The California sun was surprisingly strong that early in the morning. The sidewalk burned through Kayden's lime green flip-flops; she had been so sick of wearing Blaze's oversized leather shoes that she had bought the pair from a street vendor outside of their motel. Celery had taken the rental car to Le Lieu, so the four of them were stuck walking, navigating the streets of Los Angeles with just the outdated map they had snagged from the front desk.

After walking several miles, Kayden lowered her map. "This is the place," she said, but she hesitated as she looked upwards. They stood in front of a large warehouse where every window was either smashed in or sloppily boarded up with two-by-fours. The door was chained shut with a large deadbolt, the puke green paint peeling off the wood, and the entire building was speckled with graffiti.

"This can't be right." She rechecked the cross streets. "This place is abandoned."

"I know," Blaze said, but he was frowning at the building, his eyes squinting in the morning sun. He turned to Helio. "Do you see that?"

Helio looked as confused as Blaze. He let go of Lexi's hand and took a few steps towards the building. "Yeah I do. But I thought..."

"See what?" Kayden asked. She scoured the building, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

"You won't be able to see it," Blaze explained. "There's a glamour on the building. It's cloaked in magic."

Kayden stared hard at the crumbling bricks, unable to see what really lied beyond the rugged exterior. "Oh. That's cool," she admitted.

"That's not why we're staring at it." Helio rolled his eyes as if he was dealing with a toddler. "There's a magic warp. Don't you remember what the Congregation said yesterday? Glamours shouldn't be working." He lowered his voice. "Non-er."

"Well excuse me," Kayden snapped, folding the map roughly. "But you can keep your snippy comments to yourself."

Helio narrowed his eyes. "Don't you dare tell me—"

"Helio!" Lexi gasped.

"Calm down," Blaze said, climbing up the front steps. "This is a good sign. If they found a way to get magic working again, then they'll be able to help us."

Blaze pulled at the doorknob. The deadbolt instantly vanished and the door opened with the tinkling of bells.

They filed in one-by-one and Kayden's eyes widened as she stepped over the threshold. They had entered a large room, and it was by no means abandoned. Wooden beams crisscrossed the high ceiling, and the windows, which had looked broken and boarded up from outside, were tall and whole and let in beams of natural light.

But it was the hulking printing press in the center of the room that captured Kayden's attention. The wooden structure looked like it had been built in the 1800s, but it was functioning as smoothly as a well-oiled modern-day machine. Kayden immediately saw why.

There were several stacks of blank white paper on one side of the room. As the press clanked away, several sheets flew off the pile and fed themselves into the machine. The handle on the crank spun like a top, silver streaks blurring as the giant press imprinted each page with lines of black text. Once the papers made their way through the press, they gathered in the air as a piece of thread sewed them to a crisp white cover. Only then did the completed book fall to the ground in a neat pile.

All by magic.

"Holy Gutenberg," Kayden said, walking towards the stack of books. The book jacket read A Progressive Book of Magic in fluid green script. However, the uppercase letters appeared to be sprouting. She stared in amazement as little illustrated buds bloomed into flowers and then withdrew into small green dots.

"It is a little gaudy compared to the first edition," a voice greeted, "but I figured that with the projected boom in sales, I could afford to Harry Potter the cover a little bit."

Kayden turned and saw an old man approaching. His white hair sprouted like dandelion fluff off the top of his head, and he wore large round spectacles that framed an inquisitive pair of brown eyes. He looked vaguely familiar, though she couldn't place him.

"Mr. Voyle?" Blaze asked, stepping forward.

"Please, call me Walter!" The man smiled widely; his yellowed teeth were as straight as a line. "What can I do for you young'uns?" He plucked a newly formed book from the air before it could fall onto the pile on the floor; his hand-eye coordination was impressive for someone his age. "Are you here to buy a copy of A Progressive Book of Magic, Version 2.0? It's the only spell book that's guaranteed to work during the magic warp! Check the pages!" He thrust a copy into Kayden's hands. "No warning from the Congregation! 100% safe."

"Mr. Vo—er, Walter," Blaze said awkwardly, "I actually already own a copy of your book. My parents bought it for me about ten years ago."

"Ohhh!" The old man's bushy eyebrows rose. "You're a first edition man! To be honest, I didn't sell too many copies back then. Just a few hundred. It was a bit of a failure."

"I can see why," Blaze said with a forced chuckle. "I'm fairly certain I almost blew myself up in my first year of school because of it."

Walter took the copy out of Kayden's hands and tapped the cover. "It's called A Progressive Book of Magic for a reason. It was a little ahead of its time back then, like traffic lights and the iPad."

Kayden stared at the man, unsure if he was eccentric or crazy; he definitely had more energy than any other senior citizen she knew. She looked over at Blaze, who seemed to regard the man with a mixture of confusion and suppressed dislike. Must have been a traumatic first year experience, Kayden thought. She turned to see what Lexi thought of the man, but her cousin had her eyes on a door across the room: the restroom.

Lexi caught her gaze and blushed. "I'll be back," she whispered as she excused herself and hurried away.

"Wait, what do you mean 'ahead of its time?'" Blaze asked, his voice ringing with a distinct edge. "Did you know about this magic warp ten years ago?"

"Oh good gracious no!" Walter said. "We've known for much longer than ten years. This warp has been hypothesized for forty years at least."

Helio narrowed his gaze, staring at Walter suspiciously. "Forty years? Why hasn't it been on the news, then? Or mentioned in a textbook somewhere?"

Walter laughed. "The potestas news? When we interviewed with the news stations, they called it a conspiracy theory and refused to air the segment! And when we sent representatives to the Congregation back in the late 70's, they dismissed us even more quickly. Those old coots refused to see anything unless it was right in front of their liver-spotted noses."

Kayden didn't feel like pointing out that Walter had his own liver spots speckling the side of his neck. "So how did you know about this so early?"

"Well there have been hundreds of indicators," he said. "There are records of spells going awry all throughout history, but spell-related deaths skyrocketed in the 60's. Back then I worked as a historian. When I saw the pattern, I decided to change careers to focus on the future instead!" He smiled. "I've been the happiest man on earth since then."

"The happiest man for what reason?" Blaze asked. "For realizing that magic would implode?"

The man shook his head. "Not implode! Shift! Magic isn't stationary." He held out his arms. "It evolves just like every other being in this world. That's why over time spell books must be re-written, spells tweaked to accommodate the changes. Of course, it usually happens fairly slowly, maybe just a symbol or two changed in a handful of spells every hundred or so years. Magic just happened to evolve more quickly than usual recently."

"But why?" Kayden asked. "Why so suddenly?"

Walter took a big breath and grinned. "Global Warming!"

Kayden stared at him blankly, unsure if she had heard him correctly. Then Helio started laughing.

"Wow," he said, clapping his hands together slowly. "Kayden, thank you so much for dragging us all the way across Los Angeles to talk to a crazy old geezer."

"Helio!" Kayden hissed, her face flushing. She looked up at Walter, but he seemed to regard the situation with an air of amusement.

"Come on," Helio goaded, his lips curling into a smirk. "It's the truth and you know it." He took a step towards Walter, tilting his head as if the old man were a child. "You probably went senile years ago, didn't you?"

"Helio!" Kayden felt a surge of anger. "You're being rude. Stop it!"

"Stop what?" Helio wheeled towards her and Kayden felt a rush of panic. It felt like he was about to lunge at her. "Go on," he continued. "Just try to contradict me. You're as pissed off as I am. You didn't come all this way to hear an idiot talk about global warming." His eyes shone darkly. "Or are you as screwed up as he is?"

"You can't just cut him off when he may—"

"You know what your problem is, Kayden?" He pointed a finger at her. "You think someone has the answer to your problem, when in actuality, no one does. And even better: no one cares." His voice rose above the clanking of the printing press, echoing off the walls. "And you know why? It's because you are just a stupid, naïve non—"

"Shut up about my cousin!"

The shout echoed throughout the whole building, resonating through the windows with a sharp ting. Kayden jumped and saw Lexi standing in the doorway of the restroom, her body shaking. Kayden had never seen her so riled up before.

"Lexi," Helio staggered, taken aback. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. It just slipped ou—"

"Slipped out?" she snarled, storming her way across the room. "How can something like that slip out? Kayden was right. You're a fucking asshole."

Kayden's jaw dropped; Lexi never cursed.

"Lexi," Helio begged, moving towards her.

"Stop!" she screeched, flinging her hand out as tears spilled onto her reddened cheeks. "Stay away from me!" And with a powerful glare, she turned on her heels and ran out the front door.