Everyone does magic. It's just that they don't know it. Have you ever heard the phone ring and known who it was before you answered? Or picked up at the exact moment that someone you wanted to call was calling you? Ever just known that someone was staring, even though they were behind you? That's magic. Low-level magic: the kind that everyone can do.

There are very few coincidences in the world, but there is a great deal of magic. And not all of it is low level.

Imagine discovering that magic is real, and that you're as good at it as Lauren Jackson is at basketball, as Jacqueline DuPre was at playing the cello. That you and many of your relatives have the gift of magic.

Or the curse of it.

Reason Cansino comes from a family with a talent for magic. But wielding magic has a high price and Reason is about to find out what it is.

Not all doorways lead where you expect them to.

One of the doors of Esmeralda Cansino's house in Sydney, Australia opens onto East Seventh Street in New York City in the United States of America. On the New York City side it's the front door of a brownstone; on the Sydney side it's the back door of a Federation mansion.

All over the world there are doors like that. If you are magical enough (and they're not locked) they will open onto somewhere wholly unexpected. All of them are located in populated centers. Doors cannot be imbued with magic away from people. The magic that animals generate only works on those things that are important to animals. Humans love their doors, they need them.

But even the best locks in the world can't keep everybody out.

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