Legacies (Mercedes Lackey) - By Mercedes Lackey Page 0,14

so skinny she was on the edge of being too skinny. She had a sardonic little smile on her face, and something about that face reminded Spirit of a cat.

The other girl was her opposite in every way. Her hair was black—a true black, the kind with blue highlights—and it was completely straight, with straight bangs, and looked really long. Her eyes were a warm brown. If she’d been blonde-haired and blue-eyed, she would have looked just like every picture Spirit had ever seen of Alice In Wonderland, down to that faint little knot of stubbornness at the side of her mouth. She was several inches taller than the redheaded Goth, and sleek to the point of being plump.

“I’m Muirin Shae,” said the Goth-girl. “You do not get to call me ‘Murray’ or ‘Rin-Tin-Tin’ or any other cute names you can think of, because you will really regret it. This is Adelaide Lake. You can call her Addie, because everyone does. We’re supposed to get you oriented, show you around, keep you from slitting your wrists, all that stuff. You aren’t going to slit your wrists, are you?”

“Um. No.” Spirit eyed Muirin dubiously, unable to tell if the other girl was joking or not.

Muirin let out an exaggerated sigh of relief. “Well good. It makes an awful mess and Addie and me’d get our butts kicked. That’s one out of three.” She walked into the room, pulled out the chair from behind the desk, and flopped into it. “So what’s your sad story? We all have sad stories here. I have a Wicked Stepmother.”

Spirit blinked. “You do?”

“She does.” Addie rolled her eyes, following Muirin into the room and closing the door behind her. “I just have a trust fund.” Addie did have a faint accent, too faint for Spirit to tell if it was English or not. “Do you mind if I—?” She gestured at the couch.

There was a couch—a love seat, really—and two chairs, forming a little seating group around a coffee table. “Yes, please,” she said, getting up off the bed to join Addie.

Muirin promptly got out of the desk chair to sprawl on the bed, rolling onto her stomach and kicking her feet in the air. “But don’t be shy! I know you want to hear all about my fascinating life—and that way I can ask you all about yours. Once upon a time I was a normal, happy child—”

Addie snorted rudely and Spirit was startled into a stifled giggle.

“Quiet!” Muirin said imperiously. “Then Mummy Dearest shuffled off this mortal coil—propelled by booze of course. Daddy Darling promptly married the Trophy Wife, then wrapped himself around the nearest tree in his little red sports car, leaving me at the mercy of my Wicked Stepmother.”

“It gets better,” Addie murmured, as Muirin paused dramatically.

“A little sympathy,” Muirin said. “I was only a baby.”

“Fourteen,” Addie explained.

“And had led a very sheltered life—”

“In and out of every progressive warehousing school Mummy and Daddy Dearest could find,” Addie footnoted.

“Who’s telling this?” Muirin demanded.

“Oh, you are,” Addie said. “Go on.”

Muirin heaved a theatrical sigh. “All right then! My Wicked Stepmother planned to lock me up in yet another boarding school while she took off for Europe to spend Daddy Darling’s fortune. Too bad—how sad—that Daddy Darling wasn’t as well-fixed as he’d looked.” Muirin smiled sweetly, but there was a wicked glint in her eye.

“First Wicked Stepmother tried to hand me off to a relative. Only neither Mummy Dearest or Daddy Darling had any. Then she figured she’d save money and keep me in public school instead of sending me off to another facility for troubled teens. Except that meant I was around, and by then I’d been . . . learning things, so whenever she tried to pretend she was in charge, I’d just show her who was really the boss.” Muirin sighed dreamily. “So of course when Oakhurst offered to take me off her hands, no charge, she couldn’t sign the papers fast enough.”

Muirin rolled over on her back and stretched herself like a cat, then held out her hand, palm-up. In rapid succession, a glowing ball of blue light, then a flame, then a tiny human figure appeared on it, before she closed it again. “I do illusions. Adelaide’s a Water Witch. What do you do?”

“Nothing,” Spirit said, still staring at Muirin in shock. “I mean, I don’t know, I—”

“Don’t let her tease you. Most of us aren’t as precocious as Murr-cat,” Adelaide said kindly. “You should get into a uniform