Wizards At War

“Oh, don’t you get paranoid now,” Nita said. “Remember how it was with Ronan before, when he just wanted the Champion to fall asleep or go away? Now at least the two of them seem to be working together. We ought to be really grateful, because we’re all going to need that.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Kit let out a long breath, feeling relieved. But Nita glanced back at him, and the smile she was wearing was distinctly odd. “What?” Kit said.

“Uh, nothing serious,” Nita said. The smile started to turn into a grin. “I was just thinking about Carmela.”

“Filif got a little too close to the original there,” Kit said, passing a hand over his eyes.

Nita snickered. “Not that. I was thinking that when we get back, somebody’d better make sure she knows exactly what she’s getting into.”

“With what? Ronan?”

“Yeah.”

Kit raised his eyebrows. “You mean we should tell her that being hot on Ronan is actually being hot on both a cranky Celto-Goth hottie and a Senior Power-That-Is who spent most of the past ten years living on Earth and wearing a macaw costume?”

Nita looked at him.

“Nah,” Kit said at last. “Let’s not say anything. Let’s just let it play out.” And then Kit broke up laughing.

Nita’s look grew annoyed. “You’re enjoying the idea,” she said.

“Oh yeah!” Kit managed to say. It took a while to get control of his laughter.

“If she realizes that you’re letting her walk into this without a warning just for your own amusement,” Nita said, “the universe being destroyed is going to come as a relief.”

Kit wiped his eyes, forcibly smothering the last few laughs. “Look,” he said, “when we get back, if he hangs around for very long, Ronan’ll have to tell her. Assuming she doesn’t figure it out herself, somehow. She’s been figuring out way too much lately.”

Nita suddenly looked concerned. “You don’t think she’s going to pull a late-onset Ordeal on us?”

Kit shook his head. “She’s too old. But even if she is getting good with the Speech, you won’t find me complaining. I’d rather have her the way she is than like my other sister.”

“Oh, please,” Nita said. “Helena and your ‘deal with the devil.’ What a laugh.”

“I can’t believe she could even think I’d do something like that. You live with somebody all your life and then—” Kit threw his hands in the air, let them fall again, a helpless gesture.

Ronan appeared off to one side of their hardened-space platform. “I’ve got just the thing,” he said, coming over to them. “There’s a big stony outcrop a couple of miles from the end of the tunnels of the biggest city.”

“So what did you find?” Nita said. “Caves?”

Ronan nodded. “A big bubble cavern with no connection to the city tunnels,” he said. “But there’s plenty of room there for all our pup tents, and no surface access of any size; no one’s going to come sneaking up on us.” He glanced over at Nita. “You want to call your dad now?”

“Yeah,” Nita said, and got out her phone. “Feed the cave coordinates to our manuals, huh?”

“And to me,” Sker’ret said. “I’ll want them for the short-term transits.”

Ronan headed over to where Sker’ret was working with Filif on the spell diagrams. As Nita dialed her phone, Ponch got up from where he’d been lying and ambled over to Kit, his tail swinging idly.

We’re going now? he said.

“Yup,” Kit said.

Good. I’m hungry!

Kit reached down to scratch behind Ponch’s ears. “It’s all about dinner or playing or sleep with you, isn’t it?” he said.

Not all, Ponch said in a slightly hurt tone of voice. There are other things. Sometimes it’s about squirrels.

“Oh, great,” Nita said under her breath. “What now?”

Kit glanced over at her. Nita gave him another of those exasperated looks and hit the button that put the call on the speaker.

At the other end—the other end of the galaxy, or the universe, for all Kit knew—the phone was ringing. And ringing, and ringing, and ringing…

“Nobody’s home,” Nita muttered. She started dialing again.

“Maybe your dad’s at work?” Kit said.

“I sure hope so,” Nita said. “Not that I’m sure what time it is there.”

But when the call started to go through, that number, too, just kept ringing. After a few rings someone picked up. Kit saw Nita’s expression go a little less scared. “Hi, this is Harry Callahan—”

“Daddy! What time is it? I thought you’d be—”

“—at Callahan’s Florists,” said her dad’s voice. “Unfortunately there’s no one available in the shop to take your call right now. Our normal business hours are 8:00 A.M. to 5:30 P.M. Monday through Friday—”

Nita hung up. “Okay,” she said. “His own phone—”

She dialed again. But this time all she got was a different recorded message, a digital one. “The party you are dialing is not available at this time. Please try again later—”

Nita hung up again, starting to look upset. “This makes no sense,” she said.

“You could try getting hold of Dairine,” Kit said. “Maybe she’s heard something.”