Page 109 of The Blue Moon Café & 24-Hour Occult Emporium

Talula knew that smile.

“That’s—” Simon gasped.

“Damien King,” Talula muttered. “Kiki’s ex.”

Rage and fear flooded her senses. She wanted to get her mother and all the other magical beings out right now. Her emotions flowed into her connection to the Volta. The Volta took it…and ran with it.

Something was happening in the room where Sara was kept, but Talula couldn’t quite see it. All she could feel was the Volta’s power surging, channeling through her like a lightning storm. She withstood it, trusting the Volta to do whatever it was trying to do. Her vision darkened, and her connection to the Volta snapped. Talula gasped for breath, her body one big cry of agony.

Blue mist hung over Talula, magical miasma fluttering like anxious butterflies.

“It’s okay,” she told the Volta. “One battle at a time.”

Then she crumpled to the floor.

Talula woke up in her own bed to the smell of sweet, fried comfort food. Something heavy and warm lay on her feet. She looked down and saw a mass of gold-and-white fur. Talula wiggled her toes experimentally. The mass twitched and turned.

“You’re awake!” Simon jumped to his paws and leapt up to her. He sniffed her from elbow to ear. “How do you feel?”

Talula tried to sit up and grimaced. She ached all over. “What happened?”

“The Volta pulled every scrap of energy from you for that bit of sorcery. I’m surprised you didn’t sleep all week,” Simon explained. He swatted at her arm with a paw. “Don’t you ever do that to me again!”

“I second that.” Elegba echoed, entering the room holding a breakfast tray. “Eat, young sorceress. You earned it.”

Elegba lay the tray down, and at the sight of it, Talula’s mouth watered, her stomach groaning. The orisha had filled a plate with fried plantains and scrambled eggs flecked with cooked onions, tomatoes, and peppers. Talula’s favorite mug was carefully balanced on the tray, full of milky spiced tea. She dug in. After a slight whine from Simon, she scooted some food to the corner of her plate, where he could more easily snatch bites.

“Thank you,” she told Elegba once her hunger was less of a roar and more of a grumble. “This is delicious.”

“Almost as good as your breakfasts, Talula,” Simon said snarkily.

“Don’t be a snob.” Talula poked him in the shoulder.

“If what Simon tells me about your cooking is true, it’s a compliment.” Elegba chuckled, sitting on the edge of Talula’s bed. “That was quite a hat trick you pulled last night.”

He tipped his own hat in recognition.

“But why did it work?” Talula clasped her mug of tea in both hands, its weight and warmth a comfort in her palms. “The entire Council is looking for Mom. But the cage repelled their magic. Why didn’t it repel mine?”

Simon and Elegba shared a calculating look.

“How did it feel to delve into the Volta like that?” Elegba asked.

Talula’s body shuddered at the memory of the Volta’s overwhelming power, sloshing tea out of her mug and onto her duvet.

Elegba handed her a handkerchief from his sleeve. “The Volta isn’t just a sparkly door people pop through to get their happy endings. That’s just the tip of the magical iceberg. The Volta is a raw source of magical power that’s been carefully monitored by the likes of Sara and yours truly. The blue archway in your basement is essentially a trickle of water that branches from a torrential wellspring of power in the earth. We’ve been able to shape that trickle for our own purposes—to protect the town with the ward line and transport the vulnerable to safety through the portal.”

“Right, just a small part of the Volta is a portal,” Talula replied with a nod. “But the rest is like a big battery.”

“Understatement of the millennium.” Simon swatted at her again. “The rest is a well of raw magical power simmering just below the surface, barely kept in check by intricate magical protections. That’s what you channeled last night.”

Talula shuddered again. “I may have bitten off more than I could chew.”

“There’s a reason those magical protections are in place, Talula!” Simon snapped. “Just a drop of the Volta’s true power created the portal. Can you imagine what the rest of the magical wellspring could do?”

“Actually, I can show you.” The orisha opened his hand. Hovering above his palm was a faint, red-tinged version of the scene Talula had summoned last night. With several changes.

One, the room was completely empty of smug businessmen and cold scientists.