Lyn Benedict: Ghosts & Echoes

Sylvie leaned back in her desk chair, fighting a tinge of envy. She’d had that kind of future planned out once, had been on the right path—college, a business degree almost within her grasp. Then a friend from her high-school days came to her with an impossible story—her husband was trying to sacrifice their child to gain immortality—that turned out to be true. Sylvie’s normal future had never materialized.

Spend too much time with Zoe, and you’ll blight hers, the little dark voice murmured. It sounded almost sad as it dished out unpalatable truth. Zoe was observant, determined, clever; she’d find out about the Magicus Mundi if she spent any real time with Sylvie. And the genes were the same. If Zoe got a good look into the Magicus Mundi , what might wake in her? Her own dark voice? Her own bloody determination? A violent life to rival Sylvie’s?

New plan, Sylvie thought. Forget about the crazy lunch tour they had launched in an attempt to eat at every restaurant in Miami. Forget about the late-night phone calls where Zoe giggled and dished gossip that Sylvie could barely follow. Forget it all and fuck sisterhood. Keep Zoe at a safe distance.

Yeah, that was going to go over well. Zoe didn’t need a magical wake-up call to be determined. She’d been born that way.

The quiet below was broken. The front door banged open, Guerro barked, and Alex’s voice rose up the stairs, faintly muffled by the closed door. “Sylvie?”

A walk-in? Zoe earlier than anticipated? Sylvie pushed herself to her feet, grabbed the Hurricanes Windbreaker hanging over the back of her chair, tucking the gun into its pocket. Just in case.

Thumping down the stairs, she drew to a halt, a smile forming as she saw the young man waiting by the doorway. “Frankie?”

“Hey, Shadows,” he said. “Got a minute?”

“For you, sure,” she said. She leaned on the reception desk next to Alex.

Frankie was the boy next door, in this case literally; he and his partner, Etienne, ran the bar across the alley. Frankie, she liked. The woman lingering in the doorway behind him, she didn’t. Lisse Conrad, owner of the art gallery down the street, had started her relationship with Sylvie by passing a petition to deny her business space. PIs, apparently, were not posh.

Conrad looked uncomfortable now; high spots of color bloomed on her sculpted cheekbones when she met Sylvie’s eyes. Her mouth twisted. She jumped when Guerro barked. That was all right with Sylvie. Art dealers weren’t high on her happy list right now. Not after Lilith had nearly brought about the end of the world in the guise of one.

“Don’t tell me,” Sylvie said. “You want my help.” Conrad looked to Frankie. Sylvie looked at him also, at his hands stuffed in his chinos, rocking back on his heels, trying for the look of an innocent schoolboy and failing.

“What gives, Frankie?” Sylvie asked.

“Things have been kind of weird around here last month or so; don’t know if you two were in the loop?”

“Consider us excluded,” Sylvie said. Alex coughed. A warning of bad behavior.

“Please, have a seat,” Alex said, gesturing toward the sofa. Frankie led Lisse to the seat, settled himself beside her. “Coffee?”

“No,” the woman said. She flicked her fingers, pushing dog fur away from her skirt.

In the gaps of the miniblinds, Sylvie saw an older-model grey Taurus slowing to a halt, holding up traffic just outside the door.

Sylvie opened her mouth to kick the woman out; she wasn’t interested in helping. Alex cut her off. “Syl, your sister’s here. Why don’t you let me talk to Lis—” At the woman’s sour expression, she continued, “Ms. Conrad.”

Sylvie hesitated. Letting Alex talk to Conrad was as good as taking the case. Alex was a soft touch, and she approved of income.

The front door slammed open, slammed shut, and brought in a teenage girl, all bad temper and self-importance.

On the desk, the silver warning bell rang twice uncertainly. Alex set her fingers to it, stilling the echo, but looked around warily. The bell was a witch’s gift, alerting them to any dark magic entering their shop.

Sylvie turned her attention away from the bell as it fell back to inert metal. Just a fluke. It wasn’t bad magic walking in, only a teenager with a penchant for slamming the door. Even the window had rattled briefly; no surprise, then, that the bell had shifted.

“Nice,” Zoe said. “You can’t have a bell over the door like everyone else?”

“You can’t come in without slamming doors? How old are you, six?” Sylvie sniped right back. Ah, sisterhood. She waved at her dad as he drove on by, having committed his personal hit-and-run on her life.

Lisse Conrad picked at the patch on the couch, her nails finding the old damage unerringly.

“It’s Friday,” Zoe said. “How lame is this? I’m grounded for something so stupid, you won’t even believe it.” She turned to throw herself on the couch, her usual sulk pattern, and blushed scarlet when she saw Conrad watching her with a frown.

“Don’t want to get grounded?” Sylvie said. “Don’t get caught. C’mon, brat. Upstairs. You can tell me what you did. Then we can go get dinner and bitch about the folks.”

Zoe blew sleek hair out of her face on a sigh, smoothed the seaming of her crisp white blouse before taking the narrow stairs ahead of Sylvie. Checking that she still qualified for fashion-model status, Sylvie thought. But that was Zoe. Sylvie had taught her to drive the day she turned fifteen, loaned her the truck the day she turned sixteen, and tried—and failed—to persuade her parents that Zoe needed a car of her own. It wasn’t altruism on her part. Sylvie’s weekends had been subject to being held hostage at the mall while Zoe worked her way through the sale racks at Banana Republic and Armani Exchange, interrogated the women at Sephora, and turned herself into ms. junior fashion plate.

Sylvie looked down at her own worn jeans, her T-shirt, the faded ’Canes jacket, and wondered if they were truly related. Zoe liked the nice things in life, and Sylvie, whose clothes were ruined as frequently as they were bought, didn’t bother much with trying to look anything beyond clean and presentable.

Once they were in the office, Sylvie slumped down behind her desk, and said, “So, spill?”

Zoe ambled about the room, poking at things. She ran her fingers over the pile of phone books in the guest chair, pulled the dusty roman blinds up so she could stare down into the alley. “Stayed out overnight without asking first. It’s not like it was even a school night! It’s summer, for god’s sake. Ari and I had been shopping all day, trying on a billion ugly swimsuits, then hunting for furniture. She’s going to redo her room. I was just too tired to drive home after all that, and it was too late to call. I was being considerate. Catch me doing that again.”

Sylvie snorted, trying to hide a laugh. That much excuse mingled with indignation? It had to be a lie. Teenagers never understood the concept of less being more.

Zoe sighed and grinned. “Look, you probably have things to do. Let’s just make a deal.”

And sometimes, she knew in her bones that they were sisters. In some ways, the brat reminded her of looking in a fun-house mirror—same brown hair, same brown eyes, same rangy build, only distorted—made smaller, made innocent.

“Syl, you’ll let me go out, right? I mean, Mom and Dad totally overreacted. And I’ve got a date with Carson.”

Sylvie said, “What happened to Raul?” Not committing to anything.

“Oh, great. Bring him up,” Zoe said, sweet entreaty defaulting right back to teenage indignation. “He was only three boyfriends ago. You know, if you can’t bother to call me back, you could at least read my blog. . . .”