I again rose high enough in the sky so I could see far down the roads leading to the campus. The flashing lights of fire trucks were nowhere to be seen.
“Puck, we’ve got to do something,” I said. “A bunch of people are about to die.”
There’s nothing we can do. You can’t perform magic in your spirit form, remember?
“I’ll go back and get my body.”
No. You need to stay focused on your mission. Our job is to find the Spear before Millennium does, not go around playing Smokey the Bear.
I was shocked by Puck’s callousness. “How can you say that? Those are students in that building. They’re practically kids.”
If they were newborn babies I’d say the same thing. A lot more people than those few in that building will get hurt if Millennium gets his hands on the Spear. I’ve seen generations of people live and die. It gives you perspective, makes you realize no individual or group of individuals is all that important in the grand scheme of things. We need to do the most good for the most people, which means we should focus all our attention on the Spear. We gotta keep our eyes on the prize.
I thought about Puck’s words. This was like the incident with the gargoyles all over again. Fighting those gargoyles had exposed my magic and landed me in the soup. Maybe I should just mind my own business this time.
It only took me a moment to decide. I took careful note of a spot near the burning dormitory that didn’t have bystanders close by. I started racing back toward my apartment to retrieve my body. Right was right, and wrong was wrong. Dad had taught me that. I would not dishonor his memory even if doing the right thing wound up screwing me in the long run.
This is a mistake, Puck warned. You’re being impulsive again.
“There’s a difference between being impulsive and giving a flip about others,” I said as I zoomed toward my apartment, careful to not lose my mystical tether to my body in my haste. I traveled so fast that the buildings below were a blur. “You say your long life has given you perspective. No offense, but maybe it’s warped your perspective instead. A lot of the magical world is cavalier about the welfare of mundanes, but you’re taking it to a whole new level.”
What about the First Rule? You’re in enough trouble with the Conclave as it is. And what if Millennium finds the Spear while you’re roasting chestnuts on an open fire?
“Then he finds it,” I said grimly. “I won’t sacrifice humans to save humanity. If we become the kinds of people who’ll let others burn to death, then we don’t deserve saving.”
Since it’s your body, not mine, you get to call the shots. But I’ll go ahead and say “I told you so” now in case I forget when this misadventure goes sideways.
“Thanks for the support.”
I dropped into my apartment through the walls of the Leverette house. My body and Daniel were where I had left them. I sank into my body. I released my hold on the astral projection spell. Like a key sliding into the lock it fit, my spirit reincorporated into my body.
My body’s eyes flew open. I nullified the protective spell that surrounded my body. I stood hastily. My legs were stiff from being in the same position for a while.
Daniel stood too, obviously excited. “You found the Spear?” he asked eagerly.
“Working on it.” I dashed into my bedroom with Daniel dogging my heels. I neither had time to explain what I was doing, nor did I want to give Daniel a chance to tag-team me with Puck and try to talk me out of helping the Howard students.
With Daniel standing in my bedroom doorway asking questions I ignored, I raced around the room. Lives were at stake, and here I was scrounging around my disaster of a room, looking for something I had Daniel buy a few days ago. Darn my messiness!
I found it on top of a pile of laundry, under a pair of underwear.
If your panties were smaller, maybe you’d have found it sooner, Puck suggested. I didn’t dignify that with a response, though the notion of throwing him into the building fire looked more and more appealing.
What I had found was my mask. More specifically, it was a Colombina mask, one of those ornate half-masks some women hid their faces with at the annual Carnival of Venice in Italy. This one was a glossy tan and black. I had Daniel get it for me while I was busy studying so I would have something to hide my face with other than a ski mask if I needed to use my magic in public to get the Spear of Destiny. Wearing this kind of mask made me look like I was going to a costume party; wearing the ski mask had made me look and feel like a criminal.
I secured the mask to my face with the ribbons attached to its end.
Now you really do look like the Lone Ranger, Puck said. Except subtract the big horse and add small boobs. He was being super helpful. I was learning Puck got snarkier than usual when I dared to ignore his sage advice.
I glanced at the digital clock on my dresser. Not even a minute had passed since I’d come here to get the mask, but it felt like an eternity. I needed to get back to the fire before it was too late.
I began the Wave for the portal spell I had learned from Puck.
“Where are you going?” Daniel demanded.
“I’ll explain later,” I said, then shut his protests out of my mind as I completed the Wave, said the Word, and Willed a portal to open. The magical doorway, roiling with black and blue colors, opened directly in front of me. I mentally high-fived myself. It was a vast improvement over the magical trapdoor I’d opened for us at the Sackler Gallery.
I stepped into the portal. The disaster area that was my room disappeared, replaced by the disaster area that the fire was causing at Howard University.
I closed the portal behind me. I had exited the portal at the spot near the dorm I had made note of before I’d flown back to get my body. I was behind most of the people around the building. No one seemed to notice that a masked woman in a red cloak had stepped out of a glowing hole in the time-space continuum. Even if I hadn’t materialized behind everyone, they were too busy staring at the ever-growing fire.
Since I could hear and smell now that I wasn’t in astral form, the scene seemed vastly different than it had before. Even this distance from it, I felt the heat of the fire. It crackled like something from the pits of Hell. The screams of people trapped in the building mingled with the crackling. The smoke was choking, and it smelled of burning plastic and chemicals. I heard the wail of police cars and fire trucks, but it was obvious they were still far off in the distance. They would be too late to save many of the students in the building.
Puck let out a loud, long-suffering sigh. I still think it’s a stupid waste of valuable time, but since you insist on doing this, there’s a spell that should put out the fire. Hopefully you can learn it in time. The first thing you’ll need to do is—
“Take it easy with the capesplaining,” I said, cutting him off. “I’ve got this.”
“Those stupid Metas wear capes. I’m a cloak,” Puck protested, sounding offended.
I ignored him, my mind focused on extinguishing the fire. Truth be told, I was not certain I’d been right about having the situation under control, but there was no time to learn a brand-new spell. Besides, successfully tackling astral projection had boosted my confidence. Perhaps disaster did not have to inevitably follow me engaging in high-level magic.
I didn’t think I could use magic to extinguish the fire directly. The fire was too big, and fire I did not create was much harder to control than fire I generated. On top of that, I was tired after maintaining the powerful astral projection spell. Now was not the time to rest, though.
The first thing I needed to do was get the gawkers farther away from the building. I envisioned what I wanted to happen, planting it firmly in my mind. Then I executed the Wave, said “Ignis,” and unleashed my Will.
With a loud whoosh that could be heard over the roar of the dorm fire, a ring of orange and red spellfire erupted into existence around the building, between it and the onlookers. They cried out in surprise and alarm.
Gritt
ing my teeth with the effort of maintaining the biggest batch of spellfire I had ever conjured in my life, I willed it to expand. It got closer to the bystanders. They stumbled over themselves in their haste to run away from the encroaching fire.
There! The bystanders were far enough away from the building now. Unfortunately, in retreating from the spellfire, a few had gotten close enough to me to notice me. They nudged each other, pointing at me. With me wearing a mask and what looked like a cape, they probably thought I was a Hero. Either that or they thought I was a Rogue, maybe one who had set fire to the building in the first place. Oh well. I was more concerned about being identified as a sorceress than about being misidentified as a Metahuman.
I relaxed my Will, and the ring of spellfire winked out of existence. I switched mental gears, again envisioning what I wanted to happen now that the bystanders were out of the way.
“Ventus!” I cried, and unleashed my Will as I finished the Wave by extending my hands toward the building.
Winds kicked up around the base of the building, picking up debris as they circled the structure, faster and faster. It looked like a Metahuman speedster was running around it. I drew in magic from all around and poured it back out of me, channeling it into the burgeoning windstorm around the building.
While still maintaining the ever-expanding whirlwind, I moved my hands to the Wave of a different spell. “Terra!” I exclaimed, channeling magic into the building itself.
In seconds, a raging tornado surrounded the inflamed building, though there wasn’t a single storm cloud in the sky. The tornado raged with the building in its eye. The wide end of the tornado’s funnel reached far into the heavens, drowning out the sound of the fire and sucking in debris from all around us. People screamed, some ducking and covering to protect themselves from the debris that whipped through the air and into the magically created tornado.
So much magic poured out of me, it made me gasp. I was getting cold, like I had just fallen through ice and into a frigid lake. I knew I was draining too much of my magic and life force in maintaining the massive spells I had cast, the biggest forms of elemental magic I had ever attempted. But I also knew I had to hold on a little longer.
The fire inside the tornado dimmed, as if a giant jar had been placed over the building and the fire was running out of oxygen to consume.
Then, abruptly, the fire went out.
I maintained the tornado for a few seconds more to make sure the fire was out. When darkness started closing in from the edges of my vision like a closing camera shutter, I relaxed my Will and my hold on the wind and earth spells before I passed out.
With desultory swirls of air, the tornado dissipated, then disappeared altogether. Small pieces of debris pattered the ground like hail. The building still smoked, but the fire was out. The air was noticeably colder. People’s breaths condensed in the night air when they exhaled.
I stumbled and fell to my knees. I panted, my lungs burning, with my head hanging between my shoulders. I felt like an orange with all the juice squeezed out of it.
Sweet baby Odin! Puck exclaimed. Tornadoes create freezing conditions and a lack of oxygen in their eyes, like the death zone conditions high up on mountain peaks. You used that phenomenon to extinguish the fire. You simultaneously used an earth spell on the organic material in the building to help hold the structure together while the tornado whipped around it. His voice was full of wonder, like he had just seen Willow Wilde and Marilyn Monroe making out while naked and standing atop a galloping unicorn.
I nodded yes. Talking right now was out of the question. I was too busy remembering how to breathe.
Holy magical mojo, Batman! Puck exulted. I was wrong when I said at Ben’s Chili Bowl that you’re no superhero. You are a superhero. Not too many people could pull off what you just did. If I had a penis, I would be so hard right now.
Through the haze that shrouded my sluggish brain, I became vaguely aware of people staring at me. I looked up.
Many of the bystanders who had been gawking at the fire were now gawking at me. Multiple phones were trained on me. I got a flashback of when I had been videoed at the Institute of Peace. Déjà vu all over again.
This was no place to linger. Cops and firefighters would be here soon, and they would have uncomfortable questions to ask, questions a certain conspicuously masked and caped sorceress who was already in trouble with the Conclave did not want to answer. Plus, I vaguely remembered something about how the Hero Act made it illegal to dress like a Hero unless you were licensed as one.
Though I didn’t want to, I staggered to my feet. I lifted my arms. They felt like lead weights. Though people were looking at me, I was going to open a portal in front of everyone anyway.
Crap! I lowered my hands before I barely began the Wave. There was no way I had the energy to open a portal right now. And if by some miracle I did open one, I was so exhausted and unfocused, it might deposit me at the gates to Hell. However, to be honest, I was so cold from draining my magic that the warmth of Hell did not seem like a bad idea right about now.
Oh well. I’d just have to return home using conventional means. Once I got away from all these gawkers, I’d just grab a cab home.
Then I remembered.
Double crap! I didn’t have any money or my phone. My pockets were as empty as my magical reserves were. The next time I took a stroll down astral lane, I needed to make sure I had an emergency twenty in my pants pocket.
I had no choice. I started walking away from the smoking building and the increasing crowd of spectators. Once I was away from everyone, I’d pull Puck and the mask off so drivers and pedestrians wouldn’t stare at me like I was a freak as I trudged the streets toward home.
Applause trailed me, picking up in volume as I walked through the bystanders. I lifted Puck, shielding my masked face from the people who were recording me with their phones. I felt like a celebrity trying to escape paparazzi.
Dude, this is embarrassing, Puck said. You’re making my imaginary woody go limp.
“Shut up,” I whispered. I tried to say it without moving my lips. It would never do to be filmed talking to myself.
The only thing worse than people thinking I was a superhero was them thinking I was a crazy superhero.
CHAPTER 20
The night after the fire at Howard University, I again flew over the city in my astral form with my Third Eye open, looking for any sign of the Spear of Destiny. It was dark, with clouds covering the moon and most of the stars. Just like yesterday, the world was as quiet as a mute. It had taken me over eleven hours of sleep to recover from my first astral projection and extinguishing the fire at Howard.
Daniel sure was pissed at you, Puck said. Daniel had pitched a fit when I returned to my apartment after extinguishing the Howard fire and I told him I would have to put off looking for the Spear again until I rested up some. He had taken the same position that Puck had, namely that it was more important to find the Spear than it was to save the lives of college students. Only Daniel had been more adamant about it and more colorful in his language than Puck had been. I wound up having to throw him out of my apartment again. He was back again now, however, watching over my body as I did my ghost impersonation throughout the city.
“Daniel will get over it,” I told Puck. “Or he won’t. I don’t care, frankly.”
The name’s Puck. Don’t call me Frankly.
I groaned. “That’s a terrible joke.”
They can’t all be good. With all the pitches I swing at, I’m bound to strike out from time to time. It’s the law of averages.
“How about making just some of them good? You know, as a change of pace.”
Now you’re just being hurtful. You put out one fire, and suddenly you’re an expert on everything, including humor. It was a mistake letting you people vote and wear pants. It’s made you uppity.
“You people,” I repeated. “Has anyone ever told you you’re sexist?”
Of course I’m not sexist. Sexism i
s wrong, and only you broads can be wrong.
I laughed despite myself. The way Puck spoke to me had changed subtly since yesterday. Though he still had no problem teasing me, now it was the good-natured teasing of one colleague to another. Like we were equals. Before the Howard fire, much of the time Puck spoke to me like I was a mentally challenged child struggling through a remedial class. I must have impressed him at Howard.
The fact that an article of clothing being impressed with me gave me a warm glow of accomplishment made me wonder when my sanity had jumped the shark.
We had searched the city for a few hours. We were flying over the National Mall now. As cynical as I sometimes was about how the country was run, seeing symbols of our democracy like the Capitol building, the World War Two Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Washington Monument made my heart swell with pride and patriotism. I probably would have hummed The Star-Spangled Banner if I hadn’t known Puck would tease me mercilessly.
The lit-up Washington Monument glowed like something magical, both the tall obelisk itself and the structure’s reflection which stretched across the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. The base of the 555-foot tall structure was surrounded by fifty flags, one for each state.
I stopped flying, hovering high in the air over the monument.
Here are some fun facts about the monument, Puck said. It’s both the world’s tallest stone structure and the world’s tallest obelisk. The upper two-thirds of it is a slightly different color than the bottom third because of a twenty-five year pause in the monument’s construction, after which time they got the marble for the rest of the monument from a different quarry.
“Here’s a less than fun fact about you: You talk too much. Less talking, more looking. Don’t you see that?”
Don’t I see what? Rudeness is not visible to the naked eye.
“That,” I said, pointing. The base of the monument glowed.
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