A Nomadic Witch

“That was Aervyn’s idea.” Ginia unwove spell threads as she talked. “Uncle Marcus vetoed the alligators, though. Too many teeth.”

Aervyn was loose in Realm? That couldn’t possibly end well.

Jamie tried to remember he was in charge-that’s what he told investors all the time. “Who gave him admin access?”

“Mia. Or maybe Shay. Somebody did.” His niece cheerfully dismissed a major security breach. “Marcus says we can make one of the rooms pink and glittery from head to toe if we want.”

Bribed by glitter. He needed to have a serious discussion with his child labor, but first he needed to chat with the rogue player who was running this show.

Getting there was tricky. He encountered a singing Moira, planting neat beds of blue flowers. Mia and Shay, installing a lagoon that looked suspiciously like the one he’d just coded for his private Realm retreat. Daniel and Kevin, directing a geek brick-laying crew. And Sophie, muttering something dire at the rocks underfoot.

By the time he got to the guy in charge, Jamie was pretty sure he was the most poorly informed witch on either coast. “Ahoy the captain. What’s going on here?”

Marcus shrugged. “It was either this or move to Kansas. This seemed easier.”

“Kansas?” Jamie had sudden visions of tornadoes. The last time one of those had shown up in Realm, it had spread purple poop over four kingdoms. “Why?”

“Far away from the water.” Marcus pointed a delivery of rocks in the direction of one of the castle walls. “Where have all the travelers lived?”

He was failing witch Twenty Questions. “Not in Kansas?”

Marcus’s eyes sparked with victory. “Exactly. Kevin figured it out-they all live near water. The mists. Water must be some kind of conduit for whatever power makes astral travel possible.”

Jamie blinked. It made an eerie kind of sense. “So you’re taking Morgan away from water?” Virtual reality was about as far away from water as you could get-of the real kind, anyhow.

“Only at night.” Marcus tossed an incantation cube in the direction of a pile of rocks and hummed in approval as they helpfully rearranged themselves into a tower. “We’ll spend the days in Fisher’s Cove and sleep here.”

And most of the citizens of Realm were blowing all their game points to help him do just that. Jamie was catching on fast, but his head was having trouble wrapping around a few of the salient details. “And you need a castle for this?”

Marcus rolled his eyes, alight with humor. “I asked for assistance. It was perhaps a mistake. The crew is rather zealous.”

They certainly were. But it was the first part of what he’d said that had Jamie’s attention. Marcus’s high mountain keep was the fanciest private zone in Realm. And instead of retreating there, he’d brought Morgan to the very heart of Realm’s communal strength-and asked for help. That wasn’t the act of a crusty old bachelor witch.

It was the act of a father.

One whose girl-child was about to have the fanciest castle in Realm. Jamie turned, surveying the hive of activity. “How can I help?”

Humor fled, and in its place came the battle-worn general. “Help Ginia with the wards. I need the best protection spellcoding can buy.”

Well, you didn’t kick a guy into action and then rain on his first big idea, even if it was re-landscaping half your virtual world. Jamie saluted, and looked around for Warrior Girl. He had a couple of ideas for that layering spell.

And then Kevin pushed a wheelbarrow full of bricks by, and Jamie knew he had one thing do to first. He looked back over at Marcus. Have you thanked Kevin?

The general was back to throwing incantation spells at walls. What?

Jamie resisted the urge to bonk him over the head with a mental two-by-four. Clearly, plenty of crusty-old- bachelor brain was still alive and kicking. He’s a kid about to explode with pride that he brought something important to the table. Try something new. Thank him.

Marcus looked at Kevin’s retreating back and scowled. And what magic tells you this?

Not magic, replied Jamie wryly. Experience. I was kid brother to a magical menace a fair amount like Sean.

His companion snorted. “You didn’t have a fraction of Kevin’s common sense.”

Probably true. “I had more than Devin, though.” Most days.

“Doubtful.” But Marcus was looking at Kevin with new eyes. “Living in the shadows, is he?”

It occurred to Jamie, far too late, that there had been another wild brother once. One with a forty-three-year- long shadow.

***

Building towers was exhausting, even if you had fairly unlimited magic at your disposal.

Marcus walked a quiet hillside overlooking Realm, a transport cube in his pocket. Morgan was asleep in her new castle, and there was a bevy of tired coders eating in the main hall.

He’d needed peace more than food-and real warriors didn’t eat pizza.

A wisp of long-forgotten memory tickled his mind. Evan, disgruntled in his Superman cloak and very wet pants, insisting that warriors didn’t eat turnips. Or maybe they’d been pirates that day-the cape and wet pants weren’t much of a clue.

Mom had laughed-and made them eat the turnips anyhow. Five-year-old warrior pirates just didn’t have that much pull in Fisher’s Cove, no matter how big and fierce they thought themselves.

Evan would have loved the many battles of Realm. Hell-he’d have been leading most of the charges.

Marcus stopped, the twisting in his gut all too familiar. There was a reason he left those memories buried in the sludge of time. It did him no good to remember.

Scaredy witch.

Evan’s favorite taunt. Marcus scowled as the words floated up in his head. I’m not five anymore. And any old memories that thought he might be could just go back into the moldy boxes of his brain. He had a very adult problem to solve, and thoughts of pirates and turnips were hardly going to help.

Turnips still suck.

Great. Now the moldy boxes were trying to have a conversation. Turnips are good for you. As were any number of other vegetables that most witches turned up their noses at. Magic can’t be powered on cookies alone.

You sound like Mom.

Yes, he did. And that was a sad commentary on the inner workings of his mind. How about we get off the topic of turnips, hmm? If he had to have a conversation with himself, there had to be a whole universe of more interesting topics.

Kissed a girl yet?

Marcus stopped dead, fist ready to punch his brother in the nose-before he remembered he was forty-three years too late. Hecate’s hells, what had been in the healer goo? His head had enough to do without imaginary figments of Evan.

Kissing’s fun.

Marcus snorted. The last thing you kissed was a dead fish. On a dare-one that had somehow managed to include both of them. The genius idea of Mary Margaret Higgins, age seven. You killed my dating life forever.

It seemed wrong that his own head thought that hysterically funny.

You didn’t stick around long enough to end up being the teenage boy who once kissed a fish. Mary Margaret’s memory had been very long.

She’s waking up.

That made no sense-until the transport spellcube in his pocket activated.

Morgan was awake. And it was long past time to leave memories of turnips and fish-faced girls well enough