Right Hand Magic (20 page)

“Oh, I get it,” Vanessa giggled, her pupils the size of dinner plates as Hexe and I helped her up the front stairs. “
Kid
nap, because he’s part goat. Ha!”

“What exactly did you give her?” I asked. The last time I’d seen her that loopy was after a couple magnums of bubbly at her kid sister’s wedding.

“Just some smokeless cannabis, mixed with a couple of special herbs from the garden,” he replied. “Don’t worry, she’ll be fine.”

“
Ooooh
look, a kitty!” Vanessa exclaimed as we entered the parlor, pointing at Scratch, who sat perched atop the horn of the antique Victrola.

“Great. Another nump,” the familiar said sourly. “Allow me to befoul myself with delight.”

Hexe and I carried Vanessa to his office, where he carefully examined her ankle to make sure it wasn’t broken.

“Has anyone told you that you have a
marvelous
touch?” Vanessa said with a blissful smile on her face.

“It’s merely a sprain,” Hexe announced. “I’ll boil up some fenugreek leaves and wrap them around her ankle with some elastic bandages. She’ll be good as new in no time. Do you want to help me make up the poultice—?”

“I think I’d better stay here with her—in case Scratch decides to taunt her some more.”

The moment Hexe left the room Vanessa turned around to look at me, her mouth hanging open in exaggerated disbelief. “He is sooo hot!” she whispered.

“I
know
,” I groaned.

“And you’re telling me you haven’t even kissed? Girl, what are you
waiting
on?”

“It’s complicated, Nessie. I’m still getting over Roger. ...”

“Bullshit! You’re just scared of taking a chance and putting your heart on the line—just as I am with Adrian.” She blinked, a look of surprise on her face. “Whoa. Did I say that? What just happened?”

“It’s called an epiphany,” I said, patting her shoulder. “You’re also as high as a kite.”

We fell silent as Hexe reentered the room, carrying a small bowl of steaming fenugreek leaves in one hand and a roll of Ace bandages in the other.

“This should bring the swelling down right away,” he explained as he began applying the warm poultice, massaging it into her wounded ankle. “However, I don’t want you walking on it too much for the next day or so. Try and keep it elevated when you go to bed tonight, as well.”

“Are you sure this stuff will work, Doctor?”

“Please, don’t call me that,” Hexe said as he wound the length of bandage about her foot. “I’m not a man of medicine. I’m a hedgewitch, an herbal healer, if you will. But as to the efficacy of this cure, you can ask Kidron if it works or not. I brew up poultices like this all the time for him and the other centaurs who work for the cab company. Their fetlocks become swollen from walking on pavement all the time.”

“Too bad you’re not a doctor,” Vanessa said, batting her eyes as he pinned the bandage into place. “I’d
love
to check out your bedside manner.”

Hexe glanced up at me, his cheeks flushing bright pink. “Yes, well ...”

“I think it’s time I escorted you back home, Nessie,” I said firmly. “I’m sure Adrian is worried
sick
about you.”

“How much do I owe you for the, uh, hedgewitchery, then?” Vanessa asked, reaching for her purse.

“On the house.” Hexe smiled, wiping his hands on his shirttail. “Any friend of Tate’s is a friend of mine. Now, if you’ll please excuse me, I really have to get back to work. I have a cyclopean client with a bad case of pink eye.”

A couple minutes later, as we were climbing back into Kidron’s cab, I delivered a quick punch to Vanessa’s shoulder. “Ow!” she yelped, in surprise. “What was that for?”

“ ‘I’d
love
to check out your bedside manner,’”I said, mimicking her voice. “What the hell, Nessie?”

“
Oooh!
You
are
serious about him, aren’t you?” she giggled. “Sorry about that—don’t mind me. I’m hopped up on goofballs, or something.”

“So—what do you think of Hexe?” I knew that Vanessa’s initial assessments of my boyfriends were always correct. I might not always follow her advice, but at least I was certain she would never steer me in the wrong direction.

“I think he’s absolutely incredible. And I’m not just saying that because he isn’t human. I’ve
never
seen any of your exes look at you the way he does.”

“How does he look at me?” I asked. It was as if we were back in our old dorm room, eating cookie dough ice cream while talking about boys.

Vanessa paused for a second as she tried to find an analogy. “He looks at you—the same way Adrian looks at
me
. But, if you decide you’re not gonna hit that, let me know”—she winked—“just in case things on my end don’t pan out. ...”

And so it came to pass, after what seemed like an eternity of hard work, that the gallery opening was finally at hand. A week before the show, I received a call from Derrick Templeton, owner of Templeton Gallery. I had not seen him since the day he agreed to book the show, and I had spoken to him on the phone only once, as most of our correspondence since then had taken place online.

“How’s my favorite sculptress? Is everything ready?” he asked, somehow managing to sound both laid back and anxious at the same time.

I automatically glanced at the gleaming
Cyber-Panther
, which I had finished only the night before. It took sixty hours to complete, once I had all the parts I needed. It measured two feet high and was five feet long from nose to tail, weighing in at just under a hundred pounds.

“Yes, everything’s ready, Derrick. There are six pieces.”

“How much do they weigh, total?”

“Around six hundred pounds.”

“Very good,” he muttered. I could hear him scribbling something on a piece of paper. “I’ll send a van around to collect everything. Give me your address again. ...”

“Yeah, about that . . . I’ve moved since we last spoke. I’m living in Golgotham now. Is that going to be a problem?”

“The company I use isn’t licensed for cartage in that part of town,” he said flatly. “You’re going to have to arrange transportation to the Relay Station on South Street. My guys can do pickup from there.”

“That’s what I thought.” I sighed. I’d run into problems moving my stuff into Golgotham; now it looked like I would face stumbling blocks getting things
out
as well.

“Is that going to be a problem for you?” Derrick’s laid-back tone was completely gone, leaving only anxiousness. The last thing I needed was for him to decide to get cold feet about the show.

“I’ve got it under control,” I assured him. “I know a guy.”

After I finished talking to Derrick, I dug around in my purse until I found the business card I needed. After a couple of rings, the receiver on the other end picked up.

“Faro Moving!”

“Hey, Faro, this is Tate. ...”

“Sorry, but I’m not in the office right now! I’m in Greece on my honeymoon! I’ll be back in two weeks! Please leave a message after the beep.”

“Damn it!” I slapped my cell phone shut in disgust. “I
knew
that was too easy!”

I headed downstairs to find Hexe. He was sitting at his desk in his office, polishing his scrying crystals. He motioned for me to take a seat.

“What’s new?” he asked without looking up from his work.

“Did you know Faro got married?” I queried, swiveling so that my legs were draped over the arms of the easy chair.

“Yeah, I just heard about it last night. Turns out he and Chorea hooked up at my birthday party, and now they’re honeymooning on the Aegean. A real whirl-wind romance, apparently. Lafo’s pissed because she left without giving any notice, so now he’s short-staffed at the Calf.”

“Chorea? The maenad?” I grimaced involuntarily. “Isn’t that sorta dangerous?”

“Yeah, well,” Hexe replied with a shrug, “Faro likes living on the edge.”

“I should get them a wedding present,” I said, eyeing the paperweight made from a monkey’s skull.

“I’d wait to see if the groom survives the honeymoon, first.”

“I’m happy for them, I guess.” I sighed, “But this honeymoon of theirs really puts me in a bind. I hate to keep bothering you for favors, but do you know anyone else in Golgotham with Faro’s teleportation talent?”

“There are a couple, but they’re nowhere as good. Teleportation is a tricky business. Faro makes it look simple, but it’s
real
easy to make mistakes. One little mix-up and poof! Your stuff is at the bottom of the Mariana Trench or orbiting one of Saturn’s moons.”

“Crap. I was afraid you were going to say something like that.” I scowled.

“What do you need moved?”

“I’ve got to get my sculptures to the Relay Station, so Derrick’s guys can pick them up and take them to the gallery.”

Hexe looked up from his work. “Who’s Derrick?”

“Derrick Templeton. He owns the gallery I’m showing at.”

“Oh.” He nodded to himself and returned to his polishing. “Why don’t you give Kidron a ring? His brother is a Teamster. They run the Relay Station. I’m sure he can arrange a pickup for you.”

“Thanks, Hexe. I appreciate your helping me with this. You must really be sick of me asking you for help all the time. ...”

“It’s not a problem.” He smiled. “Besides, I like helping you.”

“What exactly
is
the Relay Station?” I asked.

“It’s this huge distribution hub over on South Street, near the Brooklyn Bridge, where goods going into and out of Golgotham are switched from trucks to Teamster wagons, and vice versa. Pretty much everything from the outside has to come into the neighborhood through the Relay Station.”

“Sounds like a real pain in the ass.”

“It
is
a pain in the ass,” he conceded. “But it’s also what keeps Golgotham the way it is. The Golgotham Business Owners’ Organization made sure the city charter outlawed automobiles in the neighborhood shortly after they were invented—otherwise they’d have widened the streets and put in subway tunnels a long time ago. It also keeps the centaur population gainfully employed.”

I swung my legs back around and stood up. “I think I’ll go call Kidron and see what I can work out with his brother. Once again, thanks for everything.”

“You’re welcome,” he replied, returning his attention to the crystals. “This Derrick guy—how old is he?” He was pretending not to look at me as he turned the larger of the scrying eggs over in his hands, studying it for flaws.

“I dunno.” I shrugged. “Thirty-five. Forty, maybe.”

“Is he married?”

“What does that have to do with anything?” I frowned.

“Nothing at all,” Hexe replied hurriedly, his cheeks suddenly pink. “Just curious, that’s all.”

As I closed the door to the office behind me, I allowed myself a little smile.

Just curious? Yeah, right
.

 

 

Later that same evening I spoke on the phone to Kidron, who agreed to talk to his brother for me. An hour later he called back to inform me the pickup was scheduled for the day after next and would run me two hundred bucks, cash on the barrelhead.

The next day I dragged out the two wooden crates I had used during my recent move to transport my sculptures and placed them in the front parlor. Then I went and arranged for the delivery of a “slightly used” plywood import box from a waterfront warehouse for the ones I had recently finished. Later that same afternoon, a wagon pulled by a sorrel centauride dropped off my purchase, and by that evening the front parlor was almost as impassable as Mr. Manto’s apartment.

“What’s going on?” Hexe asked as he squeezed through the front door. He kicked at a tumbleweed of snarled excelsior at his feet. “It looks like a roc’s nest in here!”

“Kidron’s brother is picking up the sculptures tomorrow,” I explained as I distributed wood shavings between the containers. “I have to get them ready.”

“That’s great!” He smiled. “You must be very excited—this is your first show, isn’t it?”

“I’ve displayed my work at group shows at university, and I was involved in a couple of art installations in Williamsburg, but this is the first time my stuff will be in a real gallery. Templeton isn’t exactly Gagosian, but it’s a good start. So, yeah, I’m pretty excited.”

“You know, I’ve never really seen your work—”

“What are you talking about?” I snorted. “You’ve seen me in a welding helmet more than you have a dress!”

“That’s the thing—I’ve seen you
at
work, but not the finished pieces themselves.”

“Would you like to take a look at them before they’re packed up?” I asked.

“I should, in case you sell them all.”

“I hope so!” I smiled as we headed upstairs. “But this won’t be your last chance to see them. You
are
coming to the opening, aren’t you?”

“Of course. I wouldn’t dream of missing it.”

“Good, because I’m totally counting on you and Lukas to be there. I need all the moral support I can get.”

“What about your parents? Aren’t they going to be there?”

My smile dimmed. “I haven’t told them about it yet.” I opened the door and ushered him into the room before he could ask any more questions—only to cringe at the sight of the tools strewed across my workbench, my unmade bed, and several days’ worth of dirty clothes scattered about the floor.

“Please forgive the mess,” I said as I hastily gathered wadded-up socks and panties and tossed them in the full-to-overflowing laundry hamper behind the door “Things have been hectic lately, and I kind of let things slide. ...”

If Hexe heard my feeble excuses for why I lived like a pig, he showed no sign of it. He pointed at the collection of sculptures in the far corner of the room. “Is that them?”