I wanted to knock Magnus over the head with something. Just once, to get it out of my system. He wasn’t that big. Taller than me, but not much wider. No real core strength, from what I could see, judging by the way he’d slouched in his chair all evening. I could take him down, easily. But hitting him was risky, seeing as he was the one paying me.

This is your only option for a patronage. Grin and bear it until the job is done.

I followed Magnus and Kelela out of the dining room. We headed down the hall, ending up in a game room. But instead of engaging in billiards or darts Magnus went straight to the couch beside the fireplace. Kelela sat beside him without question. I, on the other hand, took one of the two armchairs across from them, if only so a coffee table could act as a bit of a barrier between me and the two irritants in the room.

I guess Magnus didn’t care much for coffee ceremonies, because hot coffee was already brewed and laid out on the table. Then again, the ceremonies were about togetherness, and he didn’t seem to care much for that either. He picked up a deck of cards from the table as Kelela poured.

“Our new guest should be served first,” he said, shuffling the deck.

There was a brief moment of suffocating tension in the air before Kelela handed me the small cup of coffee.

“So, what do debtera do, other than bind curses?” Kelela asked, and, for once, there was almost a light of humanity in her eyes. “Do you tell fortunes?”

“Debtera don’t practice black magic,” I said.

The light was extinguished almost immediately. “Maybe they do tell fortunes, but you got thrown out too soon to learn.”

Magnus cut the deck with one hand, shifting the top of the pile to the bottom with a quick spin, keeping his eyes on the cards as he did it. “What would you want her to say, Kelela, if she could tell fortunes?”

“That I’ll have a rich husband, of course,” Kelela said.

“Your brother is rich enough.”

“I’m twenty years old, I can’t stay under his care forever. I need a kind, rich, generous husband.” She hugged Magnus’s arm as she said it. “Who dresses well and adores me.”

“That’s an easy find,” Magnus said. He kept his eyes on his cards, but there was a slight smile on his lips.