“Hey, Beef Wellington! Try to keep up, won’t you?” Jacob was not pleased to learn that Binah-level clearance involved mentoring younger agents. In his case, Jacob was tasked with a roly-poly new recruit by the name of Wells Jenkin. He was plump, didn’t seem to have much affinity for magic, and worse off, Jacob strongly detected the odor of sheep. Jenkin was from Wales.
“So, so, sorry, Mister Orange!” The young man in his pressed suit struggled to keep pace with Jacob as they marched down a busy street of tourists near Niagara Falls, the Canadian side.
Jacob spared a glance to turn his head and glare at his companion. “Cut it out on the mister stuff,” he shouted. “And hustle!”
Wells nodded, visibly panting, and mustered to keep up with his teacher. “What,” he gasped, “should I call you then?”
“Jacob is fine, though if Victoria were our handler today she’d insist on ‘Agent Orange’ — but for reasons you can assume I’m not too fond of that. Some people call me JO, but those someones usually find themselves organ-less, lying in a bathtub deep in the heart of Mexico.”
“All right… Jacob.” Wells clutched a parcel, about the size of a football, to his side. It was twice enfolded in bubblewrap and enchanted to stay inconspicuous.
Jacob turned and ushered Wells to a stop. His ginger hair, needing a cut, flapped about in the breeze from the nearby waterfalls. “There’s a good lad. So you know the mission brief, correct?”
“We’re,” Wells said, “to deliver this package to a certain someone by the entrance to ‘The Maid of the Mist.’”
Jacob took a moment to fish into the pocket of his denim coat and pull out two garish yellow ponchos, one for each of them, that were alarmingly big for the size of his jacket.
Wells whistled. “That’s tidy magecraft, sir. Mister Orange. Agent Orange. Jacob.”
“Well, just announce my presence to the world, you silly chit.” Jacob stuffed one of the water-proof ponchos into Wells’ free arm. “Put that on; it’s sealed. I had R&D work on in because I can’t stand cold water. Can you work shadows yet?”
Cloaking oncself in a veil of night was the nearest form of invisibility Jacob’s agency offered and was part of the basic of training for field ops, but he had heard Wells hadn’t exactly passed with flying colors. That sheep-shagger.
“I think,” Wells said, “I can manage. May I ask a question… Jacob?” The poor sod was still trying to catch his breath and figure out Jacob’s queer sense of decorum.
“Bang away.”
“Why are we running?”
Jacob merely grinned. “I’m hazing you, Wellington. Now, into this alley here…”
Stepping gingerly in his new trainers — the last ones were eaten by an ooze — Jacob tugged Wells into a small crevasse between a café and a bank. The street was rife with passersby, and they needed to be inconspicuous with this dead drop.
“Okay, give me the parcel.” Jacob more or less took it from Wells before the eighteen-year-old had time to blink, let alone parse the directions.
“Shroud yourself. Remember, your aptitude goes into my report at the end.” Christ, he sounded like Victoria. He was surprised he hadn’t acquired her curt accent as well.
Wells adjusted his jacket and brushed some imaginary lint off his shoulder. “Do we need to, sir? Er, Jacob? There’s plenty of crowd to blend into.”
Jacob sighed. “I read your records, Agent Jenkin. Well, rather, Doctor Munroe made me read them. Why I got tasked as your mentor is still a mystery to me, as the man never seems to explain anything, but for the time being you’re in my care. Now make like an overweight star on Strictly Come Dancing and disappear.”
Wells visibly winced and drew in a sharp intake of breath. Jacob watched as he closed his eyes and sweat, already dappling his forehead, began to run down his brow and slick his nose.
“it’s coming, Mis… Jacob,” he stammered, “I promise!”
Jacob ran his fingers through his hair. His magic could run laps around this boy’s, and Jacob was only a few years out of graduate school. Annoyed, he grabbed his force-fed pupil’s hand.
“Shadows,” he murmured. Normally he wouldn’t need words of power for such a simple glamour, but he worried about Wells’ stability to maintain the illusion. “Cover him with darknesss, so that he may walk as night. Inumbrare.” And he crossed himself with Catholic rites.
Immediately around Wells a sort of misty darkness began to writhe about his feet; it slowly and steadily slid its way up his body until he was covered in motes of darkness, barely visible in the dim light of the alleyway.
“Mister Orange!” exclaimed Wells, forgetting Jacob’s addressing protocol. “You’re not supposed to help me with spells!”
“Wellington, consider this a one-off. Mum’s the word.” And Jacob pressed one finger to his nose before turning his gesture into a swift flourish, gathering shadows around him and obscuring his form.
“I can barely see you,” whinged Wells. It grated on Jacob’s ears.
“Well, that’s the point then, isn’t it?”
“How will you see me?”
“Since I cast the spell, I can see you like a sheep at a shearing. The others? Not so much.” Jacob decided he should probably stop on his sheep euphemisms. The poor Welsh.
“Oh… oh, okay,” said Wells; Jacob’s words had probably struck a nerve. On to happier things!
“Keep to the sides; don’t engage anyone, and we should be fine.” Jacob nodded at their dubious delivery. “Whatever that is, the sooner this test is over, the sooner you get your marks. Apprentice.”
“Yes, sir! I mean, Jacob, sir!”
Inwardly groaning, Jacob flicked the piercing in his ear and wondered which was the worst of two evils. “Handler, do you copy?”
“Hey there, JO!” called a boisterous battlecry into Jacob’s eardrum.
“Aphy? Is that you? What on earth are you doing as a handler?”
“After the incident with the Eyeballs and a bar fight or three, I requested some lighter work from Doctor Munroe. He was more than obliging.”
Lighter work? Victoria would have Aphrodite’s guts for garters if she heard her profession described as “light work.” Jacob allowed himself to smirk.
“Status?” he asked.
“You rendezvous in fourteen minutes. Better get a shuffle on.”
Jacob nodded, mostly to himself and then looked at his protégé. “All right, mate?”
“Yes… Jacob.”
Suppressing an almost dietetic urge to roll his eye, Jacob grabbed Wells by the hand and pulled him out of the alley. There were still massive throngs of people: tourists taking selfies and gorging on poutine. Jacob kept close to the side of the bank and pushed Wells out in front of him.
The poor lad was shivering from nerves. How on earth did he get cleared for field duty? Jacob would have to write a very scathing report indeed if he didn’t want Wells to end up dead in a ditch somewhere. For now he just hissed, “Proceed, Jenkin, to the attraction’s entrance. I’m right behind you.”
It was a pity, Jacob mused, that their cloak of illusion didn’t ward off smells. He wondered if he should propose something to R&D; Jenkin stank like a skunk in heat. Even on-goeres who were too involved and deceived by Jacob’s magic turned up their sunburned noses after catching of whiff of them. Deodoraant, Jacob thought, was probably a better idea.
The bank they passed was old, back from trailblazing times, and despite the bustling crowd it didn’t look much modernized. The brickwork was in dire need of repair and flecks of paint peeled off its door.
“Twelve minutes, JO,” Aphrodite’s voice chimed in his ear. He daren’t respond lest he drew the crowd’s attention. Jenkin, for his part, did his best to inch his way forward, eyeing the package nervously. Jacob wondered why neither he nor Wells hadn’t been briefed on its contents.
Oh well, he thought. It was probably something utterly banal and useless for the purpose of testing the wee mageling. Jacob slinked along the bank’s exterior, letting his fingers trail along the bricks. Just a few more minutes, he reckoned, and they could make the drop and be on their way. He hoped that their contact was more adroit than his pupil.
That was when he sticked a finger in it. “Wellington,” Jacob said in a harsh whisper.
“Did you make sure the package was sealed?”
“Ye…es, Mister Orange. I mean Jacob. JO?”
Jacob ignored the nomenclature and took a gander at his new trainers. Just like before, a slimy intensely green substance covered the toe of his shoe. Ichor.
