“Tommandros, put those clouds back where you found them,” his mother called from the doorway of their cottage. “Can’t you see I’ve got clothes on the line? How do suppose they’ll dry if you keep the fog rolling in like that?”

“She has a point, you know,” Gran’s voice said. But she wasn’t there. Not really. She was dead, lying blissfully unaware of the failure-of-a-summoner her grandson was in her absence. Still, she spoke to him from a shaded corner in the back of his mind, a warm place . . .

The adrenaline caused his heart to race faster as sweat endeavored to form on his face, only to be whisked away by the cold winds of the creeping November winter in Chicago. Twenty-one floors high, Mike Auburn stood on a six-inch I-beam looking at the city below him. The sun, blood-red on the horizon, added a grim look to the city when mixed with the swaths of people leaving their daily jobs. Go back home to your reality TV and frozen pizza. Mike thought.

I’m out here for a reas. . .

The adrenaline caused his heart to race faster as sweat endeavored to form on his face, only to be whisked away by the cold winds of the creeping November winter in Chicago. Twenty-one floors high, Mike Auburn stood on a six-inch I-beam looking at the city below him. The sun, blood-red on the horizon, added a grim look to the city when mixed with the swaths of people leaving their daily jobs. Go back home to your reality TV and frozen pizza. Mike thought.

I’m out here for a reas. . .