Conjuring Quantico (The Federal Witch Book 1)
Page 14
The mercenaries could hear me and glared at me. I was polite and only smiled back.
“How many agents do you think they will waste trying to get into my spell supplies?”
“Is that what is in those bags? They can buy that stuff anywhere. Why try so hard?”
“You can’t buy my stuff. Some of the items in those bags are worth more than this command center.” I thumped the big bus we were leaning up against.
“You might want to tell Mooby that he’s too close to their casting. Oops too late.” A stray bolt of lightning just missed making Moo a Mooette.
The agent in question crossed the lot and approached our table. “Agent Lowery, I demand that you order them to lower that ward so we can inspect their bags for stolen items!”
Cat reached under the table and laid a hand on my leg. I had been about to say something. This was a dominance battle. If there’s one thing a Were would know about its dominance.
“What stolen items would those be? Who is making the accusation?”
“I don’t have to tell you that! Do as I say: that’s an order.”
The three Russians came up behind Moo and started talking to me. “Glupaya ved'ma”
“Poluchit' etot shchit vniz yeshche?” All three of them glared at me.
“What is she saying to them?” Moo looked a bit put out.
“Not a clue. I don’t speak Russian.”
“Yesli Sovet Ved'my uznayet, chto vy kradete oni naydut vas i polozhit' konets vas.” I drew a finger across my throat. All three of them got very anxious and looked to Agent Moo to save them.
“What are you saying to them? I demand you tell me!”
“All I said was if the Witches’ Council knew they were stealing things, that they would be in serious trouble. More or less.”
“What have they stolen?”
“My stuff in the car. It’s mine. Not theirs.”
“Whatever is in the car is the property of the US Government! Now drop that shield now!”
“What in the hell is going on out here?” All the agents turned to their right and grimaced. Three United States Senators and the Mayor of Alexandria were standing in the parking lot staring at Agent Moo Moo.
“Senators, Mr. Mayor, we are just having a small difference of opinion and I will be with you in a moment.”
“Excuse me? Agent Mu? We would like to know what is more important than our children's lives?!”
“We had a report that these young women stole something from one of the residences and we are trying to search that vehicle.”
Senator Payne stared at Moo like he was crazy. “And that is more important than my daughter? Isn’t this the young lady that found the thing that ties this all together? The thing that your investigation missed?”
“Senator I can’t comment on an active investigation…” He didn’t have time to finish his statement before his phone rang. He looked at the display and excused himself.
Cat smiled at me and tapped her ear.
Agent Mu looked a bit pale when he stepped back to the Senators. He handed his phone to Agent Lowery and stepped back.
“Hello? Yes, Sir. No, Sir. He’s an asshole sir. Yes, sir. Yes, Sir. I do believe they heard me Sir. Yes, Sir. Thank you, Sir. Right away.” She handed Mu his phone back. “Do I have to say it?”
“No.” Mu turned and left the area.
“That was Director Turton. I’m now in charge. Back to work all of you. Ladies?”
Nita turned to the Senators. “Sorry about all of that. We will find them. I have our best people on it.” She shook all of their hands and stepped back to us.
“What do you want us to do?”
“Agatha, can you get with the forensics team and see if you can figure out what we are dealing with? Cat can go with you to watch your back. I need to go fire some Russians.”
~~~~
The portable forensics lab was inside a large moving truck parked behind the command center. Cat followed me as we weaved around the vehicles to find the entrance to it.
“Chuck is going to be big time jealous that he missed this! This is his thing.”
“Well maybe next time he can guard me instead of you.”
Cat looked, and me and laughed. “Nah.”
“Yeah, didn’t think so.” I found the door and knocked. A white-coated lab tech opened the door.
“We’ve been sent to help.”
“We don’t need help.” “SAC Lowery said to help you. Have you figured out what spell is on it yet?”
The tech opened the door, and we stepped inside. The four statues were lined up on a glass table. Techs in lab coats were examining them looking for external clues. A team of two Russian mercenaries were standing against the wall peering at the one at the end.
“Figurnyye yego yeshche?” The Russians looked at me and shook their heads.
“Nyet.”
“Eto primanka. Eto zastavlyayet vas brosit' svoyu okhranu i stolovykh s chuvstvom suzhdeniya.” The two stopped and started to nod their heads. Then they shrugged.
“Voznikayet vopros: pochemu?”
“Uh, what is she saying to them?” One of the techs came over to Cat.
“What I told them is the statues are a form of lure. They somehow disturb humans and mess with your judgment. Your sense of right or wrong. It’s a very intricate spell, but it doesn’t make any sense. Why use it?”
“Who are you?”
“Agatha Blackmore. I located those for you. I really wouldn’t be touching them with your hands. Just a suggestion.” The lab techs in question froze and carefully set them down.
I stepped closer to the table and peered at one of the dragon figures. I felt a shiver up my right arm and saw my new bracelet flash red for just a second. Interesting.
“Have you figured out what they represent?” The lab guys all stopped and stared.
“She means the actual figures not the magic. Are they from mythology or something?” Cat for the save.
“Yes, we traced the iconology to a fifteenth century text. It’s not a hydra as we first thought but a dragon. The heads are all different; dog, griffin, and man.”
“What text was it in? And what does it refer to?”
“It is an early Christian work by Johann Weyer, called De Praestigiis Daemonum et Incantationibus ac Venificiis.”
Crap! “Gentlemen that is a very rare and very scary book about demons. What demon does it represent?”
“My Latin is a little sketchy but the name that leaps out at me is Bune.” It didn’t ring a bell but grandmother only touched on the major demons.
“Any other more modern references to be had?” I pulled out my cell phone and frantically texted Grams about a three-headed dragon representing a Demon named Bune.
“Just one by Mathers.”
“Key of Solomon Mathers?”
“Yes. He says that Bune gives riches, wisdom, and eloquence. And that he can answer questions truthfully.”
“Crap on a stick. We need Agent Lowery in here. Right now!” My cell phone rang, and I answered it.
“Aggy what are you mixed up in? Bune is a high powered Duke of Hell. His followers were called Bunis. You remember what I taught you about demons. Don’t worry about the Council, I will update them.”
The Russians came up to me and began asking questions. “What is happening? What you find out about spell?”
“Chto vy znayete o demonakh?” They couldn’t get off the truck fast enough. They just about knocked Nita down as they ran for the hills.
“Agatha, is there a reason why two Russians just about knocked me down on my way in here?”
“We figured out what it is we are dealing with.”
“Don’t all tell me at once…! What is it?”
“Demons. Someone is trying to raise one again.”
“Crap! We run into something like this about once or twice a year. Most never get so far as to have victims or potential victims. Do you know what Demon it is?”
“Bune. One
of the Dukes of Hell. That statue is a dragon that represents him.”
“One question; or rather one big question. How did these kids get these and why them?”
Chapter 13
“What do we know about the parents and grandparents? Is there something that they all share?” Both Nita and I turned and stared at Cat.
“What? It’s basic police work. I do pay attention in class sometimes.” I looked at Nita and spread my arms.
Nita turned and went back to the command center to check on that. She had been finding that Agent Mu had not really been doing his job. With no evidence, he had not believed it was a kidnapping and was off in left field looking for runaways.
I looked at the forensic techs. They all looked tired. “Let’s all take a break? Half of you go eat something and relax for a bit. Come back in an hour, then we will switch.” The tired techs nodded and left to go eat. With half the people gone the lab looked very empty. The forensics lab was pretty cool. It was based upon a semi-truck using technology associated with recreational vehicles. Both sides of the cargo area were slides that when deployed doubled the inside floor space. Every conceivable piece of equipment available that would fit was inside. Power was supplied by a large towed generator and a solar panel array on the roof. A radar dish similar to that used by news crews was also deployable from the roof. It was a very comprehensive vehicle.
“That was a good idea.” One of the techs sitting behind a computer was looking at us.
“Everyone looks so tired. They needed a break. Cat and I have been sitting outside at a table since you guys got here. They wouldn’t let us help. We are still students, remember?”
“That’s right, I forgot about that. Technically, I’m the one in charge around here but I rarely pull rank. I just suggest things and they do it. Agent Mu gave us explicit orders to work this case, so we got lost in it. We haven’t been introduced, have we? Agent Anastasia Moondragon.” She held out her hand to me and I took it. Her hand was very cool to the touch. I glanced at her face and looked closer. It could have been the light but her skin was very pale and washed out looking.
I smiled at her and took a chance. “Vampire?”
“Very good Miss Blackmore. Not many get it on the first try. Yes I am a Vampire. One of very few in the FBI these days. You might say the Forensic Department is my domain since I rarely leave the truck.”
“I’m so sorry I just charged in and started giving you orders! I just want to find the kids.”
Anastasia started to laugh. “I want to find them too. That’s why I let you. Besides, you breathed a bit of fresh air into the room. We get stuffy and focus on the wrong things sometimes.” She turned her attention toward Cat. “I can tell what you are but not the species.”
“WereCat. Catherine Moore, nice to meet you.” Cat held out her hand.
“I would say you are an Alpha too. Not all that many female Alphas running wild out in the world. Welcome to the FBI.” Cat could only stare.
“Don’t look so shocked. I’ve been around for a while. Never worked with a Witch before, or at least not a sanctioned Witch. The Russians don’t count. They don’t care for me or I them. Too much history there.”
“Anastasia, were you alive during the Demon War?”
“Well, not alive. But yes, I was around then. I joined the FBI during the summer of love in 1969 on a whim. This is not the first time since then that we have come across demon influences, but it appears to be the most organized. I’ve got the system searching for a manufacturer or supplier for those things. They look like they may be mass produced. If so, we can trace the shipments.”
“Have you tried local artists? Maybe it was done locally.”
“That’s a good idea... I will add it to the search.” She typed on her computer for a bit then looked up at us. “Anything else?”
“I don’t think so. Do you mind if we go check out what Agent Lawson is working on?”
“Ladies you don’t have to ask me, you aren’t one of my charges. Good work by the way. I’ll let you know if we find anything.”
I grabbed Cat by the arm and we exited the lab. “Did you know she was a vampire?” I couldn’t believe I had just met one!
“She smelled like damp earth and Cinnamon. I’ve never smelled a combination like that on a human before so I knew she was something else. But I’ve never met a vampire before either. Chuck is going to be big-time jealous! Imagine an FBI tech on the job for over forty years? She must have an incredible amount of knowledge.”
The command vehicle was directly behind the massive forensics lab. The truck was more than half the size. I knocked on the door and waited for someone to answer.
“Yes?” The Agent that answered the door was a large man with grey hair and deep-set eyes. What surprised both Cat, and I was that he was wearing shorts.
He saw us laugh, and he smiled. “It gets hot in here. What can I do for you ladies?”
“Is Agent Lowery inside?”
He checked our badges to make sure we were who we said we were and let us in. The area inside was tight with computer stations lining the walls. The center of the room was set up with a video conferencing station and a map plot complete with whiteboards and research areas. Despite three air conditioning units the place was very warm.
Nita was hunched over a computer station with another Agent reviewing information on the screen. “Nita?”
“Hello ladies, how was forensics? Anastasia didn’t give you too hard of a time did she?”
“No, Ma’am she didn’t. We came to see if you found anything about a Bune cult or whatever.”
“Well, no cults as far as we can tell. It’s not illegal to worship demons so we don’t track religious groups. Only those that have caused problems or have been arrested before. Records show that Bune worshipers have popped up on our radar once before. In the early 1990’s the FBI stopped a rogue Bune group from influencing a presidential campaign. Once we shut them down the candidate stopped making sense to the public and was defeated fairly easily. The gift of eloquence is real. We have been searching the backgrounds of our Senators and the Mayor looking for some sort of commonality that links the four. So far we have nothing. All government officials are scanned very carefully for demonic influences these days. We learned our lessons from both the 1960s and the 1990s incursions. Demons cannot be allowed to influence politics or government.”
“So nothing links them at all?”
“They all belong to some of the same charity groups and two of them are in the same Masonic lodge. Masons are different. They follow a specific creed and are bound in fellowship. We have investigated lodges before and found them to be benign.”
I nodded. “Grandmother once told me that Masons were building the temple in the next life. We should be ashamed for suspecting them. But everyone is suspect when the life of a child is involved, much less four. What about the wives?”
“We checked them too. No links that we could find. They all went to different colleges. Each came from a different part of the country. Most were married right out of college and are the perfect politician's wives.”
“Stepfords?” Nita gave Cat a sharp look.
“Fictional movies and books aside there has only been one case of real so-called Stepfords and that was in France of all places. The reports that we have are they used flamethrowers against them and the entire cult was destroyed before they could do any more damage. No, this is something else entirely. But good guess!”
I stared at the screens and then glanced at the whiteboards. My new wristband twitched. I had an idea that the whatever-it-was bracelet agreed with.
“What about the mothers of the children? How do they match up with their parents? What do they have in common other than being family? I might be saying this wrong.”
Nita made a face and began typing. “How the mothers and fathers relate to the parents? What they have in common? Is that what you mean?”
“I was studying the whiteboard information and s
omething rang a bell. Because the children live with politicians, we have assumed the kidnappings were political. But what if they aren’t? Have we checked out the mothers? Or maybe how the mothers relate to their parents?”
Nita looked around the room. “OK everybody I want two teams. Half of you start researching the grandmothers, the other half the mothers. I want links between the two up on the board, let's move people.”