The Wiccan Diaries: Neophyte Adept Part 55

"With Crispus gone, the Quirinal was in power. But a small faction of us rose from withinnot Eclectics, per se, but fully-fledged werewolves and otherkin kind." His eyes lit up like fiery bijoux. "Before the splitting, Rome embraced all forms of permutationthere were a million words for the things we could do. Loup garou and berserkers and so forth. Unfortunately, there were not enough of us to put an end to the Grigori, as should have been donebut we maintained Crispus's last wish, that the Grigori should be watched. So that is what we have done. We broke from the Sons and Daughters of Romulus and headed north. To Stromovka. And so became the Benandanti. Those Who Do Good. But how do we good? We do good by keeping an eye on those who do bad."

He pointed through the opening of the Hollow with his finger directly to Prague and the Districts of Magic. The places I must go. I felt a p.r.i.c.kle of fear.

"The Stromovka circles Prague," said Laurinaitis. "It surrounds it . Like a great magic circle. And the only thingthe only thingbetween the Grigori and Rome, between the Dark Order and Rome, is us."

"You meanyou've been watching all this time?" I said. "For a hundred plus years? For what the Grigori will do...."

"'Watching' is a good wordas will be shown. But it was not the Grigori alone, our vigilance extended to. It included the Dark Order."

I did the math in my head. The European Covenant of Magic was signed in 1887. That would make Rayven hundreds of years oldan expert spellcaster. Way beyond fledged. Better than me.

"Don't forget," said Laurinaitis, "some of us can live for extraordinarily long times. Rayven, as he's called, is ancient. In the lexicon of the Grigori, he is the worst." He pa.s.sed me an aperitif. The snow had let up, but the torch-side chat continued. "Prague was bad then," he said. "Now it is a dangerous place, even if you don't have magic."

"The Dark Order is spreading," said Laurinaitis. "Magic is growing once more from Prague, unfurling itself from the Districts of Magic. That knowledge alone would require this gathering you know, I think we should get Manon," he said to Asher.

"We know you wish to go there," continued Laurinaitis, as Asher got up to go, "to Prague," he said.

"Don't do it. The friends.h.i.+p of our two families is paramountperhaps we can repair old ties, and settle this matter once and for alland reunite the Benandanti and Romebecause by going alone to Prague the Grigori have the advantage. But together...."

Did he mean what I thought he did? Were the Benandanti still interested in eliminating the Grigori? And if so, did they need our help? It had been a hundred and twenty-five yearsfive Gathering's-worth since the Dark Days. As for two families, I wasn't a part of the Sons and Daughters of Romulus. Not really. Families lived in houses and I still needed to find mine. For once, I was glad I had not won the race. It enabled me to go my separate way. Meanwhile, did the Sons and Daughters of Romulus need Ballard back?

"Think about it. Ravenseal is tottering. The Master House wants them. And when they say they come for you, Ravenseal comes on behalf of them. Surely you know this?" said Laurinaitis. "If we do not come for them, the Grigori will come for usthat is their plan. We grow our numbersbut so do they. And there are other parties involved, such as the Master House. Our story's getting out of hand. The Magister Equitum will wish us to speak coherently, you two. Everything depends upon it."

Asher and Manon were back. Manon looked tousle-haired. "I was sleeping," she said. "h.e.l.lo, Halsey."

"Hi." I nodded. "But why me?" I said. "Who am I?"

"The two shall be explained," said Laurinaitis. "But right now, as an answer to your question, I will say thisit was your parents, Kinsey and Max R, who set things in motion. A greater Gathering may indeed be in order down the road, where others will be included, but for now let us rattle this out together. Ballard knows everything of which I'm about to tell you.

"How does he know? It's simple. As Head Wolf, Ballard is privy to certain inside information. As was Lorenzo before him. But unlike Ballard and Gaven, Lorenzo got in the face of the Quirinal," said Laurinaitis.

"The Quirinal had forgotten the Last War, you see, or wished to. When the covenant was signed, that was the end of it. But for the Grigori....

"The aftermath resulted in a xenophobic desire of sortsyou to your corner, we to ours. Even those few of the Lenoirwho had taken on the name of the great wizardas a hunter will display his hornswere excommunicated, banished from the city. Rome fell to ruin and the werewolves to their banethat of willful ignorance. Rome used to be very cosmopolitan. But the Quirinal wished to forget everything. The war, the other sides... Even," said Laurinaitis, "their own magic. Yes. The werewolves have some. Occasionally, one or two of them will discover it. Meanwhile, the rest of them feel content to put it in its box, until today they do not know they possess it. Don't you know that the Sons and Daughters of Romulus happen also to be Wiccans? We all do. But Wiccans of a certain type. Magic is in many voices, Miss Rookmaaker."

"It's true," said Manon. "Magic split, but we all got a piece. Even the werewolves."

"What about the Grigori? Do they have Magic?" I asked, thinking about Rayven, and wondering if his mark could be explained some other way. If perhaps Lenoir had given it to him, specifically, and the others were merely nasty?

"The Grigori have a brand of magic; so do the Sons and Daughters of Romulus; so do we. Eclectics is a term traditional Wicca-craft uses to shun. The Three wish to remain elite, and so are limited. And that is good," said Manon.

"The real purpose in Hiving," said Laurinaitis, "was as a check against The Second War. The Wiccan purges, they called it. Wizards and witches were wiped out during the warkilled mainly by each other. The otherkins being in it, we acquitted ourselves well, but blood was everywhere, and on everyone's hands, including the vampires. It made it convenient that so few wizards and witches were left. Their numbers fit with the number thirteen. Thirteen-or-greater became a rallying cry of sortscovens had to split, hive. Peace was the order of the daylike the reduction of nuclear armsbut a false peace. Everyone knew the Dark Order still existed. But who cared, if in the short-term wounds could be healed, and the days of darkness finally be forgotten?

"I have often thought of those three words: The Last War. Is it the last war because there is another one coming? Or is it the last war because we all die and so magic will be wiped from the universe? In any event, the Last War never really ended. It simply stopped."

"At the beginning of this, I asked you about rebirth, which is the symbol on this necklace," I said, "and you said it was like a compa.s.s, that there were four cardinal points..."

I turned it up and saw the symbol for fire , which also meant north (or Prague) to me.

This was like that . Only inverted in a way. The vampire symbol became the symbol for otherkin: The Grigori, the benandanti, and the Sons and Daughters of Romulus: or in my mind werewolves and ailuranthropes. .

The north symbol was also a delta or change. My fourth Protector would have a connection to fire. Fire pointed north. All the way to Selwyn. Could that be it or was I reading these tea leaves wrong? If this was Lennox and that was Ballard, was I in a love triangle with them both? Did I want to be? I remembered Infester's words. He was really the symbol masterthe one who taught me they came before usthat the symbols were the key to my own destiny and the destiny of others.

Rebirth... This swirl doodad, here, factored in, somehow.

Laurinaitis held up the necklace. And here I thought I was done with the symbols.

"The four points, North, South, East, West, are for the Watchtowers," he said, "the protettori as they were called, those who defended Magic." He seemed determined to make me "get it." Some Chosen One. Everyone at the table looked at me like I was clueless; I felt like I was. Excuse me if I had never been indoctrinated before.

"Before he died, Pendderwenn told me my parents were Watchtowers. Powerful Wiccans, he called them. But who are the Watchtowers?" I said.

"It's who they were," said Laurinaitis pointing the triangle back down.

Grabbing some carrot sticks off his plate, Laurinaitis chomped them, until he made this symbol: "This is the Wiccan symbol for EARTH," he said.

He dipped his finger into the salad dressing. "Earth. Air. Fire. Water." He drew them all out, joining them together.

"What does that look like to you?" he said.

I shrugged. "Like the four cardinal points?" I said.

Laurinaitis seemed pleased. "If you imagine them shooting from Prague, you have a fairly accurate representation of the initial splitting of Magic," he said. "Like a compa.s.s rose on a map."

"But wait," I said. "Magic split into Three, the Covens, the Harcorts, and the Ravenseals, did it not? So why are there four Houses?"

It reminded me of my Four Protectors. One, two, three, four of them.

The Protection symbol had a fourth point, right in the center, which I had understood to mean Selwyn. But if that were the case, what were the symbols protecting me from?

From this? I filled it in mentally in my head. Was this accurate? Were they protecting me from all comers? From all corners? From the vampires in Paris? From the evil witches and wizards and Grigori in Prague? And from enemies closer to home? Now that I thought about it, it was an awful lot like the triskele on my ring . Three circles, and a center. The Protection symbol could also be drawn this way .

My ring was my Four Protectors.

"Actually," Laurinaitis said, "there's five. Look in the center of the four and you'll see a fifth element." 411. I need help, I thought.

He pointed them out. "Can you guess what this is?" he said, pointing to the circle, number 5. "I'll help you.

"You have been told about it before. You must've been, if you were selected. Neophytes aren't allowed to not know this, Halsey Rookmaaker."

I was drawing a blank. Manon helped me out. The only thing that I could think was that it was my full moon, the circle, or a magic circle? That it represented Ballard, somehow. I didn't understand. Manon was rubbing her three Wiccan fingertips together, willing me to figure it out.

Finally, I got it.

"The aether," I said. "The is the aether."

Laurinaitis nodded. "That's right," he said. "The circle is the fifth element, and it is also called spirit, or soul. It is the ethereal, the intangible, the unbelievable, without which there is no magic."

So did that mean my three circles were surrounded in Magic? Ballard, Lennox, Selwyn, Marek? That they all could craft? Or were they protecting me from Magic? I didn't understand. Magic split FOUR waysBut there are only THREE Housesbut there are FIVE elementsand there are Watchtowers. What came next?

My heartbeat started doing funny things.

I was thinking about the four triangles shooting off in different directions. Earth, Air, Fire, Water. Like a House of Fire, or a House of Air. And spirit, or soul, the fifth element, which was this . The intangible, the illusory.

Was that accurate?

Somehow it was all connected, like a Rubik's Cube, but whatever it meant, I couldn't solve it. It was too complicated. I couldn't get it all to line up.

Manon said, "Not to worry, Halsey Rookmaaker. We will help you figure this out. Now, in fact."

She gathered up all of Laurinaitis's carrot sticks, putting them back on his plate, and said, "The answer is The Fifth of Fourth."

Chapter 10 The Fifth of Fourth.

The torchlight flickered over us, almost as if an invisible hand had been reaching out to snuff it.

"You know what this looks like, don't you?" said Manon. "Us meeting here.... Like an insurrection. The Lenoir and the Master House will be quite interested to know what we're doing herequite interested, indeed."

"We can no longer be disinterested," said Asher. "The war is coming."

"I'm in. Tell me. You're freaking me out," I said.

"The thing about supernaturals, Halsey, is there is always some small sign, a tell or otherwise, which encourages outrageous speculation: Oh, he must be a wizard. Do you see her? She's magic, no doubt. We judge each other by our Marks. Which reminds me..."

She pulled back her sleeve and showed me hers. "So why I think I should talk in spirals," she said...

It was Insight. Under my hoodie my orchid began to writhe and snake its way along the length of my arm.

"The Last War was a time of intense fear and paranoia," Manon began, "and the linesever drawnwere clearer then. I have seen the old headlines: Murders, ritualistic killings; a period of crossover, during which the world of fantasy and magic intersects with the world of the mundane. This Rayven fellow killed two gravediggersrecentlyand it was in the news! That has always been our great fear, and the reason we build fortresses! But during the time of the Fifth of Fourth we came closer than ever before to being found out."

"But what are Watchtowers?" I said. "What do they do?"

Asher and Laurinaitis grinned ear-to-ear.

"It will be tied in a bow. Wait for it. And get me pen and ink! I'm tired of these carrot sticks!" said Manon.

I went, as rapidly as I could, to my domov, and fetched out my diary and pen. She took the Diary and opened to a fresh page, clicking the pen, and proceeded to draw several intricate designs. How could I fail to believe in the symbols when others put stock in them?

"This is the sign for Adept," she said. "What you're trying to become. Two horns, pointed up, a second-degree. Not to be confused with the septagram."

She drew the seven-sided star as well.

"The septagram is quite literally the ancient symbol for Magic. You see it engraved all over Rome. The Sons and Daughters of Romulus have forgotten who they are, and think the septagram means only otherkinor shape changers. Not so," said Manon.

Was this why Lia could craft? Had she found her magic? Was it already there, latent within herself? And if so, did Ballard have it? He must have! They were brother and sister!

I was suddenly anxious to test it out, but he was still laid up, Ballard. Being treated. I was forbidden from seeing him. Was something really really wrong with him?

"We need to flip the pentagram," said Manon, "so it's like a bodywith a Head. Or one horn. There."

I watched her fill it in.

"Now look here. Magic split into Three. Houses Harcort, Coven, and Ravenseal. True, the rest of us possess magic, but the original Hiving was these three Houses, when they split.

"Flagrante." She drew the pentagram out in fire, there in the air, where it hovered before us.

"Four points, and a fifth, which is spirit, or soul," she said, pointing to where the head should be.

I looked at the SPIRIT , thinking it was the crucial pieceand mentally word-h.o.a.rded what she'd just said. If I couldn't do magic by thinking it, I would ape it instead: flagrante, I thought.

"The Fifth of Fourth is actually a reference to the five elements and how the most important one, aether, , is the one that cannot be seen. In essence, it's the magic within us," said Manon.

"You can't see air either. Unless it's smog," I said.

"But let's look at the other points first. You remember how we flipped the pentagram from two horns up, to where it became like a figure for a human being? A lot of scholars get upset that fire , which points north, ACTUALLY points south. You have to flip it, remember? So Fire is south, east Air, west Water, and the north Earth. Backwards. Like this."

"I suppose it makes sense, the closer you get to the equator the warmer it becomes. Fire is Rome."

I was quickly becoming confused. Now fire was this? It looked like Sandor's soul patch.

"Interestingly enough, look where spirit resides now," said Manon, pointing down. "Some scholars see that as a sign of impending doom, but I just see it as an earthly reference to the resting place of the dead. Which brings us to the symbol of rebirth .

"This symbol ," said Manon, "has rebirth inside a delta, which is the symbol for change. Change is of course a direct reference to lycanthropy. But specific to shape s.h.i.+fters is the idea of their animals. Cut the man and the therian shows through. The ancients used to believe that. This is where spirit comes in. The s.h.i.+fter has within him or herself a protector, or guardian spirit, called a Lare, which is the aether itself. Still with me?"

"Sort've."

"Now, repercussion holds that if the animal dies, the shape s.h.i.+fter does as well. That's not quite true. If I am a werewolf and I s.h.i.+ft and am killed, I die. If, however, my therian is cut.i.t may die, but I go on living... It's called therian exorcism and it's very deadly."

"Even when we lose our power to s.h.i.+ft, we are still connected with our sangomasunless they are cut from us," said Laurinaitis.

"We can discuss parallaxis more in depth laterfor now" said Manon, "we need to get to the Watchtowers. It used to be there were crossroads to Rome, where a man would stand, like a guard, or sentry. And these posts were called Watchtowers; and their guards, watchers. There were always Four. East was Aldebaran, south Regulus, west Antares, and north Fomalhaut. The original Watchers represented the four elements, and to this day are invoked during the ritualistic casting of magic circles. North, South, East, West. Like this: "So in a sense, the stands for Rome. But I had not heard that the Watchers were back. Who told you that your parents were Watchtowers?!" said Manon.

"Julius Pendderwenn," I said. He hadn't lied to me, had he? Manon looked skeptical.

"So far as I know the last of the Watchtowers were killed during the purges of the Last War," she said. "Your parents couldn't've been them. It was Lenoir, Halsey, the Dark Lord, and his servants, who destroyed the last Watchtowers, igniting the powder keg, which lit the war.

"Everybody died. There was a rumor a necromancer was to blame. A cult of Lenoir had sprung up. Misguided, foolish. Enamored of what he had done. What he was doing...

"He managed through charisma and craft to siphon off from the other houses certain of their up-and-comers, what he called The Fifth of Fourth. Aurelia Peril and Electra Goodiefeeder being two notables.... Some pretty bada.s.s Wiccans joined with him. Not to mention Rayven and the Grigori. He wanted outsiders, the ones who felt disenfranchised. So naturally his rhetoric found a foothold with the young.