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“Not big enough to send us, but a message, maybe. If I can aim it properly, we could send it where we’re sure our people would find it. It’ll take a lot of power, so we’ll need to revive enough people.”

“You know how to do that?” Earl asked.Advertisement

“I’ve never tried it, but I know the theory.” Owen didn’t sound confident enough to reassure me.

“If the illusion was enough to get their attention, wouldn’t that kind of power be noticeable?” I asked.

“It depends,” Earl said. “There’s a lot of magic going on here all the time, just keeping this place running. What they noticed was magic they didn’t expect to be there. If we can hide among their magic, we might get away with it.”

The two of them looked at me, and I realized they were waiting for a decision from their leader. “Do you have any other ideas?” I asked.

“I don’t think Mac’s prison riot would help much,” Owen said.

“And it doesn’t look like we can get through a portal, ourselves. Sending out a message may be our only hope, and we don’t have a lot of time to waste.” I took a deep breath, then said as forcefully as I could manage, “Let’s do it. How many people do you think you’ll need?”

“At least five. More if we can swing it.”

I turned to Earl. “Do you think you can get that many without being noticed?”

“I should be able to. With any luck, the memories we’ve all got hidden will have already done the trick, but I’ll go round people up.”

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“Be careful,” I warned. “You’re a known fugitive.”

“I’ll get one person and then that should have a ripple effect.”

“We could try working it some from our end,” I said.

Earl shook his head. “No, you’re the one who’s public enemy number one, the one person the whammy didn’t affect. They’ll be out to get you. It’s probably safest if you stay put for a while.” He checked his watch and said, “I’ll meet you back here in two hours.”

When Earl was gone, Owen put his arm around my shoulders and said, “I did thank you for rescuing me, didn’t I?”

“It might have come up,” I replied, unable to hide my smile.

“Well, you were incredible. Thank you.” He bent and kissed me, and I sighed with relief to have my Owen back.

When we ended the kiss, I leaned against him and asked, “Do you think you can really do it?”

“I’ve got to.”

“You do know that needing to do it doesn’t necessarily mean you can, right?”

“I’ve read some books about it, and I’ve even done some study of elven magic. The trick will be getting enough power. It’ll take as many elves as Earl can round up, and possibly you, too.” He paused before adding, “It’ll probably drain you entirely.”

Forcing bravery I wasn’t sure I felt into my voice, I said, “We knew it was going to happen eventually, anyway. It might as well be for a good cause, and I’d rather get back to the real world than be able to make glowy balls of light. Even if that is kind of cool,” I added wistfully.

He turned and kissed me lightly on the temple. “I’m sorry.”

“To be honest, I’m not sure if I’m cut out to be magical. I think I’m a pretty great immune, but let’s face it, I was a mediocre wizard.”

“That’s not true at all. You caught on very quickly. You only started having problems when your power ran below a certain level. If you had full power like a real wizard, you’d be formidable. Your technique was excellent—even if it was a mix of traditional magic and whatever it was your grandmother was teaching you.”

With a soft sigh, I settled my head against his shoulder. “I never thought I’d ever say this, but I wish she was here now.”

He chuckled and said, “Yeah, it would be interesting to see what she’d do in this situation.”

“She’d probably take one of the gray guys hostage and work her way up the chain of command.” I hesitated, then said, “You know …”

“If the portal idea doesn’t work, we may consider that.”

As confident as he sounded about being able to open a small, perfectly aimed portal, I started thinking about every movie or TV show I’d ever seen involving a kidnapping so I could get ideas for the best way to take one of the guards hostage. We’d have to find a way to neutralize their powers, or else our hostage could put the whammy on us even as we took him prisoner—maybe even while he was a prisoner. I supposed I could always burn through my remaining magic supply so at least one of us wouldn’t be affected, but it would be hard to convince Owen of that. His stance made sense in that, to him, being immune to magic had been like a punishment, and getting his powers back had come as a great relief. He couldn’t imagine that I might prefer to go back to what was normal for me. pqdm.com