Freddy didn’t even comment on the wet patches from where I’d fallen. Kind of him.
“You do have your inhaler, Ximena?”
She held it up to show me before she finished belting her coat. One worry off my mind.
I locked up behind them and followed them toward the T. I was certainly getting my exercise on this stretch today. When I got home, I was going to take a long hot shower. And see about cleaning my jacket. The pants were a lost cause until laundry day after that tumble in the alley.
But the tugging of a gap off toward Boston Common caught my attention. No, not that far — Tremont Street, where I had faced down Melanthios. It didn’t make sense for there to be a gap there, though — no one had died, and my magic didn’t make gaps, didn’t break the foundations of reality. Something else was going on, or rather, something else had gone on. Maybe Melanthios’s summoning of the sirenkin was enough to break a bit of the bedrock, or maybe the underpinnings were already worn and muses popping in and out weakened it more — I doubted that last, though. The muses had been around at least as long as the trolls. If this were a problem, it would’ve come up before now.
Cars on Tremont splashed the sidewalks as they drove along, and the pedestrians huddled close to the buildings to avoid them. I ducked under some scaffolding from ongoing renovation and surveyed the street for the damage. I couldn’t kneel by the gap here, so this was going to have an added level of difficulty. As if doing my first repair without a troll around wasn’t enough of a challenge. I didn’t count the one at Primark — that had been merely a crack, not an actual gap.
My magic trickled down the metal of the scaffolding, grounding itself, seeking out somewhere to empty out. It ran into the gap, playing across it like thundersnow, sparking along the rim of the gap, a thin line, barely a handspan wide and less than a yard deep. Eagerly, my magic filled the gap, melding it together, sealing it with the heat that only lightning could bring.
I swayed against the building, startled that I wasn’t more tired. That trollmiod was strong stuff.
Chapter 23
On Saturday, I felt at loose ends without the twins around when I got home from working the open shift. Fear stabbed through me that I would have to get used to this feeling, that it wouldn’t be just these two weekends or every other weekend that Matt got them, but all the time. To try to bury that voice of doubt, I started sorting clothes, deciding what I’d rather give away than move to the new place. I was staring at a cowl scarf Beth had given me that didn’t go with anything I owned when a whispering breeze crept up the stairs outside my apartment. It seemed an odd time for Vanessa to come to call, but I went to the door to open it before she knocked.
She looked startled. “Someday, you need to teach me how you do that. I’m always getting interrupted at work.”
“It probably wouldn’t work at the bank unless you have a more interesting group of coworkers than I do.” I thought of Svetlana and amended my statement, “Most of my coworkers, anyway.”
“Probably not interesting in the same way you mean. But that’s not why I came by.” She waved to the stairs up to the attic. “Can we go up?”
A twinge of guilt hit me. I’d been remodeling the attic to convert it to bedrooms for the twins, but my work had slacked off during the summer as I’d been assailed by doubts and fears about losing them. Now, I had somewhere else to go, and I didn’t know if the attic would ever be finished. “I suppose.”
I followed her up. She paused to flick on the light switch before we entered. I had managed to get the old lath and plaster off the walls, and in my last burst of enthusiasm for the project, I’d even put up wallboard and started partitions to create sleeping areas for the twins while leaving the main area open for play and study. The tools still sat where I’d left them sometime in September, the last time I’d been up here, the hammer on top of the toolbox next to the bag of nails, the level leaning against a wall near the cordless drill I’d been using to double as a screwdriver.
Vanessa looked around, nodding in approval at what she saw. “I don’t know how you found time to do any of this.”
“A little here, a little there. It’s been harder since I got promoted.” It was an excuse and we both knew it, but she let it slide.
“Matt picked better than he knew. I wish he could see that.”
I crossed to the toolbox, moved the hammer and nails off, and sat down, looking around. “The kids were excited about this. I think Gavin’s mad at the thought that he might not get to live up here after all. Won’t, unless his dad gets custody and comes back to live here. I know I can’t stay.”
“You should finish it anyway. They’ll come to visit sometimes, and it would be good for them to have a place of their own.”
I compared this space — how it looked in my mind, done, furnished — with the small bedroom over the music shop where the twins were going to need bunk beds to have any space to move. Finishing this would make them resent their new room all the more. “I don’t know if I can do that.”
She came over and sat next to me, put her arm around me. “I’ll help. It’ll be fun. Besides, I have an idea for painting in here.”
“I had planned to do their favorite colors in the bed areas and white in the rest of it.”
“I was thinking something more like your coffee shop, if you’d let me.”
“You paint?”
“Not so much as I’d like, but I’ve always loved — my favorite artist is Ma Lin, of the Song Dynasty. I would love to do a mural here, with the mountains and clouds, the people arranged in their tasks. Maybe a dragon circling in the heavens, and a phoenix above the door. But scenes from Boston, too, grounding them in how and where they live now.”
“It seems my fate to be surrounded by muralists.”
“You’ll let me, then?” She broke into a wide smile. “It would be a welcome break from mergers and takeovers and worrying about who didn’t do their tax filings properly for their corporation.”
“Your brother won’t like the inclusion of the dragon or the phoenix.” Wei had told me that Vanessa had met Hsien, so I assumed she knew his nature, but did she know Matt’s feelings on the matter?
“No, he won’t, will he?” She sounded almost too satisfied with herself. Maybe she did know Matt had seen Hsien? “I told you, I love my little brother, but he’s being an ass.”
It seemed half the family conspired to get me to stay while the other half couldn’t wait for me to leave. I had never expected this — had assumed their loyalty would be to Matt. I’d already accepted Benjamin’s terms, so I would be here anyway, even after I moved out. And part of me wanted to see this area completed, simply because I hated leaving work unfinished.
“All right,” I said. “I can’t until after Thanksgiving, but then we’ll get back to work.” Around my move, which I didn’t want to mention.
“Can I make one suggestion?”
I looked at her expectantly.
“I’d like to embed some fairy lights — LEDs on copper wire — into the paintings. Mask the wires, of course. They won’t take much electricity, but they’ll look amazing.” She frowned. “I’ll have to think about how to do replacements when they burn out, though.”
“Lights sound wonderful, as long as it’s not going to be so bright they have trouble getting to sleep.” We’d worry later about how to replace the wires. Or maybe Vanessa would figure out how they fit into her paintings, and I’d never have to worry about it. I didn’t have to do everything on my own.
We sat there for a few minutes with our thoughts. Dorothy’s words a couple weeks back haunted me, about wishing my sister-in-law ill, and I considered the size of the chasm in Canada and the sense of Vanessa’s magic that had let me find the other side.
“Vanessa, were you only in Canada for a business meeting?”
“What?”
“The bad breaks you had there — there was magic targeting you. Someone accused me of doing it, asked what I had against you. I know it was
n’t me, but I want to know who it was. What if it happens again?”
She let her breath out between her teeth and tapped her fingers on her knee. I’d hit a nerve, but I wasn’t sure what kind. I waited.
“It’s not against me. When Jeixing broke his leg, he was getting the children out of the way of a luggage cart. His leg got pinned between the cart and the closing elevator door. The hotel apologized abjectly, and I had to intervene to keep them from firing the bellhop. It wasn’t his fault the cart got away from him.”
“Someone attacked Kane and Aniyah?” That made even less sense to me than someone directing their attacks at Vanessa.
“They were in both places; I was not. And the cart would have crushed them.”
“But — why? Who would have a grudge against a pair of nine-year-olds?”
“They’re a tool, a step along the way.” She turned to meet my eyes. “Why do you have children?”
My brow furrowed in bewilderment. She knew why. “Matt was terrified. Babbled to me about a death curse.” I shook my head dismissively. “There was no death curse.”
“Not per se, no. But if there are only and exactly four grandchildren, tied to my parents by magic…”
I let the words sink in. I’d agreed with Matt years ago that the risk to his parents wasn’t worth taking. Now, it looked like he was right, at least partially, when he started off our conversation about children by talking about his fears for his parents. And if the children were in danger, if there was the possibility that there would be only four — what was a life-threatening disease but a threat of death? Which might mean Benjamin’s heart trouble was magical in origin, but not something I could heal. Only something I could help with by keeping Gavin, Tina, and their cousins safe — which I would do anyway.
“But why would someone want to hurt your parents?”
“To weaken Hsien. He has been alive a long time. No doubt, he has many enemies who have been looking for a weakness. They think they’ve found one. Grandmother won’t last forever. If Mother dies, and the grandchildren so the line cannot continue—”
Anger rose like heat within me, and sparks shot from the outlets in the room. The lightbulb brightened. In the back of my mind, I heard the manic laughter I’d feared since college, but for once, I didn’t care. “They’re wrong. I’ll destroy them rather than let anyone hurt your family.”
Chapter 24
My heart fluttered as I stopped on the doorstep, afraid to go in. Haris rested his hand on my back, which didn’t exactly calm my heart rate. He leaned in close to my ear. “Your parents like me.”
I gave him a sardonic smile. “Of course they do. And my aunts will, too.” Although it was too much to hope they’d acknowledge they’d been wrong when they stopped by my apartment.
“Then what are you afraid of?”
He knew what I was thinking. Why did he want me to say the words out loud?
His dimple flashed, and I melted. With the heat in me right now, the very last thing I wanted to do was sit and make family small talk. But he wanted to hear the words, hear my fears.
“My aunts are going to start talking about marriage. As if that’s the biggest thing in my life.”
He tilted his head to one side. “Is it the biggest thing in theirs? You never say anything about their families.”
I was about to answer him when the door opened. Aunt Ti stood there, her eyebrows arched. “Were you planning to come in, or are you going to talk on the step all afternoon?”
“Let me think about it.”
Haris was charming, as ever. He reached out and took Aunt Ti’s hand. “Don’t mind her. She wants to keep me to herself. But she’s told me so much about you. Now tell me — you’re the younger aunt?”
My choke was eclipsed by Aunt Rena pushing her sister out of the way. “That would be me. You can tell because I don’t have any gray — excuse me, silver — hairs yet.”
“Aunt Ti, Aunt Rena.” I kept my voice civil. It’s easy with decades of practice. “If you really don’t want us standing on the doorstep, perhaps you could move out of the way?”
Aunt Rena sniffed anyway. “You don’t have to be rude, Pepper.” She made a show of peering past me. “Where are those delightful twins of yours?”
“You know this is their weekend with Matt.” I didn’t growl. It’s possible — likely? okay, fine, certain — that my fingertips sparked a little, although the only one who seemed to notice was Haris, who grabbed my hand with his. As if his touch would calm my magic down!
“Ti, Rena, come help set the table.” My dad, peacemaker as ever. Amazingly enough, they listened to him and turned away from the door.
“Are you okay?” Haris asked, his voice low.
“I will be.” I sighed. “Family can be tough.”
“You’re telling me. You do remember my cousin, right?”
As if I could forget Melanthios! Or Haris’s brother Vlassis, for that matter. “Let’s go.”
Aunt Ti was putting plates on the table while grumbling that it should be my job, since it was my fault we were eating at the table rather than buffet style. Aunt Rena wordlessly poured orange juice into glasses. I walked past them to lay my coat over the back of a couch, then turned to take Haris’s and do the same with it.
“Pepper! You know that’s not where they go!” Mom said.
I turned to face her, wide-eyed. “I’m just putting them next to Aunt Ti and Aunt Rena’s.”
She glowered at me, but turned to smile at Haris. “So good to see you again. I see you didn’t let Pepper scare you away from meeting my sisters.”
“She tried.” He squeezed my hand to take the sting out of the teasing.
“I’m sure she did.” She fixed her gaze back on me. “Come help me get the food on the table. Haris can socialize with my sisters.”
I wanted to say that no one could socialize with her sisters, as that required both sides to be social. If it was possible to do so, however, Haris could do it. He’d dated Teles, a siren, for goodness sake!
He winked at me, and I blushed — more at being caught thinking about him and Teles than because of the wink. Let the others think what they wanted — we knew the truth.
Giving up, I followed my mother into the kitchen.
“You really need to trust him more,” she said as she handed me two bowls full of muffins and picked up a bowl full of cut fruit for herself to carry. “He’s not going to run away because of anything those two have to say.”
“I trust Haris completely. It’s them I don’t trust to be polite.”
“That’s a fine thing to say about your aunts!”
“Did Dad tell you they came by my apartment with a real estate agent they were trying to fix me up with?” I led the way out to the dining room, where I put muffins at both ends of the table.
My aunts heard this, and Aunt Ti reacted with the umbrage one might expect. “That’s not true. We came by to help her in her quest for somewhere to live.”
I looked at her with disbelief. “You said straight out that even if I didn’t want to look at apartments, that I could still go out with him a couple of times and see what happened.”
“I did no such thing.”
It would have remained her word against mine, but Aunt Rena decided to throw her to the wolves. “Yes, you did. I remember being shocked at your behavior, since you knew Lexy said she was serious.” Aunt Rena fluttered her lashes at Haris. “I can certainly see why.”
I bit my lip to keep from laughing out loud. My aunt’s eyelashes were nothing compared to Haris’s when she decided to flutter them at me. I glanced over at him, and he grinned, sharing my merriment.
The by-play between my aunts wasn’t done yet, though. Aunt Ti wasn’t about to let her sister get away with putting all of the blame on her. “Me? Why, you’re the one—”
The better part of valor was definitely a retreat to the kitchen to grab more food. Haris and my dad came with me, while my mom stayed behind to try to make peace between her sist
ers. Judging from the raised voices, that was going to take a while. I moved toward the coffee grinder. If I had to deal with them, I wanted some of my favorite fuel.
“There’s a pot already made,” my dad said mildly.
I spared a glance for the coffeemaker in the corner — not a pod unit, at least, and fine for most visits. Today, however, its moderate brown was an offense of weakness, and I shook my head.
“I want some pour-over, thanks.” It gave me something to do with my hands that did not involve throttling my aunts or focusing to make sure I didn’t short out all of the kitchen appliances.
“Any spices this time?”
Sometimes, I would drop cardamom, coriander, or cinnamon in with the coffee beans to add an extra layer of flavor. Not so much today — the oils and flavor would be lovely, but I just wanted coffee, good coffee, the deep and nutty, slightly bitter drink, rich and velvety and capable of letting me focus on it rather than what ridiculous thing one of my aunts was saying.
“No, thanks.” I ground the beans, then glanced at the cabinet with the mugs, and as an afterthought, asked, “Did either of you want some?”
“I’ve got a cup already,” Dad said, picking up his “World’s Greatest Dad” mug from the counter.
“I’ll have some,” Haris said as he handed me a matching pair of mugs. “Your coffee was the second — maybe third — thing I noticed about you.”
The GFCI circuits in the kitchen tripped.
“That was the first.”
My dad chuckled, and I was amazed again that I’d never realized he knew all about my magic. “I won’t ask what the second was.”
Heat flooded through me, and I very deliberately did not look at either of them as I reset the circuits. I pulled a pair of cones from a drawer — gifts from me so I’d have them when I wanted them — slipped a filter inside each, and set them on top of the mugs Haris had gotten out.
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