Bars in the daytime should be dingy. But this was Sydney, and the city doesn't do dingy. Philodendrons and ironic art prints were a crap backdrop to misery, but it was all I could find.

My phone buzzed. Fourteen missed calls, Gregory was unable to take a hint. I should block him. I thumbed at the screen but only managed to open on a picture of dad, arm in arm with some stranger behind an enormous blue cocktail. Shit. My head hit the bar with a thump.

 The barman had been avoiding me for a while when Gregory showed up in person. In demon, hahahaha. Damn it, I was hilarious. If only I had a single soul to share the joke with.

“Hey, buddy.” He sat down beside me and signalled to the bartender, who finally grew eyes.

“Vodka tonic, please.” I wasn’t giving up on oblivion. Maybe Gregory would even pick up the tab.

A glass slid in front of me, but I wasn’t so far gone to notice the complete absence of alcohol in it.

“Hey. Did you do this?” I squinted up at Gregory. There was only one of him, but he was decidedly fuzzy around the edges.

“Yeah, sorry. Can we talk?” 

“Sure, what about?”

A faint chuckle emerged from his throat, but it sounded a little forced. “Whatever it is you want to know.”

So many things. Were they really demons? What did they want with the opals in Thunderbolt Springs? What did they want with me?

But the questions tangled up in my mouth and became one plaintive appeal. “What did you do to my Dad?”

“Oh, he’s fine,” the fine thread of tension in Gregory’s voice eased, “he’s really on a cruise. I can get someone to call him for you, if you like?”

“I know where he is,” well, roughly. The Pacific Ocean, at least, “you arranged the trip?”  

“Yeah. But it wasn’t my idea! I thought it was stupid, to be honest. The boss insisted.”

“W-why?”

He sighed, and raised a finger at the barman. A glass appeared and he took a short sip.

“He wanted you. To, um, work for him.”

“What is it that you actually do?”

He swirled his glass and stared into it as though it was a magic 8 ball. By the look on his face, he didn’t like the answer it came up with.

“Look, you know about opals, right?”

I nodded.

“Well, in this realm they’re pretty stones. It’s not like that where we come from.”

Formed over millions of years, opals are indeed pretty stones. Tiny, perfect spheres, trapped inside an iridescent matrix. Blue, green, fiery red. And on earth, utterly useless.

“Tenebralis exists at the confluence of the universe, the point where the celestial spheres meet. Are you familiar with the Musica Universalis?”

“Let’s assume I’m not.”

He flashed a brief smile. “The music of the Spheres. Spinning in perfect harmony. Each one has its own tone. You know, when it’s quiet up here I can hear the earth turning? B flat.”

“Ugh.” I scoffed. This was the bullshittiest bullshit I’d ever heard.

“Some humans can hear it, too. Boethius. Kepler. Some guy named Shakespeare.”

“Okay, smart guy.” I could feel my lips again, a sure sign of sobering up. Not ideal. “What’s this got to do with me?”

“Ah, you’ve got me there, I’m afraid.” He shrugged. “The boss knows. The Varanor family have been responsible for shipping opal to Tenebralis for generations. It vibrates, we harvest the energy. Lights go on. See?”

I. Did. Not. See.

“So, why don’t you come in to the office tomorrow? Things will make sense in the morning.” He suggested. It sounded reasonable. I almost fell for it.

No. There was no way I was going back to that office without an explanation. I didn’t even want to go back to the apartment.

“Where is he now?”