Insidious Page 10

  “J.K. Rowling is a visionary of her era,” he said primly.

  “Now you’re talking. Gotta go!” She shouldered her purse and nearly ran for the door, but stopped at the threshold. Respect him. Always. “Thank you, Graus Claude.”

  His voice rumbled ominously. “You do not have cause to thank me yet, Miss Malone.”

  * * *

  Joy ran out of the brownstone and down the stairs, looking for the chocolate-caramel Bentley and its nougat-colored wheels. Instead, she saw a young man with sea-colored eyes standing on the edge of the walk glaring up at her through his snowy hair as if she’d done something stupid.

  “Are you?” he asked.

  Joy wasn’t certain if she should grab her scalpel, bang on the door to get back in or run as fast as she could. Instead she said, “Am I what?”

  “Are you truly one of us?” the young aide asked. “One of the Folk? A descendant of mixed blood born with the Sight?”

  Joy sighed a tight exhale and adjusted her bag. “Yes,” she said, slightly annoyed. “I am. You were there in the Hall when it happened. You saw.”

  The young man nodded, his eyes hooded, suspicious. His cloak of feathers rippled gently in the wind. He glanced up at the brownstone. “I am supposed to follow you,” he said. “And report your actions to my master.”

  Joy arched her eyebrows as the Bentley rounded the corner. “Oh?”

  He nodded stiffly. “Yes,” he said. “But I do not think it right nor fair to spy on our own, so while I will not disobey a direct order or dishonor my position, I wanted to inform you of it.” His lips thinned as the car slowed. “You deserve to know.”

  “Really?” Joy said, mildly curious now that she was fairly certain that he wasn’t about to attack her here on the sidewalk. “Why?”

  He stepped away from the curb as the Bentley slid to a stop. “Because if you are one of us, then all Folk are welcome within the Twixt,” he said. “No matter what their origin or circumstance.”

  The Bailiwick’s driver stepped out, adjusted his uniform jacket and opened the door for Joy. She took the last steps and paused before getting in, her stomach queasy, her senses alert.

  “Why tell me this?” she asked. “I thought you worked for the Tide.”

  The tiniest flush colored his face, a creeping pink tingeing his neck and cheeks. “The Tide stands for all of its citizens. It is Sol Leander who wants you to fail,” he said. “He will use any means to achieve that end, and the gala presents him with the perfect opportunity.”

  Joy hesitated. “What would happen if I ‘failed’?”

  The courtier placed his hand firmly on the door like a wall between them. Joy settled herself on the leather seat and he shut the door with a slam. She heard his last words muffled through the glass. “Mark my words, Joy Malone—do not fail.”

  SEVEN

  JOY SKETCHED OUT a plan in her head as she sorted her pre-packing laundry. The first thing she had to do was to find out how everyone in the Twixt had managed to forget about the King and Queen—not just “not remember.” Inq said that they were actually unable to recall something that should have been impossible to forget. If Joy could figure out what had happened, then she’d be one step closer to finding the culprit and one step closer to finding the door. Joy was fairly certain Graus Claude would help her petition for a slight change in the rules as a reward. One thing she knew for certain: the Bailiwick was very, very good at negotiations and always came out ahead.

  She scratched the back of her hand, the skin pink, scaly and raw. It was probably her allergies, seasonal eczema, but she couldn’t stop imagining her body changing somehow. Was there something hiding below her skin? Feathers? Fur? Scales?

  Joy emptied her basket and fled the room.

  Normally she might be worried that if Inq and Kurt hadn’t come up with a way to solve this mystery by now, she never could, but Joy had learned that being human gave her a fresh perspective—like the way she’d seen Aniseed’s signatura on all of the Scribes’ clientele while they’d been oblivious—and now Joy had a few advantages that they did not. Not only could she erase signaturae should it come down to it, but she also knew something about magic. She knew that there was a difference between glyph magic and spell magic; what the Folk considered magic and what humans considered magic was as different as 80% Lindt was from Cadbury milk.

  If it had been spell magic, it was unknown to the Folk—a carefully guarded secret among wizards—but Joy just so happened to have a man on the inside.

  “Sounds like a blanket spell,” Stef said as he stuffed more shirts into his duffel bag. “In order to spread an effect without requiring line-of-sight on all intended targets, you’d have to define the boundaries based on geographical parameters, or in this case, magical ones.” He spoke over his elbow as he cleaned out another drawer. “A spell that affects everyone in the Twixt? One that no one knows about? That would have to be a Class Ten, at least. Way beyond anything I know, or anyone I know would know, for that matter.” He sniffed a sweatshirt at the pits. “Why do you ask?”

  Joy couldn’t say “Nothing,” but she couldn’t lie, either. It wasn’t like she had a school report on spell classifications due anytime soon.

  “Something happened, Stef, and it’s affecting everyone except Ink and Inq. I know you don’t like it, but that world’s a part of me now.” And it’s a part of you, too. This was the perfect time to say it. Here. Now. Right now. Stef, people with the Sight are part of the Twixt. We are descended from Folk. We have a drop of faerie blood in our veins. But she didn’t want to say it. He wasn’t like her; he didn’t have someone like Ink. He didn’t love the Folk—he hated them. She didn’t want him to hate that part of himself, any part of himself. It was weird trying to protect her older brother when he’d always been the one protecting her.

  “I have an obligation,” she said instead.

  “No, you don’t,” he said, rolling pants into logs. “It sounds like Other Than politics to me. Best to stay out of it.”

  “Stef, we could help...”

  “‘We?’ No. I’m not getting involved,” he said. “And neither should you. Do you remember the last time you got mixed up in one of their plots?”

  “Um, I stopped a magical disease from killing off most of humanity?”

  “No. You almost got killed when an assassin tried to drown you in your car!”

  “Oh,” Joy said. “You mean the last last time.”

  Stef paused, adjusting his glasses. “Wait. What was that first thing you said?”

  Joy blanched. “Never mind.”

  “No! Not ‘never mind,’” her brother said angrily. “Exactly what’s going on?”

  Joy shook her head. “Please, Stef, you don’t understand.” She had to say something. Something! Now! Say it! “It...has to do with the rules of the Twixt,” she blurted out. Joy twisted her thumb in her shirt. “Do you know about the rules?”

  Stef glared at her through his rectangular lenses, knowing she was editing herself. “I know about the Accords, the written agreements between the Council and our world, I know about the Edict that protects us, I know about having the Sight, and I know more than a little bit about wizardry and spellwork—proper magic, not glyph magic, that’s for Folk and druids,” he said, fiddling with his red thread bracelet. He tossed another shirt into the bag. “That’s more than enough rules for me.”

  “Yeah, well, someone’s messing with the rules that created the Twixt, and that can affect both worlds,” she said. “You, me, all of us.”

  Stef flung his stuff down on the bed. “Joy, what is going on?”

  She couldn’t say “I can’t tell you” or “I don’t know” or some other throwaway phrase because that would be a lie. Argh!

  “It’s a secret,” she said, which was about as close to the truth as she dared.

>   Her brother fumed for a long moment and then wiped his lenses on his shirt. “Yeah, well, secrets don’t tend to stay secret forever.”

  Joy didn’t say anything to that. It was true of her mother’s affair, her father’s first girlfriend, Stef coming out and her own signatura. There were no secrets that stayed secret. There was no use trying to hide the truth.

  She took a steady breath and looked him straight in the eye. “Stef...”

  “Listen,” he interrupted. “I’m headed back to school soon, and I want you to promise me that you won’t go seek out my master anymore.”

  That threw her completely off track. Joy frowned. “Your ‘master’?”

  He sighed. “Mr. Vinh.”

  “Mr. Vinh is your master?” she said. “The Wizard Vinh?” Had she known the manager of the C&P was her brother’s teacher? Or had she forgotten? Had Mr. Vinh known about her when she’d appeared that first time with Inq? How much did Stef know? Her ears rang. She was deep into information overload.

  “Don’t look so surprised,” Stef said. “I said I was a wizard’s apprentice, and you knew he was a wizard. How hard can it be to connect the dots? He even said you’d gone to see him about a glamour.”

  Joy shook her head. “That was for Ink.”

  “And you bought one?” Stef asked angrily. “With what?”

  She was obscenely glad that Stef didn’t know anything about her trade with Ladybird. It didn’t take a genius to know that paying three drops of blood to a drug dealer was bad. “With nothing,” she said. “I didn’t end up buying one. Ink did! Because he knew I wanted you guys to meet him.”

  Stef blew out a long breath. “Fine. Well, that’s a relief,” he said as if it were one more thing to check off his to-do list. “Just promise me you won’t go to the C&P for anything other than convenience store crap.”

  Joy hedged. This was getting perilously close to lying territory.

  “That’s why I came to you,” she said earnestly. “You could help me.”

  “You? Yes. You, I can help. Here’s my helpful, brotherly advice—stop whatever it is you’re doing or whatever it is you’re thinking of doing right now. End sentence. As far as helping them?” He snapped a pair of his jeans in the air with a sharp smack! “I’m not helping any Other Thans.”

  Joy stepped back, stung.

  Tell him, she thought.

  “Stef...”

  Tell him!

  Their father’s voice called from the den. “What are you two doing?”

  Stef shouted, “Joy’s not finished packing!”

  “Joy!” Dad barked. “What did I tell you?”

  “No dithering!” she shouted back and, with a last glance at her brother, went to her room and started yanking open drawers and throwing stuff on her bed. Stef might not want to help her out, but he’d just helped her enough to make a start.

  She might not know what a Class Ten blanket spell was, but she knew a few people who did.

  * * *

  Shoving a last fistful of underwear and socks into her pack, Joy hit the auto-dial and waited for the click. Monica picked up on the first ring.

  Joy said, “When.”

  “You serious?” Monica said. “Aren’t you heading out in two days?”

  “I am,” Joy said, grabbing her hiking shorts and ratty jeans. “But the feet want dancing now.”

  “You packed yet?”

  “I’m packing,” Joy said. “As in, ‘in the final stages of getting packed.’”

  “Hmm. You know your Dad’ll kill me if I spring you before you’re through, and I have this crazy, personal attachment to breathing.”

  “Aw, c’mon,” Joy begged, folding T-shirts into thirds. “One last night of fun? It’ll be special—we could double date.”

  “Double date?” Monica said suspiciously. “You mean like you, me, Gordon and your invisible boyfriend? Or are you planning on bringing a Ken doll in your purse?”

  Joy snorted. “Ha-ha,” she said. “You in or not?”

  “In,” Monica said. “Seriously in. What time are we talking?”

  “You name it.”

  “Gimme till nine,” Monica said. “I have to pick out an outfit and call Gordon and everything.”

  Joy grinned. “Nine it is.”

  “And dare I ask where this party will go down?”

  “The Carousel,” Joy said, putting her plan into motion. “Where else?”

  * * *

  Ink appeared for their date through a rift in the wall. Joy checked the clock.

  “Right on time,” she said.

  “I received your message.” He touched the carved box he’d given her on her birthday. Joy found that a scribbled note placed inside would disappear. A response would appear later. They sent little love notes back and forth at all hours of the day and night, tiny scraps of paper that made every day a surprise. Joy had a small collection of her favorites stashed in her drawer. It was way better than email!

  He tugged his shirt across his chest self-consciously. “How do I look?”

  Joy chose not to say the first word that jumped to mind. Scrumptious wasn’t perhaps the subtlest of adjectives.

  “You look great,” she said. “Really.” And he did. As nondescript as his tight black tee and skinny blue jeans were to human eyes, they hugged his long, lean muscles, and his smooth, boyish face made him look anything but ordinary. The silver wallet chain only added to the clean-cut Goth vibe, coiled and cool. Joy remembered thinking that he had an intense, animal grace when she first saw him across the floor of the Carousel. Admittedly, that was before he’d tried to cut out her eye. Theirs was not a case of love at first Sight.

  “You are remembering,” he said, reading her face.

  Joy blushed. “I am.”

  “The first time or the second time we were at the Carousel?”

  The first time, he’d tried to cut out her eye. The second time, they’d danced as close as a second skin in the middle of the crowded floor where no one else could see him. Joy felt the hot memory trickle along her ribs, warming the sides of her neck and tightening her chest.

  “Well, I was thinking about the first, but now I’m thinking about the second.”

  Ink leaned close enough to whisper, “Third time’s the charm.”

  Joy laughed and stepped back, wondering where he’d learned that line. He smiled, pleased with himself. She could tell because both dimples were there. The secret of his mother and the door inside Graus Claude burned inside her. She’d promised Inq that it was her decision, but the look on his face made her want to tell him everything. He was so open, so trusting and so handsome standing there just like a normal boy. Joy consoled herself that after tonight, everyone would be one step closer to the truth.

  “However,” he continued, “I suspect our going out tonight is not to reminisce.”

  Okay, maybe not that much truth. Not yet, anyway.

  “You’re right,” she said. “We’re going to share Date Night with Monica and Gordon, and then I have to see a guy about a spell.” She glanced back at him. “Got your glamour on?”

  He twisted his hand, activating Mr. Vinh’s spell. Having the Sight, Joy couldn’t tell the difference, but she recognized the on/off gesture. “Ready to go,” he said.

  “Joy...” Her father stopped in her doorway, staring at Ink. “Oh. I...” Her dad glanced back at the hall. “I didn’t hear you come in.” His brow furrowed. “Did you come in? I was in the den...”

  “We were just heading out,” Joy said, grabbing Ink’s hand. “We’re meeting Monica and Gordon at the Carousel.”

  Dad sighed. “Have you packed?”

  “Yes. Packed. Done,” Joy said as she led Ink down the hall. She didn’t want to get caught in any questions she couldn’t easily dodge.r />
  “Fine. I’ll walk you out,” Dad said, grabbing his keys.

  “What?” Joy said. “Why? I mean, what for?”

  “I need to get some bungee cords and things for the tent.”

  “I can get them,” Joy volunteered, standing in front of the door. She didn’t need Dad witnessing their exit. “We can pick them up. You can text me a list.”

  Dad wavered. “Nah. Thanks for the offer, but I know I’ll forget to write something down, and then I’d have to go out again later. I’ll just haul my keister out to the store and maybe force myself to hit the gym while I’m out.” He smiled at Ink and clapped him on the shoulder. “Come on, Mark, I’ll walk you to your car.”

  Ink looked curious but smiled. “Okay.”

  Closing the door, Joy thought she was going to have a heart attack and die.

  They walked down the stairs and out to the parking lot. Joy grabbed the keys from her purse and double-clicked the fob as they turned the corner. She was relieved to see that Enrique’s car had appeared right where Ilhami had left it. Her father approached the Ferrari with a low whistle.

  “This is your car?” he said.

  Ink tucked his thumbs in his belt loops the way Ilhami had. Joy bit her lip.

  “You like it?” Ink asked, evading the question like an expert.

  “You kidding? It’s a beauty.” Joy’s father circled the front and peered in, appreciatively. “Of course, an old guy like me couldn’t get away with one of these. It’s got midlife crisis written all over it.” He looked at the tires. “Any reason you parked it out here on the grass?”

  Joy laughed a little too loudly. “Hate to get it dinged,” she said. “Ink’s touchy about cars.” She was very glad that he’d actually touched the Ferrari because then what she said wasn’t technically a lie...

  Mr. Malone crossed his arms over his chest. “Yeah, I can believe it,” he said. “You two go ahead. I’ll wave you out of the drive.”

  Joy’s stomach splashed in a pit of cold acid. Ink glanced at her quizzically. She clutched the keys in her purse. She’d been hoping that her dad would head out, and then they could reengage the cloak and zip out unobserved. Joy’s brain scrambled for some way to get them out of this.