John Ringo - Queen of wands

Vartouhi was tall and slender with an olive complexion and looked faintly Italian or at least Mediterranean. Pretty, edging to beautiful, she was elegantly dressed in a rose pantsuit with orange-yellow highlights. Her one touch of accent was a strange brooch. It was similar to some Celtic designs Barb had seen but much simpler, just three curves forming three lobes. And, simple as it was, it was sounding alarm bells in Barb’s soul.

“I’m Kurt,” Kurt said. “And this is Barbara. She’s just visiting.”

“Yes, Kurt, I’ve seen you here before,” Vartouhi said, smiling again. Perfect teeth, Barb noted. Something about the woman, possibly her too-perfect attitude, just made her skin crawl. “Barbara, we hope that you enjoy your visit and come back often.”

“It’s a lovely place,” Barb gushed. “When was it built?”

“At various times,” Vartouhi said. “The buildings used to be apartments and were built mostly during the sixties. They were rather run down when the current owners bought them and fixed them up.”

“Well, it’s one of the nicest coffee shops I’ve ever visited,” Barb said. “And you seem to do a brisk business.”

“It suffices,” Vartouhi said. “I’ll leave you to your coffee. Take care.”

“Nice lady,” Kurt said. “She’s always circulating.”

“Uh-huh,” Barb said.

“What? Did you, you know, sense anything?”

“Well, ‘something is fishy in Denmark’ is about the best I can do,” Barb said, watching the hostess. “Except about the hostess, who is anything but a ‘nice lady.’ There’s something here but I can’t put my finger on it. And I’d bet dollars to donuts that our hostess could. I wonder what’s under these buildings…”

“Rock,” Kurt said, looking at the set of blueprints he’d requested. “The sewer runs down towards the Aquarium then across the river via the Market Street bridge. They’ve got a couple of basements…”

“There was something there,” Barb said. “I’d say not far above river level. But it’s hard to tell distance with this kind of thing.”

“Well, if it’s there it’s not on the blueprints,” Kurt said, rolling them up. “We’re going to have to find a way to search for it. I can ask the management, but if they get sticky we’ve got nothing for a search warrant.”

“It’s possible that the management is totally unaware,” Barb said. “Equally possible that they’re some sort of source. Who owns it?”

“A corporation,” Kurt said. “I’ll check into ownership of the corporation.”

“And see what you can find on that hostess,” Barb said. “Vartouhi.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Check on Janea.”

Barb had to show ID to get into the house where Janea was being kept. At one level she was relieved-whoever had attacked Janea might try again-but on the other hand she wasn’t sure that a rent-a-cop, okay, a high-quality one from the look, was going to do much good.

On the other hand, as soon as she stepped through the door she realized there was far more than mundane security on the house. It was “clean.” Not just physically clean-in fact, it was rather cluttered-it was mystically clean. She hadn’t examined it mystically the last time she was there, but this time it was clear that there were no malevolent entities or “vibes” to the place. Mystically it was more like a really good church. In fact, instead of dark shadows, there were flashes of light in the corners of her eyes. She wasn’t sure what that represented, but it wasn’t bad, whatever it was.

However, the house was physically crowded. There were six people in robes holding hands in a circle in the center of the main room and a young woman in a blouse and peasant skirt sitting on a chair watching them. Barb quickly realized that it was, in fact, a “circle.” A Wiccan prayer group that was “calling power.” She suddenly realized that although she worked every day with pagans, she had some deep-seated prejudices about being around a Wiccan gathering. She knew they weren’t evil per se. She wouldn’t be able to do what she did to support them if they were working with the devil. But watching them essentially worshipping “false gods” triggered childhood responses.

The young woman stood up and tiptoed over, putting her finger to her lips.

Janea? Barb mouthed.

The young lady motioned for Barb to follow her upstairs. Barb let Lazarus out of his bag and followed her.

The cat checked out the circle for a moment, sniffed, then followed.

“I’m sorry,” the young lady whispered as they reached the top of the stairs. “I was afraid you’d disturb the circle. We would have put it somewhere besides the front room, but the energies were best there. Are you Mrs. Everette?”

“Yes,” Barb said, shaking the young witch’s hand. “Call me Barb.”

“Janea’s in the back bedroom,” the young woman said, leading the way.

It wasn’t just Janea in the room. Cots had been moved in, and Sharice, Drakon and Wulfgar were stretched out on them, apparently asleep. All three of them were clearly in REM sleep; their eyes were twitching like mad, and Janea was slowly writhing as if struggling against invisible bonds.

“Wish I could take a nap,” Barb said.

“Astral projection requires a trance at the least,” the witch said. “They’re actually deep in the Moon Paths. Can’t you feel it?”

“I’m…just starting to figure some of this out,” Barb admitted. “I only recently got the, hah-hah, ‘Gift’ of Sight. And given some of the stuff I’ve seen today, I’m just as glad that Sharice taught me how to not use it.”

“You have many other Gifts. Use your Sight. There are no dark spirits here.”

“I noticed,” Barb said, opening up to the mystic.

The first thing she Saw had nothing to do with the foursome. There were clouds of… sparkles hanging in the air. She wasn’t even sure what they were. But there were a lot of them. The room was packed. It looked like a bad special effect.

“What are… those?” she asked, pointing.

“We call them light spirits,” the young witch said. “You would call them angels.”

“Angels?” Barb asked. “Like, angels of the Lord? Messengers of God?”

The angels suddenly swarmed around Barb in a dancing light show that was hard to ignore.

“Uhmmm…Yes. And…no,” the young witch said, chuckling. “More like guardian angels. These are what Christians term cherubim. Not the little babies with bows, but…”

“Cherubim are fairly high angels,” Barb said, wonderingly. “Higher than seraphim, according to most texts. Where did they come from?”

“They apparently come with the house. The house belongs to Memorial Hospital.”

“Catholics,” Barb said, nodding. “Okay, starts to make sense.”

“They sometimes carry messages,” the young witch said. “But mostly they just sort of swirl around and squeal ‘Look what I can do!’ They’re not warrior light spirits, they haven’t been tested greatly. Cherubim are mostly concerned with the element of air. When they get out of hand they tend to cause storms. And they’re always glad when someone notices them. These are… young isn’t the right word. Innocent. Early. Lacking in mass or sophistication. But they serve as effective mystic guards for the house. Not because they would battle well, but because demons avoid all angels, and if one was powerful enough to try them, they could call for fiercer guardians. Seraphim, although lesser in power, tend to be way more serious. At the worst, they could call upon the true warrior spirits. Let us hope it never comes to that. It’s worth remembering that all demons were once light spirits. It is why we simply call them dark spirits. And the warrior light spirits are different from greater demons only in which side they take. They’re really rather unpleasant, from what I’ve been told.”