The girl with the scarf is now ‘Mags’, a local ambassador.
Rose, too, has returned.
They always pushed paper in training. The idea that paper is more permanent than the digital.
My papers are getting awfully messy, with big gaps in the files. For any poor soul that has to dig through my teenage ramblings, any gaps in the files are because Eva opened a window and some of the pages blew out the window.
I think there’s more to it than coincidence. Too specific, as events go.
The files that went missing seem to have something to do with the younger Rose. They cover the point in time when Rose Thorburn the younger replaced Molly Walker. Trickery, or did the universe want to erase traces? Even my memories of Rose are fuzzy and nonspecific. It feels somehow like it’s the first time I’m seeing her face.
She did offer me support, at a time when I was feeling pretty grim.
She brought a cabal with her, and they look fairly new to all this. It reminds me of me, back when I started the training with Mac. Every monster was a whole different kind of frightening. Molly Walker was like that up until the end.
Rose feels different than when she left, somehow. Now, as I think about how her predecessor handled everything… I think about how Rose coped, and I wonder ‘how did she handle it?’ and I can’t come up with much.
When I asked Eva, Eva reminded me of the techniques we learned. Right off the bat, she found the discrepancy.
When we ask, “How did Rose manage?”, we struggle to answer.
When we ask, “How did the second Thorburn heir manage?” we can mutually agree that the heir was almost eerily in step with this world.
As witch hunters, free of any vows or ties to the world the monsters and practitioners inhabit, we’re protected against the trickery. A measure of innocence can challenge that reality, and clearly see the emperor without his clothes.
It’s the youths that are going to make a difference. Good or bad.
■
Notebook 27:
Note: After action reports.
Eva’s commented on the change in my outlook. We’re working more effectively as a team now.
Eight threats targeted and chased down in the past week. Eight victories. I even allowed myself to get excited about it, as we found our stride. Eva in close, drawing attention, me at a distance.
She’s listening to me more, even. It’s always been her propensity to ignore people she doesn’t agree with. I think she agrees with how we’re doing things now. Block escape routes with traps, wait until they’re in the right position, then attack. Things aren’t fixed. She’s still more reckless than she once was.
It helps that we have less administrative work, with Mags taking on the messenger duties, standing by at meetings. She doesn’t have a lot of firepower, but there’s a symbolic element to it.We remain ninety percent positive that one bogeyman we dealt with was attached to Rose. Testing the water, seeing how responsive we were. We crossed paths a few days later, and it felt like she was showing me just a bit more respect.It’s now impossible to keep track of the local guests. No less than twelve practitioners under Sandra, twenty monsters working for or doing favors for Johannes. I’m getting four hours of sleep a night, staying up reading, and sleeping in thirty minute bursts during the day to keep going, but I have more drive than I had when I was sleeping twice the amount.
The remainder of the action reports are as follows:
- Eva baited a skinchanger into an old boathouse past the marina. I crushed it with a deadfall trap.
- Went with Mags to help with goblin hunting, helping to herd them to a place where she could bind them. I believe they’re still bound, and she’s waiting them out.
- One Nightmare-type monster was invading dreams. Targeting normals. Not affiliated with Johannes or Sandra. Found wandering the streets in a human guise, spotted through the trickery with innocence, cut down with katana.
- Junior council pointed us at a new child at school. We followed. No parents or furniture in house, never slept – only stood in the house. Executed quietly, no blood was drawn by cuts. Plant matter at core.
- Investigation by Sandra led us to second wooden person. Adult, fought back. Immolated by molotov.
- Arrogant practitioner among first outsiders to make open bid for leadership. Small bomb under seat of car. Sandra and Duncan, the new police liason, diverted attention of authorities.
- Backwards Man required special means of tracking, as the human-like monster functioned by operating backwards in time. Wounds occurred in his future, our past, making it impossible to make anything stick. Came after us with knives. I distracted while Eva slipped by to invade his apartment. Destroyed the object at the crux of his nature. Investigation into ties to local Chronomancers was initiated and dismissed.
- Practitioner was posing as a tertiary member of the Duchamp family. Sandra’s records showed no such evidence of marriage. Simply trying to hide in the background. I took him down with the second shot from 150m range with a hunting rifle.
I don’t enjoy the killing, but I was proud of that last one.
Things are accelerating.
■
Notebook 27:
Note: Council Notes
Samaniego told me to keep logs, in case something happened to me.
If something happens to me in the near future, this is going to be at the root of it.
I’m writing it as I remember it:
■
Mags entered the church. Molly ‘walked’ a half-step behind her. Not quite floating, not quite walking, not walking like someone would walk on the moon either. She didn’t really have feet, either.
Andy studied the ghost, pen ticking on his notebook as he leaned against the stage.
He’d visited it before, to study the thing, even considered getting rid of it.
Now it was active, alive, and it looked meaner.
“We’ve got a problem,” Eva said.
“Yep,” he said.
“We were just talking about you,” Johannes commented.
“I don’t suppose you want to start over from the beginning?”
“We were talking in generalities,” Sandra said. “Unlike the demesnes claim, it isn’t always obvious if someone has carried out one ritual or another, like the familiar ritual.”
“That’s an invitation to share,” Johannes said.
“Oh,” Mags said, looking between them, “I thought you’d say more. You had to have discussed more than that.“
“We’re not your enemies,” Sandra said.
“Yet somehow I don’t think you’re baking me a cake in here,” Mags said.
“When you wanted to claim the title of ambassador, I’d like to think we were gracious.”