by Emma Savant
Imogen dodged my hand and took in the odd couple behind the counter.
“No luck, then?”
“Shh,” I said, realizing a second later that shushing her was ridiculous—who would have any idea what we were talking about? But I couldn’t shake the paranoid feeling that I was being watched and that any second now, I was going to screw up and the whole world was going to know about it. I wanted to stay under Elle’s radar for as long as I possibly could.
Unfortunately for me, Imogen wasn’t on board with that plan.
“Oh, relax,” she said, and marched up to the counter.
I could never put a name on the color of her hair. It wasn’t auburn or Orphan-Annie orange or warm blond, but, instead, what might happen if all those colors came together and agreed to compromise. Whatever it was, it wisped down from her messy bun and perfectly matched the Order Here sign propped on the counter.
“It’s my first time here!” she announced to the people behind the counter. “What’s good?”
The tall girl raised one bored black eyebrow, like she really couldn’t care less, as someone emerged from behind the burnt-orange counter with a stack of disposable coffee cups in hand.
“It’s all crap,” the new girl said. “The shortbread mocha cappuccino is probably as good as you’re going to get.”
Someone was clearly having a bad day.
As soon as I saw her face, I stepped on Imogen’s toe and made a coughing noise that could have meant anything. Imogen didn’t need to be told.
“Let’s try that, then,” she said with a big smile. After glancing at me and realizing I was too busy studying Elle to come up with a drink order, she added, “Make that two. To stay.”
We sat down, and I immediately took out my phone and pretended to text.
Elle was efficient; I could see that right away. She knew exactly what she was doing and wasted no time about it. She was also impatient, slamming things around and jerking our cups around the counter like she couldn’t stand to touch them for more than a few seconds at a time. The freckled boy looked at her as if wondering whether he should offer to help, then decided—wisely, I thought—that rearranging the slices of cheesecake in the glass-fronted display case was a better use of his time.
She walked around the counter, our drinks in hand, and set them on the table. I couldn’t decide whether to look at her. Meeting her eyes would commit me to this whole crazy charade. Not meeting them would mean I was missing crucial pieces of the puzzle. I settled for a quick glance up, but she kept her eyes on the cups or the tops of our heads.
“Let me know if you need anything.”
“Thanks!” Imogen said with about ten times too much sincerity. Elle looked at her for a second as though unsure whether Imogen was making fun of her, then forced a smile and went back behind the counter. She was wearing a dark blue Dr. Who T-shirt with a blue police box printed on one shoulder blade like it was flying across her back.
Imogen waited until she was out of earshot before leaning forward and hissing, “What a piece of work. That’s your client?”
“Aren’t I lucky,” I said. I watched her for a moment, then said, “Maybe she’s just having a horrible day.”
Imogen shot me a quelling glance, then closed her eyes and was still for a moment. All faeries could feel magic and emotions. That sort of thing took all my concentration, but Imogen was better at it than anyone I’d ever met. A self-satisfied smile appeared on her face, then her hazel eyes snapped open and she said, “Yes, a bad day, but she’s starting to feel like all days are bad days.”
She closed her eyes again while I pondered this. On the downside, once people started thinking like that, the attitude got pretty entrenched. On the upside, a string of bad days could be interrupted, and that had a tendency to make fairy tale endings actually feel like fairy tales.
That was the theory, anyway.
Imogen’s eyes opened again and she leaned back into the cushioned bench.
“She’s seriously fed up with her life,” she said. She inhaled the layer of foam on the top of her cappuccino and added, “Girl’s got some major baggage. I can’t quite figure out what it is, although I’m pretty sure she hates the chick with black hair.”
She pointed toward the counter, not quite as discreetly as I would have liked. The girl was refilling a napkin dispenser. I squinted at her name badge. It said Mallory in the same swooping letters that made up the place’s logo. I remembered the name, but flipped open Elle’s folder just to be sure.
“That’s her stepsister,” I said. “The older one.”
“That makes sense, then,” Imogen said. “Cinderella trope, right?”
“Except I don’t think this one’s going to be able to talk bluebirds into doing her laundry.” I blew the foamed milk across the top of my coffee and took a sip. It wasn’t crap, but it wasn’t anything spectacular, either.
The black-haired stepsister, Mallory, was alone with Elle and the freckled boy, who I suspected wasn’t going to be able to separate them if a fight started. It looked like one was brewing: The girls were pointedly ignoring one another, but the tension between them was so thick that even I could feel it crackling in the air between their tightly strung bodies. Imogen, whose empathic gifts were better than mine, leaned back in her chair and nursed her coffee. Her face wore an expression of rapt interest that she did nothing to hide.
“It’s like watching cats about to spring at each other,” she said, fascinated. I couldn’t blame her. Sometimes, our jobs felt like we were being paid to watch reality TV, and even when I found it trashy I couldn’t tear my eyes away.
Mallory glanced at Elle, then slouched against the counter and started texting. Elle leaned back against the counter that held the espresso machine and folded her arms across her chest. They stood in silence for a moment, then Elle said, “Your shift’s up.”
“Yeah, I know,” Mallory said, not taking her eyes from her phone.
Elle let the silence draw out, then said, “So?”
“So what?”
“So, are you just going to hang out here all day?”
“What’s it to you?”
“Rawr,” Imogen muttered, sitting up straighter.
Mallory kept texting while Elle’s jaw got tighter. Finally, Mallory pushed back from the counter and said, “Okay, then. All yours.” She looked at Elle like she was trying to decide something, then marched to the cash register. It gave a ping as she opened it, and then she pulled out a ten-dollar bill.
“Seriously?” Elle said. She launched upright from her slouch and stepped forward until she was just a little too close for Mallory’s comfort. “Seriously, you’re going to do this? Right now?”
Mallory slammed the drawer shut and spun around. “Dude,” she said, like they’d had this conversation a thousand times. “Chill. Dad’s cool with it. Look, I’ll write him a note. Happy?”
“I’m not cool with it,” Elle said. “You’re screwing over his business and you don’t even care.” She threw her hands up and let her body fall back against the counter again, then scoffed, “But whatever. You know what? What-the-freak-ever. I’m done.”
Mallory’s eyebrows lifted in a way that didn’t affect the rest of her face at all. Annoyance radiated off of her. It made me feel annoyed, even though I knew the emotions I was feeling weren’t my own. Mallory opened her mouth, then seemed to decide it wasn’t worth it. She pocketed the bill, pulled her apron over her head, and disappeared behind another burnt orange curtain that probably led to the kitchen.
The freckled boy had kept himself busy rearranging the straws in a canister. Now he rocked back on his heels and offered Elle an encouraging smile.
“Dumb, huh?” he said.
I cringed, waiting for her to unleash on him, but she only half-smiled and said, “Yeah, Noah. Usually is.”
The tension was gone. Mallory had taken it all with her.
The front door bell jangled as a large group of middle-aged women dressed in business cas
ual came in. A moment later, Elle and Noah were swamped, and I took a break to enjoy my just-okay coffee.
Imogen didn’t like silences. “I’m pretty sure my sister is a Thumbelina,” she said.
“Which one?” I said. I couldn’t picture it. All Imogen’s sisters were tall and willowy.
“Maia,” she said. “Seriously, she was dating this wizard who specializes in amphibian magic. Like, turning people into toads and whatever.” The disgusted look on her face told me exactly what she thought of this. “Then she was with this guy who was obsessed with the Beatles, her roommate seriously looks like a mouse and keeps trying to set her up with her brother, who’s got these Coke-bottle glasses like you wouldn’t believe, and she’s being pretty much stalked by an ornithologist.”
“Which one’s that again?” I said.
“Guy who studies birds,” Imogen said. “The girl is a Thumbelina checklist. Literally the only thing missing is her faerie prince.”
“Wow,” I said.
“Right?” Imogen dumped half a packet of sugar into her coffee and stirred it around. “I’m kind of glad he hasn’t showed up yet. The last thing I need right now is another wedding.”
Imogen was the youngest of seven sisters from one of Portland’s oldest Glim families. Her family didn’t actually rule anything, but they were technically aristocracy in our world, which meant reputation, money, and magical gifts had been raining down on her since birth. Three of her sisters were already married, one was engaged to her longtime girlfriend and in the middle of planning a giant wedding in California, and now apparently Maia was ripe for her Story to start resolving itself. The only sister who seemed like a safe bet for a while was Nicole, who was too busy earning her master’s degree to bother with dating. Every last one of Imogen’s sisters was glamorous, intelligent, beautiful, and accomplished, and it drove her crazy with envy.
“Maybe she’ll totally screw up her Story and have to start over with another one,” I said.
“If only,” Imogen said. “No, I’m pretty sure her prince is going to show up and they’re going to get married at, like, the most inconvenient time possible. Probably the day I’m supposed to start at Institut Glänzen.”
“I’m pretty sure they’d let you start classes a day or two late,” I said, though of course that wasn’t the problem at all.
Institute Glänzen, nestled in the Swiss Alps, was the world’s best university for magical glamours and charms, and Imogen’s heart had been set on going there since we were kids. Her college prospects reminded me too much of my own, though, and I made a face and sipped at my coffee.
All the best magical universities were in Europe, and my dad was determined that both his kids would attend his alma mater, the Imperial College of Faeries in Austria. I couldn’t even begin to number the places I’d rather go after I got out of high school, but there was no getting that through his head.
The cluster of women around the counter drifted to one of the comfy brown couches. Elle and Noah worked in a seamless frenzy, whipping up cappuccinos and lattes and smoothies like they were born to do it. After the entire order had been carried over on a tray, Elle returned to the counter. She glanced at us on her way back, but only for a second. We weren’t interesting enough.
“So I’m thinking we should go to Gilt,” Imogen said. “On Saturday night.” She leaned forward in her seat, her eyes sparkling with excitement.
I couldn’t bring myself to match her enthusiasm. Gilt, the supposedly spectacular club for the Glimmering underaged, was opening to the general public Saturday night. We were technically the right demographic, but I knew I didn’t belong there.
“What are we going to do there?” I said. “It’s just a bunch of pretentious rich kids. I don’t think we’d even be allowed in.”
“Of course we would,” Imogen said. “Think about it. I’m from the Dann family. It’s not like people don’t know that name. And you’re the daughter of a freaking Council member.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “It’s going to be awkward. You know how cliquey royalty is. Just imagine us walking in and disrupting their… vaporizing gold coins or smashing ancient magical artifacts, or whatever those people do for fun.”
“You’re a snob,” Imogen said. She leaned back into her seat and pointed a long-nailed finger at me. “You’re worse than a snob. You’re snobby because you don’t want to hang out with the other snobs. It’s snobbery to the power of snob.”
I rolled my eyes. Every few months, Imogen decided it was time to re-assert herself as one of the unbelievably rich and beautiful royal kids that made up the clientele of places like Gilt, and every few months, I talked her back down to reality. I know what Imogen didn’t, having attended all my dad’s awkward ribbon-cuttings and state dinners: The more elite a group, the less interesting they were going to be to hang out with.
“And you’re better off without them,” Elle said. I blinked and looked up sharply. She’d just completed my thought. But she wasn’t looking at me. She was pointing at Noah, a dishtowel dangling from her hand. “Don’t try to fit in with the popular guys, dude. You’re so much better than that.”
“Cynthia’s nice,” Noah said. “She doesn’t fit the stereotype.”
Elle scoffed, but followed it up with a quick smile, so he’d know she wasn’t just being mean. “Yeah, she does,” she said. “I’m sorry to have to be the one to tell you that, but she does. You just can’t see it because she has really nice boobs.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Noah said.
“They’re just a bunch of stuck-up kids with no actual interests or self-worth of their own, so they have to rely on their parents’ money and entrenched political opinions to feel like they’re important in this world,” Elle said.
If nothing else, this girl wasn’t short on opinions.
“And they’re not,” she continued. “You’re important. You’re going to change the world someday, and Cynthia is going to be just another washed-up soccer mom on her fifth martini by lunch.”
I gestured toward Elle. “Need I say more?”
Imogen sighed and pursed her mouth to one side. “I’m going to get you to Gilt eventually,” she said. “If I don’t give up and just go there by myself. The only reason I won’t on Saturday is because I’m such an awesome best friend. You better appreciate me.”
I couldn’t help laughing.
“Side note,” Imogen said. She was staring at Elle now with her head cocked to one side. “I was thinking she looked familiar. Pretty sure this chick is in World History with me.”
At last, some good news. I held up my hand and she high-fived the tip of my pointer finger with the tip of hers. It was what we had always done when we were in class and trying to be quiet. She downed the last of her cappuccino. “Which means you’re done here, which means—” She trailed off, looking at me expectantly.
I let out a giant sigh I didn’t mean. “Which means we can go shopping now,” I said.
She fluttered her eyelashes at me. “Oh, you’re good.”
Chapter 4
The second I stepped in the door, I could tell a storm was brewing. Even someone with my underdeveloped empathetic skills could tell when Reginald and Marigold Feye were about to get into a major argument.
I wasn’t surprised. The tension in the house had been slowly rising ever since last night’s dinner, when Mom had disagreed with Dad about elven trade policy in front of his boring coworker, Charles.
I shut the door and got all of three steps into the foyer before I heard Dad’s voice bellowing down the stairs.
“If you don’t like it, why don’t you take it up with the Dwarf Coalition?” he shouted. “I’m sorry if my saving the magical world is inconvenient for your little get-togethers!”
“It’s not a party,” Mom said. “It’s a meeting with your son’s teacher, and I just can’t wait to explain to his Humdrum teacher that his father cares more about some stupid Dwarf Coalition than his own children. Or doe
s it not matter to you that Daniel has been skipping class? I have no idea where he’s been going or what he’s been doing.”
“Then why don’t you parent your son?” Dad said coldly. There was silence, and then the slamming of a door, probably the one in their bathroom.
I closed my eyes and sighed, mentally picturing the words bouncing off me, falling to the ground, and being absorbed by the earth.
Even a faerie who wasn’t talented at reading other people’s emotions, like me, tended to pick up a lot of emotional crap from other people. We were like magnets, attracting everything around us, good and bad, and my parents’ fights were bad all the way through. Most faeries had good marriages, because arguments took such a toll on us. But not Reginald and Marigold. Nope, they could scream and swear with the best of them. I rolled my eyes up at the now-silent ceiling. I couldn’t be more proud to be their daughter.
I walked quietly through the kitchen and into the adjoining living room. Daniel was there, slouched on the leather sofa with his phone pressed between his hands. He stared intently at it. He picked up on stuff even more than I did, and it sounded like whatever was happening upstairs had been going on for a while.
“Hey,” I said, softly so I wouldn’t startle him.
He glanced up. His face was pale and drawn, but he managed a half-smile. “Hey,” he said. “Leftover pizza’s in the fridge. I don’t think Mom’s doing dinner tonight.”
But Mom was doing dinner. A moment later, I heard her footsteps clomping down the stairs. She marched into the kitchen, barely glancing at us, and started slamming pots and pans around. Sparks shot from the end of her wand, which was tucked in her hair. It was clearly only a matter of time before her head caught fire.
Daniel mumbled something about homework and stood up. I followed him, not bothering to come up with an excuse for escaping the room.
“What’s the deal this time?” I said on the stairs, careful to keep my voice down.
“Nothing new,” Daniel said. He sounded way too cynical for a kid his age. Then again, I had been too. “The Faerie Queen still hasn’t picked an heir. The Dwarf Coalition insists that the Oracle’s fountains around the city are hosting some kind of parasite, which is, of course, yet another probably unfounded criticism so the Dwarf King can finally get a seat on the Council. The usual.”
