The New Magic - The Revelation of Jonah McAllister, Landon Wark [10 best novels of all time .TXT] 📗

of the carton that Harold Klum pulled out of the refrigerator and he angrily poured it out into one of the dirty bowls lining the cupboard, redoubling it until there was enough to pour some cereal into.

"Pouring cereal into the milk," he muttered in German. "Animals pour cereal into the milk."

He checked his phone, as he had diligently for the past week. Hilde and Roth had not been very receptive when he had made the claim that there was actual magic in the world. At least, not at first, and Roth was still pretty standoffish, too entrenched in the weird strain of Catholicism that his family was into. Hilde had said she would come back, but that she wanted to see her family first.

That he, of the three of them, would turn out to be the adventurous one was an irony that was not lost on him.

He could make milk, and a few basic other foodstuffs, some money. It was a liberating feeling, but when he got a feel for what some of the others were capable of, it made him feel somewhat inadequate. The woman who had picked him out of the bar could apparently alter her form, command lightning and speak with sea-creatures (though he had not seen any of this for himself). Even the man he had managed to get as a roommate could make marijuana plants grow at a phenomenal rate.

And yet he could not make milk or clean the dishes.

Harold sat at the table and took a spoonful of his cereal. It really wasn't as bad as all that. He had been prepared to bolt when the door had opened up onto what he had been certain would be an army-style barracks. But the apartment was actually quite nice for the city. Two bedrooms on opposite ends of the dwelling ensured privacy and the furnishing were relatively new. His roommate claimed he could make the rent by himself, but making that much coinage took up a tremendous amount of his time. Time better spent on other things.

Like pot.

At least he spoke German.

Harold began mentally composing an email to his father as he spooned out another few bites of cereal.

Dearest Father. I am having a good time learning sorcery—

All joking aside he was going to have to come up with some excuse why he was not coming home yet. Most of the ones he had played with so far involved meeting a woman. Those usually fell apart when he realized he would likely have to send a picture with a girl eventually, or at least post one on social media. Maybe the woman from the bar would pose for one. She had seemed to lose interest in him afterwards, a little busy perhaps. He really didn't have any idea how to get a hold of her. Having asked the—what was it; Initiate instructor?—once how he could contact her Harold had gotten the response of 'Best forgo that squirrel, Mikey. She's got Loch Ness.' He was still scratching his head over that.

The door down the hall opened up and his roommate, Skimbal (a street name) announced himself with a guitar riff from his oversized speakers.

"Harooooold. Are you going to the weekly meetup tomorrow?" the grizzled and skinny man asked.

"It's on Friday," Harold replied acridly.

"Yeah. Tomorrow."

"Today is Tuesday." He walked his empty bowl over to the sink and rinsed it out. "And could you make more milk when you finish it?"

"Oh, shit. How many days have I lost? Is it earlier or later I think it is?"

"Later. It's always later."

"Well, not like it matters. They'll likely just break it up again."

Harold frowned. "Are you worried about that?"

"Bah. Not really. As long as you're not trying to organize some workers around here the government doesn't really care. They'll hassle you for two things, bribes and information on the people they do care about. Trust me. I know."

"Oh."

Skimbal started pulling some laundry off the floor around his door and sniffing it. Evidently coming up with an acceptable combination of clothing he started pulling off his pants.

"All right, man. I got myself another sort of meeting, with some geiles luder."

Harold winced. "Fine."

He walked over to the sofa and flopped down as his roommate geared up to go out. Waiting only a minute for an invitation he quickly gave up on the idea and grabbed his phone to absently begin flicking through some of the social media of his friends from back home.

As the door closed behind his roommate a notification popped up on the top of the screen. Hilde. Harold pulled it down into the centre of the screen.

"Is this what you were talking about?"

Below it was a headline obscured by the edge of the screen. He tapped on it and after a second of buffering the article came up.

"Eastern European official murdered by cult."

"Fuck," Harold whispered, rising quickly from his spot on the sofa.

He looked around the apartment, desperate for someone to show the headline to, but Skimbal had left the apartment and was down the hall. He sprinted to the door and threw it open only to find the hallway empty. He thought about trying to catch his roommate by taking the stairs down to the lobby, but would never be quick enough. He sprinted back to the window that looked out onto the street two storeys below. He waited for a minute for the man to appear, watched the sidewalk closely for his distinctive man bun.

He waited another minute and then two.

Looking at his phone again Harold wondered if he had gone out the back exit. It was unusual as the alley back there was difficult to navigate.

"Shit." Harold grabbed his coat off the back of a chair and headed out into the hall, intent on finding one of the others.

Aegera Has