Unlike Sylvie’s family, who’d been less than enchanted by their wacky, sometimes ghost-seeing grandmother and denied any connection to the supernatural world, Nicky’s family seemed to have embraced magic with open (and greedy) arms.
Tamara and Sylvie had declined help preparing the sandwiches, and I suspected Tamara had used their time alone to answer some of Sylvie’s questions. Whatever was said had put Sylvie more at ease. I was itching to mimic Lilac and blatantly ask—about necromantic mages and ghostly grandmothers—but unlike Lilac, I had some self-control.
It was well past lunchtime, so when the pile of sandwiches arrived, they didn’t last long. Our hunger sated, we sat around the kitchen table and spitballed the best methods for shielding Sylvie’s newfound powers.
Lilac asked, “Why not dig around in that magic man cave of yours, Hector, and pull out the perfect solution?”
“The concern is that Sylvie’s magic, which is still new and unfamiliar, might interact unpredictably with a cursed object,” Tamara explained, as if they’d not just been talking about this very issue for ten minutes.
Lilac rolled her eyes. “Like that’s a greater risk than asking poor Sylvie to do the equivalent of complex math while being grilled by kidnappers and negotiating Clarence’s safe return.”
“What do you think, Hector?” Tamara asked. “Worse to try new magic or to try a cursed object with new magic that not’s actually in play?”
“Ah, do I get a vote?” Sylvie asked. Everyone turned to her. She’d been very quiet through the discussion. “These powers you guys are talking about? They don’t exist, not in any usable form. I vote cursed object, because I can’t do magic.” Now that she had everyone’s attention, she took it down a notch and, in a lighter tone, said, “Also, I vote we stop calling them ‘cursed’ objects.”
Lilac looked intrigued. “Why cursed? Why not enchanted, ensorcelled, or even just magical? Cursed is so . . . dark.” She looked at me and nodded. “You were right. Demons have a PR problem.”
“We’ll change what centuries of culture and myth have wrought—just for you, Lilac. Let me get right on that.” Hector leaned back in his chair. “After we’ve retrieved the cat. And I’ve recatalogued my library.”
I took that to mean no time soon. “So, Hector, what type of cursed object do you think might do the trick? Won’t Nicky be able to see a cursed object as easily as someone’s else’s magic?”
Hector quirked an eyebrow at me. “Plant the curse deep enough within the fibers of the object’s being and you can hide the magic from most people. Not a demon, but most others.”
Lilac’s eyes lit up. “So are you going to make something? Or do you have the perfect ‘cursed object’ in mind?”
Her blatant attempt at compliance amused him. He didn’t flash his usual easy smile, but his eyes crinkled at the corners, giving him away. “No, Lilac, I will not be making something in the next few hours. It’s not like ordering pizza; it takes time.”
Eyes huge, Lilac sat on the edge of her seat. “So? What have you got?”
He listed a few options and watched as Lilac and Sylvie paid close attention. I couldn’t help but worry that Lilac’s blind enthusiasm, her outright exuberance for all things magical, might be leaving her open to harm. Sylvie’s more cautious approach seemed safer.
Tamara patted my hand. “She’ll be fine. She’s just young, and you’ve forgotten what youth is like.”
Quietly, I asked her, “What kind of witch can read minds?” If she was going to continue to pry inside my head, then my reservations about her own privacy were going to diminish in equal proportion.
“The kind who isn’t all witch,” she replied quietly. “And you’re right, I shouldn’t be prying. But you also need to put protections in place. You’re a very open person, Geoff, which makes you a lovely man, but also very easy to read for those of us with the talent.” With a concerned look, she patted my hand again and then joined the most-suitable-cursed-item debate.
The eyeglasses won in the end.
Hector handed Sylvie a pair of feminine-looking glasses. “So long as you’re looking through the lenses, your magic should be hidden from view. So don’t take them off.” With a serious look, he added, “And don’t lose them.”
Tamara sighed. “Don’t start with the ‘cursed objects in the wild’ speech.”
“Since you mention it, there are several excellent points that you should all be made aware of. And it’s not a speech.” Except Hector was wrong. It was definitely a speech, which was especially entertaining because it conflicted with the lady-killer image I’d developed of him over the last few hours.
What I gathered from his serious, heartfelt, and very speech-like pep talk was that cursed objects could be very powerful and that sometimes they were unpredictable. We should do exactly as instructed with them, no more, no less. Only some of the items under his control were created by him. Cursed objects in general could be unpredictable, and even more so if they’d been created by a demon with morally questionable objectives.
Only trained, responsible individuals should be allowed access, and under no circumstances should we ever allow one of his toys—uh, catalogued items—to return to the wild where just anyone could use them.
“The ‘wild’ being anywhere that’s not here or under your direct supervision?” Lilac asked. And she wasn’t even poking fun. She looked quite serious.
“Basically,” Hector said. “There are a few responsible curators in the state, one in Austin, but certainly cursed items shouldn’t be allowed into the public domain. Everyone got it?” He looked at each of us, and one by one we agreed that we did, in fact, have it.
Hector took a little of the fun out of playing with magic toys.
And then he handed me my very own magic toy: an iron knife he retrieved from a case that contained a dozen or so
