good to see you.” He beamed at me, and I realized that if someone fattened him up a bit, gave him a pair of wire-framed glasses and a red suit, and aged him twenty years, he’d easily be able to pass himself off as Santa Claus.
“It’s, um, good to see you, too.” I wasn’t sure what was supposed to happen next.
“I imagine you have questions.” He sat back in his chair, looking perfectly relaxed. “Ask anything. Ask away!”
“Okay. Well.” I paused, wondering if “ask anything” actually meant anything. I supposed I didn’t really have that much to lose by being blunt (not that I ever have much luck trying to be delicate). “So I heard you died in prison?”
He laughed, sounding a bit embarrassed, and tugged at his beard. I realized that his hands were spotted and gaunt, looked considerably older than his face. “Well, if you get sent to prison for life, you might as well die and get it over with, right?”
“So you, what … died and got better?”
“Oh, come on. By now you of all people should know that resurrection magic is entirely doable, even if the powers that be tell us otherwise. Death never stopped a Shimmer.”
He paused. “Though mine did put me out of commission longer than I’d hoped. By the time my friends finally got to my body, it was too late for me to save your mother. Fortunately she was able to save you before the Virtii’s minions took her from us.”
To save you. Benedict Jordan had told me that I’d been diagnosed with untreatable cancer when I was a child, and that my mother stole the life energy of a boy awaiting a heart transplant in the hospital in her spell to cure me. He said she was forbidden from using any magic, much less grand necromancy, so she’d been quietly put to death soon after. I remembered finding my mom dead on the floor; the coroner told us it was an undiagnosed aneurysm. She couldn’t really have done what Jordan claimed, could she? I had to know.
“Jordan said she murdered a kid to save me,” I said.
“That boy was going to suffer a slow, painful death from his illness,” Shimmer replied gently. “What your mother did for him was a mercy.”
“But she could have saved him.” I hadn’t expected I’d be so contrary with him, hadn’t expected to be suddenly feeling so much anger and sadness over what had happened so long ago. “She had that power, didn’t she?”
“She had the power to save exactly one child before she would be killed for the sin of using her natural gifts. Would you expect a mother to save a stranger’s dying child rather than her own? Would you rather she betrayed you, let you suffer and die of cancer to preserve that sick young boy? Would you rather be dead?”
“No. I wouldn’t,” I replied. The admission made me feel dirty, like I’d personally murdered the boy I’d never even met. “So how much more of that kind of ‘mercy’ has there been? Was that what landed you in prison?”
“If you ask the authorities, they will tell you I was put in prison for grand necromancy and murder. But since you’re asking me, I will tell you I was imprisoned because I dared to study the magic of time and probability, magic that the Virtii feel is their sole domain. If I had been a good little wizard who sat at the back of the bus when I was told to, I never would have been prosecuted.”
“But did you commit murder?”
“I killed a pair of cockroaches who happened to look like men. They tried to rape your mother, and I cut them down. Given the same circumstances, I would gladly do it again. It was my right as a man, and my duty as a husband. Had I used a gun or a sword instead of a killing word—well. Unfortunately my lack of a pistol gave my enemies more ammunition than I expected.”
I did some quick math in my head. “So you were freed and resurrected … when I was eleven?”
“Yes. And I’ve been keeping an eye on you ever since.” He beamed at me again, his slightly gap-toothed smile declaring Aw, my widdle girl is all growed up and ain’t I proud!
I thought back on the horrible months I’d suffered through when my powers began and I didn’t know what was happening to me. My cheeks flushed hot, and I suddenly wanted