“Well?” Trent said, clearly anxious.
I stepped down from the box and squinted up at the bell. It was as if I could still feel it resonating, which was impossible. If there was no ley line connection, there was no energy. “The bell resonated,” I said, glancing out the window to see that my circle was indeed down. “I felt it soak into the perimeter. I think it worked.”
And then the softly vibrating bell seemed to shake itself awake and a distinctive bong rang out. I ducked, hands over my ears. The clapper hadn’t moved. It had been a tiny burst of magic, like a ripple in reverse, echoing in from the outer edge, gaining strength as it neared the bell until it hit it with a hundred times the original strength.
“Maybe not,” I said as the last of the vibrations faded.
“Maybe it’s responding to you,” Trent said.
The Turn take it! I hate it when I do stuff wrong, I thought, head down over the book. “The ones in your mom’s hut and spelling area never responded to me,” I muttered. “Did I mispronounce anything?”
“No, it sounded perfect.”
“It calls for multiple spell casters. Maybe that’s it,” I said, then turned to the open stairway as Stef’s voice echoed up.
“Rachel? There’s someone to see you?” she called. “Mr. Dali?”
“Dali?” I looked at my phone for the time. I was meeting him at Junior’s today to take him out to meet Keric. But that wasn’t for an hour.
“It worked,” I said, pleased as I dropped the book onto a box and picked up my phone. “I have to go. Dali’s here.”
Trent chuckled. “Tell him I said I hope he’s well. And I love you. And be safe.”
“You too,” I said, then added, “I mean, I love you, too.” I hesitated for a moment, reluctant to end the call. Trent, too, lingered, and in the silence, I knew he really did love me. More than was probably safe. “Bye,” I whispered, then hit the end icon.
Why is Dali here? I thought as I stuffed my phone in a back pocket and thumped down the narrow, dark stairs to the foyer. My steps were light, but worry dogged me, worry about how the collective had reacted when I’d pulled that time-shift curse from storage. Get Dali, echoed in my thoughts. Then get Al! Crap on toast. If there was magic that I shouldn’t be using, it needed to go in the vault with the rest of the war curses.
The foyer was bright with the light from the open door, and Stef smiled, clearly relieved as I came down the last stair and shut the door behind me. Dali stood on the stoop, looking decidedly odd and a bit peeved in a suit that was more gray than white. It was hard to tell. The color kept shifting.
He held a takeout cup, and he raised it when he saw me. “I brought you a skinny demon,” he said, his thick build and somewhat short stature making his voice deep and resonant. His red, goat-slitted eyes were hidden behind dark glasses, and with the suit, dull dress shoes, and jaded demeanor, he looked for all the world like a desk-heavy, middle-aged public servant. All of which was weird, but perhaps having a few wrinkles and graying hair gave him some cred in a society where you could be anything you wished. I knew for a fact it wasn’t because he wanted to “blend in” with society.
“Thank you,” I said, more than a little uncomfortable as I took it. “I thought we weren’t meeting until noon.” And at Junior’s, not my broken, unlivable church. “Give me a sec, and I’ll get my bag and we can head out,” I added, knowing he was anxious to meet the toddler. Keric was a demon born to witch parents as I had been, surviving thanks to Trent’s illegal genetic tinkering. Trent’s dad had ironed out the methodology when he’d fixed me.
“Rachel, I’m heading into town.” Stef picked her purse up from the side table and edged around Dali and out into the cool morning air. “I need a couple of things they didn’t chuck out my window. Do you want me to pick up anything for you?”
“No, I’m good. Thanks,” I said, and she smiled cheerfully, already on the walk. She looked good in her jeans and light top, hair sparkling when one of the new resident pixies dropped down to talk to her.
I turned to Dali, wondering how he got that purple tie to work with the rest. He was squinting despite the sunglasses, and a classy-looking, brimmed hat materialized atop his head, shading his face. “Gray is a new look for you,” I said as I dropped back and gestured for him to come in. “Give me a sec. I need to get my bag.”
“Do you know how hard it is to find something that says ultimate power without looking like a dime-store comic-book villain?” he muttered.
“Only every day of my life,” I said as I tugged the door shut behind him and lowered the locking bar. “But seeing as you’re visiting a toddler, you might want to tone it down.”
He sniffed, and the faint scent of burnt amber tickled my nose in the close quarters. He hadn’t moved, and I finally inched past him to go into the dark sanctuary. “I am not wearing jeans,” he said in disdain, and I stifled a shiver at the scuff-click, scuff-click of his shiny shoes.
“You’ve . . . taken a familiar?” he said, and I turned to see he’d removed his glasses and was squinting at the ceiling, a lordly look on his face.
“I have not,” I said, insulted. “Constance kicked her out of her apartment. Stef is staying here until she finds a new place by the hospital.” Ice dropped down my spine when his eyes found mine, almost glowing in the chancy light of the boarded-up windows. “That’s where she works,” I added, and he stopped at the hole in the floor, toes edging the plywood cover.
“Mmmm.” He rocked from his toes to his heels and back again, and I wondered if he was contemplating fixing the hole rather than making the effort to walk around it. “It looks better in here. Better, but not good,” he added, deciding to walk around it. “If you apologize to Al, you could make a tulpa of the ruined parts and be done with it.”
Eyebrows high, I watched him heel-toe a slow arc, skirting the plywood cover. “Tulpas give me headaches,” I said, though the reality was that making a solid object or place from nothing left me comatose from anywhere from an hour to three days. That was bad enough, but the real issue was that it required another demon to pull the thought construct from my mind and memory to give it a lasting substance. I only trusted Al to do it. Unfortunately, in the mood he was in, Al would likely rip through me like a fox in a henhouse—and Dali knew it. It was a suggestion that was designed to hurt, not help.
Whatever. I grabbed my bag, checked for my keys, and took a sip of the coffee. It was cold, but was I a demon or was I a demon? “You should rethink that suit,” I said as I warmed the drink with a stray thought. “Keric is a toddler, and you want to convey the impression that you will play with him, not sit him in a high chair with a handful of Cheerios while you watch the news. If you were twenty pounds lighter, I’d say jeans and a tweed jacket. No?” I said when he glared at me. “Look, you’ve got, like, a zillion outfits to match the tulpas in that restaurant jukebox of yours. There’s got to be a classy, casual something that says money and demon both. Maybe something like Newt used to wear. She could do money-casual like no one else.”