Kiss and Spell

Owen stiffened, like he was about to protest, and I could tell from the look in his eyes that he didn’t agree with this plan at all. But then he nodded acknowledgment and slapped Mac on the back, as though congratulating him on the game, before we headed for the store.

Once we were in Owen’s office, I said, “You don’t think overtaking the guards is the best plan, do you?”

“I don’t see how it can work. Even if we’re in charge, they can keep us here indefinitely if we can’t get to the portal.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Keep trying to find a way out that doesn’t involve violence. If I can do that before Mac plans his prison riot, then things won’t have to get ugly. I doubt the elf prisoners will go along with that plan, anyway. It would mean turning on their own people, and no matter how unhappy they are with Sylvester’s regime, I don’t see them going after other elves unless they absolutely have to, or trusting any plan put together by wizards. Remember how Earl had to be deep under the influence of the Eye of the Moon before he was willing to attack Sylvester.”

“Speaking of Earl, should we snap him out of it now?” I asked.

“Might as well.”

He called Earl into his office for a meeting, presumably to discuss how to market his section. As Earl sat in front of Owen’s desk and discussed which series was most popular, I studied him, trying to recall everything I could about working with him. He’d been given a human illusion, so he looked different from the Earl I knew, and that made it harder to dredge up anything that would trigger a memory.

Then I got an idea. “We should come up with a logo to brand our fantasy section,” I said. “That treasure hunt was so successful, I thought we could take it a step further and create a logo that looks like an enchanted object, and do a broader treasure hunt for that kind of object—maybe something Celtic-looking.”

Owen immediately picked up on where I was going with it, grabbed a notepad and a marker and drew a reasonable facsimile of the Knot of Arnhold merged with the Eye of the Moon, the enchanted brooch we’d been looking for when we met Earl, who was on the same quest. “Something like this,” he said, turning the notepad to face Earl.

Earl got a funny look on his face, like he was trying to dredge up some distant memory, and I moved in for the kill. “We could build a narrative around it, like the brooch itself is an ancient elven object that gives the wearer invulnerability.”

“We could call it the Knot of Arnhold,” Owen put in.

“But it’s been lost for centuries, and then it reappears, but it’s been merged with an equally legendary gem that gives its owner great power.”

“Call that the Eye of the Moon,” Owen said.

“And now the brooch has been lost. Whoever owns it could rule the world—after starting a lot of wars. There’s a great quest to seek it, but are the seekers looking to use the brooch for their own gain or to destroy it and save the world?”

Earl sat there, looking stunned. His eyes glazed over. I leaned toward him and whispered, “Shut up, Earl.” That had been what Sylvester and his cronies used to say to Earl all the time when Earl was working in the Elf Lord’s court.

Earl jumped out of his seat, shouting, “Sylvester’s opened a portal to the elven realms! We have to stop him!” After his outburst, Earl stood panting for a moment, then he blinked and looked around the office, at Owen, and at me. He blinked again, then said shakily, “Are you who I think you are?”

“Who do you think we are?” Owen asked.

“You’re Katie and Owen, but you’re not people I know from working in a bookstore. You’re wizards with MSI. All of this is wrong.” He sank back into his chair like his legs had just gone out from under him. “What is this place?”

“It’s some kind of containment zone in the elven lands. I guess you saw something they didn’t want you to see.”

Earl rubbed his temples with his thumbs and shook his head a few times, like he was trying to clear out the cobwebs. “Yeah, I followed one of Sylvester’s men to the warehouse, and I found the portal there. They’ve got a steady connection to the elven realms. Our people have supposedly been cut off from there for ages. I tried calling you, but I guess they got to me first. We didn’t talk, did we?”

“I got the call, but there was no one there,” Owen said.

“How did you two end up here?”

“I got the photo you sent, and then we found that same warehouse.”