Free Kingfisher by Patricia A. McKillip

needs.”
    She moved among the tables toward curtains hanging over what might have been the bank-vault doorway, doorless now, but still heavily framed with steel set into the gray and white marble walls. He watched her mindlessly, her long limbs in black skirt and gray silk shirt moving quietly, gracefully. She disappeared. He straightened, feeling as though he had been for a few timeless moments utterly bewitched. He noticed the paper in his hand, laid it on the bar. No one came in while he waited. He felt oddly alone though he thought he heard the rise and fall of voices from far away, maybe from the street. Or maybe it was only the incoherent sound of distant traffic. The café curtains, black like the tablecloths and shadowing the lower half of the broad windows, gave him a view of the bay at the end of the street, the water gull-gray with the coming twilight and absolutely still.
    He heard footsteps. But they were outside, he realized, on the sidewalk. He looked around, wanting a drink now. His eyes fell on the paper lying on the marble bar. It wasn’tso much a menu, he saw as he scanned it, as a manifesto. Something that seemed utterly pretentious, absurd, amid the prosaic diners, car lots, chain motels of Chimera Bay.
    Eat, it pretty much commanded, what I give you. I’ll tell you what it will cost you when I decide the meal is over.
    His cell phone rang.
    He jumped wildly. “Mom,” he breathed, hunched over the phone as though he were in church. “I can’t talk now.”
    â€œWhat in the world were you thinking?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œWhen you stole that knife?”
    Her voice sounded strange, amazed and completely bewildered. But he was the stranger, he realized, unrecognizable, unpredictable. “I wasn’t,” he said tightly. “Thinking. I just wanted. I’ll let you know why when I know.”
    â€œBut, Pierce, you don’t— You’ve never done— This is so unlike you. Where are you? You promised to let me know. I can’t find you anywhere, and I’ve been so worried, especially after Lilith told me. She said that things of such ancient power find their own paths; they take what they need. That is hardly comforting. Sweetheart, be careful.”
    â€œMom—”
    â€œBetter yet, just come home. Return the knife and come home.”
    He opened his mouth to answer, found no argument, no answer, nothing at all that either one of them would understand, except that he could undo nothing.
    He gave up, turned the phone off, and dropped it into his pocket. Sage pushed aside the dark, heavy curtains, came toward him carrying something. Again he was drawn intothe timeless vortex that seemed to flow around her, a spell she cast without awareness, with every movement, every shift of expression. As she drew closer, he sensed the disturbance behind the calm, saw the faint flush of red in her eyelids. He swallowed, stunned at himself, at what he felt and saw, at her for making him see.
    â€œI’m sorry.” Her voice seemed unchanged, but her smile was less luminous, more controlled. “Todd says he won’t cook tonight. We are now closed.”
    â€œOh.”
    â€œIt happens, sometimes.”
    â€œWas it—” He stopped, cleared his throat. “Something I did? Or didn’t? Do?”
    â€œOh, no.” She shook her head but without letting him see her eyes. “No. Maybe he just knows that no one else will come in tonight. Sometimes he knows things like that. Sometimes they matter, sometimes not. He made this for you.”
    She put a small, covered plate down on the bar, and let him see her eyes now, direct, unsmiling.
    â€œA consolation?” he asked, gazing back at her. “Or to make me regret what he won’t give me?”
    â€œMaybe,” she answered simply, “so that you will come back.”
    His hand hovered over the black cloth covering the little plate. Then he dropped his hand,