"They'll be here tomorrow afternoon."
No one in the room seemed surprised that the Gale family expected to be able to book twelve seats on a Calgary-bound flight with less than twelve hours' notice. Given how much of a threat both his ex-boss and the Dragon Lords had considered them, Graham knew the older Gale women were powerful, but they were clearly more powerful than he'd imagined.
"They'll be bringing Katie with them," Allie added.
Thirteen seats, Graham amended as Charlie's brows rose. She glanced over at Roland-who looked admirably neutral-before saying, "Katie's closer than I am. Way too close to do David much good."
Standing just behind her right shoulder, Graham watched the muscles tense in Allie's jaw.
"They're not bringing Katie for David." Her tone suggested that whatever was going on-and he wasn't positive he wanted it explained-was not open to discussion.
Not that Charlie didn't try.
"But..."
"David will be anchoring the first circle."
Roland let out a long sigh that suggested he'd expected as much.
Charlie shook her head, the mute denial as much of a denial as she could evidently make. "Oh, Allie, I'm sorry."
"It might not... I mean, he's strong, and nothing might..." Allie pushed a hand back through the hair that had worked its way out of her braid. "But if he does, it means at least one of the aunties will have to stay."
"Oh, sweetie, now I'm really sorry."
Allie cracked the first smile she'd managed since she'd hung up the phone. "So you won't be abandoning me when this is all over?"
"If the Wood stays clear..." Her head cocked, Graham suspected she was listening to a call no one else in the room could hear. "... then I've got some traveling to do, but if you're staying, I'll base here with you." She glanced past Allie to flash an exceedingly smug smile at Graham. "With you two."
"So it's like that, is it?" Michael's brows rose, and his expression had enough of a warning in it that Graham had to fight to keep his hands from curling into fists.
"No," Allie told him, stepping back, bumping her shoulder into Graham's. "No one's made any choices yet. We're taking it slow this time."
"Shouldn't be a this time," Roland pointed out.
"Shouldn't be a half-Human Dragon Prince in the bathroom," Charlie reminded him. "Cope."
Roland snorted. "Then speaking to that-it's a little early to make plans for after, don't you think? If his mother is as terrifying as reports indicate, we might not survive."
"Joe."
When Joe looked over at her, Allie gestured that he should smack Roland on the back of the head.
The leprechaun sank back into the sofa cushions. "I couldn't."
"I've got it." Stretching out a long arm, Michael did the honors.
Roland dove over Joe to get to him.
Graham could just barely remember his brothers Frank and Evan, the closest to him in age, wrestling like that, using the physical to defuse tensions rising over... over... He couldn't remember what, exactly, but this was the clearest memory of the time before the fire he'd had in years.
He wanted to blame it all on Kalynchuk, wanted to say it had everything to do with the way his life had been manipulated to create the man the sorcerer required, but he suspected he'd been a willing participant in dividing his life into the years before and after the fire. What thirteen year old wouldn't have wanted to stop hurting so badly?
"Hey! If the little guy is going to eat the bigger one, I should get to eat the leprechaun!"
Jack's voice drew Graham out of the smoke-filled corners in his head, and Michael's roar of laughter banished the flame.
Still laughing, he bucked up against Roland's hold. "You wish you were going to be eating me, don't you, littler guy?"
"Bite me," Roland snorted, catching Michael's flailing hand and pinning it beside the other. "Say uncle."
Dimples flashed. "Auntie!"
"Close enough."
Jack frowned as the two disengaged and dragged themselves up onto facing sofas, breathing heavily. "So no one's being eaten?"
"Not tonight. Or rather this morning," Charlie amended glancing at her watch. "I am totally bagged and I have a gig tomorrow night, so at the risk of doing Allie's job and sounding like the grown-up, it's time for bed."
"Well?"
Standing at one of the windows facing the street, Allie leaned back against Charlie's warmth as her cousin wrapped her arms around her and rested her chin on Allie's shoulder. "Well, what?" she asked just as quietly, aware of Michael and Roland and Joe asleep on the sofa beds behind them. Jack had the other bedroom-everyone seemed fine with giving a teenage Dragon Prince his space-and David had stayed in the loft.
"Well, you and Graham for starters?"
"We're... okay." Given all the new baggage, in some ways, it had been more like a first time than their first time had been. "No choices until all this is over."
"Sure you don't want to get him locked down before the aunties toss in their twenty-four cents' worth? They're going to want you all the way into second circle before Mommy dearest shows up."
"I want him to be sure this time. The aunties are going to have enough to worry about without interfering in my love life."
Charlie snorted, warm air blowing strands of hair along Allie's neck. "Yeah, like that's ever stopped them. And, also... well, David?"
"I can't get close to him until he gets some control back."
"You could call him."
Allie shrugged just enough for Charlie to feel the motion. "Not really the kind of thing you can do over the phone." She knew Auntie Jane wouldn't agree. Auntie Meredith, Auntie Gwen, and Auntie Carmen-Roland's grandmother-had called Roland and Charlie's mother and two of Charlie's sisters had called her. Both phones were now buried inside bags of frozen peas in the freezer. Katie had sent a brief and profane text message. Someone had to have called David.
A familiar shadow flickered along the street, a darker gray now the sky had begun to lighten. Charlie's arms tightened.
"There's been a flyby about every forty minutes," Allie told her. "I was lying there in the dark, and I could feel them passing-or maybe it's just one of them, I don't know. I got up to see if I was imagining things but I wasn't. Obviously. Can you...?"
"Feel them? No. Probably a second circle thing."
They turned together to look at Roland, the light spilling in from the street enough to see him lying on his back, one hand tucked up under his chin, a silvered line of drool rolling toward the pillow.
"Maybe," Allie allowed. She thought of the anger and the burning and the vast weight of personality she'd touched. "Maybe not."
"So, Graham's ex-boss; you figure he's going to get involved."
"He's going to have to. He can't run because the Dragon Lords will take him out. He can't stay hidden because she'll find him no matter where he is. The way I see it, he has two choices-get to Jack before she makes it through, or take her out during that moment of disorientation right after she arrives."
"You think she'll have that moment?"
"How would I know?"
"You have to have more info than we do, sweetie. Or you'd never have called in the aunties."
"I keep forgetting you're smarter than you look."
"I'd kind of have to be."
"She's..." Allie took a deep breath and watched it fog the window as she exhaled. "Remember Auntie Gwen right after the change? Scarier than that."
"Wow. Okay, you think Adam and the dragon brothers up there are actually standing guard over Jack?"
"I think..." Allie went over everything she knew about Adam and the Dragon Lords, which was less than she knew about their sister. "... I think they're easily bored and angling for a front row seat."
"So, Graham's ex-boss..." The words were the same, but the tone had become frankly speculative. "... I have to say, sex with a dragon, that's impressive. Still, unless he gets his trousers made to measure, that must make him a grower not a shower."
Allie rolled her eyes. "He was in a very expensive suit; probably tailor made. Plus, he had burn scars."
"Ouch."
"No, Katie'll be staying here, but I've booked six rooms at the Fairmont Palliser for the aunties."
"The big fancy hotel by the convention center?" Joe tried not to look relieved as he wiped down the glass countertop. It wasn't a significantly successful attempt.
"That's the one. It has a spa; they'll be thrilled. The aunties are big on getting what they feel they're entitled to." Allie took a deep breath as a minibus pulled up in front of the store. "Case in point; I had to talk them down from a fleet of airport limos." She suspected they hadn't actually wanted the limos, that it was just Auntie Meredith attempting to wrest some control of the situation from Auntie Jane, but that hadn't shortened the phone call-proving that the cell service along the 401, all the way from Darsden East into Pearson International Airport in Toronto, was excellent.
Joe nodded toward the rental. "Good thing Michael had a license for driving that rig, then."
"He didn't. He had Charlie."
"And she's the driver?"
"No. She's the Gale girl." Right on cue, Charlie jumped out and beckoned from the sidewalk. "Okay, this is it. Hold the fort." Throwing her messenger bag up over her shoulder, Allie took a deep breath. "Wish me luck."
"Aren't they on your side?"
"Remember Gran?" she threw over her shoulder as she headed for the door. "Multiply her by twelve."
"Breathe," Michael suggested. "The plane's on the ground. It's too late to change your mind."
He had a point. Passing out from lack of oxygen wouldn't help.
Allie took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and tried unsuccessfully to ignore the omens that said reality was about to shift in a big way. A man in a cheap suit with a sample case at his feet moved away from the crowds before starting to talk into his cell phone, keeping his voice low and unobtrusive. Three small children sat cross-legged on the floor at their mother's feet and colored quietly. Two young men were having a quiet conversation with the young woman in the Information Booth who seemed to be actually giving them information. Outside, although construction had put a not inconsiderable ripple in the traffic flow, things seemed to be moving smoothly without horns or profanity.
It was creepy.
"Allie..."
"I hear them."
Twelve women all talking at once made a lot of noise. Especially since at least two of them were going deaf and refusing to admit it. Allie braced herself and then, as the aunties appeared from the baggage pickup, closed her hand around Michael's arm.
"Ow."
"Sorry."
"They know it's a real organization, right?"
"Oh, yeah. They run the local group. Actually, they pretty much are the local group."
"So why...?"
Allie sighed. "I'm pretty sure they consider it to be gang colors."
Each of the aunties wore purple. And a red hat. Many different shades of purple. Many different kinds of hats. Four of them were wearing straw cowboy hats bought at the Darsden East dollar store, spray painted red and individually decorated. The aunties quite enjoyed being crafty
Auntie Gwen, at fifty-eight, the youngest by about six years, looked vaguely annoyed by the attention they were getting. The other eleven were reveling in it.
"It's a good thing you didn't ask them to be stealthy," Michael murmured, raising his other arm and waving it.
"This is stealthy," Allie snorted. "Nothing's blowing up."
"Alysha Catherine!" The volume of the surrounding chatter lowered considerably as Auntie Jane stopped an arm's length away. Heaven forbid the entire airport not get a chance to hear what she had to say. "Still teetering on the edge, are you?" Dark eyes narrowed. "Were you one of your cousins, I'd assume you were waiting for our approval. As you aren't and as you are, in point of fact, becoming remarkably like your grandmother, I can only assume there's something wrong with your young man."
"There's nothing wrong with him, Auntie Jane. We had a misunderstanding, we're in the middle of a situation, and we're taking it slow."
"Gale girls don't misunderstand, the situation can only be improved by you tying up loose ends, and you're taking it slowly." Auntie Jane had been the terror of the Lennox and Addington County school board, teaching grade seven and eight English at every school in the district until she retired some years after the mandatory retirement age. The aunties considered government regulations to be more a set of guidelines. With Allie put in her place, she turned to Michael and sniffed, "Talked to your young man yet?"
Allie felt the muscles in his forearm tense under her hand. "No, Auntie Jane."
"And why not?"
"It's not... We aren't..."
Nudging him into silence, Allie took half a step forward. The old woman had no right to dig at Michael. "I don't think that's any of your business, Auntie Jane."
The silence in the terminal was so complete Allie felt like she'd just tried to smuggle a lip gloss through security without placing it first into a clear, one-liter plastic bag. The sound of a red Styrofoam bird falling from the brim of Auntie Christie's hat was impossibly loud.
"You don't think that's any of my business?" Auntie Jane repeated slowly.
"No, I don't," Allie told her. "For what it's worth, I don't think it's any of my business either. It's between Michael and Brian."
Auntie Jane stared at her for a long moment-didn't quite tip her head to the side so she could bring each eye to bear independently, but it was close. Then she glanced over at Michael. Then she smiled. "Well, all right, then. And you're both too old now to give me a hug?"
Michael moved first; Allie could feel the relief rolling off him like smoke. She held back just a little, just enough to come to his rescue if affection turned out to be a trap. It didn't seem to, and once Auntie Jane had gotten her hugs, the other aunties moved in, and, from the shoulders down, Michael disappeared behind a swarming mass topped off in an embarrassment of scarlet feathers.
Allie backed up to find Katie standing draped in canvas tote bags stuffed full of neck pillows filled with buckwheat and flaxseed.
"I hate you so much right now," she sighed.
"You know I wouldn't have called in a full circle if it hadn't been the end of the world."
Katie snorted. "I'd have bet serious money on you preferring the end of the world."
"So how did you get roped into this?" Allie asked, taking a couple of the bags as the aunties, singly and collectively, offered advice to every single person who'd been with them on the plane as they ran the gauntlet of red and purple in an attempt to leave the airport.
"Officially, because I'm self-employed and can take off at a moment's notice. Unofficially," she continued when Allie snorted because a first circle could have swept up as much of the family as they felt they required, "I suspect I'm competition for the young man you've found."
"Competition?"
"You're the only Gale girl he's met..."
"Charlie..."
"Please." Katie flashed a smile at the first of the baggage handlers. He blushed and ran the loaded cart into a pillar. "The aunties want to be sure he's serious, they want to make sure the attraction isn't part of the sorcerer's plot, and they figure I'm enough like you to confuse him."
"It isn't like that."
"Good."
"It's..." She wanted to say terrifying but was afraid Katie would misunderstand. "... real."
"Well, duh." Katie stopped, holding Allie back, keeping them from running up on the who gets to sit next to Michael in the bus argument. "It's second-circle real, even I can feel that.You're all connected to things." She said connected like it was a dirty word. "I don't get why you'd choose that, frankly."
Allie could feel herself blush and hoped none of the aunties would turn and see her. "You'll understand when you meet him."
"He knew we were coming." Auntie Jane patted at the arm of her purple jacket where the fabric was still smoldering. "You didn't tell him you'd called us, did you, Alysha?"
Something squished under Allie's shoe. She didn't look down. "No, of course not!"
"No of course not about it," Auntie Bea growled, picking the crimson brim of her hat up off the ruins of the desk. They hadn't been able to keep the blast entirely contained within the workroom. She stepped away from the wreckage, closer to Allie. "You did keep him hidden from us. Don't even try to deny it."
"I didn't tell you where he was," Allie admitted, standing her ground. "But I had my reasons."
"Your reasons..."
"Leave it, Bea," Auntie Jane cut her off. "No one thinks clearly while they're changing."
"That wasn't..." Auntie Jane's expression clamped Allie's teeth shut on the protest. Let the aunties believe what they wanted. They would anyway, and it wasn't like she'd done David any good.
"He's definitely made a run for it." Auntie Christie backed out of the destroyed closet, dusting ash off her hands. "But when the workshop imploded, it covered his tracks pretty thoroughly."
"It could be years before we find him again," Auntie Kay muttered. "Years."
"Don't be so defeatist," Auntie Jane told her grimly. "As long as his son's alive, anyone can find him."
"Blood magic." Auntie Meredith spat the words on the pile of dust that had been a bookcase.
"I didn't say we'd use blood magic to find him," Auntie Jane snapped. "But he won't go far as long as anyone else can. He'll remove the threat first."
"So Jack's in danger?" Allie asked.
Auntie Jane turned dark eyes on her. "How much of that blast did you absorb, Alysha? Of course the boy is in danger." Muttering under her breath, she stalked out through the newsroom.
"I was expecting someone... taller," the very scary old woman with the dark eyes sniffed as the dozen aunties circled Graham like cats moving in on a mourning dove, shifting him away from the counter and out into the store without touching him.
Graham sought out Allie, bringing up the rear of the pack, and didn't feel particularly reassured by her reassuring nod or her mouthed: Auntie Jane. It had been her idea he meet the aunties downstairs and get it over with before they were distracted by the complications of a half-Human/half-Dragon Lord sorcerer. When Auntie Jane ignored his outstretched hand, he let it fall back to his side. "I get that a lot."
"We'll have to see what we can do about having those hex marks removed while we're here."
"Thank you, ma'am. I'd appreciate that." Allie'd suspected one of the glyphs had something to do with his blocked memories.
"You and I being together, that's likely what's helping you to remember." She stroked her fingertips down the center of his chest. "But if you want these off, we're going to need a little help."
A slightly taller woman, steel-gray hair cropped short, eyes as dark, frowned at him over the top of her glasses. "So you used to work for a sorcerer?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"And you knew he was a sorcerer? From the beginning?"
"When I met him, I'd just saved him from being killed by a basilisk."
"How?" His confusion must've shown because she sighed and said, "How did you save him, boy?"
All things considered, he decided to let her form of address stand. "I had my hunting rifle with me, and I blew its head off."
"Quite the shot," the shortest of the aunties said thoughtfully. "Blowing the head off a moving basilisk." Shortest, Graham realized, was a relative term since at least two of the old women were Allie's height and none of them were less than five four.
"He could have taken that memory right out of your head," another auntie declared, dark eyes wide, her knitting unraveling slightly with the force of the gesture. "Left you with a big blank space you probably wouldn't have even noticed, boys being boys and all. You were what, thirteen?" She stuffed a few meters of loose yarn back into the bulging bag hanging off her shoulder. "Can't think why he didn't."
"He didn't because he saw young Graham would be useful to him," Auntie Jane snapped. "Grace is right. It was a phenomenal shot, and you know what sorts of things his kind attract. For pity's sake, Muriel, use what's left of your brains before they atrophy entirely."
One of the first lessons he'd learned was not to look the Fey in the eyes-most of them would take advantage; some of them took souls. As far as he knew, the Gales were Human. Although, as he stared as fearlessly as he was able into Jane Gale's eyes, he had to admit he wasn't one hundred percent convinced of that. Ninety percent, tops. He suspected that final ten percent would be chewing at him.
After a long moment, she snorted and allowed him to look away. "I don't actually care why you went to work for him," she said. "You were a child, so I doubt it was your idea anyway. He very likely set himself up so that he was there when you needed him, so that he was the only one there, in all likelihood. What I'm more interested in is why, after serving a power-hungry bastard with delusions of grandeur so faithfully for so long, you decided to jump ship and throw in with a family determined to destroy him and everyone like him. It can't possibly have been because of Alysha's physical attractions."
"It could have been," Allie muttered.
"Because if that's all it was," a round, apple-cheeked auntie continued, cheerfully ignoring Allie's protest. "We wouldn't want you. First time there was a crisis, you'd be just as likely to run off with young Katie here. Her breasts are larger."
"Very subtle, Auntie Kay!"
"Well, they are, dear."
Without the extremes of Charlie's hair color, it was easier to see the family resemblance between Allie and her cousin Katie. Given that Katie was currently beating her head against Allie's shoulder, it was a little hard to pick out specific details, but she didn't seem to have Allie's golden sprinkle of freckles.
"Well, boy?"
It took Graham a moment to figure out what they were waiting for.
Right.
Why had he walked away from thirteen years with Stanley Kalynchuk? He hadn't known the emerging Dragon Lord was Kalynchuk's son when he'd refused to pull the trigger, so he hadn't exactly been struck by a sudden ethical objection. That had come later. He'd decided not to pull the trigger when Allie'd made it clear she didn't want him to. She hadn't asked him not to, hadn't said anything more than his name, but he'd chosen...
Son of bitch.
He'd chosen.
"So it's like that, is it?" Auntie Jane's voice pulled him out of his head, and he realized none of the old women-aunties, he amended silently as the youngest of them narrowed dark eyes and glared in his direction as though she was aware of his group designation-stood between him and Allie. He didn't remember any of them moving.
"As Mr. Spock said, in what was undeniably the best of the movies..."
"Kay has a Ricardo Montalban fixation," one of the older aunties interrupted.
"Lovely man," Auntie Kay agreed. "Amazing pecs. May his soul be at peace." She frowned. "Where was I?"
Graham wanted to kiss the corner of Allie's mouth where it curved up, fighting a smile.
"The needs of the many..." Auntie Muriel sighed, waving a knitting needle.
"... outweigh the needs of the one. Of course. Had you killed the boy, we wouldn't have needed to come to Calgary to save the world."
"Knowing what you know now..." Auntie Jane said with a glance around the circle and in a tone that suggested interrupting would prove fatal. "... given the choice again, would you choose differently?"
Graham was certain she hadn't been using choose like that before his realization. And there was that ten percent uncertainty again. The store was so quiet he could hear the soft whisper of Allie breathing. He could see the faint dusting of freckles across her nose and cheeks, and the mole on her right earlobe. He could smell the shampoo, shower gel, Allie mix that made him think of her moving under him, legs wrapped around his hips...
And given that there were twelve older women in the store wearing at least thirty-six separate scents between them, that should have been impossible.
"If I had to do it again," he said, "I wouldn't do anything differently."
Allie raised a brow.
"She was talking specifically about last night," he reminded her.
"She is the cat's mother, Graham Buchanan," Auntie Jane snorted. "Remember it. Christie, Grace, Ellen-go talk to David. Do not wear him out," she snapped as they surged toward the back door. "Until we know exactly when the Queen is emerging, he could have to lock us down at any moment. Just get him to the point where he can be in the same room as his sister. Vera, Meredith, and Faith, take Michael, find a grocery store, get supplies. I very much doubt we'll be able to put together decent meals from whatever Catherine has left behind. Oh, and you'd best find a hardware store as well, there's no point in leaving it to the last minute." If Michael'd had any objections, he had no chance to voice them as he was tugged back toward the bus. "Gwen get out from behind that counter. This is not the time for that sort of thing. The rest of you, upstairs, let's get that Dragon Princeling sorted before we have to start supper."
And just like that, they were gone.
Well, not exactly gone; he could hear them arguing on the stairs and in the courtyard and out on the sidewalk, but the store practically echoed with their absence.
Allie took a deep breath and let it out slowly as she closed the distance between them, slid her arms around Graham's waist, and rested her head on his shoulder. "That could have gone worse," she admitted as his hands spread warm and comforting across her lower back.
And all at once, the store was full of aunties again-down the stairs, in from the courtyard, spilling out of the bus and back in through the front door. Barely daring to breathe, Allie lifted her head and met Auntie Jane's gaze. She couldn't see a demarcation between pupil and iris. She could barely see any whites.
Auntie Jane's lips curled into the second scariest smile Allie had ever seen.
"Well, well, well," she said.
Then the aunties were gone again.
"Okay, that was weird." Katie's voice pulled Allie out of the circle of Graham's arms although she kept her hand in his. "Any ideas?"
Allie shook her head. "I was going to ask you."
"Not a clue. But hey, still third circle, what do I know. Hi, I'm Katie," she directed a slightly harried grin in Graham's direction. "Just so you know, if you were just fooling around with Allie, I'd be open to joining in because, seriously, those are a pair of fine looking shoulders and my breasts are larger, but since you clearly aren't just fooling around, it's nice to meet you. Now, please tell me Rol's upstairs running interference for that poor kid."
It took Allie a moment to realize the poor kid referenced was Jack. The Dragon Prince.
"He should be." Allie turned to Graham who nodded, looking a little stunned.
"Charlie's there, too," he told them. "I think she's teaching Jack how to download Torchwood."
"She's probably teaching him how to surf for porn," Allie sighed. "Just as illegal but more likely to piss off Auntie Jane."
"Either way," Katie sighed, "we need to get up there."
"Rol can hold them for a few minutes."
"Roland?" Graham asked.
"You've only seen the geeky lawyer in the sweater vest," Allie told him, searching the store for Joe. "When a Gale boy turns on the charm, even the aunties pause to appreciate..." She managed to keep the girly shriek down to a single syllable since she'd half expected Joe to fade in behind the counter-and there he was. "Are you okay?"
His cheeks were flushed, and his lower lip was full and red like he'd been biting it. "Your Auntie Gwen kept groping me."
"She could see you?"
He shrugged. "Didn't seem to matter, did it?"
Allie glanced over at her cousin who responded with the universal eye roll of how the hell should I know? "If you tell her to stop, she will. But you have to tell her flat out."
"Yeah, well..." Joe shrugged again.
"Are you...?" Allie waved a hand, indicating the store, the counter, and the possibility of selling another yoyo.
"Oh, I'm good down here." He gripped the edge of the counter with both hands, and Allie suspected it would take all three of them working together to break his hold.
As they passed the mirror, their reflections walked by the writhing body of a white Dragon Lord being pecked to pieces by crows. Allie's reflection suddenly became a feminized version of the scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz. When she spread her arms, just to see what would happen, the crows flew away.
"Not exactly subtle," Katie pointed out. "And why isn't Graham naked?"
Graham's clothing began to fade. Allie touched her fingertips to the glass. "Stop it," she said quietly, and Graham's clothes returned. Plus a parka, a toque, snowmobile boots, and a pair of enormous, gauntleted ski mitts. "Thank you. How did you know the mirror would do that?" she demanded of her cousin.
Katie sighed. "Gran's mirror." The "duh" remained unspoken but present. "And if I hadn't already known you were crossing, that would have given it away." She started up the stairs. "Second circle is so possessive it's a bit creepy."
"I'm not..."
"Allie, you've written mine on a leprechaun. And Graham. And Michael, again. And, I'm guessing, on a Dragon Prince." Leaning back, she stuck her head around the corner into the lower hall. "You've been here a week. If that's not possessive, I don't know what is."
"Preemptive."
"Potato, potahto, Allie-cat."
When Katie waved and disappeared, Allie returned her attention to the mirror. "Don't worry," she told it, lightly gripping the frame. "I won't let them destroy Jack."
"Are you sure," Graham began, touching his hair with a bare hand while watching his reflection poke at the hat with a mitten tip. "... that's Jack?" he finished as Allie shot him a look that said, Don't undermine my authority with the mirror. She knew he'd been going to say, "Are you sure you can?" and was impressed he'd understood her message.
"If it's possible to prevent it, I'd rather the aunties didn't eat any of the Dragon Lords alive."
"Are they likely to?"
Linking her fingers with his, she tugged him toward the stairs. "Depends." With any luck he wouldn't ask depends on what? "You didn't happen to count the crows did you? The ones in the mirror?"
"No, why?"
"Well, it was hard to tell since they were never still, but as they flew away, I could've sworn there were thirteen."
"Is that important? Thirteen crows?"
Allie glanced back, lower lip caught between her teeth. "It means something," she said slowly. "I'm sure of that, I'm just not sure what."
"In Mesoamerican divination, thirteen is the number of important cycles of fortune and misfortune. Loki was the thirteenth guest at a banquet where he killed Baldur beginning Ragnarok. Thirteen nodes make up the Metatron's Cube." When Allie stopped climbing and turned to face him, he grinned. "I wrote an article on Triskaidekaphobia for our second issue."
"I keep forgetting you have a secret identity."
"Had." The grin flattened. "He might have moved out of the office, but he still runs the paper."
"Remember, it isn't over until the fat lady sings." She brushed a strand of hair back off his face. "In this case, that would be Auntie Kay. If she starts in on Andrew Lloyd Webber, run."
Graham frowned. "Why?"
"She's really, really bad."
They entered the apartment just in time to see Roland step in front of Jack and say, "Auntie Bea! He's thirteen!"
Since Jack looked more intrigued than upset, Allie decided she didn't need to know the context. And anyway, Auntie Jane stepped forward before she could say anything, moving around Roland-or possibly moving Roland, Allie couldn't be positive which-and pinching Jack's chin between thumb and forefinger.
"Oh, yes," she murmured, turning his head to the right and then to the left. From where Allie was standing it looked very much like she was peering up his nose. "You're family, all right."
Allie rolled her eyes and pushed her way through the crowd of aunties-and six aunties were more than capable of seeming like a crowd. "He's family because I claimed him, Auntie Jane." All the charms but the one on his forehead were covered by clothing but should have made no difference to an auntie.
"He's family because of blood, Alysha Catherine."
"Blood?" Her cousins, standing together behind Jack in a show of generation unity, returned I have no idea what she's talking about expressions. "We're related to the Dragon Lords?"
"Don't be ridiculous, child. We're related to his father."
"His father?"
"My father?" Jack grabbed Auntie Jane's sleeve. "You know my father?"
"I wouldn't say that I know him, child, but I met him once. It was just before he disappeared. I was three and I remember my Auntie Anna insisting he was going to turn and his youngest sister, that would be Clara who died, oh sixteen years ago now, kept insisting he wouldn't." Patting Jack's hand, she turned her head toward Allie. "He killed Auntie Anna when she tried to stop him. Sisters are usually fairly stupid about that sort of thing."
"Clara," Auntie Bea snorted as Allie backed up until her shoulder blades were pressed against Graham's chest and his hands rested warm and grounding on her hips. "Woman was a total nut job there at the end. Eight dead, and she refused to believe her brother had done anything wrong."
"Magnificent fruitcake recipe, though," Auntie Muriel added. "Impossible to duplicate." The other five made noises of varying agreement.
"Wait, wait, wait, wait!" Roland had both hands up, his eyes so wide Allie could see the whites all the way around. "Are you saying what I think you're saying?"
"Oh, for pity's sake, Roland, law school ruined you." Still holding Jack's hand, Auntie Jane moved over to one of the sofas and sat. Jack tried to pull free, had no success, and ended up sitting beside her looking just a little freaked. "Stop it," she said as the lights began to flicker.
To no one's surprise, they stopped.
The other aunties found seats, leaving Roland, Charlie, Katie, Allie, and Graham on their feet.
"Well, Charlotte, you've always been good at jumping to conclusions, what do you...?" Auntie Jane frowned up at her. Blinked. "What on earth have you done to your hair?"
Charlie tucked her hands into the front pockets of her jeans. "Red's a better color for country," she said evenly.
"And I'm sure Reba McIntyre is thrilled you approve," Auntie Jane sniffed. "That, however, is not a shade of red intended for hair. That is a shade intended for cheap lipstick and slutty lingerie."
"The blue hair made her look like a Smurf," Auntie Muriel pointed out, unrolling a long multicolored tube and starting to knit.
"I'm not saying this doesn't look better," Auntie Jane sniffed again.
Allie could tell by the curl to Charlie's lip that she was about to say something they'd probably all regret, given that the aunties believed in spreading the blame. "You're saying that Graham's boss... ex-boss," she corrected hurriedly as his fingers tightened, "was a Gale."
"Was a Gale?" Auntie Jane's gaze whipped around toward her so quickly Allie nearly felt a breeze. "No. Is a Gale."
"Is?" Allie repeated.
"They're too young," Auntie Bea snapped.
"That horse is already out of the barn, Bea. Besides, the child is sitting right here, and blood always tells. Eventually, they'd have figured it out for themselves or," Auntie Jane continued, her voice dropping into what David had always called someone's going to get it territory, "I'd have had something to say to the lot of them about paying attention to what's actually going on."
Katie raised a hand. "I just got here."
"And don't make me regret bringing you."
"So Alastair Bronwin," Roland said slowly, "the sorcerer the family took out in 1973..."
"He had the brains to settle in Syria," Auntie Kay snorted. "Never would have found him if it hadn't been for the oil crisis."
"... he was a Gale?"
"They're all Gales," Allie said, watching Auntie Jane's face as the last few pieces fell into place. "That's what sorcerers are. They're Gales gone bad who got away. They don't just use the power to gain more power, they use the power to extend their lives. Who was he?"
"He?"
"Jack's father."
"Before he was a sorcerer, his name was Jonathon Samuel Gale."
Allie nodded. "That's why we stop them, isn't it? Because they're Gales. They're family. They're our responsibility. And that's why we're attracted to them, it's not the power, it's because they're..." With an image of Stanley Kalynchuk in her head, with Roland in the room, she couldn't say Gale boys. "But I wasn't..." Graham. "I wasn't because by the time I met him, Graham and I had already connected..."
"Is that what the kids are calling it these days," Auntie Carol snickered.
"... and I was moving into second circle. And Graham was in the room with us. What if I hadn't... Oh." She wouldn't have even known there was a sorcerer in Calgary if she hadn't seen the hexes on Graham's chest. Not with him locked down and hiding from the Dragon Lords. Not until it was too late. Everything came back to that first meeting between her and Graham that night in the store. Just the two of them. Because Charlie'd been delayed.
She looked up to see Charlie's gaze locked on her face and wondered how much her expression had given away. Or, with more information than the aunties had been given, whether Charlie'd arrived at the same place.
Then she took one more step.
"Jack's a sorcerer."
"Yes."
Allie realized Auntie Jane hadn't let go of Jack's hand. "And a Gale."
"Yes."
They were all looking at her now-the aunties, her cousins, Jack. Jack's eyes were gold, but Human enough for all that, and he had a curved blemish on one cheek that looked like a hockey scar. Somehow Allie doubted the Dragon Lords played hockey, but it wouldn't be the strangest thing she'd heard. His nose was a little too big for his face and he had a smudge of lemon pie filling on his hoodie. He'd just started into the all-knees-and-elbows phase and Allie hoped that his mother's heritage had gifted him with more grace than his Human side. He sat motionless beside Auntie Jane, breathing a little heavily, two thin lines of smoke trickling out of his nose-but then the one thing she knew about his upbringing was that he could recognize predators.
His uncles kept trying to eat him.
His aunties...
But if they truly were his aunties...
"Gale boys choose," Allie said, straightening and squaring her shoulders. "And he's not old enough. He's thirteen. Fifteen's the minimum for third circle, no matter how much of a pain in the ass the boys are about it."
"He's a sorcerer now," Auntie Bea reminded her. She sounded almost gleeful about it.
"That doesn't matter. He didn't choose it. His abilities are innate because sorcery was used in his conception."
"The situation is unique," Auntie Jane agreed, dark eyes narrowed. "But that in itself suggests we find a unique solution."
"If he's a Gale, then what applies to the rest of the family applies to him. Either family matters, or it doesn't. If he isn't a Gale, then he isn't your responsibility. And what's more..." Allie was suddenly tired of butting heads with stubborn old women. "... like I told his uncles, he's under my protection."
"And that's your last word on the matter, is it, Alysha Catherine?"
"Yes."
"Well, that seems like a unique solution to me." She patted Jack's hand, released it, and stood. "Muriel?"
Auntie Muriel shoved her knitting away. "With this many people, this late in the day, it had better be chili and cornbread."
"Three bean salad on the side?"
"None for me, dear. It repeats on me."
"Wait!" Allie held up a hand and the sudden, purposeful bustling paused. "What just happened?"
"You just agreed to be responsible for young Jack here until he turns fifteen."
"I what?"
"I don't need a babysitter!" Jack protested surging up onto his feet.
Auntie Jane placed her hand in the center of his chest and pushed him back down onto the sofa. "How fortunate that Alysha has always wanted a younger brother. Perfect timing," she added as the apartment door opened, "here's the girls with the groceries. Chop, chop, supper isn't going to make itself!"
"How did the women buying the groceries know what to get?" Graham asked, the question brushing warm against her ear. "They only just decided to make chili."
She turned just far enough to raise an eyebrow at him. "Do I really need to answer that?"
She could feel him thinking about it. "Actually, no."
Watching nine aunties maneuver around a kitchen was a little like watching ballet had the corps all considered themselves principal dancers. And been armed.
No. Eight aunties.
Allie frowned and moved away from Graham's touch to where Auntie Gwen was standing, staring into the middle distance. She'd only just changed over and sometimes the color of her eyes still took Allie by surprise. Tucking herself up by the older woman's shoulder, Allie followed her line of sight but as far as she could tell, there was nothing there.
"You've been awfully quiet," she said.
"I was just wondering..." Auntie Gwen's dark eyes gleamed. "... what your leprechaun's name is."
As soon as full dark fell, the Dragon Lords began flying over again, although only Allie and the aunties could feel them.
"Testing the wards," Auntie Jane sniffed. "I'll say this much for my sister, if she wanted you to stay out, you stayed out."
"Are they trying to get in at Jack, or are they making sure his father can't?" Allie twisted up a fistful of curtain and stared up at what the lights of the city allowed of the stars.
"Don't know, don't care. Who's going to Charlotte's concert and who's up for euchre?"
That was enough to turn Allie away from the window. "Charlie's playing in a bar, Auntie Jane."
"We've been in bars before, Alysha." Auntie Jane sat down at the dining room table as at least half the others started pulling on jackets and shoes. "Your Auntie Ellen used to bartend at the Royal when she was younger."
"But what if Jack's mother shows up tonight?"
"Is she going to?" Not a rhetorical or any other type of bloody-minded question, Auntie Jane looked at her like she actually wanted an answer.
"Jack..."
"I'm asking you, Alysha Catherine. Is she going to show up tonight?"
How was she supposed to... Oh. Allie slid her awareness out through the city, allowed it to be drawn to the sacred site on the top of the hill.
"Second circle makes connections, Alysha."
"I know that," she murmured, finding the path Jack had created between realities.
"Of course you do," Auntie Bea sniffed.
"Kids today." Auntie Christie rolled her eyes with the expressiveness of much practice. "Think they know everything."
Auntie Meredith sighed. "I don't know why we even bother to..."
Allie pushed the aunties' litany to the spot in her mind where muzak lived, rested her forehead against the window, and moved carefully along the path. A little further. And back one hell of a lot faster at the first brush against the edge of the burning.
The glass had warmed under her skin, so she shifted six inches left, sucking in air through her teeth at the cool touch.
"Well?"
"Not tonight."
"Well, there you go, then. Roland, you'll stay here. Michael, you'll drive. Meredith, have you got the cards?"
"Allie, do you...?"
"Guess again, future-cousin-in-law." Wearing a pair of NHL boxers and a faded Blue Rodeo T-shirt, Charlie pulled the bedroom doors closed behind her. "Allie's settling Jack. He ate a tube of toothpaste."
Graham frowned. He had a vague memory of one of his cousins doing the same. "That shouldn't hurt him."
"He ate the tube, too."
That, his cousin hadn't done. He leaned back against the dresser, unwilling to get any closer until he knew why she was in the bedroom. "Well, how was the gig?"
"Interesting. When Auntie Christie gets a couple of beers in her, she does a scary two-step."
"Any sign of trouble?"
"You mean besides there being more bowlegged cowboys in the city tonight than there were yesterday? No."
It was the expression on Charlie's face that made Graham decide he didn't want to know. "So, no Dragon Lords?"
"Auntie Ellen said a couple of them landed outside, but they didn't come in."
"Because of the aunties?"
"Or they got freaked by our kick-ass cover of 'Roughest Neck Around.' Hard to say. So, look at you two..." She dropped onto the end of the bed and bounced. "... all alone in this great big bed while I'm fighting the Jolly Green Giant for space. Plus, he's a blanket hog. He's always been a blanket hog."
"Did you want to join us?" Graham asked. He'd thought the sarcasm had been obvious, but Charlie looked like she was actually considering it.
"After things are locked down," she said at last.
"Things?"
"Between you and Allie." She tucked a bare leg under her butt, and gazed up at him. "I was hoping the aunties would bring Uncle Tom, that's Allie's dad, out west with them. He's a Gale by marriage; you've probably got some questions."
"About marriage?" He ran a hand back through his hair. "Charlie, Allie and I are..."
"Twinned, turbo-charged souls who have miraculously found each other and now have an eternity of bliss ahead. Also, you're really hot together. No, not about marriage, you ass, about what it means to choose a Gale-so this time, when she asks you if you understand your choice, you won't be talking through your fucking ego." She leaned back on her elbows, and Graham tried very hard not to look at the nipple poking Jim Cuddy in the eye. "Figured out what you want to say to her yet?"
"Do I need to say it at this point? I mean, I'm here."
"Not at this point." Charlie rolled her eyes. "But it's going to come up. So, since I'm here and you and Allie are still..." She sketched the most sarcastic set of air quotes he'd ever seen and given that she had to know about the sex, he supposed he didn't blame her. "... treading carefully, any immediate questions? Say, about the aunties?"
"The aunties..." Graham remembered everything Stanley Kalynchuk had told him about the Gale women and suppressed a shudder. From what he'd seen so far, that, at least, the sorcerer hadn't lied to him about. "The aunties are self-explanatory."
"True that."
"Most of my questions..." Most of his questions, he wanted to howl at Kalynchuk. "... you can't answer. Except... No."
"You're thinking that if you want to know the thing you want to know, you should ask Allie, not me, aren't you?" She shifted to run a hand back through her hair, frowned at the single brilliant strand caught on a guitar callus and flicked it off onto the floor. "That means it's either about Michael or David. She loves Michael, always will."
"I'm okay with that."
"Big of you," Charlie snorted. "David..."
"She apologized to David." It was all Allie had said to him during the whole meal. She'd said, I'm sorry. He'd kissed her forehead and called her an idiot.
"David's going to have to anchor the whole first circle."
"And that's dangerous."
"That wasn't a question."
"I'm not an idiot."
"About what?" Allie glanced between them as she came into the bedroom and frowned. "What have you guys been talking about?"
"You." Charlie bounced up off the bed, grabbed Allie by the shoulders of the faded Great Big Sea T-shirt she wore and kissed her soundly. Graham tried not to think about implications. Or east coast Canadian music meeting up with west. "I told him all about the spot under your right ear."
"He found that already," Allie snorted.
"Really? Well, did he find..." She shot a wicked glance in Graham's direction and bent to whisper in her cousin's ear.
Allie grinned. "No. Not yet."
"Should I..."
"You should leave. Joe's sharing with Michael, you and Katie are sharing with Roland."
"I could help him find..."
"If I need your help," Graham said, "I'll ask for it."
Charlie turned to look at him, fully at him, and just for a moment, he thought her eyes had turned a darker gray. "Deal." Then she winked, and the moment passed.
Later, with Allie's head pillowed on his shoulder, he stroked along the damp curve of her spine and thought she was beautiful and thought for the first time in a long time he was exactly where he belonged and because he couldn't entirely shut the reporter up, he thought about that niggling ten percent.
"You're thinking very loudly."
"Sorry."
"You can ask me anything, you know."
"Anything?"
He could feel her smile against his skin. "I'm fairly certain you'll keep it out of the papers at this point."
It might be the only way he'd ever find out. "Are you..." It sounded like such a stupid question even before he asked it. "Are you Human?"
"Was I just that amazing?"
"Allie." Graham caught her hand before it slid lower on his body.
She sighed. "Yes. No. Essentially. If the world doesn't end and you decide to stay, there will be babies."
"He managed that with a dragon."
"Okay, so not my best argument." Her thumb stroked the hollow of his hip and he knew she was drawing another charm. He thought about stopping her. He didn't. "Do you remember your family?" she asked softly. "From before the fire?"
Did he? He pushed through the smoke. "I remember a house too small for the number of people in it. I remember a lot of yelling and laughing and broken toys and the reek of wet hockey equipment piled in the summer kitchen. I remember knowing that wherever I went in town a spiderweb of connections defined me."
"Good." She kissed the spot under his ear. "That's what we are."
"It's not all you are."
"It's all that matters."
He wanted to believe that.
Graham lay quietly, one arm trapped under Allie's body, trying to identify the sound that had woken him. Instinct told him it hadn't come from one of the five sleeping out in the living room. Jack, maybe. But what was Jack doing up at 6:10?
Allie murmured as he slid his arm free, but he kissed her bare shoulder and she settled back to sleep. He'd left his clothing so that he could dress quickly in the dark, and it only took a moment's extra time to scoop the boxers he'd worn to bed-and not kept on long-up off the floor.
Staying low, he slipped out into the main room, silent on sock feet, and nearly crapped himself when Auntie Kay turned from the kitchen and waved.
"I couldn't sleep any longer," she whispered as soon as he was close enough. "Time change, you know. Bea and Meredith are in the pool. Jane is on the phone with Ruby-the silly old dear was up the water tower again, wrote Surrender Dorothy with the paint left over from when Tom redid the trim on the farmhouse. When Christie started in on that Tai Chi nonsense, I decided to come over and get a start on the biscuits for breakfast. You wouldn't know where Allie keeps her shortening, would you?"
It seemed safest to merely answer the direct question. "Sorry, no."
"I have this terrible fear she's out and that's, well, that's just wrong."
Graham knew where this was going. "There's a twenty-four-hour convenience store just down the road. Do you want me to go out and get some shortening for you?"
"Would you, dear? How sweet to offer. Get as much as they have. If Jack's mother doesn't have us all flying about in circles today, we'll use it for pies."
She didn't offer to pay for the shortening, and Graham didn't ask. Truth be told, he was just as glad to get out on his own for a few minutes, even if it was just walking a couple of blocks to the store and back. He'd shut the newspaper down-citing a family emergency when he'd made the calls, and his whole life had devolved into waiting for Jack's mother. The Dragon Queen.
And after?
"If the world doesn't end, and you decide to stay, there will be babies."
Yeah, he could use a walk.
As he slipped into his boots, tugging them from the pile at the door, he realized his jacket was still in the bedroom. He pulled what had to be Roland's off a hook-it had to be Roland's because although the jacket he'd found was big on him, Michael's would have been like wearing a circus tent.
Leaning against the wall at the bottom of the stairs were a dozen new corn brooms.
"Do you remember your family? That's what we are."
"Oh, yeah..." The orange sale stickers were very bright on the blue handles. The aunties had gotten a deal. No surprise. "... just like my family."
When he glanced over at the mirror, fourteen reflections glanced back. Most of them were dressed. The one out front was holding a suitcase.
"I'm not leaving, I'm just going on an errand for Auntie Kay. And I'm talking to a mirror." Since he didn't have a key to the store, he went out the back door and through the garage. Since anything coming back in would have to get past David, still in the loft, it seemed safest.
He kept close to the walls of the alley and, when he reached the street, stayed close to the storefronts. The sky had lightened enough to keep the Dragon Lords flying high, but one had landed and walked right into the store, so daylight wasn't exactly the protection it should have been. He kept half his attention on the local pigeons. If they dove for cover, he was heading right under that newspaper box with them.
Early morning traffic had started to pick up by the time he left the store, six pounds of shortening in a bag and the storekeeper's puzzled gaze still on the back of his head. He didn't notice the big black SUV before it stopped beside him on the road.
No, he didn't see the big black SUV before the door opened and Stanley Kalynchuk growled, "Get in."
"No."
But he stepped up into the car.
"Hurry!"
He couldn't stop himself from dropping into the seat and closing the door behind him.