Devon Monk - Magic on the Storm

When Zay looked back at me, some of the seriousness was gone. “Move over, woman.”

He crawled under the blankets and hogged the bed.

Note to self: explain that the bed was mine, and I should get more than half of it just on principle alone.

He hadn’t put on his shirt, but still wore his jeans, as if knowing we’d be out of bed soon. I shifted closer to him, and judiciously placed a sheet between us, because a half-naked man in my bed-especially if that man was Zayvion Jones-was going to ruin my control.

“How long do we have?” I asked.

“Forever,” he said.

I savored that thought. It was a nice fantasy, anyway.

“Maeve’s at ten, right?”

“Mmm.” He shifted so I could throw my leg over his, and rest my head on his shoulder, his arm snug down my back. “An hour or so.”

“Need the alarm?” I asked.

He shook his head. “I’ll be awake.”

I was going to ask him about that. Ask him why. But I really was tired, and it took only a few breaths before I slipped off into deep, blissful darkness.

Zay didn’t have to wake me up. The cold air coming in from the window did the trick.

I shifted away and elbowed up. “Stone,” I groaned. “Go out or stay in. Don’t just stand there with the window open. You’re killing my heating bill.”

Stone stood on his hind legs, half his body out the open window, backlit by the streetlights below. His head was tipped upward. He seemed to be watching the sky. Probably fascinated by the moon. He was smart like that.

He made that bag-of-rocks happy sound, and pulled back into the room, dropping on all fours. He, of course, did not shut the window behind him.

He clacked some more, his ears perked up, his wings tucked tight against his back. He seemed happy I was awake. So happy he trotted over to my side of the bed and stuck his big freezing-cold head in the middle of my chest.

I yelped. “Too cold, you dummy.” I pushed at his face and he just ducked under my hand, begging for a scratch.

Zay chuckled.

“You’re no help,” I said.

“He’s your yard ornament.”

Fine.

“One scratch.” I rubbed the ridges of Stone’s eyes. He pulled his lips back in what I could only guess was a smile, even though there were a dozen too many sharp teeth involved.

“Now go. Shut. Window.” I gave him a little shove, and he rubbed the side of his head over my hand for one last scratch, then tromped back to the window, cooing a sort of out-of-tune hum.

“All engines ready to go?” I asked.

Stone clacked.

“Runway clear for takeoff?”

Stone stuck his head out the window again. Cooed, vacuum cleaner-style. His ears were straight up, and his wings quivered. This was a little game we played. I liked it much better than the chew-on-the-chair-legs game.

Zay snorted. “You think he understands you?”

“I’d sing him show tunes if it would make him shut the window. Ready?” I said. “Five, four, three, two, one. Blast off! Go, go, go!”

Stone gathered himself, his back legs dropping, his arms braced outside on either side of the window. He had gotten pretty good at launching himself out the window, his wings tucked tight. With one big push, he shoved out into the night air, his wings catching like a parachute, then beating, stronger than they looked. Yes, they were made of stone and didn’t look aerodynamic, but somehow, he did it-the big lunk of rock and magic really could fly.

And the big lunk of rock and magic did just that.

But the big lunk of rock and magic did not close the window.

Hells.

I groaned. Zay just snorted.

Dragging the comforter with me, I scooted off the bottom of the bed, and shoved the window shut. I thought about setting the lock so the beast wouldn’t be able to get in, but decided against it. I was pretty sure Stone would find a way into my apartment, lock or no lock. And I didn’t want to have to pay for repairs.

Zay stood, stretched, and shook out his arm and hand.

“Arm asleep?” I dug through my closet looking for a sweater. It was freezing in here. How long had Stone had that window open?

“Can’t feel it from my elbow down. You never moved.”

I pulled one of my favorite sweaters off a hanger. With the blanket still wrapped around my legs, I shuffled to the dresser, found panties, bra, and jeans. Didn’t take me long to get into all of them, plus a nice thick pair of socks.

“You could have shoved me off if you didn’t like it.” I found my boots, put them on too, and strode to the bathroom to fix my hair.

“True,” he murmured.

For once, fortune was on my side. My hair wasn’t sticking straight up. I brushed it back, tucked it behind my ears, and took a look at my eyes. Green, but too dark to be just my own. Someone else was looking back at me.

“Dad?” I whispered.

A weight shifted in my head and the entire room slid downhill sideways. I grabbed the sink, braced my feet, and tried not to fall down or throw up as dizziness tumbled through my head.

The storm , my father’s voice said, quietly, as if he were speaking from far away. He sounded concerned, but calm. The same way he had sounded when I was seven and broke my wrist and he’d told me going to the doctor was going to hurt a little. The same way he’d sounded when he told me my mother had left me, left us, for good, but everything would be fine.

Nothing they say will change it; nothing they do will stop it.

I was on my knees now, still holding on to the sink, still trying not to fall down while the room spun and spun. I wondered where Zayvion was, if he was sliding down this dizzying slant too.

They will try to use it. Madness.

What? I thought. Who?

I must have said it out loud, because Zayvion was suddenly there, in the doorway to my bathroom, his smile quickly gone.

He reached for me. The moment he touched my shoulder, the world snapped back into place.

I was sitting on my normal bathroom floor. With my normal dead father silent and distant in the back of my mind.

I looked up at Zayvion. “Did you feel that? The dizziness?”

“I felt magic flux. Not hard, though.”

“Dad pushed at me.”

He exhaled, and knelt in front of me. Even though he took up too much room, I didn’t feel claustrophobic. I wanted him near.

“He must have tried to use magic’s fluctuation to shove me out of the way. Started talking.”

I rubbed at my arms, trying to scrub away the cold. Zay placed his hands over mine and I realized I wasn’t rubbing-I was digging. Like somehow I could dig the cold wrongness of magic out of me, out of my bones. Long red scratches lined my arms, but didn’t ease the magic gone to ice in my blood, biting, stinging, burning.

I leaned the back of my head against the sink.

“What did he say?” Zay asked.

“He said they can’t stop the storm. And that they’ll try to use it, but it’s madness, and that they’ll fail.”

Zay straightened and offered me both hands. “Huh.”

I took his hands and he helped me up on my feet. “You cannot be calm about this.”

He walked out of the bathroom, still holding my hand.

“It’s not the first time in my life someone’s told me I’m going to fail. I decided a long time ago not to believe them. Worked pretty good so far.”

The living room table was taken over by an alphabet-block sculpture. Stone had stacked the blocks in a decent replica of the dual-spired convention center, with something that looked like fork tines stuck up out of the top two blocks. If that big lug was de-tining my cutlery, I was going to take a belt sander to his claws.

I tugged Zayvion off toward the kitchen. I needed coffee.