by Martha Carr
“What? If I wasn’t sure, I wouldn’t have said it. That’s—” She huffed and started to text back, but he beat her again.
‘I really think you’d love it. Big old house right in Circle Ranch.’
“Oh, why? ‘Cause every woman’s supposed to be drawn in by a big old house in a super nice—wait. Where did I see that name?” Laura ran her hand over the papers on her desk and slipped out the rendition of the magical energy core map she’d copied to have in physical form. “No. That’s too small.” She snatched up her phone and tried not to punch her finger against the touch-screen keyboard.
‘What’s the address?’
Nathan sent back just as quickly, and she pulled up the map app on her phone. “No way.” She zoomed out until the area of the map on her phone was the same as the circular one she’d drawn around the printed map of Austin. Laura blinked. “So…a part-Kashgar professor invited me to a party in the same neighborhood as one of the energy cores…” A wild, disbelieving laugh escaped her. “Unbelievable. I can’t decide if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.” Sitting back in her desk chair, she clicked her tongue a few times and figured she might as well go for it.
She texted: ‘Can my sisters come?’
‘Depends on how many sisters you have.’
Laura rolled her eyes. “Very cute.”
‘Just two.’
‘Bring your sisters!’
“And…I told Nickie I’d ask about plus-ones, didn’t I?” Shaking her head, Laura sent him yet another question: ‘Can they bring dates?’
‘For sure. You can’t, though.’
Laura snorted. “So he went from, ‘Yeah, bring your sisters,’ to incredibly rude in less than thirty seconds? What is wrong with this—”
Nathan’s next text came through. ‘Because I’ll already be there.’ Punctuated with a winking emoji.
“He literally just…oh, my god. He called this a date and made it the worst joke ever at the same time.” The confusing part was she had no idea how she felt about it. The only thing she could do was laugh.
‘Okay. We’ll be there. Five of us.’
Nathan’s final reply was a lot simpler than his previous enthusiasm.
‘6:00 p.m. Can’t wait.’ After that was a grinning emoji, and the conversation was apparently over.
“Not like anybody can really express very much through a text.” Laura squinted at the screen. “And a grinning emoji.” She shook her head, checked the screen one more time, and grinned. “Guess we’re going to a party. And no one else needs to know that we’re doing it only to get right up close and personal with another energy core. Because those definitely need to go first.” That thought brought her unexpected giddiness down a notch and replaced it with her usual Laura Hadstrom brand of determination. “That’s more like it.”
She glanced at the map of Austin on her desk and all twelve points where they’d find the energy cores. She’d highlighted the intersection at the Thinkery in yellow. “Guess I should tell Nickie and Emily and start getting ready for what’ll probably be the weirdest night ever…”
Her gaze fell to her phone again, and she snatched it up for one more text. “I can’t believe I didn’t think about this. Wait…is it against some kinda rule to text right after making plans like that? I don’t even know how to—no. Laura, stop it.” She pointed at her phone and scowled. “You’re doing this for the energy core first. Probably also to protect people. Maybe a little bit as a…” She swallowed. “Date. That’s the least important part.”
She typed and sent the text before she could change her mind: ‘Is this a magicals-only kind of party?’
The little dots while Nathan typed flashed on her screen, disappeared, and repeated that back and forth until Laura wanted to toss her phone across the room. Finally, he sent a reply.
‘I definitely had another witty response to that, but I think I’ve reached my quota for cheeseball jokes. Not strictly magicals, no. Maybe half and half. Does that kill it for you?’
Laura scoffed. “Oh, please. Don’t be so dramatic.”
‘No. My sisters’ dates are human. I just wanted to make sure.’
‘All good. See you at 6:00!’
“Okay, now that looks like an official end to conversation, Laura. You’re done.” She shoved her phone into her back pocket and took another look at the map. “And we’re gonna have to keep this hidden from everybody. Real fun night.”
With a nod, she glanced around her room and found herself feeling remarkably satisfied by the serendipity of getting to hit up Nathan’s party and another energy core at the same time. “Literally.” She smirked and walked out of her room.
She found Nickie downstairs in the living room with her Strat in hand and the strap over her head and shoulder. Nickie had just finished plugging in the cables when she rounded the corner. “How’s it comin along in here for you—”
Nickie struck a blaring chord, and the amp roared with electric guitar. The force of it made Laura stop dead in her tracks, feeling the vibrations through the floor and halfway up her legs before Nickie clamped a hand down on the strings.
“Woah. Sorry.” Her sister smirked. “Goin’ pretty well in here, actually. I think. Kind of amazing how one little tweak in mindset can change the whole freakin’ picture. Wanna see?”
“Yeah…but you gotta turn that down first.”
“Right.” Nickie lowered the amp’s volume, then stood behind the couch. “Okay. I know it’s really not much, but it’s better than nothing. And I’ve only been at it for like, I dunno, a couple hours? Just…okay. Just watch.” She bent down to pick a tissue off the floor and set it on the back of the couch.
Laura folded her arms. “Um…”
“I know. Just bear with me.” Nickie gave the Strat an experimental strum, and when she looked at her older sister to check about the noise, Laura nodded.
Then Nickie started playing. It could have been a solo—and probably was—starting out fast and light and almost fluttering. Nickie closed her eyes a few seconds, fingers on the fretboard and her lime-green pick moving faster and faster. When her eyes flew open, Laura thought she saw a dark flash from the black legacy ring on her sister’s thumb. She wasn’t sure because her attention was diverted to the tissue on the back of the couch.
It was trembling.
Just a little at first, as if someone had turned on a box fan at the other side of the room. Then, the thin paper flapped wildly, fluttering as quickly as Nickie’s fingers shredded the devious solo. When the tissue lifted into the air inch by wavering inch, it could no longer be mistaken for a tissue buffeted by a fan. The white paper didn’t blow off the couch or across the room but lifted straight up, higher and higher, until it hung suspended in the center of the living room, flapping wildly. Nickie’s fingers moved faster than Laura could follow them, lips twitching with intense concentration as she stared at the floating tissue. With a squealing slide and a final chord, Nickie stopped, and the tissue floated down to land on a seat cushion.
“No way…” Laura whispered. She stared at the tissue, then glanced at her sister. “No way.”
“I know.” Nickie wiped beads of sweat from her forehead, breathing heavily. “Pretty insane, right?”
“Yeah, that’s one way of putting it.” Laura cocked her head. “You can cast a levitating spell on stuff just by playing a song?”
“Well, just the tissue so far.” Nickie shrugged and pulled the guitar strap over her head and set the Strat in its stand. “It’s kinda ridiculous. I feel like I’m ten again and waving my wand around for the first time. I don’t know if it’s just ‘cause I like the Strat better, or because it’s louder, or…maybe just because having music blasting out of something helps me focus.” She chuckled. “But I think I got it to go a little higher this time.” Tossing her hair back, she took a deep breath. “Definitely a step in the right direction.”
“Yep. That’s definitely what that is. And Dad knew this would happen when you told all that stuff about music being mag
ic?”
“Uh…I don’t think so.” Nickie folded her arms and shook her head. “I mean, he definitely put the idea in my head. I wouldn’t have figured this out without him. But I don’t think he knew what was really possible. I mean, unless you remember him casting spells with his guitar when we were kids.”
Laura laughed. “I would definitely remember that.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“You think you have enough of a handle on it to play the lullaby?” Laura licked her lips. “You know, if we happen to run into the Gorafrex again at the next energy core?”
“I mean, I can’t exactly practice with the lullaby to really know. We don’t need that thing showing up at our house just because I wanna test out my new skills.” Nickie snorted. “But yeah. Yeah, I think I have enough of a handle on it. At least enough not to play myself into a coma again.”
“Good.” The oldest Hadstrom sister nodded, eyed the tissue on the couch again, and grinned. “So…we’re going to that party tonight.”
“Really? I thought you were pretty gung-ho about going for the energy core at the airport.”
“Well, I was.” Laura shrugged. “Turns out the party’s in the same neighborhood, so it’s actually a good opportunity. We can be there and take a look around without anyone wondering what the heck we’re doing, and…well, Nathan said it’s a mixed-bag party, right? Magicals and humans. We have to be careful, but we can at least be there to make sure everyone’s okay after the energy core’s smashed.”
Nickie chuckled. “Don’t forget about the fun, Laura.”
“What?”
“It’s a party. Which is also a good opportunity to have fun. Let loose for just a few minutes, even. You remember how to do that, right?”
“Do I—of course I remember how to have fun. I can be fun.” Laura shot her sister a dubious frown. “Unless you wanna make the whole thing un-fun. We can just go to the airport energy core instead.”
“Oh, come on. Who picks the airport over a party?”
Laura smirked. “That’s what I thought. Invite Chuck, if you want. Got the okay for that too.”
“Excellent.” Nickie grinned. “This’ll totally be fun.”
“Just don’t let your expectations get too high, okay? We’ll still be there for a pretty important reason.”
“Yeah, no problem.”
Laura took out her phone. “I’m gonna text Emily to let her know, and then we need to grab everything we have and make sure we bring it—oh.” Her eyes widened, and a grin slowly spread across her lips.
“Okay, it’s really creepy when you smile that way.”
“Not creepy. Just seriously awesome.” She finished the text to Emily, sent it, and stuck her phone back in her pocket. “I think I know how to make it up to Emily after this morning.”
“You mean after you belittled her career by calling it meaningless?”
“Stop it.” Laura rolled her eyes. “But yeah. To make up for that. Like a peace offering.”
Nickie chuckled. “Do I wanna know what that is, or…”
“You’ll see it when she does. I’m gonna go get started on that. Can you…” Laura glanced behind her and across the foyer at the dining room table with the lance and one of Emily’s iron spheres on it. “Can you put those in the Clubhouse? And whatever else you think might be a good energy-core-destroyer?”
“You’re gonna use the Clubhouse as a giant purse, aren’t you?”
Laura laughed and headed toward the stairs. “You know, that’s a ridiculous analogy, but yeah. A giant weapon purse. Something for every occasion, right?”
Nickie laughed as her older sister bounded up the stairs.
28
Emily moved through her work on the line in a fog. She couldn’t stop thinking about John and the way he’d kissed her in the parking lot. Not that the rear lot is the most romantic place or anything. And not that I’m the most romantic person. Guess it doesn’t matter when he somehow always says the right thing and kisses me like that…
“Hadstrom!” Chef Ansler’s growling shout pulled her out of the fog, and she realized it wasn’t the first time he’d shouted for her.
“Sorry. I mean, yes, Chef.”
“What is up with you tonight?” Meadowlark’s Head Chef moved toward the back of the kitchen past the sauté and fry stations and stopped in front of her at the soup station. “You feelin’ okay?”
“Yes, chef.”
“Drop the salute, Hadstrom. I’m serious. You look flushed and glassy-eyed.” He scrutinized her with a skeptical frown. “You get high before stepping into my kitchen?”
“What? No, Chef.” His frown darkened, and she shook her head. “Sorry. No.”
“Would you take a drug test right now?”
“With an hour left in my shift and orders still coming in?”
Chef Ansler’s eyes narrowed so much, he might as well have closed them. The man was sweaty and critical, but he was also concerned. “Yeah. Right now.”
Emily puffed out a breath, gestured toward the order line, and shrugged. “I mean, yeah. If you don’t trust me and you don’t mind the soup orders getting backed up, sure. I’ll take a drug test.”
“Good. Stay here.” He walked toward the front of the kitchen bustling with the other chefs at their stations, all working to run the well-oiled machine that was Meadowlark.
“Wait, so do you want me to or not?” Emily called after him.
“No, I trust you.” The Head Chef turned around and spread his arms. “I just want you to do your job, Hadstrom.”
“Yes, Chef.” She went back to stirring the chicken soup with jasmine rice, summer squash, and lima beans she’d made in a daze that morning and now kept hot—but not too hot—on the stove. “Jeeze,” she muttered. “The mind games and this guy. I don’t even get high.” She shook her head and frowned at the soup.
The minute her mind turned back to John, the kitchen door burst open, and John actually came storming into the kitchen. “I don’t think I can do this again.”
Another server in her mid-thirties dashed into the kitchen behind him. “John, come on. We still need you out there.”
“I don’t know if it’s this place or some kinda full-moon thing twice in two weeks, but this is nuts.” He threw his arms up and turned to face the other server. “Those people are crazy, Annie. Did you see what she did?”
“Yeah.” Annie swallowed. “I think she was just trying to be friendly—”
“That wasn’t friendly.” He jerked a hand toward the kitchen door. “She practically molested me! Like just randomly, out of the blue, tried to jump my bones.”
Emily froze. “What the hell…”
“That crap’s not supposed to happen at all, let alone in a place like this.” John smoothed his hair away from his forehead with both hands. “Unless you have a better way to handle how freaked out I am right now, just give me a minute, okay?”
“John, we’re fully sat—”
“Yeah, I know. I know. Don’t worry about my tables. I’ll get to them. Go do your thing.”
The server frowned, then jumped a little when she remembered something else important and stepped through the kitchen. “Chef Ansler?”
The Head Chef turned around and raised his eyebrows at her. “Yeah.”
“Um…the woman at fourteen’s been asking to speak to you for the last fifteen minutes.”
“The same one?”
Annie nodded.
“Did you explain to her we’re working a full line back here?”
“Multiple times, yeah.” The server bit her lip. “She’s really adamant about it, Chef. Said she’d…” She leaned toward Chef Ansler but still had to raise her voice to be heard over the clink and hiss and spitfire communication in the kitchen. “…call her husband and tell him everything if you don’t come out in the next two minutes.”
Chef Ansler leaned away from her, blinked, and shook his head. “What the hell is wrong with these people?” He stalked around Annie and push
ed open the swinging kitchen door with an aggravated shove. The server turned in a small circle, glanced at all the chefs—who pretended they hadn’t noticed—then dashed back out into the dining room.
Emily turned off the burner beneath the soup pot and wiped her hands on a dry rag. John moved down the side of the kitchen toward the back. When he met her gaze, he shook his head, then disappeared into the staff room. Emily took her chances going after him.
He was sitting in one of the chairs against the wall when she stopped in the doorway. “Hey. What’s going on?”
“I have no idea.” He was bent over, forearms on his thighs, shaking his head as one knee bounced up and down in agitation. His wide-eyed gaze settled on the staff room floor, and he didn’t look up.
Emily bit her lip. “I, uh…heard you talking to Annie just now. Something about a woman at one of your tables…”
John winced and shook his head. “Yeah, she was just…she was really grabby, like, in the weirdest way ever.” He sighed and rubbed his face. “Feels just like the other night, right? Like a week ago. When everyone out there started climbing up on the tables and shouting about how they were the best at whatever and completely losing their shit.”
“Uh-oh…” Emily bit her lip and couldn’t think of a single thing to say. I seriously screwed up again, didn’t I?
John scoffed. “Yeah, big uh-oh.” He glanced up at her, as if he hadn’t meant to say it out loud and closed his eyes. “Sorry, Emily. I’m just…it was weird last week, and it’s really freakin’ weird again, and it feels like the whole world’s going crazy.”
More like head-over-heels crazy, I bet. And only the people who ate my soup. Man, I really need to pay more attention to what I’m doing. The only thing she could think of to say was, “Yeah, I bet.”
John puffed out a sigh and shook his head. “I really need a cigarette.”
Okay, how did I forget that one unappealing detail? She leaned back and glanced at the kitchen. “Go take a smoke break.”
He looked at her and blinked. “No. I quit. No more smokes for me.”
“Really?” Emily tilted her head and studied him. “When?”
