The night’s arguments had wearied Sam more than the long days without enough sleep. Dawn was beginning to lighten the sky from black to indigo. He rubbed at his eyes and felt their puffiness. Almost a new day and they hadn’t heard anything yet. Maybe Hart was right.
"There it is," Willie announced.
Sam’s stomach flopped.
"Hey, Hart," Willie called from her seat by the rigger board. "I thought you said that with the wendigo dead the Circle was out of business. Morning scream-sheet’s got a Bone Boy kill. One victim. Just like we never bothered them."
"Must be a copycat," Hart said sourly.
"Sweet dream, elf, but no joy. it’s them, or I’m an unjacked ferrophobe. Wendigo or not, they’re still on course."
"We can’t let this go on," Sam said.
"What are we supposed to do about it?" Hart asked. "They know about us now. Willie can’t get a drone near enough to follow even the acolytes. Dodger’s off chasing who knows what. Without surprise, we won’t be able to crack their security. If we try to catch them in the act again, they’ll be waiting. Even if we still had Estios and his bunch, we’d only get ourselves wasted."
"We’ve got to do something. We can hire muscle."
"With what? We don’t have the resources. Even if we had muscle, what about their magic? Those druids are pulling down some powerful mana."
"We’ll get the resources," Sam insisted. "We’ll find a way to cancel their magic."
"How?"
"That’s a question I’ve got to ask too, Twist," Willie said. "I’m not gonna quit on you, but you gotta know that we ain’t gonna get much help on the street. Burnside’s been spreading the word that anybody who works with us, crosses him."
"He’s just one cop."
"Maybe he's just one cop, but he’s got a lot of hooks in the shadow world. Most runners still got to live in this plex with that one cop."
Sam hung his head and massaged the back of his neck. After a few moments he let his hand drop. "Then we’ll do it ourselves. Dodger can slice loose some of the druids’ own money. With enough nuyen we can refit your drones, Willie. Cog’s a good connection; he can get us combat drones."
Hart forced a hissing breath through her teeth. "Willie’s firepower didn’t do much against their summoning in the warehouse. The mundane approach won't work without some serious firepower. Even then, it’s not sure. With preparations, and they will be prepared, they can raise stronger spirits. Lots of them."
"Then we’ll need magic to take care of the spirits." Sam stared her in the eye. He willed her to put aside her negativism. They all knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but they had to do the right thing. Why was she being so difficult?
"Don't look at me that way," Hart snapped. "I’m not sure I have the juice. Putting down that last one almost broke me."
Sam was disappointed. Had the dismissal of the spirit really been so hard for her? Since that night she had been so defeatist, not like herself at all. As much as he hoped that she would be by his side to face the Circle, he knew he would face them without her if he had to. The Circle and their pawn-patron Gordon had to be stopped. If she wasn’t going to be there, he’d find another way.
"Herzog will help," Sam said. He tried to sound assured. "He’s always said he’s a master of spirits."
"He won’t leave his sewers."
Hart’s statement was made with utter confidence. Sam’s hope sank. She had known the Gator shaman longer than he had; he feared she was right.
"Then he’ll have to teach me how to handle the spirits, because I won’t let those druids sacrifice another person."
28
Dan had not come home for days, but Janice wasn’t worried. He was strong; nothing could harm him. With him gone, her lessons had perforce stopped. She had grown bored and begun to prowl the maze that made up the residence floor. It was a fascinating place, full of mementos, books, and art. There seemed to be artifacts from all seven of the continents. Many of the more curious items were magical, and those were the most fascinating. She had never dreamed that there were so many different kinds of aids for magical operations. When Dan returned, she would badger him into explaining them to her.
She had known that his corporate holdings were widespread, but her browsings in his library and databank showed her just how extensive they were.
Through networks of holding companies and brokerages, he held controlling interests in more than a dozen corporations of varying sizes. GWN was the largest, but not by much. He could go to any of the world’s major cities and find one of his corporate enclaves.
Her readings uncovered a curious fact. None of the heads of his corporate empire had ever met, despite a strong interweaving of business efforts. The presidents and CEOs must be very good to pull off such an arrangement, considering the disparate natures of their businesses and the spheres in which they operated. Dan must have chosen his subordinates well. Intrigued with how he had found so many loyal followers, she delved deeper.
She began to wonder if all of Dan’s top corporate officers shared his metatype. Garcia and Han were both of the metatype and so were important officers of his operations on different continents. While the computer records showed all of the principal officers as norms, she knew better in at least one case. Dan himself was head of GWN despite the registered smiling face of a blond man named Doug Randall. Therefore, there was no reason to believe that the other records told the truth. The photographs accompanying annual reports could only be considered circumstantial evidence at best. Some megacorps deliberately published false pictures of their officers as a security measure.
In the beginning, Dan had said that he wanted her to join his organization. At the time she had been scared and disoriented by her change. She had thought him hypocritical for hiding his own nature within an illusion of normal humanity. She had learned otherwise, been educated in the necessity of his approach.
In her second change she had lost her self, but with his aid she was finding that self again—or rather, redefining it. She no longer wanted to consider herself human. Humans were petty beings full of hate and prejudice. She wanted no connection between herself and those awful creatures.
She had come to see Dan’s mask as the way of survival, appreciating its necessity and adopting one of her own. Thus, she was not surprised when the bits and pieces began to fall into place, and she realized that all of the presidents and CEOs were Dan himself. There was no need for them to communicate with each other. Each knew all of the others’ plans, hopes, and aspirations. Each agreed whole-heartedly. It was a wonderful joke.
She scanned the executives’ pictures over and over, imagining Dan's toothy grin lurking behind each face. The collection was a wide sampling of racial and bodily types. The choices showed a clever imagination. Would he ever consent to wearing one of his masks as they made love? Most of his guises were handsome in human terms, but a few were less than appealing. especially the grossly fat Hyde-White. She wouldn’t care to share her bed with that one. She finally decided that it wouldn’t matter. Her astral senses were becoming so tuned that she could pierce an illusion spell almost automatically.
She hoped he would return soon. She missed him.
* * *
Hart kept her face carefully neutral. She didn’t want to give anything away. Bambatu’s expression was one of stern disapproval.
"You have not fulfilled your orders, Katherine. You know that the Lady will be displeased."
"But you haven’t told her, have you?"
Bambatu’s mouth quirked up in irritation. It spoiled his good looks.
"Are you guessing, or are you better informed than I think'."'
His question answered hers, but Hart just smiled in response to his query. Let him worry.
"The actions of the Tir elves continue to be a problem, but not an insurmountable one. Since their split from Verner’s team, they have done little to harass the Hidden Circle. Burnside’s efforts are keeping the elves off balance and ineffective. H
owever, Verner is still alive. He remains a focus for the efforts against the Hidden Circle, and I expect that sooner or later the Tir elves will rejoin their efforts to his. If they do, there is a reasonable certitude that the Circle’s plans will be disrupted before they can become the undeniable embarrassment to the Lord Protector that the Lady desires them to be. With minimal planning and firepower, Verner’s team and the Tir elves managed to reduce the Circle’s numbers. Further reductions might prove sufficient to disrupt their plans completely. The Lady no longer wishes to see the Hidden Circle die a quiet death in the shadows. She wishes to see these druids fail spectacularly, damaging the credibility of their uncorrupted brethren and drawing the House of Britain down with them."
Hart shifted uneasily. Did he know she had actually saved Sam?
"I’ll take care of it. I have my reputation to consider."
"You must take positive action, Katherine. Your results to date have been unsatisfactory."
She rose to leave.
"Soon, Katherine. The Lady has a habit of discarding unworthy servants."
"Worried about your own butt?"
"I am an elf who wishes to live a long and full life."
"That makes two of us."
* * *
The first-level precautions had proved adequate; there had been no interference in the first ritual of the new cycle. Glover felt charged with energy. He wanted to call Hyde-White, but his secretary reported that the fat man still had not arrived at his office. Glover had not seen him since those wretched American runners had ruined the second cycle’s closing ritual. Hyde-White might be dead, but Glover doubted it. He felt sure that the fat man’s death would resonate in the Circle’s ritual. Glover had felt no diminution of power; therefore, the fat man must still be alive.
He thought it unlikely that the runners had captured the fat man. Hyde-White was too powerful, too resourceful to be held captive by the inexperienced magicians in the runners’ team. Perhaps Hyde-White had been injured and was lying low, while he recuperated. Careful treatment was required to restore a magician to health without harming the delicate mana pathways through which he channeled his power. If the fat man was licking his wounds in private, he would not want to be disturbed.
The Hidden Circle had lost one member to the surprise raid by the runners. But then, Carstairs had been something of a weak sister, though not as bad as Neville. Too bad the fireballs hadn’t caught him instead. The simpering old fool was weak-willed despite his considerable mana-manipulation ability, and Glover would gladly have accepted the drop in the Circle’s power. Such a power loss would only be temporary, for the rituals were raising the pool of mana which he, as archdruid, could direct.
The day of restoration approached nearer with each soul whose blood bathed the land.
Still, it would be some time until they could complete the full cycle of rituals as Hyde-White had prescribed. Until then, mosquitoes such as the American runners could continue to plague them. Perhaps something more direct should be done about them.
Glover poured himself another brandy and reseated himself before the fire to contemplate the situation.
* * *
Sam’s eyes jerked open. He tried to force his muscles to relax, but they only tightened more. His shirt stuck to his sweat-soaked torso, chafing the sensitized skin. As his breathing slowed from panting to a more normal rate, he levered himself up on his elbows.
Herzog was watching him. The Gator shaman’s face was shadowed by the snouted headdress he wore, but Sam didn't need to see that visage to know that it bore an expression of disgusted contempt. Herzog reverently placed his drum to one side and stood. Fetishes and power objects clattered against each other and the bone-studded vest that the shaman wore as he heaved his bulk upright.
"You returned far too soon," Herzog said.
"The Man of Light was there."
"You knew he would be. He has been there as long as Herzog has known you. Herzog does not believe you thought tonight would be different."
"I had hoped. You said that if my need was great, I could transcend the barrier."
"Did you really try?"
Sam rolled over to escape Herzog’s stare. He was ashamed. His consciousness had fled from the Man of Light as soon as the apparition had turned its blazing eyes toward him.
"No," he whispered as he stood.
"Louder! Admit what you have done! Accept what you are! If you do not, you cannot progress. You learn nothing from Herzog. Herzog is wasting his time."
The Gator shaman stamped his foot. The slap of his bare foot against the concrete was a sharp crack of thunder in the small chamber. The echoes of the sudden noise were engulfed by the rustling of the shaman’s accoutrements. The cacophony subsided, damping down into a heavy silence.
"Go away," Herzog boomed.
Sam wanted to go, but he knew he couldn’t. As much as he disliked and distrusted magic, it seemed to be a permanent part of his life now. Certainly magic had its attractions and uses; it had saved his life time and again. But those magics had been spells and the use of enhanced senses, things which were relatively easy for him to accept. Spells were just manipulations of energy. The ability to see into the astral planes was a sensory ability. Natural, or rather paranatural, stuff. But now it seemed that he needed to master another aspect of magic, one that touched the supernatural. He didn’t like it at all, but he knew he had to find a way to come to terms with it.
"I need you to teach me how to harness my power so that I can control spirits," he said.
"You tell Herzog that Dog speaks to you. You tell Herzog that you have seen Dog. You do not lie when you say these things, but you do not believe in Dog. You think that you have power in yourself." Herzog huffed his laugh. "Power you have. But Herzog tells you that the universe is not just man’s playground. Herzog tells you that you are a chosen one. Dog is your guide. Dog himself. You must listen because Dog is you and you are Dog. Listen to Dog and not yourself, for Dog is the way of your power."
Herzog's logic made Sam’s mind reel. Logic? Too rigorous a word for arguments that doubled back on themselves. "I wish you could just explain things more clearly."
"There is nothing for Herzog to explain. Dog is your totem."
"Totems aren’t real. I read Isaac; they’re just symbols, psychological constructs that allow a shaman to focus his personality and will. They’re not true spirits or even angels. They’re not real."
"Totems are. You must believe."
Sam could see Herzog believed in his totem. Did he worship it? Many shamans seemed to do just that. Sam could not follow that creed. "I believe, all right. I believe in God, not some mystic canine archetype. I’m a Christian, not a pagan. The Lord told us not to put false gods before him. What is a totem but a false god?"
"Totems are," Herzog said flatly.
Sam waited for Herzog to say more. He wanted to hear how the Gator shaman would defend his beliefs. But Herzog remained silent.
Frustrated, Sam took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. Herzog professed Gator as his totem, yet he lived and worked powerful magic in the sewers of a great metroplex. The shamanic mindset often put restrictions on its traditional practitioners. Commonly, the magic available to a shaman was limited if he was not operating in an environment believed to be favored by the totem. Despite decades of urban legends, alligators lived in swamps, not cities. Where was the favored environment? Herzog operated in England, where there were no swamps. As far as Sam knew, the burly shaman never left the metroplex, and he rarely stirred from the tunnel complexes. Still, Herzog’s magic was effective. Was that a contradiction? Or a clue?
You must believe, Herzog had said. Belief was the key to shamanic mindset. Belief also terrorized generations of urban children who had heard and believed that alligators dwelt in the sewers of their cities. Did that make Gator an urban totem? If that were the case, a totem was no more than a symbol, a way to place the mind in a receptive frame. Issac’s writings had implied as much, but Sam
hadn't grasped the emotional core of the concept. Now, he began to see.
"Look," he said to the implacable shaman who was still frozen in his stance of dismissal. "I understand symbols. I used to do work in the Matrix, where computer programs take on imagery to make it easier for the human mind to grasp. I can see that magic could work like that. Magical theory is full of stuff about symbols. I don’t know how it works or why I picked the imagery, but I can see that Dog is a symbol that my mind has conjured to allow me to manipulate magical energies. If I need to learn other symbols to manipulate the magic imagery, teach me. I can do it. I have to do it."
Herzog simply stared at Sam.
"Herzog, I’ve listened to your lessons and I’ve learned some spells from you. I’d be happy if that was all the magic I’d need. The spells don’t need this Dog construct to work. But I’ve seen what the druids of the Circle can do, and I know that it’ll take more than spells to stop them. We need the energies of spirit constructs to fight the spirits they can call up. It smacks of devil worship but, Lord help me, if it takes spirits to fight spirits, I’ll call them up."
Herzog pretended an interest in the ceiling. "Your need lends you strength."
"Show me how to use it."
The Gator shaman lowered his head and gazed at Sam out of the corner of his eye. "You accept Dog as your totem?"
Hadn’t Herzog been listening? "I’ll have to, won’t I? If the image of Dog as my totem is the key to using the magic, I’ll talk to the damn hound. If I don’t, people will die. That’s something I won’t let happen while I can do something about it."
"You know what Herzog tells you is true, but you do not accept." Herzog shook his head slowly and sighed. "You will fail."
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