Or skip this wild experiment, get married, and live together in mate-bond bliss. That feels like a potential option as well.
I keep that thought to myself, though. We need to do this.
Impatient to move things along, Ansel says, “Are we going to chat all night?”
“No, let’s go.” I’m already walking.
Ash ends up following us, apparently not having anything better to do. Ansel lets us in through a gate that leads to the pitch-black side yard. As soon as we’re inside, the sorcerer casts a series of magelights. The glowing orbs float through the air, alighting on branches and fenceposts, washing the unkempt garden in soft, warm light so we can see.
Ash makes a disgusted noise, greatly offended by the overgrown landscaping.
“Not a word,” Ansel warns him.
“Moss Hollow has standards to uphold?—”
“Tourists aren’t allowed back here, so I keep my own standards. Get over it, or you won’t be allowed back here either.”
Ash grunts, gesturing for Ansel to lead the way.
We enter the sorcerer’s workshop directly through the back door.
My palms start sweating the moment I step inside, and I begin to second-guess myself.
“Will this be painful, do you think?” I ask Ansel.
“I already checked for volatile reactions with the sample.” Ansel pulls open a drawer in the workbench, retrieving a dust pendant. Magic shifts inside it. Though black and somewhat menacing, it’s quite lovely.
“What exactly does shadow pixie magic do?” I ask, intrigued despite myself.
“And how did Russell get his hands on it?” Rowan asks.
On closer inspection, I realize the pendant is maybe an eighth of the way filled. “How much dust did you use while experimenting with the sample? Do we have enough?”
“Not much. Russell didn’t give me a lot to work with.”
“So a fraction of a pendant of shadow pixie dust is equal to a full pendant of mine?”
Russell agreed to give me thirty thousand dollars for one pendant. That means a full pendant of shadow pixie dust would come to over two hundred thousand dollars.
“That’s what Russell wanted for it,” Ansel says, distracted. “I don’t know what its black-market value is.”
“How do we want to go about this?” Rowan asks.
“I think we’ll keep it simple. Just draw from the pendant as you would from a regular magic cache. Kit’s magic should recoil, breaking the mate bond.”
“But then Rowan will have shadow pixie magic in his system,” I object.
“He won’t be connected to that pixie,” Ansel explains. “Just a finite amount of dust. By tomorrow, I imagine it will be out of his system completely.”
“Let’s return to Kit’s question,” Rowan says. “What does shadow pixie magic do?”
“Skipped your spectral fae classes in college, did you?” Ansel says, so condescending it’s almost amusing.
Rowan gives him a wry look. “They weren’t required at Mablemyer unless you were going into spectral studies.”
“Ah,” the sorcerer says, obviously believing that proves his school is superior.
“Is it seasonal?” Ash asks.
