Natalie laughed. “You have that dream, too?”
“Well, that’s the way I feel right now. Like I got started late and I’ll never catch up with all this magic business.” Emma downshifted as she navigated past the square and turned north toward the lake.
“Trust me,” Natalie said. “The only reason I know this much is I spent a summer in Trinity apprenticing with one of the sorcerers there. Mainliner history isn’t a focus of the curriculum at the Anchorage. In a way, Gabriel’s still a separatist.”
“Seems like it’s not working out that well for him either,” Emma observed.
It was nearly dark when they reached their destination, a small Victorian house on a leafy street that edged the lake. Tiny orange lights outlined the doors and windows and sparkled in the trees. Emma turned into a gravel driveway, past a large sign that said The Party is here! and pulled up behind Jonah’s van, which was parked in the drive as close to the side door as he could get. The others must have just arrived, because they had the rear doors open and were unloading equipment onto the drive. Alison, Jonah, and Rudy were dressed casually, like musicians ready for a gig.
I knew this was a bad idea, Emma thought, plucking at her own gloves.
Jonah was kneeling in the back of the van, his muscled chest and arms flexing as he lifted amplifiers and speakers down to Rudy, his black hair ruffled by the wind from the lake. Emma’s heart clenched. He was just so damned pleasurable to look at.
Natalie had poked through Jonah’s clothes, looking for wardrobe options. Then they’d argued for another hour. The negotiation had ended with Jonah in a skintight, paper-thin vintage Ramones T-shirt and faded blue jeans. And his trademark gloves.
When Rudy saw Emma and Natalie approaching, he nearly dropped the speaker he was holding. “Whoa!” he said. “Guess they don’t need us for sex appeal.”
Alison stared at them. “Nobody said we were dressing up,” she said, twisting the ends of her hair.
“Meet Lady Day,” Natalie announced, stepping aside to showcase her work. “Lady sings the blues.”
Jonah looked up, then did a double take. Sitting back on his heels, he stared at Emma, his face transitioning from surprise to wistful resignation. Like somebody who’s hungry and knows he won’t ever get fed. Emma could feel her cheeks heating, pinking up under his scrutiny.
We can’t be together, he’d said. Not now, and not at any other time.
Granted, maybe Emma was misreading him, but the signals he was sending definitely seemed mixed.
By the time she got close, he’d cleared his face of emotion. Nearly. “So,” he said, his eyes on her ruby-red lips. “You’re Billie Holiday?”
“Sort of,” she said, “though I guess you’re more of a torch singer than I am.”
He smiled, reached out, and fingered a tendril of her hair. “You look amazing,” he said. “It’s hard to imagine that anyone would recognize you.”
“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” Emma asked. “If so, it’s hitting my ear wrong.”
She noticed something glittering at his neck and leaned closer. It was a pendant, hanging from a chain. A flower pendant just like hers.
His blue-green eyes met hers, his gloved hand closed over the pendant, and he tucked it out of sight.
“Come on,” Alison said. “Let’s get this gear inside.”
“What was that?” Emma asked, still staring at Jonah’s neck.
“Nothing,” he said, climbing down from the van. Scooping up two guitar cases, he led the way to the door.
A very tall, broad-shouldered guy wearing a black mask met them there. He wore a linen shirt with voluminous sleeves, a tight-fitting studded leather vest over it, velvet pantaloons and tights, and leather gauntlets.
Something about the mask pinged in Emma’s memory. A word came back to her. Zorro.
“Um. Jack?” Jonah said, raising his eyebrows.
“I hoped you wouldn’t recognize me,” Jack replied, scowling. “Would a hat help?” He plunked a velvet hat with a feather plume on his head. Reaching over his shoulder, he pulled a lute out of a sling on his back and cradled it in his arms. “What about now?”
“You still handle that lute like it’s a sword, Jack.” A girl appeared in the doorway next to him. “Don’t forget yourself and try and skewer someone with it.” She was nearly as tall as Jack, wearing a long velvet gown with a laced bodice and cathedral sleeves that hugged her athletic frame. Her hair was tucked up under a jeweled net. “I told you black leather and gauntlets wouldn’t work for a minstrel.” She studied him, rubbing her chin. “Though I must say . . . leather suits you. And you should wear tights more often. You do have a fine leg.”
“If you’ll recall, I wanted to go with the gladiator costumes,” Jack said, stripping off the mask and hat and tossing them aside.
“Then everybody would recognize us for sure,” the girl said.
Emma guessed that these two would be recognizable in any costumes. “Who are you supposed to be?” she asked, curiosity getting the better of her.
“He’s a wandering minstrel, and I’m the highborn lady who runs off with him,” the girl said. “Also, an assassin.” Shaking back her sleeves, she revealed twin daggers in wrist sheaths.
“I don’t think the assassin part works,” Jack said. “You criticize my leather, and then you—”
“Weapons go with everything, Jack,” she said, twitching her sleeves down, concealing them again. Her eyes flicked over Emma in her finery. “That’s a great dress,” she said.
“I’m Ellen Stephenson, and the man with the fine leg is Jack Swift.”
Now that she heard the names, Emma recognized the two of them from the photographs Rowan had shown her of suspects in the murders at Tyler’s house. As warriors, they definitely seemed capable of causing mayhem. If they recognized Emma, they showed no signs of it.
“I’m Emma Lee. I’m a new student at the Anchorage.”
She had that story down, at least.
“Really? I didn’t know you were accepting new students,” Jack said to Jonah.
“We needed a new guitar player,” Jonah said, his voice cool and businesslike. “So we made an exception.”
Jack got the message. “Look, Jonah, on behalf of nearly everyone, I’d like to apologize for those idiots at the council meeting. They were not the sharpest knives in the drawer to begin with, and having their children kidnapped adds that extra layer of—I don’t know—hysteria.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Jonah said. “Savants are used to that kind of talk from mainliners. Where do you want us to set up?”
“In the conservatory,” Jack said. “Here, I’ll show you.” Picking up an amplifier like it was made of Styrofoam, he led them to the rear of the house, to a stone-floored room with two stories of windows overlooking the lake. “We’re expecting several hundred people, and this is the only room that might begin to hold them.” He pointed up at a balcony overlooking the space. “The bar and the food will be set up on the balcony. We’ve got heaters out on the terrace, and we’re hoping they will keep it warm enough that people will dance out there.”
Ellen pointed them to a spot on the opposite wall from the massive hearth. “We were thinking this might be a good place for you. You’re out of the line of traffic, and away from the draft from the doors, but you won’t get overheated either. But if someplace else works better, let us know.”
“This works,” Rudy said, dropping his load of sound equipment in the corner, along an inside wall. He and Alison set to work, plugging in and testing the sound system.
Jack nudged a power strip along the wall with the toe of his boot. “You’ve got plenty of power here, but let me know if you need any extension cords or anything. We were thinking you could start the first set an hour after people begin arriving, play an hour, break for an hour, and then play a second hour-long set. We’ll use a playlist in between. That way, most everyone coming and going during the evening will get to hear you, and you’ll have time to party, too. Or . . . ah . . . not,” he added, seeing Jonah’s expression.
“That sounds good,” Emma said. “You’re warriors, right? Do you ever get to fight these days?” Well, she thought, that was about as subtle as a brick to the head.
“We get in a lot of sparring,” Jack said. “We work out regularly with a diverse group of . . . of fighters.” He nodded toward Jonah. “Didn’t Jonah tell you? We had a great bout with him. We’ve been trying to get him to come out and spar with us again.”
“What?” Emma swung around to face Jonah. “You never told me you were a fighter!”
“He’s an amazing fighter,” Ellen said, with frank admiration. “It took me and Jack both to beat him.”
“Are you talking about martial arts, or—or—”
“With swords,” Ellen said, looking from Emma to Jonah, as if puzzled by the questions.
Jonah rubbed the back of his neck. “Fencing is one of the phys ed options at school,” he said, not meeting Emma’s eyes. “You can sign up if you want. I’ll go collect more of our gear.” Turning on his heel, he walked out of the conservatory.
Troubled, Emma watched him go. She’d known he was athletically gifted . . . she’d seen him in action that night in Bratenahl . . . how strong he was, how easily he scaled the cliff face. It was one more indication of how little she knew about him . . . how little they knew about each other.
Once they got set up, they did a sound check. Emma had chosen her amplified SG, Jonah the Stratocaster, the guitar he felt most comfortable with. The acoustics weren’t optimal, what with the stone floor and glass wall. They never were, for this kind of gig.
Natalie went over the set list on her tablet. “If we’re doing two hour-long sets, we’ll plan on about forty-five minutes of actual music for each, and fifteen minutes for chitchat and equipment changes.”