I didn’t pull away, preferring to linger against his body and soak up the heat of him.
He started toward the inn, shifting so we were shoulder to shoulder as we walked up the wooden steps to a covered porch that stretched along this side of the building and corner to continue across the front, riverside of the building.
A wooden sign next to the door read FEILE SAN FHOMHER and beneath that, WELCOME.
Zayvion lifted the door latch and pulled open the door, the old hinges giving out a mewl of metal on metal.
The scents of sage, butter, bread stuffing, and baked apples filled my nose and mouth as we entered the high ceilinged, open-raftered main room of the inn. A lunch counter to the right of the room traced a round-edged square in white marble countertop. Only a few people sat in the walnut T-backed stools around the counter, a mix of old and young, suits and jeans.
Rows of round tables filled the space between us and the lunch counter, and square tables tracked along the windows all the way to the end of the building.
A smattering of people sat at the tables. A group of gray-haired men who looked as if they didn’t have a penny between them were working their way through heaping turkey meals. At a table by the window, six teen girls chatted and laughed.And at other tables I saw executives holding business lunches, moms with shopping bags at their feet and children in high chairs, a set of couples, some construction workers, and more than a few loners, men and women, eating lunch, talking, reading papers, drinking coffee while the waitstaff-a couple girls, at the moment-connected them all through service and smiles. Several people behind the lunch counter kept busy cooking and cleaning. The overall atmosphere was a nod to the past, when transitory people gathered and socialized in the comfort of a home away from home.
“Zayvion, Allie.” The voice had a lovely Irish lilt to it, and I looked away from the tables to the woman walking across the room. Maeve wore jeans and deck shoes and a dark green sweater layered over a cream turtleneck. Her red hair was pulled back in a bun and tendrils of it fell free to curl in soft reds and gray around her face. Her eyes were green with wicked intensity, her smile welcoming, if not exactly warm.
What was it Zayvion had said at dinner? My father killed her husband? I suddenly wished I’d asked him more about that.
“Any luck?” she asked Zayvion.
He shook his head. “Still hunting.”
Maeve turned toward me. “I’m glad you made it. Let me take your coat. Then you and I can get started.”
Zayvion tensed. “You don’t want me there?”
“Not this first time. I want to see what Allie can do on her own.” She strode off, talking over her shoulder. “You can stay out here if you’d like,” she said. “I don’t think this will take long.”
I picked up the pace to keep up with her as she beelined between tables, smiling at her guests. She led me back to a wide hallway, where wall lanterns cast the wood in warm tones, then past a white wooden staircase that square-railed up and up. We strolled through a doorway into a small sitting room done up like an old-fashioned parlor.
Plush love seats and chairs big enough for two filled the room. Beside each chair was a small table. In the center of each table was a clear glass bowl, lined with lead.
Magic conducts through glass and lead, if the right glyphs are worked into both. I also noted the wallpaper that at first looked like gold and forest green flowers in a repeating pattern were actually magical glyphs. I caught Shield, Ward, and several other negating glyphs around the room before Maeve had crossed to a dark door that did little to call attention to itself.
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.
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.
