Диана Дуэйн - A Wizard Of Mars

“Thanks a heap,” Kit said. “Finish being nutritious and then get your butt over here.” He glanced down at the directory and saw another name go dark. “Aha. Later.”

He touched Ronan’s name; it glowed under his finger. “Hey,” Kit said, “good morning.”

“Oh, listen, Rodriguez attempts to score on irony,” Ronan’s voice came back. He yawned. “But no! It bounces off the goalpost! What a shame.”

“Why is it always sports with you?” Kit said. “Football, rugby, that thing with the weird sticks—”

“Hurling.”

“Yeah, the only sport with a mandatory body count.” Kit had seen the game played once and was glad he didn’t go to school in Ireland: hurling came across like lacrosse on crack, but Ronan loved it and would blather about it for hours. “Forget the playing field for now, okay? We need to go to Mars.”

“Oh, really. What have you blown up now?”

Kit was tempted to bang his head on the table. “Nothing blew up!”

You don’t fool me,” Ronan said. “You went off to be with your friend the superegg in the middle of the night.” He laughed. “The Martian night! You know, some day you may want to reproduce, but you’re never gonna do it if you freeze off your—”

“Ronan,” Kit said. “I can either shoot you a précis from my manual, or you can force me to embarrass myself directly…”

“Always much more fun,” Ronan said, and yawned. “Go.”

Kit spent five minutes or so describing what had happened. Ronan stayed quiet during the explanation, then simply said, “Creepy.”

“Yeah,” Kit said. “But that thing’s yelled for its friends. I don’t think we’re gonna have to wait for long before something happens up there.”

“And when it does,” Ronan said, “it makes sense for there to be wizards there. Okay, sit tight and I’ll have a word with my ride.”

Kit’s eyebrows went up. Irish wizards were restricted from casual long-distance transport due to the buildup of ancient spell residue on the island. Normally they had to go a considerable distance to get to a city-based rapid-transit worldgate, unless they were on active errantry and entitled to a personal transport dispensation. “What kind of ride?”

“Five minutes.”

Ronan’s listing in the manual faded down to gray again, while beside it an annotation came up: In consultation; please wait. Kit pushed his chair back and got up to take his bowl and spoon into the kitchen.

While he was putting them in the dishwasher, he heard someone coming down the stairs. Moments later Carmela wandered in, wearing one of her super-long striped nightshirts. She made for the refrigerator, stuck her head in, and just stood there yawning.

Kit shut the dishwasher and looked with mild interest at his sister, who was still contemplating the fridge’s interior— morosely, he thought. “Looking for something?”

Carmela yawned again and straightened up. “Just thinking that this is the last morning for the next two weeks when I can be sure that if I leave a strawberry smoothie in here when I go to bed, it’ll still be there the next morning.”

Kit headed back for the dining room. “Why? I don’t like your smoothies.”

“I know,” Carmela said. “But Helena does.”

Kit stopped right where he was and stared at her.

“Kit?” said Ronan’s voice from the dining room table. “We’re all set.”

Carmela’s head snapped around. “Is that who I think it is?” She pushed past Kit into the dining room.

“No, wait a minute! I mean, yeah—” Kit went after her. “Carmela, wait! What do you mean, ‘Helena does’? She’s not going to be here until next week!”

Carmela was leaning over his wizard’s manual. “Hiiiii, Ronaaaaaan!”

There was a pause at the other end. “Uh. Carmela, hi. Kit?”

“Yeah, give me a minute! What did your ride say? When can you get here?”

“Whenever you want. I’m in Baldwin now.”

“What? Already?”

“Yeah. Darryl fetched me over. How long do you need?”

“Ten minutes.”

“Right. Cheers.”

“Byeeeeeee!!” Carmela shouted at the manual as Kit slapped it shut. “Hey, that was rude. I wasn’t done!”

“You can go all gooey over him when he gets here,” Kit muttered, pushing past her to get his vest and jacket off one of the dining room chairs. “It was supposed to be Wednesday she was coming! When did everything get changed?”

“Last night,” Carmela said. “You were asleep. Helena e-mailed Pop: the airline screwed up her flights. She had to either fly today or wait another week. She’ll be here this afternoon.”

Kit groaned as he zipped up his vest. “I do not need this right now!”

Carmela leaned on the chair opposite. “Kit, give her a chance. You’ve talked to her on the phone lately. You’ve heard her. She’s a lot mellower.”

“You mean she no longer comes right out and says she thinks I sold my soul to the devil?” Kit said. He laughed. “Forgive me if I’m not convinced.” He put on his jacket. “If I’m lucky, she’ll be too busy running around socializing with her old friends to want to spend much time thinking about her weird little brother.”

“Ooh, bitter…”

Kit sighed and picked up the manual, eyeing Carmela’s nightshirt. “You plan to be wearing that when Ronan shows up?”

Her eyes went wide. “Ohmigosh,” Carmela said, and fled upstairs.

Kit leaned against the chair at the end of the table and sighed. When he’d realized he had to tell his mama and pop that he was a wizard, they hadn’t had incredible trouble coping with the concept— at least after they got over the initial shock. Carmela had actually been delighted. But Helena had been horrified, and as upset by the rest of the family’s relatively ready acceptance as by the idea that Kit could do wizardry in the first place.

Though the whole family was churchgoing, Helena had always struck Kit as more religious than all the rest of them put together; and until she started getting used to the situation, Kit had been really annoyed by the scared or worried looks Helena gave him every time their paths crossed. When she finally went off to college and put some time and distance between herself and what her little brother had become, Helena had calmed down a little… or so Kit had thought.Oh, please, don’t let her get all freaked out all over again, he said to the universe in general. The stuff that’s going on right now is so important. It’d be a nuisance to have to sneak around and hide what’s happening so she won’t drive everyone crazy—

Ronan appeared at the other end of the table in a muted bang! of displaced air that rattled the dining room’s venetian blinds. Like that kind of thing, for example, Kit thought. I was being discreet about wizardry when Helena was getting all nuts. What’s she going to do when stuff like this happens out in the open?

Ronan was all in black, as usual: though this morning the black was heavy black jeans and hiking boots, and a black parka better suited to January than June. He glanced around, then pulled a chair out and flopped down on it. “Where’s the Mouth that Roared? Thought she’d be right here.”

“She was. I told her to go put on some clothes.”

“Thanks for that,” Ronan said. He sounded actively grateful: but he gave Kit a peculiar look. “You okay? You look pale.”

“I believe you.” Kit laughed, rueful. “Family stuff. My older sister’s coming home for a few weeks. She’s not so clear about who we work for.”

“Uh oh. Going to lie low? Or try to talk sense to her?”

“No idea. Depends on how she is.”

“And you’re not eager to find out.”

Kit shook his head. “Don’t get me wrong. As sisters go, she’s okay. More than okay. But as soon as she found out about wizardry…” He shrugged a helpless shrug. “It’s like… I don’t know. Not just that she thought it was a bad thing. Almost as if my being a wizard embarrassed her.”