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Joanna awoke from a dream, unable to remember any of the details except a figure disappearing into darkness in front of her. A feeling of sadness lingered like a faint scent on the air, teasing at her memory. With difficulty, she moved her left arm from under her body; it had gone numb from the weight. The clock on the nightstand glowed 6:12 AM, and her alarm would be going off soon, but the knowledge couldn't pry her from her bed, even though it was Monday and traffic out to San Serano would be horrendous.
A bolt of sickening terror shot through her as someone shifted next to her in the bed. She started violently under a touch on her shoulder, until the memories snapped back into place and Antryg's face resolved itself out of the blur of early morning darkness.
"Sorry," she said, hearing her voice as if from a distance. "I forgot you were here."
Although she hated herself for it, during the first few weeks after Antryg's arrival, Joanna found herself occasionally wishing for the miserable quiet she'd sunk into when she'd thought he was dead. She knew, objectively, that wishing didn't mean wanting, and that the fact that he was alive at all, let alone with her in L.A., was a miracle beyond anything either of them could have dreamed. And she knew that love didn't guarantee happiness, any more than magic did.
No one could argue the fact that Antryg had the greater adjustment to make, but he seemed to take everything in stride, maddeningly calm and delighted as always. Traffic on the 405 became a study in human nature. American money elicited a lecture on the monetary systems of the various cultures in the empire of Ferryth, including Sykerst goat herders who exchanged swatches of animal hide. Nothing bothered him, or if it did, he hid it well.
Joanna wasn't convinced she was doing the same. Adjusting to someone's constant presence in her life was a struggle. She'd never spent longer than a weekend with Gary, and by Sunday morning, she'd usually been thinking longingly of her bed and the book on her nightstand table. Her delight at Antryg's survival hadn't abated at all, but it was mixed in with confusion and uneasiness. For every positive thing, like climbing into bed to feel the sheets already warm with his body heat, there was a negative, like the fact that he sprawled out and took up three-fourths of the mattress. Her apartment had never been neat, but she was already tired of tripping over papers and books and aluminum can pyramids. Sometimes she wanted solitude so desperately that it almost made her scream, and the fact that Antryg invariably went for a walk at those times did little to soothe her. He was absent-minded, unfailingly curious, and more than a little loopy.
And for all that, all he had to do was smile at her to make her breath come faster.
The second night back, as they lay tangled together in her narrow bed, the movement of his fingers through her hair stopped, and he asked, "So, what does one do to earn a living in this world if one possesses no appreciable skills?"
She thought about it for a minute, because he really would have to find something to do. The first thing she'd done the morning after Antryg showed up was to give her two weeks' notice at San Serano. Regardless of Antryg, she'd decided there was no way she could continue working there, seeing Gary's ghost around every corner. It would probably take a while for her freelance income to build up, and until then, they needed to eat and make rent.
"You could work at McDonald's, but you'd hate it. Or they'd hate you."
"I'm used to being hated. As long as they don't have pitchforks or an arrest warrant, it'll make a nice change."
She shook her head. "It's a miserable job. And you can't really do anything that requires reading or writing, at least not until you learn the language." The Spell of Tongues didn't extend to electronic media, like television or telephones or computers, although she knew Antryg would be a disgustingly quick study. He'd already picked up a few choice words from daytime TV, but she'd prefer it if his vocabulary wasn't limited to the subjects of adultery, cross-dressing, and crime.
"What about taverns? You do have taverns here, don't you?"
"Bars? Of course. In some areas of town there's one every block. But don't tell me you know how to make a margarita."
"Mixing drinks is very much like brewing tisanes, my dear, and I have an excellent memory for ingredients. Students in the wizards' Citadel do nothing but memorize lists for years." She couldn't see his face, but his voice tightened. " And Suraklin trained me long before I ever reached the Citadel."
She never knew quite what to say to him when old memories took him by surprise, but she was at least learning to try. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"Oh, no," he said, the tension gone from his voice as if she'd imagined it. "The whole sad saga is really rather boring unless you have a taste for the macabre."
"That reminds me," she said, twisting in his arms to see his face, half-hidden in shadow. "The theater down the street is having a Vincent Price festival this weekend. I think it's time to introduce you to movies."
Antryg did well tending bar at Enyart's, since the combination of his cheerful personality and mad wizard routine tended to get good tips. Her freelancing business picked up, and the cats loved Antryg, and her neighbors loved Antryg, and when she wasn't careful, she began to feel content with her life.
But the other times, the times when she would catch Antryg in an unguarded moment staring at his own hands, or when, after they made love, he would wave his fingers as if he expected light to kindle at his command -- the other times tore at her. And the worst part wasn't the fact that she couldn't make it better. The worst part was the fear that one day, despite the danger, he would go back.
She had asked him about magic numerous times during those long days on the road between Kymil and Angelshand. They discussed theory and execution, the history of magic, its boundaries and limitations. Antryg told her the story of Ramarran Skycaller, the first mage to codify the Circles of Power that all mages used.
"What...what does it feel like?" she asked, wishing she had the vocabulary to truly understand.
He didn't answer for a moment, but gave her his hand to guide her around a gaping hole in the road, Caris' silent presence at their backs. When he spoke, his deep voice was hushed and beautiful. "It feels like nothing you've ever experienced and everything you've ever known. It's the feel of rain on your face, the touch of your lover in the moment right before orgasm, the warming of your skin as you stand in front of the fire on a cold night. To have it and not use it..." He broke off and cast a glance at Caris.
Caris said quietly, "Far better to have magic and not use it than to use it for ill as you do."
"Yes," said Antryg, "I suppose that's true. But it's little comfort when you're outside in the cold and not allowed near the fire."
There was some magic that he could perform, even in Los Angeles. He could still touch the Void, of course, although opening a Gate and alerting the Council to his presence would be suicide. A brush of his fingers against her temple smothered all but the most persistent headaches. Plants thrived around him, animals and children adored him, and streetlights tended to turn green in his presence.
She quizzed him one day over Chinese takeout. "Why don't people ever notice that you're not speaking English?" His long fingers handled the chopsticks without difficulty, and she felt heat flare through her, watching them. This was new too, this constant hum of low-level desire. He was a playful and generous lover, and if she'd ever let herself think of Gary, the thoughts might have been unkind.
"Most people don't care to examine their environment that closely." He chewed for a moment, swallowed, and stole the carton of garlic shrimp from her side of the bar. "It's the same aspect of humanity that Suraklin exploited, that willful ignorance. Most people have enough in their lives to worry about -- food, clothes, children, parents, lovers."
"Don't borrow trouble," Joanna said, hearing it in her grandmother's voice.
"Yes, exactly. Is that a proverb?"
She shrugged and closed the container of rice. "Something like that. My grandmother used to say it when I got upset about things."
A puzzled line creased his forehead. "I suppose, but sometimes getting upset is the only way to solve a problem."
"Not in my family." She stood and took the food to the refrigerator so she wouldn't have to face his knowing gaze.
There was silence, then his presence at her side, stowing the food away. "Then it's a good thing for me that you don't take after your family."
As they drove through a neighborhood between the apartment and Enyart's, Antryg nudged her arm and pointed a finger at a house with a discreet sign hanging above the door: "Psychic Readings -- Tarot Cards and Palmistry." In the window, another sign read "Help Wanted."
Joanna slowed the car and pulled into a vacant parking space. "You're kidding."
"Not at all."
"Tarot cards? Here?"
"It's one of my few natural talents." He leaned back against the passenger-side door and pretended to be nonchalant. She wasn't sure why she was objecting -- Antryg would certainly be as good at reading the cards in L.A. as he had been in his home world, although that had occasionally proved to be a mixed blessing.
"Joanna." His voice was quiet and his eyes half-closed against the glare of the setting sun, although the desperate glint in them was impossible to ignore. "I need this."
It wouldn't be enough, she knew, and maybe that was why she didn't want him to even try. He would feed on the scraps of magic he could tease out of this dead city, and they would both pretend he wasn't starving to death with a smile pasted on his face. She was still new to love, and especially to this kind of all-consuming, mind-blurring love, but she didn't think she could watch that happen to him. What if there came a time when not only was he desperate enough to open the Void in search of magic, but she was desperate enough to push him through?
Tell me you need me, she wanted to say. Tell me you'll never leave me. Tell me I'm the most important thing in your life. Tell me you love me more than magic.
But she knew better than to ask that of him, and more than that, she knew that she didn't really want to hear him say it. And it didn't matter anyway, because he knew all of it just as well as she did. Instead, she put the car into Park and said, "Well, let's go knock on the door. What's the worst that could happen?"
"Oh, anything," he replied cheerfully, maneuvering his long frame out of the car. "Zombies, aliens, a halfway respectable job opportunity..."
"Perish the thought," she murmured, and lifted her face for his gentle kiss.