Free Magic of Home: an Uncollected Anthology story by Annie Reed Page A

on the open road. Gillfoil was ruthless, and she didn’t have enough magic to go up against him on her own.
    She had no time for second thoughts.
    She leaned into a quick turn, cutting across two lanes of traffic, thankful for the quick reflexes of the drivers who braked and swerved to avoid hitting them. She pointed the motorcycle toward an exit on the left they had nearly missed.
    She could feel her friend’s disappointment as the tone of its magic slid into a more subdued range even as she gunned the engine at the bottom of the exit ramp and they tore down a darkened city street.
    “I’m sorry,” she whispered to the rumble of the motorcycle’s engine echoing off cracked concrete sidewalks and boarded up storefronts. “I don’t know where else to go.”
    The motorcycle didn’t answer.
    It didn’t know either.
     
    * * *
     
    Twig left her friend in a spot in the alley behind Jocko’s club where the flow of magic was thin. The overflowing trash bin at the mouth of the alley would hide the motorcycle from sight of those passing by on the street, and without a strong flow of magic, Gillfoil wouldn’t be able to sense her friend unless he stumbled on the alley by accident.
    At least Twig hoped so. Even with the sensitivity her long ears afforded her, Gillfoil’s sense of magic was greater than her own.
    She’d locked her helmet down on the seat. Before she reached the entrance to Jocko’s club she scrubbed her hands through her hair until it was a wild auburn tangle around her thin face.
    She’d look more human this way, and with her dark leathers, she’d look more like she belonged in The Shadows with the rest of the hard case humans who called this part of Moretown Bay home.
    Unfortunately, there was no hiding her ears, not without a veil, and Twig couldn’t use one. A veil tinged with her magic would be like a homing signal to Gillfoil.
    Delicately pointed, the tips of her ears were longer than her index finger, curving up and back along the sides of her head. They marked her as royalty among her people, a position she’d given up when she’d left Marlette Island. Her family may or may not want her back, but her ears would have at least given her entry into the enclave had she been able to get there.
    Her ears gave her trouble now even getting through the door into Jocko’s club.
    Her ears, and the fact that she looked about fourteen years old to most humans.
    The bouncer manning the front door of Jocko’s Club was definitely human. He shook his head when he saw her.
    “Come back when you reach puberty, honey.” His gaze slid down the front of her leathers. “And you grow some tits the size of those ears.”
    The man towered over her, all beefy muscles and heavy brows. He had a scar that ran along one side of his chin and another on his forehead. Heavy tattoos were clearly visible on his skull through the shaved stubble of his dark hair.
    Twig resisted the urge to tell him that she had reached puberty before he’d been born.
    As for the rest, she wasn’t surprised.
    The outline of a naked woman gyrated overhead, illuminating the name of the club: Snow’s Palace. The finest strip club in The Shadows, or so Jocko had told her on the day he cashed out his pension and bought the place.
    The bouncer clearly thought that any woman who came here was looking for work, but Twig didn’t have time to deal with his assumptions.
    “I need to speak with Jocko,” she said.
    “Last time I checked, dwarves don’t get along so well with elves. Especially underage elves.”
    Twig stepped toward the bouncer. She crooked her finger in a come-closer gesture, and he actually bent forward.
    Bad move.
    Twig grabbed the lobe of his ear with one hand while the other found his crotch and squeezed. Hard.
    All the color left his face the same time the air left his lungs. Twig had a strong grip. The years she’d spent riding motorcycles had only enhanced her natural strength.
    “This particular dwarf will see me,” she