Диана Дуэйн: Wizards At War

“Oh, sure! So we’re going to be running all over the place, saving the universe, and I’m going to have to write things down on stickies while I’m doing it?” Nonetheless, Dairine pulled one of the notes off and started scribbling on it furiously. “How do you spell ‘commorancy’?”

“You’re asking me?” Nita said.

“You’re the spelling champ.”

“It’d help if I’d ever heard the word before!”

“Better look it up,” Tom said. “Meanwhile, we have to get moving. We’ve got a lot more people in the area to see today, and some who’re a lot farther away than the Island. Any questions before we go?”

For Kit, there were at least ten or twenty, many of them variants on the theme of How are we supposed to save the world when you don’t know how? One question, though, had pushed its way to the forefront and was going to drive Kit crazy until he got an answer.

“Why didn’t you tell us about this before?” he said.

Tom and Carl each let out a long breath. “Because there might not have been any need for you to worry about it, if we’d solved it?” Carl said after a moment. “Because you had enough to deal with in your own lives? Because we were fairly sure we could handle the problem—and so were the Powers That Be?”

Everyone was quiet again. “And then things didn’t turn out the way any of us thought they would,” Carl said, “so it became time to start worrying you. Believe me, we wish we didn’t have to. But right now, wishing’s a waste of time. We’ve got our work cut out for us. So…”

He and Tom got up. “Thanks for making the time for us,” Tom said. “We’ll be in touch.”

They headed for the back door. Nita got up and went out after them, and Kit got up and followed her, while Dairine finished scribbling on her sticky note, and Roshaun, Sker’ret, and Filif watched her.

Nita peered in Tom’s open car window as he settled himself in the driver’s seat and Carl got in on the far side. “If you’ve got all these people to see,” she said, “why don’t you just worldgate it?”

“We’re saving our strength,” Tom said as he started the car. “And, anyway, when all this is done, we still need some groceries.” His smile, though kind of tired looking, had the usual humor about it. “See you later…”

Tom backed the Nissan out of the driveway, turned, and headed up the street. Neither Nita nor Kit said anything until the car was almost down to the traffic lights at Park Avenue.

“They are both completely freaked,” Nita said at last. “I’ve never seen them like that before.”

Kit shook his head. “ They’re freaked? What about us? ”

“Yeah,” Nita said. “I know.”

Nita still looked a lot calmer than Kit felt. He envied her composure. “All we have to do now,” he said, “is start figuring out what to do until they get us assigned to these teams.”

Behind them, the screen door banged. They both turned to look. Dairine came out. A moment later she was followed by Roshaun, who stood there, somehow managing to look regal in a floppy T-shirt, and glanced down the driveway as if nothing particularly upsetting had happened. And what about him? Kit said silently. Completely cool. Or so he wants us to think…

I don’t know him well enough to know what’s going on inside his head, Nita said. But Dairine’s another story. The very thought that she might have to stay home again while we’re out in the Great Wherever is driving her nuts. I think she’s got her plans made already…

“You’re gonna love them,” Dairine was saying to Roshaun as the two of them came down the driveway. “They’re unbelievably terrific.”

“Who?” Kit said. “Your little one-celled buddies on Titan?”

Dairine turned a don’t-get-cute expression on Kit. “Them, too,” she said. “But they weren’t who I was talking about.”

“Uh-oh,” Nita said, glancing at Kit. Then she looked back at Dairine. “Something tells me you’re thinking about doing some traveling.”

Dairine looked over her shoulder, back up the driveway. Twenty feet or so behind her, Spot was sitting in the middle of the driveway, staring with all his eyes at the sky. They all looked upward to see what he was looking at, but nothing was immediately obvious.

“It’s a long way there, and a long way back,” Dairine said, looking back at Kit and Nita. “It’s not somewhere I’ve been for a while, except virtually. Not enough energy available for the transit. But now”—she laced her fingers together and cracked her knuckles—”now it’s a whole new ball game.”

“Don’t do that,” Nita said. “You know it’s bad for your hands.”

“Like the state of my finger joints is going to matter if the world comes to an end?!” Dairine said.

Nita made a face. Kit had to admit that Dairine had a point. “Doing your own spell to get there’s going to cost you a lot of power,” Nita said.

“It would if I was going to do one,” Dairine said. “But why should I, when the visitors’ worldgates in the cellar are fully subsidized?” She grinned at Roshaun.

“And on checking mine,” Roshaun said, “I find that as of your Seniors’ talk with us, the subsidy has been extended indefinitely. We’ve retro-engineered those gates before.”

“Yeah, but this is going to be a much longer jump,” Dairine said. “If you’re not careful how you restate the spell’s power statements, you’re gonna make a mess. Better let me handle it.”

Roshaun frowned. “I should remind you that when I restated them last time—”

Kit took Nita by the elbow and steered her casually away; they headed down to the end of the driveway. They’re at it again, he said silently. How many times is this now since we got back?

Don’t ask me. I stopped counting yesterday.

They looked up and down the street, while behind them the argument started to escalate. “What’s your dad going to make of all this?” Kit said.

Nita shook her head. “He’s already dealt with the houseguests saving the solar system. After that, maybe saving the universe won’t seem like such a stretch.”

But she didn’t sound certain, and the uncertainty was catching. Kit looked around at the maple trees, the street with its potholes, the across-the-street neighbor washing his car in the driveway, the front-fender rattle of a kid riding by on a mountain bike—and found that everything suddenly felt peculiarly fragile and undependable, as if something far more solid and deadly might break through at any moment. Kit stuffed his hands into his pockets, hunching his shoulders a little. The day that had seemed mild earlier seemed chilly now, as the spring breeze whistled down the street and rustled the maple leaves.

“Well,” Kit said, “even if our parents don’t completely get what’s happening, it’s not like they can stop us.”

“I know,” Nita said. “But I’m so used to them coping, now. I’m getting spoiled for being open about it … it saves so much time.” She rubbed her forehead for a moment. “Time. What are we going to do about school? ”

“Still thinking about that one,” Kit said.

Nita looked around, shook her head. “I can’t think straight,” she said. “I’m in shock. And now I’m wondering if I’m going to lose it totally when it starts to sink in. Dairine’s right for once: They’ve just told us the world might end in—what, a few weeks? A couple of months?”

“Something like that.” Kit’s mouth was dry again.

She looked up and down the street. “Makes everything look different,” she said. “Look, here comes Carmela…”