“If, if, if,” I muttered as I stared at the charm balanced on my fingertips. I was putting the F back in if, and I didn’t like it. Time was stealing my buffer for when if turned to no. I was starting to hate two-letter words.

I’d thought that practicing reinvoking old charms would be a good idea. I just wished I wasn’t blowing my dad’s old charms to hell, one by one. It didn’t help that I was trying to be quiet as Jenks read to Lucy in the back living room, or that a handful of pixies were playing in my dad’s dusty box, giggling and whispering as they plotted mischief. Between the catchy rhymes from next door, the giggling whispers, and me thinking Jenks had hidden Pierce’s old watch from me so I couldn’t try to resurrect him, it was hard to concentrate.

Indecision had made me cranky, but I figured if Pierce was able to be summoned back to a temporary life, he would be changing my ringtones. My phone had been distressingly silent. Ceri and Pierce were gone, and my heart ached more than I could have imagined.

Stifling a sneeze from the dusty box, I exhaled, balancing the defunct disguise ley line charm and pushing my aura off my hand. The weird mental gymnastics needed to shift my aura to different shades was getting easier, but leaving my hand mostly bare of protection made it ache.

“Hey!” I shouted when the flap of the box flipped out, almost hitting me. Dust rolled up, and I sneezed, earning six high-pitched “bless-yous” from the pixies giggling inside. “Okay, everyone out!” They rose up, a charm between them as they apologized, begging to stay. “Out,” I reaffirmed, holding my hand under the charm, and they dropped it. The tarnished silver fell into my hand, a pool of gold pixy dust seeming to warm it as they apologized again.

“Out, and stay away from Lucy! She’s finally settled down!” I called after them, and they were gone, out through the flue in the back living room if the squeals of Lucy’s delight were any indication. I relaxed a bit as I listened to Jenks’s voice murmur in rhyme, soothing as I set the charm back in the box. Wiping my nose, I sneezed again, but it was only a sneeze. I didn’t expect to hear from Al until it was too late. I was on my own, and I thought it ironic that elves were going to help me save the ever-after and all demonkind.