that my best resources on magical creatures were stacked nine layers deep, in the very back corner of the reinforced room. Given the fragile incunabula stored in the front rows, it would take at least an hour to get to what I needed.
Maybe I’d better take another tack. I could focus on magical warfare. Someone had to have written a treatise about how to wage battle with animals. No. I remembered stacking those books on the back wall. They were buried under the facsimile copies of the Washington Coven’s record books, the forty-one volume cloth-bound set.
Fine. I could research warders’ weaponry. I had to have a reference volume that listed all creatures that could be banished by titanium. But the warders’ books were the first ones David had brought into the vault after Teresa claimed her benefaction. I couldn’t even remember where they’d ended up in the clutter.
If I shifted that stack there … If I balanced these boxes against those . If…
My phone rang, startling me out of my hopeless game of real-life Tetris. I barely glanced at the screen as I answered. “Hey, Melissa.”
“Thank God I caught you before you left.”
“Left?” I craned my neck, trying to identify a cochineal-dyed copy of Reed’s Magical Beasts and the Nightmares They Breed , going solely by the bottom edge of the volumes stacked behind the haphazard pile of cauldrons.
“You’re going to kill me.”
I shook my head and sank to the floor cross-legged, giving up on my impossible task. “Why would I kill you?”
“I have to cancel.”
Cancel.
That’s right. I was supposed to meet Melissa at the bakery that evening. I should have wrapped up an easy lesson with my students about an hour ago. I would have had plenty of time to come up to the house, heat up a nice bowl of soup for lunch, and change into clean clothes before I made the drive down to DC.
“You must hate me,” Melissa said.
This probably wasn’t the best time to tell her I had forgotten about her completely. “Of course I don’t hate you.”
“Rob just got invited to dinner tonight with the chairman of his firm, and it’s a command performance for me. We’re going to a country club . I have to wear a dress !”
“‘What fashion, madam, shall I make your breeches?’” I took a strange comfort that the words came to mind easily. Even if my magical life was in shambles, I could remember my Shakespeare. If worse came to worst, I could give up on the magicarium and get a job teaching high school English. Actually, right about now, that career shift sounded like heaven.
Melissa’s aggravated shriek told me she recognized the quotation, even if she wasn’t amused. “ Two Gentlemen of Verona ,” she said. “And I hate that play. I cannot wait until Rob’s stupid partnership vote is over. I don’t care if he ever makes partner—I just want to be done with the dog and pony shows!”
The panic in her voice almost made me feel guilty for taking pleasure in the Bard. “It’s okay,” I soothed. “You’ll do fine. And we’ll reschedule my coming down to the city. I’ve actually got a lot going on here today.” I was not going to tell my best friend that I’d been attacked by a two-headed dog on the beach, my powers had temporarily been stripped, and the monster’s corpse had disappeared without leaving a single hair behind. She’d make time for me if I told her that. She’d make time all the way to the psych ward.
“Friday night,” she said. “Mojito Therapy. I’ll come out there, since I’m the one wimping out tonight.”
“Friday,” I agreed. “Can’t wait.”
And that wasn’t a lie. I desperately wanted to retreat to the early days of our friendship—to the easy times when we lived a few blocks apart, when we were both looking for the loves of our lives, when our greatest dilemma was whether we had enough lime juice for another round of well-muddled tropical drinks.
I heard a bell jangle in the background on Melissa’s end,
Maybe I’d better take another tack. I could focus on magical warfare. Someone had to have written a treatise about how to wage battle with animals. No. I remembered stacking those books on the back wall. They were buried under the facsimile copies of the Washington Coven’s record books, the forty-one volume cloth-bound set.
Fine. I could research warders’ weaponry. I had to have a reference volume that listed all creatures that could be banished by titanium. But the warders’ books were the first ones David had brought into the vault after Teresa claimed her benefaction. I couldn’t even remember where they’d ended up in the clutter.
If I shifted that stack there … If I balanced these boxes against those . If…
My phone rang, startling me out of my hopeless game of real-life Tetris. I barely glanced at the screen as I answered. “Hey, Melissa.”
“Thank God I caught you before you left.”
“Left?” I craned my neck, trying to identify a cochineal-dyed copy of Reed’s Magical Beasts and the Nightmares They Breed , going solely by the bottom edge of the volumes stacked behind the haphazard pile of cauldrons.
“You’re going to kill me.”
I shook my head and sank to the floor cross-legged, giving up on my impossible task. “Why would I kill you?”
“I have to cancel.”
Cancel.
That’s right. I was supposed to meet Melissa at the bakery that evening. I should have wrapped up an easy lesson with my students about an hour ago. I would have had plenty of time to come up to the house, heat up a nice bowl of soup for lunch, and change into clean clothes before I made the drive down to DC.
“You must hate me,” Melissa said.
This probably wasn’t the best time to tell her I had forgotten about her completely. “Of course I don’t hate you.”
“Rob just got invited to dinner tonight with the chairman of his firm, and it’s a command performance for me. We’re going to a country club . I have to wear a dress !”
“‘What fashion, madam, shall I make your breeches?’” I took a strange comfort that the words came to mind easily. Even if my magical life was in shambles, I could remember my Shakespeare. If worse came to worst, I could give up on the magicarium and get a job teaching high school English. Actually, right about now, that career shift sounded like heaven.
Melissa’s aggravated shriek told me she recognized the quotation, even if she wasn’t amused. “ Two Gentlemen of Verona ,” she said. “And I hate that play. I cannot wait until Rob’s stupid partnership vote is over. I don’t care if he ever makes partner—I just want to be done with the dog and pony shows!”
The panic in her voice almost made me feel guilty for taking pleasure in the Bard. “It’s okay,” I soothed. “You’ll do fine. And we’ll reschedule my coming down to the city. I’ve actually got a lot going on here today.” I was not going to tell my best friend that I’d been attacked by a two-headed dog on the beach, my powers had temporarily been stripped, and the monster’s corpse had disappeared without leaving a single hair behind. She’d make time for me if I told her that. She’d make time all the way to the psych ward.
“Friday night,” she said. “Mojito Therapy. I’ll come out there, since I’m the one wimping out tonight.”
“Friday,” I agreed. “Can’t wait.”
And that wasn’t a lie. I desperately wanted to retreat to the early days of our friendship—to the easy times when we lived a few blocks apart, when we were both looking for the loves of our lives, when our greatest dilemma was whether we had enough lime juice for another round of well-muddled tropical drinks.
I heard a bell jangle in the background on Melissa’s end,
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