Neon Blue by E Frost (best big ereader .TXT) 📕

Trying not to let what the demon and Lin have said bother me. Failing. I’m not homophobic. At least, I don’t think I am. I’ve always thought that whatever consenting adults did in the privacy of their own bedrooms was fine. As long as I didn’t have to see or hear it. But when it’s in my house, in the next bedroom, somehow it’s a different story.

The realization that I’d have been a little jealous, but not disgusted, if it had been a woman, doesn’t make me feel any better.

The salamander finally wakes up for the last part of the potion. The part where I imbue the magic milk with some of my living energy. It should sap me. Leave me drained. Instead, brewing always makes me feel intensely alive. Like really good sex. I feel like I could build bridges, move mountains, afterwards.

Power flows into me easily when I call it, channel it into the potion. I reach out to the salamander and let some of that energy flow into the little lizard. Not that it actually did anything while I was brewing, but magic is generous. The salamander hisses, laps at the air with its forked tongue. Its spotted crimson and cream body glows. Echoing the glow from the cauldron.

I raise my hands over the potion and call the Elements. Dust, fire and water swirl around me. A rising storm of primal energy. I reach up and the ceiling disappears. Blue sky. The crack of thunder. And then a bolt of lightning sizzles down to explode whitely inside my cauldron.

I lower my hands. The light fades. The ceiling reappears. Only the smell of ozone, and the taste of power, linger.

I smile at the lizard. “Now that’s what I call cooking with gas.”

The lizard flicks its black tongue at me and disappears.

“You’re welcome,” I say to the empty air. Then I pick up a ladle and begin scooping the magic milk into containers.

My last appointment of the day is Mrs. Feeney. She’s been referred by Mass. General’s Fertility Center. Four successful I.V.F. implantations. Four miscarriages very late in the second trimester. My heart aches each time I read her file. A note from a specialist at Mass. General suggests that Mrs. Feeney may be a pre-symptomatic diabetic. But a special diet and monitoring during the last pregnancy didn’t prevent the miscarriage.

I had little hope that I’d be able to help Mrs. Feeney after our first consultation. The magic milk’s not a cure-all. But reading through my family’s handbooks, I found a recipe written in my great-grandmother Jeta’s spidery hand and marked, ‘best for ladies who lose late.’

It’s taken a month to brew. The recipe was very exacting. But it finally finished aging a few days ago, and when I opened the oak cask sitting in my herbarium, it smelled right.

I set out a cup and a gallon container of the potion on my desk. The potion’s a deep orange, and it glows like a pumpkin in the late afternoon sunlight slanting through my office windows.

Mrs. Feeney arrives late, breathless and sweating. I let her catch her breath while I explain about the potion.

“And you really think this will help, Doctor?”

I correct her gently. Lin’s the doctor, not me. “I think we should give it a try. Say a month. Finish the jug.” I give the gallon container a pat. “And then I’d like you to have some blood work done. See if anything has changed.”

I’m hoping there will be some clinical change. I can’t ask her to go through another pregnancy and risk losing another baby, only to find out if my great-grandmother’s recipe works.

Mrs. Feeney nods tremulously.

“Could I ask you to take the first dose now? I’d just like to observe you for a few minutes afterwards.”

“Observe me?” she asks, looking alarmed.

I’d like to smell her, actually. She’s always smelled a little strange to me. Sickly-sweet. Like overripe bananas. I want her to drink the first dose and see if it makes any change in that funny odor.

“Some women feel light-headed or dizzy afterwards. I’d just like to wait a few minutes after you take the—” I catch myself before I say potion. “Formula. And see how you do.”

Mrs. Feeney gives in gracefully. She drinks a cupful of the potion with a small grimace. Guess it doesn’t taste as good as it smells. I take her into Lin’s recovery room and let her relax in there with a magazine for fifteen minutes while I clean off my desk and dictate a file note. I hear the front door buzz as I’m going to check on Mrs. Feeney.

“Have a great weekend,” I call to Lin. “Bring me back a peck.”

She doesn’t answer; she must be out the door already. I continue down the hallway into the recovery room.

Mrs. Feeney tells me she feels fine. No light-headedness or dizziness. I nod sagely and pretend to peer at her pupils while I’m really leaning close enough to get a good sniff.

Still that sickly-sweet odor. Strong enough that it wrinkles my nose. But maybe it’s just a little less. And now there’s a different scent. Fresher. Slightly starchy. Like just-cut potatoes.

I feel the faint rush of euphoria I always feel when I know my magic’s working. Not all magic has to be flashy. Some works quietly. Either way is fine with me, just as long as it works.

“That’s great, Mrs. Feeney. I think it’s okay for you to go. Why don’t you give me a call in three weeks and tell me how you’re feeling? Then I’ll send a referral slip over to Mass. General for that blood work.”

She thanks me and shakes my hand and says she’ll show herself out. I tuck away the magazine she’s been reading and head back to my office.

My desk clock reads five-fifty. If I leave now, I’ll be home in time for dinner.

Cold sweat pops out on my forehead, slicks my palms. Another night with the demon in my house. What will I hear through