"Marcus!" I screamed, as I scrambled over to him. "Marcus! Are you okay?"
"Ow," he groaned as he slid onto his side. "I might have said this before, but poltergeists hurt like hell."
It was at this point that something inside me snapped. This was the fourth supernatural assault in two days and twice Marcus had been attacked. I'd exorcised the spirit from the girls' washroom and I'd be damned if some witch-hating piece of crap was going to try and steal Marcus' soul, or mine for that matter.
I strode up to the middle of the car as Betty looked on. I held out my left hand and spread my fingers until I knew I was directly beneath the spot where the entity spoke those menacing words. I held my amulet over my head and invoked the strongest banishment spell I could think of.
"I am a witch of ancient lore," I roared. "And this is the twenty-first century. You want a piece of me, come and get some!"
The car started shaking again and I grabbed a hand hold to keep myself from falling flat on my face. The floating debris which moments earlier had been pummelling poor Marcus flew straight up and crashed against the ceiling.
"Begone!" I cried.
A vaporous mass took form above my head, dripping spectral ooze down my forearm and onto my shoulders. I pushed my amulet into the slushy mess, willing my magic into my banishment spell. It twisted and churned as it tried to resist my power so I drew from my spirit further, digging as hard as I could for every ounce of energy I could muster. A shriek of rage roared through the car as I cast the presence back onto whoever had sent it here. My hair blew in every direction as a stinking breeze swirled around me. In seconds the mass dissolved into a harmless mist and I dropped to my knees exhausted.
Betty strode up to me clapping her hands. "Well done, Julie! That was a remarkable show of will."
"T-thanks," I panted. "You guys okay?"
Marcus slowly got back to his feet and brushed himself off. "Yeah, I'm good. Are we going to head out to the Beltline?"
"The hell with this!" I growled, knowing that where I wanted to go wasn't going to fly with Betty, but I was desperate. "I need an edge if I'm going to end this crap and save my Mom."
Betty folded her arms and gave me a stern look. "This had better not be what I think it is."
I shot her a defiant glare. "Yeah, Betty, it is – we're going to Bankers Hall to talk with Holly."
Chapter 15
Towering over fifty stories, Bankers Hall is at the heart of a spider's web of pedestrian malls that connects thousands of shops and businesses to Prince's Island Park to the north (where last year there was a bona fide troll sighting, believe it or not) and to the Olympic Plaza and City Hall to the east. It is also home to Star Corp Petroleum, where serious players in the oil and financial worlds cut deals worth more money than I'll ever see in a thousand lifetimes.
Oh, and I should mention the distinctive crowns of both buildings are designed to look like cowboy hats when viewed from afar. Talk about tacky.
Betty, Marcus and I wandered through the mall until we reached the huge foyer of the east tower and sauntered up a corridor containing two sets of elevators. Sure, we probably stuck out like a sore thumb, particularly Betty's garish leopard skin outfit, but really, unless you're wearing an expensive business suit that costs more than a month's worth of groceries, you're going to get a lot of stares in a building like Bankers Hall. A pair of elevators arrived simultaneously, so we waited a moment and hopped on the one that had collected the fewest people. Within a minute or so, the large shining brass doors opened on the forty-sixth floor, and we casually walked into another foyer, this one with the Star Corp Petroleum logo embedded in the shining granite floor.
Marcus and Betty sat down on a pair of luxurious leather chairs as I shuffled up to a mahogany reception desk that was about as big as my bedroom. A very curt woman of about fifty with a wireless microphone hanging down from her ear raised a finger for me to wait as she finished directing a call.
"There," she said with a huff. "How can I help you?"
"I'm wondering if Holly Penske is in," I said, trying to sound about ten years older than I was.
The receptionist scanned me from head to foot and then arched a suspicious looking eyebrow. Her eyes panned across the foyer at Betty and Marcus sitting in silence, and then raised her other eyebrow.
"If you're looking for Star Corp to donate to your school, there's an application form and instructions on our website," she clucked.
"And that's precisely what I would have done had we been looking for a donation," I responded with a sweet smile on my face. "Holly Penske, please?"
The receptionist looked put out as she glanced down at a flat screen monitor. She clicked away at the keyboard for a second and then said, "She's just out of a board meeting, I'll call her office. And you are?"
"Julie Richardson," I said tersely. "She'll know who I am when you tell her."
She grunted and tapped an impatient finger on the polished desk. "Ms Penske, there's a Julie Richardson here to see you… Right. Fine then. I'll let her know."
She clattered away at the keyboard again like she was deliberately trying to avoid conveying the message she'd received and then said, "Just have a seat with your friends. Ms Penske will be on her way out here shortly to meet you."
"Thanks," I said. I turned on my heels and sauntered over to the plush leather chairs and considered for a moment that if and when we rescued my mom, she was going to rip me a new one because I'd sought out Holly Penske.
Betty was still scowling as I sat down on the chair between she and Marcus, and I'd given serious consideration that her face might possibly be frozen that way since she'd been scowling for the last thirty-five minutes.
"Who's Holly Penske?" asked Marcus.
"A very powerful entity in Prada shoes," I said. "She's in the know about all the supernatural goingson around town. I thought to see if she could offer us a bit of help. Oh, and she's an immortal."
"Are you serious?"
I nodded. "Yep. Prepare to have blown your mind again."
Marcus shrugged. "Meh, I'm used to it. So, is she a good guy or a bad guy?"
"She's a troublemaker," Betty snipped. "That's all you really need to know."
"In what way?" he asked.
"In more ways than you can count. Julie, there is nothing she can offer you that either of you have the ability to pay for. We should leave."
I held up my hand to cut her off as I glanced down the long polished corridor to see a leggy woman with perfectly sculpted calves in a sharp navy blue skirt and matching blue blazer close a large office door and head toward us. Her midnight-black hair was cropped in a severe looking bob that contrasted with her flawless ivory skin and penetrating blue eyes. A group of men in business suits stopped chattering amongst themselves as the heels of her peep-toe pumps clicked loudly against the granite floor, almost demanding that everyone within earshot should immediately drop what they were doing and look at her. Her eyes fixed on me as she dropped a large manila envelope off to the evil receptionist from hell. She offered a warm smile and stuck out her hand as she strode across the Star Corp Petroleum logo to the waiting area.
"Julie Richardson and company," she said in a luxurious voice as her eyes darted over to Betty. "I see that my old acquaintance has found a new home. I do quite like the faux animal skin, Tutelary. Tell me; are you very much in demand these days?"
I could almost hear Betty's teeth grating together. "I'm where I'm needed," she said, icily.
"I'm really sorry to bother you, Holly," I said, standing up. "Something's happened to my mother. Something terrible."
"And you've come to seek my counsel," Holly said, her smile never wavering. "Well do follow me down to my office."
Holly's office was a huge room with black granite and marble pillars that stretched up more than twenty feet. The ceiling was of crystal clear glass and yet the room itself wasn't awash with sunlight. In one corner was a modern looking glass-topped desk and there was a very large,
but very modest triangular table with leather cushions surrounding it at the centre of a sunken portion of the floor.
"Well, I'm never one to turn down a request for my counsel," she said, stepping down into the sunken floor and then taking a seat at the triangular table. "From the looks on your faces, I'd say that whatever has befallen your mother is rather… Shall we say, time-sensitive?"
I glanced at my watch as Marcus and I took a seat around the table. Betty chose to stand, her arms folded across her chest and her eyes fixed firmly on Holly. "That's right. I think we have less than two days to help her."
Holly nodded slowly as I relayed the events of the past two days. She walked over to the biggest wall unit of book-shelves I'd ever seen in my life, a look of deep concern on her face. She climbed a rolling ladder and pulled herself to a series of enormous volumes bound in bright red leather. "Here it is," she said with a look of satisfaction. She pulled a huge book off the shelf and rolled the ladder back to its original position. She heaved it under her arm and climbed down the ladder, while Marcus gave me a worried look.
"What's with the big honkin' encyclopaedia?" he whispered.
"It isn't an encyclopaedia, young man," she said as she dropped it on the table. It landed with a loud slap. "I am in no need of one."
"Then what's with all the books?" I asked.
"They're debt ledgers," Betty warned, "dating back a thousand years."
"Tack on another thousand years and you'd be correct, Tutelary," said Holly. "Julie, I'd be interested in learning what you might be able to offer me as a trade so that you won't become another signature among my records of those who owe me."
Of course I had nothing that Holly would want and she knew it, that's why she pulled out the book.
Fantastic.
Yeah, this was probably a dumb idea.
"I could let you borrow some of my magic," I said, immediately realizing how unbelievably amateur I sounded.
Holly let out a cold chuckle and shook her head. "Julie, respectfully, your magic is of no significance when compared to mine and you know it. But there are other things."
"You're not going to ask for my first born child or anything weird like that… Are you?"
Holly ignored my question and slid the book toward me. "I am counsel to seemingly insignificant practitioners like you, and large multi-national corporations like Star Corp Petroleum. The names of the directors of this company are listed alongside countless others who did not have an immediate way to compensate me for my insight."
Marcus piped up. "What if those who ask for your help aren't exactly working for the good guys?"
Holly's eyes shifted to Marcus. "There are no 'good guys' as you put it, boy. There are no bad guys either. Mortal concepts of right and wrong are unimportant to a daughter of the sun. However, profit is. Don't those of your kind deal in the sharing of information? How is my asking for compensation for a service that much different than a lawyer or an accountant asking to be compensated for their labours?"
Well, she had a point.
I placed my hand on the thick volume and it tingled at my touch. I hesitated a moment as I was about to open it and see what kinds of debts Holly had arranged for her debtors but she brushed my hand away at the last moment.
"That is not for you to see," she warned. "It would place a power imbalance in our negotiations."
"Is that what you're doing? Negotiating?" Betty snipped, her voice oozing with sarcasm. "I wonder what your contemporaries would say about forcing someone so young to be in your debt. It seems to me that more substantial deities living in the mortal realm would never take advantage of a mere child."
Holly glared at Betty so hard her eyes could have bored holes in the wall behind us. "Always the reasonable one, aren't you?" Her voice was flat and hard. "I am not in the business of providing free advice, not even to a child. I suspect others of my kind have made, shall we say, alternative arrangements."
"What kind of alternative arrangements?" I asked with a note of suspicion in my voice.
Holly pulled the book off the table and dropped it on the seat beside her. She folded her hands and her business-like demeanour returned. "I am aware of something from the spiritual realm that holds a great deal of malice towards witches. I am also aware there is a practitioner in the city acting as a vessel for this entity."
"I think I know who it is," I said. "Does the name Hudibras mean anything to you?"
She had a look of cold calculation in her eyes. "Before I answer your question it seems to me that alternate arrangement I mentioned should be discussed first."
"And what kind of alternate arrangements are we talking about, lady?" Marcus asked impatiently.
Holly's eyes narrowed as she opened a large drawer in the table and pulled out a block of wood that was weathered with age. She flipped it over to reveal an engraving identical to the one I'd seen on the background of Hudibras' YouTube page.
"You're familiar with the person in this engraving, aren't you?" she asked.
"It's Matthew Hopkins, the Witchfinder General," I said, trying hard to conceal the uneasiness in my voice.
She nodded. "Very good. He is the entity I spoke of earlier. If I'm to offer you assistance, then I'd like you to capture his essence and return it to me."
I blinked hard. "I can't imagine why you'd want his spirit."
Holly relaxed a little and she folded her hands on the table. "I have my reasons."
I could almost hear the veins throbbing in Marcus' forehead and the look on his face told me we were in for one of his rare tirades.
"Look, lady," he snapped. "We don't know anything about Hudibras, Matthew Hopkins, or whoever this Witchfinder General dude is, but you're just as bad as leopard-skin girl over here. You both speak in riddles, and you both know more than you're letting on. Betty can't offer information unless the right question is asked, and you probably know enough to help Julie save her mother, but you won't tell her how to find this guy! Julie, screw it. Let's just get out of here, okay?"
I motioned for Marcus to calm down as I opened my backpack and took out my amulet. I laid it on the table in front of Holly and said, "It's pretty obvious that I'm going to do what you want if I have a hope of getting my mom back. I guess you'll probably need this as a down payment if you're going to be giving me any useful information. But first, you know about this amulet, don't you?"
"It's very lovely," said Holly. "Copper is an exceptionally strong conduit of magical energy. Tell me, Julie, are you in a coven or are you home-schooled?"
"Mom hates the political stuff in her coven," I said calmly. "So yeah, I'm home-schooled."
Holly examined the sigil in the center of the oval disk and said nothing for a moment. She dangled the amulet by its copper chain and held it out in front of me.
"Do you know what this engraving is?" she asked.
I grabbed the amulet and held it in my palm. "It's a combination of images. One is an inverted letter d, which represents the first letter in my mother's name. It's attached to the letter j for my first name. I've never been able to figure out why they're set in the middle of a serpentine shape."
Holly smiled warmly. "Really, that is interesting. Are you quite certain it's a serpentine shape because it could have a different meaning."
I gave her a confused look. "Excuse me?"
She stared hard at the amulet. "Tell me, Julie, do you remember anything of your father?" she asked.
I shrugged. "Just vague images from when I was very young. I have the occasional flash of a man with blond hair and bright eyes smiling at me. I mean, he died when I was four."
"And how did he die?" she asked.
"A car accident, why?"
Holly stood up from the leather cushion and returned to the book-shelves. She seemed to know exactly what she was looking for and this time she returned carrying another large volume with a dark green spine and gilded lettering.
"This," she said sliding the book across the table, "is a record of deaths
among those in the local supernatural community. It goes back fifty years and you'll note that each entry contains an image of a tombstone or grave marking of some kind showing the last resting place of the departed. Tell me, do you often visit your father's grave?"
I gave her a confused look. "My father was cremated and his ashes were scattered from the highest point of Nose Hill Park. I was there. It's one of my earliest memories."
Holly remained impassive and pointed to the book. "Really. Are you quite certain of this?"
I pursed my lips and I flipped to the index and ran my finger down a lengthy list of alphabetized names until I found my father's. It said Stephen William Richardson was on page two hundred and four, so I searched through the book until I found the page with the entry for my father. When I saw the engraving of his grave marker, I gasped.
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