by Sara DeHaven
"I was read within an inch of my life when I applied, I assure you. You've read me yourself. If it was your call, would you say I shouldn't be a Keeper? Or for that matter, that I should have all my abilities shut down? Because that's what the Ecclesias would do if they thought I was a Binder."
It was a telling argument. Clearly, more experienced Readers than she had vetted Daniel, and it was true that if she just went by her own read, she couldn't detect enough Binder talent, or even dark power, for her to believe he shouldn't be a Keeper.
Bree shook her head. "No, I wouldn't say you shouldn't be a Keeper. It's just, well, I guess I've never really been on the wrong side of the Ecclesias before. You know I'm supposed to turn you in if I see you using any kind of Binder ability." Even as she said the words, she knew she wouldn't do it, at least not based on what she'd seen today. She looked at Daniel again. He was hunched over, hands clasped between his knees, his expression a mix of wariness and patience.
"I'm sorry to put you in that position," Daniel replied. "Naturally, you'll have to do as you think best."
Bree almost wished he hadn't said that. It put the responsibility squarely on her. He could so easily have threatened her or manipulated her by emphasizing his ability to protect Hunter, not only with his Binder ability, but with all the offensive and defensive magic of a Keeper. Of course, it was possible that his not doing any of that was a manipulation in and of itself. Bree thought hard. It was no small thing to knowingly break the law, which is what she'd be doing if she didn't go straight to the Ecclesias with this.
“I really do get that you just saved our asses,” Bree finally answered him. "But I hope you can understand why I would be nervous about Binder talent. I have to tell you, if I really thought you were misusing it, I would go to the Ecclesias about it.”
“I understand,” Daniel replied, looking tired and dejected. Good old Catholic guilt crept up on Bree. Now she felt bad for making him feel like a monster. She imagined that was what someone with any Binder talent at all might feel like. She pushed the guilt away. She wasn’t crazy to be cautious about this.
“Right,” said Kevin briskly, clearly trying to break the tension. “Let’s get some food in us. I’ll call a Keeper after that and report what happened. I’m sure they’ll help with some extra protection while we try to get this thing figured out.” Bree noted the concession to Daniel’s request not to go straight to the Ecclesias with their concerns about the possible hiding talent of demons, but decided not to question it tonight. She was feeling nervy and out of her depth and wanted time to think it all over.
All three of them went along to Hunter's room and worked at reassuring him that everything was fine. This was a challenge, given Hunter’s emerging Reader talent, but he seemed willing to be distracted by all the attention. While Steve finished putting Hunter to bed, Kevin forced a quick snack on Bree and Daniel before they set off for home.
Daniel insisted on walking her out to her car. “You will set house wards when you get home, won’t you?” he asked, hands in pockets, shoulders hunched against the evening’s chill. He hadn't worn a coat.
Bree stopped digging for her keys for a minute to look at him. “After tonight, I’d be scared not to. But I still don’t think this has anything to do with me.”
“It likely doesn’t, but we don’t have enough information to draw any conclusions at this point. You may be involved just by association.” Daniel hesitated, then reached deeper into his pants pocket, drew out an amulet on a black silk cord, and held it out to her. All she could see in the dim light was that it was a silver medallion about an inch and a half across. She couldn’t make out any of the markings. “This is a protection amulet. It has to be touching your skin to work. It deflects aggressive and coercive energy, though not at the intensity we faced tonight. But one or two powered could be handled with this, maybe long enough for you to get away if there's trouble. And if you touch it here,” he pointed to an symbol on the center of the back of the amulet, “and say ‘By Wind, by Will, I call Daniel Thorvaldson,’ I’ll feel it and know you’re in trouble. It will also activate a locater spell so I’ll be able to find you.”
Intensely mixed feelings sprang up in Bree. She realized she didn’t want to take anything from him, because she was still weirded out by the Binder thing. All kinds of paranoid thoughts about what the amulet might really be rushed through her mind. But at the same time, if it was legitimately a protection amulet, it was very valuable. She knew they weren't easy to make. Not many Casters could do it. She reached out to take the amulet gingerly by its cord. She didn't want to touch it, let alone put it around her neck, not yet. She’d wait until she got home and could get a good look at it. Or better yet, until she could have a Caster she trusted look it over.
“Thank you,” she said. “I hope I don’t have to use it.”
“I hope so too,” Daniel said wearily as he stepped away, and turned to go.
Chapter 4
Bree barely glanced at the amulet after she got home. She was almost too tired to eat, although she knew she must to refuel her base energy, and setting house wards once she’d gotten home had further drained her. She wasn't enough of a Warder to just whip them off without paying for it.
A quick look revealed a number of unfamiliar symbols on the front of the amulet, and a detailed and beautiful engraved hawk on the back. She wasn't much of a Caster, had only studied the few basic spells needed for exorcism and a few for self protection. Though she still felt some uncertainty about the amulet, being careful never to touch the metal disc directly, she did keep it on her bedside table. The fact that she was willing to keep it near her in spite of her reservations about it let her know she how frightening the evening's events had been to her.
She woke twice in the night with nightmares. As sometimes happened, they weren’t directly about Seth’s death, but more about possession. Being chased by demons and entered by demons. She woke up in a sweat when the demon in the dream merged with her body. She had expected bad dreams after the taint clearing, and been incredibly relieved when they hadn’t occurred. But last night’s demon encounter had obviously crossed the line as far as her psyche was concerned.
In the morning, she sat eating cereal in the tiny dining alcove between the kitchen and living areas of her house. The round wood table was covered with her favorite vintage tablecloth, the one peppered with perky bunches of red cherries, but it failed to look cheerful in the grey morning light. She looked out the window, feeling depressed by the cloudy weather after the last couple of brilliant autumn days, and by her bad dreams hangover. Three cats, a ginger and two tabbies, were arrayed along the side yard fence, looking at the house, clearly plotting a break in. The ginger cat was particularly sneaky in her experience. She'd have to take care when she left the house or he'd get in.
She considered calling in ‘sick’ and canceling her clients for the day, and for tomorrow as well. She didn’t desperately need the money, what with Seth’s life insurance benefits, but she hated to disappoint her clients. Still, until she was sure what was going on with the attack at Kevin’s house, it was probably irresponsible to spend the day around normals. She couldn’t, after all, be one hundred percent sure someone wouldn’t come after her.
She picked up the amulet lying by her bowl, and dangled it from its cord. It spun gently, looking innocently like a nicer piece of hippie jewelry. She reflected that she didn’t know any high powered Casters, barely any high powered anything. She had always existed on the edges of powered society. Even the exorcism and taint clearing work she and Seth had done had usually been small time stuff. Oh, they’d done a few bigger cases, and Dion was always pushing them to stretch themselves, to develop their powers further, Bree in particular, since he was so convinced she'd crossed over into high power on a couple of things.
But Seth had been lackadaisical about all of it. He’d liked helping people, but he’d liked his music more, and had never been tempted to go for Keeper, though he had the talen
t for it. And Bree followed his lead because, although always rewarding, demon exorcism was also risky and very, very disturbing. If she got too much of a reputation for being good at it, there would be constant pressure to do more. And the longer she did it, the harder it had gotten.
Well, the sooner the issue of the attack at Kevin's was resolved, the sooner she could have the time and space to figure out just what kind of power working she wanted to do and could handle. She’d have to do something. She’d felt a big lightening of her energy once she’d recovered from clearing Daniel’s taint, and she knew it was because she was using her powers. Dion had been right about that one. She’d been meant to use them, it had been hard work not to. And she had to admit to herself, in the privacy of her own mind, that she was a little proud of how she'd handled herself last night. Executing a somewhat effective defensive spell on the fly was not half bad.
A part of her still wanted to leave the mystery of the attack to Kevin and to whatever Keepers got called in. But Daniel had implied there might be some threat to Hunter. It certainly wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that one of his biological parents wanted him back. It was the dirty little secret of powered culture that powered children were considered highly desirable and non-powered children as second-class. Somehow, she just couldn’t bear to be out of the loop if it was about Hunter. She wanted to call Kevin, find out what was going on, and take part if there was a guard put on Hunter. Maybe she could keep Hunter distracted if nothing else. But before she got going on all that, she wanted to find out more about the amulet. She didn’t quite trust it, but if it was legit, she should be wearing it. If she were going to be part of protecting Hunter, she'd need all the help she could get.
Fortunately, a quick phone call assured her that her Caster friend Sophie and her husband Bruce were both at home this morning, so Bree headed off to meet with them at their house.
Sophie worked as a midwife and had the day off, although she was on call, as was often the case. Bruce was working a later shift at the Raven’s Nest, the bookstore he owned up on Phinney Ridge. They lived in a mid sized Craftsman bungalow in the Greenwood neighborhood, not far from the store. The house was painted a funky purple shade with yellow trim, and managed to look more artsy than garish, although just. There was an overgrown, drunkenly leaning laurel hedge, some weed infested grass, and a sad yellowing rhododendron bush in front of the house. Neither Bruce nor Sophie had the inclination to do yard work.
Sophie answered the door, a cheerful smile on her broad face. She was several inches shorter than Bree’s five six, and generously sized. Her waist length, wavy dark brown hair was pulled back today in a messy braid, and her warm, caramel colored eyes had their perpetual twinkle. She always reminded Bree of a friendly wood gnome.
“Hey, sweetie, pleasant surprise!” Sophie greeted her. “Come on in. I’ve got pumpkin muffins baking, so get ready for second breakfast.”
Bree followed her into the house, through the cluttered living room, and back into the kitchen. It was a comfortable space, with wood cabinets, orange walls, and a nice big window looking out onto a lushly overgrown back yard.
Bruce was sitting at the kitchen table reading the morning paper on his laptop, one of his cockatiels sitting on his shoulder, nibbling on his ear. He was more than a foot taller than Sophie, and burly with it. He had shoulder length, reddish brown hair, and a redder beard. He looked like he’d be at home at a forge, pounding out plowshares, or maybe tending bar in a battered bowler hat in the Old West. His cockatiel, the one named Oscar, launched off his shoulder and flew at Bree’s head. Bree was prepared for this, and ducked handily. Bruce made a casual gesture with one hand, and the bird veered back toward him and landed on his arm. “Be good, now," he murmured, and put his huge palm gently around Oscar’s head. “That should hold him,” he told Bree, giving her a smile. He was a Bird Master, and like most Animal Masters, loved the animal to which his energy was attuned.
Bree joined him at the table as Sophie fussed around the kitchen. She got out plates and cups, then pulled the muffins from the oven, which were fragrant with cloves and cinnamon. Bree started to relax for the first time in what felt like days. While they ate muffins and drank coffee, Bree caught them up recent events. She left out the part about Daniel having some Binder talent. She told herself that it was because she didn't want to bias them against the amulet or its maker. Inside, she knew that now her initial shock had worn off, she wanted to give Daniel the benefit of the doubt. In good part, it was because he was a friend of Kevin's, and she trusted his judgment about people. But she was self aware enough to know that it also had to do with her attraction to Daniel. “So I’m hoping you can tell me something about this amulet,” she said. “I don’t have enough spell lore to figure out the markings, or enough spell sense to reverse engineer it.”
She pulled the envelope out of her pocket in which she'd put the amulet and handed it to Sophie. Sophie opened the envelope and pulled the amulet out by its cord, then put a napkin on her hand and dropped the amulet onto it. She closed her eyes, then opened them again quickly, removed the amulet from the napkin, and held it in her bare hand. Sophie was a low power Caster who knew a lot of spell lore. She also had a touch of Healer talent. “To do this right, I think we should cast a circle. I’d just feel safer working in protective space if I’m going to probe this thing. It doesn’t want to be messed with,” she said.
When they were done eating, Bree followed Sophie and Bruce upstairs to the room they had set aside for worship and power working. The ceiling was a deep royal blue, with silver stars hand painted all across it, the walls a soothing sage green. There was an altar on the west wall under the window, with a large breasted, large bellied statue of the Mother goddess carved from wood, paired with a rough hewn, ceramic horned visage of the Green Man. Though Bree had a Catholic school upbringing that had taught her Wicca was something to be feared, over the years she’d become quite comfortable with her friends’ Wiccan faith and saw the beauty in it.
There was a reason, though, that Wicca was equated with witchcraft. Many of the symbols and traditions of Wiccan spell casting and “white” magic had their basis in lore and traditions of the powered. Powered were simply better able to access and direct energy so that spells actually worked well on the physical plane. And powered Casters were by far the best at this type of working.
Bree sat on a pillow on the floor next to Bruce as Sophie called in the four directions and walked a circle with sword, wand, water, and crystal. Bree felt the energy building, creating a pleasant buzz as the circle was completed and the warding aspects activated.
Sophie held the amulet up by its cord and pointed to the carvings on the front of the amulet. “See here, this one, the oval shape with the zig zag across it, is a symbol for shield. This triangle is clearly a fire sign, which is for protection, but it’s over written with this other symbol, one I’m not sure of. It could be meant to represent a holly leaf. That’s considered a fire plant, though you seldom see it used these days as a Casting symbol. It's pretty old school. This spiral is drawn widdershins, that’s counter clockwise to you, Bree, and I believe that’s the unraveling of negative energy. An anti-dark magic symbol used in concert with these others. So far, it all jibes as a protective amulet.”
Sophie pointed to the last symbol on the front, a series of small humps and curlicues. “This one I can’t make heads or tails of at all. Bruce?” She held the amulet up by its cord, as close to Bruce as she could get and still stay inside the circle. He wasn’t a Caster, but he was something of a historian, and he knew a lot of lore.
Bruce leaned forward and looked at it a moment, then shook his head. “It looks like some overwritten symbols, maybe two or three of them. I can’t quite make it out. It’s quite a jumble.”
Sophie turned the amulet over, and put her finger on the symbol on the back. “This one’s obvious, a hawk, borne on air. This is for communication. I think it sends the call for help across the air. It’s possib
le the hawk is a symbol for Daniel, specifically. There’s more, of course, on the energy level. Just give me a minute, and I’ll tell you what I get.”
Bree waited while Sophie communed with the amulet. She tended to be thorough and detail oriented by nature, so this took some time. There was a subtle sense of energy moving, but there were no lights, no heat, no sounds that would indicate a serious energy discharge. Finally, Sophie opened her eyes.
“This is a very good protection amulet, Bree. Really multi-layered spell work. It must have taken two full days of working, maybe more, to make this thing. In fact, I’ve never seen anything this powerful. But it’s benign, definitely not dark in any way. And here’s a funny thing,” she said, pointing again to the unknown symbol on the front. “The meaning of this was more clear on the energy level, where I could get a sense of the intention of the maker. I think this is a combination of the signs for Leo and Scorpio, your sun and rising signs.” She looked at Bree with an expression part surprise, part arch humor. “This is for you. He made this specifically for you.”
Jim Scanlon was driving south on Highway 99 toward downtown, on his way home, when he felt a piece of his mind dissolve. It was a bizarre and nauseating sensation. He'd been humming along to Satisfaction by the Stones on the radio, feeling relaxed and content when it happened. He felt ill, but there was nowhere to pull over the car. He tried breathing shallowly to control the nausea, and then the second weird thing happened. He realized he was angry. Stunningly, blindingly angry. His mellow mood was snuffed out, and he gripped the steering wheel hard enough to hurt his hands. He started remembering the job that had gone south last night, and what it had meant.
A part of him had been aware of what happened all day today. He would have flashes of memory, of the unexpected level of resistance in the house wards, of Justice growling like a dog in frustration, snarling, and saying, “The bitch cut me off!” Then he remembered them all turning and walking away, giving up at the same time. He hadn't cared, and no one had said another thing. They just got in their cars and drove away, and he hadn’t heard a damned thing from any of them since. That fucking Keeper in there must have seriously messed with them. Some kind of binding spell that made them all want to go away, right when they were winning. He’d spent almost two weeks getting the right people together, and everything had been going his way that night, he’d been about to get two jobs done at the same time, and wouldn’t Carson have been impressed! He’d have his best chance so far to move up in the clan.