Chapter 5 Tea And Whiskey
Tea And Whiskey
Alaric’s hazel eyes met mine, and I saw a mixture of things in his stare. Tiredness. Reluctance. Also a kind of frustrated determination that overrode some of the more defeated emotions.
“I’ll tell you what, darling Leda,” he said, pulling his shirt away from my fingers and buttoning it up higher to cover the tattoos. “I’ll tell you all about my many adventures these past few months. In excruciating detail, if you so desire…”
He paused, eyes darkening.
“…If,” he continued pointedly. “You tell me at least some of the possibly insane number of things you left out of your own story. I don’t believe for a second you need permission from Cal to tell me all of it.
” He folded his arms, his eyes appraising me cynically.
“There are so many gaping holes in that tale you told me just now, I could ride a dragon through it. You could at least respect me enough to lie well.”
Thinking about his words, I exhaled in frustration.
I leaned back on the couch, and stared at him for a moment, too.
In the end, the decision was easy.
“I’ll get us more tea,” I said, pushing up off the couch. Looking down at him, I added, “And I’m not telling you all of it. But you’re right. I can tell you more.”
“Well, fine,” he retorted mockingly. “Then I’m not telling you all of it, either. You’ll just have to guess at the parts I’m leaving out.”
Despite his semi-joking tone, I could tell he wasn’t happy about my answer. He might’ve even been a little hurt. I thought about everything we’d told one another the summer before, and I understood why. But there were things I hadn’t told him last summer, either.
I walked over to Bones’s small kitchen, and felt strange suddenly, being there.
Was he going to be annoyed the two of us just made ourselves at home?
Even with the storm, it struck me as pretty presumptuous.
I might’ve suggested we relocate to Frumpy’s, but Alaric just said this was the safest place on campus for us to be right now.
I rinsed Bones’s copper kettle out, filled it with water and stuck it on the stove. I lit the burner and cranked it up to high, then lightly explored the tins on his counter by the sink.
Four that I opened appeared to hold tea.
One contained an herbal, fruity-smelling blend.
Another smelled like mint. A third smelled distinctly unpleasant, which made me wonder if it might have magical or medicinal properties.
The last and largest tin, thankfully, smelled like regular black tea, and strong. I opted for that one.
I set out two matching cups and saucers on a tray with the bone china serving pot that went with the set.
I eyeballed a measure of black tea for the pot, and stepped back to wait for the kettle to boil.
Away from the fireplace, even only this much, it was freezing.
Standing by Bones’s kitchen window didn’t help, as a draft whispered through the cracks.
The longer I stood there, the colder I got.
Magical or not, the kettle seemed to take forever to boil.
“I heard they were going to do a ritual on you,” I said finally, raising my voice over the wind.
I rubbed my arms by Bones’s sink, shivering.
“Your buddies were talking about it at one of the Eyrie bonfire parties you royals love to throw. I think it was Scar who said it. Or maybe Norrick? I can’t remember. I was pretty sloshed by then.”
I saw Alaric blink.
It was pretty rare for me, to get a genuinely unguarded reaction out of Alaric.
The kettle started to whistle, and I focused my attention back on the stove. I pulled the kettle off, filled the pot, grabbed a small container of honey for Alaric, and picked up the tray. I walked it over to the low table by the fire and set it down.
Realizing I forgot milk, I returned the kitchen, but when I couldn’t find anything in Bones’s ice box there, I walked to his office and looked in the small cabinet by his desk. In that smaller one, he had four pitchers lined up for his coffee under preservation charms.
When I came out of the alcove holding one of them, Alaric’s eyebrows rose for real.
I thought for sure he would ask, but he didn’t.
He waited for me to walk around the couch and plunk down on the soft throw next to him. The tea hadn’t finished steeping, so I concentrated briefly, performing a mudra like Alaric had shown me, and summoned the menu we’d used to order our meal.
A cloud of purple smoke made a whup sound in front of me. As it dispersed, it revealed a piece of parchment, floating over my knees, and a feather quill.
“I guess we could have ordered tea, too,” I muttered, thinking of it only now. I turned to Alaric. “You want dessert?” I asked.
He scoffed, folding his arms. “Do you need to ask?”
I took the floating quill carefully in my fingers, and marked a number “2” over the line next to “dessert.” Then I put a checkmark in the box that said “Order Complete.”
The menu and quill disappeared in another poof of purple smoke.
I looked at Alaric.
He’d leaned deeper into the couch, throwing an arm across the back as he shifted sideways to face me.
I couldn’t help noticing he was looking at me with a particularly intense scrutiny that I recognized.
I hadn’t always seen the look aimed at me.
Often it was aimed at that magical radio he’d programmed to pick up Priest broadcasts, or at some particular problem we were trying to work out with the chimaeras.
A pang hit my chest at the sheer familiarity of the expression.
It was such a quintessentially “Alaric” look.
Without thinking, I threw my arms around him, and hugged him.
If I surprised him, he didn’t let it show. He hugged me back, just as hard, and rubbed the top of my back. My throat closed as it really hit me that he was alive, and that he was still him.
“We’ll fix your magic,” I promised, wiping my eyes as I crawled out of our embrace. I sat back on the couch, my jaw hard. “We’ll talk to Blackstone tomorrow.”
Blackstone was known to be the expert in magical maladies, even more so than the staff of magi-physicians at the campus hospital.
I’d only ever really spoken to him once, at the Golden Sun meeting in Forsooth’s tower, but I knew roughly where his offices lived.
Luc might be with him, but maybe he’d have some ideas, too.
“Don’t worry about me, tulip,” Alaric smiled.
“Tell me about that mark,” I said, motioning towards his chest.
He fell silent. Then, exhaling, he leaned over and, instead of pouring himself tea, his fingers found the bottle of Bones’s probably-expensive liquor. He filled the glass he’d been using before we ate supper, then held the bottle up in an offer to me.
I shook my head.
Alaric leaned back in the couch, arranged his body and legs, and took a long swallow of the drink he’d poured. He gasped a little, then met my gaze, his own serious.
“I don’t know,” he said flatly. “It’s not like they told me what it was for.”
I frowned. “Is that what destroyed your magic?” I asked.
“No.” He took another swallow of liquor, eyeing me over the rim of the glass. “I told you. Sergius Calvarias did that. He tortured me for weeks, trying to get me to give up names in the Golden Sun. Obviously, I couldn’t help him.”
I bit my lip. “Did anything change in your magic after the ritual?”
“No.”
I considered pressing the point, then changed direction. “You heard the incantations they used? You likely could have pieced together something from that.”
He looked at me, and I saw his eyes flinch.
“Right,” I said. “So what do you think the ritual was for?”
He looked at me for a beat longer, then dusted off the rest of his drink. He set the glass down on the table and poured himself another.
“Alaric,” I warned, soft.
He leaned back with the new glass held lightly between his fingers. He at least waited on drinking any of it long enough to answer me.
“I don’t have a strong opinion,” he hedged, swirling the glass gently. “I actually hoped you might help me with that. And Cal, of course.”
“Of course,” I said dismissively. “We’ll help you. But you have an opinion. Preliminary or not.”
Alaric exhaled, giving me a slightly exasperated look. He took a somewhat smaller swallow of the amber liquid and held it in his mouth before swallowing. I could see him stalling so he could think, so I didn’t speak.
He swallowed eventually, and shrugged.
“I think it was a bridging ritual. Likely the first in a series.” At my questioning look, Alaric sighed.
“They use them for a number of things, Leda. Their basic function is to keep a passageway open between the magic of the ritual’s target and the magic of the person conducting the ritual. Or some other designated person.”
I felt my muscles tense as I added that information to what little I knew about Bones and his father. Anger made it difficult to think, to even reason past the sheer brutality of the practice.
“Who did the ritual tie you to?” I asked, colder. “Where did your ‘bridge’ go?”
He grunted, his eyes showing a harder edge. “I don’t know.”
I stared at him, my anger worsening, even as it mixed with disbelief. “How could you not know? Wasn’t it the same Magical who conducted the ritual?”
Alaric’s gaze shifted inward as he seemed to think about my question.
Slowly, he shook his head.
“No,” he said after another sip of Bones’s liquor.
“No, I don’t think so. Whoever they tied me to, I don’t think they were there, in the room.
Not physically, at least. I got a flavor of them during the ritual itself, a kind of presence…
” He trailed, and I watched him pale as some part of him was there again.
Forcefully, he shook it off.
“But it didn’t feel like any of the Magicals there that night,” he added, refocusing on me. His smile grew cynical, and bitter. “Believe me, Leda, I checked.”
My throat tightened as my hands clenched in my lap.