Free Till Human Voices Wake Us by Victoria Goddard Page A

were half so safe.
    He assessed the feel of magic in the pub. No strangers, but for the still-obtrusive feel of Kasian beside him. His closest friends, Robin, Will, Scheherezade. Max the proprietor in the back with Gwynn the cook. His more distant acquaintance Angharad who was on her way out. Perfect for his purposes.
    He opened the door in time for Angharad’s exit. Though the ability to see magic was rare and it was probably coincidence, she was wearing her aura in a dress of jade silk and narwhal-ivory lace under her black coat. She greeted him cheerily: “Good afternoon, James. How are you?”
    “I’m fine, thank you,” he replied automatically, safely back in character. “And you?”
    “Oh, fine, fine.” She unfurled her umbrella and added with mock surprise, “It’s raining!”
    He smiled slightly as she tromped off in her high black boots. He looked at the sky, etching a line of gold in the cloudy west. No one seemed to notice, as Kasian was looking after Angharad and her head was bent. Raphael let the clouds slide back together.
    Kasian caught his glance. “And what did that mean?”
    Raphael had switched into Welsh without thinking after her greeting. “I’m sorry. It wasn’t particularly interesting. Comments on the weather.” Noswaith dda. Sut ’dach chi? Dw i’w iawn, diolch. A chi? Iawn, iawn. Mae hi’n bwrw glaw!  
    Kasian smiled slowly at him. “I’ll take your word for it, Relly.”
    Raphael suppressed a shiver at the nickname and gestured for his brother to proceed into the building, which Kasian did, but stopped so abruptly that Raphael nearly walked into his back. Peering over his brother’s shoulder he saw no reason for him to have been so arrested: his friends were sitting calmly, dressed ordinarily—green waistcoat, white shirt, teal dress—and Max and the cook were in the back singing an old song of ancient Greece.
    Raphael shook his head gently to compose himself. Sherry was looking at them, with some interest at Kasian, Robin was talking, and Will was bent over his writing. From across the room Raphael couldn’t see if it were the Agamemnon play or something else; it looked like blank verse from a distance, or alexandrines, in Will’s looping Elizabethan hand.
    Scheherezade brushed back her hair as they approached, thin gold bracelets clinking on her wrist. She smiled. “Good afternoon, James. We didn’t expect you to come after all!”
    He’d completely forgotten he’d been invited. He smiled mildly to cover the lapse. Kasian stirred as if to comment. Sherry elbowed Robin to make him stop talking. Raphael took a deep breath, dismissing the unexpected urge to introduce them formally, titles and accolades and all. That would just embroil them all in complications.
    “Kasian, let me introduce Robin, Scheherezade, and Will.” He paused uncomfortably when it came to following through on his decision, then managed to transform his pause into a smile, or thought he did, but Sherry caught the hesitation; he saw the direction of her curiosity change to follow the oddity. He resolutely barrelled through. “My friends: this is my brother Kasian.”
    There was an astounded silence, then Scheherezade moved. “Do call me Sherry.   You might sit here, if you’d like.”
    She patted the chair next to her. Kasian grinned happily at everyone and sat down. It was only then that Raphael realized he hadn’t asked him whether he spoke English, and now of course was supremely confused as to why he did. If it were a magical gift it was akin to the enchantments Raphael had on himself to prevent anyone from being able to gauge his own degree of power. Even Robin didn’t know that he had more than a whisper of magic.
    Raphael drew up a fifth chair between Robin and Will. He moved an empty glass from before him, presumably Angharad’s. Even Will had stopped writing and was staring at Kasian; they all were. When Raphael looked at Kasian he could see why they were amazed: it was no doubt