Catalyst
Rating: M
Pairing: DG/Cain
Summary: She really needed to put a better lock on her door because Cain was definitely violating her personal space. Then again, knowing him, he’d shoot the lock off and then where would she be? Probably in a room that had a door with a smoking hole in it… She needed to make some friends that didn’t pop out of cramped and questionable materials, but she digressed.
Disclaimer: Not mine, not mine, not mine.
She knocked on her sister’s door impatiently. When she didn’t get an answer she pounded and yelled. “Az! Time to get up and play with your baby sister!” The guards standing in the hall glanced at her and she saw them fighting off smiles as they tried to be tough and menacing. What a waste of time. The only one that could see them was her. Having accidently stumbled over a few of them loitering, she was under no delusion that they were this scary in real life.
There was movement, and a few moments later Az opened the door. She tried not to laugh. Her sister’s hair was a tangled mess and she was clutching a robe closed around her neck. Her dark eyes were bleary with sleep and she was clearly grumpy at being woken up. Az wasn’t much for drama but she did like her beauty sleep. Today she was going to have to go without. They had things to do. Her sister wasn’t aware of that yet because she was greeted with an extremely unfriendly glare. “It is five in the morning.”
“I know.”
“Why aren’t you sleeping?”
“I did for about an hour but then I woke up and I feel totally wired. And I figured since we had stuff to do we might as well start now.” Twenty minutes ago her eyes had snapped open and she’d known without a doubt that sleep was no longer an option.
She’d snuck out of bed to let Wyatt rest, after last night he so deserved it, and had her mind set on getting Az so they could work on making multiple doubles. The sooner they did that the better. Then the tin man could put his plan in motion and they could go back to a life that wasn’t full of explosions or sneak attacks, at least for a while. She was fairly proud that she’d taken a bath, cleaned up, and dressed without waking him. Either she was sneakier than she thought, he was now used to her moving around, or he was dead tired. With the night they’d had she was guessing it was the last one with a dash of the second. It was amazing how much could change in a few weeks.
Az never blinked. “It is five in the morning.”
“You said that already.” And people accused her of not listening. That was crap. She always listened. Sometimes she simply chose to ignore what they said. Huge difference.
“What is so important that it can’t wait until seven?”
“I’ll tell you if you let me in.” With the way things were blowing up and creepy people were sneaking in she didn’t even trust their guards anymore. She hated that. She hated that she had become nearly as paranoid as the tin man and Jeb. Nearly, of course. No one else could come close to the two of them. It was downright creepy how much those two had in common when you got right down to it. She was afraid to know what might happen if she and Cain stayed together and had their own children. Not that she’d spent much time thinking about it but really. Talk about a dangerous baby.
She took a step forward and Az shoved her hand out and stopped her dead. Stumbling back, she glanced at her sister. Her robe had fallen open at the quick move and she saw her sister had a pretty green nightgown on underneath. She didn’t fully understand why she was hiding it because it was a very trendy looking piece of sleepwear.
Az spoke, interrupting her admiration. “Is anyone going to die in the next three hours if this isn’t done right now?”
She thought about that briefly. “I can’t say for sure but my guess would be no-“ Az stepped back and slammed the door in her face. Her nose was nearly smacked off and she let out a small yelp. Then she banged on the door. “Hey! Totally uncalled for and overdramatized dismissal! Open the door!”
“I will at seven.” She heard through the wooden paneling.
“But, Az! I’ll get you coffee! We-“
“Seven!” Her sister shouted.
Pouting at the door she grumbled and turned around. Kindly the guards avoided her eyes as she walked dejectedly by them. She supposed she could go get started by herself if Az wasn’t going to get up to help her. Some sister she had. Heading toward the library she skipped down a few stairs as she tried to work out what this was going to take to make more than one copy of herself.
Other than a rather extreme amount of magic from both of them she would need Az to make the copies. Then she could stabilize them while her sister created more. That should work if they practiced. Her sister would get to craft her magic like a flimsy gauze and she could make it strong as steel when she was finished. Really, it should all work out if they melded together carefully enough. Her confidence grew the closer she got to her destination.
Turning into the large room that housed all the books she flicked her hand and her magic flared out. All the lights came on with a flash and she hummed contentedly. She had rebounded fast enough, although even the candy she’d consumed couldn’t stop her body from aching. She felt bruised all over, or maybe like she’d worked out far too hard the day before. Ignoring the feeling she flipped a piece of candy out of her pocket and popped the treat in her mouth. On her way out of her room she’d shoved a handful of sweets in her pockets. Almost immediately the pain subsided. Pleased, she attacked the nearest bookshelf and began searching for any book that might help her figure out the best way to assemble multiple illusions. Since she had never read a spell about it she figured a rather hefty amount of improvisation would be needed, but any information would be helpful at this point. Maybe if this worked she could add her own creation to the library. That would be really satisfying come to think about it.
An hour later she was cursing her stature as she put her feet on the bottom of one of the many shelves and reached up toward a book she could see but not reach. She thought the thing was silently mocking her hanging just out of reach the way it was, but that was only a guess. She had little to no insight n the thought processes of magi books. An arm appeared out of nowhere behind her and plucked the volume out of it’s place. It lowered it to her and she tossed her head back. Wyatt was behind her and she smiled up at him happily.
“Good morning.” She chirped perkily.
“Good morning.” She took the tome and spun around to face him. He had a cup of steaming coffee in his left hand and he looked tired. He should have slept more but she supposed with his office blown up, his son attacked, and her nearly dying he didn’t have the motivation to relax long enough to laze about in bed. “I woke up and you were gone.”
“Oh.” She kissed his cheek briefly before going to the table she’d been piling her finds up on. Considering what they’d done last night she was terribly distracted from him at the moment. “I couldn’t sleep and I thought I’d figure out how to make a bunch of me. I like your plan. At least the overall idea. You’re going to have to hammer out the details if I can get this to work though, Tin Man.”
He followed her and set the mug down before tugging gently on her arm. She turned to face him and he kissed her forehead gently. She could suddenly see he was frustrated and trying to hide it. Usually she noticed things like that. She must be more off her game than she thought after her drain and lack of sleep. “Could you tell me before you leave next time?”
“You’d rather I wake you up then let you sleep?” She questioned. To her that was horribly wrong. Sleep should be savored like fine wine. Especially when it was so hard to come by anymore.
“Yes, I didn’t know where you were. I don’t like havin’ you up and vanish on me.”
Her eyes softened. “I’m sorry.” She leaned into him in apology. Of course he wouldn’t like that. How stupid of her. “That didn’t occur to me. I thought it would be better to let you sleep.”
“I appreciate the consideration, but wake me up. I want to know you left on your own.”
“I will.” When she went up on her toes he lowered his head so she could peck him on the lips. When she rocked back down to the flats of her feet she sent him a smile. “I thought you were going to see Jeb?”
“I wanted to be sure you were okay first. I doubt Jeb is up yet at any rate.”
“I doubt anyone is. Az wasn’t very nice about helping me this morning.” She turned her attention back to her books as she rolled her shoulders in an effort to loosen them up. “Although I suppose she’ll be here in a bit. She indicated seven was an appropriate time to begin planning the downfall of evil. I feel when evil strokes there shouldn’t be a set time to eradicate it. After all, time is a human construct to begin with. And if that’s the case I don’t see why we have to adhere to it so strictly.”
“Is this your way of trying to explain away being late to a meeting at some point in time?”
She shrugged thoughtfully. “I could use it for sure. I’ll have to be careful about who the meeting is with though. Maybe the trade guild. They bother me all the time. I could bother them back with logical, illogical reasoning.”
Cain rubbed the bridge of his nose at her rambling. It was far too early for him to follow any of it and she wasn’t even bothering to make it make sense. She was just talking. “I’m sure you could.”
“I’m sure of it. I don’t know what else to do with those people. You won’t shoot them for me.”
“I can’t just shoot people because they annoy you.”
“Excuses. I think you don’t love me. If you did you would make them leave me alone.”
“That’s it. Don’t worry about being an ambassador or the princess of peace. We’ll destroy them all and start over.” He changed the subject after the sarcastic and dry agreement. “Why are you wigglin’ like that?”
“Huh?” She suddenly noticed she was shifting her weight. With a small grumbled she pulled out another piece of candy and started chewing. When she swallowed she felt better again. “Apparently the candy only works for about twenty minutes.”
Wyatt frowned and put his hands on her shoulders as he stepped behind her. He began to rub her firmly and she leaned back into him. Tingles of pleasure raced down her spine and her eyes hooded in pleasure. He was so good at this. She wondered what it would take to bribe him to give her a full massage that was uninterrupted by people knocking on the door or work. Most likely all she’d have to do was ask, but that really seemed like a lot. She wouldn’t mention it. “Maybe you should go back to bed, Deeg. How long were you sleepin’?”
“Not very long. I’ll probably crash in a couple of hours, but until then I’ll be productive.” Leaning back into his chest she smiled up at him. His hands squeezed down her arms before wrapping around her waist and holding her against him. His eyes were far away as he stared past her and at the piles of books she’d created.
“You need to find Raw once he wakes up so he can take care of the rest of your bruises.”
“I will.” She put her arms over his. “You finish your coffee and go talk to Jeb before you work yourself up any more.”
He sent her a disbelieving look. “I’m not workin’ myself up.”
“Liar.” Turning in his embrace she wrapped her arms around his middle. “He’s your son, Wyatt. He’ll love you whether I’m here or not.”
He sighed and turned his attention to her face. “It took me two years to get things settled between us. I didn’t like havin’ my own son feel like a stranger to me. That’s not how it’s supposed to be. I want my family to be a family. Right now everything’s separated. He’s already worked up about what happened to Olivia and Sam.”
Reaching up she cupped his face. She needed to diffuse him. “Okay. What do you need from me to make that happen?”
His eyes warmed considerably. “Right now I don’t need you to do anything but work on this spell.”
“But you’ll let me know when I need to change tactics?”
“If it comes to that. I’m sure I’m makin’ too much of this.” Bending his head down he kissed her warmly before letting her go. “Make sure you eat somethin’ other than sugar this mornin’.”
She rolled her eyes and began to flip through pages with one hand as she scribbled notes with the other. “Away with you. You have a general to talk to and I have an illusion spell to break down and rebuild from scratch.” She shook her head. “And I thought algebra was hard.” The tin man stood where he was beside her and she kicked his boot gently. “Standing here and admiring me, while flattering, is not going to get anything accomplished.”
“I’m goin’.” He sighed as he turned toward the door.
He made it two feet before she looked back up at him. “Hey, Wyatt?” He paused and turned his attention to her. “Be careful, all right?”
He nodded seriously as she was grateful he was taking her fears of him getting hurt more seriously than he had last night. “I will.” With that he stepped out into the hall and vanished. She stared after him for several long seconds as anxiety rolled around her stomach before she returned her attention to the books. If she dwelled on her worry she wouldn’t get anything done and eventually one of them really would die. Focusing on her task she pulled out a clean sheet of paper and started making a diagram. She thought she might have a tentative idea of what they needed to do now but this was going to be hardcore trial and error for her and Az.
By the time she’d destroyed her first two sketches, both of them had been far too simplistic, her sister made an appearance. She was dressed in a simple dress, her preferred attire, and seemed much more willing to be awake than she had several hours ago. “Okay. What are we doing?”
She nodded toward the assortment of material as she drew meticulously. “Wyatt had a good idea yesterday before his office blew up. I think between us we can-“
“His office blew up?” Her sister cut in.
Surprised, she looked up. How had she not heard about this? “Yeah.”
Alarm filled her sister. “Is he hurt? What happened?”
“He’s fine. There was a booby trap on his door. Luckily he heard the bomb before it went off and I shimmered us out-“
“You were there?” She thought her sister might start to hyperventilate or melt something in rage. With her it could go either way.
“Everyone is fine-“
Her sister puffed up. “You were nearly blown up and everything is fine? You could have been killed! You could have been hurt!”
You know what? She was going to skip over her flightless journey down the staircase for the moment. She didn’t need Az worked up any higher than she already was. “But everything is fine. Can you help me please? If we can do this I think we can get Vy-sor.”
Az pushed her rage down and picked up one of the discarded sheets of paper. Her lips moved silently as she read the notes scrawled around the page. Her eyebrows came together as a delicate frown overcame her. “Multi layer illusions?” She picked up another page as she sat down. “Deeg, this is going to be impossible.”
“I disagree. Nearly impossible perhaps, but I have yet to meet impossible.”
Az muttered something under her breath as she picked up one of the pencils and began to change the most recently disregarded sketch. “You’ll have to add at least five more layers.”
“I thought about that but we need too many separate illusions to sustain that kind of power.”
“How many are you envisioning?”
“Optimistically seven, but realistically I think we could hold five together.”
Her sister scribbled some more. “Three of you and two of me or the other way around?”
“That’s up to the tin man. This is his idea. I’m not entirely sure where he wants this ambush of his to take place. I don’t know which one of us Vy-sor wants dead more either.” She dragged a book to her. “It could be five of you and none of me by the time this is done.”
“That could make a difference.”
“How does that make a difference? They’re illusions either way.”
“But they’ll act differently. It will strain our magic in very distinctive ways. We’ll need to be ready for the difference.”
She threw herself back in her chair with a frustrated breath. “Great. I hadn’t even thought of that.”
“Which is why I’m here.” Her sister had gone calm and soothing. “Let’s start at the middle and work our way out.” She stood up and sorted through the books on the table. “And there are a few books we’ll need that you haven’t pulled. I’ll go get them if you get some more paper. I have a feeling this is going to require a lot of diagrams.”
“Do you think I should get Toto?”
Az nodded as she held one book open and ran her finger down it as she read the passage. “It couldn’t hurt. He’s probably better at nit picky mechanics than both of us combined. We’re going to need that at the base of this or the illusions will unravel before we’re even halfway done.” She closed the cover. “And how long do we need to keep these running?”
“As long as possible.”
“Go get, Tutor.” Her sister walked toward the back. “Then we can get started.”
She leaned back and called after her. “I’ve been started for two hours!”
“Then we’ll get started again the right way.”
“That hurts me, Az!” She stuck her tongue out at her retreating figure before getting up. If her sister was going to get prissy about this she was just going to have to outshine her. It was the only course of action.
Author Note: Soooo sorry this took so long. There were many things happening in my life but I won’t bore you with reality. Enjoy and I’ll get the next chapter out much sooner than this one.
Pairing: DG/Cain
Summary: She really needed to put a better lock on her door because Cain was definitely violating her personal space. Then again, knowing him, he’d shoot the lock off and then where would she be? Probably in a room that had a door with a smoking hole in it… She needed to make some friends that didn’t pop out of cramped and questionable materials, but she digressed.
Disclaimer: Not mine, not mine, not mine.
She knocked on her sister’s door impatiently. When she didn’t get an answer she pounded and yelled. “Az! Time to get up and play with your baby sister!” The guards standing in the hall glanced at her and she saw them fighting off smiles as they tried to be tough and menacing. What a waste of time. The only one that could see them was her. Having accidently stumbled over a few of them loitering, she was under no delusion that they were this scary in real life.
There was movement, and a few moments later Az opened the door. She tried not to laugh. Her sister’s hair was a tangled mess and she was clutching a robe closed around her neck. Her dark eyes were bleary with sleep and she was clearly grumpy at being woken up. Az wasn’t much for drama but she did like her beauty sleep. Today she was going to have to go without. They had things to do. Her sister wasn’t aware of that yet because she was greeted with an extremely unfriendly glare. “It is five in the morning.”
“I know.”
“Why aren’t you sleeping?”
“I did for about an hour but then I woke up and I feel totally wired. And I figured since we had stuff to do we might as well start now.” Twenty minutes ago her eyes had snapped open and she’d known without a doubt that sleep was no longer an option.
She’d snuck out of bed to let Wyatt rest, after last night he so deserved it, and had her mind set on getting Az so they could work on making multiple doubles. The sooner they did that the better. Then the tin man could put his plan in motion and they could go back to a life that wasn’t full of explosions or sneak attacks, at least for a while. She was fairly proud that she’d taken a bath, cleaned up, and dressed without waking him. Either she was sneakier than she thought, he was now used to her moving around, or he was dead tired. With the night they’d had she was guessing it was the last one with a dash of the second. It was amazing how much could change in a few weeks.
Az never blinked. “It is five in the morning.”
“You said that already.” And people accused her of not listening. That was crap. She always listened. Sometimes she simply chose to ignore what they said. Huge difference.
“What is so important that it can’t wait until seven?”
“I’ll tell you if you let me in.” With the way things were blowing up and creepy people were sneaking in she didn’t even trust their guards anymore. She hated that. She hated that she had become nearly as paranoid as the tin man and Jeb. Nearly, of course. No one else could come close to the two of them. It was downright creepy how much those two had in common when you got right down to it. She was afraid to know what might happen if she and Cain stayed together and had their own children. Not that she’d spent much time thinking about it but really. Talk about a dangerous baby.
She took a step forward and Az shoved her hand out and stopped her dead. Stumbling back, she glanced at her sister. Her robe had fallen open at the quick move and she saw her sister had a pretty green nightgown on underneath. She didn’t fully understand why she was hiding it because it was a very trendy looking piece of sleepwear.
Az spoke, interrupting her admiration. “Is anyone going to die in the next three hours if this isn’t done right now?”
She thought about that briefly. “I can’t say for sure but my guess would be no-“ Az stepped back and slammed the door in her face. Her nose was nearly smacked off and she let out a small yelp. Then she banged on the door. “Hey! Totally uncalled for and overdramatized dismissal! Open the door!”
“I will at seven.” She heard through the wooden paneling.
“But, Az! I’ll get you coffee! We-“
“Seven!” Her sister shouted.
Pouting at the door she grumbled and turned around. Kindly the guards avoided her eyes as she walked dejectedly by them. She supposed she could go get started by herself if Az wasn’t going to get up to help her. Some sister she had. Heading toward the library she skipped down a few stairs as she tried to work out what this was going to take to make more than one copy of herself.
Other than a rather extreme amount of magic from both of them she would need Az to make the copies. Then she could stabilize them while her sister created more. That should work if they practiced. Her sister would get to craft her magic like a flimsy gauze and she could make it strong as steel when she was finished. Really, it should all work out if they melded together carefully enough. Her confidence grew the closer she got to her destination.
Turning into the large room that housed all the books she flicked her hand and her magic flared out. All the lights came on with a flash and she hummed contentedly. She had rebounded fast enough, although even the candy she’d consumed couldn’t stop her body from aching. She felt bruised all over, or maybe like she’d worked out far too hard the day before. Ignoring the feeling she flipped a piece of candy out of her pocket and popped the treat in her mouth. On her way out of her room she’d shoved a handful of sweets in her pockets. Almost immediately the pain subsided. Pleased, she attacked the nearest bookshelf and began searching for any book that might help her figure out the best way to assemble multiple illusions. Since she had never read a spell about it she figured a rather hefty amount of improvisation would be needed, but any information would be helpful at this point. Maybe if this worked she could add her own creation to the library. That would be really satisfying come to think about it.
An hour later she was cursing her stature as she put her feet on the bottom of one of the many shelves and reached up toward a book she could see but not reach. She thought the thing was silently mocking her hanging just out of reach the way it was, but that was only a guess. She had little to no insight n the thought processes of magi books. An arm appeared out of nowhere behind her and plucked the volume out of it’s place. It lowered it to her and she tossed her head back. Wyatt was behind her and she smiled up at him happily.
“Good morning.” She chirped perkily.
“Good morning.” She took the tome and spun around to face him. He had a cup of steaming coffee in his left hand and he looked tired. He should have slept more but she supposed with his office blown up, his son attacked, and her nearly dying he didn’t have the motivation to relax long enough to laze about in bed. “I woke up and you were gone.”
“Oh.” She kissed his cheek briefly before going to the table she’d been piling her finds up on. Considering what they’d done last night she was terribly distracted from him at the moment. “I couldn’t sleep and I thought I’d figure out how to make a bunch of me. I like your plan. At least the overall idea. You’re going to have to hammer out the details if I can get this to work though, Tin Man.”
He followed her and set the mug down before tugging gently on her arm. She turned to face him and he kissed her forehead gently. She could suddenly see he was frustrated and trying to hide it. Usually she noticed things like that. She must be more off her game than she thought after her drain and lack of sleep. “Could you tell me before you leave next time?”
“You’d rather I wake you up then let you sleep?” She questioned. To her that was horribly wrong. Sleep should be savored like fine wine. Especially when it was so hard to come by anymore.
“Yes, I didn’t know where you were. I don’t like havin’ you up and vanish on me.”
Her eyes softened. “I’m sorry.” She leaned into him in apology. Of course he wouldn’t like that. How stupid of her. “That didn’t occur to me. I thought it would be better to let you sleep.”
“I appreciate the consideration, but wake me up. I want to know you left on your own.”
“I will.” When she went up on her toes he lowered his head so she could peck him on the lips. When she rocked back down to the flats of her feet she sent him a smile. “I thought you were going to see Jeb?”
“I wanted to be sure you were okay first. I doubt Jeb is up yet at any rate.”
“I doubt anyone is. Az wasn’t very nice about helping me this morning.” She turned her attention back to her books as she rolled her shoulders in an effort to loosen them up. “Although I suppose she’ll be here in a bit. She indicated seven was an appropriate time to begin planning the downfall of evil. I feel when evil strokes there shouldn’t be a set time to eradicate it. After all, time is a human construct to begin with. And if that’s the case I don’t see why we have to adhere to it so strictly.”
“Is this your way of trying to explain away being late to a meeting at some point in time?”
She shrugged thoughtfully. “I could use it for sure. I’ll have to be careful about who the meeting is with though. Maybe the trade guild. They bother me all the time. I could bother them back with logical, illogical reasoning.”
Cain rubbed the bridge of his nose at her rambling. It was far too early for him to follow any of it and she wasn’t even bothering to make it make sense. She was just talking. “I’m sure you could.”
“I’m sure of it. I don’t know what else to do with those people. You won’t shoot them for me.”
“I can’t just shoot people because they annoy you.”
“Excuses. I think you don’t love me. If you did you would make them leave me alone.”
“That’s it. Don’t worry about being an ambassador or the princess of peace. We’ll destroy them all and start over.” He changed the subject after the sarcastic and dry agreement. “Why are you wigglin’ like that?”
“Huh?” She suddenly noticed she was shifting her weight. With a small grumbled she pulled out another piece of candy and started chewing. When she swallowed she felt better again. “Apparently the candy only works for about twenty minutes.”
Wyatt frowned and put his hands on her shoulders as he stepped behind her. He began to rub her firmly and she leaned back into him. Tingles of pleasure raced down her spine and her eyes hooded in pleasure. He was so good at this. She wondered what it would take to bribe him to give her a full massage that was uninterrupted by people knocking on the door or work. Most likely all she’d have to do was ask, but that really seemed like a lot. She wouldn’t mention it. “Maybe you should go back to bed, Deeg. How long were you sleepin’?”
“Not very long. I’ll probably crash in a couple of hours, but until then I’ll be productive.” Leaning back into his chest she smiled up at him. His hands squeezed down her arms before wrapping around her waist and holding her against him. His eyes were far away as he stared past her and at the piles of books she’d created.
“You need to find Raw once he wakes up so he can take care of the rest of your bruises.”
“I will.” She put her arms over his. “You finish your coffee and go talk to Jeb before you work yourself up any more.”
He sent her a disbelieving look. “I’m not workin’ myself up.”
“Liar.” Turning in his embrace she wrapped her arms around his middle. “He’s your son, Wyatt. He’ll love you whether I’m here or not.”
He sighed and turned his attention to her face. “It took me two years to get things settled between us. I didn’t like havin’ my own son feel like a stranger to me. That’s not how it’s supposed to be. I want my family to be a family. Right now everything’s separated. He’s already worked up about what happened to Olivia and Sam.”
Reaching up she cupped his face. She needed to diffuse him. “Okay. What do you need from me to make that happen?”
His eyes warmed considerably. “Right now I don’t need you to do anything but work on this spell.”
“But you’ll let me know when I need to change tactics?”
“If it comes to that. I’m sure I’m makin’ too much of this.” Bending his head down he kissed her warmly before letting her go. “Make sure you eat somethin’ other than sugar this mornin’.”
She rolled her eyes and began to flip through pages with one hand as she scribbled notes with the other. “Away with you. You have a general to talk to and I have an illusion spell to break down and rebuild from scratch.” She shook her head. “And I thought algebra was hard.” The tin man stood where he was beside her and she kicked his boot gently. “Standing here and admiring me, while flattering, is not going to get anything accomplished.”
“I’m goin’.” He sighed as he turned toward the door.
He made it two feet before she looked back up at him. “Hey, Wyatt?” He paused and turned his attention to her. “Be careful, all right?”
He nodded seriously as she was grateful he was taking her fears of him getting hurt more seriously than he had last night. “I will.” With that he stepped out into the hall and vanished. She stared after him for several long seconds as anxiety rolled around her stomach before she returned her attention to the books. If she dwelled on her worry she wouldn’t get anything done and eventually one of them really would die. Focusing on her task she pulled out a clean sheet of paper and started making a diagram. She thought she might have a tentative idea of what they needed to do now but this was going to be hardcore trial and error for her and Az.
By the time she’d destroyed her first two sketches, both of them had been far too simplistic, her sister made an appearance. She was dressed in a simple dress, her preferred attire, and seemed much more willing to be awake than she had several hours ago. “Okay. What are we doing?”
She nodded toward the assortment of material as she drew meticulously. “Wyatt had a good idea yesterday before his office blew up. I think between us we can-“
“His office blew up?” Her sister cut in.
Surprised, she looked up. How had she not heard about this? “Yeah.”
Alarm filled her sister. “Is he hurt? What happened?”
“He’s fine. There was a booby trap on his door. Luckily he heard the bomb before it went off and I shimmered us out-“
“You were there?” She thought her sister might start to hyperventilate or melt something in rage. With her it could go either way.
“Everyone is fine-“
Her sister puffed up. “You were nearly blown up and everything is fine? You could have been killed! You could have been hurt!”
You know what? She was going to skip over her flightless journey down the staircase for the moment. She didn’t need Az worked up any higher than she already was. “But everything is fine. Can you help me please? If we can do this I think we can get Vy-sor.”
Az pushed her rage down and picked up one of the discarded sheets of paper. Her lips moved silently as she read the notes scrawled around the page. Her eyebrows came together as a delicate frown overcame her. “Multi layer illusions?” She picked up another page as she sat down. “Deeg, this is going to be impossible.”
“I disagree. Nearly impossible perhaps, but I have yet to meet impossible.”
Az muttered something under her breath as she picked up one of the pencils and began to change the most recently disregarded sketch. “You’ll have to add at least five more layers.”
“I thought about that but we need too many separate illusions to sustain that kind of power.”
“How many are you envisioning?”
“Optimistically seven, but realistically I think we could hold five together.”
Her sister scribbled some more. “Three of you and two of me or the other way around?”
“That’s up to the tin man. This is his idea. I’m not entirely sure where he wants this ambush of his to take place. I don’t know which one of us Vy-sor wants dead more either.” She dragged a book to her. “It could be five of you and none of me by the time this is done.”
“That could make a difference.”
“How does that make a difference? They’re illusions either way.”
“But they’ll act differently. It will strain our magic in very distinctive ways. We’ll need to be ready for the difference.”
She threw herself back in her chair with a frustrated breath. “Great. I hadn’t even thought of that.”
“Which is why I’m here.” Her sister had gone calm and soothing. “Let’s start at the middle and work our way out.” She stood up and sorted through the books on the table. “And there are a few books we’ll need that you haven’t pulled. I’ll go get them if you get some more paper. I have a feeling this is going to require a lot of diagrams.”
“Do you think I should get Toto?”
Az nodded as she held one book open and ran her finger down it as she read the passage. “It couldn’t hurt. He’s probably better at nit picky mechanics than both of us combined. We’re going to need that at the base of this or the illusions will unravel before we’re even halfway done.” She closed the cover. “And how long do we need to keep these running?”
“As long as possible.”
“Go get, Tutor.” Her sister walked toward the back. “Then we can get started.”
She leaned back and called after her. “I’ve been started for two hours!”
“Then we’ll get started again the right way.”
“That hurts me, Az!” She stuck her tongue out at her retreating figure before getting up. If her sister was going to get prissy about this she was just going to have to outshine her. It was the only course of action.
Author Note: Soooo sorry this took so long. There were many things happening in my life but I won’t bore you with reality. Enjoy and I’ll get the next chapter out much sooner than this one.