Its mouth opened. "Richard," the fish croaked, Ree-shard.

Richard blinked and then started to grin. He glanced around-unlikely that anyone else could hear his talking fish. He laughed. What a funny idea! A talking fish! This was hysterical.

"Richard," the fish said again. "Come back to New Orleans, It'll be worth your while, I promise. Daedalus "

Richard waited a moment, but the fish had exhausted its message, apparently. Quickly he slipped his fingers down the hook, flipped the fish off it. It dropped the eight feet to the cloudy olive-drab water, its flanks flashing,

Hmm, New Orleans, It hadn't been that long since he'd been back. But long enough. He grinned, A road trip. Just what he needed to cheer himself up.

Daedalus laughed softly to himself] watching Richard gather his gear. It would be good to see him again. Probably.

A sound downstairs drew Daedalus s attention. Moving deliberately, not quickly, he doused his candle and put his glass globe in the cupboard, draping a square of black silk over it. He smudged the circle of salt on the floor, erasing its lines with his foot, then smoothed his hair back.

He felt drained, hungry, thirsty. He'd done a lot in one day-perhaps too much. But there was no time to waste.

Clio

"Yeah, so she was pissed."

Racey reported, flipping her streaked hair back. She leaned against the wall in the tiny curtained dressing cubicle and took a sip of iced coffee.,

"Yeah?'

I asked absently, unhooking my bra so I could try on a tie-dyed halter top. "What'd she say?"

"She said the next time I missed a circle, my ass would be grass," Racey cocked her head, which made her short, asymmetrical haircut look almost even.

I gave a quick grin-Racey's mom was a riot. More like an older sister than a mom. My grandmother was cool in her own way, but you couldn't get away from the fact that she was a grandmother. True, she was aging well-in fact, her looks hadn't changed much for as long as I could remember. Those were the genes I wanted to inherit-those and Nans force de magie. "And she'd be the lawn mower?" I guessed.