She drew her hands out, and I held my breath. The book said this would simply conjure a foxfire. Given that we were only a few hours from sunset, a night-light creature wasn’t going to do much. What appeared between Ari’s hands crackled and hummed like an electric sun.
Every dish in my cabinet broke at once.
Every light in the apartment went out. Through the walls I heard angry yells and the sounds of feet shuffling. Apparently, Ari had not only broken the bulbs, she’d blown out the power to the whole building.
Ari’s eyes snapped open and the foxfire blinked out like yet another bulb. “Crap.”
“I’m out of bulbs, out of power, and we’re eating on plastic tonight.”
“It’s not my fault.” Ari’s voice trembled with frustration.
I brought out a flashlight, because the single window in my apartment didn’t let in nearly enough light. “It’s not mine either.”
“Actually, it kind of is.”
I swung the flashlight to her. Sweat rolled down her head from the effort, and her hair clung to her face. She rubbed her palms together and glared at me.
“Go on,” I said, taking a seat.
She stepped out of the circle. Regardless of what anyone tells you, princesses aren’t slugs. “Those things with you go crazy every time I get started, and they start bouncing everywhere. Closer I get to doing a spell right, the angrier they get.”
Great. My blessings didn’t like it when my only friend did her stuff. That kind of ticked me off. Somewhere along the way I’d started thinking of her as my princess. Kind of like my cold sore. And nobody picked on my princess except me.
“I think they’re eating the spell power and converting it into, well, I don’t know. Destruction,” said Ari.
I was completely frustrated. Then an idea came to me. I looked at my hillbilly bookcase (pine boards and cinderblocks) and found it: Spellwork and Curses. If there’s one thing I’d learned about apartment maintenance, it was that it might be hours before we had electricity again. I once watched the building supervisor throw the same breaker over and over, in hopes that it might restore power. “Let’s head to the park and see what we can do. We can at least study until sundown.”
Ari looked over the book. “Curses? You said they were a blessing.”
“It’s kind of a gray area from what I gather.”
We spent the rest of the day at the park and came back to an apartment building with power. I read late into the night, and in the morning I had a plan. The only problem was it required something I didn’t have a way to buy: Permission.
I stood in my bathroom, using the sink mirror to call. “Grimm, I know you can hear me. I need to use the Visions Room. Please.”
He slowly faded into view in the mirror, and if he ever slept I’d say he was worn out. “I’m sorry, my dear. I am a bit occupied at the moment.”
“I’ve been doing my homework, and I’ve gotten to the point where I need to do lab work.”
“Fine. You can come in after ten and use it for an hour.”
“How is he doing?”
“He is deeply enchanted, my dear. Even worse, it is a type I can’t identify, though I have a theory. I suspect, in fact, it is a salamander charm.”
“He turns into a lizard?”
“Amphibian,” said Ari, apparently tired of eavesdropping from the door.
“A salamander is a creature of fire. It fits the pattern, prince into frog and such. It matches the evidence as well, his home being burned down, but there are aspects of this curse that are baffling.”
“Did he hurt you?” Ari asked Grimm.
“Young lady, I don’t understand your question,” said Grimm.
“He broke your mirror,” said Ari. “Did it hurt?”
Grimm laughed a gentle, deep laugh. “Young lady, I have had so many broken mirrors in my time I have lost count. Only obsidian may break our portals in a way that hurts. Even that wouldn’t kill me, it would just be quite painful.”
“How is he?” I asked again, knowing Grimm would know what I meant.
“He is angry, and sad, and hurt. Everything I’ve ever asked you to make a prince.”
“I’ll be in tonight. Call if he’s there late, and I’ll make sure to wait.”
Grimm didn’t leave. He looked at the floor a moment, then back at me. “Marissa, I might have been overly harsh with you. I regret not taking the time to explain more. I’m not punishing you for a mistake, whether you believe that or not. I’m doing what is best for you. You’ve never taken more than a day or two off, and the pressure of this job is hard to handle even if you are a fairy.”
“See you tonight, Grimm,” I said. I couldn’t decide if I should be happy that Grimm had almost apologized for dismissing me, or upset that he thought I couldn’t handle it. “That was a private conversation,” I said to Ari.
“Sorry.” Ari had never shown a tendency to apologize for snooping before. “I’m worried about you.”
I CANCELED THE morning run in favor of study time, though my blessings made it impossible to get any sort of spell work under way. We spent the day doing absolutely nothing, which was as much work for me as actually working. That evening, I drove us to the Agency, trying to time it right. Too early, and I’d run into Liam. Too late, and I’d waste precious time. I was relieved to find my bracelet worked, letting me in the back door.
I took Ari to the back corner of our office. “This is the Visions Room.” It looked like a large closet until you noticed the four-foot-square window in the side. And the blacklights. And the prisms. “It should let me see the same thing you see.”
“M!” said Evangeline, nearly scaring me to death. She came over and hugged me. Before I’d met Ari I’d always thought of her as my friend. Now I wasn’t so sure. More like a sister who can’t stand you, but knows that killing you would get her grounded.
“You can take the scarf off around her.” I glanced at Ari, trying to give her warning.
Evangeline unwrapped herself.
Ari did well, focusing on her eyes and keeping her mouth shut.
“You get used to it after a while,” said Evangeline. “Well, maybe you do. I don’t think I ever will. Grimm said you’d be in tonight. Guess you aren’t grounded as much anymore.”
I hit the power-up button to start the lights. “Going to get a look at my blessings. Try to calm them down.”
“I don’t think you should talk to them,” said Evangeline. “You want to see something nasty? Check this out.” She punched up the Visions Room monitor and brought up a picture. It was Liam, and I could finally see the curse I had sent after him. It looked like a net of barbed wire, but the loops were curved like scales, and it was tattooed in spirit ink across his entire body. “Never seen anything like it. Jess says she hasn’t either, and she’s old.”
I spent a moment admiring the man under the curse, wondering what his skin felt like without one of those flannel shirts he always wore. I shook away the thoughts and focused on my current problem. “I gotta get in and see if this works.” I’d taken aspirin in anticipation of the migraine the Visions Room would give me. I opened the door and walked in. The ceiling was low, but this was one case where losing the genetic lottery worked in my favor. All I had to do was stand and wait for the lights to activate. When they did, the light was simultaneously brilliant white and deep purple. The prisms kicked in, splitting the normal light away and bending the magical energy down to the visible spectrum.
My eyes focused, and I blinked a couple of times to be sure. “You two seeing what I’m seeing?”
The speaker in the box buzzed and Evangeline spoke. “Kingdom help you, M. We can see them.”
Ari had said they looked like pixie lights that dashed back and forth, but obviously she needed a pair of magic bifocals to go with the contacts. Across from me sat two creatures, like tiny children, except children don’t have six-inch claws, or three toes and fingers, or a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. They looked more like piranha than people. Their tiny bellies pooched out like they’d swallowed a poodle or two, and they hunched over so that their tiny fish faces hung forward. I smiled at them and they returned the grin with a mouth that could swallow a cat.