Post by StoryGirl83 on Feb 12, 2010 18:56:08 GMT -5
Chapter Nine – The Magician
Wyatt pulled open the door and looked at Emily confused. “What are you doing here?”
“Is Chris here?” Emily asked trying to glance behind him.
Wyatt frowned. “Aren’t you supposed to be working tonight?”
“Keeping track of my schedule?” Emily asked, amused.
Wyatt shook his head. He looked pointedly at her waitress uniform. “The outfit was kind of a giveaway and I know how my mom schedules shifts.”
Emily smiled. “Okay, you have me there. Now, is your brother home?”
Wyatt glanced toward the living room and back at Emily. “Why?”
She scrunched her nose in thought. “Well, something . . . odd happened at work today and Chris helped me out, but then he just left. I wanted to thank him, but I kind of wanted an explanation, too. Is he here?”
Wyatt nodded and opened the door wider. “Come in.” Once he was sure that she was following he headed into the living room.
Melinda was sitting on the couch opposite the kitchen, seemingly relaxing watching the mysteriously turned on TV unless someone looked at her eyes. Those were firmly fixed on Seth who was standing by the window, apprehension in them. Chris was no longer in the room.
Wyatt glanced over at Emily. “Just a minute.” He left the room and headed into the kitchen.
Chris was inside mopping the floor. A sticky red substance stained broken glass.
“My drink?”
Chris looked up and nodded. “I dropped it when Melinda screamed earlier.”
“It was more of a yell.”
Chris gave him a look.
Wyatt nodded. “Yeah, not relevant. Why are you hiding from The Manor’s wait staff.”
Chris moaned. “So it is her?”
“It’s Emily Colson from The Manor, the girl I hired last month.” Wyatt looked at him. “Why is she here?”
“I’m sure I wouldn’t know.”
“I’m sure you would. What did you do, Chris?”
Chris exhaled slowly and started pacing. “I orbed her.”
“You what?!” Wyatt exclaimed, stunned. “Why would you do a foolish thing like that?”
Chris stopped and looked at him. He sighed. “I thought she was about to be stabbed.”
Wyatt stared at him. “Stabbed? By whom? Did a demon attack?”
Chris shook his head. “She fell and knocked a knife set off the shelf. Look, I didn’t have time to think. I didn’t want to let her die, so I . . . I orbed her. And now . . .” He sighed. “I don’t expose magic. I just don’t.”
“Right. Never?”
Chris paced for several seconds and stopped. “David, on my last day at Centennial a month ago. Demons attacked him, but that was different.”
Wyatt shrugged. “Anyone else?”
“Brian, in the other time line,” Chris admitted. “I told you about that.”
Wyatt nodded.
“And other’s in the other time line. Gen, Miles, who knows how many others, though probably most of that was more your fault than mine.”
Wyatt chuckled. “Right. Blame me.”
“Sorry,” Chris grinned up at him, “but you kind of exposed magic to pretty much the entire area, maybe even the entire world. Brian was definitely my fault though.”
“So why is Emily different?”
Chris glanced toward the living room. He sighed. “She asked me if I was a witch, like it was a joke, as if it was no big deal.”
“And this is a problem?”
“Yes.”
Wyatt glared at him. “Why is someone accepting magic a bad thing?”
Chris brushed his hair out of his face. “Because it’s weird and in our world, weird usually means evil.”
Wyatt barked out laughter at that. “Chris, my best friend is a demon. Our sister is from another reality. And our dead aunt and uncle are alive with two teenage daughters. For that matter, our dad has been dead since the 1940s, thirty years before our mom was born. Not a one of them is evil.”
“Point taken,” Chris admitted. “but how do I learn if she’s the good weird or the bad weird.”
Wyatt didn’t answer. He was looking bemused into the living room.
“Wy?”
Wyatt beckoned him over.
Chris looked through the doorway in time to see Emily pull a coin out from behind Melinda’s ear.
Wyatt looked at his brother amused. “Maybe she’s just a magician who doesn’t know what real magic is.”