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Isabella Amariah takes a little under a day to fly to Québec City from her teacher's home in Maine. She doesn't have to spend that long in transit, but the book she's fetching isn't urgent; as long as she's faster than international overland shipping it's worth sending her.
Witches are politely ignored by customs on undefended borders as long as no clans are giving either government particular trouble. As long as she's in the air, obviously a witch and not a human dressed up as one to play a stereotyped character on television, she doesn't even have to dip down and show her clan tattoo to prove that she's descended from those who give allegiance to the Olympic clan. (Clans still refer to themselves by geography, though her teacher is as Olympic as she and lives on the other side of the continent and cloud-pine hasn't gotten any faster recently.)
Isabella touches the symbol inside her left wrist: two concentric circles, two lines. It doesn't mean anything, it's just unique, simple, easy to draw on the floor in herbs or honey or lighter fluid for a spell that refers to the coven.
"If only you were a proper Harry Potter owl," Isabella tells Pathalan, "I could send you for the book, you'd be able to carry it all by yourself, and I could be working out the kinks in this latest impossible assignment."
"Perhaps you wish I were an albatross," says Pathalan dryly, coasting through the air in her wake. "To fetch and carry and be not a bit like you at all."
"No," laughs Isabella. "Owl's fine. Soft and see-in-the-dark."
"It's never dark," says Pathalan. "Never quite."
She approaches the city, and attracts attention; witches are known but hardly common. A teenager - not even old enough to look properly ageless and spectacular like Metis Imestha, her teacher, or even Ranata Ekamma, her mother - dressed in raggedy black silks that whip around her in the wind, soaring over the streets on cloud-pine, is more unusual still.
Isabella Amaraiah coasts to a stop outside the correct address - witches can benefit from Google Street View even when they do not use streets - and descends to ground level.
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"Huh." He shakes his head. "Okay, I give up. I don't think I can explain it without actually taking you to a strip club."
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"I don't think I can justify hanging around in Québec that long," she says. "Interesting research project on a subject unrelated to my studies though it might be."
"Well, try one sometime," he says. "See if you figure it out. Actually, got a pen and paper?"
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Isabella reaches into her bag, produces a small notebook, and tears out a page. Pathalan picks up a pen from a pocket of the bag in his beak and Isabella passes that over too.
Kas writes down an address. It's in Montreal.
"I worked there for a while," he says. "It's pretty good. They thought I was nineteen, though, so shhh."
"I worked there for a while," he says. "It's pretty good. They thought I was nineteen, though, so shhh."
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"I don't appear in Canada routinely. I doubt I'll be in Montreal anytime in the next few years at least," Isabella says. "The most likely way for me to wind up there would be going on a trip with my mother."
"Guess you'll just have to wait to find out what the fuss is all about, then," he says.
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"I think I'll live. I can file it under Human Peculiarities."
"Awwwww," he says, with exaggerated disappointment.
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"I have a lot of magic to learn before I can expect to get anywhere without a teacher," Isabella chuckles. "It's my main priority for the next few years. I try not to spend too long on side trips."
"Where are you, in Maine?" he asks. "Maybe I'll come visit. Take you somewhere nice."
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"Rockland. How are you going to take me somewhere if you're broke?"
"I'm not always broke," he says. "I just am now."
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"Going to do more dancing-with-a-bowl-of-cereal?" she teases.
"Definitely better than hooking, in this weather. But nah, I think I'll go see my friend first. She might have something for me."
"She is, I love her so much," he says happily.
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Their second dishes arrive at long last and Isabella starts in on her chicken. Path puts the piece of paper with the address on it in her bag, and peers at Petaal quizzically.
"I know you're not a witch's daemon, but don't you ever come away from him?" he asks the fox.
"I know you're not a witch's daemon, but don't you ever come away from him?" he asks the fox.
"Noooo," says Petaal, tucking his face against the side of Kas's neck.
"We're really close," says Kas. "Closer than most people, I guess."
"We're really close," says Kas. "Closer than most people, I guess."
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"It's probably just as well you aren't a witch, then," Isabella remarks. "Although come to think of it I think some humans separate, too, just not all."
"My dad wouldn't fuck a witch if she held a gun to his head," Kas remarks idly. "And I have a dick, I hear that's disqualifying."
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"It is," Isabella says mildly. "Why doesn't he like witches?"
She's not insulted. You can't really insult a witch.
She's not insulted. You can't really insult a witch.
"He was just an asshole," shrugs Kas. Petaal snuggles his neck some more. "I'm sure he'd shit himself if he knew I was hanging out with you."
"It's okay," Kas says cheerfully, "he's dead."