“Daisy, I know,” Sinclair said in a low voice, calm and soothing. “Look, it’s one of the things I like about you. You may have been conceived in darkness, but you’re always struggling toward the light. I admire that. A lot.”

My anger dissipated. “Thanks,” I muttered. “Credit my mom.”

“I do,” he said. “Are you kidding, girl? I envy you your mother. I wish I had one like her.”

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s just . . . I need time to process this, all right? It’s a lot to spring on a person, Sinclair.”

“Fair enough,” he said.

And that was how we left matters. We talked a bit longer about pragmatic issues like meeting with the Fabulous Casimir to discuss studies in the magical arts, and the fact that Sinclair was really going to need a car to get around before winter and probably a part-time job to supplement his income in the off season, and maybe should consider taking in a roommate to help with the rent even though it was cheap on account of the work he was doing to improve the place, and whether the deadline for dear Emmy’s ultimatum meant four weeks from today or the same date in October, because I really did want to be prepared. Sinclair guessed it was the latter, but he wasn’t sure.

When I left, Sinclair walked me to the door and kissed me good-bye, his lips lingering briefly on mine. It was one of those indeterminate kisses that could mean anything or nothing depending on what I wanted to make of it, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about a lot of things.

Which did not include the pebble that stung my ear as I walked toward my Honda. That just plain hurt.

“Dammit, Jojo!” Clapping my hand to my ear, I whirled around, looking for her. “I thought we had a truce!”

She darted out from behind the slender trunk of a ginkgo tree, sling in hand. “Who said aught about a truce, you whey-faced scullion?”

I winced. “I assumed it.”

A look of disdain flitted across the fairy’s face. “You know what they say, lackwit. ‘Assume’ makes an ass of ‘u’ and ‘me.’ Although in this instance,” she added judiciously, “I’ll allow it’s merely you.”

“Okay, look.” I held up both hands, spreading my fingers in a universal gesture of peace. “I’m calling a truce. Can we talk for a minute? It’s about Sinclair’s sister.”

Jojo lowered her sling and tilted her head, regarding me. The afternoon sunlight angled into her cat-slitted eyes, turning them an eerie and luminous hue of lavender. “I am listening.”