Kiss and Spell (Enchanted, Inc.) (29 page)

Florence must have known the pattern of any patrols because we didn’t run into anyone on our way to that small park. By the time we got there, my magic levels must have been hovering around the “E” on the gauge because the buildings flickered when I looked at them out of the corner of my eye. There was still something there, but it was just a big, blank box instead of a block of picturesque brownstones.

“This place isn’t nearly as nice without the illusion,” I whispered to Owen. “It really does look like a prison.”

Then I did a double take. On top of the building across the street from the park was a row of gargoyles. I didn’t see them if I looked directly at them, but they flickered in and out of sight if I didn’t try to focus on them. I reached around and grabbed Owen’s jacket with my free hand. “Owen, they’ve got gargoyles here! Instead of trying to make them look normal and enchanting them to think they belonged here, they must have just brought them through the portal, stuck them on the nearest building, and veiled them.” I paused to think about it, then added, “Though I suppose they could have enchanted them to think they really were regular gargoyles who can’t talk or move. I know I didn’t see them when we were here before.”

He turned to look, even though he couldn’t see them. “Do you recognize any of them?”

“They’re pretty far away, and I still don’t see them if I look directly. But if we could snap them out of it, they’d be helpful in getting to that portal.”

“Florence!” Owen called out. She stopped and turned around. “Can you see the gargoyles on the roof?”

“Nope. My security clearance is pretty low. I had a limited assignment. You’re saying some of your gargoyles are up there?”

“Maybe.”

“We have to try,” I urged Owen. “We still have some time before our diversion starts.”

“Give us a few minutes,” Owen said. Still holding my hand, he led me to the nearest set of steps, and then we went into the building and up until we reached the stairs that led to the roof.

The higher we climbed, the less substantial the staircase looked. The upper landing was as blank as those unformed rooms had been, without all the touches that had made these buildings seem real. It was disconcerting. To cover my dismay, I said, “You know, I feel ripped-off. If they were going to give me the ideal New York movie life, I should have had access to a romantic rooftop oasis, where we should have had at least one good scene. There’d be twinkling lights, some potted plants, and space to have dinner for two before dancing in the rain.”

“Really? That’s something you want? Dancing in the rain?”

“It’s what’s in all those movies. I don’t know if it’s actually any fun, though. I’ve never tried it.”

This rooftop wasn’t at all romantic, probably because I was back to my usual state in which illusion no longer worked on me. Part of me wanted to cry out in relief, but this wasn’t the best place to be a magical immune. The most realistic thing I saw was a row of frozen gargoyles.

I moved closer to them, still holding Owen’s hand, so that now I was leading him instead of the other way around. Sam wasn’t among the group, much to my relief, since I wanted him to be around on the other side to help take care of Sylvester, but I knew two of the gargoyles, Rocky and Rollo, who made the most unusual chauffeur team I’d ever met.

I faced Rollo and said, “Hey, Rollo, BRAAAAAAKE!” It was all I could think of, and I figured that tag-team driving, with one looking out the windshield and steering and the other working the pedals, was something truly unique to their existence in the real world.

The gargoyle shuddered, then slowly turned around to face me. “Oh, hi, Katie.” Then awareness of his surroundings seemed to hit, and he asked, “Where are we?”

“Not in Kansas,” I quipped. When he obviously didn’t get the reference, I said, “We’re prisoners in the elven realm, and you’ve been enchanted. But we’re about to try to get to the portal that will let us go warn Merlin about what’s happening.”

“Oh, okay,” he said, nodding as though that was a perfectly reasonable explanation. “Do you need some help with that?”

“Yeah, as a matter of fact. Do you know all these other gargoyles well?”

He looked up and down the row, then said, “Sure do.”

“Then talk to them. Call them by name and say something that should remind them of the real world. And then join us across the street.”

“Got it,” he said. He wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed at the best of times, but I figured I could count on him for that much, so Owen and I left the rooftop. I avoided looking beyond the immediate vicinity because I didn’t want to see what the idealized New York romantic comedy neighborhood looked like now. From the bits I’d seen, I had a feeling I’d have enough nightmares about being trapped in a featureless world, as it was. Without the illusions, it was like something out of a dystopian science fiction movie.

“Were they ours?” Earl asked, his voice tight with concern.

“I recognized Rocky and Rollo,” I said. “I was able to wake up Rollo, and he’s taking care of the rest.” Sure enough, dark shapes were already swooping down from the rooftop to join us.

At the same time, there were loud booms in the distance. It sounded like our diversion had begun. We hurried to hide behind a set of front steps and watched as gray guys ran from the park and into the neighborhood.

“Looks like we’re ready to go,” Florence said with a smile of grim satisfaction. “Are you fully immune now? Because hitting the wards would be a bad time to find out you aren’t.”

“I was able to see the gargoyles,” I said. “And this place no longer looks anything like the Upper West Side.”

“I’ll make sure she’s okay,” Owen said.

The gargoyles flew in first, doing some aerial reconnaissance, then returned to report that there were four guards, two at the gateway and maybe two more at the portal. I started to feel like that was more than manageable, but then I realized that if they were at the portal, they were
inside
the wards, and I’d have to deal with them on my own.

“Um, how am I supposed to take out two guards?” I asked nervously.

“You don’t have to take them out. You just have to get past them,” Florence said.

“They’ll probably use magic to fight you, and by the time they notice that it doesn’t work on you, you should be through the portal,” Owen added.

“Maybe we can do something out here that will draw their attention so you can sneak past,” Earl suggested. “I’m sure we can pull off another diversion.”

“Oh, that’s a great plan! I like that idea!” I said, perhaps a wee bit too enthusiastically.

“We’ll make the guards at the gateway scream for help,” Earl said, and the tone of his voice implied that he’d greatly enjoy doing something to make them scream.

“First, let’s make sure you’re immune,” Owen said. He squeezed my hand tighter for a few seconds, then released me and stepped back. I felt the tingle of magic surrounding me, but didn’t notice anything else happening. “Okay, you’re immune,” he said, perhaps a bit mournfully.

“Then let’s do this,” I said. I wanted to get it over with before I lost my nerve—and before I had to spend another minute in this crazy place.

We entered the park, the gargoyles flying ahead. It didn’t look like a park to me now. It was just a blank space with a couple of plain benches and a few shapes that might have been trees and bushes. Instead of having the wall of a building at the far end, the space stretched on, the way it had the first time we’d found it. Just beyond where the wall should have been stood the first two guards.

By the time we reached the guards, the gargoyles were already upon them, dive-bombing them and grabbing at them with their talons. I’d experienced a gargoyle attack like that, and I didn’t envy the guards.

According to plan, the guards started shouting for help. I hoped the portal guards were the ones to respond because things would get a lot more complicated if other guards appeared and we ended up with more people to fight.

And, of course, as luck would have it, reinforcements appeared from elsewhere in the park. Earl and his friends turned just in time to fight them off. “There goes my cover,” Florence muttered as she joined the fight. Owen held me off to the side so I’d be ready to run as soon as the way was clear.

Our luck improved when one guard arrived from beyond the gateway. “This may be the best we can hope for,” Owen said.

I didn’t trust myself to speak, so I gave him what I hoped was a firm nod. There wasn’t really anything firm about me at the moment, as my legs seemed to have turned to jelly and my insides felt all watery. But I still managed to run as Owen and I dashed past the first set of guards and through the gateway out of the containment area and into the elven realm.

Without the illusion of dense park vegetation or whatever else they’d used to hide it, I could see the portal just ahead, a shimmering oval casting a greenish glow on the surrounding area. We stopped at a safe distance, and he waved a hand in what I recognized as a veiling spell. “So, I just go through it?” I asked, even as I winced at how badly my voice shook. “No spell, incantation, or anything?”

“I think it should be as simple as just going through it. With the kind of energy required to create a portal between realities, they’d have to keep it open.”

“What’ll I find when I get through to the other side?”

“That would be the tricky part,” he said with an audible gulp. “It should be that same warehouse where we first found the other end of the portal, but what’s there now, we don’t know.”

“And I should be able to go through, in spite of being immune to magic?”

“It shouldn’t make much of a difference.”

“Then what stops them from sending me right back here?”

“They can’t mess with your head the way they did before, and they’d have to use physical force to make you go through the portal.”

“That’s not very reassuring.”

“This was your plan,” he reminded me.

“Yeah, I know, and I still can’t think of a better option.”

“Me, either,” he admitted. “You’re on your own after this. I can’t go any farther.”

“What’ll happen to you on this side?”

He gave me a smile that strained at being cocky but didn’t quite make it. “Remember, you’re going to come rescue me.” More seriously, he added, “If we can hold off the guards long enough, I may be able to do something about these wards. It’ll take time, but now that we’re here and have the guards busy, we’ll see what I can do. I may join you before you know it.”

I was about to give him a jaunty salute and then head boldly through the wards, but he abruptly reached for my hands and held them clasped tightly in his own. His palms were clammy with what I suspected was fear, and my suspicion was borne out by the tremor in his voice as he said, “Take care of yourself. Above all, stay safe. Put that above sending messages, getting help, or getting us back.”

“That sort of defeats the purpose of me doing this,” I said, but the tremor in my own voice diminished my attempt at a snarky tone.

“I just don’t want to lose you.”

“I don’t want to lose you, either. And that’s why I’m going to go through that portal and do whatever it takes to get everyone back home and stop Sylvester’s scheme.” I managed to crack a smile. “I think you just don’t like the idea of being the one to be rescued. You make a lousy damsel in distress.”

“I do, I really do,” he agreed, sounding a little more like himself. He released my hands, but before I could move away from him, he grabbed me and held me in a tight hug.

“I’m only going to another reality,” I gasped, struggling for breath with my chest constricted. “It’s not like you’ll never see me again.”

He eased his hold just enough to kiss me. If I hadn’t already been breathless, that would have done the trick. “I’ll find you again, no matter what,” he whispered hoarsely, his lips still lightly brushing mine.

“Right back at you, handsome,” I said. “See you on the other side.” I reluctantly slipped out of his embrace, and he let me go.

I felt the wards before I reached them. I was used to the wards Owen put around his office and his home, and I thought they were powerful, but these were industrial-strength. My hair felt like it was standing on end, like I was touching one of those things my physics teacher used to demonstrate electricity. I steeled myself, took a deep breath, and stepped through the wards, hoping Owen was right about having removed every last trace of magic from me. If he hadn’t, I had a feeling things were about to get really unpleasant.

The sense of passing through powerful magic walls took my breath away, but nothing stopped my progress, and soon I was safely on the other side.

Unfortunately, that brought me to the attention of the remaining guard. He seemed more than a little taken aback to see someone on the other side of the wards. I got the feeling that up until now, he’d thought he had the most boring job around, guarding something that no one could reach. Now he didn’t know what to make of someone who could reach it.

“Hi there!” I said with a friendly wave. “Whatcha got there? It’s very shiny.”

He hit me with some magic, but it had its usual lack of effect on me. I laughed out loud with the joy of being back to my usual self. Being able to do magic was cool, but this was who I really was, and I knew how to work it in a way I’d never understood magic.

My sense of triumph died when I saw that Owen was no longer alone on the other side of the wards. More guards approached him from behind. I shouted a warning, though I wasn’t sure the sound would carry through the wards. At the same time, the guard on my side of the wards hit me with another bit of magic that I ignored while I watched Owen. He turned just in the nick of time, but he was badly outnumbered. They would overwhelm him in a moment.

I started to rush toward him, but stopped myself. More of our people were on the other side of the wards, and I was the only one who could get through the portal. I was our only hope. As much as I hated leaving Owen behind, I forced myself to focus on my mission.

The guard kept attacking me magically, astonished that his magic had no effect on this impossible interloper. I took advantage of that by rushing straight at him. He ran toward me, and at the last second, I veered aside to aim for the portal. It was an old fake-out I’d learned when playing touch football with my brothers, and since this guy obviously hadn’t experienced the joys of football, it took him a while to react.