Spirits were the most basic and oldest option when it came to manipulating the physical world through the esoteric. One object as simple as a pencil could have a host of spirits inside it, representations of the purposes the object had, its nature, its elemental makeup, ownership, and many, many other qualities.
Shamans, then, were practitioners who worked more or less exclusively with spirits. They would be able to find and interact with more powerful spirits. Not simply the spirit of one particular stone, but the spirit of all stones for an area.
I was thinking along those lines because I couldn’t help but wonder if what I saw was one of those shamans at work.
A boiling cloud of what might have been vapor, a haze, sat over the city. It was as though stormclouds were rolling in, and they were doing it at ground level. At times there was a fluidity to it, as though the nearby lake had swelled and swamped the area, waves rising and falling, only periodically allowing buildings to be seen, where they dipped low enough.
This wasn’t water or water vapor. It was spirits.
I shut off the sight.
The scene I saw without magical aid was an ordinary one, a simple snowfall, with clouds in the proper places. My view of the buildings was still limited, periodically obscured, but only by snow.
There were things outside, as there had been last night. Daylight wasn’t safety. It only meant that the Others without human forms had to stay out of the public eye.
I sighed. I wasn’t big on plans. I wasn’t the type to use lists or keep to them. It helped to frame what I was doing in my head, but it wasn’t me.
Better if I figured out the high points I needed to hit and then winged it. I’d figure out what I needed to shop for when the time came.
I sat down with what I saw as the little black book. I filled myself in on the local practitioners.
When I got to the Others, however, I found the entries got a little more complicated and short form. Latin classifications, short form that necessitated I look it up, measures and linking to reference material instead of explaining them outright.
Grandmother, it seemed, was more interested in Others than people.
“Rose!” I called out.
There was no reply.
I made my way through the house, searching each of the mirrors. I found her in the library.
“Rose,” I said.
She sat on the floor. Her hair had pulled free of the brooch, and she was surrounded by books. Damn, she looked worn out. Not tired, per se, but like she’d been through the wringer.
“What do you want, Blake?”
“First of all, I want to make sure you’re okay.”
“Let’s say I’m not,” she said. She carefully set books aside and climbed to her feet. She didn’t seem willing to meet my eyes, biting her lip, thoughts clearly elsewhere.
“What can I do?”
It wasn’t a hard question, but it seemed to bother her. “Survive the meeting? We survive, there’s always room for things to get better.”
“I’m on board with that,” I said.
Why did it look like I was upsetting her more?
“Listen,” I said. “I’ve done the reading. The sections on the Others in the little black book are kind of dense, but I got the gist of it, and I think I can put names to most of the important faces. I know the practitioners I’m up against.”
“That’s good,” she said. “I read through all of that too.”
“I’ve also memorized a few of the basic sigils. Driving people away, like Laird Behaim did in the coffee shop, moving things like I did with the mug, and protecting objects. I’ve got salt and chalk if I need it.”
“I wouldn’t rely on that, if I was in your shoes,” she said.
I frowned, “Why?”
“The books say that generally, spirits aren’t that smart. They’re more like small animals, in terms of their capacity to understand things. Like animals, you can train or bait them. In an area trafficked by people who use spirits a great deal, you can trust they’re going to listen.”
“This is that type of area.”
“But who are they listening to? Remember how Laird said the spirits of community listen to him because of his role? Out there, they aren’t just listening to you. Their loyalties are divided.”
“I think I follow,” I said. “What’s the end result? What happens if they aren’t all in the same camp?”
“I think it’ll be slower, or fuzzier. You might get nothing, or it might backfire.”
That took some of the wind out of my sails. “I’m still powerless?”
“Powerless until you get enough clout to bully them or convince them to play along. It might be that grandmother’s name gives you some of the oomph you need. But if you reach for their help in a bind,” Rose said, “It’s going to be-”
“-a crapshoot,” I said, in the same instant Rose did.
I smiled a bit, but Rose didn’t. Her eyes dropped to the ground.
I sighed. I could hardly blame her for not being in a smiling mood. Rose had her own concerns. Ones I couldn’t even wrap my head around. We didn’t have enough information on what she was or why grandmother had gone to the trouble of creating her.
Problem was, I didn’t know how to fix this. When in doubt, the strategy was to empathize. As a rule, people wanted their feelings recognized more than they wanted fixes.
“I can’t imagine how you feel,” I said. It was the truth. “You’ve been put in a horrible situation, with-”
“Don’t do that,” she said. “Not if you’re using it like they taught it to you.”
“Huh?”
“Dad taught us that. How to get on people’s good side. Which may be something he picked up from grandmother.”
“Grandfather,” I said. “It fits what we know of him.”
“Don’t manipulate me, Blake. Don’t use strategies to deal with me. I was raised the same way you were, up to a point, I know the tricks.”
“I do care, Rose. I want to help you. If I’m drawing from what I know to try-”
“Blake,” Rose said. “It’s fine. It’s done, you’re in charge, I’m the backup. You want me to keep the criticisms to the most vital points? Fine. You want me to do the research and supplement what you’re doing, fine. You win.”
“I don’t want to win. I want us to be on the same page.”
“The same page? You got the power, I got… this. How do you have a partnership if things are this unequal? Let’s face it. Look at what happened to Molly. Grandmother is willing to use us as expendable assets. I’m nothing more than a piece in a greater puzzle. I’ll serve my role, and the road ends there. I’m the most expendable one of us.”
“I don’t think she made you as some expendable asset,” I said.
“I’ve been reading. Everything referencing diabolists says they’re dangerous lunatics, except for the stuff that was written by grandmother and other diabolists. The temptation to offer pieces of yourself for obvious gains sucks all of them in eventually. The guys who unleash some of the worst stuff out there? The guys who meet the worst ends? They’re in the same category as her. Our grandmother. Over and over, they become monsters. Literally, or generally monstrous people that might use their kids or grandkids as sacrificial pawns to get what they need.”