Magical Midlife Love (Leveling Up 4)

“Now, I know Edgar usually reads these to you,” he continued, “but since the house showed the book to me, I assume it’ll be okay if I read them. You’ll have to let me know what she says. I don’t want to step on any toes.”

“He has been approved,” Ivy House said.

I relayed the message.

“Oh. Great.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “I thought maybe she’d strike me dead.”

“He is watched, always, and if he steps wrong, I will ensure the fear he feels during his slow death will cure him of chasing his next adrenaline high.”

“Good grief.” I scrunched my nose but relayed the message.

“That’s fair,” he murmured.

“What do you say to her?”

“Oh, just odds and ends, truths and horrors of my past. My plant is surely happy to be rid of me. It’s probably less depressed on its own.”

I couldn’t decide if I should give him a comforting word or two, or just blink at his oddness. He certainly fit into my crew.

“Must be hard working for powerful people, huh?” I finally said.

“In my world, yes. In your world, it seems not. Now, this passage is entirely written in Latin. It is incredibly advanced, but since you have a knack for potions—or following directions, as you say—and enough power, I think you’ll be fine to learn it now.”

“Right now?” I checked the time again.

“Yes, right now,” Ivy House said.

I rolled my eyes. “Fine,” I said, and Sebastian gave me that deadpan stare of his before glancing around. He clearly knew Ivy House had answered.

“You’re not weirded out by the magical house, huh?” I rolled up my sleeves and then looked at the stainless-steel pot on the camping stove. “Did you remember to turn on the gas?” I checked the propane tank on the side of the setup without waiting for an answer.

“Do you know what’s funny?” Sebastian tapped the page and then took two sideways steps over to a clunky green card table with stains in deep red, black, royal blue, and one rusty orange. Little dishes sat on it containing herbs or leaves, one holding tiny eyeballs and another containing a black talon. Sebastian prepped for potions like Austin did for cooking.

I pushed the rush of heat away.

“No,” I said, pulling a blue rubber apron over my clothes. I’d learned to keep it down here for this purpose. “What spell are we doing again?”

“Using a camping stove to create potions is considered incredibly gauche. If I weren’t so powerful, everyone in the mage community would look down on me. They’d ridicule me. But since I am powerful, with a good and respected position, they call me eccentric.”

I frowned at the equipment. “This is a high-dollar camping stove. My ex used to take a similar one for camping trips.”

Sebastian laughed. “Yes, see? That is what I mean. Because of my power and placement, magical people think I’m making a statement of some sort. You just take it for what it is—a good-quality contraption that gets the job done.”

“You’re in a part of the house that has no electricity. How else would you cook the potions?”

“Crisscrossed logs and magical fire.”

“This is a way easier setup. You can just fold it up and put it away when you’re done. It has a handle and everything.”

He laughed again. “The cooking pot is another item I’m side-eyed for using. My kind use cauldrons, like in the stories.”

“Oh. Well, yeah, I can see how that would be more fun.”

“But not as practical.”

“No. You can wash this in the dishwasher. I doubt a cauldron would fit in there. We never make that much potion, anyway.”

He bent with his hands on his knees, laughter ripping through him. He was shaking with it. “Yes.” He wiped his eyes when he straightened up. “Yes, exactly. You don’t think I am eccentric—you think I am practical.”

“I just thought you were normal”—or normal for this house—“but yeah, I’ll go with practical.”

“I am normal, actually. Far too normal for the life I lead.” He took a deep breath, and a few more chuckles escaped. “To answer your question, Miss Jacinta, I do like this magical house. I like it very much. I like that it has a personality, that it values people on their merits, and that it will kill me if I step out of line. Its rules make sense. Now, let’s get to work. We’ll be making a kind of invisibility potion that will trump all the others I’ve ever heard of. I highly doubt anyone will be able to create a counter-spell to this, which means you can truly be invisible in a way few can.”

“Or…you can, right? Since we’ve agreed to go with Niamh’s strategy?”

Niamh had suggested we keep Sebastian as the silent partner for as long as possible. Keep him in the shadows. That way, I’d still seem inexperienced and naïve, which would make Kinsella think he had the upper hand, while still having Sebastian close at hand for backup. It was a good plan.