Page 20 of Thicker than Water

They chuckle. “I hear that.”

A small group of women come up to the bar, already a little bit tipsy by the look of them.

“We’ll have threechamps ellie’s-says,” one of them says. I can’t tell if her words are slurring or if she just doesn’t know what she’s saying.

“Awhat?” I ask.

“Achomps ally’s-says,”she repeats confidently.

I stare at her blankly. Nova watches the scene, looking amused. Then it clicks.

“Do you meanla Champs-Élysées?” I ask. “Like the street in Paris?”

“Exactly!” she says. “Can you make us three?”

I eye herskeptically. “Is that even a drink?”

“Yes, it’s all over DrinkTok!”

“It’s all overwhere?”

“Just bring them over there,” she says impatiently, pointing toward a seat up on the balcony. Her and her two companions make their toward the stairs, stumbling precariously on their high heels.

Nova snorts. “Have fun with that one!”

“Do you know what aChamps-Élyséesis?” I ask, flipping through the battered copy of theBartender’s Guidethat I keep under the counter. “It’s definitely not in here.”

“I have no clue,” they say.

“Ugh, I’m screwed.”

“Why don’t you just look it up on your phone?”

I look at them quizzically. My phone? Are they suggesting that I call someone and ask them? I know that many non-witches have mobile phones nowadays, which they can carry around. But I never bothered to get one. Why would I, when I have a scrying mirror and a familiar? But I can’t give that away to Nova.

“Um, I…don’t have mine right now.”

“That’s all right, you can use mine,” they say. They pull a slim, shiny black box out of their pocket and hand it to me.

It’s surprisingly heavy, and it immediately lights up like a flashlight. It’s startlingly bright, like energy magic. I hold it limply, completely clueless about what I’m supposed to do with it.

Nova frowns. “Oh, are you an iPhone person?”

I have no idea what they’re saying, but I decide to go along with it. “Yep, I’m definitely an…iPhone person!”

They take the box back from me with a grin. “No worries, I can never get an Android to work either! Let me look it up for you.”

Holding the black box like a remote control, they use their thumbs to tap on the lights that appear on its surface. It’s got to be some sort of new device. I really need to keep up with technology better. Luckily, I don’t think I blew my cover.

Nova reads out the ingredients while I whip up the three drinks and put them on a tray.

“Nova,whyaren’t you at the door?” shouts Xia from across the room.

“Whoops, gotta go!” Nova says, flashing me a smile. “Thanks for the whiskey, Amara!”

“Thanks for the help!”

I take the tray up to the second floor, where the women are seated around a table overlooking the dance floor below. They don’t bother to say thank you. They’re too busy holding what I now realize are their phones, although I still don’t understand why they’re making faces at them. I decide that I don’t want to know and I make my way back down the stairs. The bar is still fairly empty, so I move between the tables, taking glasses that have been discarded onto my tray. It saves a bit of work for the busboys, and I like to keep busy.