CHAPTER THREE

  The Voice in the Teacup

  II

  Skidding to her knees beside Wilburn's mattress, Ez swept him into a tight embrace, trying in vain to quell his shaking. As she pressed his tiny body to her own, the distant hum suddenly jumped in volume, so much so that it was resonating through her. It took her a moment to understand why. The boy’s convulsions were exactly synchronized with the vibrations of the inbound vexpids. The hairs on the back of Ez’s neck prickled. Magic. Somehow, the hornets were causing Wilburn to have a seizure, even though they must still be a good mile away. A feeling of utter, devastating helplessness threatened to smother her. She could do nothing—nothing—for her son.

  Dimly, as if from the far end of a tunnel, Ez heard Gramma yelling. What she was saying, and to whom, Ez didn’t know, but her voice punctured the fog of despair that was holding Ez inactive. She lurched to her feet. Gramma would know what to do. Ez dashed down the stairs with Wilburn in her arms—and found the older woman shouting at a teacup.

  The world had gone mad. Ez had gone mad. Gramma had certainly gone mad. She was holding the cup an inch below her nose and peering into it slightly cross-eyedly. “But you’re the only person who can possibly get here in time to save us!” she was shouting. And the maddest part of all was that the cup actually answered. Or at least, a voice from within it did, a masculine voice, deep and supercilious.

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  “In the hypothetical universe of your imagination,” it said—Ez nearly stumbled at the bottom of the stairs—“perhaps. But here in the particular iteration of reality known as Real Life, a rescue mission is completely out of the question. I am drafting a rather nuanced dissertation on the non-being of un-being tonight—a subject I wouldn’t expect you to appreciate—which, I believe, will come to be regarded as one of the finer theses in contemporary meta-metaphysical theory, and I must get back to work. I regret answering the wizidex. Your scry has disrupted the flow of my creative genius.”

  “So you’re just going to sit there?” Gramma demanded of the teacup. “Scribbling that hogwash, while we fight for our lives?”

  “Precisely,” the cup said. “The Path is the Path. I don’t decide what happens. If tonight’s your night to die, so be it. Try to reincarnate as something less annoying next life—a cabbage, for instance. And if not, I suppose I’ll see you at the equinox party.”

  “WELL, THANKS FOR NOTHING!” Gramma screamed.

  “Anytime,” the cup said, and that was the last thing it said, for Gramma hurled it across the room with all her might and it shattered against the far wall in a spray of tea and porcelain. Her face was brick red as she spun around, but it went white as chalk when her gaze fell on Wilburn.

  “Do something,” Ez pleaded.

  Gramma didn’t. She stood rooted to the spot. Behind her glasses, her eyes stretched wider and wider as she stared at the convulsing boy in Ez’s arms. With deepening horror, Ez realized that Gramma was as powerless as she against whatever force was attacking him.

  “Psychovatry,” Gramma whispered. “Oh god… Oh god…” she was breathing very fast and gripping her cane for support. Ez had no clue what the word meant, but the way Gramma had said it, as if it were some foul blasphemy, told her enough. Gramma appeared to be on the verge of a breakdown. Meanwhile, the humming had grown so loud that dishes rattled in the cupboards. There was precious little time.