Page 18 of Magic for Nothing

“What did you fly here for?”

Here it was: the big moment. If I couldn’t convince them to buy what I was selling, I might as well pack it up and go home—and there was a good chance I wouldn’t be able to do that, because I would be dead. I took a deep breath, and said, “I’m looking for the Covenant of St. George. I was told this was a recruitment center, and I want to sign up. Um. Please.”

They exchanged a look. Leo gave the strong impression that he was pleading silently with his grandfather. Reginald shook his head before focusing his attention back on me. He took a step forward, suddenly menacing. The cane in his hand looked very much like a weapon.

“Who told you those words, little girl?” he demanded, voice low. “Who spoke those things to you?”

They were definitely choosing “menace” from their menu of options. That was fine. I know how to deal with menace. I swallowed, and said, “I met a man in a bar in New York City. I was . . . my family, my whole family died. Monsters killed them. I guess I got sort of drunk. I was trying to tell people monsters were real, that the government was lying to us and hiding them, and this man, he bought me a coffee, and he sat with me until I sobered up, and he told me about the Covenant. He said St. George was a dragon slayer who founded an order dedicated to keeping humanity safe. He said they were heroes.”

I was laying it on a little thick, but my audience seemed to be lapping it up. At least Reginald Cunningham hadn’t shown me what was inside his cane, and under the circumstances that was good enough for me. I sniffled, letting myself break eye contact and look down at my feet. There are people who think too much eye contact is just as sure a sign of a liar as not enough.

“He said no one would believe what happened to my family, and he was right, because I’ve tried to tell a lot of people, and no one’s been willing to listen. And he said if I came to London, if I found this bookstore, I’d find the Covenant. I could offer my services. Maybe I could get some peace, or at least a whole lot of revenge.” I looked up. “I just want to make sure no one else has to go through what I’ve gone through.”

“Monsters, you say,” said Reginald. “What kind of monsters?”

“Wasps. Wasps the size of kittens. They killed everyone, and when I came home to bury my parents, they talked to me from the trees.” I shuddered. “They had my mother’s voice. They called me by name. They wanted me to go with them. God help me, I wanted to go. I wanted to let them take me into the trees and make the hurting stop. I guess I would have, if one of them hadn’t flown too close to the light.”

“Apraxis wasps,” said Leo.

“Quiet,” said Reginald.

“But, Grandfather—”

“I said quiet, Leonard,” snapped Reginald. His eyes never left me. “Where did this happen?”

“Vancouver. My family owned a small traveling carnival. Um. The Black Family Carnival? I was away taking my SATs when they stopped for repairs and the wasps came. I didn’t . . . I wasn’t there with them. I lived because I wasn’t with them. I don’t know whether to be happy I survived or guilty, because maybe if I’d been there, we would have been able to keep the wasps at bay.”

Reginald raised his hand. I forced myself not to flinch as he reached out and set it gently on my shoulder. His skin was cool and papery where it touched mine.

“There was nothing you could have done, child,” he said. “Apraxis wasps come out of the dark like a wave, and they flow over everything in their path. Your family wouldn’t have had any time to flee before the oncoming devastation.”

“I should have been there,” I said.

“You’re here now,” he said. His expression hardened. “I don’t trust you yet. You’ll be questioned, and you’ll be tested. But you have come this far, and never let it be said that an order founded in St. George’s name turned any earnest supplicant away.”

Well, score.

He turned to Leo. “If you would do the honors?”

“Yes, Grandfather,” said Leo apologetically. He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a white rag.

“Whoa, hold on,” I said, putting up a hand. “Is this where you ask me whether that smells like chloroform? Is there any other way? I’m here because I want to be, but I’m really not in the mood for a three-day headache and depressed breathing, if that’s okay.”

They both stared at me. Belatedly, I remembered that while Antimony Price was intimately acquainted with the effects of chloroform, Timpani Brown probably wasn’t. Exhaustion also had its downsides.

“We had lions for a while,” I fibbed. Hopefully the carnival records would support that, or at least not contradict it. “Their trainer preferred to control them with chloroform. All of us had to learn what the risks were, for safety reasons. I really don’t like chloroform.”

“That is a fascinating story, Miss Brown,” said Reginald slowly. “Regardless, you cannot be awake when we remove you from this shop. What would you suggest?”

I grimaced. “My jet lag is so bad you could wait fifteen minutes and I’d probably start snoring?”

He raised an eyebrow. I sighed.

“Okay. Chloroform it is. Just try to keep it brief? I’d rather have a clear head when you tell me what I’m trying to sign up for.” I yawned. I couldn’t help myself. Jet lag really was a terrifying mixed blessing: I was about to let myself be knocked unconscious by two members of the Covenant of St. George, who might not be buying my cover story the way I was trying to sell it, and I couldn’t work up a decent panic over the idea. I was reaching “mild annoyance,” and that’s where I ran out of steam. At least if they knocked me out, I’d be able to get a nap before I needed to talk to anyone else.

(And I did need to let them knock me out for real. I can feign unconsciousness pretty well on the other end, but no one has the muscle control to fool a pro into thinking they’ve been successfully drugged.)

Leo clapped the chloroform-soaked rag over my mouth and nose. The characteristic paint-thinner and rotten fruit taste of chloroform overwhelmed my senses, and the world went gracefully away, taking me with it into the dark.