"magic, madam, is like wine and, if you are not used to it, it will make you drunk."
What strange children they are.
Not that that makes her love them any less. After all, it is the strangeness Bexley has already seen in their mother for many years; and Diana, in particular, is strange in the way that O was strange, her soul born a century older than her body was made. Foaming at the mouth since the instant she could use it.
But Ambrose is quiet. Studious. Every week when Bexley comes to visit the little family, she finds herself watching him closely and affectionately. Something about his shyness, the look of reservation that is always in his darkly golden eyes, makes her feel the need to protect him. It’s obvious Diana can handle the world on her own. Dominate it, even. But Ambrose she’s less sure of.
Perhaps that’s why she feels a little prickle of anxiety at the sight of him lying prone under the wide leaf of a fern, a little dun-striped body flooded in shadow. He is all alone—all alone except for two Dorcas gazelles, tan and white with long, ribbed horns. One of them is standing significantly closer to Ambrose than a normal deer ever would. Bexley watches intently as, from his spot in the sand, Ambrose shoos it away, and the deer goes bounding off to join his friend closer to the bank of the oasis.
For a moment it almost looks like a mirage. For a moment, she thinks she can see the seam between the deer’s neck and chest, his leg and his torso, as if it is not a real deer at all but a ball-jointed doll painted to look like one.
But by the next second it’s disappeared over a dune. Bexley pauses, then trudges through the sand toward the little pegasus.
“Ambrose,” she calls out, voice warm. A rosy smile breaks over her golden face. “Good morning.”
