It was only now, in a worn leather booth of this pub, that the edges of everything softened and she could see a glimmer of the souls of those seated around the tables and the bar. This world was framed by the other world, the one that could only be accessed by those who possessed the sight. She had a vision of her sister walking down an alleyway with water rising on either side of her, and glittering silver fish swimming over the cement, and bells ringing. There was no mistaking a prediction of love. She looked into her teacup and an image of Sally flared as she knocked upon a door, her heart in her hand.
What was happening to Gillian here in London, and what on earth was taking Sally so long? Gillian had a sinking feeling when she thought of Sally navigating the world of left-handed magic. Despite her cool exterior, Sally was more vulnerable than she’d ever admit, and far more caring. On the night their parents had died, Sally had told Gillian to go to bed, then she had gotten out from beneath the covers and tiptoed through the inky darkness of the near-empty house to the living room. The world had altered. They had no parents and the night had been filled with shadows, so Gillian had scrambled out of bed to follow her sister. There was Sally in the dark, sobbing.
Thinking of that moment, Gillian now interrupted Franny and Vincent. “I’m afraid Sally’s not safe.”
They turned to her, unhappy to be drawn away from their conversation, but softening when they saw the worry in Gillian’s face.
“Don’t be silly,” Franny said. “We’re in London. What on earth could go wrong?”
* * *
Professor Ian Wright had taught at Oxford and at the University of St. Andrews, and although he’d been a great favorite with his students, he’d been let go from both positions because of his unorthodox teachings. He was now within days of finishing his life’s work, The History of Magic. He was actually at the point of copyediting, a time-consuming endeavor he had little choice but to accomplish, for the book was scheduled to be published by an American press in Illinois the following year.
Initially, he’d been wildly excited about coming to the end of this huge project, but that pride had evaporated into a strange sort of despair. He had spent his thirties and forties on the manuscript and the years had gone past much too quickly. As he reached the end of two decades of working on his book, which had grown to over a thousand pages, a monster he had no wish to slay, he felt the unique sadness of completing a task that had been set out when he was young, when time had seemed endless. He was still handsome at fifty, exceedingly so, with dark hair and dark, liquid eyes, and an obvious sexual power, but despite his good looks, he had no vanity, and even as a younger man, he’d barely glanced in a mirror. You never knew what you might find gazing back at you from the glass, especially in his line of work.
There were those who insisted that there were no demons in the world, but Ian knew otherwise. Take a turn to the left and you’d find darkness everywhere, in corners of rooms you’d walked through every day, on the streets late at night, in the hearts of men you thought you knew, and in your own heart as well. Then you had to choose. You were on the Crooked Path or you weren’t, or, if you dared, as he did, you walked the line between left and right, hoping you wouldn’t fall to your knees.
At present, Ian wore his hair long because he never had time to get a haircut and it nearly reached his shoulders, though he wore it pulled back with a leather band. He usually threw on a black jacket, a white shirt and black jeans, except for the times when he took to the street at five a.m. to run through the first gray light of morning. His work was risky, and he took chances; his daily runs provided a block of time when he was thinking of nothing but racing through a sleeping city. He’d started running not for health, but because he’d had a life of crime and knew what it was like to be trapped inside a cell. All that was long ago. He was still ashamed of his behavior, but not of what it had taught him. Some things stayed with you, the joy of throwing yourself into the world after you’d been caged, of going as fast as you could and not stopping for anything, not even red lights. Running still made the world seem like a dream, as it had back when he was fifteen and too alive to take heed of danger.