Read Online Trio of Sorcery by Mercedes Lackey - Free Book Online

into that closed class?”
    â€œWell…you got in. There might have been a lot of reasons—”
    â€œAnd I’m going out with Angela Harris!” The grin got larger and more triumphant.
    â€œNow that, I must admit, is close to a miracle.” Emory shook his head.
    â€œIt wasn’t a miracle, it was magic! The stuff works!” Zaak crowed triumphantly. “You just watch, my man, it won’t be long before you’re begging me to help you!”
    At that moment the elevator door opened and they all turned to see who it was. From the happy look on Emory’s face, it was exactly who he was hoping to see. Zaak reached for Di’s arm and pulled her inside the apartment.
    â€œCome in, sit down,” he urged. “Are these candles handmade?”
    â€œMy grandmother and I made them,” she said. “Beeswax and bayberry. We got the wax from a honey farm.”
    â€œBetter and better! Do you believe in magic? Not stage magic, that’s Marshal’s thing, I mean the real stuff.” He waved at one of the somewhat battered armchairs and perched eagerly on the corner of the equally battered sofa,putting the candles down on a coffee table made of a door on two stacks of cinder blocks. They might have a lot of room, but her furniture was better. She really didn’t want to know what the Indian bedspreads that covered the chairs and couch hid.
    At least there weren’t any busted springs poking her.
    â€œWho’s Marshal?” she asked. Someone who knew stage magic? That could be incredibly useful…
    â€œFriend of ours, he’ll be over tonight probably. So, do you?”
    She shrugged. Okay. Don’t lie. It’s never a good idea for a mage to lie, especially not around another mage….
    â€œThere’s a lot of things you just can’t explain by scientific means,” she temporized. “I’m studying folklore, and you have to wonder where some of that stuff came from, you know? Every culture has some form of ghost, every culture has some form of shape-shifter, or vampire. Every culture has good and bad magicians. So, I guess—”
    She didn’t need to go further. With a potential believer in front of him, Zaak was off and running. All she had to do was listen and make vague noises once in a while. It was too easy, and (not for the first time) she was just a little appalled at how naïve these self-taught occultists were. She wasn’t going to have to pry, Zaak was practically pouring everything she wanted to know right into her lap. And if she’d been the sort of creature he was likely to run into, a magician who got power by draining it out of others,who got what he wanted by controlling them, she could have made him hers within an hour.
    It was quite possible that the only thing that had saved him so far was the simple fact that there were relatively few of that sort of predator…and so very many willing victims.
    As she had feared, Zaak had picked up a handful of fairly dubious books, and now he was convinced he had the Answer. It wasn’t that the books in question were bad, it was that, like Zaak himself, they were incredibly naïve. These “new Druids” and “modern pagans” wanted to believe that everything “out there” was just waiting to welcome you into a joyful realm of harmony, peace, and love.
    Well, they were right about one thing. There was a great deal “out there” that was waiting to welcome you. But the universe was not a friendly place, all sweetness and light, and greeting the would-be magician with open arms. It was more like a tough neighborhood, filled with things that would be only too happy to mug you and take your metaphysical wallet. If you were lucky. If you weren’t so lucky, they would beat you up and leave you bleeding in the metaphysical gutter. If you were really unlucky…
    As it happened, maybe she could do something about that.