by Jamie Hawke
“It was before I met you, of course,” Steph started. “Long before. And… I’d had a dream.”
That caught my attention. “You, too? With the dream travel stuff?”
She nodded. “Ironically, it only began when I started at your school. So… clearly connected. But, I thought they were only dreams at first. One day I was napping in the library, this guy sits next to me and I groggily wake up but am like, ‘fuck it,’ and go back to sleep. Something touched my arm, and then the dreams came. I was in a dark tunnel, taken over. Then…”
“Yes?”
“I… don’t want to talk about it. So much is a blur. So much… pain.”
Nodding, I took her hand and waited.
“They sacrificed themselves for me,” she finally said. “Every last one of them, all because this witch lady had said I was meant for greatness. That I had some role to play in their beliefs, and I think… relating to you.”
“That’s… intense.”
“It was. Is.” Shaking her head, she tried again to make the wraith knights appear, but nothing. “So, you can see why, I mean… it’s not like I was ever romantically involved with any of the knights, but knowing who they were and what they sacrificed for me…”
“Yeah, I get it.”
“They’re like my best friends. Friends I can’t really have conversations with, but… friends, anyway.”
More sounds of explosions outside, then a bunch at once, and I laughed.
“What?” Steph asked.
“Shit, what day is it?”
“I don’t…” Her eyes widened, and she laughed, too. “Fourth of July? No shit?”
“I mean, that doesn’t explain the magic not working, but at least those explosions probably aren’t us being attacked. Damn, what kind of American am I that I forgot the Fourth?”
“A shitty one, for sure.” She winked my way, gesturing around. “You are a bit distracted, though. I think that, considering what you have on your plate, Uncle Sam will let it slide.”
“That explains all the flags and hot dog carts and whatnot around earlier today.” I knelt, feeling a marking in the floor. “I mean, I thought it must be some presidential address the nation celebration or something.”
“For someone who was going off to college, you sure aren’t up to date with any of this D.C. stuff.”
“Well…” I shrugged. “Key word there is was, you know?”
“Bullshit. You’re thinking about not going?”
I looked up from the markings, waving her over. “Like you said, I have a lot on my plate.”
She pursed her lips, kneeling at my side and letting it go. “What do you have here?”
“Hard to see in this light, but…” I heaved.
“Can you…?” I asked, moving my hand as she would when doing her fire magic.
She held up her hand and moved her fingers, as she would when creating little flames to give us light. But that didn’t work—blocked. Frowning, I attempted it, watching the light of the room intensify with each blink. Sometimes my powers astounded me.
“Whoa,” we both said. Now that we could see the room, it was clear that this was much more than we had first realized. Pillars with stories carved into the stone, more runes carved along the ground in patterns like flowing water, and walls with rocks that seemed to shift in shape and hue before me.
And, for the first time, it at least made partial sense. There was so much more to do, more to experiment with down here, but for now, that would have to do.
“Come on,” I said, pulling her back toward the stairs. “Let’s see if there’re any more fireworks we can catch from the roof.”
“Wait.” She pulled me back, then in to kiss me passionately. “Okay, now we can go.”
I started off, but froze. Then laughed.
“What?” she asked.
“The magic, of course. Ebrill and the others should be awake now. We’ll take them up for the show.”
“Great idea.” She beamed, and we made our way back up, Shisa at my heels.
101
Fireworks continued, visible even from the bedroom window. Kordelia was already there watching as we came skidding into the room. Ebrill was transforming, stone glowing blue and cracking off her as she moaned, a final touch from the orgasm the night before. Aerona was the last of them, stone breaking apart as we turned her way.
She emerged from her hard cocoon with a golden burst of light and a roar. Her eyes met ours and for a moment she looked strong, defiant… but then stumbled back, hand going out and being caught by Kordelia.
“What’s happened?” Ebrill asked, sitting up and assessing them, eyes going to the fireworks show outside.
“It’s late,” Kordelia noted. “And… that?”
“If you can make it to the roof, I’ll explain on the way,” I replied, not sure if we should stick to the plan of going up there to watch the fireworks. Now that they were all up, though, and curious, I figured it wouldn’t hurt.
They came, Ebrill throwing on her armor as we went so that she was decent, and we emerged onto the roof as a crescendo of fireworks went off over the area by the Lincoln Memorial.
“First, those are fireworks,” I explained. “A celebration of our country’s freedom. Enjoy the moment.”
“And second?” Aerona asked.
“Why didn’t we wake with sunset?” Ebrill added.
“That… Well, we found out something interesting—a block on most magic, including, apparently, the type that allows you to wake.”
“No.” Kordelia’s eyes flicked to Steph, then back to me. “How?”
“It wasn’t the enemy,” Steph said.
I nodded. “At least, our best guess is it had to do with me rearranging the house for our defenses. There are a series of old runes below the house, and—”
“Wait, what?” Aerona interrupted.
“Yeah, old runes, carved deeply into the stone. My actions caused other stones to fall down there and affect it, creating a break in a rune, changing the spell.” I took a breath, making sure they were following. “And… while I think the runes were meant to amplify magic or do something of the sort, when I broke it like that, it did the opposite, or maybe created a new pattern that had a limiting effect.”
“Meaning…” Ebrill’s eyes lit up. “If we could learn to control that, we’d have the option to turn magic on and off. Or at least as it relates to our general vicinity.”
“That might work,” I admitted.
We all turned back to watch the fireworks as what had to be the grand finale started, each of us likely considering the runes below and the implications. I was thinking mostly how we could use them to amplify our powers even more, but first I would need to create some sort of digital map of them with my powers, as I had for the screen that tracked my levels. From there, I could study the patterns, maybe figure out ways of altering the runes for various effects.
“I don’t get it,” Aerona said, the reds and blues highlighting her face as she turned to me. “Some sorcerer just showing off?”
Steph chuckled, but motioned for me to explain.
“Not magic, actually.” I tried to indicate the spot the fireworks were coming from, telling her about how the fireworks were shot off from there, made from gunpowder or something for the point of celebrating.
Aerona frowned, then turned to Ebrill. “Still sounds like a sorcerer showing off, to me.”
I scrunched my nose, then nodded. “Sure, but it looks pretty, doesn’t it?”
“It certainly does,” Kordelia chimed in, unable to take her gaze from the fireworks. Every once in a while, she would startle at an especially loud firework.
Steph leaned against me, watching as her hand found mine, but soon the last of the fireworks drizzled out and faded, leaving only purple tails of smoke in the sky.
“How much did we miss?” Kordelia asked.
“Of the night?” I glanced around, realizing that without a phone or watch, I didn’t really have much conce
pt of time.
“No, the show. I want to see it again. When can we?”
I chuckled. “Once a year, although… we could go to Disneyland or SeaWorld, where I think they do them every night?”
“Let’s do that!”
“Right…” Steph put a hand on Kordelia’s arm, moving away from me as she provided mock comfort to the gargoyle. “Considering your wings and whatnot, I don’t know if going to some of the most crowded places on Earth would be prudent.”
“Prudent? Fuck prudent.” Turning to Ebrill, Kordelia added, “Can’t we just illusion ourselves to fit in?”
“Not if it’s that crowded.”
“Ladies,” I cut in. “There’s no point in talking about it right now. We have to find the rest of your group, to figure out what we’re going to do about the rest of the Nine that might come after us—”
“And we don’t have the money,” Steph pointed out. “It’s a bit of a trek from D.C.”
I shook my head. “Fatiha had said Gertrude took care of me, or left us well provided for. While she was a traitor, I believe a lot of what she did had truth to it—every good lie has at least some level of truth.”
Steph looked impressed. “Shit, we might be loaded.”
“We might be very loaded. Worst case scenario, there have to be some vases and whatnot worth money in here… And actually, Gertrude confirmed it, too. Another thought—maybe some closer theme parks have shows?” Turning to Kordelia, I held out a hand for her to shake. “I’ll make you a deal. We take care of all this stuff we have to do like finding the others and staying alive business, and I’ll do my best to get us to another fireworks show as soon as possible. Yeah?”
She grinned, shaking my hand with a strong grip.
“Wait, the show’s not over,” Kordelia said, dropping my hand and stepping toward the edge of the roof.
I looked up, wondering if the fireworks show had been slow to release the true finale, or part of the display had been late to trigger, but this wasn’t that at all. It was several lines of light blue and green moving our way in a sort of wavy pattern.
A moment later, they were converging on us, exploding in puffs of smoke that turned into one man. He stood tall right there in front of us on the roof, head bent, hands at his side, feet spread shoulder-width apart. The city lights reflected faintly from his armor.
“You…?” Steph asked, shaking her head. “But it’s… impossible.”
I turned to her, my mind reeling with which attack I should use, but she wasn’t getting ready to attack. In fact, she was staring at the man as if she had seen a ghost.
“Steph, what’s up?” I asked.
Instead of responding, she summoned a wraith knight. The knight appeared, sword at the ready, and turned toward the man. Sword vanishing, the knight took a step toward him, froze, and then vanished.
“That was him, wasn’t it?” the man asked.
“Not… you?” Steph asked.
“My brother,” the man replied.
Now I was starting to catch on. One of the men who had sacrificed himself so that Steph might live on, so that she might help me, was the brother of this witch-knight. And more of the story came together in my mind, including the fact that, if there was a group that helped her before, it stood to reason that there was at least one group still out there, maybe more, who were working on our side.
“How can we help you?” I said, figuring the passive tactic was the way to go here. My hands were up, but I slowly put them down now to show I wasn’t being aggressive.
“Much of the day, a magic block kept me from reaching this place, even after my patron was made aware of your discovery.”
He took a step forward, hand held out. My instinct was to cut off his fucking head, but when I held out my hand and started to consider a spell, I noticed that he held a simple card in his hand. Not so simple, actually, I noticed as I made it larger in my vision—whoa, that was badass, like zooming in on a computer screen—and saw the red swirly lines, the address and time listed.
“What is that?” I asked.
“An invitation, nothing more.” The man stopped, and I stepped forward to accept. No attack came, but when I looked back at the others, it was clear they had been expecting something more aggressive as well.
“We’ll be in touch,” the man said.
“That can’t be all.”
He gave me friendly smile and nodded. “For now.”
“And your name is?”
“Galahad,” he replied, then vanished into a puff of smoke that was swept away as fast as he had arrived.
“As in…?” I frowned, confused.
“One of the Knights of the Round Table,” Steph said, nodding.
“Like King Arthur stuff?” I chuckled. “Come on, when’s he going to step out? Maybe I can get a knighthood from this all, huh?”
Steph shook her head, solemnly. “We don’t talk about him.” The ladies and I shared a look of concern.
“Aerona,” I said, breaking the silence, “didn’t you say you have a lead, via Avalon? Before you returned to stone this morning, I mean.”
Aerona nodded, eyes on the sky. “The world has changed. But yes, I have an idea or two we can start with.”
Glad to have them back, even if my head was spinning with the new insight into the magical aspects of our world, I led the way back downstairs. At least we had the gargoyles awake again, and a plan for next steps.
And, apparently, an invitation to a fancy D.C. style dinner from Sir Galahad himself.
102
“If that was Galahad,” I started as we entered the room, unable to leave it alone, “doesn’t that mean… Regarding his brother—”
“That one of my wraith knights was one of the Knights of the Round Table?” Steph nodded. “Or more than one. Yes. All of them, perhaps.”
“Damn.” I looked at the others, wondering what they thought about this.
“Considering what we are,” Aerona waved at herself and her fellow gargoyles, “and the fact that you opened the magic Avalon after all this time, that doesn’t seem like the biggest of revelations.”
I frowned, then laughed. “You’re right. Still, it’s kinda badass.”
“We’re not actually going to the event, right?” Ebrill asked.
“What? Why not?”
“I mean, because it’s clearly a trap.”
The others nodded, although Steph held up a hand, then cleared her throat.
“You don’t think it is?” Ebrill asked.
“It could be, for sure,” Steph replied. “But… it’s tough. My understanding is there’s a connection between the Round Table and the Order of the Mystic Moon. Galahad being the one to deliver the message makes me wonder if maybe it’s legit.”
“And we can trust this Order?” I asked. “I mean, I was told they were set up to protect the Liahona, but it was Fatiha who told me. She hasn’t exactly proved trustworthy.”
“The Order is legit,” Steph replied. “That much, I do know.”
“Still, proceed with caution.” Ebrill took my hand. “Even if an organization is on the right side, that doesn’t mean all the people within it are.”
Steph nodded, no arguments there.
“How can you be so sure about them?” Kordelia asked Steph. “I thought you couldn’t remember much from that time.”
“It’s been coming back,” I explained for her.
“And if there’s trouble, the Order would come to our aid?”
“I think they serve the purpose of trying to keep everything in order, within margins.” Steph went to the window, moving the curtains so we couldn’t be seen from outside. “Imagine a fire department that only acted if a fire was threatening to completely destroy a house.”
“A fire…?” Ebrill asked.
“Just—”
“We get it,” Kordelia cut in, nudging Ebrill. “Or the point, anyway. Right?”
“Sure.” Ebrill eyed the other, and I wondered which of them would win
in a fight—they were both quite intimidating, although Kordelia was the largest of the three.
“It’s all pretty stupid,” I said. “If there’s a fire, it’ll burn down the house if not checked.”
“If not checked by any other influence, sure,” Steph countered. “But that’s not likely in our situation, is it?”
“So, we think of them as a safety net,” I replied, eyes moving to the card Galahad had given me. Eyes going wide, I laughed. “This is a ticket for a dinner party. At the French Embassy.”
“What?” Steph leaned over, looking at it. “How the fuck does that make sense?”
“Whoever we’re supposed to meet with will be there,” Ebrill posited.
“It’s an odd place to meet,” I said. “But… we’re in D.C., after all.”
“When is it?” Ebrill asked.
“In two days,” I read from the invitation in red cursive ink over black.
Steph grinned. “I’m kind of excited. To go, I mean.”
“We’re going? To be clear… Even if it’s a trap?”
“Are we?” Ebrill spread her wings, as if making a point. “Doesn’t seem like the sort of party ‘we’ can all attend.”
“The rest of us will find areas to be ready—stay perched and keep a lookout,” Kordelia offered. “If there’s a problem, we’ll be there.”
“Guess that means we’re going,” Aerona said. “But only Steph and Jericho get to have fun.”
“If we get to crack skulls, I’d say we’ll all be having fun.” Kordelia grinned wide, showing off her gargoyle teeth.
“And on the note of having fun… Aerona, you’re up,” I said, ready to move on to the next topic. “I think it’s time we visit Avalon. We have time to decide on the rest of that stuff.”
“Ah, for finding the others, yes.” Aerona eyed me with curiosity—a good reminder that we hardly knew anything of each other yet. She crossed over to Ebrill and Kordelia, taking each of their hands in hers and starting a chant.
