Mulberry Wands (32 page)

“I’ll let you out.” She stood up to get the
door for him. As he walked out, holding the box of owls, she tucked
a business card into the top owl’s wing.

“What’s that?”

“My day job. Even the best mage in Phoenix
can’t make a living as a mage, at least, not a comfortable
living.”

He glanced at the card. It said
“acupuncture.” He didn’t know what that was. Something medical,
maybe, because it had a caudex on it, but he couldn’t imagine
what.

***

Fox was waiting for him when he got home,
curled up asleep in the ivy bed beside the door. She was mostly
hidden, just a tiny patch of fur and an ear showing through the
leaves, like a little blonde cat taking a nap, but he could sense
other Sunwards well enough to know she was there as soon as he
crossed the parking lot.

“Everyone is upset about the mage and the
twinge trap,” Fox said, sliding out from under the ivy to peer into
the box. “These some of the ones that got hit? Oh, all parliament
members. Well, well.”

“Don’t bite them, that would be rude.” Paul
unlocked the door.

“I won’t,” Fox licked one, as though it were
a cub, to prove that she had sympathy no matter what she said.
“They’re terrified. Put them in the sunlight.”

“They can’t fade,” Paul said, picking up the
box again.

“I know, but I don’t think they like being
apart from the lady.” Fox had pity on her vulpine face. Pity for
owls. Paul didn’t think it possible of her. She gently picked them
up with her mouth and set them in the shaft of sunlight pouring
through the window. “Let them die in the light.”

“I hope they won’t die at all. I’m going to
negotiate with Maggie to un-petrify them.”

“Negotiate? You think the parliament will let
you do that? They’d rather let the owls die than let a human
Sunward have a perch in the parliament.”

“I wasn’t going to ask the parliament. The
parliament barely tolerates me. But I’m on good terms with the
Prime Minister. Love her, in fact. She chose me for a reason. Maybe
this was it.” His own arrogance frightened him. Did he dare ask?
Surely she’d refuse.

“You’re going to—” Fox paused. “Oh. Well. I’d
like to see that happen.”

Paul picked up his phone and called his boss
to ask for the day off. He thought he’d have to fake an illness,
but his boss just told him to take a ‘personal day’ which he’d
never heard before.

He stood near the window, not quite letting
the rays of sunlight touch him. He took a deep breath, then
another. He could do this. She wouldn’t punish him. His reasons
were valid. Shit. Okay, one more breath, then he’d do it.

Fox shook her head, a gesture she’d used more
now that she’d worn a human form. “You got balls, my friend.”

“Yeah, but she chose me anyway.”

He thought about what kind of argument he
could frame, then realized it was pointless. She would know
everything he knew as soon as he faded into her. He squeezed his
eyes shut, took another breath, and exhaled sharply. If she didn’t
agree with him, the parliament would probably maim him for his
insolence.

He glanced at the owls, lying petrified on
the floor. If he didn’t succeed, they would die. He disliked them,
hated them sometimes, but they were Sunwards. They were his
sisters.

Paul stepped into the light before he could
think too much about it.

He faded, melting into the sunbeam.

He had never been able to explain what it
felt like to go into the light. He was everywhere and nowhere at
once, a part of the lady, no longer having any sense of
himself.

Everything he had been and done in the
darkness she learned, assimilated, kept.

She knew what he asked.

She considered.

She granted it.

He wanted to stay, as always. Once you faded
into the light, it was hard to leave her warmth and return to the
darkness. He felt the other Sunwards, learned what they learned.
Time lost its urgency. This is how a few moments became a few
years, and you found yourself returning to a society that had
passed you by.

But not this time. This time he had a job to
do.

He stepped back into his apartment, and he
brought the lady’s mantle with him. Her light was heavy. He thought
he would burst with it.

“You’re glowing,” Fox said, looking awed.
“She allowed it.”

“Yeah.” He was breathing shallowly. He felt
as though he was already holding as much as he could.

“The parliament is going to be pissed.”

“Yeah.” They would know right away, as soon
as they went into the light. Some had already found out. They
weren’t happy, none of the parliament was. Parliaments hate
viziers.

“There’s never been a human Raylight before,”
Fox said.

“Might never be again.” Paul’s voice came out
as a squeak.

Fox tilted her head to one side. “Is it hard
to hold in?”

“Extremely.”

“Guess we’d better talk to the mage
then.”

“We?”

“Of course I’m going with you,” she said,
trotting towards the door. “I have more fun when I’m with you.”

“Thanks, Fox.”

She snorted. “It’s not a compliment; it means
that you’re a magnet for trouble.” But she grinned, tongue lolling
against her teeth. It was a compliment. Fox loved trouble.

***

“Maggie!” Paul called, since he still
couldn’t cross the ward to knock on her door.

Fox twined around his feet, alternately
fading and coming back into focus. She was frightened to be around
so many people during the day, but she was too curious to leave
entirely. Paul could feel her, could feel everything the light
touched, including two Sunwards who had been missed by both him and
the wildlife rehabilitationists.

“Maggie!” He called again.

He was having trouble holding the light in.
He was glowing so brightly that some of the neighbors had come out
of their trailers and pointed. Some of the other ones just shut
their curtains.

“What?” Maggie said, coming out of her
trailer with a bottle of Jack Daniels in one hand and a can of Coke
in the other. “Oh, it’s you.”

“I have authority to negotiate.”

“I called Susan’s house. Six weeks she’s been
gone. Her boss said she disappeared in early November. Your people
killed her.”

“We didn’t.” He was still breathing
shallowly, trying to find a comfortable way to hold the light. As
far as he could tell, there wasn’t one. “She was kidnapped by
someone else and she should be home soon.”

“Bullshit. You’re lying.”

He felt the light, felt what the parliament
wanted, what the lady agreed to. “If you release the owls, we can
give you amnesty for killing our prey, as long as you don’t do it
again.”

“Not good enough. I want Susan back.” She
took a swig of the Coke and poured some Jack Daniels in the
can.

He consulted the light. “We can’t give you
that. Amnesty is the best we can offer.”

“Then don’t waste my time.” She turned to go
back into her trailer.

“I can get you Susan. I know where she is.”
He didn’t, but unlike owls, he knew how to bluff. Most of the owls
he could feel were pissed off that he’d been named Raylight, but
they couldn’t do anything but respect the lady’s opinion. She gave
him authority. She trusted his judgment.

“Yeah?”

“You can?” Fox asked.

He nodded.

She poured a little more whiskey into the
Coke can and swirled it around, then drank it. Paul wouldn’t have
minded a sip too. A drink of anything. It may have been December,
but it felt pretty hot when you were standing in the sun holding a
goddess of light within your body.

“Get me Susan, and swear that you guys are
gonna leave me alone, and I’ll let the owls go.”

“Let the owls go and swear not to use any
more rumblers.”

“Yeah, yeah. Only I gotta have Susan here.”
Maggie glared at him. “Alive and well.”

“Agreed.”

He couldn’t hold the Raylight mantle any
longer. He let go, and faded.

Susan was still trapped by the sinews, but
she had a sharpened stick and enough ointment to blind a whole
litter of cats. If the litter of cats they’d seen earlier had the
second sight, she might need it. She waited, and waited, and
waited. Was Sphinx going to come out? Darius had already left for
school, she’d heard his bike chain clink against the wall. Zoë
hadn’t left yet, but she had odd hours since so many of her tattoos
were done by appointment, and because she was part owner and she
could adjust her schedule as needed. Did she notice that Susan
wasn’t in bed? Did she wonder what had happened to her? Susan
thought about shouting, but the chances that the litter of kittens
would hear her was much greater than the chance that Zoë would hear
her within the house with all the windows closed.

She was very sleepy. She hadn’t slept at all
that night, and she was starting to nod off.

She jerked awake. Sphinx wasn’t here yet. She
couldn’t hear the asshole hiding in the branches either. Were the
other ones still there? God, she was so tired.

She jerked awake. She looked at the sky. How
long had she slept? What had awoken her? The garbage truck rumbled
by in the alley.

She yawned and stretched, rotating back and
forth to get the kinks out of her back. She wasn’t shivering
anymore now that the sun was on her, but she still felt stiff an
achy from being out all night without any clothes on. She yawned
again, then choked it off as adrenaline pumped through her.

Sphinx had just jumped to the top of the side
wall.

Susan pursed her lips and made a cat calling
sound. “Here kitty!”

Sphinx meowed and leapt down, trotting
closer. She paused halfway across the yard and crouched, tail
swishing in the air. She crept closer.

“Oh, come on, you dumb cat, it’s not like I
can’t see you,” Susan muttered. Stupid suburban cats that thought
they were hunters.

Sphinx crept closer.

Susan took a wide stance, holding her
sharpened twig in the right hand. “I’m ready, cat. Come and get
it.”

She wasn’t really ready, she was terrified.
She’d gone past shaking, past the cold pit in her stomach, and now
she just felt an empty roaring where her thoughts had been.

The cat leapt.

Susan had meant to stand still and let Sphinx
get her, but she flinched away at the last minute, her body
deciding that self-preservation and holding still while a predator
leapt were incompatible.

Sphinx lifted her paws as though expecting to
see a tiny woman under them.

Susan leapt on her back, tucking her ankle
under the new nylon collar.

Sphinx shook her head, and Susan found
herself flung off. She didn’t hit the ground though, because the
sinew tied to her leg had become caught on the jump ring that held
the brass nametag to the collar.

Sphinx backed up, shaking her head back and
forth, and when she got to the end of the rope, she jumped in the
air, twisting. It wasn’t enough to free her; the translators had
pounded the stake quite far into the ground.

Susan tried to ball herself up to keep from
getting whiplash, but she hadn’t been fast enough. Her neck was hot
and achy, and she knew it would hurt soon. She remembered the
feeling from being in a car accident.

Susan was still hanging upside down, her back
and head dragging on the ground. By some miracle she’d kept her
hold on the stick. She swung her arm to jam the stick into Sphinx’s
fur, but the cat had her winter coat in and her pelt was too thick.
Sphinx yowled and shook her head harder.

Susan felt herself flung into the air again,
the scenery spinning past faster than her eyes could focus. The
back of her head hit the ground again, and a headache blossomed.
Then she lay still, with the sky wheeling rapidly above her. The
sinew must have worked itself loose from the cat’s collar.

Sphinx pounced.

Susan felt warm paws on her chest, then
needle-sharp claws. Sphinx started purring, sounding as loud as the
engine of a car bearing down on her. She bit Susan’s head. Susan
felt the teeth slice her scalp, but she was beyond pain now. She
jammed the sharpened stake into the cat’s gums.

Sphinx yowled, but she didn’t let go. Susan
wiped more ointment on the stick and stabbed the cat again, this
time in the roof of her mouth. She wedged it in as far as she could
get it. Sphinx let go this time, gagging. She pawed at her face,
shaking her head back and forth.

Susan held completely still. How long would
it take for the ointment to work? Quickly, she prayed.

Sphinx shook her head some more, still gaping
like a fish. Eventually she spat out the twig. It glistened with
ointment and blood. Sphinx worked her mouth, yawning and gagging as
though to get the taste out.

She sat down and wiped her face with a paw.
She gingerly licked her paw, but stopped and set it down again,
yawning and licking her teeth again, like a dog who had been given
peanut butter.

Susan was trying not to breathe too loudly.
Had it worked?

Sphinx looked right at her.

Susan grasped quietly for a weapon, but found
only dead grass. She waited.

Sphinx sniffed the ground. She looked at
Susan again, then at the spot next to Susan, then at a spot just
behind her.

Sphinx meowed once, then walked away. She
trotted to the side wall, leapt to the top of it, then disappeared
into the neighbor’s yard.

Susan almost fainted with relief.

“You did it,” Yoonu said, from the safety of
the branches.

“I said I would,” Susan told him. “You’re
safe from her now.”

“Garaant is still dead.”

She lay on the ground, exhausted and aching.
She opened a conduit to the earth, drawing in energy. Some people
could use earth magic to heal themselves, but for her it felt like
rubbing a sunburn with sandpaper.