Damsel Under Stress

by Shanna Swendson

  I braced myself for the usual meltdown as his fingers brushed the back of my neck. He seemed utterly oblivious to his effect on me as he handed me the necklace. I put it in my pocket while he dug in the hamper for dessert, which turned out to be slices of chocolate Yule log cake with chocolate filling and icing. “I think I really like Gloria,” I said.

  “I think she liked you, too. But I worry about how much she tries to do, keeping that big old house all by herself.”

  “She’s not by herself. She’s got a brownie helping her.”

  “She does? How did you find out?”

  “I caught the brownie last night while she was cleaning my room. I guess she usually uses an illusion to keep people from seeing her at work. She gave me permission to tell you because I said it would make you feel better, but you can’t let on to Gloria that you know.”

  “It does make me feel better. I wonder how long she’s had help.”

  “Since you were little, from the sound of it.”

  In the front seat, the two gargoyles started singing Christmas carols with great enthusiasm, if very little talent. Rocky might have been one of the few beings in the universe with a worse sense of pitch than I had, and Rollo’s attempts at harmony didn’t work, but their joy was infectious. Before I knew what I was doing, I was singing along, my terrible voice fitting right in. When Owen grinned and joined the chorus, his ability to carry a tune made him seem to be the one out of place.

  Soon, the singing had to stop because we’d reached the edges of the city proper and Rocky had to use his voice for shouting instructions to Rollo. Traffic was light on Christmas day, but this was New York, so “light” was a relative term. “Okay, start easing off the gas,” Rocky instructed. “Brake. Inch forward a bit—a little more—not that much. Green light! Go! Go! Go! Wait a second, brake! BRAAAAAAAAAKE!”

  I squeezed my eyes shut and turned my head because the rear of the truck in front of us was a little too close for comfort. When I didn’t feel a jolt or hear the screaming of tearing metal, I cautiously opened my eyes, only to close them again. I’d have been a little unnerved at driving myself in city traffic, but being a passenger in these circumstances was almost enough to make me want to get out and walk the rest of the way. The only thing keeping me from it was the fact that this was an unfamiliar neighborhood. It was also pretty cold outside.

  It only got worse as we made it into Manhattan proper, where driving down Broadway can be stop-and-go at the best of times. I had a feeling I’d be hearing, “A bit more, no, brake! Go! BRAAAAAKE!” in my nightmares for the next few nights. Other cars had an uncanny way of swerving out of our path, so we made remarkably good time. Finally, the car screeched to a halt in the middle of Times Square, with one wheel up on a curb just inches from a lamppost.

  “Okay, folks, here we are,” Rocky announced as Rollo climbed up onto the driver’s seat behind him. “And Sam’s nowhere to be seen, so it looks like we win.” He and Rollo started a victory dance. “We rocked and we rolled, we’re Rock and Roll,” they chanted.

  “Guess again, boys,” Sam said as he landed on the hood of the car. “Now, come on. You’ve got to see this.”

  Owen opened the car door and climbed out. I followed him. Merlin was already standing in the traffic island, looking up. As soon as I looked around and got my bearings, I realized why we’d been called back to New York. “Holy crap,” I said under my breath.

  My voice must not have been as soft as I’d thought, for Merlin turned to me. “I take it you see it, too. And that would mean it’s real, not illusion.”

  “Yeah, it’s real, all right.”

  All the brightly lit, giant billboards in Times Square were a glaring tribute to one Phelan Idris and his company, Spellworks. One billboard urged people to “Spell Different,” and I doubted we were part of a spelling bee. “Not very original, though,” I commented. “He’s reusing an old Apple slogan that wasn’t that great to begin with.” Another billboard said, “Do magic your way.” There were images of stodgy, gray conformists in suits being bested or shocked by colorful radicals.

  “Now we know what he was up to,” Owen said, staring up at the billboards.

  “I’m assuming these ads are veiled to the rest of the world,” I said. “Maybe the spell is filtered to target only people with magical ability?”

  “That’s probably it,” Owen agreed. “He’s definitely making a splash in a big way, and it appears to be that he’s attempting to legitimize his company among the general magical population. No more photocopied spell instructions sold in hole-in-the-wall shops.”

  “I’m afraid the implications are bigger than that,” I said, a sense of gloom filling me as the realization dawned on me. “Do you know how much this kind of thing costs? These ads are really physically here, which means he had to buy the ad space, and that costs millions. He’s bound to have the space for at least a week because New Year’s Eve is a prime high-traffic time here. And this probably isn’t his only advertising. You wallpaper Times Square to make a splash, but you also have to follow it up with ads that everyone else will see. Odds are, this little display is for our benefit so we’ll know he’s gunning for us.”

  “He’s got someone bankrolling him,” Owen said grimly, finishing my thought. “He might have been able to raise some cash through magically underhanded means, but not at this level. So he’s got someone rich—and presumably powerful—in league with him. Maybe that’s where your friend’s enemy comes in.” He gave a quick recap about Philip and Mr. Bones to Merlin.

  “That company certainly would have the capital to fund these activities,” Merlin said. “They’ve been one of our larger corporate customers—mostly security and contract-enforcement spells. I haven’t much liked Jackson Meredith in my few dealings with him, but I had no sense that he was unethical enough to be involved in this sort of thing.”

  “He’s currently ‘indisposed,’” I said, making air quotes. “His niece Sylvia is in charge now.”

  “Ah, yes, that would explain things. She quite clearly is evil.”

  “There’s got to be something else going on,” I said, staring at a larger-than-life image of Idris breaking a cement box with a karate chop. It looked like the hand breaking the box had been badly Photoshopped onto a picture of Idris striking a karate pose.

  “What do you mean? Isn’t this enough?” Owen asked.

  “Has Idris ever done anything splashy when he wasn’t there to see it? That’s his big downfall—he gets so sidetracked watching us react that he forgets to follow through on whatever advantage he’s gained.”

  “And that is the reason I called you in,” Merlin said. “I thought it would be a good time for a stakeout. He’s sure to be nearby.”

  All of us then turned and looked around Times Square. The area wasn’t quite as crowded as it was on most early evenings, but there were still enough people milling around that it would be hard to spot one unprepossessing wizard. “I don’t think I see him,” I said, well aware that I was probably the only one who would see him.

  We settled in to wait. Owen conjured up cups of hot coffee for us, and Rocky, Rollo, and Sam took aerial patrol. I wasn’t sure if there were any laws against loitering, but this didn’t seem like the kind of place where it would be easy to enforce them. Still, I couldn’t help but feel jumpy whenever a police officer went by. One finally did stop and ask us, “Are you folks waiting for something?”

  “I’m fascinated by these billboards,” Merlin said cheerfully. “Don’t you think they’re more entertaining than television?”

  The cop gave us a funny look, and I took Merlin’s arm. “Grandpa doesn’t get away from the nursing home often,” I said. “When he gets out for a holiday, we let him do some of his favorite things.”

  The cop nodded. “Ah, I see. Well, have a merry Christmas.” Then he moved on, and Owen and I immediately broke down in laughter.

  Merlin looked mildly amused. “I never thought I’d have to play the dotard in order to do my jo
b,” he said.

  As I turned to reply to him, I thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye. “Is that—? No, rats, it’s not,” I said.

  “Not what?” another voice asked. We all turned to see Rod. His hair still looked good, his skin was smoother, and if I wasn’t mistaken, he’d had his teeth whitened. “I just got the message and thought I’d join you. Any action?”

  “You mean other than convincing a cop that Grandpa’s senile and likes to look at the pretty lights when we let him out of the nursing home?” I asked.

  “So, no fight scenes yet, then.” He looked up and around at all the billboards. “These are truly, spectacularly awful.”

  I opened my mouth to respond, but then I saw something, and this time I was sure it was Idris. He was lurking just inside the doorway to a nearby restaurant, and he had a few of his usual gang surrounding him. “There!” I said.

  “Where?” Owen asked, then he said, “Oh, hell,” and waved his hand. Nothing much changed for me. I still saw the same menagerie of magical creatures—both the good guys and the bad guys. But judging from the screams, I got the feeling that now everyone else could see Mr. Bones and the circling gargoyles. “That’s not what I meant to do,” Owen groaned. “Katie, you and Rod see if you can catch up with Idris.” He and Merlin were already muttering magic spells, presumably to reveil all the magical folk who’d been revealed to the world.

  Rod waved to the gargoyles, who zoomed in on Idris like they were on a bombing run. “I got ’em!” Rocky shouted, latching onto Idris’s shoulder with his feet. A second later, he lost his grip. “Hey! Ow! That hurt! No fair!”

  Rod and I nearly reached Idris, but just before we got to him, a clump of tourists moving in an eerie zombie lockstep got in our way. I wormed my way through them, but when I got to the other side, Idris was gone. I made a full circle turn to see if I could spot him, but all I saw was Rod fending off a couple of women. It seemed Idris knew just how to target him. It must have been the first time in a very long while that Rod had actually fought to get away from women. Even the ugly magical creatures were gone. On the bright side, the worst of the panic had been quelled, as Owen and Merlin had apparently reveiled all the magical stuff.

  “He got away,” I reported when I got back to them and Rod had escaped from his female admirers with a couple of phone numbers. “He must have used that influence spell of his to get the crowd to block us. Is everything okay here?”

  “I think so,” Owen said wearily. “Next time, I won’t be so impatient and I’ll try targeting the unveiling a little better. It shouldn’t have hit the whole square like that, though. I thought it would only cover a short distance.”

  “There aren’t many with the power to forcibly remove veiling spells from that many beings at once,” Merlin said. “It was an impressive display, and there seems to have been little harm done. We put things right soon enough that most of these people will likely assume they just imagined it all. Not that you shouldn’t be more prudent in the future, with that kind of power at your disposal.” I remembered then what I’d overheard from James and Gloria. Merlin had a similar tone to his voice, a mixture of pride and concern.

  “I guess that spell needs more work,” Owen said with a shrug. His face was flushed, and he didn’t look Merlin in the eye.

  “I doubt Mr. Idris will make another appearance tonight,” Merlin said. “Now, I’ve taken away enough of your holiday. Please enjoy the rest of the evening, but I would like to meet in the morning. Say ten at my office?”

  Owen and I exchanged a look, then he said, “We’ll be there.”

  “Rocky and Rollo will get you the rest of the way home,” Sam told us. He then addressed the two goofy gargoyles, emphasizing each word. “In. One. Piece.”

  They saluted him. “Yes, sir, Sam, sir.”

  “Oh, off with you,” Sam grumbled.

  The drive from Times Square to my apartment near Union Square managed to be even more bizarre than the drive from the Eatons’ house into Manhattan. Owen gave Rocky directions for each turn, and then Rocky told Rollo when to drive or brake, so the entire drive was a flurry of, “Turn left at the next intersection. Ease up on the gas. BRAAAAAKE. Okay, now you can go. Then make another left. Stop, stop, stop! Go!” and so forth.

  When we finally stopped in front of my building—one tire up on the curb and the fender inches from a tree—Owen said, “I’m close enough to home. I can walk from here, and you guys can take the rest of the night off.” He looked about as pale and shaky as I felt. Once we were safely on the sidewalk with our bags, I vowed never again to complain about New York taxi drivers. After the Town Car peeled out into traffic, to much honking of horns, and took the next corner on two wheels, Owen turned to me and said, “Do you want some help getting your bag upstairs?”

  I was sorely tempted to say yes so I could then invite him in and try to salvage a little of what remained of Christmas, but my roommates would be getting home at any time now, and I knew he’d want to get home and study our latest problem. “No thanks,” I said reluctantly, “I’ve got it. I guess I’ll see you in the morning?”

  “Yeah. I’ll come by around nine-twenty.”

  “Okay.” I unlocked the front door, then turned back to face him. “Merry Christmas. And thanks for inviting me to go with you. Aside from the last hour or so, I really enjoyed it.”

  “And I enjoyed having you there. It made things a lot easier.”

  I would have hoped for a kiss, but I could tell he was distracted again, brooding over whatever had happened with that unveiling spell. After seeing James and Gloria, I understood better why physical affection wasn’t exactly second nature to him. I waved good-bye as he walked away, then picked up my bag and trudged up the stairs. The more time I spent around Owen and now his family, the dingier this stairwell seemed to me. I felt like I was entering a different world, or maybe going down to steerage on the Titanic after having been up on the first-class deck—and we know the steerage folks didn’t come out of that situation too well.

  It was hard to believe I’d only been gone a little more than a day, the apartment felt so foreign to me. It was stiflingly hot, which meant my downstairs neighbor must have spent the day complaining to the super about being cold, and he didn’t want to be called again on a holiday. I opened every window in the apartment and traded Gemma’s cashmere for a T-shirt before I unpacked. As much as I’d joked about enjoying the time alone and changing the lock before they got back, the apartment felt empty without my roommates.

  That reminded me, they weren’t expecting me to be home. I was supposed to have come back the next day. I needed an explanation for why I was already home and why I had to go to work the following day. And I needed it fast, considering I heard a key turning in the lock.

  Gemma yelped when she opened the door and saw me. Marcia, coming in behind her, dropped the bags she was carrying and assumed a defensive posture at Gemma’s yell.

  “Gee, I didn’t know I was that scary,” I said.

  “We weren’t expecting anyone to be here,” Gemma said. “Why are you here? Weren’t you supposed to be with the hottie’s folks until tomorrow? Nothing went wrong, did it?”

  I followed them as they carried their bags back to the closet to unpack. “No, nothing went wrong. The visit was fine. I was apparently a big hit with the folks.”

  “Of course you were,” Marcia said. “You’re a mother’s dream girlfriend for her son, unless she’s one of those controlling mamas who can’t handle the thought of turning her baby boy over to another woman.”

  “There was just a work crisis,” I continued my story, “and he had to come back to the city. I even have to go in for a while tomorrow because the executive I work for is part of it.”

  “What kind of business crisis comes up on Christmas?” Marcia asked.

  “It’s the perfect time for a business crisis. Don’t they often plan sneak attacks during wartime on Christmas, because they know your guard will be down?”


  Even Marcia didn’t have a good response to that. After they dumped their bags in the bedroom, Gemma ordered Chinese food, then we settled down to chat about our respective holidays while watching the last of the Christmas specials on TV until a commercial came on that almost made me spit rice across the room.

  Eleven

  P helan Idris’s face filled the TV screen, which in and of itself wasn’t a pleasant sight, but the implications were disturbing beyond that. He’d definitely launched a serious ad campaign. The ad urged magic users to try new and different spells to help them break out of their humdrum lives. Or something like that. The music used as background for the ads gave me a headache and was very distracting. The real surprise was the announcement of a Spellworks store, opening the next day on Fifth Avenue.

  I managed to cover up my shock at seeing the ad by going into a coughing fit and sputtering, “Oops, that went down the wrong way,” but I watched my roommates for their reactions at the same time. I doubted they’d seen what I saw, or surely they’d have commented on someone opening a magic store and claiming to sell actual spells. It would have been nice if they’d done me the favor of saying anything that would have hinted at the cover ad nonmagical people saw—something like, “Hey, sale at Victoria’s Secret!” or “Yeah, like a body spray really has that effect.” Unfortunately, whatever they used to mask the ad for normal people, it didn’t seem to be an ad worth noticing or snarking about. Once they were sure I wasn’t going to choke to death, my roommates went back to eating and chatting.

  The ad was the first thing I told Owen about when I met him on the sidewalk in front of my building the next morning. “I wish I could tell you what the rest of the world sees,” I finished, “but I couldn’t think of a way to ask my roommates what ad they saw on television without sounding like I’d lost my mind.”

  “This is not good,” he said, shaking his head. He looked tired. If I knew him, he’d been up most of the night thinking and researching.