Chapter 18
Eighteen
Byron
Iappreciate that The Eclipse’s other patrons rarely visit more than a couple of times a week. It’s unlikely anyone’s noticed I’ve been stopping by much more often than usual except maybe the staff, who know better than to gossip.
Still, the sight of Grady Tadros stepping into the lounge at his father’s heels sends a waft of relief through me. If I find out everything I need today, I can take a break from pompous airs and subtle snubs.
I get the impression that Grady showed up mainly to appease his father. He sticks close to the older man as they receive their drinks and amble through the room, his face set in a vaguely dissatisfied expression.
Where else does he want to be that he’s been torn away from?
They pause to shoot the breeze with a few of his father’s associates. It doesn’t seem wise to interrupt their conversations. I’m not sure I want to catch the elder Tadros’s notice at all—not if he might be tied up in a scheme against Elodie too.
It’s better for her and us if her matches continue to go under her enemies’ radar for as long as possible.
Two of the Luminary students Grady often gravitates to emerge through the front door. My skin tightens.
They’ll make it even harder for me to prod Grady the way I’d like.
Before they reach the lounge, I aim a light pulse of ephemera their way. Just enough to give them a hankering for a card game upstairs.
My patience pays off a few minutes later. The older Mr. Tadros eases away from his son and heads toward the back of the building, maybe to enjoy the patio in the temperate May weather.
I amble toward Grady before he has time to do more than set down his empty glass. The flick of his gaze over me tells me he knows who I am, even if he’s barely acknowledged me before.
“Tadros,” I say evenly with a dip of my head in greeting.
“Worth.” He rolls his shoulders as if finding the linen blazer he’s wearing too tight. “Pretty stodgy crowd here today, isn’t it?”
He didn’t notice his friends coming in then—good. And he’s given me a decent enough opening.
I offer a wry smile. “Seems like it’s trending that way lately. Maybe we need to find our own places to make the right connections.”
“Ah, we’ll take over the club eventually. Out with the old, in with the new.”
Grady’s unadulterated arrogance annoys me, but I keep my irritation out of my tone. “You haven’t been around much lately. Have you got some exciting project in the works or just found a better haunt for the time being?”
He might be over-confident, but he’s not an imbecile. Grady fixes his gaze on me with a more assessing air. “I’d say a little of both. Are you getting bored here?”
He’s trying to figure out why I started this conversation.
I deal out my words carefully. “I heard some of the other guys mention you’ve done well for yourself lately. I’m always interested to hear about new opportunities.”
“Those jerks have big mouths on them, don’t they.
” Grady gives a light laugh, as if he wasn’t openly bragging here a week or so ago.
“There’s nothing I can cut you in on, Worth.
Some things you can’t reach for directly.
You show what you’re made of, and it’s up to them whether they want to tap you. ”
He makes a flippant gesture that stiffens as he lowers his hand. His mouth flattens as if he’s worried he’s let too much slip, not that I’m at all sure what he’s talking about.
I’m not going to risk using magic to directly nudge a guy near the top of his class and already hesitant, but I can’t resist one more mundane attempt at prying. “And if I wanted to make sure ‘they’ see what I’m showing…?”
Grady shakes his head. “We get the opportunities we’re meant for.”
He pulls away from me and meanders over to greet another club member who’s just arrived.
I clamp down on my initial flare of frustration. Of course that’s his attitude—as if opportunities are granted fairly from on high rather than dictated by circumstances and privilege.
Who exactly would be watching us and doing this tapping? The way Grady phrased it, I got the impression his plural referred to multiple people rather than a single figure whose gender he’s keeping vague.
Was the woman he got into the car with one of them? Or did that ride have nothing to do with the “moving and shaking” he was talking about last week?
Restless with the additional questions piling up in my head, I wander into the hall, considering going upstairs and seeing whether Grady’s sometime companions might have more beans to spill. I’m just in time to observe his father ducking into one of the smaller rooms farther down the hall.
Hmm. He might be a better source of information.
I amble that way, past the scattered doors that lead into the club’s smaller meeting and social rooms. Stopping a few steps from the doorway the older Mr. Tadros passed through, I pause and pretend to be checking something on my phone.
At the same time, I draw on the building’s ephemera and create a thin funnel directing the sound from that room to my ear.
Voices reach me as if stretched across an immense distance, faint and tinny but audible.
The first is Mr. Tadros, though he sounds oddly plaintive. “I’m so glad you could find the time to talk this through with me.”
The answer comes from another male voice: a smooth, deep tone I don’t recognize. “Of course. That’s what I’m here for.”
“It’s such a difficult decision, choosing between the options when each could make such a difference.”
“But you deserve to be in this position. You’ve earned it. Never doubt that.”
“Yes, of course. I’d just hate to make a mistake.”
“Whatever choice you make will be the right one. You have the power here, Ilias. You hold the world in the palm of your hand.”
Those last words set off a creeping sensation over my skin. Who in the blazes is he talking to who’s pumping his ego up like that?
A couple of attendants push a cart down the hall, and I lose my sound funnel while I shift out of their way. One of them smiles eagerly and asks if I’d like one of the sandwiches they’re bringing around.
I take one just to have something else to do with my hands, and then one of my father’s friends comes strolling in the front door.
He lifts his hand the second he catches sight of me.
Reluctantly, I go over to make the necessary polite small talk, still watching the door to Mr. Tadros’s chosen room from the corner of my eye.
I’m just wriggling out of the unwanted conversation when the older Tadros emerges, with a more energetic spring to his step than I remember seeing before. I drift in his direction again, nibbling on my sandwich and waiting for his companion to emerge.
It takes long enough that I start to think I must have missed the man leaving ahead of Mr. Tadros. To avoid looking awkward, I amble into the lounge, staying close to the doorway. Finally, the door clicks again.
A figure walks past the lounge so briskly I only catch a glimpse of bowler hat and gray pea coat… and a tickle of ephemera that hits my skin just slightly heavier than seems quite right.
My pulse stutters. I lurch forward without thinking, tossing a tendril of collected energy after the figure, attempting to divine what I can from his presence.
The fleeting impressions I glean, fading as the man strides away, feel totally ordinary with the usual light quiver of ephemera; starkly bitter coffee, a bland reception room, a cheerful hello. Not a trace of it jolts me with the same uneasy familiarity as that first wisp I thought I noticed.
The stranger leaves the building with only a quick nod to the doorman. I return to the lounge, my face carefully blank, my nerves twanging.
I could have imagined the odd sensation. It was so subtle, so brief, and I wanted to find answers so badly, to be able to connect something here to what happened with Kenneth. It could have been a random shift in the air or pure hallucination.
The latter isn’t totally unbelievable, is it? I can’t exactly claim I’m perfectly mentally stable.
The thought rattles through my skull and constricts my lungs. I manage to smile and choke down the rest of my sandwich, but my mind has scattered.
I’m not going to accomplish anything else here today.
One of the family cars arrives shortly after I text my request for a pick-up. I slide into the back with a polite greeting to the driver, but my attention is already darting through the space.
There’s too much scrutiny in the club to release the pressure in my head effectively. Here I can count every stitch on the seams of the seat in front of me, every parked car we cruise by, until the jumbled sensation behind my eyes starts to settle.
I’m all right. I’m still in control.
Even if I slipped up and thought I sensed something that wasn’t there, it’s not the end of the world. I just… won’t mention it to Elodie or her other matches.
I wouldn’t want my capricious ticks to lead us down the wrong path.
When we reach the house, I’m itching to head straight to my room and completely ground myself. Unfortunately, Pa hustles to meet me as soon as I step inside.
“Byron! You’re a difficult man to keep track of these days.” He taps his knuckles against my shoulder the playful way he’s been doing for as long as I can remember, though he no longer has to reach down to do it. “We’re having dinner a bit early, unless you’ve got other plans to rush off to.”
I don’t think my parents would accept re-straightening my bookshelves or floating in my bathtub as acceptable “other plans.”
I summon another smile. “Sounds good. What’s for dinner?”
“Lois found some excellent sirloin at the butcher shop today. Or at least it smells excellent. Let’s dig in.”
Mom and Dad and Hannah are already in the dining room. They sit down as we join them, my sister shoving her hands under the table. She doesn’t meet my eyes, just stares at her plate while the staff bring in the first course and the wine.
Did she get into trouble again? She’s always coming up with the most inventive projects… but her follow-through isn’t great. And if you’re haphazard with your magic, it’s easy for whatever you’re trying to create to turn into chaos instead.
Savory smells as mouth-watering as Pa promised wind through the room, but my stomach stays balled.
Dad waits until I’ve taken my first couple of bites before clearing his throat.
He gazes over us from the head of the table all benevolence. We all look at him, but Mom and Pa’s eyes flick toward me first.
What’s going on here?
“We’ve been having some important discussions, Byron,” Dad says, “and we felt we should loop you in, because of course it affects you too.”
He waits for a response. My mouth has gone dry. I barely manage to swallow my mouthful. “What affects me?”
He folds his hands together at the edge of the table.
“You know your sister has been… struggling with the expectations we face here. We’re considering moving to the London residence this summer—and staying in the UK for the rest of her schooling.
The atmosphere in the Americas has gotten more toxic than any of us likes. ”
I stare at him, my heart thudding in my ears. “We’re moving overseas for eight years?”
Across an ocean from the match who’s stolen more and more of my heart, from the tentative groundwork I’ve laid here for my own life.
Mom reaches to pat my forearm. “We realize it’d disrupt your final year of undergraduate studies.
You’re an adult now—if you wanted to stay on here on your own, of course we’d understand.
But there is a wonderful graduate program in London.
It might benefit you as well, and it’d be best to start making connections right away. ”
Dad nods, watching me expectantly. Waiting for me to be the dutiful son and say of course I’ll stick with my family.
My body balks from throat to gut.
I can’t quite commit to the performance today.
“I’ll have to look into the program and see what makes the most sense,” I say in as warm a tone as I can manage. “How soon would we need to make arrangements?”
The corners of Dad’s mouth dip downward. “As soon as possible. Give it some thought if you need to… but we Worths are always strongest when we stay together.”