Chapter One

Life is the ordinary expression of magic, and much of what gets called magic is simply an unexpected expression of life. Before I caught on to that concept, the great adventurers who filled my boyhood reading and dreaming hours were magic-seeking archaeologists. I wanted to be one so badly, I stepped out onto the back stoop on a bitter-cold starry night and offered my soul for the chance.

Aunt Bella rushed out and swung a soup ladle at me, screaming at me to cancel the trade subito! Before some power agreed to it!

I grinned, ducked the arc of dishwater, and skipped out of reach.
Aunt Bella had come to stay with us the week her son and my dad and all their stockbroker buddies jumped out of the top windows of the Empire State Building. She spent her hoarded dimes on the books I begged for, jackanapes that I was. Adoring her did not keep me from trying her temper at frequent intervals. Usually, I got away with it.
Not this time. She chased me down and locked a sudsy hand on my collar. Despite both of us being coatless in the snow, she dragged me to the church on the corner, where she begged red-faced Father Patrick to explain my peril.

“You again, Dickins?” He boxed my ear, not quite hard enough to knock me down.

I dropped anyway, to get the sympathy. No dice. In mid-drop, pinching fingers caught my ear. (continue reading…)

When Adin woke up on Lufthansa flight 456, it had already landed at LAX and he’d had the strangest night of his life. Words stuck in his sandy and arid mouth.”I know he didn’t have too much to drink. I served him myself,” one of the flight attendants said. “Does he look pale to you?”

“Yes,” said the air marshal. “Better call the EMTs.” Two other people gathered around him as he fought the dizzy spinning of his brain. He looked out the window and his heart slammed into his rib cage when he saw a familiar, handsome figure walking confidently away from the gate inside the terminal. A sudden feeling like he’d never known, a hunger, coursed through him, and he flushed from his head to his toes.

“Water,” Adin croaked.

“There you are.” The flight attendant, Marcia, motioned to someone farther to the front of the cabin. “Welcome back. You were beginning to scare us. Do you have a medical condition?”

“Blood sugar gets low when I travel,” Adin murmured, and someone brought him not only water but also a can of orange juice. (continue reading…)