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Oh, boy, had I. I supposed I should have been freaking out about all these revelations, but they came as something of a relief to me. This meant I wasn't going crazy after all. That, or I'd suffered a total psychotic break. "I'd just always heard New York was kind of weird," I said at last. "I guess we don't have magic back in Texas."

There was laughter around the table. "No, you don't," a man about ninety degrees around the table said. "Just a few isolated pockets. For the most part, settlement in that area is too recent to have a fully developed magical culture, except among the native groups."Advertisement

That actually made a strange sort of sense. All of this did. "Okay, that explains a lot.

But it doesn't explain who you are or why you need me."

All heads turned to the big boss. "We are Magic, Spells, and Illusions, Inc.," he said. "Magic is our business—and I don't mean the card tricks and fake wands that your people think of as magic. We create the spells that magical folk use to get through their daily lives."

This made less sense. I shook my head. "But don't you people have spell books handed down through generations? Or have I seen too many movies?"

Owen picked up the explanation. I wondered what his job here was. "While it is true that there are some timeless spells, we also need spells that keep up with the pace of modem life. None of the ancient spells passed down from our forefathers would be of much help in summoning a subway train, for example."

"I thought that's what you were doing," I said. "Well, no, I didn't think you were really calling the train, but I did think that's what it looked like you were doing."

He gave me a wry grin. "I didn't even try to mask that spell—not that it would have mattered to you. Nearly everyone stands on the subway platform, urging a train to come soon. I'm just more effective at it than most people."

I felt sick and dizzy. Maybe this was one of those dreams you have the night before a big event that you're anxious about, where you dream the whole event but it's gone horribly bizarre. At any minute I'd wake up and realize I'd dreamed the wildest job interview ever. I pinched my thigh under the table, but I was still there at the round table in the great hall.

"A lot of what we do also involves illusion to hide the nature of who we are or what we do," Rod said, apparently not noticing that I was on the verge of a total meltdown. "That's why you see so many things others don't. One rule we have about magic is that nonmagical folk can't see what we're doing—although that does no good with people like you. Most people see only ordinary humans when they encounter fairies, elves, and other magical creatures. They see what we want them to see when

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we do magic."

I nodded like I understood. I did, in a way. In fact, all of this made too much sense, and I knew I shouldn't be buying such outlandish explanations so easily. I needed proof, but they'd built themselves an easy out if I asked for it. They could just say I couldn't see what they were doing. Then I looked at the fairies floating above their seats and the gnomes seated on the piles of cushions. I didn't know what to believe anymore.

"It was your immunity to illusion that helped us find you," Rod said. "Owen noticed you a couple of weeks ago, staring at something you shouldn't have seen, and reported it to me." I tried to remember what I might have seen a couple of weeks ago, but that seemed like a century and a half ago now. Then my brain zeroed in on the fact that it was Owen who'd noticed me from afar, and I felt my cheeks grow warm in a blush worthy of Owen himself. I reminded myself that it was my magic immunity Owen had noticed, not my great legs or bouncy, shiny hair, as Rod continued.

"So we began observing you, and you did appear to react to things that should have been veiled to you, but you weren't extremely obvious about your reactions, so we weren't sure. We'd noticed that you were most likely to take the subway on Monday mornings, so we set up the test for you. Owen made sure that the train I was already on arrived at the right time, and then we were able to measure your reaction to me."

If I'd felt sick and dizzy before, I felt worse now. I didn't like the idea of these freaks spending a week or so watching me. "How was I supposed to react?" I asked.

He gave me a sheepish smile. "What do you see when you look at me?" he asked.

All the women in the room leaned forward with great interest, but I couldn't think of a diplomatic way to phrase it. He must have noticed my discomfort, for he said,

"Don't worry, I know. You won't hurt my feelings." pqdm.com