Kitty was watching Nathaniel as he was finishing the pentacle. He stood up and with a book in his hand checked everything all over again. Boy seemed satisfied with the result, he closed the book and turned to Kitty, who was sitting on a chair next to bed and was witnessing the whole procedure.

„Too bad your supplies cabinet was destroyed, we could have done this a few days ago."

Nathaniel didn't seem very inclined to answer that, it was more of a mumbling. „Right, really unfortunate, have no idea how that happened." He sit on the bed and supported his head with a hand.

„So, are you sure we're doing this?"

Kitty was almost annoyed. „What are you afraid of? You don't trust him? I mean, you're the last person who has a right to doubt him. You've trusted him with much more."

„Yes, but that was different, we didn't really had a choice back than." There was a slight hesitation with which he spoke next sentance. „And he's still a demon." Kitty looked at him with concern. He kept using that word, that didn't change.

„Maybe, but he had a lot of choices during the whole thing, not to mention when each one of us was in the Other Place." Nathaniel closed his eyes when he remembered the chaos of spirit's realm. With sigh he stood up.

„You're right, i just wanted both of us to be sure about this. So let's do it." He took his place in the pentacle, found the exact page in the book and started with summoning.

Once again i was being pulled to Earth. There is no time in the Other Place but it couldn't have been long since my last summoning. So i decided for a form of a smoke and yellow eyes glowing from the center. It's classy and it won't take much of my energy. The wind filled the room and lights were dimmed to produce a nicer atmosphere. I opened my eyes prepared to say some flashy monologue in a deep voice. But than i saw that boy in the pentacle again and Kitty sitting on a chair close by. I sighed and change into Ptolemy.

„You know, you people are a bad audience, it's a waste of my talent to even try anything here."

„Hello, Bartimaeus," Kitty gave me a big sincere smile. Interesting. It was kind of suspicious.

„Yeah, i know, you're glad to see me, blah blah blah, but in a minute it will be all just Bartimaeus do this and do that, just as always." I crossed my arms and turned away offended. And than Nat grinned. I wanted to send him flying out of the window for that.

„You really are in a bad shape Bartimaeus, you didn't even check the pentacle." What is he talking about? It was Nathaniel, so i didn't even consider looking for loopholes in his summoning, there was never any, this was what he was good at after all. So i frawned at him but than i started to inspect the pentacle. And i froze in disbelief. I glanced at them, with their wide grins and pretentious expresions and i looked for a sign of a trap. But there was none. I carefully put a foot closer to the barrier, expecting a pain. But instead my foot touched the ground outside of the pentacle, and all that without Nathaniel putting so much as a hair out of his. I probably looked really stupid. But the situation didn't make sense at all.

„I don't understand." Kitty was still smiling at me. „This room and this pentacle is yours and only yours. You can come in and out of the Other Place whenever you want, and without any tasks or conditions."

Nathaniel coughed. „Although it would be nice if you could not hurt anyone in the process."

Kitty growled at him. „And till this pentacle exists, nobody else can summon you. This is our gift for you. For everything."

Even Nathaniel gave a cautious smile in my direction. I didn't know what to say.

Maybe i should really kill somebody from time to time, these two idiots are getting too soft with that whole trust thing.

After that i lived my life between the Other place and London. I was coming to their house unexpectedly, sometimes few days in a row, other time i didn't show up for two weeks. Can't appear too predictable. But i must admit there was something nice about this new life.

Although Nat was still no fun. Once i came to him in Kitty's form while he was in his office and he didn't even look up.

„Bartimaeus,what do you think you're doing. You realize i know it's you, i can see you on the seventh plane and i can't say i like what i see."

„Stop talking, Nathaniel. I don't want to hear anything about my seventh plane from you with your human catastrophy on every plane."

When Kitty came back to London, a last will of John Mandrake was found. Apparently signed on the day of Mandrake's death, everything he owned was supposed to belong to Kathleen Jones, including the house. Me and Kitty occupied two free rooms on the third floor, the rest of the house stayed the way i remembered.

Kitty contacted Mrs. Piper and managed some kind of an agreement. She wasn't really part of the Council, but she could attend the meetings and have her own suggestions. She had her own department which consisted only of her and her assistant, but nobody ever saw him in person, even though he was daily managing a lot of issues over phone in Mrs. Jones's name.

But i wasn't really paying attention to their work in goverment, i was still testing how far i can go with them. And after i read THE one book about travelling Nat had in his library (he got it as a gift, there was a dedication at the beginning, that boy clearly never thought there might be something interesting to see outside London, while i think there is nothing interesting in London) i made him order some more and they slowly started to hoard in my room. But after a little break in the Other place i was ready for a roadtrip.

In hindsight, I should have probably paid more attention to their work. They both had a long history of making powerful people discontent.

Kitty was sitting on the floor of the library among the pile of papers with her legs crossed, when she heard a knock and saw Nathaniel's head pop into the room. „Hi Kitty, how's it going?" She spoke distractedly. „Not great. Somehow my papers with speech for tomorrow disappeared, i must have left it in ministry or somewhere. So now i'm going through it again and trying to remember what i changed in it before. Could you look at i tas well? I didn't have time to read your notes you wrote to it yesterday. Sorry. What about you? How's that translation going, by the way?"

Nathaniel was already in the room standing next to Kitty, and took his time to look around on papers surrounding them, before he crouched down next to her. „I'm working on it but i almost have it, i'll give it to you tomorrow, i know how important it is for you. Right now i just wanted to take a little break." The boy that could be called a man if you looked at him from a distance, was just sitting there and looked at her hand. Just as her face, even her hand contained a small wrinkles. It's been a couple months, Kitty was stronger, but some things just won't change. He took her hand into his two hands and smiled at her.

Kitty was so startled she didn't even jerk, not even when he moved closer to her. „I think you should also take a break sometimes. We could go for a vacation somewhere. Didn't you want to go to Egypt?"

Kitty was completely off. She was looking at her hand in Nathaniel's hands and than at his face, at his hands and back to face. WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING? But he continued. „There will be always a lot of work in London, but you already put in motion lot o fit, so you needn't stretch yourself. London is a big boy, he can take care of himself for a while even without you here. Besides, " Nathaniel came even closer, with her hand still in his „there is a lot to explore in Egypt, not just for our work."

There was something about his eyes when he was looking at her. What was it? Could it be...? Wait, was that a SMIRK?! Kitty freed her hand and hit me with her fist, so much that i lost balance and fell on the floor. Kitty quickly stood up. She was really mad, looking at me from above like that, even far stronger djinni would be scared, really.

„You're a dead spirit, Bartimaeus."

I had to laugh. Not the best of my ideas, if i may say. A voice approaching from behind the door saved me.

„I finished the translation of Apocryphs, Kitty, now you can read it whole and use it for your book. But about this passage here - ". Nathaniel stopped when he raised his head and saw me, in his form lying on the floor and Kitty standing with her fists clenched and little red. We were looking from one to the other, not saying a word. Nathaniel broke the silence as the first. By looking at me he probably just realized how ridiculous he looks everytime he falls on the floor.

„What happened while i wasn't here?"

I changed my form and suddenly there was an egyptian boy. I had to use this second coming of Nathaniel to retreat, that's the only way to survive the situation i got myself into. Funny, somehow it all seemed like a good idea before.

„I was asking myself the same question, henc e my Natty form, but i got the same answer you'll get: Nothing happened. Nothing EVER happens here." I stood up, carefully eyeing Kitty in case she decided to fulfill her threat. „But about what i was saying, i would really like to go to Egypt someday. It would be nice if you could summon me there to spare me the long journey, so just let me now when you'll book a flight. In the meantime, i'm just headding to travel around for a bit, so i came to say bye."

Kitty was still glaring at me. I guess my wide-not-forced-at-all smile didn't work miracles. At least Nathaniel seemed genuinely surprised. „You're leaving? You haven't been here for two weeks. How long will you be gone?"

„ Can't really say, just call me if you need anything. So in the mean time, you kids have fun." I saluted and opened the window. „ And don't burn down the house," i shouted as i jumped out and changed into a pigeon flying towards the world.

Nathaniel looked at Kitty with a big question mark written all over his face.

„Please don't ask." Carefully, so she wouldn't crumple any more papers, she came to Nathaniel and took the translation from him. „So what aboout the passage?"

Nathaniel gave her another paper. „Here you go, i wrote down some interpretative notes to it. But of course ask if something won't make sense."

„Thanks" with a smile she took papers from him and looked towards the window. „I should really talk to Bartimaeus because sometimes he's - " –

Kitty stopped talking abruptly and took a closer look at Nathaniel.

„Did you grow since yesterday?"

„What? N-no." He seemed offended, like a boy caught doing some mischief.

„You are taller, even taller than me now."

„I've always been this tall."

Kitty decided to roll with it. "Yeah, right."

The boy tried to quickly change the topic. „So how did it go with the education reform?"

„Actually quite well, the minister didn't oppose me as much as last time when i didn't agree with their propositions."

„Yes, they probably got used to us meddling in their work."

„That's not what we do."

„Well that's probably the nicest word they would use to describe it."

Kitty sit on the table and started flipping pages of Apocryphs. Nathaniel meanwhile looked at papers on the floor.

„Hey, what happened to my notes to your speech?"

„Oh, right, it wasn't you who i told. That's a new copy. I must have left the old one somewhere in ministry, although i was sure i left it with my other stuff and i took everything from there when i was leaving. I'm sorry but could you look at it one more time?"

Nathaniel looked worriedly at her. It could mean nothing but he had a bad feeling about it. He picked up papers from the floor and stood by the free part of the desk to write his former suggestions.

Kitty sighed and put the translation to the side. „If i didn't had to waste so much time argueing with people, my book about the Other place would already be finished and there would be no reason for me to have this speech in the first place. And when i annnounce publicly that we're working on eliminating summonings alltogether the remaining magicians will go even more crazy. I'm just not cut out for so many ridiculous people all the time wasting time with nonsense. Hopefully i won't kill anyone in front of all the witnesses."

„And here i thought you're a symbol of patience and people skills," Nathaniel grinned. „Maybe Bartimaues is right, a vacation would be a good idea." She glared at him. „You know what i think would be the best solution."

Boy stopped smilling. „I don't feel like telling the world i'm alive."

„But you would be so much better in whole this dealing with people. And i could finally spend more time on my research about the Other Place if i knew you would take care about communication with other ministries. It will be even worse now when Council agreed to your suggestion to financially support industry. Or you could change form and pretend you're somebody else. You could even pretend you're me."

Silence. Nathaniel stopped writing and looked at Kitty. It was kind of ironic how in those moments when he wanted to defend his humanity his eyes had something demonic in them. Although not enough to scare Kitty.

„But it's up to you, of course."

He didn't say anything to that and instead passed her the notes.

„Well, i'm going to look again at the speech and then just straight to bed because i'm already tired and if i won't get enough sleep i might really kill somebody. So good night." As she was passing by him she rested her hand on his shoulder for a second.

Nathaniel spoke when she was already at the door.

„One more thing, Kitty. Ii'll summon you some demon for tommorrow, so in the morning don't leave without stopping by."

„What? Why? Is it necessary?"

„Just in case. It's probably nothing, just a feeling. But let's not take risks. Good night."

As he was looking around the empty library he realized he forgot to tell Kitty her parents called during the day. But there will be better time for that. It took them this long to call, they can wait one more day.