Shadow Magic
Page 47
“It’s just this way, my dear,” I told him, taking his arm as we turned down a mirrored corner. There were a great many things I would not miss about our sojourn in the Ke-Han palace, but I couldn’t help but think I’d picked up one or two terribly clever ideas while there. I would have to see about getting mirrors installed in my own estate. If nothing else, they would keep me remarkably well coiffed at all times.
“I hope you’re leaving us enough time to pack,” Alcibiades said. “Not that I need as much time as some. Knowing you, you’ve probably got more clothes leaving than you did coming here.”
I waved my hand to dismiss the idea, then reached out to open the door that led down into the stables.
“It just seems that way because the fabrics are so voluminous,” I pointed out. “I’ll be the first to wear such fashions in Thremedon. I predict they’ll become a trend soon enough.”
“Yeah,” said Alcibiades, scuffing some hay aside with his boot. “Sure. I can’t believe you’re going back to all… to all that.”
“Whatever do you mean?” I asked.
Alcibiades blinked down at me. “You’re going back to Thremedon, I take it,” he said. “City of pleasures and vices alike. Well, not me. I’m not even stopping there. I’m going straight to the farm, and I guess that’s where we’ll be saying good-bye.”
I guided him through the bank of stalls that housed the mounts for the Ke-Han nobility. There was one at the end that held a horse much larger than normal, more like a farmer’s draft horse than one meant for a diplomat.
“Oh, my dear,” I said, releasing his arm as we drew up to the stall, “you have it all wrong. Do you think I would ever give up the opportunity to meet the famous Yana Berger?”
Alcibiades went still at my side. I glanced up at him, quite delighted with myself, only to find his expression changed. He looked quite serious all of a sudden.
I opened my mouth to apologize—or perhaps to express my shock at finally having provoked some emotion out of the general at last.
“It’s Petunia,” he said before I could speak, and the next thing I knew he was hefting himself up over the stable wall to put himself into the stall with his horse.
I sighed and plucked a stray piece of straw from my sleeve. I was going to have to have a whole new wardrobe made up for the countryside.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
JAIDA JONES is a graduate of Barnard College, where she wrote her thesis on monsters in Japanese literature and film. A poet and native New Yorker, she had her first collection of poetry, Cinquefoil, published by New Babel Books in 2006. She also writes the Shoebox Project—a Harry Potter fan website with over 5,000 subscribed members.
DANIELLE BENNETT is an ex-Starbucks barista from Victoria, British Columbia, where she studied English literature at Camosun College. She has finally seen her first firefly in New York City. Havemercy was her first publication.
Shadow Magic is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2009 by Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett
All rights reserved
Published in the United States by Spectra,
an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group,
a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
SPECTRA and the portrayal of a boxed “s” are trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Jones, Jaida.
Shadow magic / Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-553-90675-2
I. Bennett, Danielle. II. Title.
PS3610.O6256S53 2009
813′.6—dc22
2009013270
www.ballantinebooks.com
v3.0
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
ABOUT THE AUTHORS