The bakery was quiet as afternoon melted into evening, and though the sun still hung high in the sky, Gracey could feel quitting time in her bones. She glanced at the clock; six o’clock. She removed her apron, shook her hair free from its scarf, and flipped the ovens off. Stretching her arms over her head, she smiled to herself, ready to close up shop and spend the rest of the evening with a bottle of wine and good company. Tiny was taking herself to a movie in Placerita, so Gracey had invited Simon over for television watching and, with any luck, cuddling.

She blushed at the thought of it.

As she was wiping down the counter, the bell over the front door tinkled, and Gracey looked up to see a smiling Nora Goldman entering the shop, face creased with a thousand wrinkles, hair a fluffy white halo about her head. Mrs. Goldman had to be in her eighties, and she’d been a regular at the bakery since its inception. Gracey grinned at the sight of her.

“Howdy, stranger,” Gracey teased, arms akimbo as she gave the older woman a warm smile. “Haven’t seen you in a while. You been on a diet?”

Mrs. Goldman clucked her teeth, a rosy blush coloring her cheeks. “Nothing like that, sweetheart. At my age you have to appreciate all God has to offer and that includes pie! I was out of town for a while, staying with my sister in Austin. Her husband passed away.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Gracey said, but Mrs. Goldman waved the sentiment away. “Old people die, that’s just the way it is. Have to make room for the new generation.”

“I suppose that’s one way to look at it,” Gracey admitted, “but when someone you love dies, that’s pretty cold comfort.”

Mrs. Goldman gave a brief nod, then her face brightened. “I need a pie for my granddaughter’s husband,” she said, changing the subject. “I know it’s short notice, but my memory isn’t what he used to be and the anniversary slipped my mind. It’s his birthday, and I happen to know that your chocolate pecan is his favorite. Do you happen to have any?”

Gracey dried her hands, pulled a collapsed rectangle of cardboard off the shelf. “I’ve got some,” she said, manipulating the cardboard into a pie-size box. “I have two; would you like them both?”

Mrs. Goldman shook her head. “One ought to be good enough; my granddaughter is always watching her weight,” she said, disdain flickering across her face. “Shira’s skinny as a willow as it is; what is it with young girls and their silly ideals of beauty these days?”

Gracey, who wore an extra fifteen pounds around her hips and suspected women had long held silly ideas of beauty, could only chuckle. “If she were happy with her weight, she’d find something else to be unhappy with,” Gracey said. “That’s just how we women are.”

Mrs. Goldman shared in the laughter. “That is the truth, though, isn’t it, sweetheart? I could do with a sight fewer wrinkles myself.”

Gracey grinned,  pulled the pie from the refrigerator and slid it carefully into the box. “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

A small look of embarrassment passed over Mrs. Goldman’s face as she wrung her hands nervously. “Actually, I do have on other request, sweetheart, if it isn’t too much trouble. I normally wouldn’t ask it of you but I have a ladies’ auxiliary meeting today and I’m running late as it is. I wondered if you wouldn’t mind taking the pie over to Shira’s house tonight? If it isn’t too much trouble,” she repeated.

As far as Gracey knew, the Goldmans were the only Jewish family in Love & War, and Mrs. Goldman served on the auxiliary board of Temple Beth Shalom in Fort Stockton, the closest temple but still a good forty minute drive from their town. She glanced up at the clock; it was only a few minutes after six. Simon wasn’t coming over until seven, the house was already clean, and Shira and Aleister Fairgood’s house was only a few minutes from Gracey’s.

“I’ll take it over there right now,” Gracey said as she collected the cash for the pie.

Mrs. Goldman took Gracey’s hand in her own, squeezing softly. “Thank you, dear. Please tell my granddaughter that I expect a phone call this week; it’s been too long since she’s indulged an old woman’s ramblings.”

Like most of the other families in Love & War, the Fairgoods kept a modest property, a lawn more weed than grass, a front porch in a moderate state of disrepair. As Gracey pulled into the driveway, she noted two trucks parked outside the garage. Shira Fairgood worked on and off as a substitute elementary school teacher, and Aleister worked in Placertia as a cable repair man, but it appeared they were both home. Pie in tow, Gracey marched up the porch steps and rang the doorbell.

No one answered.

She knocked. When she got no response, she pressed her ear to the door, listening for movement. Nothing. She tried the doorknob and, finding the door unlocked, she pushed it open slowly. “Hello? Y’all home? It’s Gracey Daylittle from Want Some Pie? Bakery. Nora sent me.”

Silence.

Gracey considered her options. Both cars were in the driveway and the front door was unlocked, indicating that the Fairgoods were probably home. Still, if it was Aleister’s birthday, the couple could be engaged in private birthday shenanigans that Gracey sorely wouldn’t want to interrupt; the very thought made her blush.

Door open behind her, Gracey took a tentative step inside. “Shira? Aleister? Y’all here?” Gracey vaguely remembered a daughter, but couldn’t remember her name.

The house was still, and Gracey didn’t want to take the pie home with her. She figured she could leave it in the refrigerator with a note explaining where it had come from. Her mind made up, she pulled the front door closed, waited a heartbeat more for someone to make themselves known. She’d never been in the Fairgood house, and she was keenly aware of her status as an intruder as she tiptoed her way into what she thought must be the kitchen.

As she rounded the corner, she stepped into a brightly lit kitchenette, satisfied with her home navigation skills and almost tripped over Shira Fairgood.

Shira was huddled on the linoleum, knees pulled into her chest, arms wrapped about her legs. Her eyes were wide and unseeing as she rocked back and forth, her lips moving as if to whimper but no sound escaped. Her face was white as a ghost. Gracey set the pie on the floor placed both her hands on Shira’s shoulders, giving her a small shake. “Shira? Shira, honey, are you all right? Look at me.” Gracey placed her fingers under the woman’s chin, turned her head. But Shira’s eyes did not blink, did not move, did not register Gracey’s presence. She was utterly catatonic.

Heart beating wildly in her chest, Gracey jumped to her feet, knowing she had to search. “Aleister?” He or the daughter had to be here somewhere. Even as she pushed herself through the house, she didn’t want to know, oh God, she didn’t want to know whatever had forced Shira into that state of shock. “Aleister? You here?” She ran into the adjacent dining room, into the living room, down the hallway, into the guest bathroom, a child’s bedroom, and finally crossed the threshold into the master bedroom where she drew up short, covered her mouth with both hands and let loose a wild, ear-piercing scream.

Aleister Fairgood was propped up on the bed, head lolling to one side, the front of his clothes saturated with blood.

A black maw just underneath the ridge of his brow sent thin tendrils of white smoke up to the ceiling. His eyes had been burned out of his face.

Gracey turned and vomited on the carpet.

She’d managed to make the necessary phone call and it was only a matter of minutes before an ambulance and the sheriff’s department arrived, perimeters were taped off, and onlookers began amassing. Gracey was sitting on the front porch; someone had wrapped a blanket around her shoulders. She watched as a couple of paramedics loaded Shira into an ambulance, took her vitals, placed an oxygen mask over her face. She had recovered from her stupefied state and was crying now, nearly hyperventilating. The paramedics were trying to calm her. They were giving her water, drugs. People with notepads were asking questions. Everything was happening in slow motion, underwater.

“Gracey?”

The voice rippled through her, yanking her out of the nightmare. She looked up, saw Simon’s tired, worry-creased face looking down at her. In a moment he was crouching, at her side, and Gracey felt the internal dam break, tears rushing out of her as she pressed herself against Simon, sobbing.

He stroked her hair, her back, saying nothing, letting her cry until she was empty. He wiped her eyes, her nose, held her close to his body. When the sobs subsided, she said, “It was the most horrible thing I’ve ever seen, Simon. How could anyone do that? How could anyone hurt another human being like that?”

Simon said nothing. He held her for a long time.

A deputy approached, tipped his hat at Gracey. “I’m sorry to bother you after such a traumatic event, ma’am, but I’m gonna have to ask you some questions.”

She had known it was coming, of course. She’d been the one to find the body, the one to report the crime. Still, she didn’t want to relive it, didn’t want to remember any of it. She just wanted to go to sleep, to wake up and find none of this had ever really happened.

“Has anybody seen the daughter? The Fairgoods have a little girl, I think?” Gracey’s stomach rolled with the realization that the little girl would come home to find that her daddy had died. Thank God she hadn’t been the one to find him. Gracey thought she might be sick again.

The deputy nodded. “Somebody’s looking into it,” he said. He looked at Simon, cleared his throat. “Would you mind excusing us for a bit? I need to interview Miss Daylittle in private.”

Simon looked to Gracey. “Will you be all right?”

She gave a wordless nod, her eyes full of gratitude. He kissed her on the forehead. “I’ll be just over there if you need me.”

She watched him walk away, and when he was out of earshot, the deputy cleared his throat again, ready to get down to business. Gracey returned her attention to him reluctantly. “I need you to start at the beginning. Why were you over to the Fairgood place?”

With quivering voice and frequent pauses to steady her nerves, Gracey recounted the events leading up the discovery of the body: Mrs. Goldman buying the pie. Gracey making the delivery. Finding Shira in shock on the floor. Finding the body sitting up in the bed.

“Does Mrs. Goldman frequently ask you to do favors for her?”

The question caught Gracey off guard. “No,” she admitted. “This was the first time.”

“Did you think the request was odd?”

Gracey shook her head. “Mrs. Goldman is old,” she said, as though that itself were plenty explanation.

The deputy seemed to think a moment, scratching his head. Then, “You didn’t see nobody suspicious around here, did you? Anybody shouldn’t have had no business here?”

Gracey shrugged. “I didn’t notice anything out of place, but then I wasn’t looking.”

The deputy tried again. “You didn’t see a … strange lookin’ fella, about yea tall, dresses in a funny costume? Has some sort of a…skin problem?”

The image the deputy painted formed perfectly in Gracey’s mind’s eye. The Prime of Darkness. Gracey’s eyes flew open even as her heart sank. Why would the deputy ask about the demon? Had he been implicated in some way? Was it possible he’d been involved? She recalled her conversation with Lakmei in the graveyard, the angel’s assertion that the demon hadn’t been involved in the recent death of Buddy Heffman.

Had probably not been involved.

“No,” Gracey said, surprised at how level her voice came out. “Certainly not.”

The deputy snapped his notebook shut, pulled a card from his front shirt pocket. “If you think of anything else you let me know. Don’t matter if you think it’s important; you let me decide.” His smug grin made Gracey’s skin crawl. She closed her fingers around the card, certain she wouldn’t have need of it.

“One last thing, Miss Daylittle,” he said. “We’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell nobody what you saw in there. After what happened with Rubio Bautista, we don’t need no serial killer hysteria going around. Got it?”

The words rang through her, stilled her to the core. Rubio Bautista. Serial killer. The deputy hadn’t mentioned Buddy Heffman, but after seeing with her own eyes a reality frighteningly similar to the rumors about Buddy’s demise, Gracey began to link these deaths in her mind. Rubio Bautista. Buddy Heffman. Aleister Fairgood. Three men murdered. Why? What was the common thread?

As the deputy walked away, Gracey’s mind filled with questions. Why had he asked about the Prime of Darkness? It wouldn’t be the first time the demon had been implicated in a crime; Gracey knew first-hand that Darkness was capable of murder. But she didn’t think he had anything to do with this. He couldn’t.

Could he?

Simon appeared by her side again, and Gracey pushed all the thoughts of Darkness out of her mind. The magician took Gracey’s hand, entwined his fingers with hers and gave a gentle squeeze. “Let’s get you home,” he said. “You probably need the rest.”

Overwhelming gratitude flooded her, and once again Gracey felt on the verge of breakdown. She looked into Simon’s eyes and saw her own sadness reflected back at her, and her heart skipped a beat. Two. As Simon helped her to her feet, Gracey was amazed at the depth of the magician’s empathy, that he could feel such grief on her behalf. Her own mother hadn’t been able to do that, had pushed Gracey out when she’d needed her the most. Thinking of her mother, and how much more caring Simon was, Gracey’s heart swelled and she had to bite back her tears. She clung to the magician like a child as he led her down the road towards home.

She hadn’t been on a date in ages, but some customs are like riding a bike. Perfume dabbed behind each ear, a fresh coat of gloss across her lips, her wild mane tamed with a silk scarf, Gracey sat across a linen covered table smiling nervously at Simon St. Laine. The magician had chosen a posh Italian restaurant that Gracey had never been to, and had just finished ordering their second bottle of wine. Gracey was already beginning to feel the alcohol go to her head.

“So you got into magic by accident, then,” Gracey summarized, still smiling.

The magician swallowed that last bit of chianti in his glass, grinning. “That is a very kind way of putting it,” he said. “I suppose to an extent, we are all predisposed by some circumstance of nature to evolve along certain lines and destinies. Mine, it seems, was bent toward a perfunctory display of mild incompetence.” His eyes twinkled as he said this, and as Gracey moved to interrupt, surely to offer polite contradiction to this self deprecation, the magician held up his hand, shaking his head lightly. “No matter,” he said. “I won’t be doing this forever, I assure you.”

The evening was going better than Gracey had expected. When Simon had picked her up earlier wearing his signature top hot and violet glasses, Tiny had given her sister a weird look and whispered, “That guy is a total freakazoid”. But having sailed cleanly past the first few awkward silences and neatly evaded the choppy waves of past relationships, Gracey and Simon were now resting easy in safe waters. The expensive bottle of chianti Simon has ordered didn’t hurt.

“What about you? Did you always want to operate a bakery?”

The waiter appeared, refilled their wine glasses. Gracey took a small sip, settled back into her chair. “In a way, yes. But I guess it happened on accident,” Gracey explained. “I’ve always baked. I bake when I’m bored, I bake when I’m happy, I bake when I need to think something through. Anyway, after I moved here—which was unintentional, but that’s a whole ‘nother story—I was baking up a storm, you know, being in a new place. But I was baking more pies than I could eat, naturally, and I couldn’t just throw them out. Well,” she paused, looked thoughtful. “I threw out the ones I baked when I was bored or angry.” She wondered if she should explain, but decided not to bother. “So I started baking pies and setting them out on my porch with a little ‘Free pie’ sign. At first, people thought I was crazy. But slowly I started noticing the pies were disappearing. Turns out one of my neighbors, Beatríz Armstrong— do you know her?” When Simon shook his head, Gracey pressed on. “Anyway, she knocked on my door and told me she’d been taking the pies over to the Badlands. Bibi—that’s what everyone calls her—owns a salon, a renovated house on the corner of Church Street and East. Once a month she closes up shop and has the homeless in for showers and haircuts. I guess she feeds them, too, when she can, and apparently she’d been feeding them my pie. So she came by to introduce herself and to tell me I had no business giving away pie that good. She said I should open a proper shop.”

Gracey stopped to catch her breath, momentarily embarrassed that she’d been talking so much, but Simon didn’t seem to mind. He was watching her with a soft smile that warmed Gracey’s cockles. “So, Bibi helped me find a property and when the time was right…it just made sense to buy it and open the bakery properly.”

The magician was nodding, listening carefully. “So you bought it outright, then? Must have been a frightening investment for you.”

She thought a moment about how she wanted to answer. She was usually tight-lipped about her financial situation, but something about the magician’s formality and his sincere interest in her put her at ease. “My family is wealthy,” she explained. “I live off the interest of a trust fund. I’m lucky; I had the option of doing something just because I loved it without having to worry about making a living at it.”

The magician whistled. “You are lucky,” he agreed. “It could easily have gone the other way for you. A life of leisure is not without its own pitfalls. I understand it can be difficult to find fulfillment when everything has been handed to you.”

Gracey thought briefly of Tiny and the messes she had frequently found herself in before coming to Love & War to live with Gracey. It hadn’t ever occurred to Gracey before that the family’s wealth could have had a hand in Tiny’s wildness. She pushed this thought aside. “I originally studied sociology in college,” Gracey said, changing the subject. “But things happen. I found myself here instead and for the most part, I couldn’t be happier. The universe is unpredictable.”

Simon laughed and was about to respond when something just beyond Gracey caught his attention. He stiffened, his demeanor changing abruptly. He sat straighter in his chair, folded his hands in front of him on the table. Gracey turned slightly to see a slight woman approaching their table wearing a fur stole, glinting diamond earrings, and a too-wide smile. It was Simon’s cousin, Kit St. Laine.

“Well, fancy meeting you here!” she exclaimed, leaning down to kiss her cousin on both cheeks. She left a trail of thick, French perfume in her wake. “I didn’t realize you had a taste for Italian fine dining,” she said, winking.

“It’s a pleasure to see you, Kit.” The magician barely met his cousin’s eyes. “I hadn’t realized you were in town.”

Kit giggled prettily. “I hadn’t intended to be! But you know how things go—my line of work can be so unpredictable!”

Simon nodded, cleared his throat. “You remember Gracey Daylittle?” He nodded toward his date.

Kit flicked her eyes to Gracey briefly, and Gracey thought she saw the barest flicker of irritation pass over her face. But then the woman took an exaggerated step backward, and motioned quickly between the two of them. “Hold on just a minute!”she exclaimed, her mouth drawing in to make a perfect o. “You’re not…are you two on a date?”

Simon continued to stare steadfastly down into his plate. Gracey noted a flush of red creeping up the magician’s neck, but something about his expression and the slight tremble in his upper body led Gracey believe the color was from anger, not embarrassment. “I had requested the pleasure of Miss Daylittle’s company for a leisurely evening,” he replied, his voice level.

Kit threw her head back and laughed. It was the kind of laugh that made other people turn their heads and look, which they did, which made Gracey’s cheeks flush red. The small woman shook her head in disbelief, her shining curls bobbing around her face like a dark halo. “Well that is just magnificent,” she patronized. “I mean it, Simon, you are just full of surprises.”

There was a hard edge to her voice, something decidedly unfriendly that set Gracey on edge. Still, she was a southern girl born and bred, and some customs die hard. “Kit, we’ve already finished dinner, but we’d be delighted if you wanted to join us.” Gracey smiled sweetly, hoping she sounded more sincere than she felt.

The woman lifted the wine bottle from the table, turning the label toward her to read it. “Wow, a very nice vintage,” she purred. “I would never have thought you’d know a good wine from a hole in the ground.” She gave Simon another dripping grin, which the magician didn’t notice as he was still staring into his plate. Kit turned her attention to Gracey, whose upturned face was starting to betray her annoyance. “I thank you for the invitation but I sense this was supposed to be a very intimate evening,” she said, winking. Gracey felt her stomach turn an unpleasant flip. “Simon, you will be home at a decent hour, won’t you? I have something we need to…discuss.”

For the first time, Simon looked up to meet his cousin’s eyes, his face stoic. “Would you prefer that I come home now?”

The contrite response caught Gracey off guard, but she was careful to keep the surprise out of her face. Go home with this woman? In the middle of their date? She felt another flush of embarrassment color her cheeks. Was he trying to get out of the rest of the evening? She’d thought things were going so well. But when she sneaked a quick glance at her date she could sense that going home with this woman wasn’t what the magician wanted at all. His expression was impassive, but Gracey could feel displeasure coming off him in waves, and she couldn’t help but wonder at the nature of the undercurrent she felt flowing between the cousins. Kit merely shook her head, the mischievous gleam in her eye all the more apparent. “Not necessary. It can wait,” she said simply. Gathering herself together, the woman gave Gracey a final, tight smile and said, “Very good to see you again, Gracey. Simon.” She bent low and kissed him again, and in an instant, she was gone.

The magician took a moment to compose himself, and then downed the last of his wine. He filled a second glass and it swallowed it as well. When he was finished, he sagged in his chair, his previous glow diminished, if not gone altogether. He smiled apologetically at Gracey, his eyes full of a regret Gracey could scarcely read. “I apologize for the interruption,” he said.

Gracey shrugged, offering an understanding smile. “We can choose our friends,” she said, nonchalant. “We can’t choose our family.”

The corner of the magician’s mouth trembled in what Gracey thought was an attempt at a smile. He gave an absent nod. “There is a deep truth in that statement,” he said. “For all that we are blood relations, Kit and I have always been a difficult pairing. I’m afraid I find her rather abrasive. Still,we have precious few allies in this world. It would be a pity to alienate them.”

His statement hit a little too close to home, and Gracey shifted uncomfortably in her seat as her thoughts shifted to her mother’s letter. She tried to think of a way to save the evening, but her own energy was waning, and she could tell Simon was faring no better. She dabbed at her mouth with a napkin and said, “Maybe we should call it a night?”

The magician motioned for the bill and offered Gracey a grateful, if weary, smile.

He walked Gracey to her front door. Tiny had left the porch light on for them. For a moment, Gracey wished she’d had a reason to lock her doors, and therefore a reason to search her purse for her keys, a reason to keep Simon standing there, waiting for her. But she had no such convenient excuse to prolong the moment before his departure. She met his eyes and smiled into them, wracking her mind for something useful to say, something that could relay, without chance for serious repercussion, what she was feeling. She could think of nothing, however, and sensing that if she didn’t find the courage he certainly wouldn’t, Gracey leaned in, face upturned, and kissed the magician full on the lips.

Love & War hadn’t seen a violent crime in over a decade, so news of Rubio Bautista’s murder spread like wildfire. The news even caused a stir in the Badlands, where town news that didn’t involve free food or free showers and haircuts at the You Look Nice Salon was seldom worth discussing.

No one knew how to respond to the murder. Some families left the carefully hung Christmas lights that trimmed their homes dark out of respect for Rubio and his widow. Others put on brave faces and tried to carry on as normally they could, but parents were loathe to let their children too far out of sight, and lovers held each other closer and tighter than was usually their wont. The murder came as a hard blow to the town, striking at its very heart. The steel gray skies of winter did nothing to ease the deep sorrow.

Tiny watched her sister pull a pie out of the oven as she turned the event of Rubio’s murder over in her mind. Everyone else was talking about it, but Gracey had hardly mentioned it. Although Tiny hadn’t known Ines or Rubio Bautista well, Gracey knew everyone, and the tragedy must surely have affected her. That her sister had said little of Rubio’s death worried Tiny.

Climbing up on the sideboard, Tiny crossed her ankles and pushed a wild lock of red hair behind her ear. “Gracey,” she said, “Rubio’s funeral is tonight. You haven’t said anything about it, and I wondered if we were going.”

Gracey placed the pie on the cooling rack, shook her hair off her forehead. “The funeral’s at St. Benedict’s in Placerita,” she said.

Tiny waited. When Gracey said nothing else, she said, “Okay…?”

Gracey threw her sister a sideways glance as she pulled a bag of pie dough from the refrigerator. “You know I won’t go into a Catholic church.” She emptied the dough onto the counter.

Tiny rolled her eyes at Gracey’s back. “How long are you gonna carry that grudge?” She said the words with an inflection intended to raise Gracey’s ire. She braced herself for it.

But Gracey wouldn’t be roped into an argument. “Long as it takes,” she answered simply. She began beating the pie dough with a rolling pin. “No reason I can see you shouldn’t go, if that’s what you want.”

But Tiny only shrugged. “I’d feel weird going by myself. But even if we don’t go to the funeral, we’ll go the wake, right?”

“Planned on it,” Gracey replied. “Why, Tiny? You want something just say it.”

Tiny frowned at her sister. “Why are you in such a bad mood?”

Gracey turned, gave her sister a cold stare. “Somebody brought murder to my town,” she said. “And I’m a little bent outta shape about it.”

Tiny cut her eyes at her sister. “I’m not an idiot, Gracey.”

Gracey gave the dough an extra slap with the pin, and let out a long sigh, shaking her head. “I got a letter from Mama,” she said.

Tiny bit her lip, stopped kicking her feet. Gracey and Annette hadn’t spoken in over a year, ever since Tiny had left home to live with Gracey. There had been bad blood between them for longer than that, thought Tiny had never known why. It was something no one saw fit to speak to her about.

But that Annette had broken the silence with a letter could only mean something bad.

“What did she want?” Tiny asked.

Gracey rolled the dough out with more force than was needed. Her mouth was an angry slash across her face. “To let me know she wrote me out of her will.”

Tiny blinked in surprise. “She did what?”

Gracey laughed, mirthless, hard. “You heard me right,” she said. “She wrote me letter—couldn’t even face me over the phone, I guess—to tell me she no longer considers me family and that she sees no reason I should inherit any of the family’s wealth.” She threw the rolling pin, turned to face her sister. “It’s funny—Daddy was the Daylittle, not her. I’m an actual Daylittle by birth. What right does she even have to write me out of the family?”

Tiny didn’t know what to say. She could see the hurt in her sister’s face, hurt that was even greater than the anger at her mother’s self-centered audacity. “Are you going to be all right? Financially?”

Gracey nodded, waved away her sister’s concern. “It’s not the money,” she said. “Daddy left me plenty when he died. It’s just…it’s just so goddamned petty. And self-righteous. I don’t even know what else.”

“I’m sorry,” Tiny said, knowing it wasn’t enough. “But I have to mention…you probably shouldn’t be baking right now.”

Gracey turned to look down at the pie crust she’d been rolling out. She wondered how much anger and resentment she’d kneaded into the dough. Frantically, she began pulling the dough off the counter, throwing the pieces into the trash as they came up. “Jesus, you’re right,” she said. “The way I’m feeling I could poison the whole goddamned town.”

Tiny sighed. “Damn, this is really bad timing, too.”

Gracey looked over her shoulder, raised an eyebrow. “Why, were you going to ask for a loan?”

Tiny scoffed. “No. I…I was hoping we could bake a pie for Mrs. Bautista. An anti-grief pie.”

Gracey hrmmed, scraped the rest of the pie dough into the trash. She placed her palms against the edge of the counter, leaned her weight onto her arms. “Even if I were up for it, and I’m clearly not, people have to grieve, Tiny. It’s part of the healing process. Believe me, I know. I know a little something about loss.” She hesitated a moment, then continued. “When I lost Gabe in the accident, I didn’t think I’d ever get over it. Some days I didn’t even want to wake up or get out of bed. It just felt like the world wasn’t even worth being present for anymore. After he died, I just gave up.”

It was strange hearing Gracey talk about the accident. Tiny had been just a girl when Gracey and her fiance had been in the car accident that killed him and left Gracey in the hospital for weeks. She had never met Gabe, only heard his name mentioned in passing. The one thing she did know about him was that for whatever reason, for reasons Gracey had never spoken to Tiny about, their engagement had disintegrated what was left of Gracey’s relationship with their mother. Annette had never even visited Gracey in the hospital when she was hanging onto life by a thread.

She could see the grief in Gracey’s face. Tiny wondered which part of the ordeal she was remembering.

“When you lose someone you love, happiness seems impossible,” Gracey was saying. “There’s no magic in the world can take that pain away.”

Then, she smiled. “On the other hand, they’re showing The Sound of Music at the dollar theater.”

Tiny made a face. “That movie sucks.”

“It’s my favorite.”

Tiny sighed, hopped down off the counter. “If it’s for a good cause. I’ll go with you. Afterwards, maybe put on some Happy Gracey music and see about that pie?”

Gracey shrugged. “I’m not saying I can make her want to dance the Macarena, but maybe we can at least help her want to get out of bed. Help her find a reason to keep going. See that life isn’t…such a waste.”

They locked up early. For a good cause.

Five hours, a bottle of Layer Cake pinot grigio and a food fight later, Gracey, wrapped in the post-alpine glow that seemed to have pushed all angst about their mother aside, pulled from the oven a beautifully browned, bubbling cherry pie. Tiny had insisted on a playlist— “Just to be sure”—that would keep Gracey’s spirits high while they baked. Tiny put the playlist together while Gracey assmbled the ingredients, adding only songs that made Gracey feel glad to be alive. The playlist had included Walking On Sunshine, Favorite Things, Perfect Day, Life Is Wonderful, and Wonderful World. Though Tiny had found some of the songs a bit on the corny side, she could practically feel Gracey’s skin humming with a golden joie d’vivre, and she knew, as she watched her sister lay the latticework for the cherry pie, that the magic was flowing.

The townsfolk began pouring in to the Bautista home around 7pm that evening. Many of the old families who, like the Bautistas, had lived in Love & War since the town was founded, had come early to help Ines receive her guests. They brought her casseroles and cornbreads, soups and salsas. They offered condolences, many of them with faces nearly as full of sadness as her own. Amid the gathering of friends and family, Ines Bautista sat like a crying Madonna, still and alone amid dozens of warm, vibrating bodies.

As Gracey came through the door with her pie, she saw Inés, recognized the grief she wore like a mask. It stabbed at her heart, and for a moment Gracey wondered if she’d made a mistake in coming. But that was what funerals were for, she remembered. For sharing in grief, not running from it.

With Tiny close behind, Gracey carried the pie to the kitchen. She sat it on the counter and glanced around. She pointed toward a drawer and said, “Tiny, bring me a fork, please.”

As Tiny hunted for the silverware, Gracey opened the cupboard and retrieved a small sandwich plate. Using the pie knife she’d brought, Gracey cut a generous slice, slid it carefully onto the plate. Tiny presented the fork, and Gracey placed it on the plate alongside the pie. As she headed for the living room, Tiny asked, “Should I put the pie away? So no one else will eat it?”

Gracey smiled, shook her head. “One slice should do the trick.”

Avoiding the other guests was no small feat in a house this size, but Gracey managed to make her way to Inés without jostling her plate too much. She sat down next to the widow, who barely flicked her eyes to register Gracey’s presence. Gracey put a hand softly on her elbow. “Inés, I’ve brought you something. Something to…something to help.”

She didn’t wait for Inés’s permission. Gracey pierced the pie with the fork, breaking off a small bite. She lifted the fork to Inés’s lips. “I want you to taste this,” she said.

The widow caught Gracey’s gaze then and in a moment of understanding, opened her mouth. Gracey fed her the small bite, watched as the woman swallowed it. After a moment, Inés blinked, then nodded. Gracey fed her another bite, and then another. Before long, Gracey fed Inés the entire slice. When she was done, Inés took the plate from Gracey and pressed her thumb against the final crumbs and licked them off. She set the plate aside and, with a fresh wave of tearful emotion, gathered Gracey into her arms and hugged her tightly. “God bless you,” she whispered.

When they pulled apart, Gracey leaned in and kissed the widow on a wet cheek. “It gets better,” she promised. The widow gave a brief nod of thanks, and Gracey took her leave.

The cold air outside was a sharp contrast to the crowded warmth inside the house. As she stepped into the evening, away from the stifling emotion indoors, Gracey pulled her coat tight against her chest and looked up into the night sky. Even after a decade of living here, the desert sky still filled Gracey with a  deep sense of calm and wonder. She breathed the cold air in deep, let it burn all the way down her lungs, and when she exhaled, she watched her breath condense and dance in the cold air.

A shadow warned her of another presence, and Gracey turned to see Simon St. Laine approaching her from the house. He was dressed more casually than the last time she’d seen him; the top hat was missing, and he’d tied his long, black hair away from his face. The violet spectacles were gone. His skin was white against his mourning clothes—not just pale, but sickly, with purpling circles under his eyes. He offered Gracey a small, stiff smile by way of salutation. “It’s Gracey, if memory serves?”

She nodded. “That’s right.”

The magician’s smile settled in, became a little less awkward. “I hope you don’t mind my following you out here,” he said.

Gracey shook her head. “Escaping the grief, too?”

The corners of the magician’s mouth quirked. “Something like that. It might seem strange, my being a performer, but I don’t much like crowds.”

Gracey smiled, nodding. “I know what you mean. I’m a people person myself, but I can understand needing your space.” She nodded toward the sky. “Especially on a night like tonight. Seems a pity to be holed up indoors.”

Simon followed Gracey’s gaze upward. After a moment, he realized she was looking at him, expectant. She knew he hadn’t come out for idle chatter. He held out a hand, made a small, sweeping gesture, palm up. An invitation. “Would you mind walking with me a moment?”

Gracey shrugged and followed the magician’s lead as they walked slowly down Yucatan Road. He seemed, if not more comfortable, at least less uncomfortable than the first time she’d met him; some of his formal strangeness had been replaced with an air of weariness. The night was quiet; Gracey could hear coyotes howling in the distance. She was loathe to be the one to break the silence, but stealing a glance at the magician she could tell something was on his mind. “Are you doing all right, Simon? You look…unwell. Hope you don’t mind my saying so.”

Hands clasped behind his back, the magician walked with his head down, but Gracey could see the small downward turn of his mouth. “I don’t mind. I’m getting on,” he said. “As well as can be expected anyway. The past several days have been…very hard on me.”

Gracey raised an eyebrow. “You knew Rubio well?”

The magician shook his head. His hair gleamed black in the moonlight. “Not well, no. But death…it’s a funny thing. When it touches one of us, it touches all of us, don’t you agree?”

Gracey breathed in deep thorugh her mouth, stifled an urge to sneer. She couldn’t agree, not after having seen first hand how some people could utterly disregard another’s grief. In her mind she was ten years younger in her hospital bed, having heard for the first time that Gabe hadn’t survived the crash. She remembered asking for her mother, and being told Annette refused to see her. She’d begged, pleaded, cried, “I just lost my fiance!” but her mother still refused not only to visit but to speak with Gracey at all.

Her mother’s refusing her had cut her to the quick. They’d barely spoken in the intervening years; in fact, had Tiny not been living at home at the time, Gracey would have cut off all familial ties completely. But for better or for worse, Tiny had kept her tethered.

Still, the magician didn’t need to hear any of this. She shook off the reverie, breathed the night in deep. “I do, yes,” she said. “It’s a somber time for everyone.”

They said nothing else for a while, letting the silence fill the space between them. They listened to crunch of the dirt under their feet, the occasional screech of a bat, the sound of wind whistling through bare tree limbs. Finally, Simon broached the real reason he’d asked Gracey for a walk. “I saw you with Inés,” he said. “She’d been nearly catatonic all evening. Even at the funeral she hardly moved. Several people tried to get her to eat; it was like she didn’t even see them. Then you came in, fed her a piece of pie, and she…hugged you.” He looked at Gracey, a puzzled expression on his face. “How did you get her to do that? To…” He cast about for the right expression. “To…wake up like that.”

They’d stopped walking without realizing it. Simon was looking down into Gracey’s eyes. His were narrow and piercing, questioning. That stare filled her up with a thousand responses, answers to questions he hadn’t even asked, but she was unsure where to begin. Or if she wanted to begin. Something about that look, those eyes, made her want to talk for hours, and if she started she didn’t know if she could stop. Looking up into those eyes, she felt she could pour herself into him, could tell him the story of her life, and he’d listen to all of it, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

But the words caught in her throat, and her desire to tell him everything—about her magic, her mother, how she ended up in Love & War—turned sour in her stomach. She didn’t know this man at all. And the fact alone that she wanted to tell him everything made her uneasy.

“I don’t know how to explain it,” she said after a long pause. She was biting her lower lip, arms wrapped around her torso to ward off the cold. “You’re new around these parts—new by small town standards, anyway—so I guess you haven’t heard tell about me.” She smiled then, awkward, but honest. “I just…I have a way with pie,” she said. The words sounded ridiculous as she said them, and as soon as she spoke them she wanted to take them back and find a more elegant way of putting it, a way that wouldn’t make her sound like some no-account backwoods diner operator.

But that was just the problem. There wasn’t a more elegant a way to put it, because what she did wasn’t elegant. She wasn’t elegant. She was the square peg in the round Daylittle family hole, a milkweed of a woman who wore her hair wild all over her head and baked pies in the desert for a living. And now, standing with a strange magician under a star studded sky on a cold winter night, she was faced with the reality of what she’d been running from for quite a long time.

She wasn’t sure she knew where she belonged.

All of this ran through her head in a fraction of the second, and if the magician thought her words strange, he didn’t show it. He was still listening, his expression thoughtful.  “I wonder, Gracey, if I could call on you some time,” he said after a moment.

It took her a second to realize what he was asking. “Oh! I…are you…are you asking me on a date?”

The magician stepped back, lowered his eyes. “My apologies. If that was presumptuous of me, I—”

“No, it’s not that,” Gracey interrupted. “It’s just that…I haven’t…dated…anyone in a long time.” She offered a weak smile. “I don’t even think I remember how it’s done anymore,” she admitted.

The magician nodded. “I understand. It was a silly thing; I’m sorry.”

But Gracey pressed on. “I’d be happy to have dinner with you some time,” she said. “Thank you for asking.”

They stood in silence, looking up at the sky. A wind blew and Gracey shivered. “We probably ought to get back,” he said.

Wordless, Gracey nodded, followed the magician back the way they’d come. It might have been the cold, it might have been her imagination, or it might have been a thousand other things, but Gracey thought she saw the smallest bit of color return to the magician’s face as they stepped back across the Bautista threshhold. It was improper, and Gracey felt ashamed for it, but she couldn’t help, as the house’s warmth thawed her from her bones outward, smiling.

Trinity Church, situated at the corner of Church and Martinez in the heart of Love & War, gained its notoriety for having burned down not once, but twice: once over a hundred years ago, and twice less than a year before. Both times it had gone up in flames before its construction was completed. Neither fire had been satisfactorily explained, but for the most part people were willing to accept both misfortunes as freak acts of God, especially since, in this case, the upshot of the accident was a block party sublimated to a holy festival by way of brightly colored party decorations, promise of prayer, and copious amounts of free food.

The townsfolk felt this was as good a way to consecrate the church grounds for its imminent rebuilding as any.

On this particular afternoon, the church had been transformed from the charred ruins of an old building with a statue out front to a small carnival. Street vendors offered peanuts, pretzels, popcorn, and candied apples. Brightly colored helium balloons were tied to anything that stood still. Folding chairs littered the lawn, and long banquet tables were set with fruit punch, potato salad, cold cuts, fried chicken, several plates of pot-luck dishes, and an assortment of desserts.

The Prime of Darkness shuffled behind Gracey, trying his best not to make eye contact with anyone. Obtrusive as he was in his shining pauldrons and billowing silk cape, the townsfolk did a commendable job of giving him a wide berth and offering pleasant smiles when eye contact was inevitable. If they tittered or gossiped when his back was turned, they did so with dignified, hushed voices behind cupped palms and only in the spirit of better understanding the blue-skinned newcomer whose presence had so disrupted their town.

It seemed everyone had turned out for the dedication ceremony. Mothers with small children chased their wards around the courtyard while men who had grown up together exchanged stories of family life, the economy, how tough things were at work. Teenagers stood sulkily apart, disdain and boredom oozing from their pores. The conversations he overheard as he passed between groups were oddly similar; the Prime of Darkness wondered if the humans were aware how common and trite their lives truly were.

He followed Gracey through the crowd as she mingled with the folks who patronized her bakery. She was a natural extrovert, the smile that played over her mouth wide and genuine. She blushed prettily at compliments about her dress or her hair; she offered her own praises and flatteries with the practiced art of a true southern belle. The Palmers received commendations on their home’s new paint job; the Garcias were lauded for their son’s winning the spelling bee. She mingled with the townsfolk easily, doling out pleasantries with a natural grace. The Prime of Darkness couldn’t help but be impressed at the spectacle Gracey was in her natural element.

“You’re having a good time?” The demon made it a question as his eyes scanned the crowd. He was looking for someone in particular. “You seem like you’re enjoying yourself.”

Gracey blushed. “I hardly ever get a chance to do anything like this,” she explained. “Always cooped up in the bakery or at the house, and Lord knows Tiny doesn’t like to socialize with us lowly commoners.” She grinned, shrugging. “It feels good to put on makeup, wear a pretty dress, have people admire you. It’s nice to have face time with the people you live with, ” she said. “You should know your neighbors.”

But the Prime of Darkness was hardly paying attention, as at that moment he found what he was been searching for. On the far end of the courtyard, furthest from the road, Lilac and Lakmei were moving in their direction, winding their lithe figures through the crowd as they welcomed their guests, pretty, warm smiles and genteel laughter at the ready. They wore identical kelly green blouses and identical gray slacks. They flitted from couple to couple, group to group, their buoyant smiles lighting their faces until their eyes found Darkness and their smiles flickered; dark surprise dimmed their angelic brightness.

The pair found their way to Gracey and Darkness, their smiles having returned full force. Lilac took Gracey’s hand, squeezed it. “Gracey Daylittle,” she cooed. “I’m so glad to see you could make it.” She leaned in, gave Gracey a light kiss on the cheek. She flicked her eyes to the Prime of Darkness, and her smile tightened. “And you brought someone with you,” she said, her voice strained. “Now that, I didn’t expect.” She faced the Prime of Darkness directly, her smile having taken on a menacing edge. “I’m surprised you had the audacity to show your face here after what you did,” she said.

The Prime of Darkness stiffened as he looked from Lilac to Lakmei, then back again. “I haven’t come for a reprise if that’s what you’re worried about,” he said. “I was obeying orders. The mission failed, or I wouldn’t still be here. I have no personal interest in you or this church,” he said calmly.

Lakmei reached for the demon, and took his hand in both of hers, the way Lilac had done with Gracey. The gesture surprised the entire party. “It’s so good to hear you say that, Prime of Darkness,” she said, her voice soft as silk and sweet as honey. She tilted her head to the side as her thumbs caressed the back of Darkness’s hand. “We don’t have to be enemies,” she said. “I know that millennia of grievances stand between your kind and ours, but there doesn’t need to be any animosity here, between you and us. We just want to bring our message of love and salvation to Love & War. It would be good of you not to stand in our way. We don’t want trouble.”

Angelic tenderness toward the demon was a display Gracey had never witnessed, and it surprised her. She’d never seen Lilac or Lakmei direct anything but hostility in Darkness’s direction. She stole a glance at Lilac and saw on her smooth, white face an expression that mirrored her own confusion. Whatever Lakmei was trying to convey to Darkness, Lilac neither shared in it nor fully understood it. This realization was more worrisome to Gracey than the fact that she was standing between two natural enemies—a sworn solider of darkness and two messengers of light. It wasn’t exactly an enviable position to be in.

The Prime of Darkness held Lakmei’s stare and struggled to find the right words to reply, but they weren’t forthcoming. Eventually he removed his hand from hers and turned to Gracey. “I think I’ll have some fried chicken,” he said. She watched him make his way to the food tables where he soon disappeared behind a wall of townsfolk and balloons.

“Anyway,” Lilac said, returning her attention to Gracey, “it’s good to see you. Is your sister not with you today?”

Gracey shook her head. “She couldn’t make it. Though I was instructed to bring back a slice of Hannah Davey’s chocolate cake if there was any left.” She put extra effort into her smile. She hoped it made her seem nonthreatening. She’d already earned the angels’ mistrust for harboring the demon.

“Oh, well. Tell her we missed her.” Lilac took a little breath and looked around, slipping back into hostess mode. “I expect we’ll be getting started soon. We’ll talk later.” Her saccharine-sweet smile was pasted back into place, and the two angels gave Gracey little finger waves as they drifted back into the crowd.

Aware as she was of how uncomfortable Darkness felt amongst people he didn’t know—which was nearly everyone—Gracey set off to find the demon. But though she found the fried chicken and several Jell-O molds, she didn’t happen to find the Prime of Darkness. As she craned her neck to look over the heads of the crowd, she maneuvered through the throng without watching where she was going and collided with another body. A gasp, a swear, a slice of German chocolate cake tumbling to the ground, and Gracey brought her hands to her mouth as she apologized for her clumsiness. “I’m so sorry,” she breathed, kneeling to help clean up the mess. “I didn’t see you there.”

The woman on the receiving end of Gracey’s apologies chuckled graciously, waving the apology away. “Don’t worry about it,” she said. “I’m used to it.” She was referring, ostensibly, to her height, which was slight. Even crouched, Gracey could tell she was not much more than five feet tall. She offered Gracey a forgiving smile, and Gracey felt the band of embarrassment that had caught her in its grasp loosen as they stood.

It took Gracey half a moment to realize she’d seen this woman before, but she couldn’t recall where. They didn’t get many newcomers to Love & War, and fresh faces tended to stand out; why she was drawing a blank on where she’d seen this woman before, Gracey didn’t know. It wasn’t until she glanced over the woman’s shoulder and saw her escort, a thin, nervous gentleman in a top hat and violet colored spectacles that she was able to place her. Gracey pointed a finger in recognition. “Are you…you’re the lovely woman I saw onstage at the Simon St. Laine show recently, aren’t you? You’re his assistant, right?” Gracey motioned to the magician. “I thought I recognized you.”

Simon St. Laine moved to the woman’s side in one quick, graceful movement as the small woman laughed—it was a high, tinkling laugh, the sound of silver bells on a clear morning. She shook her head. “I’m afraid not,” she said. “I don’t know a thing about magic.” She looked up at the magician, eyes bright. “But Simon does put on a wonderful show. Wasn’t it just marvelous?”

Gracey looked to the magician, saw a nervous smile try to appear, resulting only in an upward twitch of the corner of his mouth. She gave a little nod and extended her hand. “I don’t believe I’ve ever had the pleasure,” Gracey said. “I’m Gracey Daylittle. I own the pie shop just down the road, Want Some Pie? Do you know the one?”

The magician nodded his head, a stiff, up once, down once movement. He accepted Gracey’s proffered hand awkwardly, like the action pained him. He pumped her hand once and released it. “I know the one,” he said. “I’m afraid I don’t partake of pastry, so I’ve never had the opportunity to patronize your establishment,” he explained. His words were more clipped and formal than they had been the several times she’d seen him onstage. Gracey wondered if perhaps he were the shy sort. “I’m Simon St. Laine,” he said. “I’m quite pleased to make your acquaintance, Ms. Daylittle.”

Gracey waved away the formality, smiling. “Gracey, please,” she said. “I’m so pleased to finally meet you. I’ve seen many of your performances over the years.” She paused, noticed the way a flush crept up his neck. She wondered if he were aware of what people said about his work. “The Placerita show was brilliant,” Gracey said. “I’d never seen anything like it; it was even better than I expected.”

Simon gave her another curt nod. “I’m delighted to hear that it exceeded your expectations.”

Gracey looked back at the small woman standing beside them and shook her head slowly. “I thought for sure you were the woman on the stage. There’s such a similarity.”

Simon cleared his throat, clasped his hands behind his back. “May I introduce my cousin,” he said, “visiting from out of town.”

The woman smiled even more brightly, showing even, white teeth. She extended her hand. “Kit,” she said, her handshake limp and dainty. “Kit St. Laine. It’s such a pleasure to meet you.”

Having grown up in Catholic schools, Gracey was relatively certain there was no Saint Laine, so she was relatively sure St. Laine was a stage name, so she was relatively confident the woman whose hand she was shaking was lying about her name. That struck her as odd, but she labeled the curious thought “None of my business” and pushed it out of her mind.

“So you own a bakery,” Kit was saying, eyes wide. “I just love pie.” She had the kind of voice that caressed her words, the kind of voice made for radio or untoward telephone operations. “My favorite is strawberry rhubarb. Do you sell that?” She leaned forward, hopeful. Gracey thought she looked like she was about to tip over.

“Sometimes, when strawberries are in season, but not right now,” she said. “But I do have a dozen flavors most days. Why don’t you stop by and try a slice on the house? Maybe even take a pie back home with you to…I’m sorry, where did you say you were from?”

“Vermont,” Kit said, shooting her cousin a mischievous look. She bit her bottom lip in anticipation. “I would love that,” she breathed. “Tell me, Gracey, which flavor would you recommend?”

Of all the questions in all the world, of all the inquiries, queries, petitions, and solicitations that had been offered up to Gracey in the past, “Which pie?” or some variation thereof, was Gracey’s absolute favorite. That moment where she was granted implicit permission to reach out with her heart and soul and touch the inner workings of another shining being to ferret out the perfect combination of confections that would elicit the greatest surge of joy was the single most brilliant point in Gracey’s day. It set her spirit on fire like nothing else. Brimming with anticipation, Gracey opened her heart to the woman standing in front of her, reaching out with her own tendrils of emotion to touch whatever emotions and pie ingredients lurked inside Kit St. Laine’s heart of hearts. She searched for one moment, two. But instead of finding contentment sprinkled with cardamom, or boredom laced with orange liqueur, amusement spiked with chocolate fudge sauce, or longing smoothed over with marshmallow topping, she found, to her profound dismay…nothing.

Nothing at all.

Kit was waiting for a response, her upturned face expectant and curious. Gracey blinked and offered a flustered smile. “Ah, well, apple crumb is my most popular,” she said, the words tripping out of her. “But right now Chocolate for Breakfast is selling like hotcakes. It’s a chocolate and espresso cream with a chocolate graham cracker crust. They’re single-serving pies,” she added, as though this made a difference. “You’re sure to get just enough.”

Delighted, Kit clapped her hands together, turning her bright, smiling face to her cousin, who offered merely an uninterested grin. “Well, I can’t wait to try it,” Kit said, eyes glittering. “It’s been such a pleasure talking to you. I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of each other before I leave. You take care, now.”

The magician offered Gracey an affected, tight-lipped smile as his cousin pulled him away from the befuddled pie baker. When they were perhaps twenty paces away, the Prime of Darkness sidled up beside her, a fried drumstick in one hand and a plastic cup filled with potato salad in the other. “We ready to go?” he asked.

Gracey looked around and spread her hands out before her. “The dedication ceremony hasn’t even gotten started yet!”

Darkness wiggled his shoulders in an ambiguous little shrug, took a bite of his chicken. “I didn’t think we were really staying for that. I’m sort of allergic to these kinds of things,” he said.

Gracey made a disgusted noise, the wind knocked out of her sails. “Don’t talk with your mouth full,” she said. Shoulders slumped, she turned on her heel and started for her car, motioning for the demon to follow. “All right, let’s go. I think I’ve had enough camaraderie for one afternoon anyway.”

Gracey and Darkness hoofed it to the car they’d parked a few blocks away, Darkness munching his fried chicken, Gracey wondering why her pie empathy had failed her for the first time in her life.

Watching from the far side of a banquet table, only one of the angels was glad to see them go.

Placerita Performing Arts Center was little more than a glorified high school auditorium. The seats squeaked, the stage small and poorly lit, and the acoustics less than desirable. Yet it was the largest venue the magician had ever booked, and the crowd didn’t disappoint. Filling the space with a respectable murmur, the audience filtered into the auditorium by the handfuls—families with small children, teenagers on first dates, older couples who had long lost the need for constant conversation. Simon St. Laine watched the performance hall fill from the shadows of the wings, silently amazed that people still turned out to see him. He knew his reputation as a third-rate magician. He’d hosted more than his fair share of children’s birthday parties and played second fiddle to home-grown bluegrass bands at numerous county fairs. His complete lack of talent was shameful, and as he watched the rows fill with spectators, a gnawing realization filled him with a dull anger. Most of these people were here for a comedy show. They were here to see him fail to guess which card the pretty young woman from the second row was holding. They were prepared to giggle at his expense when the rabbit he intended to pull from a hat sneaked out of his coat pocket. They expected to cackle politely behind their hands at his flubbed attempts to extinguish a candle with a single breath at thirty paces.

They were here to be entertained, yes. But they weren’t expecting magic. After all, magic was the one thing he’d failed to deliver time and time again.

Simon St. Laine turned his back to the crowd, straightened his rented tuxedo jacket. He was no bloody comedian.

The house lights dimmed, and a hush descended on the audience. Drawing a final preparatory breath, the magician waited a beat, two beats, before striding out onto the stage, his well-rehearsed grin bright on his face, his shining black cape trailing him with theatrical flair. The audience greeted him with polite applause. The spotlight was too bright for him to make out their faces. He did regret that. Tonight of all nights he wanted to see their expressions.

“I recognize some faces in the audience tonight,” he lied glibly, his smile never warmer, his eyes never brighter. “Thank you all for coming out.” How gave a small bow to demonstrate his appreciation. “Now, because some of you have seen my performance before, you probably expect me to do some card tricks.” He flicked his wrist, and a deck of playing cards appeared in his hand. He fanned them out expertly, gave the audience a good look. “But I’m not going to do a single card trick tonight.”

He swiveled with a flourish and threw the cards across the stage. Halfway through their flight, they blinked into nonexistence. The audience gasped.

“And if you’ve seen this show before,” he continued, “you probably expect me to apparate a pair of love birds, like so.” He reached into this coat pocket and retrieved a silk handkerchief. He shook it a few times and then tossed it into the air where it became not one dove, but two, cooing and ascending into the rafters. The audience was paying attention now, tittering with appreciation. He could feel the energy in the room begin to swell.

“And at last, if you’ve seen a magic show or two before, you probably expect to see something flashy and maybe a little…dangerous.”

He held his left hand out the audience, palm facing out, drew in a breath, and puffed five times as though extinguishing five candles. With each exhalation, a flickering flame appeared on a fingertip, each a different color, until his hand was like a birthday cake boasting green, blue, purple, red, and yellow flames.

His wriggled his fingers. The audience clapped enthusiastically. He shook his hand and the flames went out.

“But I don’t have any tricks like that for you tonight.” The audience groaned in genuine disappointment, and the smile on the magician’s face widened. “No, no, tonight, I have a surprise for you. Something different. I want to share with you a story. It’s a true story. And it took place not too far from where you sit some hundred years ago…”

As he spoke, his assistant walked onto the stage dressed in a Victorian-inspired outfit, complete with bustle, train, and hard-soled shoes whose clicks on the hardwood stage were swallowed by the poor design of the auditorium. She was small and dark, her hair swept up from her face into a fall of black curls, her cheeks and lips painted red as to be seen from the furthest row in the building. She smiled as brightly as the magician, her hips swinging as she walked.

She took her place in the center of the stage, looking up at the magician, fluttering her long, false lashes. She giggled as the magician said, “It began, as all good stories do, with a beautiful woman.”

Violin music began to play—soft, unobtrusive. The magician dropped to one knee, his eyes fixed on the woman before him. “And when you’re a beautiful woman, you are not without an entourage of suitors.” He pulled from his sleeve a bouquet of red roses and presented them to the assistant. She flicked her wrist to produce a fan, hiding her smile behind it modestly. She accepted the roses with demure grace. The audience forward in their seats.

“But this particular woman was cursed to live a loveless life. Every man who confessed his love to her soon dropped dead.”

The magician sank dramatically to the floor in a dead man’s pose, garnering a flurry of giggles from the audience. The bouquet of roses in the woman’s hand turned brown and crumbled, falling to the stage in flakes. Her spotlight softened from white to late afternoon gold. The audience gasped; applause rippled through the crowd.

With the lights dim, the magician leaped to his feet, moved like a cat between shadows across the stage, leaving his assistant alone in the center under a golden light. “She grew old, frail, alone.”

The small, dark beauty center stage slowly hunched over, her brown skin growing steadily paler until thin, green veins were visible through her skin. The illusion was monstrous, captivating. Her cascade of glossy black hair dulled, turned ash gray. Her smooth skin wrinkled, her hands gnarled. The audience watched in rapt silence, perched on the edges of their seats, their breath collectively held.

“As she lay on her death bed, having never known the power of true love, an angel appeared in her bedroom and offered her a single gift—to be loved for eternity.”

Now, the hunched, old woman in the center of the stage began to emanate a soft glow. It wasn’t a simple trick of lighting, the audience was sure of that much. No, she began to glow. Her spine straightened; her skin regained its color and smoothness. The magician moved swiftly toward her, the spotlight brightened, and with both hands he grabbed the woman by the arm and spun her like a top. He made a snatching motion like ripping out an invisible tablecloth from a table laden with china and the spinning woman came to a halt. In the same moment, her Victorian clothes were ripped from her body, revealing the conventional gleaming white gown of an angel. The audience gasped. Silence. Then an eruption of wild applause.

The magician hardly waited for their applause to die down before pronouncing, “The old woman died in the angel’s arms, and the angel … ascended …to Heaven!”

As he spoke these words, the woman began to levitate. First her heels, then her toes, then her body lifted effortless into the air. There was no awkward shifting of weight, nor the tell-tale wobble of flying wires. The motion was graceful and pure as though gravity simply ceased to exist where she stood. Her hands began to float up the sides of her body until they were level with her waist where they spread before her in a welcoming gesture, as though inviting the entire audience into her embrace. She was utterly aglow now, and floating ever higher off the stage, and the audience beat their hands together more fervently, unable to believe what was happening.

It was just so real.

Of course, it was nothing they hadn’t seen better magicians do on television. But to see it in their little theater, in the flesh, was breathtaking. The men whistled. The women laughed and squealed. Children hooted and hollered.

Simon St. Laine glided to where the angel hovered over the stage and cupped his hands before him. With a final flourish, he flung his arms out like a wizard casting a spell, palms facing upward, and golden glitter erupted from his hands, raining sparkles like fireworks around the glowing angel floating on stage. The audience was on their feet, clapping wildly. And when the angel unfurled her wings—glorious, terrible things, black as night and with a sheen like oil—the auditorium shook with the audience’s approval and suspended disbelief, the clapping of their hands, the catcalls, the delicious fury of their joy. Simon St. Laine smiled like a madman, still raining glitter on the stage. He threw his head back and laughed as the angel’s wings began to beat. His cape fluttered in their breeze.

It was at that moment the floating angel turned her head, and for the first time Simon St. Laine caught her eyes. A slow, dark smile spread over her face, chilling the magician to the core. She parted her lips and whispered something only he could hear. The words troubled him, and he swallowed hard, blinking in surprise. But Simon St. Laine was a natural performer and recovered quickly. Not even those in the front row noticed his smile had faltered, and no one saw the stark terror that washed over this face.