AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Ivor, good of you to make it,” Merlin said tightly.
“I wouldn’t have missed it. We need to present a united front. I’ve been out there mingling, and the customers have very nice things to say. My compliments to Katie for all her hard work.”
“Thanks,” I said, trying not to grit my teeth, “And speaking of hard work, I’d better get back to it.”
As I hurried back to the assembly area, the attendees were moving into the auditorium tent, where swirling lights and eerie music created a magical wonderland. It looked to me like a prom on steroids, but the guests were eating it up, so I figured it was working. “Great job, Rina,” I said as she scurried by me, barking orders into a headset. She flashed me a smile and kept going, and I gave myself a moment to take a deep breath.
As the opening session began, I went back to the dragon enclosure to check on Owen.
“How’s it going out there?” he asked.
“Okay, I guess. I had no idea what a celebrity Ramsay is, though.”
“Did someone ask him for an autograph?”
“Oh yeah. I thought a couple of those guys might faint.”
He grinned, then he frowned and tilted his head as he stared at the charms he was monitoring. “What is it?” I asked.
Instead of answering me, he called, “Jake!” His assistant ran over to join us, and the two of them placed their hands on the glass cases. After a moment, Owen said, “There’s a surge coming through,” and then his eyes went unfocused, like he was looking within. “Okay, got it, got it, got it,” he muttered to himself, then abruptly he said, “Damn!”
“I lost it, too, boss,” Jake said, panting. His hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat. Owen looked equally beat.
“What happened?” I asked.
“They sent a signal, but I don’t think it was a spell or a directive. It was more like a test, like the magical equivalent of ‘testing, one, two, three’ with a microphone. I thought for a moment I’d tracked it back to the source, but they stopped the signal before I could disrupt it. I might be able to counteract anything else they send, though.”
“What about when you’re doing the demonstration?”
Owen and Jake looked at each other. “I’d leave it to Jake, but I need him with me to help handle the dragons.”
“Then get someone else to keep an eye out. If I were the bad guys—who seem to know all about who you are—that’s when I’d choose to strike.”
“I’ve got more charms set up back at the office,” Owen said with a weary sigh. “I’ll give them a call and see if they caught anything.”
“Delegation won’t kill you,” I reminded him. “I’ll go see if anything happened when that surge hit.”
I ran back into the main hall, where a member of the sales team was giving highlights of the year. It didn’t look like anything major had happened. The place was still standing and I didn’t see any blood. The audience hadn’t turned into an army of magical zombies. So far, so good. I went out to the assembly area and poured myself a glass of juice from one of the buffets. I’d eaten breakfast before leaving home, but that was hours ago, and I was already starving again. Before I could drink it, Rina came running over to ask me a question. It went like that all day. The conference was going smoothly, but there seemed to be a conspiracy against me getting anything to eat. By the time for Owen’s presentation late in the day, the most I’d managed to eat was a cube of cheese during the afternoon breakout session, and I was becoming light-headed.
I went to the green room to check on Owen and found him pacing nervously. He’d cleaned up and changed clothes, so now he looked like the professional he was, but he also looked like he might bolt given the first opportunity. “Do I really have to do this?” he asked me, his voice sounding strained and not too steady.
“Well, considering that you have to represent Research and Development because your boss is a giant frog and refuses to go out in public, and considering that you’re the one who tamed the dragons, yeah, you really have to do this. Now, take a deep breath and settle down.”
He closed his eyes and took a few long, shuddering breaths, then shook his head. “No, that didn’t work. I can’t talk.”
“You do it in meetings all the time. This is just a really big meeting.”
His eyes went wide and panicky. “But there are a lot of people in there, and they’ll all be staring at me. A lot of them may even think I’m the big magical criminal.”
“Only the ones dumb enough to listen to rumors. Once the dragons come on, they’ll all forget you’re even there.” That didn’t seem to make him feel much better. It was time for tough love. “Look, Owen, this isn’t the time for a shy attack. The way the lights are, you won’t be able to see most of the audience.”
I grabbed his shoulders and pulled him close to me so I could look him directly in the eye. “I’m going out there to sit in the front row, where you should be able to see me, and I want you to give this presentation to me. I’m the only person in the audience, and I will like you no matter how it goes. Can you do that?”
He took another deep breath and let it out slowly. “Yeah, I can do that.”
“I know you can. I’ve seen you take on things a lot scarier than that crowd.” We stood there for a while, our eyes locked, and I wasn’t sure if I was picking up on his stage fright or if something else was going on, but my heart pounded and my mouth went dry. As I looked into his eyes, I decided it wasn’t stage fright on my end. It was the dizzying realization that I was in love with this guy. I was about to tell him, with the hope that would distract him from his fear, when Hartwell’s voice came from the stage, introducing Owen. I stood on tiptoes and gave him a quick, hard kiss. “Now go knock ’em dead.”
I went into the auditorium and found an empty seat, front and center, just as Owen came on stage. He froze at first, and his voice was soft when he started talking, but once he found me in the front row, he gained confidence and sounded more normal. Then he really got going as he forgot about the crowd and focused on his favorite thing to do: geek out about the science of magic.
