by Jess Haines
“First, I would like to know about your family. I understand you live with your mother. She’s human, yes?”
Kimberly’s eyes widened, and she pulled away just a bit in surprise. “How did you know that? Have you been checking up on me?”
He gave her a smile with a few too many teeth showing. “You asked for a shot at wooing one of the rarest and most powerful Others to walk this world. They don’t usually accept an audience without knowing beforehand that the intentions of their visitors are pure.”
She didn’t flinch from his posturing, giving him a wry look. “Melodrama suits you. You could have done things the easy way and just asked me. But to answer your question, yes.”
That startled him into dropping the fierce look in favor of a bit of laughter. “I suppose I do tend to the overly dramatic now and then, don’t I? Yes, I’d like to know a bit more. Who your father is, for starters. Any magical connections in your bloodline you’re aware of. What can you tell me about yourself and your family?”
“I don’t know who my father is. My mom said she had a one night stand back in her clubbing days and the guy must have been a mage. Her parents kicked her out when she got pregnant, so she’s raised me by herself. I’ve been helping her pay the rent doing odd-jobs and babysitting since I was eleven. We didn’t even know I could cast until I was sixteen and started summoning illusions every time I got stressed.” She coughed and blushed, giving him a sheepish smile. “She didn’t believe it until we had a screaming match about a guy I was seeing and it looked like I turned her into a giant shrew. As soon as it wore off, we looked into how I could get some formal training to get it under control. That’s how I got into Blackhollow.”
He gave a snort, amusement curving his lips. “I see. Well, your lineage isn’t quite as important as your circumstances or your intentions. Tell me a bit more about what you’re doing now and your plans for yourself and your familiar.”
She pulled her hand out of his grip, grasping the hem of her shirt to pull it out and brush at the patch of powdered sugar against the dark green button-down. He couldn’t help but notice that the third button from the bottom was missing. To keep from staring at that enticing hint of flesh visible between the gap in her shirt, he focused his gaze on her face instead. That’s when he noted the dark circles under her eyes for the first time and just how prominent her cheekbones were.
Exhausted and probably hungry, it was no wonder she’d had such a difficult time finding her composure. He would get his answers, then send her home—and think of some way to help her. He didn’t want to keep her too late waiting for takeout and wasn’t prepared to feed her, which bothered him far more than it should have. He would remedy that tomorrow.
“Well, I was really hoping to get a job in the entertainment unit at The Circle after I graduate, but I’ll take anything I can find as long as it pays better than what I’m doing now and I actually get to use my skill set. I’m working at a café—”
“Which one?”
“Allegretto’s. Anyway, I take as many hours as I can to help Mom pay the rent. I go every day after school, and I usually work a shift on Saturday and most Sundays, too. The rest of the time I’m in school or studying.”
That explained the smear of sugar on her shirt. He waited to see if she had anything to add. Maybe discuss spending time with friends or greater ambitions than a job designing themed illusions for parties hosted by those rich enough to afford such extravagance. Which still didn’t explain what she wanted the dragon for. He would have assumed a walk-on position in management, or maybe doing some flashy sub-contracting work for the Department of Defense. Considering Eleanor’s involvement, it was the most logical assumption.
As the silence stretched between them, he frowned and tilted his head as he studied her, taking a surreptitious sniff to see if he might have missed a scent cue.
Nothing.
“Are you honestly telling me you want a dragon familiar, but have no intention of using its power?”
She swept a hand through her hair and gave an impatient huff before answering him. “Of course not. I need to graduate, don’t I?”
“Yes, yes,” he replied, impatient, “but once that’s done and you have your dream job—then what?”
She shrugged. “I guess I’d let it go. I don’t need a familiar to cast my illusions, and I wouldn’t be any use to anybody anywhere else in the coven. It would be nice if I could borrow from its hoard to get a nicer place—maybe some new clothes, too—but I’d pay it back as soon as I could.”
She believed every word that came out of her mouth. There was not the slightest hint of a lie in her scent, no taste of deception from her. He was utterly baffled by her lack of greed and ambition. What she’d said was true—all she wanted was to improve her lot. After seeing her wardrobe, he supposed he could understand why.
That sent the very last of his doubts and assumptions about her out the window. The situation was not what he had assumed at all—though Eleanor had a hand in it, which meant he still had reason to be wary.
“Very well. I can see you’re tired. Why don’t you go home and get some rest. Tomorrow night, I’ll meet you at your café and we can get started.”
His heart gave a lurch at the surge of hope shining in her eyes. “You’ll introduce me to a dragon?”
“Not yet. But,” he hastened to add, hoping to alieve that crushing disappointment killing the hope in her eyes before it had chance to take root, “you’ll be taking a big step in the right direction.”
Now if only he could find a way to give her what she needed without destroying her—or her building trust in him—in the process.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The next day, Kimberly breezed through her classes, for once looking forward to heading to work. Having learned her lesson about relying on her illusions, she had picked her best clothes out of her closet and talked her mom into helping her put her hair into a neat French braid before they both rushed out the door that morning.
Most of the other students gave her a wide berth throughout the day. There was new graffiti on her locker, and a wooden coin on a string which had a repel evil glyph etched into it, which was insulting but harmless. Compared to Aiden’s prank with the fire, Kimberly counted herself lucky there wasn’t something dangerous or obnoxious waiting for her in the halls beyond some dirty looks and dispel glyphs being air drawn in her direction. She ignored the spattered insults on the industrial gray paint, untied the charm from the latch, and tucked it away in her locker. They weren’t cheap, after all. Maybe she could pawn or reuse it.
In both her Understanding and Applying Counterspells and her Advanced Casting Circles: Group Circles and Related Spells classes, no one wanted her as a lab partner. She overheard a few of them whispering about Aidan and the naga a few times. Aidan wasn’t around and no one knew if Dean Morrell had expelled or just suspended him.
The only student brave enough to ask her about what had happened the day before was a boy named Xander. Though she’d seen him around—he was a 4th year like her, and they had a few of the same classes—they had never spoken before until they were assigned as lab partners in the counterspell class. He was a lot more popular than she was and, truth be told, she’d had something of a crush on him from afar. He had a kind, charmingly crooked smile that always made the corners crinkle up around his eyes, but considering the company he usually kept, she had never felt comfortable approaching him.
They worked together to draw the intricate runic circle designed to dispel electrical energy. He kept sneaking looks at her from across the table until she got sick of it and asked him what was on his mind. They both kept their voices low so as not to draw the Professor’s attention.
“Do you know what happened to Aidan? Yesterday, I mean?”
Her charcoal smudged as her hand jerked, and she cursed quietly under her breath before answering him. “Professor Reed took him to see the dean after he hurt Sam.”
“Sam?”
“The
naga.”
“I didn’t know it had a name.”
At her incredulous look, he reddened and turned his attention back to filling in the thicker portion of the spiral he was working on with his charcoal. Neither of them said anything for a few minutes.
“It—Sam—he gave you luck, didn’t he?”
Kimberly kept her eyes glued to the newsprint, though her hand went still on the paper. Considering how things had gone for her the night before, she wasn’t so sure about that. She shook her head, then resumed sketching out an oval with a line through the center.
“Maybe. I don’t know. The way things have been going for me the past few days, I’ll be lucky to make it through the rest of the school year intact.”
He gave her a smile that soon had her smiling back.
“I wouldn’t worry about it,” he said. “You’ve got skills the rest of us don’t. I always wanted to ask you about those illusions you did in our first conjuration class. Professor Harrington, right?”
Their laughter got them a visit from Professor Cohen, who stood over them tapping his foot while they put their noses back to the shared table and diligently applied charcoal to paper. When he moved on a few minutes later, they continued a whispered conversation and agreed to meet over the weekend to do homework together. For the first time in a long time, Kimberly thought she might have made a friend.
So she was in good spirits when Cormac arrived at the café a little after 9:30 that night, a half hour before her shift was supposed to end. After serving a late night dessert of ladyfingers and an espresso to the man ahead of him in line, who was giving him a strange look, she leaned over the counter to give Cormac a sunny grin and take his order.
He had been taking in the rest of the store—every visible inch, not just the selection of sweets, muffins, and specialty loaves of bread—and in return was being ogled by the few customers hoping to get a late night discount. Their blatant stares might have had something to do with the severe wool peacoat and neatly pinned cravat he was wearing. Or maybe it was the chiseled cheekbones and intense eyes, combined with just enough scruff to make him look like a rake in duke’s clothing. No doubt, the getup was odd and anachronistic, even for New York City and its legions of hipsters.
“What can I get you while you wait?”
He shook his head and turned those icy blue eyes on Kimberly, his look so intense it momentarily stole her breath away. She could have sworn something in that look said you.
“What would you recommend?” he asked.
A little flustered, she turned away, bustling over behind the display case with the cookies. “Um, our biscotti is out of this world. You like hazelnut coffee, so you’d probably like the chocolate-dipped cinnamon hazelnut. Or maybe the anise? Oh, or the banana-rum—”
“The first one sounds fine,” he said, the quirk of his lips slipping from sultry to amused. “Choose something for yourself, too. My treat.”
She got him his coffee and biscotti—then a second biscotti for herself when he insisted—and rang him up. After she slid his change across the counter, he tugged a bill out of his wallet that made her eyes bug and stuffed it in the tip jar, along with the change. Ignoring the look she gave him, he picked up his treats and headed to one of the three circular tables over by the windows.
For the next half hour, Kimberly did what she could to ignore how he watched her every move over the rim of his cup. Staying industrious helped, but her hands were shaking with nervous energy and she fumbled a few times, spilling coffees and dropping pastry crumbles on the floor and counters.
It wasn’t very busy, but Don eventually came out to help her clean up behind the counter. He gave his best shouldn’t you be moving along look to Cormac, but it didn’t do a thing to stir him.
“This guy bothering you?” Don asked, not bothering to lower his voice.
Kimberly set down the rag she was using to wipe down the counter and put her hands on her hips as she gave Cormac a pointed look while answering Don. “He’s being a bit of a weirdo tonight, but no. He’s waiting for me.”
Don looked back and forth between the two, frowning. He radiated disapproval for the remaining five minutes Kimberly had on the clock, and didn’t say a thing when Cormac offered her his arm. She tilted her head, staring up at him with a puzzled expression as he led her outside. She waited until they were half a block away from the café before she opened her mouth.
“What is up with you tonight? You’re acting so strange.”
He glanced down at her, a hint of that rakish smile returning. “I’m finding I’m enjoying this excuse to get away from my responsibilities for a night.”
That, and he thought he might be able to upstage that naga that had left its mark on her with what he had planned. His actions tonight would set in motion the first steps of his strategy to scare up a decent familiar for Kimberly. The stir his involvement would cause in the local fae community would be delicious and was guaranteed to pique the interest of any number of powerful elemental creatures. Never mind that the thought of someone else bonding with her made him grit his teeth. He relished the challenge of it.
So they walked, arm in arm, urged along by the brisk April wind.
Kimberly kept sneaking looks up at Cormac, hardly noticing where they were going. He was such a puzzle to her. Handsome and severe, and maybe kind in a quirky way, but she wouldn’t have pegged him as adventurous. Plus she was starting to wonder if he might be attracted to her. Nothing else made sense of him doing his best impression of Colin Firth, with his Darcy-esque staring in the café, or why he was going out of his way to be so nice to someone who was basically a stranger to him.
Being an adult about it, she decided to ignore that for now.
“Where are we going?”
“Not far. I’m taking you to meet an old friend of mine who runs a café of her own.”
“If you wanted to do dinner, we could have stayed. Don makes a mean chef’s salad.”
“Delightful as that sounds, I’m afraid I have an ulterior motive for asking you to dinner. This place is something of a congregation spot for Others looking for a safe place to meet and relax. I’m taking you along to… well, let’s just say we’re showing you off.”
She nudged his ribs with her elbow, prompting him to glance down at her. “What’s that supposed to mean? Showing me off… to whom? Or what?”
Cormac lightly bumped her shoulder in return, giving her a smile brimming with anticipation as they passed under a street lamp. “The local network of elementals. All the creatures that want to hide from your kind. Remember to play nice.”
Eyes wide and so firmly focused on him that she didn’t notice a crack in the sidewalk, she didn’t get a chance to respond as she tripped. Her jaw snapped shut as she stumbled, tightening her grip on him to stay on her feet. He stopped, moving inhumanly fast to catch her before she could fall.
He held her that way a long moment, one arm around her waist and the two almost nose-to-nose, both of them breathing a bit too hard. She slowly straightened, and he pulled back once she was steady again, fingertips lingering on her arms.
When she cleared her throat, he stepped back and offered her his arm again. They resumed walking, a bit slower this time.
“Thank you,” she said. At his nod, she chuckled and scuffed her shoe on the sidewalk. “Some big, bad, scary monster of the night I turn out to be. Can’t even watch where I’m walking.”
“There is nothing scary or monstrous about you. There are plenty of Others who might disagree, a few of which will be at the café tonight, but this will lay the groundwork for us to find what you need.”
She laughed again, not quite so strained this time.
“You say the sweetest things. So, back on track. You’re telling me there are a bunch of different kinds of Others a mage might want to make into their familiar in the city, and they’re all hiding in plain sight? I mean, Professor Reed did show me a list of some Others that supposedly live here in town, but I was having
a tough time believing it.”
“Of course. Like many other cities, some breeds native to this part of New York are extinct, or nearly so, thanks to the encroachment of humanity and interference from spellcasters of all kinds. The bulk of those still alive keep their heads down and live on the outskirts of civilization, avoiding magi for the most part. Many of them hide behind a human guise most of the time. Those who do live in cities mostly live in a constant state of fear of being discovered, and only congregate in safe havens like the one I’m taking you to tonight. Which, for their safety and yours, I ask you not to visit without me.”
Kimberly shook her head, her smile slipping. “They really do hate us, don’t they?”
Cormac didn’t respond right away. When they paused at a crosswalk, he tilted his head up, squinting at the few stars visible in the sky. Even with his keen vision, the light pollution from the city made them hard to spot from his current vantage point.
“Centuries ago, it used to be an honor to serve with a mage. There were contracts, agreements, mutual benefits… but times have changed. It’s more like slavery now. There’s no guarantee they’ll be given their freedom back. Can you blame them for being afraid?”
“No. Of course not.”
“Don’t worry about convincing anyone about anything tonight. For now, we’re just stirring the pot to see what comes to the surface. My contact won’t fear you. She knows almost every Other in the Tri-State Area and hates magi with a burning passion.”
Kimberly jerked to a halt, her hand slipping from his arm. He paused, looking back to her in question.
“Hates magi? Why the hell are you taking me to meet someone who will hate me on sight?”
He grinned. “Because as soon as she hears what you’re looking for, she’ll get in touch with everyone she knows and tell them to go into hiding. The ones strong enough to be worth your while will be struck with insatiable curiosity and stir themselves to investigate. Some may even come to you with an offer.”
She frowned at him. He just held out one hand for her own, sweeping the other out to gesture in the direction he’d been leading her.
