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is feeding on your soul.”
    “Explain.”
    I leaned closer. “All people generate magic. Some can use it, some can’t; some generate more than others, but all of us are magic engines: We absorb it from the environment and emit it back out. That’s why we can shift during technology: We store enough magic in our bodies to allow us to change shape. Let’s take Kate.”
    Jim’s voice betrayed a quiet warning. “What about Kate?”
    Kate used to work with Jim in the Mercenary Guild. Kate was gorgeous, funny, and she could kill anything. I hated her. She could say anything to Jim and he would just needle her back. I was so jealous of her I used to have to leave the room, until I realized that Kate crushed on Curran. She was now mated to him, and since he was the Beast Lord, that made her the Beast Lady and not interested in Jim. Kate and Curran had some seriously rough time with an ancient goddess who blew into town, and now Kate walked with a cane and Curran was barely three weeks out of a coma.
    “Ever notice how when Kate gets stressed out the phones stop working?”
    “The phones are unreliable as a rule,” Jim said.
    I shook my head. “No, it’s Kate. She generates so much magic, she short-circuits tech if she isn’t careful. I do the same thing, except I control mine better. She can’t shoot a gun either. I’ve watched her practice and it either goes wide or doesn’t fire at all. And she has no clue. Watch her sometime: She will stomp in, grab the phone, make that growly noise, and walk away. Ten minutes later you can order takeout on the same phone. It’s the funniest thing.”
    “What does that have to do with my soul being drained?”
    “You’re magic, Jim. You absorb and consume magic, emanating it into the environment. By doing so, you modify the environment to be more suitable to your existence. It’s like the evolutionary loop: A species is shaped by its environment, because those with the mutations most suitable to the environment survive and reproduce, but a species also modifies its environment to make it more suitable to its survival.”
    Jim sighed. “Give me the short version.”
    “Something is interfering with your ability to emanate magic. You absorb and convert it, but then something or someone is siphoning it off. That’s why you feel tired and sleepy.”
    “So it’s feeding off of me?”
    My mother walked in carrying a platter with a teapot and three cups. “Yes.”
    Jim frowned. “Makes sense. That’s why it didn’t kill me—the more magic I make, the more it eats.”
    “You do realize that you’re going to die?” My mother shook her head.
    “Yeah, I’ve got the dying part.”
    “You found some sort of zombie instead of a man.” My mother pointed at Jim. “Look, he isn’t even concerned.”
    I poured the tea. “He’s concerned, Mother. He just doesn’t panic, because he’s in charge and if he panics, everybody else will panic.”
    “I can jog around the room pretending to scream if you would like,” Jim offered.
    My mother raised an eyebrow. “You’re working so hard to dig your own grave, you might work yourself to death. Simmer down.”
    Jim drew back as if she’d smacked his hand with a ruler.
    “We have to sever the connection between you and whoever is doing this,” I said before they started slapping each other. “But we can’t see it. To make it visible we need Keong Emas. It’s a magic snail. There is a legend in Indonesia that talks about a beautiful princess, who was cursed and turned into a snail. The legend is figurative and the snail doesn’t turn into an actual princess, but with the right magic, it will reveal hidden things. The only way to get the snail is to buy it at the Underground. It’s rare and expensive.”
    “Money isn’t an issue,” Jim said.
    “It’s not about the money, you stupid boy.” Mother set the teacup down. “She can’t go there because of the yisheng .”
    Jim looked at me.
    “ Yisheng is the Chinese word