by Martha Carr
“What? I can’t believe it! You never say yes!”
“Unless you get Estelle involved. She’s hard to turn down.”
“Out of fear of the unknown.”
“I heard that!” Estelle emerged on top of her stool at the other end of the bar. “What’ll it be? Wait, don’t tell me. I have just the other thing.” She made a gin and tonic and plopped it down in front of the pretty blonde who looked down the bar like she needed help. “Anything else? You don’t look hungry,” Estelle informed her. “You got a friend needs a drink?”
“It’s like being faced with a gremlin,” Scott mused.
“She hears you, you disappear,” Mike said.
“Fuck, you become barbeque,” Margaret added.
“Dancing!” Craig said, changing the subject.
“I never agreed to that. I said I’d go along for the music. Does everyone have their supply of useless things from Costco?” Leira looked in the box to make sure it was completely empty.
“Tube socks are not useless. Even Bert wanted some.”
“What’s so great about them?”
Craig put a sock on his hand and demonstrated. “You get a hole on one side, you just turn it. Lasts four times longer than your ordinary sock.”
“That’s very sad, Craig. I feel for your wife and kids.”
“Supporting a wife and kids is why I’m so practical.”
Correk whispered to Leira. “How long does this usually go on?”
“Until someone makes them stop.” Leira clapped her hands sharply twice and put her fingers to her lips and produced a high-pitched whistle. “Okay, who’s riding with us, because we’re out of here?”
“Hey, who whistled like that? Oh, Leira, well then,” said Estelle, turning around to go back inside.
“I told you she was Estelle’s favorite.”
“You’re just figuring that out? Do you have a card in your pocket that says where to send you home in case you’re found alone? That might be a good idea.”
Leira headed resolutely toward the gate with Correk right behind her. “I take it they eventually follow you.”
“Most of the time. Some get left behind on occasion but they learn.”
Craig and Scott piled into the back of the Mustang. Craig asked Leira to run the lights just for a second every time the traffic slowed down. Leira mostly ignored the backseat and instead watched how Correk occasionally tried to chime in and be part of the group. That was the moment she realized all the time spent on Earth was taking him away from his own family somewhere on Oriceran. He’s trying to bloom where he’s planted, she thought, remembering something her grandmother used to say. Haven’t thought of her in a while either. Strange day.
***
They took three cars and parked in a deck just off Congress Avenue on 8th Street and walked down Brazos Street, passing the Driskill Hotel, turning onto 6th Street. The hotel was built out of brick and limestone just after the Civil War. It was ornately decorated, with curved openings, and busts of the founder and his two sons on the peaks of the facades still watching over everything.
“They say this old hotel is haunted,” Scott remarked, as they walked past the valet stand.
“That’s just gossip,” said Margaret.
Leira noticed Correk’s slowing down and looking up at the Driskill with a growing interest.
They got to the corner and crossed at the light. Leira tugged at Correk’s sleeve and asked, “You don’t believe in ghosts, do you? They’re just old stories.”
Correk’s face grew solemn. “Not ghosts, no. In Oriceran we call it something else. The world in between, and it’s very real. It’s one thing that gives even the adults nightmares.”
“I didn’t know magical beings had nightmares,” Leira said, glancing up at the hotel.
“I assure you, there are hideous things to be afraid of even where there is magic. Sometimes, because there is magic.”
Leira wondered if going out without her gun and just a Light Elf at her side was such a good idea.
“Your firearm would prove useless in this instance.”
Leira glanced back at Correk and shuddered so hard it shook her shoulders. “Why is it ghost stories always creep people out?”
“Because sometimes they’re real.
***
High above in a window on the third floor a figure watched the street below.
At first, the older woman didn’t believe it could really be her. After four years, the memory of what the young woman looked like had faded and the woman below was some distance from her under a darkening sky. This wasn’t even the first time she thought she was catching a glimpse of the detective.
She did her best to concentrate and study the woman walking within a group toward 6th Street.
“It is her!” she shouted, hearing the hollow echo the sound made in the dimension where she was trapped. The world in between.
Even here, in this place, the woman still felt the sharp pain of longing for something she couldn’t touch. Especially for the touch of her granddaughter.
Mara Berens instinctively reached toward Leira to call to her but her hand passed through the windowpane, dissolving into mist until Mara pulled it back. She was trapped in a place with only the other beings who were trapped, the living and the dead, to talk to. But there were consequences for mingling with the darker beings trapped in there with everyone else, and it could be difficult to tell one from the other in time.
Time was difficult to calculate in the world in between, but it wasn’t long after she was trapped in there before Mara saw the darkness from a dark being, creep over a Wood Elf who had fallen in trying to use a portal. The same kind of accident that had trapped Mara. The Wood Elf begged for help as the darkness covered him like ebony liquid, engulfing him till he was absorbed. There are even worse things than the world in between, thought Mara.
She made a point to trust no one after that.
Leira looked up toward the windows and Mara saw the sharp pointed chin, just like her own and the familiar short, dark hair. She looked at the man standing next to her just as he tilted his head up toward the hotel.
“A Light Elf,” she cried out in horror. “No!” Mara felt the panic rising and fought it. It would make it more difficult for her to hold her energy still and stay in one place. She watched Leira look up one more time as they walked down the street and she focused all her energy, trying to send a warning to her granddaughter. Stay away from the Oricerans. No good will come of it. I have to find a way to warn her before it’s too late. It felt like a scream in her chest that had nowhere to go, trapped in the world in between.
***
“Hey, you guys, keep up! We found the bar where we’re going to start our great adventure.”
Craig and Mike were frantically waving them on toward a bar that was completely open in the front. The only thing that separated the people inside from the sidewalk was an iron barrier painted black.
“Oh, pizza!” Correk pointed to the Due Forni sign down the block.
“You have good taste, but no…” said Craig. “Tonight, we show you the musical side of Austin! We start with the Dirty Dog Bar!”
“For once this will not be about the food,” said Mike. “Whiskey, women and song.”
Mitzi shook her head. “Come on King Kong, let’s go in. Pay the doorman. No, he doesn’t want to see your ID. That’s how old you look to the world. No one doubts you’re well over twenty-one.”
“Hey, it’s the Bourgeois Mystics!”
“Funk band!”
“Funk what?” Correk shouted over the trumpets and the bass guitar. The sound reverberated off the walls and made his ears hum. He looked around and quietly said, “Calmination,” symbols briefly appearing under his skin.
A young man with a fade and a zigzag cut into the sides of his hair smiled and lifted his glass to Correk. “Cool tattoo!”
The sound of his voice traveled to Correk in a tube of air all its own, separated out from the
other noise in the room. Correk gave him a smile and a nod and turned away.
Now he was free to focus on the different sounds of the band and regulate the volume, blending the music.
“You’re really enjoying the music!” Leira looked at him with surprise.
“No need to shout,” he said, a feeling of calm running through him.
“What?” she shouted.
He laughed and shook his head, taking a beer from Scott and lifting it to the group. “To family,” he said, letting the spell push the sound out to only the people standing around him. They all lifted their beer and answered, “To family”.
***
Leira cocked her head to one side and said, “You cast a spell, didn’t you?” She lowered her voice even more. “And you can still hear me. Mister you had better not do magic, especially in public.” She raised her eyebrows and smiled, taking a sip of her beer.
Correk shrugged and smiled back as he swayed to the music.
“Is that Elven dancing?” Leira laughed and said, “Show me the spell, Cousin, or I try to feel my way through one of my own invention.”
He held up his hand, trying to look serious but his eyes gave him away. “I’ll need to use some of your energy. Give me your hand.”
She took his hand, and he inhaled and said the spell again, “Calmination,” blowing out the breath toward Leira. The air swirled around her, expanding, glowing in a way that only she could see, separating all the sounds and images, letting her choose what she wanted to hear or see in any given moment. A look of delight came over her face.
“Now, use the energy within you to mix the sounds you want to hear. This is a lot easier if you believe you can do it. Elven magic strengthens with belief.”
Leira started, looking up to see who else had heard him say, ‘Elven magic’ and realized no one else could hear them. They weren’t even interested.
Correk smiled and gave her an encouraging nod.
“The sound travels through its own tunnel, separate from what everyone else can hear,” she said, watching the light swirl around her. “Am I the only one who can see this light?”
“I can see it too. Other magical creatures, all elves especially, can see it. Look around you. Open your mind and your heart to the energy around you.”
Leira hesitated, unsure she even wanted to try. Correk smiled and nodded again. “You can turn it off any time you want to. Shut your eyes if it makes it easier to start.”
“I’m a cop. I’ve got this,” she said. Come on Leira, you don’t back down from a challenge.
“What is there in this world that you trust? Who do you trust? Draw on that feeling.”
“I trust Hagan to have my back.”
Correk shrugged. “Start with that. Trust that feeling. This isn’t something you do. It’s more like you allow it to be.”
Leira thought about Hagan and relaxed into the feeling, letting it spread through her.
One by one, first the people closest to her, and then spreading out through the room, different people took on the same ethereal light, swirling around them in a tunnel.
It looks like a hundred fireflies.
Leira turned in a circle, amazed, taking it in.
She stared at a tall, thin man with long hair. He seemed to feel her energy reaching out to his and he turned and smiled, before going back to watching the band.
“Leira Berens, you are at least half a Light Elf.” Correk’s voice floated to her. “That makes any of the people who you can now see surrounded by light your family. Wherever you go, you belong to them, they belong to you.”
Leira felt the wave of energy cresting, threatening to overwhelm her. At the edges, she could also feel the pain of losing first her mother, and then her grandmother. Hell, not even knowing the name of her father. It drove straight through the center of the emotions coursing through her and punched her in the chest.
Instinctively, she pulled back, letting the energy subside.
Correk saw the pain in her eyes. “It’s okay. That’s enough for now. We’re here to enjoy the music and be with the humans you’ve adopted, anyway.”
“No, I want to know,” Leira protested, taking a sip of her beer, resisting the urge to ball her hands into fists.
“You will know. Give it time. At least longer than five minutes. Start by enjoying what’s happening around you,” he said, pointing at the band. “They’re not bad. You call this, what, funk? I might like this.”
She smiled, still struggling with the different emotions pushing their way through her from the inside out.
“When you get better at this I’ll show you how to see the different colors in the light around everybody. It’s like being able to read their minds. Right now, you’re a swirl of purple and yellow, which by the way, does not exactly look good on you. Very conflicted. I think you puny humans call it, mixed emotions.”
Leira laughed and gave Correk a gentle shove.
“Much better. You’ve blended into a nice green. On Oriceran it can be hard to have secrets. Everyone’s always up inside your colors.”
“I’ve said this before, you’ve been watching the puny humans way too much and it appears it’s mostly been bad cable TV.” Leira laughed again and felt the music move through her, making her want to dance. She started to move in time with the music. What the hell? Dance? I don’t do things like dance.
“Magic is just as much a part of you as the human elements,” said Correk. “Although, I’m not sure either world would actually call that dancing.” He laughed this time. Leira smiled and did her best to ignore him.
“Tell me more about the magical community. About Lavender Rock.”
“Ah, the kemana.”
“The what?”
“The kemana. It’s a place on Earth where the Oricerans who were here thousands of years ago stored as much energy as they could. They created different places where they’d be able to gather energy later, just in case.”
“Like an emergency battery. You mean in case they wanted to get home. So fucking weird. I suppose Oriceran is my home too, at least partly. It’s like finding out you’re part giraffe.”
“Not really. I’m letting that one go. You’re getting overwhelmed. Just enjoy the music. Let the spell work its way through you.”
“This isn’t like a drug thing, right?”
“You’d have a better time if you stopped thinking so much.” Correk watched Leira fight against the calming spell, looking around, taking in her environment. “Alright, no, it’s not. You’re not becoming a magic junkie. It’s a way of getting all your emotions, your energy to align but it only works for a little while. It’s nothing permanent. For that, you’ll have to learn to relax on your own. Apparently, it’s been too long since you’ve arrested someone.”
“Over twenty-four hours. That does feel like withdrawal.”
“You wanted to come here. Any chance you can be present and enjoy it?”
“You know how much I love a fucking challenge. Fine, I’ll be here, but I want a promise from you.”
“Let’s have it.”
“Go back with me to Lavender Rock and introduce me to everyone. Help me to get to know the family I didn’t even know I had.” Leira’s voice cracked when she said the last words. She was surprised yet again that night, at the emotion inside of her. Son of a bitch, if this is happiness… “Okay, okay. I can do this,” she said, shaking out her arms. “But promise me anyway.”
“I promise. I’ll take you to the local kemana. It will prove to be more interesting than you can imagine.”
“A teaser. I like it.”
“Come on, guys. How are you still standing over here like statues? Move to the music!” Mitzi was twirling around, her arms over her head, spinning between Correk and Leira. Scott was busy doing the twist with Margaret and Lucy, and Craig and Mike were jumping straight up and down. Leira joined Mitzi, throwing her arms up in the air and doing a bad rendition of the pony. She laughed harder than she could remember in a very lo
ng time.
I have more family than I realized. She spun around and felt the energy surge through her, lighting up all of the magical people in the room. Everywhere.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“You look like something I scraped off my shoe this morning.” Detective Hagan put a mug of hot coffee down in front of Leira, who was sitting upright at her desk in the precinct but resting her head to one side in the palm of her hand.
“Why so loud?” She lifted her head and looked at him.
“I could have sworn you never go out.” He sat down at his desk directly across from her and chuckled. “Good! It’s about time you acted your age, instead of mine. Believe me, you’ll get here fast enough. No need to speed things up. Next thing you know, you’ll need a good solid grunt to get out of a chair.”
“It wasn’t the drinking so much as the dancing. And I’m a damn runner!”
“Dancing! Now I’ve heard everything. You got your dance on! You must have strained something.” He did a little dancing in his chair. “No? Okay. Well, well, well. You were actually letting loose. This may take me longer to get used to than the idea of magic and shit. What the hell!” He laughed and slammed his hand down hard on the top of his desk, startling her.
“Seriously?”
“Sorry, I get exuberant. Rose points that out to me all the time. Frankly, half the time I think she likes it.”
“That’s definitely TMI. How do people do this every weekend?” Leira rolled her chair closer to the column next to her desk and leaned against it.
“You went at it too hard your first time. You have to build up to it. You got the bends,” Hagan said, chortling. “Boy, that takes me back to my community college days. Didn’t even go out till eleven. Still woke up pretty early in the morning. Take an actual sip of your coffee.”
“I don’t have a hangover.”
“Meh, can’t hurt. Coffee cures a lot of early morning issues.” Hagan wheeled his chair closer and put his hand up by his mouth to whisper, “Why don’t you stir a little magic in your coffee. Huh? You must have something in your magic bag that would help something like this?”
“You know, when you hold your hand up like that everyone knows you’re saying something they want to hear.” Leira did her best to muster up a dead fish look.
