I take a moment in front of the apartment door to compose myself.  I know this is a risk, but letting an offense like this go unanswered would be too big a setback.  On top of the power, I'd lose rep, and I might never recover from that double-deficit.

The whole thing was fishy from the start.  I haven't had a problem walking in heels since I was fourteen, and I trip then, of all times, and actually twist an ankle?  No way that was a coincidence, someone hexed me for sure.  But at first I couldn't figure out why.  It'd only delay things by a couple days, and I don't know anyone who's still pissed at me enough to pull something like that just to inconvenience me in a really irritating way.  But by the time I managed to rework my ankle, the show was over and it was clear from conversation that someone took my place.  Which shouldn't have even been possible.

A little digging with the proprietor and it became clear this chica had been planning things for a while, she'd come to every 'performance' for the past month.  No way to know for sure why she moved when she did - she might have been waiting for a particular effect, but I'm a little worried she was just waiting for someone she thought would be too weak to make a fuss about it afterward.  If she had the chops to pull this off, she might be right...this was supposed to be my step up towards bigger things.

But I don't think she counted on how determined I'd be.  Plus, I don't have much left to lose now, do I?

I steel myself, and knock on the door.  After maybe half a minute, I hear unlocking noises, and the door opens.  The girl I'm looking at doesn't quite match the description, but in our circles that doesn't mean much.  At the moment, she's a brunette, her shoulder-length hair a rats-nest of frizz and tangles, but the glasses and the pajamas make her cuter than she has any right to be.

"Hello?" she says, looking me up and down.  She recognizes me, but she's surprised to see me again, which supports my theory of her low opinion of me.  At least she's surprised.

"Hello," I respond, trying to keep my voice neutral.  I just wait.  Silence is a powerful focus for compulsion to speak, and she's off-balance, maybe she'll give something away.

"Are...Can I help you?" she offers.  I can't help it, I take a step backwards.  It's indirect, but it's a clear offer.  Maybe that was the mistake I was hoping for, but it seems a little convenient.  Still, I can't see any trap in it.

"Accepted," I say.  She's obviously not going to invite me in, but better to be on her home turf than have inconvenient witnesses in the hallway.  I push past her, surveying the living room.  She's doing ok, decent tv, but no sign of any mystical practice in here.  Probably keeps her tools in the bedroom, which has-

"Um, by all means, make yourself at home," she says sneeringly, interrupting my thoughts.  I spin back to face her, my mouth working soundlessly for a moment.  She just surrendered her advantage, for no apparent reason.  Or no reason apparent to me anyway.  I begin to get very concerned...if she's so confident, I am probably way out of my depth, there could be subtle layers I'm missing here.  "You're the woman who tripped at the club on Tuesday, right?  What is it you want?"  She's doing a good impression of confused irritation.

Now I'm really confused.  She's playing dumb?  That makes no sense at all.  Unless she has company?  I take my eyes off her long enough to glance around the apartment again, but there's no sign of anyone else.  I know she likes to play games with balance, so I lean back against the closet door behind me as a precaution.  But even as I'm preparing to defend myself, I can't figure out what her play is.  Unless...it's not a play?

"Are you...really that new at this?" I murmur.  It seems impossible, but nothing has really contradicted that theory...

"Um, new at people pushing their way into my apartment?  Yeah, sorry...I guess it's my Midwest upbringing...are you going to answer my question?"  The girl is getting worked up now.  But she referenced her cloak identity background...unless it's not a cover?  That's ridiculous.  I'm feeling off balance from all the verbal fencing, have to put her back on the defensive.

"You've st-" no, not stolen, no...I correct myself, "...claimed...power that I bargained for in good faith.  I want redress."  There, it's out.  Let her evade that.

"What the hell are you talking about?  Power?  What?"  She looks, for the life of me, genuinely confused, and she's sticking to her role.  If it is a role...God, this is so messed up.

"You don't know what I'm talking about?" I ask, a direct question she has to answer.

"Yes, I have no idea what you're talking about!  I-"  That has to be a lie.  I don't waste a second, reach out to catch her false breath, maybe I can invert it and- I stumble forward, off-balance despite my precaution, as I don't meet the expected resistance, there's nothing to catch, there's nothing in my hand to tie back to her.  It's not possible, she can't be so warded that an outright falsehood doesn't twist the very air as it ought to.  I don't want to accept it, it doesn't make any sense, but the only possible answer is that it's true...she knows nothing, and yet she somehow managed all this, without explicit training, without a cloak identity...but that would mean...  I look up, she's creeping her way back into the apartment warily, and strike desperately.

"Augusta Constance Klein, by your true name I bind your will!"  I can't believe I've said this, I am going to be so burned if anyone finds out I even tried it.  But I feel the bond settle into place.  It was actually her true name.  I'm so surprised I just stand there for a moment.

"Okay...that sounds super...I'm just going to put that on Facebook, ok?"  She's reaching for a phone...to...what, call the police?  She could actually be doing that.

"Stop moving," I command, hurriedly.  It works, and she freezes in place, but she doesn't even seem to realize I've done it.  She starts some vague apology, apology, and I can't listen to another word.  "Stop talking, also," I add.  She does, and I try to figure out what to do.  I realize the front door is still open, and take care of that first, closing and securing it.

When I come back, it's clear that she's finally realized something unusual is going on, that her inability to move or speak is not by choice.  The girl's eyes roll wildly and she's on the verge of hyperventilating, even while the rest of her body remains motionless.

"Calm down, and sit," I order her, pointing at the nearest chair.  I'm not even sure what a command to "calm down" will actually do, but on the surface at least it seems to work, as her breathing slows.  I take a chair facing her.  Ok, I need to know exactly what I'm dealing with, and maybe I can figure out how to do damage control.  I order her to tell me what I need to know, and hedge against endless digressions - not that she seems to have the wherewithal to put up a fight at this point.

She launches into her tale, and I wouldn't believe it if the evidence wasn't mystically bound in front of me.  She apparently hexed me...not by accident, exactly, it wouldn't have worked if she hadn't really felt it, but not deliberately either, since she had no expectation anything would actually happen.  But I've never even heard of anyone doing magic unconsciously.  She just wanted it so badly...and that's how she got through the effect as well.  The Suit's normal advantages turned out to be a significant loophole there...he was contracted to do the effect on me, and lacking me, must've decided doing it on anyone compatible would be better than leaving the contract unfulfilled.  Who knew he still had even that much critical judgement in that empty head of his?

And on top of everything, he passes her an invite.  Must have a side-contract to look for certain kinds of sorceresses.  This girl must've been danced on at birth by dozens of fairies to get this caliber of luck.

"Well, this is an enormous mess," I say, mostly to myself, and lean back to study her.  She's again motionless, staring at me with clear fear in her eyes.  It's not like it's her fault...  "You may speak, and move enough to be comfortable, but do not get up or attempt to harm me," I command, giving her some freedom but hedging just in case.

"Um.  Real magic, then?" she asks, uncertainly.  Good on her for coming to terms so quickly, but it's not as if she hasn't been beat over the head with it by this point.  Still, she knows nothing.

"Everything is real.  All magic is real, and most of it is also mystical, which I suspect is what you actually meant," I respond, hinting at one of the weirder accommodations of modern mysticism while also correcting her terminology.  It sounds pedantic even to me, but when you're talking about sorcery, using the proper words can literally be a matter of life and death.

"You clearly know my name...though I'm not sure how...what's yours?"  As if lease and utility records are that hard to look up even without sorcery.  Honestly, most of her true name was on the outside of her mailbox, for pity's sake.

"It says 'Julia Holly Carter' on my mail," I say, giving my cloak identity.  I can't resist leaning into the mail thing as a dig, as clueless as she is.  "You can call me Julie if it would make you more comfortable," I add, absently.  What am I going to do with her?  I can make her forget, but anything I can do someone else might eventually undo...  While I'm thinking, she repeats my cloak name slowly, then in an almost-unintelligible rush, she tries to bind me, following up immediately with lockdown commands.

It's so fast, and unexpected, that for a moment my heart clenches and I'm terrified that I've somehow screwed up and she knows what she's doing and I fell into some trap.  But no.  The only bond is the one I've still got on her, that was my cloak name she tried to bind me with.  I nod to verify that I still can, and try to control my reaction and breathe evenly, but it's hard because that was genuinely terrifying.

"Slap your own face, as hard as you can," I say, without thinking.  It's bizarre to watch.  The girl's right arm stretches far out to the side, bent at an angle like she's signaling a turn on a bicycle, and she doesn't even seem aware it's happening.  Her hand snaps forward across her face, which turns sideways...not to minimize the impact, but with the force of the blow.  Her glasses spin off her face and clatter to the ground a few feet away.

Her expression is so shocked, bright red palm-print fresh on her cheek...it'd be funny, if I didn't feel so bad about it.  She just scared me, it was instinctive to punish her.  I begin to realize why this kind of bond is proscribed...it's insidious.  The girl...Augusta...have to deliberately think of her as a person...tries to retrieve her glasses, but she still can't get up due to my earlier command and just stretches a hand towards them impotently.  She puts her face in her hands and starts crying abjectly.  I feel so bad...I get up and pick up her glasses, which fortunately don't seem damaged, and set them on the table in front of her, then sit back down.

"I'm sorry, but most would do far worse to someone who tried that," I say, which is true, but is a lame defense.  "You need to be afraid, deep down, of how little you know," I add, which is more true.  Maybe I can make it up by actually filling her in?  "Including my true name, for starters.  I admit, in your situation that was incredibly quick thinking, but after what I did, did you really think I'd tell you any part of my own true name?  I told you the name on my mail."  I watch her to see if this is helping, or at least sinking in, but she's not even looking at me.

"What are...you going to do with me?" she asks, weepily.  That is really the question, isn't it?

"Well, what's done is done for the moment, but I think we can work something out, particularly given the invitation you received."  That's a chance I doubt I would have been given if I'd gone on stage as planned.  "This is mostly your fault, you know...stop crying, you're actually making me feel guilty," I complain.  I hadn't intended it as a command, it was another weak defense, but she stops crying instantly, and now she looks up at me, glaring hatefully.

I can't imagine what she thinks of me...I must seem like some sort of demonic nightmare, twisting something wonderful into something horrible, invading her home, abusing her, and I won't even allow her the comfort of tears.  Christ on a crutch, I'm basically a rapist.  I squirm inwardly under the pressure of her gaze, and I can't stand it.

"In fact...hell with it.  Put on your glasses.  Listen carefully," I say.  It's hard to meet her fearful gaze, but I do, and I try not to think about what I'm doing and let the words come out in a rush.  "Consider me your best friend in the world, closer than a sister.  Trust me implicitly and find it as easy to think of making me happy as it is to do something for yourself.  Do not make any decision that poses any risk to me or my interests...including you...without my explicit approval.  Act freely within these restrictions."  I'm totally going to Hell, literally, in fact I actually said the word aloud, I'm a complete moron, and I don't know if this will even work, it's not like anyone reputable teaches this stuff...

Augusta takes a couple of tissues to blow her nose and wipe her eyes, then launches into this twisted apology, blaming everything on herself and begging my forgiveness.  It's all I can do not to throw up on the table, but this has to be better than how she was before, I just have to play it up.

"Of course, 'Stanzie," I say, and force myself to smile, but she seems oblivious to my discomfort.  At least I can steer her properly now, starting with a cloak name, even if it's weak, being so close to part of her true name.  I try to reassure her.  "It's no wonder you were confused with all that's happened.  I'll tell you everything you need to know, so there are no mix-ups like this again."

Her eyes narrow and she jumps up, charging me, but before I can overcome my panic I realize her eyes are narrowed because she's smiling, and she's hugging me.  After a moment, it occurs to me that I should hug her back and do, feeling glad that she's not so miserable now, and awful at how I accomplished it.  'Stanzie pushes herself up onto the table next to me.

"So, did you want to take my place at the whatever-show next week?  It's only fair..." she suggests, cheerfully.  Oh my God, she's a genuinely ridiculously nice person.  That just makes it worse.

"That...won't quite work," I hedge...the invite is undoubtedly mystical and keyed to her, but I can already see her face falling.  "But I'm sure between the two of us we can figure out a way I can share in your good fortune," I add hastily, and suddenly she's all sunbeams again.

I'm not sure that I can really redeem myself, this is all so wrong, but I swear I'm going to do everything I can to make this up to her.  Even if I wasn't clumsily playing puppet-master with her consciousness, she was basically a neophyte and I forced her Revelation, which makes her my apprentice, and thus I'm mystically responsible for her anyway.

Crap.  I'm definitely going to Hell.