Mind Magic

by Eileen Wilks

  “The government Big People would come. They can make trouble for us.”

  “They won’t even find you unless you allow it.”

  This time it was Lily’s eyes that widened. Did Rule mean that dul-dul could be extended over the entire reservation?

  Gandalf shook her head dolefully. “Such a thing would take much power. It would also interfere with the tourists. Tourists bring money, and feeding your people would be expensive.”

  “It may be possible to reimburse some portion of your expenses.”

  Negotiations were clearly open. This might take a while. Lily leaned close to whisper, “I’m going to see if Danny will have a chat with me.”

  He turned to look at her, his face very close. “All right, but we need to talk.”

  “But not now, I think. Or with so many people around.”

  THIRTY-FIVE

  IT wasn’t that simple, of course. First Lily had to find out where the brownies were putting them for the night. The public area had a couple human-size buildings for the tourists, but it was some distance away—and not part of the thou-shalt-not-enter zone. Everything in or near the village was way too small for humans . . . with one exception.

  They’d be spending the night with the horses in their big stone barn.

  It wasn’t easy getting away without a couple dozen brownies eager to help them make their beds from the available supplies—straw and horse blankets they could lay in empty stalls—but Lily insisted that she needed something to do. That resonated. She’d thought it might.

  Getting Danny to come along was easy. She slipped her backpack on, ready to go see the horses the moment Lily suggested it. But first Rule had to place Danny officially in Lily’s charge so Mike didn’t hobble along with them. Then Lily had to turn down the mob guy’s offer to help. Little John didn’t offer; maybe Rule had given him a cue, or maybe he didn’t want to move. He’d done a lot of moving today.

  She and Danny had company anyway—pint-size company in the person of Dirty Harry to guide them, plus four-legged company. Lily had thought Charles was sound asleep. If so, he sure woke up fast when she started to walk away. Invisible company, too. Mika kept checking on her, making sure she didn’t go far. She was glad the dragon didn’t try to mindspeak her. Her headache had finally gone away.

  The barn wasn’t far, she was told—just outside the village on the edge of a meadow. Brownies might prefer trees to a clearing for their own homes, but they knew horses needed space.

  Not surprisingly, Danny wanted to talk about horses. Dirty Harry obliged, which was just as well since Lily had nothing to contribute on the subject. Harry’s chatter did make an interesting addition to her growing collection of weird-things-brownies-say-and-do. They did not imprison their horses—“imprison” was Harry’s word—so neither the barn nor the stalls had doors. Nor were there any corrals. Sometimes the horses performed weighty tasks like moving boulders, but mostly they acted as brownie buses. Currying the horses was a coveted job. Lily couldn’t figure out how the task was assigned—Harry’s explanation employed a lot of brownie logic—but some kind of point system seemed to be involved.

  Danny was disappointed when they arrived. Of the two dozen stalls, only four were occupied. Most of the herd slept elsewhere when the weather was good, Harry explained, though they’d show up in the morning for breakfast and grooming. They loved to be groomed almost as much as the brownies loved to groom them.

  Harry introduced them—including Charles—to the four horses, who were amazingly calm about meeting a wolf. He told them to take their pick of the empty stalls, which looked surprisingly clean, Lily noted with relief. She’d had some qualms. Superior as these horses might be, she doubted they were housebroken. Charles lay down to finish his nap, and Harry showed them where the blankets were kept and demonstrated the pump where they could get water for drinking or washing. Someone had already tossed down a pile of straw bales that were about half the size Lily vaguely imagined normal bales would be.

  “Use as much of it as you need,” Harry said. “Oh—I forgot to find out what the password is this week. I’ll have to find out and tell you later. I’ve been gone, and we change it every week.”

  Danny’s eyes glowed. “You mean for Wi-Fi? You’ve got Wi-Fi?”

  Harry snorted. “You’ve heard of brownie cams?”

  Everyone knew about the brownie cams. Brownies.com was one of the most popular sites on the Internet. “Those are in the public area,” Lily said. “We didn’t know you had it here, too.”

  “We’ve got Wi-Fi everywhere. This is the twenty-first century, you know.”

  They had Wi-Fi everywhere but not electricity, and they pumped their water by hand. Brownie logic strikes again. Lily thanked Harry and sent him away. Firmly. You had to be firm with brownies.

  When she turned back to her witness, Danny was petting the nose of one of the big Shire horses. The horse was a lot taller than Danny. It had a coat the color of a stormy sky and long bangs. Danny’s back was half turned to Lily and her shoulders were slightly hunched. Tense.

  “You seem to be good with horses,” Lily said. “Have you been around them much?”

  Danny shook her head. “We didn’t have horses at the Refuge. I didn’t know I liked them until now, but I do. A lot.” She sighed. “If it weren’t for all the terrible things that keep happening, this would be a wonderful adventure.”

  “Adventures tend to be messy that way.” Lily headed for the pile of straw bales. “Lots of discomfort, moments of amazement, and the occasional stretch of sheer terror. Would you like to give me a hand with this?”

  “No, thank you,” Danny said politely, then, “Oh. Was that a real question or a request for assistance?”

  “I’d like some help.”

  “Okay.” Danny joined her. “How do we undo them? Those knots look pretty tight.”

  “I’ve got a pocket knife.” She had all her stuff again, which was a great relief. She couldn’t use her phone, but at least she had it. “We should probably put them where they’re going first so we can use the twine to carry them.” She picked up two of the bales, one in each hand. Maybe twenty pounds apiece, she thought. That was a heavy load for a brownie.

  “That makes sense.” Danny followed suit with another two bales. “Why did you say that about adventures? The terror part, I mean. You don’t get terrified.”

  Lily snorted. “Human being here. I’m real familiar with terror.” She dumped her bales in one of the empty stalls.

  “But you don’t panic or freak out or freeze up. You’re a hero. If you do feel terror”—she sounded skeptical on that point—“you must be really good at mastering it.”

  “The thing about terror is that it’s physical. Regular fear is only partly physical, but real terror is an instinctive brain-body response.” Two more bales. The twine cut into her fingers. “You can’t master it, no more than you can master the flu. Fortunately, it doesn’t last near as long as flu does, so you just keep doing what you need to do. After a while it subsides and you’re left with regular fear.”

  Danny had stopped moving. She frowned down at the straw bales. “Where does panic fit? Is it like terror or like regular fear?”

  “Hmm.” Something in the girl’s expression made Lily think this was important to her. “I think panic is what happens when terror hits and you don’t have any training to fall back on. Without training, it’s easy to panic when you’re terrified.”

  Danny gave a satisfied nod and picked up two more bales. “My lists. I use my lists when I’m panicking. I can’t think straight then, so they let me know what I need to do. They’re like my training.”

  “I like lists. They organize my thoughts and keep me on track.”

  “I know! I don’t understand why everyone doesn’t make lists, but lots of people don’t. Not even grocery lists.” She shook her head, marveling at this odd behavior, and dropped her bales in the next stall. “How many do you think we need?”

  “I’m not sure
. I’m going to start cutting the twine and spreading out the straw so we can see how much it takes to make a bed. Would you bring some of those horse blankets?”

  “Sure.”

  Lily watched as Danny walked to the back of the barn, where the tack was kept. The girl’s shoulders were looser. Good.

  Rule said Danny had Asperger’s syndrome. Lily knew a little about that. A key witness in a homicide she’d investigated a few years ago had been an Aspie, though with more severe symptoms than Danny seemed to have. That’s why she’d set things up so she and Danny could work at a task together—to help the girl relax, feel more at ease. It seemed to be working.

  She was spreading straw when Danny returned carrying a pile of horse blankets. “You talked in my mind, didn’t you? I thought it was someone else, but Rule was sure it was you.”

  “That was me, yes.” Lily reached up for the horse blanket Danny handed her. “I didn’t do it on purpose. I hadn’t figured out how to mindspeak consistently when I did that.”

  “Can you do it consistently now?”

  “With some people, not everyone.” Which reminded her . . . Lily sent a tendril out to sample Danny’s mind.

  “With me?”

  “You’d be easy.” An orange, Lily decided. That’s what Danny’s mind reminded her of—a glowing orange with an invitingly nubby surface. Easy to sink a ripple into that.

  “I’d really rather you didn’t.” Her words were polite. Her face was alarmed.

  “I won’t, then, unless it’s really important.” Lily smoothed a second blanket over the straw. Blankets for Shire horses were big, but it took two of them to make a human-size bed. “Two bales per bed seems about right. Do you mind if I ask you some questions?”

  “I think I’ve already told Rule everything.”

  “And he passed on the basics, but we didn’t have time for him to go into detail, so I may cover some of the same ground you’ve already covered with him. I need to know more about the drug Smith’s people are using on the kids. Rule said you’d started telling him about it, but you were interrupted. Did they ever try it on you?”

  “I didn’t even know it existed until after I ran away.”

  “Rule said you’re certain the drug has mind control properties.”

  She frowned. “Did he tell you about Nicky?”

  “Briefly. Danny, mind control can only be achieved through spirit or through magic. Nothing you’ve said suggests Smith has a god pulling spiritual strings for him, so if you’re right about the mind control, magic must be involved. The drug’s other properties indicate that, too. Which means we can’t call it a drug. If magic’s involved, Lodan must be a potion.”

  “Does that make a difference?”

  “Yes. Among other things, it makes this my case. Using unauthorized magic on minors is highly illegal and very much Unit Twelve business. About this Lodan potion—it’s supposed to give a magical boost to a Gift?”

  “Yes, though the increase isn’t consistent. It ranges from thirty percent to four hundred percent.”

  “That’s a lot of variance.”

  “Due to their small sample size, they can’t be sure, but they think the difference is due to the type of Gift involved.” She hesitated. “The four hundred percent increase was Amanda.”

  “The telepath.” Lily nodded thoughtfully. “I see. Is this increase permanent?”

  “Oh, no. It decreases with time. Looked at proportionately, the decrease is consistent regardless of the Gift involved. Two months after the drug—or potion? I guess it is a potion—has been administered, its effectiveness has decreased by fifty percent. In another month, any lingering effect is too slight to be measured. I need to tell you about Cerberus. I didn’t have a chance to tell Rule. One of the reports outlined what dosage was necessary to achieve Cerberus, but didn’t say what that meant.”

  “Cerberus—that’s from Greek mythology, isn’t it?”

  “He’s the three-headed dog with a serpent’s tail, a lion’s claws, and a mane made of snakes. Sometimes he’s shown with just one head, and once in a while with lots of heads, but mostly it’s three. He guards the gates of hell.”

  Cheerful. “Was Cerberus mentioned anywhere else?”

  “In the report on practical applications, but it just listed Cerberus as one of the applications with a note to ‘See R.R. 1180; Harris, B.J.’ The purported author, B. J. Harris, is one of Mr. Smith’s researchers, and the numbered reports seem to be the ones that aren’t on the NSA’s system.”

  “Hmm. What Gifts are represented in the kids?”

  They finished making everyone’s beds well before Lily ran out of questions. Danny claimed one of the stalls for herself by moving her backpack there. Lily sat next to her, still asking and listening. Danny was a good witness. She sidetracked easily, but didn’t mind when Lily prompted her back to the original question. And she had a phenomenal memory.

  At last Lily fell silent, turning over what she’d learned. Danny sighed. “I wish Harry would come back and tell me that password.”

  “Brownies have a different sense of time than we do.” Rule’s sense of time was fairly human, though. She’d expected him to show up by now. Was he still negotiating? “I’d like to hear more about Edward Smith. We don’t know what his goal is. What’s your impression of the man?”

  Danny grimaced. “I’m not good at people. I can’t read expressions and body language and sometimes my theory of mind hiccups. About all I can say for sure is that he’s a liar.”

  “That’s an important datum, but don’t undervalue yourself. Rule said that Smith has a minor charisma Gift. It’s possible he’s test-driven that potion himself, which would mean his Gift isn’t minor anymore, but—”

  Danny’s eyes were big. “I never thought of that!”

  “It’s something to keep in mind. But he must be accustomed to relying on his Gift to make people like him and trust him. His Gift never worked on you, though.”

  “No, he managed to fool me without any magic.”

  “When you were thirteen, yes. It’s not that hard to fool a thirteen-year-old. But did you ever like him?”

  Danny frowned, thinking it over. “No. I didn’t dislike him, but I didn’t . . . he was just this adult who was not a friend, not family, but important.”

  “That’s factually accurate, isn’t it? He was extremely important in your life. And that’s the other thing you’ve got going for you. Because you don’t have much instinctive understanding of people, you’re used to trying to understand them logically. There’s nothing wrong with relying on instinct. It’s a powerful tool, but so is logic.”

  Danny brightened. She liked that.

  “Let’s talk about what can logically be deduced about Edward Smith based on what you know of him. I’m going to stipulate that he isn’t insane, not in the irrational sense. If he were truly irrational, someone at the NSA would have noticed.”

  “So we assume his actions make sense. That there’s logic behind them.”

  “Exactly. Let’s start with your mother. She worked for him a long time. She must have talked about him sometimes.”

  “Well . . . she trusted him, but that was because of his Gift, I expect. And, um, let me think.” She did just that, remaining silent so long Lily had a hard time not prompting her. Finally she gave a nod. “She thought he was really patriotic. That nothing mattered to him as much as protecting the country.”

  “Did you observe anything to support or contradict that?”

  They talked for a while about things Danny remembered about the man she always referred to as Mr. Smith. “He wants to be in charge,” she finished, sounding surprised, as if she hadn’t known that until she said it. “That’s my observation, based on—oh, lots of things, but my mom said something like that once. He wants to run things. He thinks he can run things better than anyone else.”

  A small brown head peeked around the opening to the stall. “It’s ‘firefly.’”

  Lily blinked at Dirty Harry.
“What is?”

  “The password. ‘Firefly.’”

  Danny had her laptop open and was typing madly. “Firefly. And the network is Browniehome, so—yes! I’m on!”

  So much for questioning her witness. Lily had a feeling it would take dynamite to get Danny’s attention away from her computer. Still, she’d covered the ground she most wanted to. “Can you check the news? See what they’re saying about the murders. And about calling in the National Guard.”

  “Sure.” Danny happily typed “national guard Ohio” into the search box. Apparently it didn’t matter greatly what she did online, as long as she get could online.

  Lily’s satisfaction evaporated quickly. “Gaddo bullets? There’s no such thing. And that supposed expert who advised the Homeland Security guy—he was discredited years ago. Disgruntled former MCD agent,” she added. “He wanted lupi put down with extreme prejudice, not just rounded up and branded, back before the Supreme Court made the whole registration thing illegal. And that’s Franklin Foster,” she said when they checked another headline. “Good God. How can anyone take him seriously? He doesn’t know enough about lupi to . . .” Her voice faded as she read quickly. “Shit. Harry. Go get Rule. Tell him it’s important.”

  “Wow,” Danny said, scanning the article, too. “What they said about Ruben Brooks—is that true?”

  “Danny. Can you make a secure phone call with your computer?”

  “Sure, but about Mr. Brooks. Is he—”

  “It’s really important that the NSI doesn’t hear what I say on this call.”

  Danny’s lip curled in scorn. Her fingers danced over the keyboard. “They haven’t caught me yet. You may see some delay because of the way I’m routing this, but it won’t trip any of their flags. Unless they’ve already flagged the number you call, that is. Who do you want to call?”

  Lily had her phone out, scrolling through her contacts. “Dr. Xavier Fagin.” Fagin was the world’s foremost expert on magical history. He was also a friend, a fellow touch sensitive . . . and a member of the Shadow Unit.