motionless as he pushed open the shop door violently and exited into the late-afternoon sun.
I locked the door behind him and flipped the OPEN sign to say CLOSED. First I gathered three pounds of yarrow, packaged it for Malina, and called a courier to come pick it up outside and deliver it as soon as possible. Then I turned off the shop lights and retreated to the Eastern Philosophy stacks, out of sight of the windows. I sat on the ground and crossed my legs underneath me, resting my hands on my knees. There I spent a good three hours laboriously updating my personal wards to defend against Kabbalistic magic-something I never thought I’d need to worry about-and also reinforcing the quick protection I’d tied to my shop’s interior wards and copying them into my exterior defenses.
There were still many unanswered questions about those two-primarily regarding their shadowy organization and how they knew anything about my activities out here-but at least I had some solid leads now. They were religious zealots out to save the world from evil as they defined it; one of them had something living on his face; and I had a very interesting knife to give to the Tempe Pack.
I strongly suspected that the rabbi would be watching my store, either to follow me home or to attempt some sort of skulduggery, so I had plans to foil him.
My shop, to all appearances, has only the single entrance. There is no back door, no fire exit, no other means of visible egress than the single glass door with a dead-bolt on it. That would never satisfy a paranoid sort like me. I needed an escape route in case something big and nasty or official arrived. In a closet marked EMPLOYEES ONLY, next to the bathroom, I had a steel-rung ladder bolted into the wall that led to a trapdoor in the roof. Said trapdoor couldn’t be opened from the outside, in both practical and magical terms. I was the only one who could budge it.
To give the rabbi the slip, I climbed the ladder with the silver knife between my teeth, pirate style, and crept out onto the roof, staying low in the early-evening shadows. I cast camouflage on myself and shed my clothes, regretting the necessity of leaving my cell phone behind. I tied one end of a piece of string around my key ring and the other end around the hilt of the knife. That done, I bound my form to the shape of a great horned owl and firmly gripped the string in my talons. I then cast camouflage on it, the keys, and the knife and lifted off, silently, invisibly, into the Tempe night. I didn’t fly straight home but rather lit high up in the branches of a large eucalyptus tree near Mitchell Park. I spent a good quarter hour just looking around to see if anything had followed me, on both the mundane and the magical planes. How the rabbi could have possibly followed an invisible bird he didn’t know to look for was beyond me, but paranoia was my standard operating procedure.
Finally satisfied, I glided home and spiraled down into my backyard, where I released the binding and returned to my human form. Oberon was very happy to see me.
‹Mr. Semerdjian’s back from the hospital,› he said. ‹We can stick it to him again when he’s feeling up to it. I hope he feels better soon.›
I cooked dinner for us, then gave Hal a call from my home phone to suggest he pick up the silver knife to aid in the investigation of Father Gregory and Rabbi Yosef. I left it on the front porch for him, the blade carefully wrapped in oilskin for his protection, then immediately began to work on shielding my house from Kabbalists. Once I finished, hours later, I felt mentally drained from the exertions of the day, but I crashed gratefully on my bed and counted myself lucky that I didn’t need to spend another night healing outside.
Chapter 17
The Morrigan tried to wake me up gently this time, but she still managed to startle me into a waking nightmare.
“Gah! Please tell me you’re not horny,” I begged, clutching the sheets and trying to hide behind a pillow.
“No,” she replied, smirking, even though she was sitting naked on the edge of my bed, raven hair falling on alabaster skin. “I have returned with the amulets.” Four black droplets of cold iron shifted with the percussive clack of rocks in the palm of her hand. “Goibhniu was quick.”
“Ah, that’s great.” I lowered the pillow and sighed in relief. “Very good. Because I don’t think I could take another day like yesterday.”
The Morrigan laughed, genuinely amused, and it did not sound remotely malicious to me. “You look well, Siodhachan. You are completely recovered.”
“Physically, yes. But you left me in an awkward position with Brighid, and you know you did.”
The goddess of death snorted. “I saw that she redecorated your kitchen.”
“She tried to kill me, Morrigan. She could have killed my hound.”
“I felt no danger for you at any time.” Her head shook slowly and a tiny smile stretched across her face.
“Will you ever feel that danger again, now that you’ve agreed not to take me?”
“Oh, yes, I know I will, because I already have. It’s coming.”
“It is? When?”
“Very soon. Today or tomorrow. You battle with shadowy figures.”
I was bemused. “That… kind of sounds like a horoscope.”
The Morrigan laughed again. She was in an extraordinarily good mood. “I suggest you perform your own divination. Soon. But for now I come bearing gifts. These three extra amulets are yours to dispose of as you wish. And there is a package of fresh sausage in the kitchen.”
“Thank you, Morrigan,” I said, taking the three amulets from her. They were teardrop shaped, with a loop at the top to string on a necklace. “Oberon’s going to love the sausage. Shall I cook breakfast for us? Are you hungry?”
“Yes, I’m rather famished. And you make such excellent omelets.”
“Okay,” I said, whipping off the bedspread and padding barefoot toward the kitchen. I had to go to the bathroom, but I was putting that off until I had the Morrigan settled. I didn’t want a repeat of what happened the last time.
Some watchdog you are, I told Oberon, who was sitting meekly by the refrigerator.
‹She scares me.›
What? I’ve never seen her in such a good mood. I gave him an affectionate scratch under the chin and got out the makings for coffee.
‹That’s what scares me. She’s never even petted me, and now she’s bringing me sausage? She wants to fatten me up for something terrible, I just know it.›
I don’t think that’s it, buddy. I think she’s happy because she feels she’s beaten Brighid somehow.
‹Well, it’s disconcerting. Wait, discombobulating. I should get a snack for that. It’s discombobulating because now I don’t know what to expect, except a snack.›
You must proceed on the expectation of good manners, both yours and hers. That is the essence of hospitality.
The Morrigan walked into the kitchen and took a seat at the table. “Good morning, Oberon,” she said with a smile.
‹Three kinds of cat shit, Atticus, she’s talking to me!›
So go over there and wag your tail. She won’t hurt you, I promise.
Oberon got to his feet, kept his head low, and wagged his tail slowly, half expecting to die.
“Oh, you’re actually coming to see me? I’m honored,” the Morrigan said. Oberon’s tail wagged a bit faster. “This is quite a feather in my cap, to be acknowledged by the great Druid’s hound,” she added. Oberon bumped his snout under her arm, flopping her hand expertly onto the back of his neck. She immediately began to pet him with a series of massaging squeezes, chuckling softly as she did so.
‹She thinks petting me is an honor,› Oberon said, his tail wagging enthusiastically now. ‹This is an unexpected position to take for a goddess of slaughter, but I applaud her defiance of convention.›
Breakfast was pleasant. The Morrigan asked for advice on what to do next with the amulet, and I advised her to wear it as a talisman for now and cast spells with it off and on to discover what difference there was. She had to discover a way to cast spells without any interference whatsoever from the iron. In the meantime, she should introduce herself to an iron elemental and give it a few faeries, asking nothing in return. Repeat as necessary until the elemental asked if it could do anything for her. “That might take years,” I warned. “It took me three years to
