When I knocked on his door, Magnus didn't come to open it. I heard him yell 'Come in!' from somewhere deeper inside. Which, if you'd seen Magnus' building, you'd know wasn't the smartest idea.

"I could have been anybody!" I called in scoldingly, shoving the door shut behind me.

"I'm kind of stuck, right now." He replied.

I stopped short when I got to the living space. If I thought it had been messy before then this took the cake. Huge masses of fabrics were draped on every surface, scattered with pins and drawings and chalks and wire and scissors and tools I didn't know the names of.

At the end of it all was Magnus, pinning a swath of midnight fabric to what looked like a purple dismembered torso. He appeared to be struggling.

I started picking my way towards him over the messy floor. "You need help, there?"

Magnus glanced up, taking in my complete lack of competence with fashion, and smirked.

"Do you need help, there?" He asked.

"Yes, actually." I retorted. "I'm not sure I can get across without impaling my foot on your pins."

"Halloween is dress-up time." Magnus explained. Well, I take it he thought he was explaining, anyway. Until he saw the blank look I was giving him. He boiled it down for me. "People need costumes. I make clothing."

I craned my head to look at a drawing on the table. The sketch was elaborate, beautiful, even. Nothing like anything I'd seen a trick-or-treater wear in my life. The other sketches were much the same - wonderfully different to one another, but nothing you'd wear to go out door-to-door.

"These aren't costumes." I pointed out. Even somebody with my level of ignorance in this area could see that. "These are beautiful."

Magnus looked genuinely flattered, finally sticking the final pin he needed to keep the fabric from falling down under its own weight. The result was only a rough approximation of what I was looking at on paper; but I knew this was very early on in the process.

"You are very sweet." He said, taking a step back to observe what he'd arranged, fairly grimly. "I hate for you to see it before it's done, now. I promise it ends up much better."

"I'm sure it does." I smiled.

I was almost out of the cluttered labyrinth when I tripped; Magnus was there to catch me. Only just, though. He got me under the arms pretty uncomfortably when I was just a couple inches above ground. I had to scramble to get up without crushing anything or falling again.

In truth, it probably would have been easier if he just let me fall. But it's the thought that counts.

"Maybe we should go out somewhere." Magnus suggested, straightening up his own clothes. "This place is a hazard."

"Agreed." I nodded, and off we went with a renewed effort to get back the way we came. This time, Magnus was able to rearrange a better pathway, seems as he wasn't shy of moving his own things around.

I didn't even want to think about where the cat was during all of this. Magnus poor kitten had it rough sometimes.

We walked for a while with nowhere to really go. Magnus told me about all the people he had commissions for, which is why he was starting production early. Well, he claimed it was probably a little late to start, but people didn't often think about their Halloween costumes until October started, really. There would be a lot of shoots too, he was really going to be up to his eyeballs in it for a while.

I was so intent on listening that I hardly noticed I was being called. Magnus turned before I did.

When I saw the person approaching, I wished he hadn't. Zach came hurrying along the pavement towards us.

"Funny to bump into you." He said with his face flushing from the half-run he'd been doing. I internally made a snarky comment about how he actually hadn't bumped into us at all. Of course, I would never have said it out loud.

"Yeah, so funny." I agreed, instead.

I was willing to leave it at that but then I got given the typical expectant looks of two people waiting to be introduced. Oh, joy.

"Magnus, this is my boss." I filled him in.

Zach made a short sound, kind of like a dog getting his tail stepped on, and then started an uneasy laughter.

"You make me sound like a dragon." He said.

Magnus laughed along, equally false about it, and extended his hand. They shook firmly, and I wanted to curse Magnus for introducing himself by name.

"Where have I heard that before…?" Zach thought out loud. His dark eyes seemed to scrutinise me. I wasn't about to clue him in so I started to swerve the topic.

"Dr Zachariah is a Historian." I told Magnus, although he already knew this. "I assist his research."

By now Magnus seemed to have cottoned on to my reluctance. I was silently pleading him to make up an excuse to leave before Zach put two-and-two together. We'd just started getting along again; but if there was one thing Magnus Bane could do, it was get a reaction. He could potentially drop me back to square one.

"All of our tutoring sessions came in handy, then?" Magnus asked with a bemused smirk. Zach seemed to miss the lack of seriousness in his voice and completely bought into the same story which had fooled my parents.

"You never told me you had a tutor." He smiled. Ever smiling. Then he turned that smile on Magnus. "You must have done an excellent job."

Zach placed a hand on my shoulder and squeezed it there. Maybe it was supposed to be encouraging? In truth it felt unusual. Zach was friendly but he wasn't typically touchy-feely about it. All the while he kept his gaze fixed on Magnus; whose head tilted as he eyed up the scene. He had the same look his kitten got when confused.

"Well, thank you." He beamed. "Although, it helps to have such a gifted student."

"I don't know about-" I blanched and started an attempt to swerve away from the praise. It wasn't exactly deserved when Magnus never had me as a student at all. Zach cut me off. Not like an interruption; more like he hadn't registered I was talking at all.

"You should stop by the Museum so Alec can show you what we're working on." He suggested.

"Sounds great." Said Magnus, even though the whole subject was a bore to him.

Magnus liked the Museum for the artsy exhibits on the floor above where I worked. He'd listen to me talk about my work but it wasn't his area of interest; so I knew he was just being polite to Zach. He'd probably avoid the place, now, to keep from getting a lecture.

"Maybe, some time." I added, mostly just to remind the two of them that I was there.

With that Zach excused himself, with the typical "Nice to meet you."

I watched him walk away and made sure not to talk to Magnus until my boss had rounded a corner. I wasn't expecting Magnus to look half as entertained as he was. It was as if his sides would split open if he didn't laugh; but he was holding it in anyway.

I didn't think much of it; Magnus got a kick out of pretending to be somebody else. He probably wished that he'd had the dumb fake glasses he used to wear when my Mother was around. To complete his 'Tutor' look.

Eventually he couldn't contain himself and started to chuckle. "Well. That explained a lot."

I was confused. "What, exactly, did that explain?"

"Why he never told you what he meant to say at your party." Magnus smirked with the knowledge of something I wasn't grasping. The temptation to hit him or at least shoulder him pretty hard was growing. We changed course to a nearby diner.

I held my tongue long enough to realise Magnus wouldn't elaborate unless asked.

"Why's that?" I probed.

"Because he was never going to say anything." Magnus laughed and threw his hands in the air as if to show it was obvious. Then he put his hands down. He moved closer, his face inches from mine. He parted his lips like he was going to speak, just as Zach had. I waited... And then he kissed me.

"He was going to do that."

Another chapter up! Thank you for reading, as always. 'Signals and Logic' is coming next - which is more like the second half of this chapter. It was getting pretty long.