“I quit trying,” I admitted. “I was so afraid she was going to use me to enthrall the whole pack. I didn’t understand that she couldn’t do that, that she didn’t have the power.” I closed my eyes and let myself remember how terrified I had been. I opened them again, almost immediately, needing to see him to feel safe. “In that place, it felt like she had all the power to do anything.”
He was so still that I thought he might have gone back to sleep, until he spoke. “She hurt you.” It wasn’t a question.
“She did.” I wouldn’t lie to him. “But it was just pain, not real damage. I knew you would come for me if I could just hold out.” I let him hear the sureness of that in my voice.
He rolled over until I was on top of him. His hands moved to my shoulders, and he gave me a little shake. “Don’t ever make me go through that again. I couldn’t bear it.”
“I won’t,” I promised him rashly. “Never again.”
He laughed then, and hugged me tight. “Didn’t Bran teach you not to make promises you can’t keep?” He sighed. “I suppose if you won’t shut up so I can sleep, I might as well find something to do with the time.”
When he was through, we both slept.
ADAM WENT WITH ME TO RETURN THE BOOK TO PHIN the next morning, an hour before the store opened. The book was still wrapped in Kyle’s towel and had apparently traveled from Kyle’s linen closet to Adam’s with no fuss. Darryl and Auriele had brought it to us, along with a new coat for me and clothes for Adam, since his hadn’t survived. Darryl didn’t crack a smile, though it would have been obvious to him what we’d been doing, even if he’d been a human and didn’t have the nose of a wolf. Instead, both he and Auriele had observed us with a satisfaction I found a little disconcerting. I was glad when they’d left us.
Phin was at his desk in the bookstore, looking very much as he had the first time I’d seen him, except that he’d lost a little weight: a man of indeterminate age with fading golden hair and good-humored eyes. There were a few new bookcases, but otherwise the bookstore looked much as it had the first time I’d seen it.
“Hey, Mercy. Adam,” Phin said with a friendly smile.
“Hey. I have something for you.” I unrolled the towel carefully and set the book on the counter.
When I touched it, the leather was butter soft under my fingertips.
“Ariana has a fine sense of irony,” observed Adam, reading the title for the first time—Magic Made was embossed on the cover and spine in gold. “Hard to believe that is glamour.”
“It isn’t, quite,” said Ariana, coming around the end of a bookshelf.
She’d changed her appearance. She didn’t look like a middle-aged woman anymore; instead, she’d altered her real appearance just enough that she looked human. Her skin was tanned and human-smooth, her eyes gray, and her hair as blond as Phin’s must have been when he was a young man.
She looked at Adam for a moment, and he stayed still with the coaxing quietness of a man trying not to startle a wild creature.
“You’ve changed,” she told him, relaxing a little. “She contents your wolf.”
“I’m sorry I frightened you.” Adam’s voice was carefully gentle, and I remembered that he’d said she hadn’t been able to stay in the same room with him.
She shook her head. “Not your fault—neither the old fear or the new. But still, you are not so terrifying now.” With a resolute breath and raised chin, she strode across the store to us.
She looked at the book and shook her head. “You cause me more trouble.” To Adam and me, she said, almost shyly, “Would you like to see what it really looks like?”
“Please,” I said.
She put both of her hands on the book, and I felt a wave of magic. She picked up the book, and when she moved it, a small silver statue of a bird was left behind. A lark, I thought, though I was no expert. It was no bigger than the palm of my hand and amazingly realistic. I looked at the book sitting next to it.
“The best disguises are real,” she said. “I just used the book to hide the artifact.”
Adam put his hand on my shoulder, bent down, and said, “Such a small thing to cause so much trouble.” And he kissed the top of my ear.