Small Persons With Wings (7 page)

“Dad,” Timmo muttered. “Geez.”

“Chief Wright.” Mom was trembling with suppressed laughter, which made me feel better. “Are you making some sort of accusation?” The clock upstairs chose this moment to start bonging, fifteen o'clock this time.

Chief Wright had no trouble talking over the noise. “No, ma'am. But I would like to know who told Mr. Turpin here that his father was dead.”

“His lawyer called,” Dad said, every word an icicle. “And then she wrote, with the keys. I don't remember her name. The letter's in our stuff on the moving van. It'll be here this afternoon.”

Chief Wright loomed over Dad, who held his ground. The kitchen shrank. “You heard from a lawyer that your father died, and you can't remember her name? Didn't ask questions? Find out where the body was? Inform the authorities?”

“Look. I was going to call her when we got here, go over his will, figure out what to do with his ashes. She was his
lawyer
, for Pete's sake. I figured she'd tell whoever needed to know, and I'm sorry she didn't, but—”

“And you can't remember her name.”

Dad took the kind of deep breath that means you're about to scream.

“Chief Wright,” Mom said. “We'll get the lawyer's name to you tomorrow. This is simply a misunderstanding.”

Dad was not calming down. “If you're so interested, how come you haven't noticed Ogier's been gone for two months? And
some
body must have carried him out of here.”

Otherwise this place would be even stinkier,
I thought. Timmo caught my eye and held his nose with thumb and forefinger.
Oh yeah, really mature, kid.

Chief Wright was pinkish now. “Mr. Turpin kept to himself, and my son saw lights on. And you're right, I'd be very interested to hear how that body got out of here. If it did.”

Mom clamped her hand on Dad's elbow, so hard he winced. “We'll do our best to find the letter, Chief Wright,” she said. “Anything else we can do for you? More coffee? It's French.”

“Find that lawyer, ma'am. Thanks for the coffee.” Timmo raised one hand to say good-bye. Then he was out of there, feet tip-tapping down the stairs. We listened to Chief Wright thump down, open and shut the outside door. Then we listened to the faucet drip. Something skittered behind a wall. At least the clock had shut up.

Two days ago, I'd had the comfy notion that my parents were on top of things. “Can we go home if we don't like it here?” I asked. All of a sudden, Boston seemed like home.

“Everything will be fine, Mellie,” Mom said. “Roly, I can't believe you forgot the lawyer's name.”

“Hey, there's been stuff going on, you know?” Dad banged his coffee mug down on the table and sank into a chair.

“It is odd, don't you think, Roly? How
did
the body get out of here? And how'd the lawyer know, when the police chief didn't?”

Dad frowned. “You think the lawyer's crooked? Something to do with the will, maybe?”

“Who knows.” Mom sat down too. “I've never dealt with a lawyer. How do you tell if they're crooked?”

“We should find the moonstone ring,” I said, since I wanted to find it anyway. “Then you could wear it and tell if she's lying.”

Dad gave a half smile. “That's not a bad idea, hon.”

I remembered what I'd been doing before Timmo and his father came. “I'm going to feed Durindana.”

The pub was chilly and silent except for the gentle snores coming from the chandelier. I stomped to the bar and set Durindana's breakfast down sharply, hoping to wake her. I scraped a stool across the floor and sat on it, kicking a foot against the bar.

“Warm dolt,” a sleepy voice said. “Have you feet or hooves?”

Durindana crawled onto a filigreed prong, positioned herself, and did a swan dive that turned into a series of swoops, like a chickadee heading for a feeder. I'd seen Fidius do that too. My heart lifted, began to sing.

At least it did until she crash-landed on her dirty dishes from last night.

Unfazed, she pulled a golden spoon from a pouch that hung from her waist and settled down to eat, bare feet tucked under her dingy skirt.

I watched her, looking for Fidius in the way she moved, the way her wings folded. Seemed to me her face had more expression than his did—the corners of her mouth had gone up, making her look almost happy.

“Why do you stare, warm dolt?”

“Do you have to keep calling me that?”

“Melissa Angelica Turpin, why do you stare?
Valde rudis. Très gauche
. Rude.”

“It's Mellie, thank you.” I stopped looking at her, and picked at a hangnail instead.

“Ai-yi-yi! You expect me to eat while you tear large pieces from your body?”

“Sorry.” I took an interest in the liquor bottles on the opposite wall, some of which had cool labels. Durindana finished her cereal and took a swig of sugar water.

“This does not caress the throat like nectar,” she said. “I prefer bourbon.”

“It's not good for you. You couldn't even fly last night.” But this wasn't what I wanted to talk about. “Hey, did you ever know somebody named Fidius?”

“You know Fidius?” She pressed her hand to her bosom, as if her heart were pounding. “Where is he?”

“He lived with us in Boston when I was little, but he left a long time ago, eight years, and we haven't seen him since.”

“I have not seen him for twelve, no, fourteen years. My mother says this is the blink of an eye, but she is one hundred and ninety-three years old and to me it is . . . forever. His parents' shame drove him from us, also the jeers of his year-mates. He fought with the
magi
too, of course.”

He told me he was popular.
“These
magi
. They're like scientists, Fidius said.”

“I do not know what is ‘scientist.' The
magi
work to understand our magics. Fidius was to be a
magus
, being adept in the Magica Artificia. But then he left.” She heaved a great sigh.

“What is Magica Artificia?”

“You do not know? You are a Turpina! Puh. Ogier Turpin. A man of taste, but besotted with his nectar. It is unforgivable that he neglects the Obligatio in such a way.”

“I know about the Obligatio. But this Magica Artificia—”

She raised a hand to shut me up. “
Bien, bien
. I will teach, although it is not my place. Magica Artificia is our second magic, the one we value most.” She sounded bitter.

“What does it do?”

“It changes the appearance of a thing. But not only the appearance.” This seemed to be a point of pride. “The feel of the thing, as well, even its use. If we enchant a window to look like a door, you may use it as a door.”

“Fidius changed squash into candy corn, but it still tasted like squash.”

“We do not taste anymore, and many of us can no longer smell, so those senses matter little . . .” Her mouth dropped open. “Turpina! You say Fidius changed this squash when he was with you? In the city he did this? So far from the Circulus?”

“Um, I guess. What's the Circulus?”

She rolled her eyes. “The Circulus, Turpina, fuels the Magica Artificia. Without it, this magic would not exist. It requires the very best Parvi Pennati, taking their turns to fly around and around in joy. The power diminishes as one moves away from the Circulus. A Small Person using the Magica Artificia alone, so far from home . . . this is an extraordinary achievement indeed.”

“He couldn't make anything last.”

“Some would be pleased with half so much.” She brushed at a spot on her skirt but only smudged it more. I watched her work at the smudge, wanting to ask what she meant. Obviously, it was a sore subject.

“If you must know,” she said, like I'd asked, “the humiliation of Fidius's parents is also mine. In us, the magics may work against one another.”

“That's . . . that's too bad.”

“The Parvi's first, true magic, the Magica Vera, gave us skills we needed to live, but also it protected us from spells. We saw through all lies and illusion. This was our salvation when sorcerers were everywhere, so many centuries ago. In your year 453, the last of them helped us invent the Magica Artificia, but our native magic prevented us from seeing the beauties it created. We cast the Magica Vera out of ourselves, transferring it into the Gemmaluna so we would have it at need. But we rarely used the Gemma, and three hundred years later we were giving it to you, the Turpini.”

“Is the Gemmaluna the moonstone?”

“Gemmaluna, moon-jewel, of course, of course, a stone of power. And yet, five generations later, tinges of Magica Vera remain in some of us, resisting the Magica Artificia. Sometimes we cannot
see
the illusions, to say nothing of making them ourselves.

“And we are clumsy.” Her voice rose into a whine. “Ah! At times I cannot even fly, it is as if a great hand pulls me from the air.” She sniffed, rubbing at her skirt. “Those more skilled than I are not kind. They call me Inepta, a terrible name for a Small Person of uncommon beauty.”

Inepta, I figured, meant something like “inept.”
Better than Fairy Fat.
“So what was the humiliation for Fidius's parents?”

“They had skills befitting the Magica Vera: Sylvia bred crickets, Glaucus made walls that kept out the damp. But they wished to be elevated to the Circulus. They tried to win favor by hosting a ball, but the food was ugly and Sylvia's headdress fell apart as she danced.”

“Was Fidius around then?”

“Yes, yes, and one's soul wept for him. He did not share his parents' affliction, was the best of the young, sure to become a
magus
. This did not change after his parents' ball, but his friends . . . ah, they were not kind. Even Rinaldo, his closest friend, made fun of Sylvia and her headdress.”

“What happened to his parents?”

“They lived with the horror for several weeks, then faded into death.”

“They
died
? Because they gave a bad party?”

“It was a very bad party, Turpina.”

I WAS SPEECHLESS. That doesn't happen often, and it didn't last long. “Giving a bad party doesn't
kill
a person.”

“Everyone left before the first star! Next you will say that one's attire matters little, the arrangement of one's hair . . .” Durindana took in my sweatshirt and pillow hair. “You and I do not share a view of life.”

“No kidding. But no wonder Fidius left you all.”

“Yes, yes. He left within the year. He fought with the
magi
—the precise reason I do not know, but his parents' fall could not but reflect upon him.”

“They didn't just fall. They
died
.”

“Yes, yes, very sad, very sad.”

Tough crowd.
“So did something like that happen to you?”

“Ah!” She pressed her wrist to her forehead dramatically. “I cannot talk of it, too, too tragic, an embarrassment beyond bearing.”

“Did anybody die?”

“No, no. But I wished to sink into the floor.”

I almost tried to cheer her up by telling her about the tampon incident. Instead, I used Mom's method, which is to highlight your strengths when you're freaked out about your weaknesses. “I bet you do some things better
because
you have strong Magica Vera. You see things as they are.”

Durindana didn't look as if she bought that. “Why would one wish to undo the Magica Artificia, to see the slug behind the
coq au vin
? Although”—she brightened—“sometimes one encounters an enchantment worth undoing. When that Gigantea visited Ogier, I saw she was a
pupa magna
, a large walking doll, very frightening. And I knew enough to hide.”

“A Gigantea? What's a Gigantea?”

“You are a Gigantea. A large, warm female.”

“Somebody visited Ogier? And she was a
doll
?”

“Yes. A shabby one also.”

It seems weird, considering that I was talking to a three-inch-tall lady with wings, but I found it hard to believe in a giant doll walking around pretending to be a human.

Durindana yawned. “You will fetch my bourbon, Turpina.”

“I don't think I'm supposed to—”

“Warm dolt!” Durindana stamped her bare foot on the bar. “I . . . desire . . . bourbon!”

Obviously, we have mixed feelings about alcohol in our family. Mom drinks wine now and then, and Dad used to. But then he took a good look at Grand-père and gave it all up. “I don't know if I have a problem,” he said, “and I don't want to know.”

One of those bottles on the wall behind Durindana might be bourbon. Last night, though, Dad didn't seem to think much of feeding the stuff to Parvi. I decided to ask him. “I'm going upstairs,” I said, heading for the door. “I'll be right back.”

“Aaayyyiii!” She landed on my head, burrowed into my hair, freezing my scalp. I reached up to haul her out of there and she grabbed my finger hard, freezing it, too, until I yanked it away from her. She pulled out one hair, then another.

I shrieked, and shrieked some more. I shook my head. I shook my whole body. I danced around the room, stomping and waving my hair, which only made the pain worse.

The pub door slammed open. “Mellie!” my dad yelled.

Someone grabbed me by the head. “Hold still, Mellie,” my mom said.

She messed around in my hair a second, and the pain and freezing stopped. When I straightened up, she was dangling Durindana from her thumb and forefinger, holding on to the back of her skirt. Durindana was writhing, punching, kicking, her wings dark brown. Mom had a grim smile on her face.