a few moments. Would Miss like to leave a message?
Sure. Miss would like to tell the dirty stinky rat to give her back her father’s ruby. But she couldn’t do that. So she declined politely and hung up.
Now, she must go see him at the hotel. Chances were that he wouldn’t want anything to do with her. That was too bad, as she couldn’t hope to fool a magus major. No one could. However, if she could come to his room unannounced, before he could do a foreseeing. Of course no hotel employee was going to let an unknown woman climb to the room of a man without calling him. And no one would give her a key. Unless...
Well... there were kits at the junk shop. For simple glamouries and enchantments and even mesmerization. She went back.
***
“As you see,” she told the slim, young hotel employee who looked, dazedly, down at the spelled note she’d put in his hand. “Mr. Zeus Olympius asked that you give me a key, so I can meet him for a very... confidential reason.”
She batted her eyelashes a little, letting the hotel employee think it was a special meeting of that kind. Maybe it would stop him from thinking twice about the mechanics of the whole thing. That is, if the note worked at all. With junk shop kits, you never knew.
But the young man flushed and nodded and swallowed hard. He was maybe all of nineteen, and clearly intimidated at the thought of aiding in a clandestine affair. Or perhaps only of aiding in a magus major’s clandestine affair. He went to the counter and gave her the key, eyes averted. She took advantage of his embarrassment to grab the note and stuff it in her pocket. It had done its job, and really she didn’t want someone finding it, and its random combination of letters and asking the young man why he’d thought it said to give the strange lady a key.
It was a generic mesmeric note, copied from the kit. The boy had simply read the words she’d told him to read.
With the note in her pocket, she crossed the brown and gold marble atrium rapidly, and headed up the broad staircase. The room, the employee had mumbled, was on the third floor. The elevator would be quicker, but an elevator was all too easy for a magus to jam.
Up and up and up, past opulent gold-leafing, across miles of Persian carpet and down the corridor to room 333. She held her breath a little till the key worked, then went in.
For just a moment, she was breathless at the room itself, all brocade and ornate furniture. It had something of the regal about it.
What it didn’t have was any of Zeus’ personal belongings. No suitcase, no clothes. She looked, even in the closet. Nothing. The rat had flown the trap.
Sure she had lost him forever, she looked again, carefully. He couldn’t have taken everything. He had to have left her behind some clue or something.
She found it when she’d almost despaired of it, hidden almost completely beneath the rich red dust ruffle. A handkerchief. Fine lawn, elegantly monogrammed ZO.
As she picked it up i
n her hand, an image formed in the air, above the bed. It was Zeus, grinning – that infuriating grin. The words Catch me if you can formed in her mind.
For a moment, she was frozen in white-hot fury. He was taunting her.
***
She was no witch. Her grandmother had once told her she had as much magical sensitivity as a coal bucket. But if there was one thing Ausenda wasn’t ready to do was let anyone mock her.
This handkerchief was supposed to give a real witch a clue of where the man had gone. Magus majors couldn’t help it. Their power was so great they left a mile-wide trail. But she was not a witch. And yet, she’d used those kits, and she’d found most of what she really, really needed to do was concentrate. Perhaps she only had vestigial power, but she could concentrate like nobody’s business.
She sat, clutching the handkerchief and concentrating. After a long, long time, a picture of the Sears’ tower sky deck formed in her mind. Was it just wishful thinking or had he really gone there?
Well... did it matter? If he hadn’t, she’d lost the trail anyway. She stuck the handkerchief in her purse, closed it, took the elevator down – if he stopped her doing that, at least she’d know where he was and what he was up to.
But the elevator went all the way to the lobby without disturbance, and, deciding that the occasion justified the expense, she hailed a cab to the Loop.
***
She got out in front of the soaring golden tower, ran into the lobby, bought a ticket to the sky deck and took the levitating elevators up. All the while a little voice in her head told her she was a fool and was going only on an hunch and power she didn’t have.
The elevators went up very fast. They were known for slamming all the way into the Sky Deck. The sky deck was one of the attractions of Chicago, and normally in May, at sunset, it would be crowded with families and cuddling couples. This time there was only one person there. His back was turned, as he stood by the railing, looking out over the city.
The wind ruffled his brown curls.
“Thief,” Ausenda said, under her breath. She hadn’t meant to speak. The truth was, the word that had escaped her lips was the end of a thought that went How can he be no more than a common a thief?
Here Be Dragons: A collection of short stories Page 19