Nightlord: Orb (15 page)

They still think I haven’t noticed.  They also don’t know Bronze is watching them.  Even if I never went out to the barn, I would still know.  She’s amused.

The Fabulous Four (my name for them) have been sneaking into my barn since before I moved in.  Under other circumstances, I might rush out and catch them in a water-gun fight, but Bronze thinks they’re fun.  That counts for a lot.  If it amuses her, it amuses me.  If they want to use the barn as a clubhouse, I’m perfectly willing to pretend I don’t know.  It’s probably more exciting for them, anyway.

What does not amuse me—well, not nearly as much, nor in the same way—is the way Edgar’s mother, Susan, keeps inviting me to social gatherings.  First it was a band fundraiser at the high school.  Edgar isn’t in high school—he’s eight—but Susan is one of those compulsive volunteers.  Then it was to come to church on Sundays.  I really have no desire to set foot inside a church, but how do I explain I’d rather not test the pyrotechnic capabilities and undead tolerances of the local god(s)?  She’s also asked if I’d like to come to Edgar’s birthday party in November.  I think I’m going to have to agree to that one.  They literally live next door.  I’ll need a real Class-A excuse—kidnapping, for example, or global thermonuclear war—to get out of that.

It’s not that I don’t like Susan.  What I dislike is her liking me so much while she’s married.  I’m old-fashioned like that; I don’t want to be chased by an irate husband with a shotgun.  But, to be fair, if a woman is going to do that sort of thing, she’s going to do that sort of thing.  If not with me, then with someone.

Wow.  That really makes me sound like an opportunistic jerk.

What I mean to say is, if she’s going to, she’s going to, and it’s not my place to judge.  I’m hoping to stay out of it; it’s a complication I don’t need.  My worry is whether or not she’ll
let
me.  Don’t misunderstand me.  Susan is nice to be around and pretty. I wonder what else she’s after, aside from the obvious.  Maybe she’s not happy at home, but maybe she’s interested in not staying there, too.

I have enough on my conscience.  Well, on the mangled ledgers I use for a conscience.

I suppose I should mention Firebrand does not share my innate dislike of probing people’s minds; that’s the only way it can communicate, really.  Firebrand reports that Susan and Larry don’t get along well.  It can’t really rummage around in their memories, but it can catch the constellation of relational concepts to what someone is thinking.

I’m not in the market for a girlfriend.  Maybe I should pretend I’m homosexual.  They seem to be pretty tolerant about that sort of thing, these days, around here, on this planet.  Well, aside from Velma.

On the other hand, I’m not in the market for a boyfriend, either, which could be even more awkward.

Science and magic are two fields where my problem-solving skills work wonders.  Human relations, not so much.  I’m going to blame that one on my nerdity, rather than monstrosity.

Thursday, October 15
th

Things were going so well.

I have a house.  I have a plan.  I have hobbies.  I feel like I have a life.

Every time I get to this point, someone comes along and screws with it.  Alien churches, foreign nations, strange gods, demonic entities—it always seems to be one damned thing after another.  Well, occasionally a blesséd thing, but you get the point.

This afternoon, I was in the barn with Bronze.  I’d just finished building a new power center for her.  One of the stalls has an Ascension Cube on it, constantly sucking in power.  Bronze, herself, has a more horse-shaped spell surrounding her, the new version, using the new alphabet, that might actually be useful.  She spends most of her time in an unenchanted stall, allowing her own spell to sustain her.  The other stall, the one with the spell, is sort of a docking station for her to charge up in a hurry if she’s running low.

I’m clever like that.  I’m also mildly paranoid when it comes to her well-being.

So I’ve finished this prototype charging arrangement and I’m scratching Bronze under the chin with my flesh-rending claws—excuse me, “fingernails”—when the hedge-doorbell goes off in the barn.  I can see the truck gate from the barn; it’s closed, so someone’s coming up the walk.  Okay.  I head for the house so I can get a head start on the front door.  I get inside, head for the front, the doorbell chimes, I open the door.

The lady on the doorstep is a bombshell.  Not literally.  What does it say about my life that I need to specify that?

Anyway, she’s hot.  Curvy in all the right places and wearing business attire that does nothing to hide the fact.  She could have walked into a courtroom as a defense attorney and made the prosecutor forget what the charges were.  Dark hair done in a weird half-long, half-short thing that hid one eye—fashion in women’s hairstyles isn’t on my short list of interests.  Big, brown eyes.  Red lips.  Sultry smile. Nearly my height in those heels.  No briefcase; nothing in her hands.  She smiled at me and toyed with one dangly earring.

“Mister Smith?” she asked.

“Yes?”

“I’m Veronica Stuart.  May I come in?”

She reminded me of Keria in some ways, from the time I met Keria in the bordello.  She was attractive, in a button-down, sexy librarian way.

Boss!

Huh?  What?

Mind trickery.  I can feel something and I think it’s reaching for your brain.

My natural suspicions came rushing back, along with a hefty helping of survival instinct and paranoia.  Things were now on a completely different footing.  All thoughts of being polite went away.  I got a firm grip on my mental state and pretended to brush my shoulders off.  The gesture helped with a generalized disruption spell.  It wasn’t much of a disruption, but in this magical environment most spells are pretty fragile.

She sized me up with an expectant air, still smiling slightly, still playing with that earring.

“No, I don’t think so.” This surprised her.  I’m not sure anyone has ever kept her standing on the porch.  “What is it you want?”

“Could we talk about your house?”

“Go ahead,” I allowed, not moving from the doorway.

“I’d rather do this inside, please,” she replied, smile dazzling.

“I’d like to know what your interest is,” I countered.  She glanced over her shoulder, back toward the street.  There was a car parked on the street with at least two men in it.  It wasn’t a cab.  It looked like an actual fuel burner—gasoline, alcohol, or hydrogen—rather than an all-electric runabout.  It’s expensive to operate a burner; there are lots of fees and taxes that go with them.

I need to rig the front gate to close on its own.  I’ll get to it.

One of the guys in the car nodded in response to her glance.  That told me they could hear us.  Whoever this Veronica Stuart was, she was wearing a wire.  It’s never good news when someone wants to interview you without telling you it’s being recorded.  My paranoia climbed a notch.

“Your house seems to have—” she began, but I held up a hand.

“Stop right there.  Your friends are listening in and, for all I know, recording.  That’s an invasion of my privacy unless you have a warrant.  Are you a law enforcement agent, and do you have a warrant?”

“They aren’t—”

“And now you’re about to lie to me,” I interrupted.  “You have ten seconds to remove whatever it is that’s relaying our conversation.  Ten.  Nine.  Eight.”

She stared at me with an expression I couldn’t read.  I made it to three before she turned around and banged out through the screen door.

I should probably get a bell for the screen door, too.  It’s a thought.

I smiled at the guys in the car, waved in a friendly fashion, and shut the door.  I heard the engine start and they drove away.  I strolled down to the front gate and closed it.

Now there was the question of the other shoe and how hard it was going to hit when it dropped.

Back inside, I put my chair next to the fireplace and put my feet up.

“Firebrand?”

Yo.

“Thanks.”

Just doing my part, Boss.

“Good work.  Any ideas about our not-exactly-guest?”

I didn’t get anything from her.

“She was close enough to hear, wasn’t she?”

Oh, yes.  I can hear people “talking” as far out as the street; not so much when they’re thinking to themselves.  But I didn’t get
anything
off her.

“Hmm.  Any idea why?”

I’m not sure.  My first guess is a spell to hide her thoughts, but around here…

“Yeah, but there was other magical manipulation going on.  I’ll keep an eye out if I see her again.”

Next time, invite her in, Boss.  Sit her down in a chair near the fireplace.  I’ll figure it out.

“I’ll see what I can do, assuming the next time doesn’t involve them burning the place to the ground.”

I’m okay with that, too.

“I’m not.”

Oh.  Right.  By the way, are you going to do anything about the Fabulous Four and the barn?

“Nope.  I’m okay with it as long as they don’t do anything destructive to themselves or the barn.”

What about Bronze?

“I doubt their ability to do anything to her even if they manage to bring the whole barn down in flaming ruin.  Besides, she can deal with anything short of high explosives without my help.”

Good point.

I had a sudden vision of Bronze eating a stick of dynamite and suddenly belching fire.  Would it work that way?  Probably not, but what would happen?  Would she enjoy a little dynamite or other explosives?  Would they be like candy, or like spices?  Fire-breathing golem biology is weird.

“Still,” I mused, “now that you mention it, I guess I should let them know I know they’re there.  They should be aware they’ll be held responsible if they break anything or burn the barn down.”

If you say so.

“Now lets get the ashes out of the fireplace and I’ll stack some more wood for you.”

I love you, Boss.

“No, you don’t.”

No, I don’t,
Firebrand admitted,
but I like you, respect you, and fear you.

“That’ll do.”

I did some cyber-shopping that afternoon.  Chemical supply houses are good about sending you pretty much anything that’s legal to own.  As a result, I have a collection of metal ingots on the way.

My thinking on the matter, after considerable cogitation, runs like this.

Magnetism can be generated by using electricity; it’s actually inevitable.  But without getting into the Pauli exclusion principle, fermions, and quantum mechanics, let’s just say that magnets are on the border between science and magic to begin with.  They could be said to alter the shape of space slightly, similarly to gravity, making it possible for materials with magnetic properties to manifest those properties.

That’s wrong, by the way, but it’s a useful way to think about it

What if some metals make “space fields” the same way iron makes a magnetic field?  Or, perhaps, could be persuaded to do so if I “magnetize” them properly with a spell?  I could warp space with an array of “warp magnets” and weaken it.  In theory, an area of weakened space would be easier to punch a hole through.  This means a gate spell would take less energy to cast. With suitable tuning, I might even be able to put a warp magnet setup on both ends and not even need a spell!  Or, more likely, it would be easy to sustain once it opened.

My other idea is that magic, itself, might be generated through a field effect.  Some fundamental field might generate magical energy the same way magnets can generate electricity.  I don’t know what that fundamental field would be, but I should be able to see the energy it produces.  If I can use magic to create that fundamental field, it would tell me something about magical energy.

Of course, I doubt an iron core will be the thing I need to make such a field.  Hence the elemental ingots I’ve ordered.  A good chunk of the periodic table is available for sale to the general public.  If even one of the solid elements can be used in such a fashion, that could be the key to building something like a generator—one to produce magical energy instead of electricity!

That would be far, far better than my spells to convert other sorts of power into magical energy.  The trick is finding something that will do it.  I’ll be trying everything I can to see if they have space-altering or magic-generating potential.  I can hardly wait to get started!

I’m going to have to wait, though, until the delivery guy shows up.  Yes, they still have delivery guys.  Apparently they only deliver something by automated drone if it’s under ten pounds and doesn’t require a signature.  Anything else still has to be handled by a human.  I’m not sure the human drives the truck, though.  The route mapping and driving might be done by computer.

With my recent visitors on my mind, I kept an eye out the back.  I really ought to install security in the barn, like a motion sensor or some cameras, or something.  Come to that, I should do more for the house, too… but, damn it, living in a fortress only goes so far!  Once it becomes obvious it’s a fortress, people treat it like one.

I need to work on blending in better, I guess.

Shortly after school, the Fabulous Four regrouped in their clubhouse—my hayloft.  They’ve been out there pretty consistently, but they started getting noisy.  I wandered out to see if I could find the reason.

I think they’re trying to be a band.  Luke plays drums—that is, he provides a beat on anything that sounds good when you hit it.  During the occasional neighborly chit-chat, I’ve been told he has a congenital nerve disorder that keeps him from hearing properly.  It doesn’t seem to bother him.  Maybe he’s on drums so he doesn’t have to follow what anyone else is doing.  He lays down a beat and everyone else sticks with it.

Edgar has an electronic keyboard and apparently knows how to play it.  I’m not surprised; Susan strikes me as the sort to make him take piano lessons at an early age.  Gary has an electric guitar that’s too big for him, but that doesn’t stop him from trying to play it.  It doesn’t make much sound because he doesn’t have anywhere to plug it in up there.  This is kind of a good thing, considering how he plays.  Patricia sings and plays the violin.  You wouldn’t think she could sing that well with a violin tucked under her chin, but she does a fantastic job of it.  She’s easily the most talented musician of the Four, followed by Edgar, then Luke, then Gary.

Yes, the deaf kid on drums is a better musician than Gary.  That tells you a lot about Gary’s musical talent.  The other Three of the Four don’t mind, which tells you a lot about the group as a whole.

Despite Gary’s fumbling, I’ve heard teenagers in a garage do far worse.  In fact, I haven’t heard many do better.  If they need a place to play and practice, I don’t have any objections to the barn.  Imagine the problems of trying to have band practice in someone’s house.  I can’t see the Four trying to have a jam session in Gary’s living room.  Considering the noise, I doubt any of their parents would be pleased.

I resolved to get some of that spray-foam insulation to cut down on the escaping noise and to run some lights up there.  They could probably use at least two power outlets, as well.  In the meantime, I unplugged the minifridge and taped the door closed; I didn’t want things falling out.  With the thing over one shoulder, I climbed up the ladder to the hayloft.  It was strong enough to hold me, being built into the structure of the front wall.

There’s another reason I loaned Larry that ladder.  It’s a long, wooden thing I could easily crush by accident.  Someday, when I do roof maintenance on the barn, I’ll need to get one of those extending aluminum jobs.  A heavy-duty one—something rated for industrial work.

Whistling, I made my way up.  When I rose into view, they fell silent and watched me.  I put down the fridge, untaped it, and draped the power cord out between the wall of the loft and the rafters of the ceiling. 

I should have brought an extension cord.  Humming the tune they were trying to play, I went back down, got the long cord, a shorter cord, a power strip, and some other materials.  Ten minutes’ work had the heavy-duty cord semi-mounted on the wall all the way to the ground.  I plugged everything in and went back up to make sure it was all working properly.