by Paul Ruditis
Phoebe chuckled mournfully. “Something tells me they’ll have the chance to visit many parks in their lives… and cemeteries… and the Underworld.”
Piper smacked her sister lightly on the arm. “Way to bring us down.”
“Yes, I’m sorry I’m not more cheerful at the latest potential demon attack.”
Now Piper glared at her sister.
Phoebe forced a smile. “Okay, I really am sorry for being such a downer. But I’m not used to magic messing with my readers. I hate that I’m here while the guys are working on it. This one’s just a bit more personal.”
Paige completely understood what Phoebe was saying, but they needed to focus on the issue at hand. She redirected their attention to the commotion near the park entrance. “We’ve got to put our resources where they’re most useful. It looks like Leo was right. This is becoming a story.”
Phoebe took a deep breath. She didn’t look like she wanted to move on from the subject at hand, but she adjusted. “I texted Elise. So far our paper is the only one that knows about the congressman. Considering the police were involved, the Presidio groundskeepers have a missing statue on their hands—or not on their hands—and anyone out for an early morning stroll might have seen it, I doubt the news will stay in-house for long. She’s embargoed the story in the meantime. It won’t go up on the website for now. She can keep it out of the paper until at least a third statue goes up. Right now it’s a minor human interest piece.”
“Let’s hope we can stop it from becoming front page territory,” Paige said.
Piper shook her head in confusion. “It’s a statue that popped up inexplicably in the middle of a park. That’s a very broad definition of human interest.”
“And yet it looks like it’s about to go viral,” Paige said with a nod to all the cameras.
“Well then the Charmed Ones will have to stop that from happening,” Piper said as she raised her hands and froze everyone in the park.
Phoebe checked to see that her sister got everyone and then turned her attention to the crowded streets around them. “Okay. What now? We can’t exactly make off with the statue like last time. I’d say the dozen people filming it might notice when they unfreeze and they’re just staring at each other. Then it becomes actual news.”
Piper started for the statue. “We can’t wait around all day for the coast to be clear. We’ll undo the statue spell, find out what we can, then I can freeze him and we can put him under a glamour so that he looks stone and keep him here until we figure out a way to return him to his normal life as inconspicuously as possible.”
“And in the meantime, if a few pigeons drop by to visit, so be it,” Paige said. “I’m okay with this plan.”
Piper led the way as the Charmed Ones carefully slipped into the small crowd around the granite media mogul. Paige could see that she was extra careful not to bump any of the looky-loos for fear of releasing them from their frozen state. It was something of a challenge because they were packed in so tight. Like being in a museum of frozen statues all gathered around an actual statue. Not her idea of a fun outing.
Piper held out a hand. “Potion!”
Paige pulled the small glass vial from her pocket. The swirling green and gold liquid sparkled in the light. “Here we go! Concentrated magical community.”
Phoebe watched the vial as it passed between sisters. “If only we’d thought to do this before. It might have cut down on our interactions with some of the more… interesting members of the community.”
“Something tells me they would have gotten involved in other ways,” Piper said as she received the vial. “It’s not like they’ve ever waited for a formal invitation from us.”
Piper uncorked the vial and raised it to the head of the statue. Ramsey was slightly too tall for her to reach the top of his head, so she settled on his face. “Ready?”
Paige took Piper’s free hand and then grabbed onto Phoebe. “Ready.”
The sisters took a breath, then spoke together: “To free a man stopped in his tracks, add fairy dust, a dash of luck, and the pick of an ax.” Piper splashed the potion into the man’s face and the sisters stepped back while it poured down his body. They released hands while waiting for the potion to take effect, eventually realizing nothing was going to happen.
Phoebe knocked on the still solid statue. “Well, that’s odd.”
Paige tilted her head. “That should have worked. Frankly, considering how easy it was to undo the congressman statue, I figured if anything we had too much power with that potion.”
“Maybe we need the actual dust, luck, and ax instead of it in its distilled form?” Piper suggested.
Phoebe shook her head. “But Prue compensated for that in the potion.”
“Piper!” Paige pointed to the park’s other entrance where a family of four were coming in with their dog.
“Got ’em.” Piper held up her hands and the family froze in their tracks. She even got the dog to make sure he didn’t run away while his family wasn’t able to control him.
Paige turned her attention back to the statue. “Should we try another basic Power of Three spell? Maybe we didn’t need Prue’s assist from the Nexus this morning.”
“Worth a try,” Phoebe said as they took hands again, closed their eyes and concentrated.
“The Power of Three will set you free! The Power of Three will set you free! The Power of Three will set you free!”
When they opened their eyes again, none of them were too surprised to see that the statue was still stone.
Piper sighed. “I hate to say this, but maybe we need Prue to give us a little Nexus boost.”
“I hate to agree with it, but I think you’re right,” Phoebe said. “But we can’t do that too often. Something about that magic didn’t feel right to me.”
Piper laid a hand on the statue and looked to Paige. “Okay then. We’re going to need to take him with us.”
Paige looked around the largely frozen park. Sure, no one around them would notice them disappearing thanks to Piper’s magic, but anyone else could easily stumble into the park. To say nothing of all the surrounding buildings with plenty of windows overlooking the space. Someone was bound to notice no one was moving after a while. “How?”
Piper held out a hand. “Quickly.”
Paige didn’t waste time arguing. She took both her sisters by the hand and focused her power on orbing them and the statue back around the globe. She barely had the time to wish that she could wrack up some frequent flier miles for the amount of distances she’d been traveling lately before they were all staring at a completely unsurprised Prue taking them all in.
“This housewarming present isn’t any better than the last,” Prue said dryly.
Piper took her eldest sister’s hand while she still held onto the others, forming a circle around the statue of Vaughn Ramsey. “The potion didn’t work. We need to do what we did earlier.”
“It didn’t work?” Prue asked. “I’m surprised. It really should—”
“Sorry, Prue,” Piper said. “We’ve got to get him back before anyone notices he’s gone. I don’t know how long the people in the park will stay frozen while I’m on the other side of the world.”
“Say no more.” Prue closed her eyes and focused on the power at the center of the Nexus of the All.
Paige kept her eyes open for a moment, focusing them on her eldest sister. None of them understood Prue’s connection to the Nexus and it worried them all that she was trapped over such a powerful magical convergence. Paige was more than a little wary of this new world order, which didn’t ease when she felt a wave of nausea as the Nexus tried to connect with her own power.
“I’ve got it,” Prue said.
“Yeah,” Phoebe said, sounding woozy. “We know.”
The sisters didn’t waste another moment.
“The Pow
er of Three will set you free! The Power of Three will set you free! The Power of Three will set you free!”
When they opened their eyes, they were shocked to see that it didn’t work.
“One more time,” Prue suggested.
The Charmed Ones shared a skeptical look, but didn’t question it.
“The Power of Three will set you free! The Power of Three will set you free! The Power of Three will set you free!”
Nothing.
Paige let out a huff of air. “What now? The spell on the congressman was so easy this morning. Why won’t this work?”
“Phoebe, see if you can get a vision from him,” Piper said. “Find out how this one is different from the congressman.”
Phoebe stepped closer to the statuary. She laid her hands on his chest, probably disgusted by the fact that she had to actually touch this guy. Paige was glad that so far she’d managed to not have to interact with the sleazeball even though he was in a stone form.
Paige watched as her sister closed her eyes and tried to evoke an image from the past. Paige always wondered what that was like for Phoebe. Paige’s magic worked so naturally for her that she hardly had to concentrate to call on the orbs that moved things around for her. But there had to be more involved with Phoebe’s power. The opportunity to see the future or the past must have required some form of concentration. There’s a whole lot of nothing in most people’s lives. The special part of Phoebe’s power was that she could hone in on the exact moment that mattered to whatever situation they were dealing with. Hopefully, she was doing just that right now.
The resigned look on Phoebe’s face as she opened her eyes suggested she hadn’t had any success. “Nothing,” she said. “Not even a blip.”
“Why is this suddenly so difficult?” Prue asked. “It was all relatively easy this morning. Are we dealing with the same magic?”
“Something’s different,” Phoebe said.
“We don’t have time to analyze it,” Piper said. “We’ve got to get this back to the park. Or maybe what we need is to get a reasonable facsimile back in its place.”
“We can’t just make another statue,” Phoebe said.
“Why not?” Piper said.
“Because none of us is a sculptress or has the money or time to commission a piece,” Paige reminded her. “Our powers don’t exactly work that way.”
Piper crossed her arms. “Prue’s does.”
Prue barked out a laugh. “What are you talking about?”
Piper ticked off some examples on her fingers. “You can make the Nexus into whatever you want it to be. You turned it from the Manor to a castle. Filled a library with books. Why can’t you make a replacement for this guy?”
“But my power doesn’t extend past the Nexus,” Prue reminded her. “It would disappear the moment it cleared the area.”
“Would it?” Piper asked. “It’s the Nexus of the All, a convergence point for magic that exists all over the world. Why can’t a piece of it be orbed to San Francisco?”
“Because that’s not how it works,” Prue said.
“The potion made it to San Francisco,” Paige pointed out.
“The potion was made from magic taken from other places,” Prue explained. “All the spell ingredients I’ve got here arrived magically from someplace else. It’s different from when I call up a new couch in the living room so there are seats for everyone when you bring the kids for a visit. Things like that… I don’t know… maybe it’s made out of the sand beneath us? But it’s different from the potion ingredients. It’s like the Nexus knows what that stuff is being used for and compensates.”
“It’s worth a try,” Phoebe said. “We don’t have a lot of other options at the moment. Whoever comes to remove this statue from the park might do a better job keeping an eye on it than those guys this morning. This could be our only chance to study it and figure out what turned him to stone.”
“And to free him from his granite prison before anyone notices the guy really is missing,” Piper added.
Prue stepped up to the statue examining it closely. “I’m pretty sure I can replicate it. But I’m worried about what will happen once he leaves this place.”
“Maybe the Nexus will compensate.” Piper gave Prue a supportive pat on the back. “But let’s focus on one thing at a time. If you can’t make a good enough likeness, it doesn’t matter what happens next. Enough people already got pictures of the statue. If it comes back looking totally different some of them will notice. Good thing you’ve always had an eye for these kinds of things. Unless you’re afraid you’ve lost your touch. It’s been a long time since you worked at Buckland’s.”
“Sounds like a challenge to me,” Paige said.
“I’d lay money on it,” Phoebe agreed. “I’m just not sure which side is the best financial investment.”
Prue’s smile indicated she knew her sisters were goading her on purpose. And that she was ready for the challenge. She waved a hand slowly over the statue, starting at its feet. As her hand moved up the body, a duplicate statue slowly formed beside the frozen man, beginning with his shoes and going all the way to the top of his perfectly coiffed head.
Prue stepped aside as soon as she was done and her sisters filled in her spot, examining the new statue. Paige looked back and forth between the original and the replica, comparing the two stone works of art. She couldn’t see any difference between them at all.
“Should have made that bet,” Prue said as her smile shifted to one that was deservedly smug.
Knowing they didn’t have a lot of time, Paige placed a hand on the duplicate statue and reached out for Piper. “We’ll take this guy to the park and come right back.” She and Piper were gone without another word.
The park was still frozen when they returned, which was good because Paige had dropped them right in the middle of the circle. She didn’t waste any time orbing her and her sister back to the tree they’d originally hidden behind on their first trip. Piper unfroze everyone just as a couple entering the park was about to walk into the family that Piper had frozen earlier. Their frightened dog hopped up on one of the kids, but no one else seemed to have noticed that anything was wrong.
The commotion around the statue grew, pulling Paige and Piper’s attention back to the replaced object. Even at a distance they could see something was wrong. The statue that Prue had so carefully recreated was melting. Slowly at first, but then it collapsed into the ground, pooling at the people’s feet before completely disappearing from the park.
Paige held her breath as she waited. After an interminable pause, everyone that had been around the statue broke out into applause. She sighed with relief when she heard the reaction. “Well, that answers one question about Prue’s powers. Hopefully, everyone will assume the melting statue really was some weird kind of viral marketing campaign.”
Piper took her sister’s hand. “Yeah, but we better get back and figure out what’s going on before Vaughn Ramsey’s disappearance goes from marketing campaign to lead news story.”
Paige bounced them back across the globe without comment. Whatever power was at play here, she suspected this was far from the end of the plan. Even though they’d only just left the Manor, she hoped the guys were having better luck than they were. Paige had the feeling that this was going to be a very long day for everyone.
Chapter 12
Coop hung up the phone, disappointed by the news but not surprised. There were only so many times members of the extended family could skip out on their jobs and still maintain their employment. Considering that Henry was one of the few relatives who actually earned physical money in exchange for his work, it was hard to put too much pressure on the guy.
“Who’s Henry going to cover?” Leo asked from the couch in the sitting room when he saw that Coop was off the phone.
“No go,” Coop replied. “He’s got meetin
gs scheduled with parolees this afternoon. For some reason he can’t drop everything to join us.”
“How dare he have a mortal job with normal responsibilities as a member of this family,” Leo joked. Though there was definite humor in his tone, Coop couldn’t help but notice some disappointment in his expression.
An extra pair of eyes would have been helpful in monitoring the situation. Phoebe did have more couples on her list than they could handle on their own. No matter how enthusiastic he’d been in his efforts to convince his wife that they had things handled, Coop suspected more of her readers would be on their road to divorce before the day was out. Coop tried to match Leo’s fake smile. “On the bright side, he’ll be near the police station in case one of us gets pulled in for stalking. Staking out people’s houses probably isn’t something they like civilians to do.”
“Then it would be good if the civilians didn’t get caught,” Cole said as he appeared at the base of the staircase somewhat overdressed for a person who spent most of his time lounging around a castle waiting to run mystical errands. “So what’s the plan?”
Coop looked down at his jeans and cozy red sweater and decided he preferred relaxed comfort over the classic cut of silk suits. This was much a more appropriate outfit for someone with two small children at home.
Since Cole was apparently one to get right down to business, Coop held up his phone with the list of names and addresses that Phoebe had forwarded to him and didn’t bother with pleasantries. “The plan is we split up and keep an eye on the people on this list.”
Cole nodded slowly in a way that suggested he was not a fan of Coop’s plan.
“You have a better idea?” Coop asked.
“I do.” Cole moved into the living room. He pulled down the decorative ribbon that Piper had hung over it in some odd fit of decorative panache she’d experienced after the last in-home demon attack. “Leo? Does Piper have any bay leaves in the house.”