Excantation Read online

  The lost clan up here had a proper civilization of their own going. The buildings were all stone, some of them three stories high, and I didn’t see any mortar in the joints. They had flat roofs, plants and vines dangling down from the top, colorful banners and awnings over the doorways. I stepped through and to the side of the portal, giving room for people to follow me, and looked around as I got my bearings. Really, it felt like I’d stepped into some sort of historical touristy place of a town from the Mayan past. Maybe Incan.

  Thais spotted me and paused mid-conversation with someone in a very colorful, feathery headpiece. She said something to them, then jogged toward me, waving as she came.

  I waved back and met her halfway. “You sure we got everyone?”

  “Yes. I left instructions at the gate on what to do to get here, just in case.” Wrapping both arms around my shoulders, she hugged me hard, rocking back and forth for a moment. “Reagan, Reagan, it’s such a terrible situation, and thank you for coming so promptly.”

  I hugged her back because today was definitely one of those days that called for all the hugs. “Tell me about it. And you’re welcome. I’m honestly glad to help. How is everyone?”

  “Heartbroken. Struggling. But alive. We can rebuild as long as we’re alive.” She let go and took a half step back. “If the international portals had been operational…”

  I grimaced as she trailed off. “Yeah. I hear you. I could have gotten here a lot faster. Let’s definitely work on those next. Do you need any more help here?”

  “It’s not something you can really help with, for the most part. We’re just trying to get people settled for the night. I was speaking with the clan leader here—”

  As she spoke, the person with the feathery headpiece slithered up to us. What I’d mistaken as a headpiece was in fact part of his body, the brilliant feathers like a collar around his neck and springing up, looking much like a headdress. The rest of him was a giant snake, green scales gleaming dully in the mellow lighting of the street.

  Thais cut herself off and turned slightly to make room for him. “Let me introduce you two. Aapo, this is Imagineer Reagan Hunt. Reagan, this is the clan leader of the Bandeira, Aapo.”

  Aapo dipped his head toward me in a serpentine bow and I returned the gesture. “Hello, Master Aapo.”

  “Hello, Imagineer,” he returned with a slight hiss to his words. “Your aid is very welcome in this time. We are blessed to have such a capable apprentice. May I borrow your help a bit longer?”

  I didn’t think I was done yet. Gut feeling. “Absolutely. What do you need?”

  “We do not have enough housing or bedding for our guests. Simple tents would suffice for now.”

  Tents I could do. Tents and I were friends—they were only three layers. “Tell me how many you need and where to put them. I’m on it. Thais, can you do bedding?”

  “Sure,” she agreed readily.

  Aapo looked relieved—I think; it was hard to read snake facial expressions—and turned, slithering off to an open area near the center square. A water fountain splashed prettily in the middle. The space was obviously meant for a marketplace, as I saw many tables and benches lined around the area. Empty now, sure, but I bet on a regular day, when the world wasn’t trying to burn, this place was hoppin’.

  I created good-sized, six-man tents and basically crammed them in the open space. Thais came in behind me, making sleeping bags and a few round beanbag-looking things, I assumed for the creatures who needed more cushion to sleep on. We went in rounds, and I lost Aapo’s attention several times as one of his own came to him, asking questions.

  The area was very pretty here. I couldn’t see much past the streetlights with such thick forest around us, but we sat high up in the mountains, and the air was clear. So different from the Amazon. I hoped such peaceful surroundings would help people rest easier.

  “Excuse me, Imagineer?” a hesitant voice asked behind me.

  I turned to look and found three different people bunched together. They looked the worse for wear, dusky skin streaked with soot, clothes turned a dingy grey. “Yeah?”

  “Thank you so much for the tent.” The woman spoke for them all, her smile hesitant, as if she wanted to smile at me but couldn’t maintain it. “I wonder, can you modify one for us?”

  “Absolutely. I’m just making tents willy-nilly, honestly. I don’t know what people need precisely. Whatcha need?”

  “Can you make one of these thicker, so no light gets through?”

  Ohhh, this must be one of the sun-sensitive people. “Sure! Just one? How many do you think are actually needed?”

  “More than one would be helpful,” the man behind her admitted. “Our family alone is sixteen.”

  “Dude, I’m not cramming sixteen people into two tents. I’m not sure what the fallout would be, but my bet’s murder.” I thought through the logistics of this, trying to imagine what their lives would be like over the upcoming weeks. It might be months before they could go home to rebuild, who knew? And only having one safe spot every day? In a tent, no less, which didn’t have a lot of space to begin with?

  Yeah. I was going with a no on this one.

  “Tell you what. I have an idea. Gimme two seconds.” I popped up onto a bench, looking around until I found my quarry, and then I was down again, weaving my way around refugees filing into the tents, and the natives here who rushed back and forth, trying to help them.

  “Master Aapo!”

  The quetzalcoatl turned, spying me. “What is it, Imagineer?”

  “I’ve got a request.” I slowed down before I rammed into him, lowering my voice to speak with him more one-on-one. “So, you’ve got quite a few races here that are sun-sensitive. One family alone is sixteen people, and they want me to modify a tent to be more blackout for them, which is cool. I can totally do that, but that means they’re stuck in a tent all day. Can I do blackout material over your main square and the main streets at least? Give them the ability to walk around?”

  He nodded before I could even finish trotting it all out. “It is a sound suggestion. I do not want anyone here stressed more than they already are. Please do so.”

  “Cool beans. Thanks.” I turned, going back to the square. For this, I’d need a good vantage point. And I had a few questions to ask, too. I went back to my request-givers with a bounce. “Hey guys, just talked to Master Aapo. He’s cool with me putting up protective screens over the main square and the streets.”

  All three of them sagged a little in relief. The speaker of the group gave me a more genuine smile. “Thank you so much.”

  “Now, I’ve not done this before, so you tell me what you need. How much sun does this have to block? Are we talking all UV light, does it need to be blackout? I can create a screen that blocks UV light but still filters light in.”

  “Can you? That would be so helpful for us.”

  “Sure, just gimme a few minutes.” I went for one of the tables, as it was taller than the benches, and stood on it. The architecture up here helped tremendously for my game plan. All the roofs were flat, giving me a perfect edge to work with. I could extend the screen over the building so there were no gaps, no danger if they wanted to go in and out of the shops lining the square.

  They made UV screens that applied to windows all the time. I basically used the same concept, with a dark grey material that stretched from building to building, and covered the square with a taut, flat surface. It went up in a split second and I studied it carefully, making sure everything had gone according to plan. It seemed to. The square turned a little darker, with the moon and stars overhead filtered.

  Hopping down, I asked them, “That good?”

  “Yes, thank you so much.” She grabbed me up and hugged me, which I wasn’t at all expecting. But I had noticed the Brazilians didn’t have the same concept of personal space as an American. Read that as they had no concept of personal space. It was fine. I liked hugs, and she looked like she needed one.

  I hu
gged everyone, in fact, and created a few more things for them so they at least had a change of clothes, some towels, stuff like that. Thais came around to create bedding for them.

  Then someone else came up with a request, and I went to go help them, and it snowballed from there. I darted across the town like a ping pong ball being batted around.

  “There’s my wandering apprentice!”

  Who, little ol’ me? I turned to see Zoya coming toward me with a sort of proud exasperation, if that made sense. “Hi, Mactep.”

  “I have been looking for you for the past hour,” she informed me. “Not even Ciarán knew where you were.”

  “We kinda lost track of each other at some point.” He’d been sucked into helping people too. Which was fine. I was in safe territory, so it wasn’t like I was in danger running around here. “Where is he, anyway?”

  “Here.” He strolled out of a doorway, stifling a yawn as he moved. “It’s near midnight, a stór, and I vote we find dinner and a hotel before it’s breakfast and a hotel.”

  Now that he said that, my stomach made gurgling noises of complaint. Yeah, past time I fed it. When was my last meal, anyway? “Sounds heavenly. Are we done here, then?”

  “We’ve done all we can for now.” Zoya looked around her with sad eyes. “Helping these people recover isn’t our responsibility. We need to go back to our true task.”

  “Yeah.” Figuring out what went wrong with the Hub and getting international travel back online was definitely our real job. I agreed with her, but I didn’t regret the help I’d given people tonight. They’d needed it, and I felt good about it. Part of me felt like I could do more, but it was a dangerous thought. I couldn’t take on the world’s problems, that was for sure. I didn’t have enough spoons for it. And I wasn’t a superhero, anyway.

  Zoya was right in that I couldn’t get sidetracked here. Other people would come in and support them through recovery. My job was something else entirely.

  But first, food. Then sleeeeep.

  We found a late-night diner and a hotel, then crashed. The hotel beds were hard, but I was so tired it didn’t even register. I did require a hot shower and some stretches the next day to get a crick out of my neck, though.

  Zoya was still fast asleep even after that, so I imagineered myself up some clothes (because luggage was still at the airport), got dressed, and wandered over to the next room, knocking on it softly before asking, “Ciarán, you awake?”

  “I am, come in!” he called back.

  Oh, good. I slipped in. His hotel room was an exact mirror of mine, two queen-sized beds, blue carpet, white walls, bad art, and all. Ciarán sat at the small desk in front of the window, laptop open in front of him. He’d been up for a while, I think, dressed in a hotel robe with his black hair still a little damp and combed back. I really should create clean clothes for him too.

  I could see James’ face over his shoulder. Oh, Skype call? I came further in and waved. “Hey, James, good morning.”

  “It’s afternoon here—you’re three hours behind us,” he replied, waving back. He did look more properly settled, although tired. I had the feeling he hadn’t slept much. There were dark circles under his blue eyes, prominently displayed in his pale skin. And his thinning hair was standing up a bit, as if he’d run his hands through it a few times. “But sure, good morning. Ciarán was updating me. Sounds like the past few days have been rough on you.”

  “They were absolutely anti-fun,” I agreed with a wince. “Tell me something good, James.”

  “Actually, I have a suggestion. I know we started in Brazil because Thais found that working platform down there. But really, we know the original platforms were here in Europe. With the state of Brazil right now, it’s no longer conducive to research there. I don’t think you should stay. Why not fly to London, stay with me here? Uh, you don’t like that idea?”

  “The thought of yet another international flight makes me want to cry inside,” I admitted frankly, and I was not kidding. I would need at least two really good books if they were going to drag me back onto a plane. I still suffered from jet lag, and right now, just the idea of boarding a plane sounded traumatic. “But…”

  “The man speaks sense,” Ciarán pointed out, although he wore a sympathetic smile like he understood exactly why I balked. “I think Zoya will agree.”

  “Yeah. Just…yeah, you’re both right. Okay. I’m game. Mactep’s still asleep, but once we revive her, I think she’ll be on board with the idea. Is there anything you want me to read while I’m on the flight? Like, have there been breakthroughs in the last couple of days that I missed because of the chaos? Please, please tell me you’ve at least figured out where the Hub is.”

  “I wish I could say so, but sadly, no. But then, we were frantically trying to understand how the platforms were powered so we could get them working.”

  “Yeah, true. I’m just checking. And maybe being hopeful you had a flash of genius.”

  James shook his head wearily. “I wish. Maybe if we all get into the same room and start talking this through, we’ll have that flash of genius.”

  “What, like a think tank of Imagineers?” Now there was a thought for you. Most of the time, or so I had been told, Imagineers didn’t collaborate much. Situations had to be grave or really important to pull more than two Imagineers into a problem. Like, for instance, the whole Amazon rainforest burning. Yikes, now there was perspective for you.

  “Precisely like it. Well, I’m going to head off and make arrangements for you here so you’re comfortable in your stay. I have a feeling you’ll be here awhile.”

  “James, don’t curse us like that!” Although he was likely right.

  With a laugh, he waved and disconnected the call.

  “If he just called on Murphy, I will be so upset with him.” I glared at the now blank screen.

  Ciarán matched my glare. “So will I. We’ll have to do something nasty to him.”

  I offered a fist to bump, which he bumped. “I knew I liked you for a reason.”

  The flight was semi-bearable this time, maybe in part because we’d taken a late departure time, so we were able to spend several hours restlessly napping. I’d taken advantage of hotel wi-fi to download several episodes of anime and two ebooks onto my kindle. It took all of it to keep me entertained during the sixteen-hour flight.

  Sixteen. Hours. Yes, I did about lose my sanity in the last half hour of the flight, why do you ask?

  Having now been in multiple airports, I suspected the same architect had designed them all. Why else was this airport also predominantly white? White tiles on the floor, white arching ceilings soaring overhead in the main part of the building. I mean, seriously. There were some differences, of course. They didn’t look exactly the same. But the similarities were enough to confuse an already addled mind.

  It took us about a half hour to get through customs, which Zoya seemed to think was something of a record, and then we were free birds. We stepped out into the late afternoon sun, as of course it was around four p.m. over here, what with the time difference and all. James met us at the curb, waving an arm overhead. He looked better rested than he had been the day before, and look, pants! His brown hair was even properly combed. The man had apparently gotten a proper night’s sleep.

  I waved back. “Hi, James! Thanks for picking us up.”

  “Glad to do so,” he assured us brightly. “How was the flight?”

  “Long,” Ciarán answered, rolling his neck around on his shoulders. “We’re very glad to be off that plane. You’ve got a hotel for us?”

  “No need. My clan’s putting you up. We’ve got a bed-and-breakfast right next door to me, so I’ve made arrangements for you there. Agna—she’s the kobold who runs the place—is expecting you for dinner.”

  “Bless her.” I was half-starved. Airplane food leaves much to be desired, let’s put it that way.

  We loaded suitcases into the trunk—or boot, as James called it—and I settled into the back of
the green Range Rover with Ciarán. Once we were settled, James put the car into motion.

  Without us prompting, he started filling us in. “Heard from Thais about three hours ago. She’s confident everyone is out of the rainforest at this point. The Bandeira are managing things swimmingly, got everyone tucked in. Really, they’re handling it all so well, you’d think they were used to emergencies. And I know for a fact they’ve never handled something on this scale before. Quite impressive.”

  It really was. “How long do you think it’ll take before rebuilding starts?”

  “No way of knowing at this point. We have to wait for the fires to stop. But I know many people are making plans and gathering up materials, prepping for it.”

  The magical community was excellent at pulling together to push through a crisis. I was seeing that in action, and it gave me warm fuzzies to be part of it.

  “We didn’t see Jackson once we reached the Bandeira,” Zoya mentioned. “Have you spoken to him?”

  “This morning, in fact. He was busy hopping from one place to another, trying to get as many platforms operational as possible to give people multiple ways out. Thankfully, as not everyone could reach Thais because of the fires. He’s fine, though, and plans to catch a plane to London tonight.”

  I was glad, as I’d been a little worried about him. We’d lost track of him pretty quickly in all the chaos. Stupid platforms were regional—only certain ones were linked together. Otherwise, we’d not be in this mess and running around like chickens with our heads cut off.

  “We haven’t made much advancement since I last spoke with you, Reagan,” James pitched over his shoulder as he got on a highway. Freeway? Did the Brits have a different name for it? “We’re still stuck on where the Hub could even be. We’re still getting in witness statements from all the clans, though, so I have hope someone knows the answer. Your grandmother seems to be in her element. She’s quick to update us when some new sliver of a clue comes to her.”