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Marcia then came through the door. The starry look in her eyes hinted that her lateness had little to do with a meeting and everything to do with her boyfriend, Jeff, who also had some frogginess in his past. Only he wasn’t ever really a frog. He just thought he was for a while.
“Guess who’s going to be here for Thanksgiving?” Gemma asked her before she even had her coat off.
“Who?”
“Katie’s parents.”
Marcia’s eyes lit up. “Is Mrs. Chandler cooking Thanksgiving dinner?”
“She plans to,” I said. It said something about my mom’s cooking that neither roommate had yet asked where my parents were planning to stay. For some of my mom’s pumpkin pie, I imagined either one of them might volunteer to sleep in the bathtub. Before they had to offer, I said, “I’ll need to make hotel reservations for them. Then I need to see if I can manage any time off. Maybe I can work half days.”
“It’s a holiday week. Nobody will get any real work done, anyway,” Marcia said. “Do you think she’ll make that sweet potato stuff with the little marshmallows?”
I was still so preoccupied by the impending parental visit that my heart almost forgot to flutter when I saw Owen waiting in front of my building the next morning. He greeted me with a warm smile, then frowned. “What’s wrong?”
“Wrong? Oh, it’s nothing. I’ve just been thinking.”
He kept his usual slight distance as he walked alongside me. “About what?”
“My parents told me last night that they’re planning to come here for Thanksgiving.”
“That’s great.” Then he hesitated and added, “Isn’t it?”
“Yeah. But I’m really busy right now, what with that investigation and all, and I don’t know that I can take any extra time off. According to company policy, I’m not even eligible for vacation time yet. But my folks really shouldn’t be left on their own in this city, trust me. I’m not sure who’d be in more danger, them or the rest of the city.”
“Your boss probably doesn’t even know we have a vacation policy,” he said with a wry grin. “I’m sure he can be flexible with you. But other than the work issue, you’re glad to see your family, aren’t you?” He sounded almost concerned.
“Yeah, I’m glad. I’m mostly worried about what they think of the city and my life. They were so worried before I moved here. Part of me is afraid this whole trip is their excuse to drag me back home. It would be a lot easier if I went to visit them.”
“Or they could see what you see in the city. They might be proud of you for surviving here, and seeing the reality instead of their fears may make them feel better about you living here.”
“You obviously haven’t met my parents.”
He laughed. “They can’t be that bad. All parents worry a little, and their worries are usually a lot worse than the reality could possibly be.”
I turned to stare at him. “You mean they’re worrying about worse things than me being caught up in a magical war between good and evil, in a company that has an enemy spy in it?” Then I thought for a moment. “Come to think of it, from what I know about my mom, she is worried about worse.”
“And it’s not like she’s going to learn about the magical issues while she’s here.”
Before I could counter that, I noticed something in the sky, something larger than a pigeon and growing larger as it came closer to us. I grabbed Owen’s arm and shoved him out of the way before an ugly half woman/half bird dove at us out of the sky. The last time I’d seen one of those things, it had been digging its claws into Owen’s shoulder. The harpy swooped back up to the sky and began another dive.
“What is it?” Owen asked, his voice tense.
“Harpy, I think.”
He frowned for a second, then nodded. “Got it.” At that moment, the harpy seemed to hit an invisible brick wall in the sky, then fell to the sidewalk with a splat. A business-suited commuter casually stepped around the body, then continued on his way, as if dead mythical creatures on the sidewalk were something he encountered every morning. I wondered what he saw instead of seeing a harpy—a pile of trash, maybe? That wouldn’t be out of place on a New York sidewalk, but as far as I knew, trash didn’t fall from the sky or appear out of thin air. The ability of New Yorkers to focus on their own business and tune out everything else never ceased to amaze me.
I took a deep breath to steady myself. “Okay, that’s why I don’t want my parents in New York. How do you explain something like that—the street people are breeding with the pigeons?”
“Your parents likely wouldn’t see anything extraordinary.”
“So, what would they see when something dropped out of the sky and started ripping them to shreds? There’s no way for anyone to make that look normal.”
He took my arm and steered me back into the flow of pedestrian traffic on the way to the subway station. “I doubt they’d come after your parents. This attack was probably aimed at me, and if I know Phelan Idris, he wants to shake me up more than he wants to hurt me. If I’m thinking about ways to protect the city against harpies, I’m not working on ways to counter his spells.”
“He nearly killed you with one of those things the last time,” I reminded him.
“It was only a flesh wound. But just in case, I’ll talk to Sam about getting a security detail for your parents.”
