The New Magic - The Revelation of Jonah McAllister - Landon Wark (bill gates best books TXT) 📗

spine. I was there when the ancient magic was written, she thought. But, more than that, she looked at the pile of money and found herself licking her lips.

"So," the fat man, Ezra, began. "You just want us to keep doing this, piling up quarters?"

"I thought we'd take shifts."

A fist pounded on the window flanking the table causing the group to jump and the long, pale face of a young man who had yet to grow into his nose butted up against the glass. He held up an open blue notebook whose pages were covered in tight hand written notes.

"Sandy?" his muted voice nonetheless betrayed his shouting. "I need some more supplies! I need a voltage meter! Now!"

"That would be our charismatic leader," Ezra said drearily.

Late night moonlight slipped in around the drapes lining the hallway window, lighting the footsteps of Clayton James as he staggered, blearily towards the room Sandy had said he could use. Despite his mouth being dry from having to practice more than the others to get the quarters trick to work he had had to get up to use the bathroom three times in the night. The excitement of the entire situation was playing havoc with both his kidneys and his intestines.

He rubbed his eyes, still unsure if he was dreaming or not. Maybe his subconscious had conjured up a fantasy that would allow him to escape from the tedium of his daily life when it had finally become unbearable. Well, if his work with quarters was any indication the minutiae of... magic wasn't much more interesting. The results were, certainly, but the journey to get there didn't seem too much different from a week in the lab. Figure out what works and what doesn't. He found he needed to put a hand to the wall to steady himself when the realization hit him like a brick, someone was doing research on goddamn magic. And it was research that he could be a part of. He had, unbelievably, been in the right place at the right time. Even if it was just in a dream.

He snorted, wondering how many times the reality of this situation had been questioned by those before him.

Was there anyone before him?

A light still on in the hall caught his attention and before he could stop himself he found his head turning to look in on the girl who had been seated first at the table with him. She was at least as bleary eyed as he was, her face contorted into a grimace as she stared at the small square of waxy wrap with its sallow, yellowish flakes laid bare in the light from the lamp.

"Y'all right?" he asked from the door, his words running together into some kind of beaten down accent. "That is what I think it is, right?"

"Yup. Some of the South's most passable yellow gold." She snorted. "I hurt fucking everywhere. When I said earlier I was almost an addict, that... might have been an understatement."

The corners of Clay's mouth turned down. His experience with narcotics was purely academic. "How bad is it?"

"I need more than this or I'm gonna get really bad, really fast."

"So, what are you going to do? Go back to town?"

"I..." she trailed off, wondering if she should allow this thought to slip out. "I was wondering if what worked for those quarters will work for this too. It'll get me through the night. And what's more, it's safe."

Clay's frown deepened. "How's that exactly?"

She groaned. "It's only a matter of time before I buy a batch that some overly ambitious asshole has mixed with too much of the wrong thing. Fentanyl, something worse. This stuff is... okay. And If it could last me forever... At least the risks would be low and I wouldn't have to go out on the street."

"I don't know if that would be any safer. Remember what happened to the quarters. The ones that were stuck together. If it happens down on a molecular level too it could be just as dangerous."

Her head sank and a low expletive came out under her breath. "How can it be that there's literal magic in the fucking world and I'm still doomed?"

Clay drummed his fingers on the door jam. "Dopamine is a helluva drug."

"I don't think I really have a choice," she said in defeat. "It's either pump some kind of magical potion of dubious safety into my veins or... go into town and get some mundane potion of... maybe equal dubious safety and pump that into my veins."

Clay exhaled. It was beginning to sound like the girl had already settled on a course of action. "I mean, maybe I can try to weasel some way to determine if it's safe out of—"

She held up a hand. "I appreciate the effort, big guy, but I don't need you to save me."

"Oh, I wasn—"

"You were. It's okay. I'm a big girl. I've been at parties with the Governor. I've seen people giving blow jobs for meth in tents by the side of the road."

"I..."

"Too shocking?"

"Well, I guess. I was more thrown by the talk of oral sex mucking up this whole 'magic academy' vibe I was trying to get into."

"Welcome back to the real world. Also, no offence, but you don't seem like the weaseling type. More like a big, dumb farm hand to be honest."

Clay snorted. "I could tell you a thing or two about groundskeeping."

There was a moment of silence between the two of them that might have passed for solemnity.

"Tell you what," Clay broke it. "If you won't take some intervention then how about someone to just watch and make sure you don't... I don't know, grow a second head or a set of gills or something?"

She frowned. "Is that something you could see happening?"