“This is the future you predict for me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Ah.” He blinked several times, baffled. So baffled, in fact, that he quite forgot his superciliousness for the moment. He began to turn away.
“But, sir?”
“Yes?” He turned back again, leaning into the counter.
“A word of warning.”
He tilted his head, looking at her through the monocle.
“I should take care you do not wear your face cream tonight.”
The color drained from his cheeks ever so slightly. “My . . . face cream?”
“No, sir.”
“Whyever not?”
“Because of the cake.”
“The cake?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What does cake have to do with my face cream?”
“Well, when the cake hits your face—”
“Hits my face?”
“—it will very likely undo all the sorcery in the cream.”
The man stared at her. A mingling of emotions rushed across his stolen features—shock, horror, rage. Rage seemed to settle in best, and the color returned to his cheeks in a sudden red rush. “Why, you brazen chit!” he roared, drawing himself up to his full, probably-not-real height. “Is that a threat? You dare accuse me of indulging in black market sorcery? Have you noideawho Iam?”
“A bit of an idea, sir. Yes,” she replied blandly.
“Insolence!” His cheeks puffed out like a blowfish, and he struck the end of his cane a sharp smack against the floor. “I am not in the habit of being spoken to in this way! I demand to see your employer at once, you wretched little—”
“Fabian!”
The man and Luna both whirled as though in synchronization. Mr. Grimm stood in the passage doorway, Debbie on his shoulder. For a moment, he appeared taller, darker, more dangerous. As though, very briefly, the image of that seven-foot figure of phantasmic dark power Luna had glimpsed weeks ago had returned.
“You may not address members of my staff in that tone,” he said. Echoing rolls of thunder growled in the depths of those words. “Step outside with me.At once.”
Nigel realized his mistake within two seconds of exiting the shop. Whereas the man whose elbow he now gripped wore a thick overcoat, Nigel himself was clad only in his shirtsleeves and apron . . . which were definitely not the garb for the sidewalk on a day like this. Too late now, however. And he was far too angry to care all that much in any case.
So he dragged that grotesque figure, positively dripping with sorcery, down the sidewalk through drifts of snow. Gods, he’d not even attempted subtlety, had he? Enchanted face creams? What in the hells was hethinking?
But then, Fabian had never been the sorcerer he liked to fancy himself.
Once they were some distance from the shop, Nigel whirled on the strange face before him. Motes of anti-glitter seemed to dance before his eyes like a veil, but he could just about see his brother’s face underneath. Fabian—who looked so very much like their father. Though his brown eyes, supposedly, were like their mother. A mother whom Fabian remembered vaguely, but whom Nigel never knew. Fabian would hold that over his little brother for the rest of their lives, and Nigel had every intentionof resenting him for it for at least that long. It was a brother thing.
“What in the hells are youdoing?”Nigel demanded, ignoring the way his teeth already began to chatter. He didn’t release his hold on his brother, but pinched the coat sleeve hard, refusing to let him budge. It was opening time, and regular customers were already lining up outside The Arcane Bouquet for Luna’s teas. The last thing he needed was for any of them to overhear the coming tirade. “Whose face have you stolen?”
Fabian looked very smug behind his sorcerous mask. “It’s good, isn’t it?” he said, making no attempt whatsoever to disguise his voice. “I’m hiding in plain sight as the Minister Supreme of the Sorcery Suppression Convocation—the last man the SSSD would ever suspect of sorcery!”
