Blue Magic (47 page)

North and east, in Saskatoon, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were having a standoff with a man who had vamped seven people. He was holding them off with a magical straight razor.

She asked: “Would you like a hand?”

“He’s had every chance to surrender,” one assented. Drawing vitagua out of the prairie soil, she flowed into the house, overwhelming the guy, freezing him solid.

A thousand tasks, time for everything. She worked, watched, wheeled and dealed, started learning Spanish. The day passed.

At dusk, she sent a ringer home to Pucker Hill.

Will was at the cottage with the kids, cleaning up dinner: corn on the cob and baked ham, from the look of it. Carson’s face stiffened as she came through the door: he was polite in class, but that did not mean she had won him over.

“Hey.” Will came to the door, kissing her cheek. It was a peck—he still found the ringers creepy.

“How’s the world?”

“Changing,” she said.

“What else is new?” He rinsed the plates and set them in a rack to dry. “Carson wants to see what’s left of our old neighborhood in Portland.”

Astrid eyed him gravely. “Is it okay if I come?”

The boy nodded, his face unreadable.

They took Stonegate to Blue Bone, stepping through to Portland. The city was half in and half out of Roused territory; it lay on the edge of an area flattened by quakes and overgrown by alchemized forest. Overnight, it had become a border town.

Will’s street had gotten a good shake. Heritage homes slumped in an untidy line along broken roadway and sidewalks, many cracked and slumping, none quite flattened. The trees around them had grown sky high, shadowing everything.

A trio of starlings flashed past, iridescent feathers glinting. Ellie waved: Alchemites who hadn’t lost their faith on Boomsday considered the birds holy.

Flying rats,
Astrid’s father grumbled. He’d never much liked starlings.

“This is it,” Carson said, voice strained. “Ellie, look.”

Rhododendrons spilled over the porch of a three-story house. Will shoved the plants back, triggering a spill of red blossoms. Beyond the growth, the door was ajar.

Ellie darted in.

“Careful, baby.” Will trotted after her, leaving Astrid alone with Carson.

“So…,” Astrid said before the silence could stretch. “You’re looking for your old things?”

The boy shook his head. “Dad got them after Boomsday.”

“Just wanted to poke around?”

No answer. She stepped back, letting him decide if he wanted to chase his father and sister indoors. His discomfort was obvious.

Maybe coming along had been a mistake.

Casting about for something to say, Astrid spotted a glimmer of steel at the edge of the garden, metal buried under leaves. She bent, struggling to unearth whatever it was, but her mouse muscles failed her.

“Here.” Carson dug, coming up with a pair of ice skates, black leather boots with a touch of rust on the blades.

“It has that sparkle,” he said.

“Yeah?” A glimmer of foreknowledge. “The first time I learned to consciously choose what a chantment I was making would do—I talked as I was chanting. I said what I wanted.”

The boy shot her what she’d come to think of as his “wary dog” look.

“Your little sister doesn’t have to be the class superstar,” Astrid said, offering her hand, letting the tip of one finger soften to liquid magic.

After a second, Carson reached out, absorbing a bit of her essence. He bit his lip, bowed his head, and clenched the skates to his chest, whispering as the magic flowed into them.

“Any idea what they do?” Astrid asked.

He nodded, unable to hide a glint of triumph.

“It’s what you wanted?”

“Yes.” He hefted them. “Did you plant these here?”

“No,” she said. “Want to give them a try?”

He sat, kicking off his shoes. “There’s no letrico.”

“The forest can spare a little heat.”

Carson started spinning, just a little, and as the letrico coiled at his feet, he wound his hand in it, balling it around his fist in a cotton candy spool. He frowned that Will Forest frown, and Astrid’s small heart pattered, expecting some hard question: How could she have let his mother be murdered? maybe. But he rose onto the blades, flexed his legs, and took off like a rocket through the trees.

The sound, the rasp of a knife cutting ice, brought Will to the porch at a run. “What’s he doing?”

“Blowing off steam,” Astrid said, fists clenched, unwilling to admit she was terrified the kid would slam into a tree.

He put an arm around her. “You are not going to become one of those permissive stepmothers who lets the children walk all over her, just for fear of being disliked.”

“I don’t know. Am I?”

“That wasn’t actually a question.”

“Rules, rules,” she said, and he squeezed her as if she were still alive.

Ellie came out of the house with a stuffed elephant clutched in each hand. “Car-car! Let me try!”

“You’ll accommodate,” Will said. “We all will. We remade the world. How hard can building a family be?”

“It’s the thing I never got right.”

“It’s going to work out, Astrid,” he said, turning her so she was looking into his eyes.

“Do you mean that, Will?”

“I believe it,” he said. Carson swooped past, bearing his sister skyward. Both kids shrieked with laughter as Will’s breath began to fog on the steadily cooling air and he pressed his lips to hers.

TOR BOOKS BY A. M. DELLAMONICA

Indigo Springs

Blue Magic

P
RAISE
FOR
I
NDIGO
S
PRINGS

W
INNER OF THE 2010
S
UNBURST
A
WARD FOR
C
ANADIAN
F
ANTASY
L
ITERATURE

“The theme here—the problems of power in irresponsible hands—is archetypal, but Dellamonica realizes it very well through characters you wouldn’t want in your neighborhood but who certainly hold your attention in what becomes an edge-of-the-seat thriller.”

—
Booklist

“I loved this. An original and terrific apocalyptic fantasy set in the real world,
Indigo Springs
is terrifyingly insightful, sprinkled with bits of humor for leavening. Newcomer A. M. Dellamonica has deftly crafted a book that is both literary and a very good read. What a fine storyteller Tor has discovered.”

—Patricia Briggs, #1 bestselling author of the Mercy Thompson novels

“A psychologically astute, highly original debut—complex, eerie, and utterly believable. Stay tuned for the projected sequel.”

—
Kirkus Reviews
(starred review)

“A fascinating and multilayered tale of people who get caught up with forces beyond their control. Not only is it a cracking good tale, it’s also an insightful look into the consequences of using great power selfishly.”

—
RT Book Reviews
(four stars)

“A lyrical and richly imagined world with a storyline that encompasses both eco-politics and the vagaries of the human heart.”

—Syne Mitchell, editor of
WeaveZine

“This is an entertaining and terrifying tale of terrific characters who stumble into the practice of blue magic and find that it is neither simple nor safe. Astrid, Jacks, and Sahara will enchant you and lead you down unexpected paths of discovery and danger. A great read that will make you look for magic in everyday objects!”

—Toby Bishop, author of
Airs Beneath the Moon

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A. M. Dellamonica is the author of
Indigo Springs,
a debut novel that won the Sunburst Award for Canadian Literature of the Fantastic. She has been publishing short fiction since the early nineties, some of which has appeared in
Asimov’s, Strange Horizons, Realms of Fantasy,
and at
Tor.com
along with numerous anthologies. In 2005, her alternate history of Joan of Arc, “A Key to the Illuminated Heretic,” was shortlisted for the Sideways Award and the Nebula Award. She also teaches writing courses through the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program.

Dellamonica lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, with her wife, Kelly Robson, and two very spoiled cats.