Quen straightened, angrily rubbing his cramped red hand. “You offering your soul?”
Daniel blinked, probably trying to decide if he was joking or not. Frowning, Trisk sat up, tired of doing nothing. “We can’t summon Gally unless the sun is down,” she said, and Daniel spun to her. “Something about the energy in the ley lines moving the wrong way.”
Hands in his pockets, Daniel shifted to the bars. “Really?”
She stood and stretched, feeling different although nothing had changed. A child. “Ley line energy moves like tides with the sun. Energy from our world is what’s keeping the ever-after, where the demons live, intact.”
“So wouldn’t that mean they owe you something? If our world is keeping their world alive?”
For someone who hadn’t known magic was real twenty-four hours ago, he was becoming comfortable with it unsettlingly fast. “That’s not how they see it, since they were the ones who scraped the ley lines into existence.” Shaking her blanket out, she draped it over her shoulders.
Giving up, Quen sat back on the bench, elbows on his knees as he massaged his palm. “I’m about ready to chew off my own finger to make a lock pick. Do you have any ideas, Trisk?”
Daniel shifted impatiently. “You said you can’t melt the bars, but what if you focused the energy on the lock itself?”
Quen looked up past bangs clumped with sweat. “You don’t think I tried that?”
“How about making the metal brittle, with cold?” she suggested, and Quen’s focus shifted to her, his brow smoothing.
“Sure,” Daniel said, voice holding excitement. “If you can shrink the workings of the lock enough, they might slide apart. At the very least, you can repeatedly warm and chill them until fatigue breaks something.”
“Worth a shot.” Quen stood and moved to the lock. “Might take a few hours.”
“A few hours, we have,” Daniel said as he followed Quen to the door, eager to see some magic in action.
Quen’s hand took on a hazed glow as he tapped the nearest line and pulled its energy through him. But the faintest click in the outer offices struck through Trisk like a shot. “Wait!” she exclaimed. “Someone is out there,” she added, and Quen jerked his hands away, the pain of having drawn the charm back furrowing his brow.
Trisk grasped the bars and leaned toward the open office. “Hey! We’re locked up here!”
“There’s no one there,” Daniel said. “It’s just the bodies settling.”
Which was ugly all on its own, but adrenaline surged when the clatter of pixy wings sounded clear and true. “Orchid?” Trisk called, not believing it. “Is that you?”
“What would Kal’s spy be doing here?” Quen said sourly, making Trisk regret ever telling him about her, and grimacing, she pressed closer into the bars. If it was Orchid, Kal wouldn’t be far behind.
“Kal! We’re back here!” she tried again, breathless. “Please,” she whispered.
With a wash of dust, the tiny woman stopped short right in the middle of the open door. Orchid’s face was flushed and a bright silver spilled from her in uncertainty. “Kal said it would be okay if Daniel saw me,” she said, twisting the hem of her dress shyly. “Are you sure? This feels wrong.”
Quen strode forward, startling her into darting back. “It’s fine,” he said. “Where’s Kal?”
“It’s you,” Daniel said, his eyes fixed on the pixy. “I knew I saw you before.”
“Before!” Quen barked as he turned to him in anger, and Orchid colored.
“You were erasing his memory. No harm done, right?” Orchid said as she flitted to the lock and bent to look into it. “This is so weird. I’ve never let a human see me on purpose. But Kal said you’re probably going to be dead in a week so it doesn’t matter.”
“Daniel is not going to die,” Trisk said, surprised when the pixy woman stuck her entire arm into the workings of the lock. “The virus is condensing in the Angel tomato. Avoid that, and you don’t get sick.”
“Then one of you is going to have to kill him,” Orchid said, distracted. “Because I’m not going to be the one giving us away.”
“No one is going to kill Daniel!” Trisk exclaimed, but then the lock clicked open, and everything left her but the need to get out.
Quen pushed past the bars. Striding to Trisk’s door, he waited impatiently as Orchid hovered before her lock, the tiny woman biting her lower lip as she fiddled with it. Her dust shifted green, then red, and the lock finally disengaged. “Thank you,” Trisk said, taking a huge step forward, then blinking in surprise when Quen pulled her into an unexpected hug. Giving her a quick, confusing smile, he set her back on her feet and went to check out the front offices.
“You’re beautiful and amazing,” Daniel said, and Orchid rose up, glowing in pleasure.
“No one ever thought I was amazing before,” she said as she landed on his shoulder, shocking the man still.
“Well, I do,” Daniel stammered, trying to see her and afraid to move all at once.