Диана Дуэйн - So You Want To Be A Wizard

The tears stung Nita's eyes again. "G'bye, Fred," she said softly in English, for fear the Speech should attract his attention, or hers.

Silently and unseen, Kit and Nita slipped through the door and went downstairs for the shuttle and the train home.

Timeheart

The walk home from the bus stop was weary and quiet. Three blocks from Nita's house, they reached the corner where their ways usually parted. Kit paused there, waiting for the light to change, though no traffic was in sight. "Call me tomorrow?" he said. What for? Nita felt like saying, for there were no more spells in the offing, and she was deadly tired. Still -. "It's your turn," she said.

"Huh. Right," The light changed, and Kit headed across the street to Nita's left. In the middle of the street he turned, walking backward. "We should call Tom and Carl," he shouted, sounding entirely exhausted.

"Yeah." The light changed again, in Nita's favor; Kit jumped up onto the sidewalk on the other side and headed south toward his place. Nita crossed east, watching Kit as she went. Though the look on his face was tired and sad, all the rest of his body wore the posture of someone who's been through so much fear that fear no longer frightens him. Why's he so afraid of getting beat up? Nita thought. Nobody in their right mind would mess with him.

In midstep she stopped, watching him walk away. How about that. How "bout that. He got what he asked for.

After a second she started walking home again. The weight at her back suddenly reminded her of something. (Kit!) she called silently, knowing he could hear even though he was now out of sight. (What about the Book?) (Hang on to it,) he answered. (We'll give it to the Advisories. Or they'll know what to do with it.)

(Right. See ya later.)

(See ya.)

Nita was so tired that it took three or four minutes before the identity of blond person walking up East Clinton toward her registered at all. By Joanne was within yelling distance, but she didn't yell at Nita at all, much to Nita's surprise. This was such an odd development that Nita looked at Joanne carefully as they got closer, something she had never done before There was something familiar about Joanne today, a look that Nita couldn't quite pin down — and then she recognized the expression and let out a tired unhappy breath. The look was less marked, less violent and terrible than that of the pride-frozen misery of the dark rider, but there all the same. The angry fear was there too — the terror of what had been until now no threat but was now out of control; the look of the rider about to be cast out by a power he had thought himself safe from, the look of a bully whose victim suddenly wasn't a victim any more.

Nita slowed down and stopped where she was, in the middle of the side-walk, watching Joanne. Even he can be different now, she thought, her heart beating fast — her own old fear wasn't entirely gone. But that was partly because we gave him the chance.

She stood there, watching Joanne slow down warily as she got closer to Nita. Nita sweated. Doing something that would be laughed about behind her back was almost as bad as being beaten up. But she stood still until Joanne came to a stop four or five feet away from her. "Well?" Joanne said, her voice full of anger and uncertainty.

I don't know what to say to her, we have absolutely nothing in common, Nita thought frantically. But it has to start somewhere. She swallowed and did her best to look Joanne in the eye, calmly and not in threat. "Come on over to my place after supper sometime and look through my telescope," she said. "I'll show you Jupiter's moons. Or Mars—"

Joanne made that old familiar haughty face and brushed past Nita and away. "Why would I ever want to go to your house? You don't even have a color TV."

Nita stood still, listening to Joanne's footsteps hurrying away, a little faster every second — and slowly began to realize that she'd gotten what she asked for too — the ability to break the cycle of anger and loneliness, not necessarily for others, but at least for herself. It wouldn't even take the Speech; plain words would do it, and the magic of reaching out, It would take a long time, much longer than something simple like breaking the walls between the worlds, and it would cost more effort than even the reading of the Book of Night with Moon. But it would be worth it — and eventually it would work. A spell always works. Nita went home.

That night after supper she slipped outside to sit in Liused's shadow and watch the sky. The tree caught her moon and, after greeting her, was quiet-' until about ten o'clock, when it and every other growing thing in sign* suddenly trembled violently as if stricken at the root. They had felt the Sun go out.

(It's all right,) she said silently, though for someone whose tears were starting again, it was an odd thing to say. She waited the eight minutes with them, saw the Moon blink out, and leaned back against the rowan trunk, sheltering from the wind that rose in the darkness. Branches tossed as if in a hurricane, leaves hissed in anguish — and then the sudden new star in the heavens etched every leafs shadow sharp against the ground and set the Moon on fire. Nita squinted up at the pinpoint of brilliance, unwilling to look away though her eyes leaked tears of pain. She'd thought, that afternoon, that living through the loss a second time would be easier. She was wrong. The tears kept falling long after the star went out, and the Moon found its light again, and the wind died to a whisper. She stopped crying long enough to go back inside and go to bed, and she was sure she would start again immediately. But she was wrong about that too. Exhaustion beat down grief so fast that she was asleep almost as soon as her head touched the pillow under which she had hidden the Book of Night with Moon… .

The place where they stood was impossible, for there's no place in Man-hattan where the water level in the East River comes right up to the railed path that runs alongside it. There they stood, though, leaning with their backs against the railing, gazing up at the bright city that reared against the silver sky, while behind them the river whispered and chuckled and slapped its banks. The sound of laughter came down the morning wind from the apartments and the brownstones and the towers of steel and crystal; the seabirds wheeled and cried over the white piers and jetties of the Manhattan shoreline, and from somewhere down the riverside came the faint sound of music — quiet rock, a deep steady backbeat woven about with guitars and yoices in close harmony. A jogger went by on the running path, puffing, followed by a large black and white dog galloping to catch up with its master.

Are we early, or are they late? Kit asked, leaning back farther still to watch an overflying Learjet do barrel-roll after barrel-roll for sheer joy of being alive.

Who cores? Nita said, leaning back too and enjoying the way the music a"d the city sounds and the Learjet's delighted scream all blended. Anyway, "& is Timeheart. There's nothing here but Now… "hey turned their backs on the towers and the traffic and the laughter, and out across the shining water toward Brooklyn and Long Island. Neiwas there just then — probably someone else in Timeheart was using, and Kit and Nita didn't need them at the moment. The silver expanse 'he Atlantic shifted and glittered from their feet to the radiant horizon, Far off to their right, south and west of the Battery, the Statue of Liberty held up her torch and her tablet and looked calmly out toward the sunrise as they did, waiting. Nita was the first to see the dark bulge out on the water, She nudged Kit and pointed. Look, a shark/

He glanced at her, amused. Even here I don't think sharks hav ewheels… .