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I had about finished with the walkways, so I headed over to greet him. He might have ideas about my percolating scheme and whether or not it could work. At the least, he could tell me the origins of the words I might choose if I placed an ad on that community board—that was part of what I had in mind.

When Bolin climbed out of his SUV, he didn’t look in my direction. Instead, he rummaged in the back and pulled out several gray and brown objects, each about a foot high. I couldn’t tell what they were until he planted one on the hood.

“Are those… plastic owls?” I asked.

“To scare away the birds, yes.” Bolin put another on the hood, then four on the roof. “They’re like scarecrows. The birds will see them, think they’re fearsome beaked predators, and stay away.”

I leaned against my snow shovel and eyed the faux raptors with skepticism but didn’t suggest his scheme wouldn’t work. After all, I had a scheme of my own in mind, and I hoped for support.

“Need any help placing them? It’s a bit stormy today. The wind may blow them off.”

“Nope. I filled them with rocks.” Bolin tilted the last one to show me a plastic plug in the bottom. “If they work, I might ask if I can store them here in one of the maintenance sheds, so I don’t have to carry them in the car. Once they’ve been out in the elements, they’ll get wet.” He curled a lip, probably imagining dour dampness touching his expensive leather seats.

I nobly refrained from suggesting the owls would probably also get pooped on. So far, the birds chattering in the nearby trees weren’t subdued by the arrival of the supposed predators.

“That’s no problem,” I said.

“Excellent.” His owls placed, Bolin drew out two to-go coffee cups. After taking a breath and visibly bracing himself, he faced me and the apartment complex.

It bemused me that he needed such bracing for an office job that started at eight, but I held my snark back so I could ask his advice. “I need a favor.”

His gaze fell to the handle of the snow shovel I was leaning against. “Don’t youpaysomeone to do that? This place has a ton of walkways, plus the parking lot.”

“I do have a service that swings through to plow around the cars if we get more than four inches.”

“And the walkways?”

“They’re not wide enough for a plow.” I waved the shovel.

His lip curled again, and he took a deep swig from one of the cups.

“I’ve got them handled though. What I was wondering…” I glanced at Duncan’s van to make sure he hadn’t ambled out, then lowered my voice to finish. “If I was able to cobble together something thatlookedlike an ancient magical artifact, do you have any druid potions that we could sprinkle on it to make it glow?”

“Sprinkle,” he mouthed.

“Yeah. Douse, pour over, drench. Whatever.”

“Did you know the word drench comes from the Old Englishdrencan, which means to give drink to or make drunk? Also from the Proto-Germanicdrankijan.”

“I assumed it did, yeah.”

Bolin squinted at me. “Sprinkling a potion on something won’t make it glow, but if you give me the object, I might be able to cast an illusion on it that could do the job. You’re looking to fool someone?” He looked toward the van. “That won’t work on him, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“I’m not planning to involve him in any way. My doohickey only needs to have a wolf head and fool whoever’s hiring thugs to steal wolf artifacts from innocent people.” I extended a hand toward him.

“You could probably use a crayon to draw a wolf on a flattened beer can and fool the troglodyte who attacked me.”

“I doubt he’sthatdumb. And he’s alchemically enhanced, so he might be able to sense whether an object, a faux artifact, if you will, has any magic about it.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it.” Bolin grimaced and touched his forehead.

“My idea is to use my fake artifact to bait a trap for him and his cronies—there are a bunch more of those overpowered guys who lurk, at least now and then, at El Gato Mágicodowntown.”

“I’ll cross that place off my to-visit list.”

“Other than the bar fight in the back, it wasn’t that bad. There were some geeky wizard types playing Dungeons and Dragons.” I nodded toward him.

“Are you implying those are thetypesI might fit in with?”