Page 38 of Shroom for Improvement

Again, my heartbeat grew quicker, tapping away at my ribs like a dancing gull imitating a rainstorm on a grassy bank.

Sonny couldn’t lie. He could spin the truth if he wanted to, but the guy I was looking at now—with his hair sticking out in clumps, his cheeks and ears all pink, and the way he plucked at the loose threads around the knee-holes of his jeans—was being earnest.

“I’m writing a paper. Have been writing it for so, so long. It’s about shroom fae and shroom fae glamour, with particular emphasis on how that glamour may benefit the soil and the soil structure and all the microorganisms that live within the soil.”

“Right,” I said, having understood maybe two-thirds of that sentence.

“It’s a... speculative research project. I’ve been unable to find out much more than old wives’ tales and strange folklore. Folklore pertaining to other species, I should say. Nothing concrete from shroom fae lore because, well, there isn’t a lot of shroom fae lore.

“Over the past two hundred and fifty-ish years, I developed a... an obsession with trying to find out more, but it seemed like the more I found out about your type, the less I felt like I knew. I studied mycology, and ecology, and dendrology—all the ologies. I spent so long studying in the fields, growingthings, farming mushrooms, testing out theories, trying other types of glamour with... varying results.

“But because of what I understand about fungi and its significance to all life, it stands to reason shroom magic is—will be—unparalleled in its latent potential.”

I knew then what Sonny wanted from me. What he’d wanted from me all along. All those times he’d asked me to get coffee with him, and I’d responded with a curt,“No.”Something heavy dropped deep in my stomach. I’d always assumed he was taking the piss. He’d have that jokester smile stretched across his face, and every time it had transported me back to the playground bullies.

“You talk to him. No, you talk to him. Ask him what his house is like. Does he live in a toadstool? Ask him why he’s so shit at glamour. I’ve seen carp with more magic. Pretend you like him, go on.”

“I understand your plight,” I said. “But I won’t be able to help you in the ways you think I can. I know nothing also, and even if I did, there are forces that would prevent me from telling you. And to make matters a hundred times worse, I’m something awful with magic. Terrible, actually.”

Even though I really,reallydidn’t want to, it felt like something I should admit, given the likelihood of the ritual being something glamour adjacent. Sonny should at least have a heads-up there.

Amazingly, after I admitted all that, Sonny smiled. “My own glamour is not much use either. Turns out a magpie fae is only useful if they want to acquire shiny things without paying for them.” His cheeks grew even pinker.

I had the absurd urge to reach over and... I didn’t know. Smooth the frown lines from his brow with my thumb? Gently press my lips against his until the tension melted from his features—no, dammit. Bad Claude.

I’d admit it wasn’t the first time I’d thought about kissing Sonny. About what those improbably puffy lips would taste and feel like against mine, but before, at least I could fool myself into thinking perhaps he might be curious about me too.

That was before I learned he only cared about what I was, what I could bring to his research, rather than who I am.

“About a decade ago,” he said, pulling me from my spiral. “I made a breakthrough with my studies. With mycelium. You know mycelium?”

I looked at him blankly, and Sonny wiggled his fingers, then linked them together.

“Ah, the universal sign for a mass of thread-like, branching, underground fungi,” I said.

He pursed his lips. “I should know better than to explain mushrooms to a mushroom fae. You know mycelium can communicate with trees? They basically create a network where they can share nutrients and water. I’m convinced that the network can also be used to transport and share glamour. I just need to find out what that glamour is.”

“Well, I had rather hoped you could help me, by telling me what that magic was.”

Sonny opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. Furrowed his brow even more. “This was why you emailed me with a dire need of assistance?”

“Yup.” I tried to laugh, but couldn’t quite get it out. “This house—manor, palace, whatever you want to call it—and its occupants, are reliant on my ability to perform a biannual ritual to keep it alive. Only, I have absolutely no idea what that ritual is, or how to perform it. I only know where I need to perform it.”

He continued to stare at me, his big black eyes flicking over my face as though looking for the clues in my words. Or cracks in my story.

“A flat stone in the middle of a deer-poo-infested paddock, as it turns out,” I added.

Sonny’s voice was almost a whisper when he spoke. “So, you need to perform a ritual... twice a year, or once every two years?”

“Twice a year.”

“Sure. Twice a year. Or this house will die, and maybe the occupants too?”

“Oh, I think the guests will just lose their home, but on second thoughts, I should find out for definite. I mean, if they died too, that would be...” I trailed off, unable and unwilling to finish my thought. Oggy and Willow’s bright little faces swam through my mind.

It didn’t bear thinking about, and it would be all my fault.

Sonny was obviously on the same page as me. His arm shot out to cradle my bicep. “I’m pretty sure sentry magic doesn’t work like that. And the other people here are guests, right?”

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