There's No Business Like Mage Business

by Nikki Haverstock

  “Sounds great, Dr. Trout.” I gave Beth a big smile and a thumbs-up. “We’ll see you in a minute.”

  Beth stepped back. “Right now? I can’t go just yet. I need to…” She looked around for something that she couldn’t find.

  I carefully grabbed her arm, her purse off the floor by the door, and her cat then forcefully led her to the front door. “She’s really excited to meet you, but she has patients, so she asked that we come right down.” I clicked the front door behind us and locked it with a key attached to the outside of the purse.

  I didn’t notice that I had left Patagonia inside until I found her already in my car, on the passenger seat. I shooed her to the back then helped Beth sit down then plopped her cat and bag in her lap. I had moved fast enough that Beth was only just realizing what had happened.

  I grabbed a bag from the back seat. “Look. I bought doughnuts and another sandwich. Eat up!”

  I slammed the door and ran around to get into the driver’s seat. I barely got buckled up before screeching the tires as I pulled away from the curb.

  I slid an eye to her, fearful that she might be contemplating jumping from the car, but she was rooting around in the bag before pulling out a grass-green doughnut with lime-colored icing.

  She bit into it and flopped back with her eyes closed. “This is so good.” She made happy little noises as she nibbled on the doughnut, relishing each bite.

  I really wanted to ask her about Legacy, but I didn’t want to risk her running away and possibly overdosing before I could find her. But maybe when we were near the hospital, I could ask a couple of questions. I had planned to really grill her on how it felt to take Legacy then talk about where she got hers in the past, but now I really wanted to know where she got it. Any details about the supply chain that she knew. Too many questions.

  I had a rough idea of where I was heading even in the unfamiliar neighborhood, and eventually, I popped out onto a street I recognized and turned right toward the hospital. We weren’t too far, and I started to relax. Beth was thoroughly engrossed in the doughnuts. She was licking her fingers and diving back in for another.

  “Thanks, Ella. I really appreciate this.”

  “Sure thing. Take as much food as you want.”

  She chuckled for the first time. “Not the doughnut. I mean this. Taking me to the hospital. I was just so scared. Just knowing that I don’t have to walk in alone helps.”

  I halted at a stop sign and flashed her a quick smile before turning. “No problem. Call me anytime.”

  “I don’t even know how I started again. I was having such a hard time but had been clean since Tony was killed. I took a sabbatical. Thanks, by the way, for helping with that.”

  “No problem.” I had spoken with Vanessa’s cousin Olivia, who owned and ran the Golden Pyramid Casino, about Beth’s situation.

  “I was starting to feel a bit better. So much so that I went over to the Magia casino a bit after it opened to see DJ Wiz at the club. We all used to know him before he got big. He, Michael, and Tony were friends, you see, but I hadn’t seen him since the funerals. It was a good night. I went back a few other nights, and one of the times…”

  I shot her a quick glance as I stopped at a light. I could feel her agitation building the closer we got to the hospital. She was ripping little pieces off a receipt she had found in the bag, showering her familiar with a dusting of white confetti. She didn’t seem to notice she was doing it.

  When the light turned green, I drove a little faster than I had been. I desperately wanted to know where she got the Legacy, but I wasn’t sure if that would push her over the edge. But when she continued talking, I didn’t stop her.

  “I was in the Snakebite Room—it’s this VIP area in the club that DJ Wiz works at—and this bartender was being really funny and nice. And I just felt so lonely, so when he offered me some Legacy, I thought it couldn’t hurt. I don’t remember much after that, but I started going back weekly, then more often. I would have sworn that was just, like, last month, but… I don’t know. You said I left six months ago? It must have been a lot longer.”

  “It’s okay, Beth.” I patted her on the knee. “Eat some of that sandwich.”

  She pulled out the sandwich I had bought for myself and bit into it. “Mmm, bacon.”

  She chewed merrily on the bacon, lettuce, tomato, and avocado on sourdough bread. My stomach growled in response, and I quietly promised it could have some trifle French fries and a bacon Brie burger when I got to work.

  I tried to focus on the road while reaching out to monitor Beth’s emotions. Dr. Trout’s warning was foremost in my mind. Maybe the other Legacy users hadn’t been as committed to rehab as Beth was, or maybe there was something more insidious at work. We didn’t really understand how Legacy worked and what long-lasting effects it had. Could something in its magic keep the users from seeking treatment?

  Her emotions seemed to be focused on her contentment with the sandwich, but I could feel agitation growing in her again, even if she hadn’t noticed.

  She finished off the sandwich and dug into the last doughnut. It was a decadent chocolate doughnut with thick ganache frosting and a fudgy filling. The rich cocoa smell was thick in my nose, and my mouth watered. I debated snatching it from her hand but decided she needed it more. I swallowed hard and tried to think of what drive-through places were between the hospital and the Magia casino.

  I wanted to do a reading at the casino before my performance in a few hours. I had dressed in unstylish cargo pants. The baggy pockets allowed me to hide the vial to preserve Legacy if I found it but also held a notebook, a pencil, and glasses. I figured I would pretend to be jotting in the notebook while wearing the glasses as I tried to get readings all over the casino. While the spell I had used at the club had worked, it was too intense to try at a dozen places. I needed to disguise myself the old-fashioned way. Anyone that saw me would assume I was a pretentious artist or author. I mean, who went to a casino to write or draw in a notebook? But it should be enough to keep security from hassling me.

  The hospital was still a ways off on a slight rise, but the top of the complex was now visible.

  Beth must have caught sight of it as well, because she finished off the doughnut and started destroying the napkin again. “The guy I got the stuff from was named Bert. I had never met a Bert before. I didn’t know people in real life were actually named that. There’s that actor with the mustache in the eighties and the kids’ puppet, but that doesn’t count.”

  Bert the bartender in the Snakebite Room. Finally, I had a name to look into. I thought of the bartender from the previous night and wondered if I had already talked to Bert.

  Beth was talking faster. She had completely shredded the napkin and had moved on to the white bag the food had come in. She tore off a piece then twisted it between her hands until it was a short, thick spear of paper. She was staring straight ahead at the hospital, and her hands seemed to have a life of their own as she tore off another piece.

  “At first, it felt so great to be back taking Legacy. I thought I could quit at any time, and then I realized I couldn’t, but it was too late. And the loneliness got worse. All I could think about was Tony and Michael. And I felt so guilty. Legacy had killed both of them in their own way. Michael’s death was the one that really did me in. We were broken up when he died, but I always knew we would get back together eventually. He understood me like no one else ever could. Even when we were apart, he was my best friend. Maybe if I had been with him, he wouldn’t have overdosed.”

  “Hey, Beth, you can’t talk like that.”

  “It’s true. He was having a hard time, fighting with our entire friend group—even his closest friends. Barely anyone was talking to him. Then he got fired from his job. But he was still coming to the casino, probably to get more Legacy. I wasn’t even talking to him, but it was just some stupid fight over something dumb. I can’t even remember what. But I wasn’t talking to him until he came crawling back.”


  I couldn’t let the clue slip by. “He bought his Legacy at the casino?”

  “From Tony. Or sometimes I would share what I had. We would all trade whatever we had, but I think we all got it from Tony.”

  “But who was supplying Tony?” I pulled into the left turn lane to pull into the hospital as the light turned red.

  “I’m not sure. Hey, do you need to know that?” Her energy was ramping up along with the long-simmering agitation. She spoke faster as her voice rose. “I’m sure that I have a number in my old phone records. Why don’t you just flip a U here and we can go through my bills.”

  “No, it’s okay.” I did want that number but not at a risk to her life.

  “I bet I could find the person.” She fought with the seat belt. “I’m feeling much better.”

  I hit the lock button and grabbed her arm. She was about to bolt. It had been building for a while, but it had hit critical mass. The aura of magic filled the car. Bitter almonds, the same as Legacy.

  She shrieked and tried to jerk her arm away from me, but she was weak. “I’m fine. I’m fine. I don’t need to go to the hospital. Let me go.”

  I pulled for my magic and tried the same spell I had used before. I took all of my good, happy emotions and shoved them at her with all the force I could muster. Whatever small amount of finesse I had managed before was completely gone, and it probably hit her like a tidal wave. She calmed and sat back in shock. The aura of the Legacy magic faded.

  I was left feeling as though my very heart had been ripped out from me, and my arms were so weak that I could barely grab the wheel and turn into the hospital. I was left with all the pain and loneliness. My father’s death. Vin abandoning me. The isolation I had built around me, not just protecting me from the danger but also keeping me from the love of my friends. I wanted to weep but didn’t have the time.

  Even as I navigated my way through the hospital parking lot, Patagonia wrestled her way around my arms to crawl into my lap and press her nose against my neck and face. Contact with her helped my pain, which had been so acute only seconds before, to fade to a dull ache. An ache I had been living with for years and could continue to abide for years more.

  I spotted Dr. Trout waiting by the curb with several employees behind her—orderlies or doctors, I couldn’t tell, beyond the fact that they wore scrubs and seemed ready to wrestle a bear should the occasion arise.

  “Thanks. I don’t know what came over me,” Beth said as I pulled up to the curb.

  “It was the Legacy.”

  Her mouth formed an O, and a tear trailed down her face. “Thank you.” She reached across the console to hug me.

  I did my best to return the hug despite the seat belt digging into my neck and Patagonia clinging to me as if I were the last life raft on a sinking ship.

  One of the men in scrubs opened her door and gently but firmly helped her and her cat from the car. Shredded paper fell around her like snow as she walked to the entrance and disappeared behind the doors.

  I jumped when there was rap on my window. I lowered it, and a second later, Dr. Trout’s face appeared as she crouched down. “I didn’t really believe you would get her here.”

  “But you were waiting anyways?”

  She gave me a half smile, the corners of her eyes crinkling up with lines. “If I was wrong, I wanted to see it in person. It’s a rare thing for me to be wrong, you know.”

  I barked with laughter. I hadn’t expected that. A bit of warmth lifted my heart. My mood would lift with time, and my magic would get replaced with rest and food. It was worth it to help Beth. It had also been a chance for me to test myself in the real world. All the training had prepared me, but this had tested me, and so far, I had been found worthy. The shield for Britney and these spells for Beth had both been beyond anything I had previously been able to do. That alone brought me joy I couldn’t measure. I had saved a life, potentially two.

  “Did she try to run off?”

  “When I was pulling left into the hospital. It was magic and somehow connected to Legacy.”

  I expected her to question how I knew that, but she just nodded and took it for fact. “How did you stop her?”

  “I just…” I fumbled for the name of the spell. It had some fancy Latin name that I couldn’t remember. I debated not saying anything, but that could put Beth in danger. “I gave her all my good emotions. I actually did it three times. Once when I arrived, again when she started sobbing, and lastly at the light.”

  Dr. Trout’s eyebrow twitched as though it wanted to rise in surprise but was too professional to do it. She handed me a bag. “You’ll need this more than me.”

  As she headed into the hospital, I opened the bag and almost cried. Inside were two croissants. One had the warm brown of chocolate and the other the bright red of raspberry filling poking out. I devoured both before I turned the car to head to the Magia casino.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  I stood off in the wings of the stage, waiting for my cue to enter the sketch. I was in a foul mood, and even the stagehands who normally treated me like a child were giving me a wide berth. My mood had not improved since the spell at the hospital, and the events of the past few hours had only made it worse.

  I had arrived at the Magia with my sunglasses, notebook, pencil, and plan, figuring that I would find the death spot for Janie and Stacey. I had a casino map, and after an event at the cheese convention previously, I had a general idea of how far I could pick up a reading. I had covered the ground floor of the casino before moving to the second floor, where there were more stores and restaurants, a spa, a movie theater, and a few other things I had forgotten.

  I had grown crankier with each read in which nothing was happening. Eventually, I gave up on the interior of the casino once I ran out of public spaces. I could manually check each floor in case they died in a room, but there were endless floors, and I didn’t have time before the show.

  I did a quick scan of the outside parking lot, though I highly doubted that they had died there. But I wasn’t quite quick enough as I was late to the dressing room. Natasha had snapped at me, probably out of fear, but I had snapped back. We had gotten ready in awkward silence until a note was delivered for me from Sapphire.

  I had completely forgotten about her up until that point. She said that she had been so sorry to miss me at the party the previous night. She heard I had saved a girl that got really sick in the bathroom and hoped I was doing okay. The Gemtones were performing that night, and there was a party afterward in the Snakebite Room, and she hoped I would come and bring my friends.

  I had passed on the invitation to Natasha and Vanessa, and we had all agreed to go. That seemed to create a truce between Natasha and me. The tension was gone, but my crankiness continued.

  The party would be two-fold. I would look for Bert the bartender, who had been supplying Beth with Legacy. I wanted information and a sample.

  Secondly, I wanted and needed to talk to Sapphire. Maybe she did know me as a child. I had gigantic blank spots in my memory. Or maybe she knew a relative of mine, a sister or perhaps even an identical cousin like the old TV show. When she first approached me, I was in too much shock to think straight. But since receiving her note, I had time to come up with a plan. I would use my Monza title to my benefit, pointing out that I can’t really talk about what has happened but perhaps I could poke around and get some information that would help me unravel the mystery.

  I could ask if her family still owned the house and try to get the address. A kid might not have known their address or reasonably could have forgotten it over the years. Perhaps I could get the names of parks or teachers or maybe find out if it snowed in winter. Anything to help me find out where it was that she thought I used to live. I wasn’t sure what I would do with the information, but I knew I would regret it if I didn’t.

  Plus, I wanted to get contact information. What if she really had known me? Then she would be the only living connection to my childhood. It was beyond m
e how I had never noticed that my childhood was missing from my memory. That I had no memories of my mother. But that was a worry for another day.

  The whole thing made me madder, and I tried to take some deep breaths to relax. I knew I was radiating prickly, angry energy. Even humans could sense it and had stepped out of my way as I stomped around the front casino. Not the least of my problems was that I was still hungry. I had grabbed some snacks but none of the food I was really craving. As soon of the performance was over, I was going to eat until I exploded.

  I checked in with the performance, hoping that it was almost done, as my cue was near the beginning of the next sketch, but unfortunately, it had barely started.

  I grunted and moved into a back corner near where the curtains stood. I probably wasn’t supposed to lean on them, but they were velvety and nice. It seemed like the perfect place to think. The audience applause would tell me when the sketch was done, so I couldn’t miss my cue.

  I needed to figure out a way to find where Janie and Stacey had died. If I assumed they died from an overdose and they were on the property of the casino, then that left only one area that I knew about—the hotel rooms. But there must be thousands of them, so where to start?

  I knew that Natasha had her own apartment in town, but maybe some of the other employees lived on site. That was pretty common in Rambler, from what I had heard. I had asked Natasha if they had lived at the casino, and she confirmed my theory, but before I could rejoice, she clarified that she didn’t know where their room was and that no particular area was designated for employees. They were probably worried about the parties that would occur if all the employees were next to each other.

  So I had taken my theory to the end of the line. I needed to know what room had been theirs, then I needed to get in. The first part was difficult, but the second seemed impossible. I had a few spells I could try, but any casino in town would have their own security spells to counteract it. This time, it seemed as if magic wasn’t going to be as effective as cunning and sneakiness. I needed to get the keys through subterfuge.