“Then what are you saying?”
“I’m saying that magic is real. It’s not native to this world, so maybe that world was made by a different God, or maybe your God made both worlds by different rules. I don’t know. That’s for people who care about God to figure out. All I know is that there really is a world where magic is common as dirt, and they’ve brought some of it here.”
“Aliens?” One brow shot up toward her hairline.
“More like fairies. Though I think we’re supposed to call them fey.”
“You can call me Vicki Plume,” the bartender interjected helpfully. “But at home they call me Foxfeather.”
Inaya turned her poleaxed expression toward Foxfeather. “You believe you’re a fairy?”
“I am a baroness of the Seelie Court,” she said with solemn dignity. “I am the lowest rank of what some humans call the sidhe, or high elves, or ‘fair folk,’ or whatever.”
“Vicki, honey,” said Inaya with real concern. “If this is some kind of role-play thing that’s fine, to each her own, but please tell me you don’t really believe in this at your age?”
“Show her,” said Foxfeather, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Oh pretty please, show her, Lady Ironbones.”
Since I couldn’t think of a better idea, I reached out and grabbed Foxfeather by the wrist.
40
Gasps sounded all over the room, and Craghorn leaped up from his seat to come and beat me to a pulp or something.
“Craghorn, sit!” cried Foxfeather, all ablaze with rainbow glory, unfolding a pair of diaphanous wings.
Inaya sat rigid on her bar stool, and her wide, dark eyes suddenly overflowed with tears. Her lips moved a few times before words came out of them, and when I finally understood what she kept repeating, I went a bit numb from shock myself.
“It’s you,” Inaya was whispering. “The angel. It’s you.”
“Is it you?” Foxfeather asked in an equally awestruck tone. I let go of her wrist, and her human facade reached across the bar for Inaya’s hands. When their fingers touched, both of them gasped and pulled back, and then they just stared into each other’s eyes for a moment.
I had the sudden intense urge to disintegrate. “Third wheel” doesn’t begin to cover it.
“How is this possible?” Inaya said, her voice raw as she continued staring at Foxfeather. “I stopped telling people about those dreams years ago, but I still have them. You’re a fairy? I thought you were an angel.”
“Maybe I am,” said Foxfeather.
So this was what it was supposed to be like to meet your Echo. I was acidly jealous, of course. Jealousy is as hardwired into a Borderline as worry is into a mother. Inaya got dreams of angels and an A-list career; I got a phone number scrawled on a coffee-shop napkin.
I tried to focus on what I had come here to do, because this could really only help me. “Foxfeather is your Echo—kind of your fey soul mate,” I said to Inaya. “Your muse. And if you want to think of it that way, a kind of guardian angel. Even without knowing her, you’ve felt her influence all your life. The two of you must have a very strong connection if she was able to reach you through your dreams.”
“There are rules about this,” Foxfeather said. “We are supposed to report this to the Authorities immediately.”
“I’ll take care of that for you,” I said. And I would. Eventually. Once I was finished getting what I needed out of them.
“Obviously you can’t tell anyone human about this,” I said to Inaya, who was weeping and holding Foxfeather’s hands. “Inaya, are you listening to me?”
“Yes,” she said without looking at me.
“John Riven is also fey.”
That got her attention. “I knew there was something weird about him.”
“His real name is Viscount Rivenholt.”
“He outranks me,” said Foxfeather. “By a lot.”
“He’s used several different names and faces,” I went on, “but he is David Berenbaum’s Echo, just as Foxfeather is yours. David’s been working with him for forty-odd years.”
“Does Vivian know about this?” asked Inaya.
“She does,” I said. I decided Inaya was coping with enough right now; the truth about Vivian could wait.
“She’s one too, isn’t she?” Inaya said. “Some kind of nasty one.”
I sighed. “Let’s not get into that right now. The point is, you need to know all this because this is the reason you’ve been feeling out of the loop lately.”
“They’ve been doing . . . magic fairy stuff,” she said, “and I’m the only one who doesn’t know.”
“They weren’t allowed to tell you.”
“Are they allowed now?”
I wasn’t honestly sure. “I think we should keep your knowledge under our hats for a bit,” I said. “Something odd is going on, and I need you to help me get to the bottom of it. If they don’t know that you know, they might not be as much on their guard.”