In the end, though, she realized that what she had thought were compatible traits were simply excuses. He liked her because she gave him legitimacy and she, in turn, had used him for leads.
And then there had been the issue of the magic.
He had none. And he had accidentally found out about hers, creating a scene she’d never forget. He wanted her to use it, to abuse it, to make them both rich, to make them famous, to make them the couple of the century.
And he begged her for immortality, as if that were in her power to give.
She was breaking up with him when she had been summoned to the Fates, who reminded her about the no-talking-to-mortals rule. Zoe had outlined what happened, trying to make it clear that his discovery was an accident.
She wasn’t ever sure if the Fates believed her, but they didn’t punish her. They made it clear, though, that future violations wouldn’t be tolerated.
They had scared her that day, and she had believed them. She’d heard of their punishments—Sisyphus and the rock was their idea, although no one remembered what the crime had been—and she wanted nothing of it.
So she vanished from L.A. Vanished and went to Vegas, but stubbornly did not change her name.
Maybe she thought the bookie would come looking for her, riding into the neon-coated streets in his white convertible, a hero on a white horse.
But she never heard from him again. And even though she dated, she never got involved again, either. Better to keep her emotions in check then go through another wrenching experience of a serious breakup for the umpteenth time in a hundred years.
And now she had promised to help Travers Kinneally. He wasn’t mortal, but he was the next best thing—a man newly arrived in his magic. A man with eight years of misunderstandings and mistakes behind him.
A man with an eleven-year-old son, which made him a man with a history, although not a history as bad as hers.
Zoe carried the yogurt drink into the nearby half-bath and looked at herself in the mirror. She still looked mid-thirties. No new wrinkles had appeared on her face since Lincoln was president. She didn’t have any gray hairs, and she worked hard to keep her figure without resorting to magical treatments.
But even if she were to take how old she looked, as opposed to how old she was, she was too old for Travers. She had been over one hundred years old when Travers Kinneally was born. When that sank in, what would he think?
Modern American men had enough trouble being younger than the women they dated. Imagine being this much younger.
Then Zoe smiled, and the crow’s feet she’d had since she got her magic reappeared like valued old friends. She wasn’t going to date Travers Kinneally. She was going to teach him. The way old crones were supposed to handle young and studly men.
Zoe sighed, took another sip of the artificially sweetened yogurt drink, and stepped out of the bathroom. She wandered into the TV room, turned the jazz on in here, and sank into her 1970s couch. Big as a single bed with cushions that had only gotten softer with age, this couch was where she went when she needed to think.
And she really needed to contemplate all that she had learned this day—beyond Travers Kinneally, who was a problem in and of himself.
“Aaaack! Where you been? Where you been?” The voice sounded almost machine-like, but it belonged to her temporary familiar, Black Bart. He sat on his perch near the couch and peered down at her, his parrot’s eyes glittering as he took her in.
“Working, Bart,” she said with a sigh. She was glad that Black Bart was her temporary familiar—an Interim Familiar, just like the Interim Fates, and just about as competent. Fortunately, in the short term, she didn’t need a competent familiar. She just needed one that would keep her magic pure, and the familiar’s very presence did that.
Otherwise, she wouldn’t have been able to use Black Bart as a substitute at all.
“Bartie like the Babe,” the bird said, and hopped down to the side of the couch, wanting his feathers stroked. He’d been saying that about babes ever since he met Zoe.
The proprietor of the magic store, who catered to both Faeries and mages, said Bart found Zoe attractive. She certainly hoped that analysis was wrong—the last thing she needed was a jealous parrot—but Bart certainly seemed proprietary in his own little avian way.
What she needed was her own familiar, not a borrowed one, and one of her many realizations today was that she wouldn’t get her own familiar, not as long as the Interim Fates were in office. They didn’t even know enough to clean up after a rather panicked dachshund; they certainly wouldn’t know how to create the perfect match between the right mage and the right familiar.
“Babe need lunch?” Bart asked, which was his way of asking if she would make any food soon. He usually got a treat when she did, mostly to keep him quiet.
She did a lot to keep him quiet.
“Not at the moment, Bart,” she said, feeling lucky that he hadn’t heard her open the refrigerator door. “Maybe later.”
“Later, later, later,” he said, like a rejected child. She half expected him to add, it’s always later with you. But of course he didn’t. He might a familiar, blessed with his own peculiar magic, but he couldn’t really speak any more than any other familiar could. She would have to spell him to give him a capacity beyond a normal parrot’s.
Zoe leaned back in the couch, letting the cushions envelope her. She put her bare feet on the coffee table and closed her eyes. The Interim Fates had worried her, and Nero had scared her. Partly because he had appeared so abruptly, but mostly because of his own personal brand of incompetence.
He had only a little magic—as evidenced by his entrance—yet he was willing to use it to attack the Fates. Fortunately, he wasn’t very bright, and Zoe had been able to fool him.
But she might not be so lucky next time.
And if something happened to the Fates, then the mages would be stuck with the Interim Fates for good.
So she had agreed to take the case, against her better judgment. She didn’t want to be in the middle of magical politics, but she felt like she had no choice.
Travers certainly couldn’t help the Fates, even if he had wanted to, and getting them to someone else—someone competent—might prove difficult. It wasn’t until after Zoe had completed her disappearance spell that she realized what danger she had put the Fates in.
She had held them in the magic stream while she dealt with Nero. Someone else could have found them and swept them along, and Zoe might never have been able to find them.
It had taken nearly two more hours, between her and Travers, to get the entire story of the wheel out of the Fates. The women went through dozens of digressions, and one small magic tutorial session for Kyle (who seemed oblivious—only Travers seemed interested).
Finally, something like a coherent story emerged: The wheel was a spinning wheel and, of course, it had magic. Thousands of years ago, the Fates used it to enhance their powers whenever they were called upon to administer justice. The wheel increased the Fates’ ability a thousandfold, and they needed it in those long-ago days.
At least, Clotho believed they needed it. Lachesis didn’t, calling it a crutch, and Atropos tried to calm the disagreement—one that had clearly been going on for centuries.
Zoe put the heels of her hands against her closed eyes. She couldn’t even think about the Fates without going into a digression. They were rubbing off on her and she hated it.
“Babe need a backrub?” Bart asked, apparently sensing her distress.
“Babe needs a new life,” Zoe said without opening her eyes.
“Backrub only,” Bart said, with his uncanny ability to communicate.
“No thanks, kiddo,” Zoe said, and sank deeper into the couch.
The wheel had disappeared three thousand years ago. At least, the Fates thought it was about three thousand years ago. Their sense of time was so fluid, though, that Zoe couldn’t be sure if the wheel vanished a thousand years ago, three thousand years ago, o
r last week.
Well, she was fairly certain that it hadn’t disappeared last week since the Fates were already looking for it then.
Still, she had never worked on a case this old or one this cold. The Fates had done nothing to find the wheel. They hadn’t used magic and they hadn’t done the old-fashioned asking-around either.
They believed they knew what happened.
At the time, the Faeries and the mages were having a power struggle over dominion of the mortals. (The Fates had a long digression over this: Lachesis had called the conflict a war; Atropos had said it was merely a struggle; and Clotho had called it unimportant.)
The Faeries were coming up in importance—they were gaining footholds in parts of Europe that the Fates couldn’t seem to touch—and they wanted even more power. The Faerie Kings snuck into the Hall of Justice and made off with the wheel.
At least, that was what Zoe thought happened. The Fates had erupted into a very bitter, very personal argument that had stopped as suddenly as it started. Travers had given Zoe a perplexed look and she had shrugged.
She had never heard of the Fates fighting before that night.
There was more to this Faerie King story than the Fates were willing to admit.
The upshot, though, was that the Fates had survived just fine without the wheel. It had augmented their powers in the early days, but it hadn’t done much once they learned how to control their own enhanced magicks.
But the wheel had powers of its own, powers that amplified—and sometimes created—magic where there was none. And because the Fates had used the wheel in the past, they had a tie to it.
The wheel could restore their magic, not just at the level it was at before they gave it up, but strengthened a thousand times. The Fates would be strong enough to take on Zeus and any cohorts he had among the Powers That Be.
And that was more than enough to get Zoe to sign on—that, and the Interim Fates, and Nero.
“Bart want cracker,” Black Bart said.
“No, you don’t.” Zoe let her hands drop. “You hate crackers.”
“Okay. Lunch.” The bird was hungry. She would have to check his food dish. It was probably empty. He always stuffed himself when she left him home alone.
“Lunch, then,” Zoe said and stood up. She had a lot of work to do. Tracing the wheel would not be easy. She hoped that it had found its way out of Faerie and into some museum collection, but she doubted that had happened.
Still, she had to start somewhere. The Internet would be her initial guide—there had to be art or artifacts that pictured the wheel. They might not be accurate (some of the early drawings of the Fates pictured them as wizened old women, a guise they had never worn), but the pictures would at least give her a place to start.
She might also try to hack into some of the Faerie sites, and see what was listed in their version of eBay. Faeries didn’t care about money; they collected items with totemic and magical value. That was one of the many reasons Faeries ran casinos; people came in with their lucky rabbits feet or their good-luck hats and often left without them. Superstition imbued those items with a slight radiance, and Faeries valued that radiance.
Zoe had no idea how much power the wheel gave off, but she suspected it was a lot. And maybe, just maybe, she’d be lucky enough to find traces of it on the Web.
Otherwise, an actual search might take her into Faerie, where she didn’t want to go.
And she certainly didn’t want to go alone, with no one to back her up. The Fates had no power, and Travers didn’t know how to use his—he’d just be a victim in there.
Zoe had no one else to ask.
If she were even strong enough to get past her fears, which she most decidedly was not.
“Lunch,” Bart said, and it was not a question. It was a demand.
“Sorry,” Zoe said. She had gotten lost in thought. Just like she would get lost in Faerie.
This case was going to be dangerous. She would have to do everything to remain alert, cautious—and safe.
Even if it meant going back on her promise to the Fates.
Sixteen
The next morning, Travers had definitive proof that he had not been dreaming: he woke up in a king-sized bed in a hotel suite in Las Vegas.
He had hoped that the last week had been some elaborate nightmare, dreamed in installments, rather like a mini-series sent by Mr. Sandman.
Of course, Travers couldn’t get that lucky.
He ordered breakfast from room service, and managed to be showered and dressed long before it arrived. He set the complimentary USA Today next to his chair, since a newspaper was always part of his morning routine, and he waited until the waiter had left and the food was spread on the table before waking Kyle.
Kyle was not—by any stretch—a morning person.
Travers was. Each new day was a new opportunity, and he liked looking at the day as if he were starting over with a clean slate. Only this morning, he felt like the slate was rather smudged, and he didn’t know what to do about it.
He had called his office, sent the clients with emergencies to another CPA whose work he respected, and told his secretary to let the rest of his clients know that Travers wouldn’t be back for another week due to family problems.
Kyle staggered out of his own room, and shuffled to the table, looking more like an old man than an eleven-year-old boy. He had splashed water on his face, but forgot to dry it off. His skin was dotted with droplets, his hair slicked back against his scalp. The front of his pajama top was soaking, but Travers didn’t say anything.
Kyle would notice eventually, when he became awake enough.
Right now, he wasn’t even awake enough to notice that his father had ordered him waffles with strawberries and whip cream, a meal that Travers usually called desert and not breakfast. Travers had also ordered a plate of sausages which, he figured, if they didn’t eat them, Bartholomew Fang would. Travers got pancakes for himself, and a fruit bowl, which he would save for later.
The thing that smelled the best, though, was the coffee. Travers didn’t realize how very exhausted he was—the stresses of the last week, and the revelation about himself, had put a strain on him that he wasn’t used to.
Kyle was halfway through his waffle and strawberries before he paused to rub his eyes. Then he stretched, sighed, and returned to his breakfast.
Travers smiled. At least this part of the morning was normal. Kyle would finish eating and soon the conversation would start, as his son slowly realized the day had begun.
Only this time, Travers wasn’t quite as willing as usual to have a conversation. He still had a lot of thinking to do. He no longer doubted that he had magical ability. In fact, his point of view on that had changed so much in the last twenty-four hours that he now wondered how he could have doubted it.
His own capacity for self-delusion startled him. Last night, he had made the mistake of trying to fall asleep by counting the magical incidents that he could remember—anything odd, anything out of the ordinary. He paused with each one, recalling the events, and started to wonder how anyone could have missed the cause.
He was sure the Fates had a theory as to how he could have missed it, and he knew that Zoe would have an opinion.
She seemed to have an opinion about everything else.
He liked that about her. Her self-assurance, her strength, her obvious intelligence. During his long bout of self-analysis the night before, he realized he would have been attracted to her, magic or not.
And that presented a problem.
It presented several problems, actually. The first was how to deal with his attraction to a woman who was going to act as his teacher. The second problem was how to convince her that he was interested—truly interested, not just magically obligated. And the third concerned Kyle.
Travers had vowed not to get involved with anyone while his son was at home. Travers had seen too many of his friends bounce from “serious” relationship to “serious” relationship, leav
ing their children confused, scared, and hurt.
Cheryl had already done a lot of damage to Kyle, by leaving and not returning, not writing, not caring about anyone but herself. Travers was determined to cause as few injuries to his son as possible, and one way to guarantee that was to make sure Kyle didn’t bond with anyone who wouldn’t be in his life for the rest of his life.
You couldn’t guarantee that with girlfriends, and you couldn’t explain casual relationships to a child—maybe not even to an eleven-year-old boy. And explaining attraction was even more out of the question: Travers couldn’t ask his son for permission to explore an interest in a woman who might simply turn out to be a passing fad.
Kyle pushed his plate away as Bartholomew Fang padded out of the bedroom. The dog, apparently, was even less of a morning person than Kyle was.
“Does the dog have to go out?” Travers asked.
“I took him out a few hours ago,” Kyle said.
Travers felt the pancakes he had eaten turn to lead in his stomach. “Without waking me?”
“Don’t sweat it, Dad,” Kyle said. “We went onto the patio. There’s some plants tucked against the rail.”
Travers wasn’t sure if he was more appalled at Kyle’s willingness to let the dog use a patio plant as a bathroom or the fact that Kyle thought it was appropriate.
Then Kyle giggled. “You’re too tense, Dad. We went just outside the front door. Of the hotel.”
The pancakes felt even heavier. Kyle had no idea how dangerous other cities were. He and Travers lived a pretty secluded life in their little portion of Los Angeles, and Kyle knew the risks there. He just couldn’t assume every place was as safe as the ones he knew at home.
“Kyle, you have to let me know when you’re leaving the room,” Travers said.
“You’d’ve figured it out,” Kyle said.
“Next time you tell me.” Travers heard his own father in his voice, and he didn’t care. “It’s dangerous out there.”
“The bellman was watching the entire time,” Kyle said.
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