Chapter 38

Danielle and her attorney had a lot more to discuss after Danielle got out of the hospital. I wanted to stick around and help out, but I got a text from Dalton, “Call me when you’re done with the police.”

How she found out about me being involved with the police, I didn’t know. It was probably through her contacts with the Dallas Sheriff’s office. I wasn’t going to ask, so there was no point in dwelling on it. I told Danielle what was going on as briefly as possible – especially since her lawyer wouldn’t leave us alone for more than a minute at a time – and then left the hospital.

I went out to the parking area and called Dalton.

“What they hell have you gotten involved in now?” she asked.

“So, you heard?” I asked.

“Outside of city tower in Arlington? Yeah!”

“Well, that was Roger, not me.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “You were involved. Why?”

“He was trying to kidnap Danielle.”

“Danielle? Oh, the redhead.”

“Yeah.”

“So, who’s Roger?”

“Her soon-to-be-Ex-husband.”

“The divorce meeting you were subpoenaed to.”

“Yup.”

“Fine, tell me what happened.”

“Can’t. Not over the phone.”

“You didn’t.”

“No, there’s more to it than just the standoff in the garage. His Lawyer is one of us.”

“What?”

“It’s true. He tried to use phony photos to force Danielle into agreeing to get back with Roger.”

“Phony how?”

“Can’t say over the phone.”

“Fine. I’m on my way to your apartment. Where are you?”

“Just leaving Arlington Memorial,” I said.

“Well, maybe we should meet at the school instead. That way you can tell me what you’ve found out about that.”

“That’ll work. How far out are you?”

“About half an hour,” she said. “I just finished my shift.”

“Care to tell me what your bosses said about what happened here?”

“No, it’s none of your business.”

“So, everything I do is your business, but anything that might keep you from being around to help me help you isn’t mine?”

She growled over the phone. “You know there are things I can’t discuss with you.”

“Fine, I’ll see you at the school,” I said and hung up.

I made it to my car, had a look around because I was still feeling paranoid, and then left the hospital.

It only took me about ten minutes to get to campus. It was also already so late in the day that most students had either finished their classes or were only using the various resources the campus offered to work on their projects, which meant the campus wasn’t nearly as busy as this morning and finding a parking spot was really easy. However, I didn’t want anyone to find my car too easily either. So, I parked in student parking north of UTA Boulevard and walked south along West Nedderman to get to the Architecture Building.

I didn’t see anyone as I made my way through the halls. I could hear where students were talking and working, but no one was walking around. I felt like a little bit of luck was on my side until I reached the main hall. All of the doors were shut. I tried the closest set, but they were locked. I went to the next set. They were locked too.

I shook my head. Was this another layer of protection put up by the caster? Or was it simply the normal practice of school security?

I went to a third set. One of them had to be unlocked. I didn’t want to use Magic to get in if I could help it.

“Excuse me,” someone said.

I looked around. A woman with red hair walked my way. She wore a light black suit jacket with a lavender blouse unbuttoned dangerously low. A few beaded necklaces glittered as she walked. Her skirt was snug to her knees, black stockings kept her legs warm, and black high heels finished her ensemble. I didn’t recognize her until she got closer. It was Valory.

“I thought that was you,” she said and glanced at the doors. “If you’re back to get a better look at the model, you’ll have to do it tomorrow. They usually lock up the main hall after three.”

I let my shoulders slump in mock disappointment. I didn’t like the idea that I came to see the model and Valory, my alleged blood sibling, shows up at the same time. It couldn’t have been coincidence. I looked at her. “So, what brings you here?”

She waved at the exits. “I was on my way out to get coffee. It’s been getting colder outside, so I stay in as much as possible.”

It wasn’t cold enough outside to warrant a coat, but then my girls sometimes complained of being cold when I wasn’t.

“Care to join me?” she asked.

I looked up. “Oh, um. I don’t know. A student hanging out with a teacher? Might not look good for either of us.” It was the best excuse I could come up with.

“But there’s nothing wrong with a brother and sister catching up,” she said with a smile. Then she hooked her arm through mine and led me away from the hall.

We left the building and I quietly let her lead me to her car, a silver Volkswagen CC. I recalled everything we talked about Friday night, including how she used Magic, and wondered if there was anything I should say at all. I could have easily turned back and waited for Dalton, like I was supposed to, but I was too curious about Valory. If she really was my sister, I wanted to know everything I could. I got in her car.

We pulled out of the parking lot and headed east on UTA Boulevard. “About Friday night,” she said as she stopped at a red light. “I want to apologize. I think I may have confused you severely.”

“Confused me in what way?” I asked.

“Well, I’ve learned that if I want a guy to tell me something he doesn’t want to, I usually have to seduce him.”

I didn’t say anything, but I did feel uncomfortable.

“I fear I may have made you think I was trying to do something that I didn’t really mean.” She glanced at me. “I only wanted you to be honest with me.”

If she was being honest, then I could understand my confusion. I smiled. “Um ... no problem. I’m just not used to anyone using that particular tactic to get what they want.”

The light turned green, and she took a left onto South Cooper. “You said your girls would be worried about you when you left Friday night.” She glanced at me with a knowing grin. “You can’t expect me to believe they don’t use their feminine whiles to get their way when they want something.”

“Oh, well, yeah. They do.”

She laughed softly and took another left onto West Abram. She turned immediately right into a parking lot for a place called iCafe. It was a small building with high gabled roof. There were only a few cars in the parking lot. We sat in her car for a moment.

“I want to talk to you about a few things inside,” she said. “Don’t feel the need to hide anything, please. After losing my ... our mother, I really want to get to know you. It’s like fate brought us together in the worst possible time.”

I shrugged. “I don’t see anything I’ve got to hide, other than talking about our heritage.”

She smiled. “We can talk about that too.” She fingered her beads. “These act like a normal security spell, only they adapt to whatever room or vehicle we’re in. The only place they don’t work is when we’re outdoors.”

My eyebrows shot up. “That’s useful.” I really wanted to trust her, but how could I verify her beads worked the way she said? I couldn’t think of anything at the moment, so I would simply have to be careful.

Her smile brightened. “Oh, there’s so much I can teach you, Seth.” Then she shivered. “But let’s get some coffee first.”

I nodded and we headed inside.

The café was very quaint. It felt very comfortable and personable. Country music added to the rustic décor and though I wasn’t into that style, I didn’t mind it too much. Valory led me to a corner booth nowhere near anyone else. A waitress followed us, set out menus and asked what we wanted to drink. Valory just wanted coffee and handed her menu back. I asked for tea and decided on something to eat while we talked.

“I’ve never had much taste for Tex-Mex,” she said.

I shrugged. “Mom didn’t make it often, but when she did, there were never any leftovers.” I looked up. “My adopted Mom that is.”

Valory frowned. “Why the correction? She raised you, didn’t she?”

I nodded. “She did, but I didn’t want to...”

“Seth,” Valory said, placing her hand on mine. “You’re not disrespecting anyone but the woman who raised you by trying to make the correction. My Mom was only your biological donor as far as the rest of the world is concerned.”

I set down the menu. “It’s just...” I looked around and lowered my voice. “I just found out from one of my step-sisters about the mish-mash of my family. It turns out that she, her sister, Alyssa, and I were all born before our parents met and married. I didn’t know anything about my heritage until I arrived here and met Jordan. So, if my Dad wasn’t a Magus, that leaves my biological mother, your ... our mother.”

Valor nodded. “I can see why you’re confused.”

“It’s more than that,” I said. “Knowing what I know now about our nature, why would my Dad leave her and take me with him?”

Valory shrugged. “I don’t know. I was only six when you ‘died’,” she said, using her fingers to make quotes around the word, died. “Mom never told me what happened. She let me and everyone else believe you were dead.”

I frowned and thought about Jordan. She had been born under very strained circumstances. “Was I a strange or strained birth?”

“What do you mean?”

I told her about Jordan’s mother, but I didn’t use her name or relation. “I’ve been told other stories about other Magi too. I was wondering if maybe she was ashamed of me or something.”

Valory shook her head. “No, nothing like that. I remember she was heartbroken after you...”

“Died,” I said. Obviously something happened that Valory was too young at the time to be aware of. Asking her wasn’t going to help, so I needed to change the subject. I pointed at her beads. “You said there was a lot you could teach me. How did you do that?”

She ran her fingers over her chest. “Actually, Mom made them. She gave them to me about a month before she died.”

I could tell thinking about our Mother still hurt. I waved at her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to...”

“No, it’s been months,” Valory said. “I should be able to talk about her without falling to tears every time.”

“Then let’s work our way backwards,” I said. “Start with how she died, then tell me what she was like.”

Valory sniffed and then looked at me. “She was murdered. The local police didn’t understand what they were seeing and the ME concluded that her heart gave out, but I know what happened. It wasn’t conventional weapons, it was Magic.”

I frowned. “If it was Magic, why didn’t a Sheriff Magus investigate?”

“He did,” she said, almost growling. “And he said Magic wasn’t involved.”

I frowned. “If he said it wasn’t Magic, then how...?” I shook my head, not sure how to finish the question.

“I know it was,” she said, leaning forward. “Mom was in excellent health. There’s no way her heart would just give out.”

I cringed at my next question. “Not to be disrespectful, but ... how old was she?”

“Forty-six,” Valory said. “Only twenty years older than I was.”

Forty-six wasn’t out of the realm of possibility, but Valory was still distraught about it, so I kept that to myself. I nodded and murmured, “Yeah.” I wrung my hands. “Was there anything going on at the time? Anyone she was having disagreements with? Anyone who might have wanted to hurt her?”

“Yeah ... there was ... he...” She shook her head like she was trying to shake away a gnat from her ear. “It was the Council.”

“Wait, you said ‘he’. He-who?”

She opened her mouth to answer, closed it, tried again, and then shook her head in the same manner. She met my eyes and said. “It was the Council.”

It seemed that was the only answer I was going to get for that question, so I decided to move forward. “Why would the Council want our mother dead?”

She shrugged. “Who really knows? Our family is one of the oldest Magus families around. Not only do we have vast fortunes, but entire libraries of spells too.” Then she looked up. “If they were after the libraries, then they’ll be disappointed to find out that I hold the key now. And since I found my little brother, you can help.” Another hurt expression washed over her face. “In fact, Mom named you in her will. The Lawyers and I believed that she simply forgot to update her will after you died, but...” she looked up. “She wasn’t sad because you were dead. She was sad because you were leaving. She knew you were out there, somewhere. She left you half the estate.” She blinked in thought for a second and then said, “I’ll have to call the lawyers, and it’ll take some time, but you won’t have to worry about money anymore.”

That wasn’t something I was expecting. A pleasant surprise, but only a dream at the moment. I smiled and said, “Wouldn’t my untimely death work against me on that?”

She shook her head. “No, Damian Ellsworth is my estate lawyer, and he’s a Magus as well. I’ll have him fly here to meet you, you two do that memory swap spell you do and he’ll understand.”

I shook my head. “That memory swap spell is an innate ability I haven’t learned to control yet.”

She smiled. “It’s only a matter of practice, just like everything else when it comes to Magic.” She held out her hands. “Here, practice on me.”

“There’s no way to know what either of us will see,” I said.

“That’s why it’s practice. You have to practice controlling what you want to see from me and what I will see, if anything, from you.”

“I didn’t know it could work that way.”

“It’s your power. It should work whichever way you want: to share memories with someone else so they’ll understand what you mean, to gain memories from someone to understand them better, or to swap memories so both of you grow closer.”

“And if you see something about me that’s embarrassing?” I asked.

“I’ll try not to rag on you too much,” she said and wiggled her fingers.

I started for them, but then the waitress returned with her coffee, my tea, and to find out what I wanted to eat. Off the top of my head, I ordered a burger and fries. She took my menu and left.

Valory sipped her coffee. “Oh, that’s good.”

“Plain black?” I asked.

“Hell yes. All this low-fat-triple-latte crap drives me crazy. Give me a cup of basic black any day.”

I smiled, added some sweetener and lemon to my tea and took a sip.

“No soda?” she asked.

I shook my head. “I feel about sodas about how you feel about other coffees.”

She nodded. “How are your classes going anyway?”

“Pretty good,” I said. “Fortunately, I’m only mostly distracted by my heritage.”

She smiled. “Can you imagine how things would have gone had you been initiated when you hit puberty?”

I shook my head. “No way. Granted, from my understanding, things went the way they did for me because I wasn’t. If everyone liked me as much as my girls do now? I’d probably be a completely different person today.”

“How so?”

“The kids I grew up around, not to mention their parents and anyone they talked to, never liked me. From my understanding, it was a side effect of not being initiated. If I had been, then everyone would have liked me better. I would probably take more for granted than I do.”

“Yeah, I guess I can see that.”

We each sipped our respective drinks and I glanced around the café. Some of the patrons that had been here were gone and new ones had come in. I couldn’t help but feel a bit of paranoia sitting there for so long.