Page 13 of Magic for Nothing

“I’ll run,” I said.

“You can try,” he said, and his voice was as flat as mine had been, and his eyes were so very, very cold.

I shivered, turning to Verity. “He always this cheery?” I asked.

Verity shook her head. “Sometimes he’s downright dour.”

Dominic grumbled wordlessly.

He was wrong. I wouldn’t become a killer for them. I would lie. I would cheat, and steal, and pretend to be someone I wasn’t. But they were not going to change me. I could kill, if I had to, if the danger was great enough. That didn’t make me a killer.

It made me a survivor.

Our driver pulled up in front of a convenience store that looked like it was two steps away from either being shut down for health code violations or “accidentally” bursting into flame for the insurance money. I couldn’t imagine anyone shopping there if they had any other option—and since I could see two more healthier-looking convenience stores and a big chain pharmacy on the same block, there were definitely other options.

“Here we are,” said Verity cheerfully. “Hey, thanks, Pris.”

Our driver flipped her off, and didn’t help us get my stuff out of the trunk. The second the doors were shut she was gone, hitting the gas and peeling out so fast that Dominic jumped to avoid getting his foot run over. Rather than rushing to her husband’s side, Verity shook her head and said fondly, “Dragons. They never really change, and that’s amazing. Come on, this way.”

Then, to my disgust and dismay—but not surprise—she turned and walked into the convenience store.

The inside was as bad as the outside. I’ve shopped in some pretty sketchy establishments (usually because the cruddy hole-in-the-wall comic book stores are the ones where you’re most likely to find the buried treasures), but this one made me want to take a shower. And then maybe another shower. And then maybe a third shower, just to be safe.

A beautiful blonde woman sat behind the counter, face buried in a trashy romance novel. She didn’t look up when the door opened, or when it swung closed behind us.

“Afternoon, Miri,” said Verity.

Miri grunted, and continued her unbroken streak of not looking up.

“This way,” said Verity, beckoning for me to follow her to a door marked EMPLOYEES ONLY. The sign was Sharpie on what looked like the top of a pizza box. Definitely some high-tech security.

Only maybe there was, because Verity had to undo three locks to get the door open, and only one of them had been visible. “The dragons closed this bodega for a while, when they first moved in with William,” she explained, opening the door and holding it for me and Dominic to pass by. “They still owned the property, though, and when the Freakshow burned down, Kitty convinced them to reopen it as part of the temporary rental agreement between them and the bogeymen. They provide a guard, Kitty promises not to make any noises about getting her security deposit back when time comes for the locals to move on.”

“Some guard,” I said.

“Oh, she is,” said Verity. “She has a panic button linked to the main room, and we always have at least one therianthrope waiting for signs of trouble. She pushes that button, there’s an angry tanuki in the bodega five minutes later. I just wish the dragons would let us clean the place. It used to be spotless, difficult as that may be to believe, and it was a lot more feasible that people would actually shop there. Now, they want it to look abandoned when they move back out, so we’re not even allowed to mop.”

“Ew,” I said.

“Precisely my thought,” said Dominic.

The employee door connected to a short hallway. It ended at another door, this one unlocked. Verity pushed it open. On the other side was a boxy little space with no exits to the street. The walls were brick; it looked like maybe it was an alley in the beginning, until too many buildings got jammed up against it and cut it off from its original purpose.

Someone had chalked a hopscotch grid on the pavement. Verity stepped carefully around the lines. Dominic, to my surprise, hopped on one foot through half the grid before turning to wink at me. I grinned. He smiled back.

“This was the original home of the dragons of Manhattan, until they found out about William,” explained Verity, heading for a nearby door. “They’re not selling the property for a lot of reasons. Using it as a rental space for cryptids in crisis is one of them. They’re also thinking it might be nice to have an aboveground place where their kids can play in a few years, once they figure out how to deal with the little boys. They have wings, and can fly until they’re about ten years old. So there’s definitely something to be said for giving them the chance to see the sky before they’re grounded.”

“Right,” I said, trying to figure out where she was going with this.

Verity opened the door, flashed me a smile, and stepped through. I moved to follow. Dominic put a hand on my shoulder, stopping me. I looked up at him, warily.

“Try not to be too hard on her, if you could,” he said. His voice was soft, sympathetic; he understood why I’d be hard on her, even if he didn’t agree with it. “Your sister genuinely regrets what happened. The people who died on that stage were her friends, and she couldn’t save them. That, alone, should buy her a measure of sympathy. To have her failure compounded by the loss of the Freakshow, and now you being sent to my former fellows to learn how much they know . . . this is killing her inside. She never meant for this to be the outcome of her dancing.”

“But it is,” I said. “She was selfish. She was always selfish. She knew she was putting the rest of us at risk when she went onstage, and she did it anyway, over and over, because she wanted to. Because she thought having a gift meant she got to decide whether the rest of us get put in danger. Because she thought Alex and I didn’t count as much as she did. This is her fault. She has to own that.”

“She’s trying,” he said, casting a quick glance in the direction Verity had gone. “Every day, she’s trying. So please, for my sake, if you could try as well, that would be . . . well, that would be an enormous favor.”

“I’m only here for a few hours; I can try for a few hours,” I said. “But I’m not going to stop being mad at her, and you don’t get to ask me to do that.”