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She’d anger Candace by not appearing on demand, couldn’t in good conscience take her mother’s money when she wasn’t going to follow through on the favor of the fund-raiser. That meant putting her career on hold, getting a job—leaving her college fund with her mother. Marian squared her shoulders. So be it.
If a full-moon ritual was important to understand the strangeness happening to her and if it could help Andrew, she’d do it. And take it seriously, by God—or by All the Powers that Were.
Lladrana
The same day
Jaquar had just finished recording his journey in his lorebook when a crackle of lightning had him jerking his head to the crystal sphere on his desk. He flicked it with his fingernail, ping, and accepted the sending of another Circlet.
Cloudiness filled the crystal, then dissolved to wisps. Two people finished the Songspell that allowed them to communicate with Jaquar and stared out at him. A shaft of pain speared through him. Jaquar was accustomed to speaking only with his parents this way, and they would never sing to him again.
Chalmon Pace and Venetria Fourney—on-again, off-again quarreling lovers—gazed at him. They both bore the mark of great magical Power, thick streaks of silver at both temples in their otherwise black hair.
The last Jaquar had heard, Venetria had been backtracking the sangvile. She’d lost an aunt in Coquille-on-the-Coast.
“Bad news,” Chalmon said gruffly.
Jaquar grunted.
“Venetria’s information, compiled with what I’ve gleaned from the oldest lorebooks, tells us that the appetite of the sangvile is exponential.” He cleared his throat. “And it prefers those with Power. The monster is directed at us, the Circlets of the Tower Community.”
With stiff lips Jaquar said, “We lost eight strong Sorcerers and Sorceresses in Coquille-on-the-Coast. That can’t be allowed to happen again.”
The other two nodded. “We agree,” Chalmon said. “We must protect ourselves from this horror. We’re sure you are right—the sangvile followed you from the Marshalls’ Castle.”
Jaquar laughed harshly. “I thought it was too weak to attach itself to me. I thought it would hide and garner strength in the Castle. Instead it knew I could lead it to a richer feast later.” He didn’t think he’d ever forgive himself for that. “You said its hunger is exponential?”
“Yes,” sighed Venetria.
“It’s back at its master’s nest.” The words pulled jerkily from Jaquar, he didn’t want to think of his journey to the red maw, his vain assault, the gloating triumph he’d sensed. Nevertheless, he told Chalmon and Venetria.
They were both pale when he finished.
“It’s coming back, and not alone,” Venetria whispered. “More than one sangvile?”
“Yes,” Jaquar said. He’d be ready for the horrors, and he wasn’t averse to attacking. “We need more to find the nest, to understand what this ‘master’ is and how to battle it. I’ll organize the effort.”
Chalmon frowned. “I don’t know—”
Jaquar gestured, stopping Chalmon’s protest. “I’ve lost the most. Isn’t that the Tower Community tradition? The one who is most passionate gathers Powerful Circlets of the Fifth Degree and directs them?”
The two looked at each other again.
“We’re all concerned with the defense of Lladrana and now finding the master who directs the monsters to invade,” Chalmon said.
Smiling coldly, Jaquar said, “If anyone wants to challenge me for leadership, I’m available.”
Venetria dipped her head. “So noted.”
Chalmon shrugged, turned the subject. “No Sorcerer or Sorceress could pass. No Lladranan with Power could breech the shield. That means we use someone from the Exotique land. Someone for the Tower community. Our Exotique.”
“We could ask the Exotique Alyeka,” Venetria said.
“She’s one of the Marshalls. We can’t be indebted to them. We’d lose our independence,” Chalmon snapped.
“Summoning our Exotique is already planned,” Jaquar said.
“The master said, ‘No Lladranan can harm the nest,’ as if just the presence of one who is not Lladranan can hurt the Dark.”
“A natural weapon,” Chalmon breathed.
“Think what she’ll be like when she’s trained!” Venetria said.
Jaquar said, “The Summoning Song will bring to Lladrana a person who will work well with us.”
Venetria sucked in a breath. “Yes, but she must be strong if we are going to send her to the nest.”
Jaquar said, “Any Exotique the Marshalls can contact will naturally be strong. As eldest and most powerful of the Tower, I believe Bossgond sent the Marshalls a list of the proper qualities.” Jaquar felt his mouth twist. “Bossgond didn’t notify me, but I received an acknowledgment from the Marshalls.”
Frowning, Chalmon said, “Bossgond didn’t tell me, either. It is time he breaks this hermit existence.”
“I’m sure he’d be glad to hear you tell him so,” Venetria said sweetly.
Chalmon continued. “The Exotique must be well-trained before we send him or her to this master you discovered, Jaquar. He or she must at least be trained enough to report what is found in the nest.”
“We may not have that luxury,” Jaquar said. “Not if the maw spews out more sangviles, as well as the other horrors—the slayers and soul-suckers and renders.”
“And dreeths.” Venetria shivered. She’d barely survived a battle with one of the winged lizards.
Chalmon scowled. “Yes, we must be prepared to sacrifice the Exotique, for the good of Lladrana, for the planet Amee herself. Knowledge is more important than one life. If worse comes to worst, we could attach a reporting orb to her and send her with a destruction spell—perhaps she’d be able to untie that weapon knot you have.”
“I would go myself, if I could,” Jaquar said.
Venetria looked at him sharply. “You are the best plane-walker. You already tried. Do you think the shield applies to all planes?”
Again Jaquar’s laughter was bitter. “It applied to as many as I could reach within the limits of the spell—twenty or so. I’m not sure exactly where or what the physical location is, but it’s big.”
Making a note, Chalmon said, “Other things to research—the shield, whether it is only magical or is physical also. Where the nest could be. When the Exotique comes, I’ll train him or her.”
“No! If she’s female, like the last one, she will want a woman as teacher!” Venetria said.
“The new Exotique is mine,” Jaquar insisted.
Now Chalmon barked laughter. “All of us will want to work with someone so Powerful. This is exactly why we need the Marshalls to Summon her. We don’t work well together.” He shot a glance at his lady. “Sometimes not even those who are intimate with each other.”
Jaquar’s heart tore. His father and mother had been an excellent team, stronger together than apart. Perhaps that’s what had drawn the sangvile to them.
Chalmon and Venetria sniped at each other, then Chalmon faced him.
“We’ll call a Gathering for tomorrow at the Parteger Island amphitheater to discuss all this,” Chalmon said. “I’ll move the process along.”
Venetria sent him a fulminating glance, then looked back to Jaquar. “What is the Marshalls’ price for the Summoning?”
Jaquar said, “I promised them objects, not favors. Some books, most of which are duplicates in all our libraries. Whatever magical weapons we have. Old battlespells.”
“A price easy to meet,” Chalmon said.
Venetria nodded. “Yes. I think I only have two weapons in my Tower—what of you?”
“One,” Jaquar said, but it was an incredible one, something that perhaps only an Exotique could handle.
“I have four,” Chalmon said.
“Of course you must pretend you’re the best,” Venetria said. And then they were arguing again.
“I’ll coordinate with the Marshalls as necessary in the days to come,” Jaquar said. He wouldn’t lie to the Marshalls, but he wouldn’t welcome them unless he had a use for them.
With thumb and forefinger, Jaquar tapped the crystal and Chalmon and Venetria disappeared. An hour later he had sent the contract and books as first payment to the Marshalls for the Summoning.
Then he crossed to his armchair and sat again, letting the soft, old leather settle around his body. He wondered if the other Circlets had forgotten one very important thing, and if they had, whether he could take advantage of it.
The Singer, the Oracle of Lladrana, had prophesied that the next Exotique would be best suited for the community of the Tower. The Singer had also told them of the time of the next Summoning—when the Dimensional Gates between Lladrana and the Exotique land aligned. The Marshalls knew this. It was tomorrow night.
In all the history of the Tower, the Sorcerers and Circlets had never come to an agreement in a day. Chalmon was too optimistic. He wouldn’t be able to forge a plan amongst all the individual personalities of the Tower.
Jaquar sank back into his chair to sleep. It would be a long time before he could face his bedroom adorned with the quilt his mother had made and the landscapes his father had painted.
He would not argue with the rest of the Sorcerers and Sorceresses at Parteger Island, had no intention of compromising. The Exotique was his. For knowledge. For vengeance.
Colorado
The next evening
Power hung in the air like a fine mist ready to condense into dewdrops. It shimmered with every ripple of chimes, every strike of the gong—the music only Marian could hear, had heard for the past month. Now the sounds reverberated in a pattern that set her nerves humming as she finished taping a ten-foot red pentagram on her living room carpet.
She took a shaky breath as she connected the last line of the star-shaped pattern and sank back on her heels to calm her excitement. She wiped her damp palms on the sweats she’d put on after her bath. Biting her lip, she examined everything again. She’d had to scramble to craft the ritual, to get the herbs and tools. There’d been no time to practice.
No negativity, not now. No doubts. So she shoved them aside.
Soon the exact moment of the full moon would finally come and it would be time to act. To perform a ritual that would bring great change into Andrew’s life and her own. To ask for what she wanted most, a miracle—a healthy brother.
In order to clear enough space to tape the pentacle, she’d had to stack books around the edges of the room, evidence that her hunger for knowledge had burgeoned until it was nearly a craving. She felt like the Chinese Dragon, ever pursuing the Pearl of Wisdom. Someday she’d find just the right knowledge that would make her whole, or set her free: the key to herself.
Marian stood and put away the tape. She checked the alcove where her hamster Tuck sat blinking at her in a corner of his plastic cage. He seemed to feel something unusual, too, since both his cheek pouches were huge with food.
“Nothing to worry about, Tuck.” She smiled at him, then rubbed her arms. Crossing to the door of her garden-level apartment, she pushed aside the small curtain over the door’s window to look out. Twilight was falling.
Hands on her hips, she scanned the rest of her preparations; her altar was fine, the notes for her ritual were on her PDA in the pentagram. A small spiral of smoke from the incense burner twisted, sending lily-of-the-valley scent through the room. The smoke sparkled silver.
Marian blinked, narrowed her eyes and stared. The glitter in the powder shouldn’t carry up into the smoke, and she thought she’d seen a flash for an instant. Maybe. Maybe not. Tonight was a night for stretching all she was, experiencing all she could.
With a sigh she looked at her gray sweats, still wavering between doing the ritual in a gossamer crocheted cotton broomstick gown or nude. She should be less self-conscious, able to accept her plumpness as pleasing.
Just as she was about to shuck her sweats for the gauze dress, the telephone rang. She glanced at the clock and bit her lip. It was only an hour before the full moon and she’d wanted to be at the climax of the ritual when that occurred. She debated answering the call. Hesitated. Then she ran across the living room floor, hopping over the star-points to reach the kitchen and pick up the telephone.
“Hey, sis.” Andrew’s light voice floated across the line, and she smiled.
“Hey back.”
There was a heartbeat’s pause. “Is everything okay there? I had a feeling…” he said.
“Everything’s fine.” She eyed the red-taped pentagram on the floor.
“Candace isn’t giving you grief over anything, is she?” Their mother had asked Andrew at the age of four not to call her any variation of “Mommy.”
“She wanted me to attend a benefit tonight, but I…wanted to study.” She was studying, learning.
Andrew groaned. “Yeah, the Colorado Charities. Sent her a check for them, and one for the Multiple Sclerosis Foundation of Colorado, too. She didn’t say thank-you, but I believe she was pleased. I don’t have much contact with her anymore. Might be better for your mental health if you backed away, too.”
“I will, soon,” Marian said.
Andrew’s snort came through the phone line. “Wrong. You’re always trying to reconcile with her. It’s a girl thing. Or maybe it’s just that you think a perfect life should have mother-daughter happiness. Too bad your dad didn’t leave you as well off as mine did me—you wouldn’t be at her beck and call over that college fund.”
He didn’t offer her money from his trust fund, and Marian was glad. “How are things going with you?” she asked.
“I get it, previous subject closed. I’m doing good, sis. Turned in the new game project today and I’m going off on sabbatical.” He paused, then words rushed from the phone. “I’m in remission right now, but—uh—I’ve had a few incidents—”
“Andrew!” Fear spurted through her.
“—and I want to try out that program we talked about last year, the one set on Freesan Island in the San Juans. Sort of a retreat, and they want us to minimize contact with outsiders. The codependency thing, you know.”
“Andrew!”
“So I won’t be available or calling you for about six weeks.”
“Did you do another check on these people? The system?”
Andrew laughed. “You always have to be in control, sis. Not an issue I’ve ever had.”
No, Andrew had always been at the mercy of his condition, his workaholic father and a series of stepmothers, most of whom found him distressing.
He continued. “The camp’s A-Okay. I know you’re frowning—”
The warmth in his voice almost made her smile.
“But they aren’t after my money and won’t sell me to labs for experimentation,” he said. “Dr. Chan recommends the program and you know how much we both trust her. I also had my financial advisor and my private investigator check it out.”
“They’ll be careful with you?” Oops. “Tuck worries about you.” Now she knew he was rolling his eyes.
