She lifted the chain at her neck and caught up a key that she used on the door, before letting the chain fall back beneath her sweater.
“We’ll start in here, since it’s nearest the center.”
Center of what? I didn’t ask because the door distracted me. Wood, but with lead and brown glass worked into it to look like the finest beveled stained glass. The lead and glass were glyphs, but so natural they looked like ribbons in the wood grain.
Holy shit, I’d never seen a magic so artfully carved. I couldn’t resist it; I dragged my fingers across the door. Magic shivered beneath my fingertips, licking at my flesh, pooling in the whorls of my fingerprint.
“You can shut the door, Allie,” Maeve said patiently.
Like a kid caught dipping into the cookie dough, I pulled my hand away and closed the door behind me.
Magic pools beneath the city naturally. There are some points where magic is the most concentrated. Wells. Spring, summer, autumn, winter. The wells are heavily guarded gathering places among the Authority. Never revealed to outsiders.
I rubbed at my forehead. My dad was back and more talkative than ever. How great was that?
With the door shut, it completed the outer spells of Illusion and Blocking, and a half dozen more I was sure I didn’t recognize. I could feel the concentration of magic in the room. It burned like a sun trapped beneath the floorboards, filling me up, scraping through me, pressing, pushing against my skin and bone. I held very still and worked hard to hold it all in.
“Did your father tell you about wells?”
“Not really.” It came out calm, not like I was clenching my teeth and trying to breathe evenly so the magic would quiet, settle, and stop shoving at me.
Maeve was across the room, hanging my coat on a simple hat rack. Unlike the parlor, this room had sparse decor. A red oriental rug took up most of the whitewashed wooden floor; the walls were polished slabs of birch jointed together with diamonds of glass and outlined with lines of lead. Pale beaded board with lines of lead and glass running through it made up the ceiling. A small brick fireplace complemented by a grill worked in something way too gothic grounded the corner.
There were no windows. Instead, an aged copper wall fountain took up the space where I’d expect a window to be, and the other window had been converted into a bookcase where hardbound books were stacked in rows. As for furnishings, they were all deep browns and reds, and easy-to-clean surfaces: a couch, four chairs, and a table with a pitcher of ice water and lemon slices next to the fireplace.
Maeve crossed the room toward the pitcher of water. “Did your father tell you anything at all about the Authority?”
“We didn’t talk much. He was gone a lot. And as soon as I was old enough, so was I.”
She poured two glasses of water, floated a lemon round in each. “I see. Then let me explain that magic naturally occurs deep within the earth.” She nodded toward the chairs, handed me a glass of water. I settled on the couch as she continued.
“I’ve always thought of it as hundreds of rivers and streams. In some places magic flows more swiftly; in others it is sluggish, or spread out and swampy. The network of conduits and lead and glass lines your father invented did wonders to mitigate and standardize the flow of magic. That made it safer for the common user to tap into it.”
I took a sip of water, and it felt good going down my throat, trailing cold all the way to my stomach. Magic eased in me a little.
She took a sip too, then set her glass on a table and folded down into one of the plush armchairs.
“Those rivers of magic split, join, knot, and pool together. A lot like those marks on your hand.”
I did a good job of not hiding my hand in my pocket, and instead nodded, like this was the most normal conversation I’d ever heard.
“The wells, and there are many of them, some weak, some incredibly strong, are where magic concentrates and regenerates. Most populated areas are within the range of at least one well. This house, this room, is over a well of magic.”
“I can tell.”
“Really? It is very carefully Blocked and Shielded.”
Should I tell her? That I felt magic all the time? That I held it within me, something no one else could do? Could I trust her?
Did I have any choice? It was either trust her or have the Authority Close me, take my memories, maybe even take my ability to use magic, though that would be a pretty trick since I had magic down to the bone.
“I-”
Killer. Betrayer.
The words rushed through my mind like a winter storm.
She is dangerous, devious. Do not trust her.
A headache stabbed at my eyes. A headache named Dad. I coughed to cover my gasp.
Shut up
, I thought.
“I do feel magic,” I said. “Not as strongly as I’d expect, since this is over a well.”
She held very still, that green gaze roving over me like she could see beneath my skin. I resisted the urge to just get up and walk out of there.
Which was probably good, since it was probably not my urge.
“Have you experienced any residual effects since your father used your mind?” she asked in the firm tones of a doctor or schoolteacher. “Dreams, memories, thoughts?”
No, no, no
, he raged.
“Yes,” I said, a little too loudly, since I was trying to drown out his voice, even though I was the only one who could hear him. Then, quieter, “I’ve experienced all those things.”
The flutter behind my eyes turned into blunt fingers trying to rub their way out of my head. It hurt, but I’d endure a lot more pain than that to get rid of my dad. Besides, I was pretty sure my father and I were at cross-purposes. We’d always been at cross-purposes. I’d long ago learned that doing the opposite of whatever he wanted me to do was generally in my best interest.
“Are you experiencing them right now?”
I have never felt my father’s raw fear before. It was just a flash, a moment. Then I could not sense him at all.
“I was,” I said. “Not right this second.”
“I need to look in your mind.” She sat forward, her hands clasped loosely at her knees.
She’d done this once before. I didn’t know why my palms were suddenly sweaty, didn’t know why my mouth was so dry.
“Like last time?” I asked, stalling.
“Exactly the same. You might feel it a little more, though. Since we are so close to the well, I will be able to look more deeply than I did before, to see if it is just residuals of your father’s thoughts and spirit, or if it is something more.”
“Okay.” I was pretty sure it was something more, like maybe his entire disembodied/reembodied spirit, but I’d leave that assessment to the expert.
Maeve placed her hand on my left wrist-the part of me closest to her.
No glyphs, no chanting. She just closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
This time, I could sense the magic rising from far below us. The magic flooded through her-something I’d never seen anyone try-then settled like a cloak or aura around her. And even though magic is fast, the way she called upon it, it was slow and I could see the white and blue shimmer of it with just my bare eyes without calling upon Sight.
She opened her eyes, shockingly silver, shadowed by shots of her normal forest green.
With magic around her, Maeve looked
into
me.
Magic in me flickered, burned too hot along my right arm, too cold along my left. I did not want to use it, did not want to cast magic. But like fire jumping a line, it ignited, filled me.
Maeve blinked, tipped her head to the side. “Allie?”
“It’s okay,” I said as I recited a mantra. Just the first two lines of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” over and over. “Give me a sec.”