“Yeah. Kind of,” I said, scratching at my hair. “You aren’t here to call me in to work, I hope.”
“Do not be ridiculous,” she said. “It is Christmas.”
I lifted my eyebrows. “Christmas spirit? You?”
She lifted her chin slightly. “Christmas falls within the realm of Winter, does it not?”
I huffed out a little laugh. “Yeah. I guess it does. But I thought you had people for that.”
“I do,” Mab said. “Yet . . .” She frowned, as if concentrating to make sure she repeated the phrase correctly. “It does not do for the boss to spend too much time in the office.” She paused for a breath and then said, “I have brought your gift.”
I think my jaw bounced off my knee before it landed in the pile of parts. “What?”
“You are participating in the holiday this year,” Mab said. “I have an obligation to my vassals.”
“What?” I repeated.
She took one hand out from behind her back and presented me with a small gift bag of wintry blue, covered with cheerful silver snowflakes.
I eyed the bag. “Is it going to explode? Or try to eat me?”
“Do not be tiresome,” Mab sighed.
“Faeries don’t give gifts,” I said. “What kind of trick is this?”
“The kind that isn’t,” she replied. “I am not giving you a gift. I am fulfilling to you an obligation.”
I felt a smile touch the corner of my mouth. “Obligation, eh? Suppose I don’t accept?”
A pained expression touched her eyes for about a tenth of a second. “That would be your choice. As would be the consequences.”
“Well. That’s the first time I’ve ever been threatened into accepting a Christmas present,” I said.
I took the bag. Inside was a jewelry box. Inside the jewelry box was a plain band that probably wouldn’t have fit on my pinky. It was made from some kind of silvery, opalescent metal. I brushed a fingertip over it. It hummed with stored energy.
“Potent,” I said. “What does it do?”
“It is meant for your daughter,” Mab said. “And it will give her powers.”
I snapped the box shut and eyed Mab. “Excuse me?”
She made an impatient sound. “Not like that, wizard,” she said. “If you give her the ring, she will . . . have a certain amount of influence, until next stroke of noon, over the forces of Winter.” She sighed. “And it will play music.”
I narrowed my eyes. “What music?”
Mab leaned over, opened the box, and obligingly touched the ring. It immediately buzzed and the room filled with a swirl of music, as a woman’s voice sang, “The snow glows white on the mountain tonight . . .”
I shut the box on the sound and eyed her. It was just possible that I’d already heard that song enough to make my teeth itch.
“Now I understand,” I said drily.
“You are welcome,” she replied.
“Just out of curiosity,” I said, “is it going to be possible for her to freeze someone’s heart and turn them into an ice statue?”
Mab looked baffled. “Those are the powers in the motion picture. Should I have cheated her?”
I rubbed at the spot between my eyes. “Got it. We’ll go someplace nice and quiet to play with this gift.”
“Make sure she knows who gave it to her,” Mab said.
Then the fire guttered again. When it returned to life, it was golden and merry, the way fire is supposed to be—and Mab was gone.
“Leave me!” I called quietly to the empty air where she’d been. “Take me back! Haunt me no longer!”
Mouse’s jaws dropped open in a grin.
“Seriously?” I said. “You’ve read A Christmas Carol?”
Thumpthumpthumpthump.
“Yeah, well,” I said. “Let’s get back to work.”
And we did. We’d been going for a while when sleet suddenly rattled against the windows outside, the silent snow turning into a quiet chorus of clicks and pops. Wind gusted again—and there was the sudden sound of a key in a locked door.
The front door of the Carpenter house opened slowly and quietly, and a tall young woman with white-blond hair and ruddy pink cheeks, wrapped in a long and stylish winter coat, came in out of the cold.
“Molly,” I said, smiling.
My former apprentice, now technically also my boss, beamed at me, crossed the floor, and promptly gave me an enormous hug, which I returned.
“Merry Christmas, Harry,” she said.
“Merry Christmas, Molls,” I said. “Tell me it wasn’t you who talked to Mab about Maggie’s present.”
“That was Sarissa,” Molly said. “She showed Mab the movie.”
I tried to imagine Mab watching a Disney movie. She did not like Disney—not the company, and not the man. Disney had, in Mab’s opinion, done too much damage to the old faerie tales by sanding off all the unpleasant bits. According to Mab, it had weakened humanity in the face of supernatural forces, when they found out that the actual wicked Fae were nothing like Disney promised.
Trying to imagine her watching musical numbers made my brain hurt.
I tilted my head and said, “You’re here to bring me a gift?”
“Part and parcel of the whole Winter Lady gig,” she said, smiling. She rummaged in her coat and came out with a silver envelope decorated with white snowflakes. She presented it with a flourish and a little bow. “It’s a little symbolic, but I think you’ll like it.”
I opened the envelope. It had one piece of paper in it. On it was written a very large number.
“What is this?” I asked.
“The total of everyone’s medical bills from last summer,” she said, her voice quieter, soberer. “Everyone who got hurt. It’s all paid for.”
I didn’t want to think about the peace talks.
Pain. So much pain.
“What about the funerals?” I asked. My voice was bitter.
Molly was quiet for a long moment before she said, gently, “Those, too.”
I bowed my head.
I counted my breaths.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “You’re trying to be kind and I’m just . . .”
“Don’t,” she said. “It’s supposed to hurt, Harry. I’m glad you hurt. It means you’re still you.”