“Of course.”
She closed her eyes. Kept them closed for almost a minute while she steadied her breath, until she was sure no tear would fall. Opened them. “That is possibly the single kindest thing anyone has ever said to me. But that’s not how this works. They take payment in magic. In results. And they have something they want me to do.”
She told him about the latest order from Shara. Most of it.
“But you wouldn’t be fighting Miranda. Not directly. You’d be dueling Ian. He’s the one magician in this who could maybe kill you. I mean, I know you’re good. Brilliant. But so is he—he was a couple of years ahead of us at school. I know what his magic is like,” Laurent said.
“A month ago, maybe it would have been close. But now, no.” The deep greenness of the strange new magic crinkled and whirred beneath her skin. “Trust me. I know what my magic is.”
“Yeah, but Sydney, you guys are—not to be in your business, but aren’t you guys a thing?”
“I knew what I’d be asked to do before the Turning started,” she said, sidestepping the question.
“What would those—the Shadows—what would they do if I refused to challenge him?” Laurent paced in front of the long line of his windows.
“There would be consequences. To me. They would likely be . . . painful.” The layers in that last word not something to be considered too closely.
“Okay, so you said they take payment in magic. What if I offered some of mine? I’m a good magician. I have power. I can fight.” The pain in his voice had turned to fury.
“Any contract you made would be your own. This plan, this thing that Shara wants done, she will make sure that I do it.”
Laurent stopped. Turned. “This is really the most fucked up day. What do I do?”
“Issue the challenge to Prospero, and trust that I can take care of myself.”
“Are you sure? What if I just say fuck all of this? Withdraw from the Turning, withdraw from the entire Unseen World. How do I even use magic anymore, now that I know where it’s coming from? I can’t. I won’t.” He scrubbed his hands against his jeans as if wiping filth from them.
“I can teach you. You had access to your own power before, and that power is still there. As for the rest of it—the one thing you can do for me now is to stay in the Turning.”
“Are you absolutely sure that’s what you want, Sydney? Because if it isn’t, I will do everything I can—everything—to get you away from that place and out of this.”
“Thank you. Truly. But there are bigger things at stake than just what I want,” she said.
“Okay. If you’re sure.”
“I am.”
He scrubbed his hands over his face, over his hair. “God, I have to tell Grey. He needs to know.”
“Laurent.” Her voice was kind. “Grey grew up in the Unseen World. He was the heir of his House. He knows. He’s known for years.”
“Oh,” Laurent said. Then, “Oh,” again.
Sydney sat with him on his couch as his world reshaped itself. After some time, he shook his head. “Anything else?”
“Yes,” Sydney said. “Let me be the one to deliver the challenge to Miranda. In person.”
“Sure, if that’s what you want.” He paused. “Did you have a choice in representing me, or was accepting the contract something they made you do too?”
“Shadows wanted me involved in the Turning,” Sydney said. “But working for you was my choice. I wouldn’t change it.” She stood up to go.
“Can you leave that unfindable spell running when you go?” he asked. “I think I want to be very alone for a bit.”
“Sure.” She rested her hand on his shoulder for the space of a breath. “Take care, Laurent.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Working in Special Projects wasn’t what Harper had expected. In fact, although theoretically this huge and all-consuming magical battle was happening across the entire Unseen World, she hadn’t seen one actual magician in the offices. At least, she was pretty sure she hadn’t. Except for the recent emailed wards—which were spectacularly cool and didn’t even give her a headache like most magic did—she hadn’t come across anything even remotely magical. Working in Special Projects was just like working in her previous firm: long hours and lots of writing. She was currently redrafting a will. Then she had to turn in time sheets. Wild excitement.
“Harper, do you have a minute?” Madison paused in her doorway.
“Sure.” She mentally raised a brow when Madison pulled the door closed behind her. Something serious, and secret, then.
“How do you feel about doing some work in the archives?”
The archives. The place where the documents pertaining to the Unseen World were kept—the ones too full of magic to leave on the computers. The place Harper had wanted an excuse to get into since she had started working here. “I feel like it would be more interesting than redrafting form documents.”
“Possibly. There’s a strong chance that it would just be an exercise in a different sort of frustration. Are you game?”
“Sure.”
“Good. I need you to be discreet about this, even within the firm. It involves a case where enforced silence was part of the settlement.” Madison looked drawn—her concealer didn’t quite hide the dark circles under her eyes. Harper knew how tired she was from the hours she’d been keeping in the past few weeks. She also knew that Madison had been in the office before she arrived and had left work after she did every day that she’d been working at Wellington & Ketchum.
“Like an NDA?” Harper asked.
“No, like a binding spell that will physically prevent them from doing so. The attorneys who were directly involved in negotiating the terms would have also been bound, and I’m not sure whether or how far the binding extends.”
Okay, that was kind of cool. “So I might not even be able to tell you about what I find. Is what you’re saying?”
“In an extreme case, you might not even be able to read what you find. The file might look like blank pages, or poetry, or gibberish. And because of the binding, I can’t even tell you how extreme a case this is.”
“Got it. So what case has all these secrets?”
“The disinheritance of Grey Prospero. Time is of the essence, so send me a memo of your ongoing projects and I’ll have them reassigned. When you’re done with that, come by my office and I’ll give you what you need to actually get into the archives.”
Harper doubted she meant a key.
“Is there anything in particular that I’m looking for in the file?” Harper asked.
“No, I just need the file itself when you find it. And don’t make the mistake of thinking that this will be a quick or easy job because that’s all it is. The archives are . . . strange.”
It took Harper two hours to write up the memo on her ongoing projects. She hit send and then walked back to Madison’s office.
“The first thing you need to know is that the magical archives are separate from the mundane ones. They’re up on the thirty-ninth floor.”