by Ann Macela
Now, here she was, and there he was at the other end of the table. Her soul mate. There had been times she wondered if they’d make it to the mating. What had she decided? Trust in the process. It—with the help of his parents—had proved true.
They’d talked about nothing and everything in between their lovemaking. What they’d been like when they were young, how to get along in a family with siblings, how they’d decided on their talents and professions, what they liked and disliked in movies, books, food, music, art. The time had been like one long date where they got to know each other as they hadn’t had the opportunity to do while running from one debate to the other.
Once Marcus relaxed and lightened up, he’d turned out to be a lot of fun. Oh, he still had a touch of stiffness, but he was learning to tease her back, and lo and behold, the man was ticklish!
He was also a generous, caring, wonderful lover. Now she understood why Daria went around with that fatuous, smug, blissful look on her face. Gloriana rubbed her cheeks to stop her own lips from curling upward.
She rested her chin on her hands and focused again on the audience. The very last debate. Hallelujah!
Ed was talking to John and Fergus. At least he was blocking her view of Marcus. Even glancing at each other was getting them in trouble. At lunch the editor had taken one look at them and said, “I’m certainly glad you two finally got together.”
When asked what he was talking about, he’d said, “Soul mates, of course. It stuck out all over you from the beginning.”
She had only been able to shake her head at his announcement. Marcus managed to mutter something about keeping it quiet, and Ed had agreed. The editor had grinned like W2‘s circulation had doubled and warned them that rumors were flying after someone discovered they were in the same suite.
All they had to do was survive the last debate, and she and Marcus could go home and back to their normal lives—as normal as it could be getting used to having a soul mate. They’d called their parents at the farm and notified them that they’d come to a satisfactory conclusion. Her mother immediately started planning a party on Sunday and told Marcus she’d invite George and Evelyn and they’d bring Samson. Gloriana wasn’t sure she was looking forward to the get-together. She was still coming to terms with the reality of Marcus and a soul mate, period, and the two of them could use some downtime.
Uh-oh. A flurry of activity by one of the doors brought Gloriana back to the present. Gordon Walcott and Bambi Kemble walked into the room with a swagger that dared anyone to take exception. The two fanatics took seats in the middle section on the aisle closest to the Traddies. Several of the THA supporters on the right pointed them out to others, yet didn’t look happy about their presence. Word had gotten around about the vandalism and its possible perpetrators. Walcott denied participation in the stunt, but it looked like he had lost ground with both the middle and the THA. The woman sitting beside Kemble made the man next to her scoot over a chair so she could move away.
Fergus walked up the aisle and said something to Walcott, who only glared and shook his head. The eight Swords took their places, one standing directly in the aisle and slightly behind Walcott.
After all the preceding anxiety-causing events, the debate went smoothly. Ed announced the agreement by the THA and FOM to study both the formula and conventional methods of spell-casting. The High Council would be setting up study groups, and everyone should watch W2 and the practitioner Web site for details. Prick and Horner reported on their attempts at casting by each method—some success, certainly worth pursuing—and each called for more study of the formula and tests of older procedures. Horner managed to put in a comment about the THA making sure there’d be no backsliding on the agreement, no rush to the future. Prick, of course, smirked and looked down his nose.
She and Marcus, practically alternating sentences, asked all practitioners to study magic methods together, reiterating that nobody was losing a thing by studying. Ed urged those with strong opinions not to tear the community apart.
Members of the audience had their chance to speak, and almost everyone who did told of their agreement with the end result of the debates. Gloriana began to think they had finally reached consensus when there was a stirring in the right middle.
Walcott stood in the aisle and took a microphone from an usher. Kemble came to stand behind him. The Swords became even more watchful, and the audience seemed to hold its collective breath. With an admonition to “watch it,” Ed recognized the man.
“Would you look at the lovefest we have here? Let me offer a counterpoint,” Walcott said in a totally calm, rational-sounding voice. He pointed at the FOM and continued in the same tone, “You people are crazy. Mindless followers of the new and sensational. You will burn in hell.”
The hair on the back of Gloriana’s neck rose at the contrast between his reasonable tone and his venomous words. The enraged glitter in the tall man’s eyes disturbed her even more. Capping her sense of foreboding was his physical appearance. Although he had been thin before, the Walcott standing before them was almost cadaverous, his eyes more sunken, his pointed nose sharper. His skin was so translucent she could almost see the skull beneath it. Give him a robe and scythe, and he would be Death personified.
Walcott turned next to the THA. “As for you, you are unthinking philistines, sycophants, joining a cause but remaining with it long past its usefulness or its degeneration into the very enemy it was fighting against in the beginning. Worthless, every one of you.”
He smiled benignly toward the audience in the middle. “And then there’s you—stupid, ignorant fools willing to go along with the rest of the herd to the slaughterhouse. Sheep. You’re little better than sheep.”
The middle audience shifted in their seats. Fergus moved down the aisle from his position near the stage and stopped about fifteen feet from Walcott, who ignored him and kept speaking.
“These so-called debates have been nothing but a sham. As proof, look at our two debaters.” Walcott pointed, first at Marcus, next at Gloriana. “We were led to believe they were complete antagonists, especially that Dr. Morgan was a true guardian of all that is right and good in spell-casting. Now they’re calling for us all to work together on their heretical formula. Blasphemy.”
Gloriana frowned and braced herself for his next words, sure to be a personal attack.
Walcott spread his hands and assumed an expression like he was laying out the only logical conclusion. “It’s all been a ruse, an illusion. How do we know? Because of what was revealed today. Forscher and Morgan are soul mates. Yes, that’s right, soul mates. How could they possibly disagree with each other? Furthermore, it’s clear that the member of the weaker sex has been under her futurist soul mate’s command all along. What else could we expect from a woman?”
An indefinable ripple of noise and movement blew through the audience. Did they agree or disagree? Facial expressions gave Gloriana no clue.
“I warn you,” Walcott said, his tone becoming sharper, more strident, “the Force for True Magic will not agree to or abide by a takeover of our casting methods. We will do all in our power to stop it. I proclaim all of them, the instigators of this farce, the THA, and the FOM, to be traitors to what should be the cause of all practitioners—the preservation of our magical heritage. Beware, for they will bring destruction! We of the Force for True Magic will fight them! Follow me or be doomed to perdition!”
He tossed the microphone to Fergus, spun around, and stalked out of the room, with Kemble on his heels. Nobody in the audience moved.
Ed stood. “Does anyone else have something to say?”
A cane waved in the middle of the Traddies.
“I recognize Mrs. Bernice Shortbottom.”
Looking like she was about to burst, whether with excitement or indignation Gloriana couldn’t tell, Mrs. Shortbottom waited for the microphone to reach her. When she had it, she exclaimed in a voice that bounced off the walls, “Soul mates? You two are soul mates?”
/> Gloriana felt the heat rising in her face and shot a glance at Marcus, who shrugged. “Yes, ma’am,” she answered, “we recently found out.”
Mrs. Shortbottom beamed. “Oh, that’s sooooo sweet. Best wishes to both of you. I attended the first of these debates, and if you and Dr. Forscher can get along, especially as soul mates, after all the arguments and contention, there’s hope for us all. Hip hooray for love!” She began to clap, others joined her, and before long, everybody had risen in a standing ovation.
When the applause subsided, Ed laughed and said, “A fitting end to these proceedings. Watch W2 for later developments in the research and study. Thank you all for coming.”
After the audience filed out, Gloriana, Marcus, Ed, and the Swords met as usual.
“What’s the matter with Walcott?” Ed asked. “He looked like death warmed over.”
“Something’s wrong,” Fergus answered. “I’m picking up strange vibes.”
“Me, too. Almost like … well, never mind,” John said with a frown. “We’re going to keep an eye on him, and everybody be careful a while longer. I hope he turned off possible followers with that crazy speech.”
“One good thing resulted from it, at least,” Ed interjected with a grin. “Everybody’s together on the soul-mate question.”
Gloriana felt herself blushing again and quickly changed the subject. “We’re leaving early tomorrow morning, so we won’t be around if Walcott decides to take out his anger on someone.”
“If you have a problem with anyone, let us all know,” John said. “We’re still investigating the vandalism, and if Walcott’s behind it, we’ll find out. If we prove it, the High Council may want to censure him for his trouble-making. These actions certainly go against every code of practitioner ethics.”
CHAPTER
THIRTY-SIX
Sunday afternoon, Marcus and Gloriana walked off the plane in Austin and straight into the arms of their parents. There was more hugging in the next few minutes than he had seen, much less been a part of, in years—no, forever—Marcus reflected as he extricated himself from Antonia’s exuberant embrace. He did have to admit, it had all felt damn good.
Alaric drove Gloriana’s car home, and she rode with Marcus to the farm. When they left the airport, she asked, “How are you? You looked a little overwhelmed back there.”
“I’m all right. Not used to so much family, I guess.”
“Brace yourself. Mother said the Houston four and George and Evelyn are here.”
He couldn’t help but sigh.
She laughed. “We’ll plead jet lag, and maybe they’ll let us leave early.”
“That won’t work, either. George will tease us about wanting to go to bed, and not to sleep, and he’ll probably tell us some interminable story about when he and Evelyn met.”
“Oh, I didn’t think about that. Clay will be obnoxious, too, especially since he’ll be getting back at me for teasing him when he and Francie got together.”
“I’m still staying the night, right?”
“Of course. I’m really glad I have my own house. We’ll have some privacy.”
“Do you have something planned for the week?” he asked, an idea forming in his mind.
“Nope, only catching up. Why?”
“Why don’t I go home tomorrow, do what needs to be done there, and come back out for a couple of days? I’ve been thinking about the magic-potential results of our mating and the equation, and I’d like to try some experiments. What you told me enabled me to learn the strength spell, and we could start with it. Maybe we can work on calibration, also.”
“I’d like to do more with our lightballs, too. Let’s show them to everybody and see if they merge again.”
He laughed. “I can’t wait to see the look on George’s face.”
“And on Clay’s,” she snickered.
In the living room after dinner, they each cast lux. Everybody congratulated them on their magic-level increases. The lightballs, however, sat there in the air, not moving. Marcus looked at Gloriana, who was standing by the fireplace, and raised his eyebrows.
She frowned, but her face cleared, and she sat down next to him on the sofa and whispered, “Put your arm around me. We were touching when they merged before.”
He did, and the spheres started moving—and merging and humming.
Several people made exclamations, and George and Clay came over to the orbs for a closer look.
“What the hell’s going on?” George asked.
“What’s with the hum?” Clay poked the merging balls. “Ouch!”
“What happened?” George asked, and he brought his finger close to the object. A tiny spark jumped to his finger. “Ow!”
Marcus grinned at Gloriana, who winked. “We didn’t try that,” he whispered.
“We’re not moving the balls. They’re on maintenance as far as our energy is concerned. We don’t know what’s causing the merging or the hum—or the resulting larger ball,” she told their audience. “We didn’t show it to anyone in San Francisco, either. I’m hoping Lulabelle might have heard of such a development.”
“Be careful with the thing, will you?” Clay asked, studying his finger.
“Oooh, poor baby,” Gloriana smirked. “George, no comments from you, either. We’ll tell you when we find out the cause.”
Marcus leaned back and relaxed. Everything was going to be fine. Gloriana could handle all the family stuff. She would protect him.
On Tuesday morning, Gloriana and Marcus were sitting down in her kitchen to try out some spells when Marcus’s cell phone rang. John was on the line, and Marcus put the phone on speaker so they both could hear it.
“We’ve got the goods on Walcott,” John said. “Kemble ratted on him to us, and the High Council’s going to censure him. Bambi confessed to being the one who wrecked your hotel suites, on his command, of course. She got angry when he began to treat her like an underling instead of a partner, and she finally realized he wanted absolute control of everything, not only spell-casting. She got scared when he started threatening to put a stop to our plans—and to you.”
“What should we do?” Marcus asked.
“Sit tight. According to Kemble, he’s still out here in California, and we’ve sent Swords to pick him up. She’s telling us some disturbing facts about him, but he doesn’t like to do his own dirty work, and after his last performance, his few supporters left him. We doubt he’ll try another threat or action before we can bring him in.”
“We’re both at the farm,” Marcus said.
“Good. Stay there, and we’ll inform you when we have him.”
They thanked John, and Marcus clicked the button to end the call. “I guess all we can do is carry on.”
“Fine with me. We have enough to think about.” She spread out the spell books she had put on the table. “I found these in Mother’s attic. Clay and I used them growing up. Daria certainly tried to use them, but the only spells she can throw are on herself and after their mating, on Bent.”
Marcus picked one up and leafed through it. “Let’s see. Looks like basic, low-level, universal spells. We have strength, speed, levitation—I could never do that—and a few illusions like putting a ball or box around yourself. Oh, here’s some arithmetic ones for addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. I can already cast those.”
“Me, too,” Gloriana said. “Let’s try one we don’t know. I’ve never managed to levitate, either.”
“The instructions say to choose a small, lightweight object. The weight of the object you can lift will depend on such variables as your power, your level, and your talent. Of course.” He shook his head and returned to the directions. “Concentrate on the object, transfer some of your energy to it, visualize it rising, and activate the energy. I assume the transference and activation are like lighting a candle. The key words are levo or levare.”
She took a sheet from a notepad and ripped it into several strips. “Okay, here’s some small pieces of pa
per. They should be light enough to start. You go first. I’m more used to manipulating actual objects than you are. I can make a vine twine around a trellis, for example.”
“Here goes nothing.” He accessed his magic center, where the increased amount of power he found still thrilled him. Concentrating as though he was casting flamma, he transferred the energy, saw in his mind’s eye the paper floating in the air. “Levo!”
The paper rose about an inch off the tabletop.
Before Marcus could congratulate himself, however, it burst into flames.
“Oh, damn!” Gloriana grabbed a dish towel off the counter next to her and covered the paper to put out the fire. “What happened?”
“I was concentrating energy like I do for flamma. I guess I forgot to make the energy cool, not hot.” He shrugged, then had to grin. “At least I did get the paper off the table. You have to give me that.”
She looked down her nose at him after she wiped up the ashes. “This, Dr. Forscher, is what I meant about the ‘messiness’ of magic.” And she laughed.
He made a disgruntled face at her and pushed a piece of paper in her direction. “Your turn.”
Within seconds, she had the paper floating about three inches above the surface. “I’m going to put it on maintenance like a lightball.”
She slid her body around in the chair and away from the table. “What’s it doing?”
“Sitting there. I’m going to try again,” he said as she faced front.
Soon his paper was floating next to hers. “Let’s try moving them.”
They floated the papers around the room for a couple of minutes. “That’s like moving a lightball,” she said after the papers were sitting on the table again.
“How about something heavier?”
She rose, went over to the couch in the living room, and brought back a thick magazine. “Here, and it’s not breakable.”
Neither of them could budge the heavier object. The most either achieved was to make the cover flutter.
