Ritual Magic

was puzzled. She felt a little flutter in her stomach. Then he spoke to her.
    “Julia? Are you okay?”
    * * *
    L ILY pushed the remains of her Kung Pao chicken around on her plate and tried to look like she was paying attention to her cousin Freddie, who was all excited about implied rates and parity and agio. What the hell was agio? Was that even a word?
    She didn’t ask. He’d tell her, and God knew how long that would take. It was some kind of broker-speak, though. Probably currency trading, which was his specialty. That was a large part of what he did for Rule these days. Rule’s second clan wasn’t affluent the way Nokolai was.
    “. . . not convinced the baht is on the rise, but . . .” Freddie broke off and chuckled. “Your eyes have glazed over.”
    “Sorry.” She and Freddie got along better now that he’d stopped asking her to marry him. She’d even forgiven him for doing so repeatedly without mentioning that he was gay. Turned out he’d been in major denial about that and had only come out of the closet with himself recently. He wasn’t ready for the family to know . . . by which he meant his mother.
    Lily could understand that. Aunt Jei—who was technically Lily’s second cousin, but Lily and her sisters called all their mother’s first cousins “aunt” or “uncle”—put the passive in passive-aggressive. She was limp, needy, and full of sighs, a widow with only one child, whom she doted on, clung to, and controlled ruthlessly.
    Poor Freddie.
    Aunt Jei was probably the reason Rule had excused himself to go to the restroom. He’d been seated next to her, and even Rule could only take so much.
    “That’s all right,” Freddie said kindly and patted her hand. “You’re probably daydreaming about the big day. Only two weeks away now, isn’t it?” He beamed at her.
    “Two weeks and five days.” After which, she thought with a smile, Rule would be officially related to Aunt Jei, Freddie, and everyone else at this table. Poor man.
    They were in the larger of the two private dining rooms at the Golden Dragon, where the family held most such celebrations since it was owned by Uncle Chen—another “uncle” who was really a cousin. The party was smaller than usual this year. None of the children were here, and Grandmother’s companion, Li Qin, had broken her foot two days before. It was still too swollen to cast. She was supposed to keep the foot elevated as much as possible, so Grandmother had insisted she stay home. Plus, Lily’s younger sister wasn’t here, though for a very different reason.
    “I attended the wedding of a colleague’s daughter recently,” Freddie was saying. “Beautiful girl. It was a very modern sort of ceremony. They wrote their own vows, and when it was time for toasts . . .”
    Lily nodded and let her mind drift. Her mother had told them firmly they were not to make a fuss: “With your wedding so close, it’s too much to ask. Everyone is very busy.” By “everyone,” she meant herself. She and Rule were shouldering the bulk of the work involved in planning a major event, for which Lily was duly grateful. Perhaps a bit more grateful to Rule, true, because it was so obvious that her mother was having a blast.
    Lily’s father had wisely ignored his wife’s instructions. Julia Yu loved being fussed over on her birthday.
    That fuss had damn well better include presents, too. Lily’s gaze slid to the table behind Freddie. The table held over a dozen gaily wrapped packages. She grinned. Freddie took her grin as tribute to his story about the groom’s toast and chuckled and launched into a tale about someone else she’d never met.
    Every year Julia Yu insisted she didn’t need a thing, not a thing, but they knew better. She adored presents—the bright paper and bows, the whole unwrapping ritual. Lily would miss it herself if they ever did skip the gifts. Her mother might be picky and perfectionistic about all sorts of things, but presents were different. Her eyes lit with delight. She exclaimed with pleasure over everything, no matter how odd or humble, and held it up for everyone to admire.
    “So what did you get Mother?” she asked when Freddie paused.
    “Why, I got her a gift.”
    That meant he was dying to tell, but she was supposed to coax him. She glanced at her watch: 8:22. “Guess I’ll find out soon. She’ll be finished primping any—”
    The first scream was loud and piercing and terrified. So were the ones that