Dancing, swirling flakes of snow filtered down through the grey Seattle sky on the night the ghosts began to disappear. For most of the Emerald City, the difference was not a marked one, and few noticed as they made their way through the unusual winter cold. Down busy waterfront streets, strings of twinkling lights made festive constellations in shop windows proclaiming only a week until the Christmas holiday. Families with laughing children wove their way through streets made magical by the falling snow, gentle clouds of steam puffing from their breath and cups of hot drinks they held in gloved hands. High overhead, the Space Needle lent its own phantasmal cheer to the city, wrapped in low, wispy clouds and glowing like a visitor from another world. And somewhere nearby, in the pooling shadows just outside the twinkle of fairy lights and shop signs, magic gathered in slow, pulsing patterns around a pair of men, their power making the air seem heavy and somehow ready to snap.

“Are you sure she’s here?” Came the first man, the larger of the pair, not that either were all that imposing. “We cannot be here long. Someone may notice.”

“I’ve seen her here before,” came the second, his voice high, the tone glass-sharp and nervous, “Come out, little spirit. Come out, come out, come out, come out,” he said, breathless repetitions coming quieter and faster in a manic, restless chant. He knelt and scratched at the snow with something he held in his knobbled fingers, sending up flakes and slush as his arm moved in arcs and slashing lines.

With a twitch almost as though he had been shocked, the smaller man’s hands flicked to each side, long, elegant fingers spread wide on each hand, the stick tumbling away with a clatter. His bulging blue eyes darted from place to place then snapped tight shut, his whole face becoming a tight-clenched grimace. Around him, slivers of magic churned like startled fish, tiny bursts of will lancing out into the night. The larger man took a step forward, raising a hand as if to drop it on his companion’s shoulder, then stopped. His own expression became first concerned, then melted into a smile of deep satisfaction as a grey-blue outline formed in the winter air, slowly filling in with monochrome detail.

A girl, no more than twelve, appeared in the snow, dressed in the fashions of nearly a century prior and without regard for the cold. She looked around as if startled, then an expression of confusion dulled her features as she finally turned and saw the pair. Her mouth opened, and her eyes stretched wide, but no sound came. After a long moment she began to turn, as though she would run down the darkened alley, toward a solid brick wall, but the larger man made a movement of one hand, hissed a word, and lines of power lanced through the night, webbing the ghost in delicate lines of glowing spellwork.

“The mortuary ghost,” The larger man said, slow, warm notes of appreciation in his voice, “Very well done, my friend. An old spirit for this town, and one they still tell stories about. Oh yes, she’ll do very nicely,” he finished, and raised his hand, more power gathering in the palm.

The smaller man watched, his eyes fixed on the ghost and the smile of a man doing good on his pale face. Beside him, light burst forth in the alleyway, there was a small, soft snap, and a deep, satisfied sigh.

—————

Morgan looked out her window, her fingers wrapped around a steaming mug of strong, black tea. A winter wonderland spread out below, only slightly marred by the darker tracks of cars down the city streets. City workers had erected hasty barriers in the night on some of downtown’s steeper hills, knowing that the morning commuters would only create chaos as they slid down the icy surface. Overhead, the sky was just coloring to pink and gold, promising the hard cerulean of a cloudless winter day. She took a deep breath, managed not to wince, and took a sip of her tea, delighting the feeling of warmth spreading through her chest. As she turned away from the window, feet padding on her apartment’s carpet, her phone started to buzz against a counter. She walked over, glanced at the screen, then tapped the glass to answer.

“Good morning, Mr. Tanner,” she said, taking another sip of her tea, “What an unexpected pleasure to hear from you so early.” To most, Morgan’s voice held nothing but British pleasantries, the subtle, dry tones of irony all but lost.

The man’s voice, huge even over the telephone, made a sound like a rockslide chuckling, “And good morning to you, Miss Blackwood. I trust you slept well.”

“I know of no better sleep aid than being hit by a garbage truck sliding across an icy road,” Morgan said, and ran a hand over her side. Her ribs ached, but much of the tenderness had gone.

“Excellent news,” Sol rumbled, still good-natured, “Now, Agent Blackwood, I’ve called you because as much as I know you abhor your fellow commuters of a morning, I should like your company at headquarters before lunch today. Before eight-thirty would be ideal.”

Morgan glanced up at a clock and smirked, “Surrounded by mortals and walking in the snow? There are days you test my love, Mr. Tanner.”

“I expect you love a regular paycheck more than me” Sol said, and Morgan could hear the grin, “According to Mr. Priest, we’re expecting a client around nine. He wouldn’t say what she might be bringing us-“

“Does he ever?” Morgan interrupted with a sigh.

“But he did say we may want some considerable resources. I’ve called in the others as well,” Sol finished, as though Morgan hadn’t interrupted.

Morgan looked up at a clock. Just before seven in the morning. Enough time to enjoy her tea, then prepare to trudge toward the office. At least the trip would only be twenty minutes or so, even in this slush.

“All right, Sol,” Morgan said with a sigh, “I’ll see you soon.”

“If you’re worried about the cold,” Sol said, “You should wear the coat that…oh, the botanist we worked for gave you. You remember, the one from the University? I remember how much you liked it - now that I recall, did you two ever go-“

“Goodbye, Sol,” Morgan said, and tapped the line off with a finger.

————

Priest & Hawthorne’s offices in Pioneer Square had a well-trampled lane of snow out front by the time Morgan arrived, hands shoved deep into the pockets of a long, dark blue coat. She pulled the building’s door open and made her way up two flights of creaking wooden stairs to the main office door, peeling her gloves off and undoing the coat’s belt and buttons as she climbed, each step making a solid thump on the old wood. Down a short hallway and on the left, a worn wooden door with a glass window, the investigative firm’s name marked out in crisp black and gold lettering, the same crispness she'd seen for a dozen years. Below the words, her long fingers wrapped around a brass knob polished bright by decades of hands. Morgan pushed the door open and strode in, shrugging her coat off to hang on the old wrought-iron rack by the door.

Everything in the office was old, but incredibly well-made and, in general, well cared-for. The desks were ancient things of dark wood, leather surfaces a testament to when the company had needed fountain pens and blotters. Now, of course, they held laptops and monitors, in addition to stacks of paperwork and odds and ends indicating their owners. On the ceiling, the walls, and even the office’s windows, Christmas decorations hung and sparkled in an enthusiastic chaos of paper and tinsel and colored lights, most intensely around Jacob Mcallister’s desk, with its attendant smaller desk and chair. Morgan couldn’t help but grin at that. The grin faded into a resigned smirk, however, as she looked toward her own desk, and the bright, bright red berry of a mistletoe someone had hung above it.

“I don’t suppose you’d like to tell me who did that,” Morgan said to Sol as he walked into the room.

“I strive to remain neutral in these matters, Agent Blackwood,” The big man said. He carried two cups of coffee, and handed one to Morgan with a smile.

“Mm,” Morgan replied, and took a sip. Dark, rich, and sweet, just as she liked, “And have the others arrived?”

“They’ll be along shortly, I have no doubt. We’ll likely be meeting in the conference room,” Sol said, gesturing to a door on the far side of the room, which held the firm’s only large table.

“And are we still in the dark about what this case is about?” Morgan said, as the sound of footsteps came from the staircase outside, another employee arriving.

“Ah,” Sol said, taking a drink from his own coffee, “Our client called shortly before you arrived. A most curious situation.” He took another sip, his eyes twinkling.

“Did she indeed?” Morgan said, locking eyes with the big man, “And what did she say?”

Sol met Morgan’s eyes for a couple of moments, then broke that contact and looked at his coffee cup, swirling the liquid around, the movement thoughtful, contemplative. At length, he looked back up.

“She says she’s lost her sister’s ghost,” he said.

The foreboding notes of Beethoven’s fifth rang out across the large bedroom. Emma groaned in the darkness, reluctant to abandon her warm fortress of blankets. The bars rang out again: da-da-da-dum. Damnit, it was the office. A slender arm snaked from beneath the covers to seize the smartphone that lay on the side table. Bracing herself, she clicked it on, recoiling a little from the light the screen cast of. A text alert pulsed.

Goodmorning Professor. Your presence is required at the office at your earliest convenience. If you are unable to comply please call us.

‘Earliest convenience’ in PHI speak wasn’t emergency, but it was close enough to ‘now’ that Emma slid out of bed and started across her apartment. The air was frigid, years in California had made her nostalgic for the alpine air of her homeland so she had taken to leaving the windows open a crack and piling the blankets on when she slept.

Gathering a soft bathrobe around her naked body she pushed the windows closed and, with a jaw cracking yawn, pressed a wasteful plastic keurig container into her coffee machine. She had been out late the previous night with Brad, a sociology professor she had known briefly before he moved to Seattle. Just as Morgan had predicted, it had not gone well. She wouldn’t see him again. It had however, meant that she hadn't gotten to bed until quite late. Or quite early.

Humming a Christmas carol to herself she shuffled into the shower and ran the water as hot as she could stand for several minutes, enjoying the sensation. Emerging from the shower she dressed quickly in a charcoal business suit with a white button up shirt. She ran a brush through her blond hair but decided against pinning it up in her traditional bun. Finishing the ensemble she donned long, black, leather boots, the better to navigate snowy sidewalks. She tucked more practical business shoes into her handbag for when she reached the office.

At last, and with some reluctance, she went back into her bedroom. Sliding open the drawer in her side table she took the compact, semiautomatic pistol and checked the safety, just as Jacob Mcallister had shown her. A concealed carry license had been among the papers she had been given when she arrived in Seattle, despite the fact she had never so much as handled a gun before. The range in the basement of PHI had given her at least a little familiarity. She stuffed the black pistol into her purse, collected her coffee and headed out the door.

The walk was a pleasant one, American Christmas was garish, loud and commercial but there was an underlying cheer to people that was quite invigorating. Only the Sky Needle spoiled the pleasant effect. It put her in mind of the darker German Farie tales. A skeletal finger busting from the earth reach for the living above and snatch them down into the earth. She pulled her scarf a little tighter.

Arriving at the building she left her fleece lined jacket in the oak paneled coat room and headed into the office proper. The old world sensibility of the place immediately put her at ease as always. The smell of leather and carefully oiled furniture mingled with the subtle scent of running computers in a seamless melange of the old and the new. Decorations hung in random profusion, according to each employees want. Her desk sat in a back corner of the office. A simple placard reading ‘Stern’ and a sleek Toshiba laptop were it's only adornments. She caught movement near the conference room and headed over.

“Good morning Morgan,” she called as she saw the other woman. Morgan disturbed Emma. It was more than just her beauty, there was something unnatural to her. Sometimes when Morgan entered a room Emma would get a strange taste in her mouth, something vaguely reticent of burning electrical insulation but not that strong. She had considered asking some other Hexen about it, the few she knew, but that seemed and invasion of Morgan's privacy. Also she was fairly sure there was a non disclosure agreement somewhere in the mountain of papers she had signed.

The room was mostly dark, save for the streaks of white, snow reflected sunlight that cut into the otherwise gray room, illuminating the messy contents within. In the center was a queen sized bed, with space for two, though there was only one figure hidden beneath the covers. Around the bed, the room was slightly messy, a pair of slacks hung over the foot of the bed and a pair of dress shoes sat haphazardly by the closet. On top of the nightstand sat a digital alarm clock, its green digits one of the only visible sources of color in the room. The clock read just before seven, the bottom portion of the numbers partially obscured by a block of black plastic, metal, and glass.

The aforementioned black block of solid material had been buzzing steadily for several minutes now, and only as the clock read 7:00 did the figure in the bed begin to stir. Out from under the covers came an arm, a small band of gold shimmering as it passed through the sparse rays of sunlight. The arm swatted blindly at the hunk of plastic, fingers fumbling as they wrapped around the little device. Pulling the phone back under the covers, Jacob didn't even bother opening his eyes as he answered the phone.

"Hullo?" He said in a thick voice, filled with drowsiness.

"There you are, Jacob. I hope I'm not interrupting anything." came the warm bass of Solomon Tanner's voice.

"I'm just trying to regain some of my sanity before the next case." Jacob replied tiredly, though at this point he had thrown the covers off of his body. He and Tanner were on good terms, but Tanner never called for casual conversation, especially not this early in the morning.

"Well Mr. Mcalister, I hope you've regained a sufficient degree of sanity, because we have a big one today, and I'm going to need you to come in today a little bit earlier than usual." Sol replied pleasantly, causing Jacob to give a small groan. "I hope thats not too rough on your daughter- she is coming to visit today, isn't she? The whole office is quite excited. Shiloh has already set apart a few hours of her schedule..."

"Yes," Jacob sighed, "She's coming."

Jacob had no idea why he had agreed to such a proposition. Tanner made the offer a few weeks ago, since Jacob was stuck working- even through most of the Christmas season, Tanner thought it'd be a good idea to bring Amanda into the office during her winter break. That way, she wouldn't have to spend the entire break by herself, waiting for her father to come home late at night and immediately fall asleep. By bringing her to the office, there was always someone to at least keep an eye on her, and she would invariably be able to keep herself entertained with something in the office. Shiloh had even offered to help Amanda with her studies and homework over the break- which surprised Jacob greatly, Shiloh was never someone to offer services.

On the other hand, Jacob didn't like involving his daughter with his work, it wasn't something that she could- or should, be talking about in school, and his job wasn't always safe either. Tanner however, argued that his daughter was safest at the office, where there was close to a dozen armed paranormal agents sitting in there at any one time. Most of the arguments Jacob could come up with, were easily countered by the confounded reasoning of Solomon or one of the other agents, and admittedly it was mostly Jacob's bull-like stubbornness that prevented him from readily taking his daughter to work.

"Ah, excellent. I shall see you and your daughter soon." Tanner said in a upbeat manner before the two exchanged their goodbyes and hung up.

Jacob quickly dressed himself in one of his work suits- a dark steel blue one with a white shirt and black tie. Running a brush a grand total of twice through his hair, Jacob pulled on a pair of brown leather shoes, and pulled his leather shoulder holster over his shirt. Unlocking a strongbox on his dresser, Jacob slid his pistol- black with a titanium plated slide, into his right shoulder, and his two spare magazines into his left. He threw his jacket over his shoulder and proceeded out of the bedroom.

Jacob walked into the kitchen to find his daughter already up and about, walking happily around the kitchen- the happiest she had been in a long time, Jacob noted. She was clearly more excited with the prospect of visiting the PHI offices than he was, and had woken up extremely early to cook breakfast, to expedite the amount of time they'd have to spend at home before they left.

"Hi daddy! Amanda exclaimed excitedly as she offered him a plate full with food. Jacob blinked a couple times. His daughter took after her mother in that both of them were quite bad with food. The food was lukewarm- Amanda had woken up at around 6, and had finished cooking by 6:30, leaving the food to cool down in the hour Jacob had spent waking up and getting dressed. The toast was overcooked, and the sunny-side up eggs weren't cooked enough, but Jacob swallowed them anyway at the risk of ruining his daughter's good mood so early in the morning.

Three cups of strong coffee later, the small Mcalister family was out of the apartment, their breaths visible as they walked through the white streets; large, calloused hand in smaller, fleshy one. It was a bit of an odd sight, a tall, gaunt man with a suit and overcoat holding the hand of a little girl in a fluffy white jacket and a Scooby-Doo backpack. Like her father, the small girl had piercing gray eyes, but like her mother, she had a round, soft face, and a head of dirty blonde hair- wavy locks that fell just below her shoulder. She also seemed to share her father's capable memory, as she knew the way to PHI offices almost better than he did, and she had only been there twice before.

Half walking, half dragged into the office by his overexcited daughter, Jacob was greeted by the dark browns and warm hues of the office that he so preferred over the minimalist white, gray, and manilla of the general cityscape. Only pausing to pull off her coat, Amanda immediately bounded into the office, leaving Jacob to hang his coat along with his daughter's on a pair of coat hooks.

The relative quiet of the office was replaced with the soft, but obviously happy giggling of Amanda Mcalister as she walked around the mostly empty office, several of the other agents and staff cracking smiles to say hi to the little girl. Regrouping with his daughter at his desk, Jacob found his desk exactly how he left it, the brass placard reading "J. Mcalister" at the head of it, with an HP laptop, in the center, and several stacks of paperwork sitting here and there. Looking up he noticed, with a sigh of resignation, an abundance of Christmas decorations concentrated just off to the side of his desk, where another, small desk sat.

Unlike the rest of the office's old furniture, this desk was new, a light pine color, and likely of IKEA brand. On top of it sat a pink cup with fresh pencils and colored pencils in it, and at the head of this desk, a placard made of white plastic sat at the head. It read "A. Mcalister." Amanda dropped her backpack at the foot of her "desk", and sat in it, adjusting her placard and straightening her back, tilting her head upwards a bit.

"I'm ready for my first case." Amanda announced, in what she likely believed was an office-like voice.

"Very professional dear." Jacob replied, humoring her. He looked over and saw Morgan and Tanner conversing near the conference room. Ms. Stern had also arrived. It would appear that Jacob wasn't the only one they needed for the job.

"Alright, I'm going to go over and talk to Mr. Tanner now," Jacob said to his daughter, "Why don't you sit here until Ms. Grey shows up, okay?" His daughter sighed but nodded, and Jacob walked in the direction of his coworkers. Several moments later, his daughter quietly slipped out of her seat and began following him.

"Tanner." Jacob said, as a manner of greeting, "Morgan, Em." he added, nodding to the other two.

"I see I'm not the only one you dragged into this, Sol."

"Good morning and merrryyyyy Christmas to all of.." Radio stated before Robert slammed his alarm clock. Some days he enjoyed himself a tune or two before rising, but last days had been nothing but Christmas carols. He didn't hate them, but it wasn't what he enjoyed listening at in the mornings in his single bed. Robert had been single for two years since the last half year affair. He tried, but the job took it's toll. Or his women, rather.

His apartment was quite decent, with 700 square feet to fill with living room with small place cut for his bed, kitchen and separated shower and toilet. Like most mornings, Rob made an omelet and let it cool down while he took a shower. This morning he took extra time to shave his beard, and a rare ten seconds to look at himself in the mirror. The man from Minnesota no longer had the dark brown hair. Neither was his face rock solid but instead softened with the wrinkles. And the fire from his eyes had dimmed to some degree, no longer the piercing look nor the tough guy ten ears ago, but a tired man despite swimming and exercising several times a week.

He shook his head and dressed up at his wardrobe. Woolen trousers tad more thick that he usually wore, white shirt and brown vest to complete the look. He examined himself from the mirror attached to the inner side of the wardrobe's door before facing the cooled down omelet. He ate his breakfast while checking the day's news on his laptop. Then the E-mail from Sol, which said there was a new case. Which basically translated into that he couldn't come too late to the job. Not that he did usually, but some of these dark mornings were harder than others. Especially in winter.

After finishing the omelet Robert started to make his leave. He put on his winter jacket - A long black woolen jacket- and his fedora with ear warmers underneath before leaving to the PHI. He felt the top-break revolver against his hip in the holster and few moon clips in jacket's pocket. Not the most efficient model around, but it had served him a good twenty years; Only his bullets had changed to silver ones with PHI. Robert made one last look into the apartment as afraid to never see it again before he closed the door.

Weather had been worse that he thought, though the travel to the office was always quick one. Robert opened the doors leading to the office. It wasn't a normal sight, it was Christmas. Decorations were all over the place; A small Christmas tree had appeared on his own table and Jacob's workplace could have been from Santa's house. Morgan, Sol, Jacob and Emma had already came to the office, Jacob with her daughter to cheer things up at the place. He wondered who else were invited to solve the new case. He passed the mornings and made his way to rack, where he left his fedora, ear warmers and his jacket.

Robert liked the ancient building. It was one thing older than him, never changing, always welcoming Robert every morning. Even the iron racket was putting good mood on Robert's mind, always keeping his jackets. Even if computers and laptops and coffee machines were on the shelves, underneath it was the bricks and planks laid down decades ago.

Huddled in one of the chairs in the conference room, Mandy stirred.

It didn’t take long for her to wake; she hadn’t allowed herself to fall truly asleep. Just a preemptive catnap to prepare herself for the very likely event that today’s case would prevent her from her usual midday siesta. Mandy unfolded her legs, hoping the creases in her dark gray slacks weren’t too obvious, and pushed her long bangs from her eyes, smoothing a hand over her low ponytail to make sure it wasn’t too disheveled.

Sol had called at six o’clock—calling her first because, in his words, she was both the person most likely to be up that early and the one least likely to bite his head off. He’d been right, of course; he’d caught her near the beginning of one of her “awake” periods, just finishing off a homemade omelet and still trying to figure out what to do with the rest of her morning. Taking his mention of a client meeting for the gentle hint that it was, she’d immediately exchanged her jeans and cotton tunic for something slightly more work-appropriate and less likely to get her marked as the office intern. She’d been ready to go by six-ten, beat the rush-hour traffic that, if not avoided, could more than double her commute, and made it to the office by six-thirty.

Mandy raised her arms over her head and gave a languorous stretch, glancing at the clock as she did so. If she focused, she could hear the faint sounds of low conversation from the next room; if she were going to hazard a guess, she’d bet that the majority of her coworkers had arrived by now, if not all of them.

Could go and say hi, she thought, wondering if the voice in her head was Sol’s or her own. It didn’t really matter who was speaking, because even as she thought it, she reached for the half-completed crossword puzzle on the table next to her. She didn’t like to draw attention; she would much rather be the first person in a room than the last, hence her near-perpetual earliness. If she was going to make the first move in a social setting, she preferred to do so one-on-one, or to skirt the edges, if there was a group.

Which wasn’t to say that she didn’t make her own attempts at being social. She’d gotten there too early to play coffee fairy that day, especially not knowing who exactly would be called in, but she’d substituted that offering with another: down at the opposite end of the table, nearest the door, sat a lone box, containing a dozen donuts of all kinds. The box was as far from her as it could be—as if it had just appeared on its own, and she was just an innocent bystander, so caught up in her crossword puzzle that she hadn’t even noticed its appearance.

It was a ridiculous, circular way of making friends, especially by human standards. But she’d only been with PHI a scant six months.

Really, she thought she’d already made a lot of progress.

Other people came into the building that housed Priest & Hawthorne’s offices, and Morgan felt every one of them, each a tickle in the back of her mind. On the street, passers-by each left a feather-soft caress on her awareness, while those nearer - not only in proximity, but in other sorts of intimacy - pressed against her otherworldly senses more intensely. Part of her felt each mind as a tiny constellation of desires, bright sparks she need only let her breath brush against to build into brilliant flame. Every one with their own beguiling temptation, a tantalizing morsel that she knew she had to ignore. So Morgan felt each quiet touch, and she dismissed them from her mind in their turn. For her, and for now, there really could be no other choice.

Morgan turned as the first of the other investigators came in, her bright eyes smiling at their corners. Punctual, as always, came the Professor, her hair down, her eyes with dark hollows beneath and wearing a clean, pressed outfit. A long night then, but one in her own home. There were times that Morgan didn’t care to be right - if the woman wanted to date, she deserved more than disappointment and an empty bed. She nodded back to Em’s greeting, taking another sip for her coffee, saw the way the other woman’s spine stiffened, even if she didn’t mean to. Some day, they would have to talk, and Morgan might have to tell uncomfortable truths. But not today.

Jacob came next, and Morgan needed no special intuition to see the marks of how the man’s life revolved around his daughter. Morgan liked the girl, Amanda, and found a vicarious thrill in the childish exuberance she herself had never known. As for the elder Mcalister, Morgan could smell burned tobacco with just a hint of liquor around the man, the miasma of a man slowly losing himself. She wished he would talk to someone, spend time away from the office, away from darkness and chases and silver bullets in the night. Maybe Mcalister wished the same thing. Maybe-

As Morgan pulled in a breath to answer Jacob, the door banged open again. Robert Miller, another former member of law enforcement, and someone she did not get along with. His easy charm had run around against her, and despite occasional attempts from both sides, the two would barely pass a dozen words in a given week. She respected his talents, and she had never found a surveillance bug in her car or desk, which either meant he was better than she thought or he had the courtesy to at least keep that professional distance. Still, she saw something she didn’t like in Robert’s eye when he thought she wasn’t looking.

Finally, the faerie girl. Or, half-faerie, anyway, her mind a swirl of subtly alien desire and excitement. She liked the girl, Mandy, the firm’s most recent addition. People tended not to come to PHI often, (and more than a few left in ways they had never thought of), and new faces always made Morgan smile. The fact that being in room with her could be like a subtle, spicy drug - if she allowed herself - was only more lovely. Mandy had proven herself to be a very useful young woman, as well - but Morgan felt that some of Shiloh’s brassiness would do well to rub off on her.

“Ah,” Sol said, his dark eyes roving over the group, “Excellent, and all on time. Even Miss Blackwood, which I must say is likely some kind of miracle. As we are also blessed with a new client this morning, I would ask that you all take your seats at the conference table, as I expect she will be here,” and the front door rattled at a quiet knock, “presently.”

——

There’s no such thing as beautiful grief. The woman at PHI’s conference table sat, her legs curled underneath her, back bent, eyes rimmed with reddish-pink, a tear stain still marking one lens of her glasses, making her look ten years older than her apparent early-twenties. She sniffled as she sat, her clothes rumpled, and wore a sweater several sizes too large with “University of Washington” on the chest. Her eyes were green, shocking, vibrantly green, and even behind her several-days-unwashed red-blonde hair and rimed glasses, they stood out like electric jewels as she looked from face to face around the table.

“Good morning, everyone,” Tanner said as he sat down himself, “This is Catherine Baker, from Capitol Hill. Miss Baker, would you care to share why you’re here?”

“Um,” the woman said, “Most people call me Cat.” Her hands slipped out the sleeves of her sweater and light glinted off the edges of a familiar gold-edged business card. She started fidgeting with the card, flipping it around, scratching at the gold before pressing it down on the table, pushing the little cardboard square away from her with nervous fingers. She took a deep and shaky breath.

“Um,” she started again, “So, um…I know this sounds kind of crazy but…I…I see ghosts. Sometimes. Like around some of the old parts of town usually.” She glared around the table, as if daring someone to contradict her, “And sometimes I can talk to them. Sometimes they tell me what they want, usually they just ignore me. Um.” She fidgeted again, stopped herself, “And I had a sister. And…”

Cat paused, her eyes squeezing shut. She took a few shallow breaths, quick and forced, “And…and she died. A little while ago. We…well, she really went missing and the police never said but…” She sniffled, “But then she showed up, when I was at her old apartment, cleaning it out. Weeks later. And I couldn’t tell anyone, and after a little while I didn’t want to. She could hear me, and sometimes even talked back. Slow words, and sometimes they made sense. Not always though.” She sniffled again.

“And later we had a funeral and she was there, and I went back to my apartment and after a while, she came there too. Like she was following me. Like she had something she wanted to say,” Cat’s voice trailed off, and those brilliant green eyes wandered the room at random before she spoke again, “I never found out what, though. And after a while I just liked having her nearby - or part of her, anyway. She smiled when I put up the shitty Christmas tree I have, and I’d never seen her smile before. And I could tell, I could tell that she was going to say something important when…when…”

Sol reached one shovel-sized hand over to the girl, settled it on her shoulder with an improbable gentleness, and Cat started to sob. Quietly, but with heavy tears falling down her face. She squeezed her eyes shut, then rubbed at her eyes under her glasses, leaving them slightly askew on her nose when she looked back up.

“Then I…she…something felt wrong,” Cat said, her voice a whisper, “All…tight, like the air was too close all the sudden? And my sister - her ghost - she looked frightened, and it was the first time I’d ever seen her that way, scared, you know? And then…like, pieces of her started peeling off, like she was just paper being torn up, disappearing. And she looked so scared, and I couldn’t stop it, and I couldn’t hear what she was saying and then…then she was gone. Just….like she was never there. And the tight…the close feeling went with her. Like nothing ever happened Like she was never there.”

Cat looked down at the table, scrubbing tears out of her eyes agains with the back of her hand. She took first one breath, then another, each one a little more steady than the last.

“Um,” she said after a long moment, “I want to know what happened. I want to know who did this. My sister…she looked like she was in pain but,” she paused, “…that doesn’t make any sense. I think…I think whatever happened is…bad. And I think…maybe she’s not the only one. When I walk around the city now, I don’t see as many ghosts as I used to. But I feel…holes, in the world, sort of. Like empty places. Places there should be something, but now there isn’t.”

She looked up, looking again at each of the agents, her eyes wet and shining. “Are you…do you think I’m crazy? Do you believe me? I’ve heard of…of sort of a firm that takes weird cases, like with monsters and werewolves and…” She sniffled, “And then I got the card and a phone number and…um. I guess…now I’m here.”

Emmaline was considering a second delicious donut by the time Miss Baker, Cat, finished recounting her tale. Catherine Baker; a name from her own lips. Names were not necessary for someone of Emma’s particular talents but they did make life significantly easier. The bundle of thoughts and emotion that referred to itself as Catherine Baker was a much better target for a magical working than ‘that woman with the blond hair’. She had heard that some soldiers came to identify with their serial numbers to such a degree that you could just use the number. The mathematician in her thrilled to that idea for a moment and then she pushed the thought away as an idle one.

As Cat spoke she had made notes in a small neat notepad with PHI monographed on the top. The possibility that Robert wasn’t recording this was so slight that she didn’t bother trying to take down particular details, rather she focused on impressions. In neat german she wrote: Irish, Sensitive, Local, Recent Death, Unaware.

For obvious reasons, a lot of people of Celtic ancestry possessed minor magical ability, even those several generations removed from their homeland. The girl was clearly a sensitive to the spirit world. Many people got the occasional glimpse of a shade in the first few weeks after a death, a familiar face in the crowd, the expectation of seeing the deceased but they erroneously put it down to the effects of grief. Some people like Cat took the talent a little further.
A haunting shouldn’t just vanish, particularly not a sibling. Blood relationships and shared experiences made familial hauntings particularly strong. Even with a relatively meager talent, a shade shouldn't’ just vanish overnight, and certainly not in mid speech with a queasy wash of energy. It is the kind of thing that ought to slowly fade over time as the spirit drifted further from this plane and towards wherever it was spirits went. What sort of working might banish a spirit? An exorcism of some sort? It seemed hard to credit that an elaborate ritual had taken place nearby without Cat noticing it. Emma clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth.

Looking up from her notes she noticed they were looking at her. A sudden rush of embarrassment hit her, she hoped the woman didn’t think skeptically dismissing her. She cleared her throat.

“We don't think you are crazy frau… err Miss Baker, far from it,” Emma began soothingly. Sol nodded to her in the corner of her eye encouraging her to continue.

“At PHI we keep an open mind and we accept the fact that our clients know themselves better than we can hope to. If you say it is so, then we shall proceed under the assumption that it is. Many of us have seen strange things and we have an appreciation of the strange that many others lack. You made the right decision in coming to us.” Sol nodded his approval.

Cat seemed to relax, clearly she had been worried that they would laugh at her story. It took courage to come forward with something like this and Cat evidently had that.

“After we are done here Miss Baker, I’d like you to cast your mind back to the day your sister’s spirit vanished. Odd coincidences, strange tastes that sort of thing, anything that struck you as unusual but not important. It may prove helpful to us.” Emma put on her collegiate smile and turned her head to indicate that she didn’t have any further questions at this time. Her eyes cut to the box of nearly finished donuts as she waited for attention to pass to the next staff member.

Mandy took a breath. She was familiar with all of the aspects of grief: the sound of it, screamingly loud or soft and subdued; the look of it, all wasting sickness or puffy eyes; the shape of it inside her own chest—something separate and foreign, but impossible to remove.

But the worst part was the smell.

The thick, heavy scent of tears had permeated the rooms in an old, oddball orphanage full of children who didn’t want anyone to know when they cried in the dark. It soaked into the sheets and clotted in the air. If you were the sort of child who could sense such things, you ignored them out of courtesy. But there was no hiding Cat’s tears—not her noisy sniffles or her red-rimmed eyes, or the way she wore her grief like her sweatshirt: something heavy and too large, hanging limply from her shoulders.

Almost as soon as Emmaline started speaking, Mandy got to her feet—not because she wasn’t interested in what the woman had to say, but because it was most likely to hold everyone’s attention. Emmaline’s elegantly clipped accent made her sound calm and capable, its edges softened, but still distinct. It was a very reassuring voice, and Mandy liked that about her.

She slipped unobtrusively from the room and ghosted back in a few moments later, pausing behind Cat’s chair to set something at the woman’s elbow.

A glass of water wasn’t much, as gifts went, but Mandy didn’t know the woman well enough to do more. And she did know this much: it was nearly impossible to drink something and cry at the same time.

She resumed her seat just as Emmaline finished, flitting a glance around the table before dropping her eyes, waiting for the next person to speak.

This woman's eyes shine like an emerald was the first thought Rob had in mind as he saw the woman who could have been called a geek. Big sweater, glasses and unwashed reddish blond hair made her look disoriented, confused or unfocused to the present day. Maybe she was shy at University of Washington (Judging by her sweater) and definitely uncertain or anxious at the PHI office. Though to be fair, few encountered supernatural and dared to tell the story. Fewer would think someone would believe and help them. For a lot of people these things were the most amazing thing in their life.

Just another Wednesday for people at Priest & Hawthorne Investigations.

Robert was writing Catherine’s tale on his Laptop, with occasional question written on his personal note book. On the right side of the laptop there was a wired mouse and steaming cup of coffee (black as the night sky with spoon of sugar to cut the bitterness). On the left side there was a tissue and on top of it a doughnut. Some kind soul had brought the sweeties very close to the racket. And as Robert was early enough, there were plenty of them left. Small things that made this job a bit happier. Just like the coffee's someone brought to his place at time to time. He didn't know who appreciated his work enough to give these small presents (or perhaps a crush?), but he had decided to not be vocal about it.

Robert took a break from writing to sip coffee. Emmaline, the professor with quite a career for 28 years old had started to calm down the witness (or client, depending if you're looking for a case or a job). A teacher and a student. Magician and medium. Who knows what more the two could have in common… Mandy had also been kind enough to bring some water to Catherine. She should see she was with professionals and in a friendly environment and calm down so she could focus. Sooner the conversation was over, sooner this group could start working with the case.

Robert grabbed a doughnut and took a bite out of it to chew upon. As Emma was bringing the witness back to the day of disappearance, Robert let his mind wonder. Ghost peeling away from reality. According to Catherine, she wasn’t the only one. Her skill to sense and see ghosts was interesting and most probably of use in this case. Robert wasn’t all into helping ghosts unless it stopped some haunting, but this was more like finding a missing person. When one goes missing, the uncertainty of their fate makes related people miserable. So he’d gladly do this job and give Catherine some relief. Besides, finding people was Robert’s specialty.

Robert swallowed the sweet, sweet doughnut and straightened up on his chair, pulling his brown vest downwards. A quick look with solemn face at Jacob. His daughter had been at PHI two times already (quite opposite of his father at the other time Rob had seen her) and Rob wondered whether he'd prefer Jacob on the field or spending time with his daughter and searching for information here at the office. It was Christmas, after all. He was hard working, but at times he wondered if the cost was too much for him and his daughter.

But it wasn't Robert's affair. So he turned his head at Catherine. "As professor Stern said. Let us return back to the day of disappearance... It happened at your home, if I understood right?"

Cat’s bright green eyes darted around the room as each investigator spoke, but the tight lines at their corners relaxed a little as Emmaline spoke. She reached out and took hold of the water Mandy offered, her hand shaking as her fingers wrapped around the cool glass, and she spilled a little as she took a sip. She closed her eyes and took a long moment to swallow, and as Robert spoke his words seemed to wash over her, perhaps even through her, until her throat moved and she opened her eyes again.

“Um,” she said, “I…mean, you guys really believe…?” She shook her head, and looked down at the table, “…Okay. The day she disappeared? Um, do you mean the first time? Because that wasn’t at my apartment, that was…well, we don’t actually know, they found her car out in Bremerton and…oh.” Cat shook her head, scrubbed at her eyes again, “Sorry, sorry. Of course that’s not what you mean.” She took a deep breath, steadied herself, and continued.

“I was putting up the Christmas tree in my apartment, just last night,” she said, “I’d gone out and bought some new Christmas lights because I actually have a little money this year, and I wanted some ones with colour. My tree is this old, crappy one that I got from our parents, all blue aluminum and plastic, from the 60s or 70s, you know? But I like it, and I remember that my sister would always come help me set the stupid thing up. And this year she was there too, but just…she sort of sometimes was standing by me, or sitting on the couch. Her ghost, I mean. I never saw her move, she’d just sort of…fade from one place, fade to another.”

Cat looked down into the water she’d spilled on the conference table, dipped her finger in and fidgeted as she continued, “And the fading got quicker and quicker, like she was…agitated. And I heard…well, not heard, but like how I hear ghosts, you know? I heard this sort of…sound. Like a far-off wail, or a…I don’t know.” She made a fist with her fidgeting hand, tapped her fist on the table, “I”m not explaining this right. But definitely like a sound, or something. Not very long after that, my sister…her ghost…well. I told you all that.” She sniffled.

“The only weird thing other than that was when I came in, there were a couple of men in the alley by my building, by where the fuse boxes are. I didn’t think it was that weird because my building has really crappy power and they’re always replacing breakers down there. When they left, I saw one of them drop something, and I thought it might have been a tool, so I went down there and looked around, but all I could find was this sort of…it was kind of like a carved stick, or something. Like one of those cheesy things you get down at the ghost-hunting tours for dowsing or whatever. I think I still have it, hang on…”

The woman reached down to a bag, rummaged around inside and withdrew something long and slender. Her hands still trembling, she set the object on the table - a tapered wooden rod, or wand, a little more than a foot long, and about as big around as two of Cat’s fingers. Both ends were ragged and torn, one end flared, twisted and shredded as though the rod had been a branch torn, rather than cut, from a still-living tree. The narrower end looked just as ragged, green fibers having been ground and twisted until they came apart, leaving the rod at whatever length the maker apparently desired. Symbols, sigils, runes and other marks were etched into pale bark, the marks ragged and rough, as though they’d been made in a great hurry by someone who either didn’t have the right tools, or didn’t know what they were. A dark mark near a particularly wide pair of lines suggested that they might even have been made by fingernails, left bloody by the results.

To those with magical senses, the object pulsed, gently, with the remnant of some kind of power - the mystical equivalent of the smell of an expended cartridge.

Morgan sat up as Cat produced the rod and leaned forward, her crystalline eyes intent on the length of wood. She took a deep breath in through her nose, breathed out slowly. Her fingers rippled along the table, and the woman closed her eyes for a moment. She shivered, almost too subtly to notice, then opened her eyes, only to find Cat looking at her.

“Are…are you okay?” Cat said, her electric-green eyes locked on Morgan.

“Just a chill,” Morgan replied, with a small smile, “You’ve been very helpful, Miss Baker, though I suspect some of my colleagues will have their own questions. I’ll content myself to wait for them, for the moment.”

Click cli-click click
Fading agitated… Wailing… After that, disappearance… Small details. Perhaps important. And then she came to the jackpot. Couple of men at the alleyway, close to a fuse box… They had dropped some peculiar staff. Filled with runes and carvings like some decorated lucky amulet from gypsy or Native American. Judging by the reaction of those… Magically attuned around the table, there was something peculiar about the staff. Robert wasn’t a doctor of mathematics like Emma, but even he could sum two and two together. At least it was promising. A lead the Priest and Hawthorne investigators could follow.

Click cli-click click
Suggesting that the men at fuse box were behind the incident, several questions came with the assumption. Who were the men? Why they kidnapped the ghost? How exactly they did it? And how did they know about the ghost? How many people were involved with the kidnapping? This lead could be quite hot to handle, they definitely needed more information. Someone to inspect the archives about the staff and possible similar cases. Other people to inspect the crime scene. Cameras from local stores or companies. Witnesses, either those living on the building or on the street. Morgan could touch the staff to see if she found out anything relevant.

There was also the unlikely chance that Catherine was making an act. Perhaps the staff was hers, perhaps the ghost disappeared by accident and they were going for a wild goose chase. It was unlikely assumption even in Robert's mind and nobody was that good of an actor anyway. But just in case, Robert would want to check her background. Information about the witness and her family. Could light her abilities and thing or two about sister too.

At any case, it was good that there were 5 of them with pistols against the possible ghostnappers with at least 3 of them – Jacob, Morgan and Rob himself- knowing how to use them effectively. Emma and Jacob knew also knew some magic in case the opposition had some of that accursed magic too. With variety of unknown factors the diversity of skills at their disposal was their strength.

Click cli-click clack

Robert rose his sight to meet Catherine. ”Alright then. Catherine, I wish you relax yourself a little and think back. Can you describe the persons who dropped this... Peculiar rod?” Robert asked with his caffeine-refreshed voice. ”Anything that struck out? Did you see any vehicle as they were leaving or could you hear them talking anything? Names, locations...” Robert tried to lead her thoughts, looking into the two wet emeralds that were her eyes.

Amanda's lip curled before she could stop it, a reflexive, unconscious gesture that briefly bared her teeth. Even she could sense the whisper of wrongness coming off of the rod, and she couldn't imagine what her mother, with her stronger blood, might have been able to get off of it. It was hard to tell how much of her reaction was to the rod itself and how much was a response to knowing what it could do.

Her mind caught on something Robert said, near the end. Something more useful than a million questions, even intelligent ones. Locations. It was probably already on the agenda, but it couldn’t hurt to bring it up...

She glanced up and around the table without quite addressing anyone in particular, one hand fiddling with the sleeve of her cream-colored sweater. "If we could go back to the location, some of us here might be able to get more than just physical evidence.” Not her, probably, but some of them. Mandy’s eyes drifted back to the potential weapon on the table, and she was torn between an urge to scoot further away and an almost overwhelming desire to touch it. To pick it up and turn it over in her hands like just another piece in one of her puzzles.

Curiosity killed the cat, she reminded herself, and suppressed an unhappy smile at the memory of more than one former guardian saying the same thing. She was only half human, after all, and caith sidhe had a reputation for going out and prodding things that probably shouldn't be prodded.

Magic wasn't a term that Emma particularly liked. It was too loaded, too many cultural assumptions, to many Disney movies and bad fantasy novels, too many games of Dungeons and Dragons. Yet here she was, looking at what what was unquestionably a magic wand. An athamae. With quick firm strokes she began sketching the thing on her notepad, capturing the runes, rendering the shadows with the edge of her pencil. Magic was about directing the will, the more precisely focused an idea, the better the result. That was why ritual magic required things like wands, circles, repetitive chanting. Emma was able to do much the same thing in her head, to much greater efficiency by applying mathematical reasoning, integration, limiting functions, nested parentheses and Fourier transforms provided much greater degrees of repetition and accuracy if one could train ones mind to use them instinctively.

Torn from still living wood, carved with a bloody finger nail, attributes redolent of symbolic meaning. She tapped the tip of her pencil thoughtfully, flicking free a few flecks of graphite. Had it been improvised at the scene? That seemed unlikely given the restraints of the runes and sigils, that was a lot of work for a rush job. Created relatively soon before use though, symbolic tree? From the sister's grave? Possible, she made a note to find out where the sister had been buried.

Emma took a sip of coffee and leaned close to Morgan. Her skin buzzed weirdly as she drew close, like it had years before when her first real boyfriend had kissed her by the lake in Lucerne. With the mental discipline of a practitioner and a mathematician she shoved the weird bundle of sensations away.

"Looks like a channeling spell of some sort, they forced and awful lot of energy through the athamae, probably attuned specifically for the spirit in question," Emma whispered to the other woman. It came out a little hoarser than she had intended, like the back of her throat was suddenly raw.

"Ill know more once Robert has done some forensics and I can touch it, do you recognize the runes?" They weren't from any tradition she was aware of, but there were as many different runes and arcane scripts as there were practitioners.

The smaller man hummed to himself and pulled his ragged coat around his slender frame. He had put on weight in the last few weeks and no longer looked emaciated and wasted, but the lines of his face were still lean and unhealthy. The larger man put a bowl of soup in front of the smaller, steam smelling of garlic and spices and savory broth, clinked the spoon against the porcelain bowl.

“You must eat, my friend,” the larger man said, his voice not unkind, “You’ll do our purpose no favors if you wither to skin and bones.”

The smaller man released his hold on his coat, his long, thin fingers reaching toward the bowl. “Will we be finished soon?” he asked, his voice high and thin and worried. He picked up the spoon, slurped at some of the soup.

“Oh no,” the larger man said, “But we have enough strength to…make a demonstration, I think.” He sighed, deeply, “An announcement of intent. There are those who would challenge our plans. Meddlers. People who think they know what’s best for this world. We should let them know what we’re capable of now, because we will only grow stronger in time.”

The smaller man nodded, his head bobbing up and down more vigorously as the larger man spoke. His hair, long and lank, flicked around his head until the larger man laid a gentle hand on his shoulder.

“Finish your soup,” the larger man said, “Then we’ll begin.”

————

Morgan couldn’t quite decide what to focus her attention on. The rod - the magic wand, an athamae, burned in her senses, distracting and delightful, like the smell of a favorite meal when you haven’t eaten for a week. It caressed and teased at those deep and primal parts of her mind, gentle but with a almost irresistible allure. She felt drawn to the wand - or to the power the wand had clearly channeled - and that fact left her deeply curious. There were many things Morgan still didn’t completely understand about herself, things she’d learned over the long years to live with. But here, now, she felt that she wanted something - in an almost mechanical, compulsive way - and she didn’t know why. She might not know everything about why she had been brought to this world, but she certainly hadn’t given up on the idea of finding out.

Cat Baker, on the other hand, intrigued Morgan in a different way. Terrified at first, but slowly opening herself to questions, to acceptance, to believing that the men and women around the table believed her. Morgan watched as Cat’s shoulders relaxed, as her spine straightened. She felt the subtle changes around Cat as her breathing evened out and her hands stopped shaking. The grief and heavy sadness were still with her, but as Morgan watched, she saw the desperation, the hopelessness start to slide away from her. Her thoughts and emotions became less tightly-wrapped around her, and they brushed and flickered against Morgan’s own psychic senses, feather-soft touches of desire and curiosity. With well-honed discipline, Morgan kept herself from reaching out and pulling on those bursts of desire. All the same, whenever Cat’s eyes met hers, she felt her control almost slip.

“Um,” Cat said, after Robert finished speaking, “Cat. My name is Cat. Even my dad hasn’t really called me Catherine since I was in high school. But um…the two by my apartment? They…one was wearing a long coat, and he seemed sort of hunched over, like he was hurt or he was carrying something. And…there might have been something glowing, maybe. Like a lantern or one of those old camping flashlights…”

Emmaline’s breath brushed against Morgan’s neck, a soft murmur of words while the others listened to Cat. She felt the electric tingle of the woman’s presence, felt her precise, ordered thoughts suddenly closer than she had expected. Emma whispered, and Morgan listened - both had been drawn to the athamae, though very likely for different reasons. Morgan turned her head, brought her lips to Emma’s ear.

“There may not be much to find, but perhaps Robert will surprise us,” Morgan whispered, “The runes are…sort of a mess. Some of the shapes look like Enochian letters, but…Shiloh will probably know more. I think Mandy’s right, we need to-“

From outside the conference room, the sound of something hard hitting the ground echoed, the sound a sharp blow against the quiet conversation. Cat looked up, her expression confused. Morgan’s head snapped around with a predator’s speed, eyes focused on the door.

“What was that?” Cat asked.

“Amanda?” Jacob called, his voice gently chiding, “Please be careful out there.”

No reply came from from the room outside. To those with magical senses, the air pulsed like the beat of a vast and distant drum. Treacle-slow, the tension of directed will and power filled the air.

Morgan stiffened, her hand shifting on the table, palms flat on the tabletop and the back of her chair.

“Amanda?” Jacob called again, his voice tight. He stood, made his way around the table, his boots thumping on the hardwood as he headed for the door. Morgan rose, arrived at the door just as Jacob did.

“Emma, come with me,” Morgan said, her voice tight, “Something isn’t right.” She followed Jacob out of the room, her footsteps quick and precise.

“Mr. Miller, Miss Staten, I would appreciate it if you would join me in keeping Miss Baker company,” Sol rumbled, a look of deep concern in his eyes, “Perhaps we should turn our attention to this wand…”

Morgan followed Jacob only a pace behind, the two moving in fast, purposeful silence. There were maybe twenty steps between the conference room and the larger area where Amanda had been left to her own devices, but each one felt like a small infinity. She reached into her jacket, snapped the clasp on her shoulder holster, wrapped her fingers around the familiar grip of her pistol, held it low and ready, one thumb rolling the hammer back in a smooth, easy motion. The feeling of eldritch power pulsed through the air again, more directed this time, a lance rather than a net. She saw Jacob swallow, felt his fear, anxiety, the desperate love for his daughter, the soul-deep anger for leaving her alone.

Finally, the pair came around a corner into PHI’s main office, and a bizarre sight met their eyes. Amanda’s chair had fallen on its side, but she was standing on Jacob’s chair, a black marker in her small fist. Her arm moved in short, mechanical jerks, like a broken automaton, and the tip of the marker squealed against a laminated map of the city. Thick, ragged letters scrawled over the plastic, not in any child’s handwriting. After a moment, Amanda apparently finished her work, and the marker dropped from her hand. The little girl turned, her feet shuffling, until she faced the investigators.

Her eyes were wide, hollow, and lines of red lanced across her sclera, the veins bloodshot or burst, and stared up and to one side at nothing. Her body seemed hunched, as though she couldn’t quite stand up straight, and her hands, now empty, were slack. Her mouth opened with the exaggerated movements of a poorly-operated puppet, her jaw crackling as the joint popped and her mouth moved.

“Do not meddle in what comes,” Amanda said, her high voice distorted and thick, “The balance of power will change. See that we can touch you where you work, where you live. Our power is without bound. ”

With that, the pulse of energy faded, the lance of will and power dissipating as quickly as it had arrived. Amanda blinked, her feet shuffling, her body relaxing from an almost seizure-tight tension. She blinked, looked around, and one hand went to rub her eyes.

“Daddy?” She said, “I don’t feel good.”

Then she collapsed, tumbling off the chair, landing on the floor in a tangle of arms, legs, and pink boots. Jacob ran forward, tossing his gun to one side and scooped up his daughter, checking her pulse, his fingers probing for broken bones.

Morgan took a step forward, weapon still held low and ready, her eyes darting around the otherwise-empty room, the power she felt lingering in her senses. She looked at the map behind Jacob’s desk, saw the thick, black scrawled letters, uneven and ragged.

THE SHAMAN HAS COME
THE SHAMAN IS HERE
THE SHAMAN CALLS

Mandy couldn’t help it—she sat perfectly still, ears straining for any sound from the next room. She kept her eyes on the rod, so she could at least give the impression of focusing on it instead of what was going on outside, but Sol would probably know. If anyone on the team was likely to guess how good her hearing was, it would be him.

Him or Morgan, who was off investigating the sound they were pretending not to worry about. Mandy was embarrassingly relieved that she’d left the wand behind.

She was distracted by something moving out of the corner of her eye; when she turned to look, she found Robert taking pictures of the object with his cell phone—thorough as always. She would ask him, later, to send them to her, just as she’d ask Emma for a copy of her notes. The more information she had, the more she could do with it.

“Cat,” she said quietly, trying not to flinch as she heard a second thud, loud enough that the others probably heard it, too, “you said that you don’t see as many ghosts now as you used to. How many were there before? Did you notice specific ones had disappeared, or do you just feel the places where they’re supposed to be? Or...something else?”

Mandy bit her tongue before she could say anything else. In her mind, those three questions had already splintered into others, many more that to untrained ears would sound almost the same. Specificity was key, and even as she tried not to overwhelm Cat by giving her more questions at a time than she could answer, she worried that she hadn’t asked the right ones.

She can’t have seen the ghosts of everyone who’s ever died in Seattle, Mandy thought, unable to stop her brain as easily as she’d stopped her mouth. Unless it’s like being at a party, where you can hear the people closest to you, and everyone else just blends into a dull roar. You would notice if a room full of people gradually started to empty, even if you didn’t necessarily see each one leave or know who they were.

Still, she didn’t know enough about ghosts or how they worked—how many people, for example, actually became ghosts, and what the requirements were—to come up with a working theory. If Cat couldn’t tell her, this was going to require research.

The magical lot were once again concerned, which didn't increase Robert's Christmas spirit. And the loud bang most probably wasn't Santa. Rob hadn't seen Jacob this concerned before; hatred against vampires and dedication to case, yes, but to be afraid for his daughter? This was his first. He couldn't imagine what could threaten Amanda in the PHI quarters. It was supposed to be a safe place and he hoped Jacob's worries were a false alarm.

Then again, even after this many years, there was still much unknown to Robert.

”Mr. Miller, Miss Staten, I would appreciate it if you would join me in keeping Miss Baker company ” Sol grunted with a voice Miller likened to that of a tractor's engine, like worried that he'd be left alone looking after Cat. Whatever out there was, Jacob, Emma and Morgan would be more than enough to handle it. Robert and Mandy would do better here. And definitely there were still more questions to be asked. Great minds thought alike as Sol continued ”Perhaps we should turn our attention to this wand…”

Robert nodded and took out both a handkerchief and his one-and-half a year old phone, complete with respectable camera and a cloud storage common with his own computer. It was an engineering masterpiece in Robert's eyes. He started to take pictures from the rod, then carefully turned it with handkerchief for more pictures.

Thud made Robert stop for a moment. Quick look towards the source's direction but as it wasn't bullets being shot, he continued focusing on the matter at hand. Mandy had started to ask questions from Cat. About other ghosts that were missing. Whether it was relevant or not he left for her to figure out.

It was remarkable in a sense. Robert was a detective: there's evidence, it leads to somewhere and he'd follow a trail to another lead or an answer. Simple and straightforward. But when Amanda Staten had come to the office, solving cases had taken another step onward. Give her a pile of evidence and she'd see soon enough where the pieces of puzzle would fall. Her hunches and thoughts felt far-fetched at times but they were always worth checking out. Especially when they were dealing with the unknown paranormal phenomena. Like now.

Robert picked up the rod with his handkerchief for closer look and a video, where he'd rotate the rod to have a great view from carvings. Branch from a birch tree. Narrow end had seen more than just twisting and racking; the bark had some wearing, like being dragged on the ground. Someone had been drawing stuff with the stick and Rob could bet his doughnut it wasn't a smiley face. A close-up picture from the rod's end before focusing on the stains. Seemed that their staff-maker had literally spent sweat and blood making this staff.

Whose blood it could be in this stain, though? The sister's? The crafter's? Or someone else? Robert took another picture from the markings and the bloody stain. He inspected it a tad closer before putting the wand back on table. Robert leaned towards Sol. With quiet voice so that Catherine wouldn't hear, he said ”Blood on the rod. Perhaps her sister... I'll do some forensics soon at the corner.”

Corner he referred was place where they had gathered some basic equipment for research. Few leftovers from police forces, some throw-away equipment from university, couple self-made paranormal sensors and a some low-quality magical artifacts. Robert preferred to work there at peace, partly because he also made phone calls to his connections. For a case at hand, he'd try to get a favor from a buddy in police force. But before that he had one more question to Catherine...

Muted sounds filtered into the conference room, an occasional, sharper sound serving as mysterious punctuation. Cat flinched at the second, louder sound, her legs curling up to her chest, an almost defensive posture. Large, bright eyes flickered from one side of the conference room to another, and her muscles tensed before Sol's voice filled the small room, deep and gentle and full of confidence.

"Don't worry, Miss Baker," the huge man said, his heavy fingers lacing together, "You're perfectly safe here."

"Shouldn't we go and see...?" Cat began, leaning toward the door.

"My agents are prepared for any eventuality, Miss Baker," Sol said, his voice like warm, heavy syrup, “And I assure you that Miss Blackwood, in particular, is likely more dangerous than anyone in this room. Now, I believe Miss Staten had a question for you."

"What? Oh...oh. Right." Cat cleared her throat, and some of the tension left her body, "Um. Right. The ghosts. I...well, I used to see a lot of them. Especially down on the waterfront and by the old hospitals. They usually looked kind of lost or distant, or...or angry, I suppose. And there were...well, more than you'd expect. Young women on corners, looking lost and alone as people walked through them. Sometimes they were kids. And I could feel...I knew how the ghosts felt. A lot of them were afraid. They made the air feel different." Cat swallowed, her eyes going down to her glass of water.

"And now...now there aren't as many. When I walk through the city, even by the old mortuary, there's just...nothing. Like nothing was ever there. There's...holes. Down on the waterfront, no matter where I went I could feel some kind of...of presence, you know? Even if I couldn't see a person, I'd feel...yearning, or sadness, or something. Now it's just..." Cat waved a hand, "Like nothing. Like when you go out into a brand new development and nobody's ever lived or died there. Just emptiness and quiet. There's not even an echo, just...nothing. Like they were never even there."

Cat's eyes stayed down, her fingers drumming on the side of her water, her expression distant. Her brow furrowed, red-gold eyebrows drawing toward one another, the corners of her mouth turning down.

"I...think the first ones I noticed were...um. They had been around for a long time. There used to be a man down by the water, where the old docks used to be. He was dressed like someone from those pictures of the gold rush, and he would just look out to sea, and I could feel..." She trailed off, "I could feel like he wanted something, more than anything in the world. I never knew what it was, but when I focused on him there was this...this burning sensation in my chest," Cat pressed a fist over her heart, and her voice cracked a little, "Of needing to go. He...he was the first, I think. You can still go down to the bars by the Market and hear stories about him, but he's not there anymore. There's just…emptiness.” She swallowed. “Emptiness, but…not peace.”

------

The larger man let out a long, satisfied sigh, and the power he had gathered around his hands, his heart, his head, slowly dissipated. Even at that, his hands left trails silver-blue light in the air behind him like tiny comets as he closed the book, old paper falling together with a heavy thump.

"There," the larger man said, "I think that should get the message across."

The smaller man seemed agitated, his long, birdlike legs taking him up and down the narrow room. His feet, in mismatched socks, sank deep into high-piled carpet, leaving thin footprints behind. He raised his hands and waved around his head as though he swatted at imaginary flies and he made a low, insistent sound in his throat.

"No, no, no, no, no," the smaller man said, his voice almost a keening wail, "You did it wrong! Or...or...or...something heard. Something that shouldn't have heard, shouldn't be here, shouldn't have come, shouldn't-" Thin hands balled into fists, clutched at the sides of his head and the smaller man fell to his knees, his eyes squeezed shut, his voice a pained, terrified sound.

"Peace, my friend, peace," the larger man said, his voice rich and smooth, "Our purpose is not yet complete. You must stay with me. You must talk to me - what did you hear? What do you feel?"

The smaller man turned, his shoulders hunched, his eyes wide as he looked at the larger man, "Do you know what heard you? She'll come, she'll come for us, she'll come for us and eat us all up."

The smaller man stopped, threw his head back, and cackled.

--------

Magic lingered in the air, the after-effects, the wake of the possession spell wrought on young Amanda swirling in Morgan’s senses, chill serpents of vicious will. As the spell faded she felt the echoes of that power coil around her heart, her lungs with an almost physical tug. Her chest rose with a quick, fast breath and she turned, her eyes focusing through a window, deeper into the city. Slowly, carefully, Morgan re-engaged the safety on her pistol, slid it back into her holster as she let her breath out in a long, slow stream.

Jacob, meanwhile, cradled his daughter, one hand supporting her small head from behind. He didn’t look at the scrawled letters, only down at his little girl as her chest rose and fell. His hands shook as he brushed hair out of her eyes, but his breathing had slowed from panicked, deep-chested inhalations to something more even. Still, he only looked down at the small form, having made no motion to pick up her fallen chair, or to pick up the handgun he’d tossed to one side.

“Emma,” Morgan said, still looking out the window, her voice equal parts thoughtful and earnest. “Please stay with Jacob, he may need someone to help him back to the real world once he recovers. Have someone our doctor, make sure that Amanda is all right, but don’t take her to a hospital. Someone knew she’d be here, we can’t assume the roads are safe.” She paused, cleared her throat, and her voice hardened. “I…think I know where that came from. I expect I’ll be back shortly.”

With that, Morgan strode toward the door, yanking her long coat off the rack, and disappeared into the hallway. The sound of the door hadn’t faded when another set of fast footsteps rang out, this time rising from a staircase nearby, the one that led down into the Priest & Hawthorne archives. A few moments later the silver-maned head of Shiloh Grey rose into view, a thunderous expression on her proud features. She stopped in the doorway, surveyed the scene near Jacob’s desk.

“Holy mother of God, what the hell happened here?” Shiloh asked, then shook her head, “Never mind, we don’t have time. Has someone called a doctor? Good. Is Rob in the conference room?” Without waiting for an answer she strode past Emma and Jacob, her long legs devouring the distance as she moved.

“You!” Shiloh said, pointing at Robert as she came in, her voice a schoolteacher’s snap, “That wand you’ve been taking pictures of, where is it?” She walked into the room, her blue eyes scanning the table, “Oh, good, it’s still here.” Shiloh looked up, saw the incredulous expression on Robert’s face, “Don’t look surprised. I hacked your phone a year ago, since it was faster than waiting for you to email me the pictures of whatever artifact you were looking at. Did you think I spent all my time down there looking at books and counting stone fertility icons?”

“Miss Grey, I hardly think-“ Sol began, but Shiloh cut him off with a sharp gesture, her hand a flat blade.

“Listen to me. Do any of you recognize this?” Shiloh reached over, gingerly touched the wand with two fingers, tracing the outline of a large symbol etched on the wand, “No? All right. This symbol, this is an icon from an ancient cult contemporary with the Picts back in Britain. You see it on burial mounds and grave markers, signs marking where the dead or spirits lay.” Her fingers moved to another one, “These are…they’re an old language, but they mean “to seek and reveal.” And this,” she traced another line, “These are…mmm…” she looked at the wand again, turning her head, “…Almost like conductors. They’re runes of transport, as though the person holding this wand would do something that fed into another working.”

“And why is that of urgent import, Miss Grey?” Sol said. Meanwhile, Cat looked up, her eyes wide, obviously not quite certain what to make of the archivist’s sudden entrance.

“Normally, no reason at all,” Shiloh said, still examining the wand, “But the Burke Museum was going to do a new exhibit on the occult - ghost stories, why we tell stories in the dark, all that. One of their deliveries - a crate of “magical artifacts” from another museum in Britain - went missing a couple of months ago.”

“Miss Baker,” Sol said, his attention focusing on Cat, “When would you say you noticed the gold rush ghost go missing?”

“Um,” Cat said with a start, “Um. Maybe…maybe six weeks ago?”

“Oh, hello,” Shiloh said, turning her head to look at the small woman sitting at one end of the conference table, “Sorry. I didn’t notice you were there. What’s this about ghosts?”

Cat swallowed, pulled her knees back up under her chin. “I. Um. I see them. Or I did. I…something took my sister’s ghost, and…”

Shiloh dropped the wand, planted her hands on the table, looked over at Cat, “Took? You saw a ghost, and it disappeared? Torn apart?”

Cat nodded.

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Shiloh said, and stood up. She pulled in a breath, looked around, paused.

“Wait a minute. Where’s Morgan?” Shiloh said.

Emma frowned disapprovingly at Morgan’s departing back. Now was not the time for rash action. It was a time for action though. The girl was her first priority. Emma slid a silver bangle from her wrist and slipped it over the young girls wrist.

“Keep this on her,” she instructed, “It will prevent any further attacks.” More accurately, it would redirect the attack to Emmaline herself, which would mean a quick death for her assailant. Emma had learned to defend herself from psychic attack in a hard school. Growing up in a household with three, older, magically talented sisters and a mother who viewed inter sibling magical attacks as educational, hadn’t always been pleasant, but as her mother said, it was useful. With Amanda thus protected she stood up and looked around the room.

Magic, like any physical force, left traces that were visible to those who knew how to look. To Emmaline’s eyes the room shimmered with magical energies, some, familiar, were her own workings but there were others, darker and more malignant. Morgan had been right, it was Inocian, although with some sort of meta-syntax she wasn’t familiar with. Maybe Gaelic or Old Frizian.

“Did you learn this from a book?” she mused. It wasn’t sophisticated work, not a Hexen certainly.

With a nod she strode to her desk and pulled open one of the draws. Carefully, she withdrew a walnut box and containing a fountain pen. It was hand crafted, inlaid with onyx and silver threading in an intricate design. It was an athamae, crafted specifically for her by master artisans. The Morgansterns had done business with the house of Ungern-Sternberg for generations. This particular piece had been ordered the day of her birth.

She fixed her eyes on the tracery of energy. She had a starting point, the office, and she could see could work back along the line the spell had came. The problem was that the spell caster could be anywhere along the metaphysical line. What she needed was a third point so that she could triangulate the other spell casters position. Frustration welled up within her and she sat down on her chair. Her eyes fell on Amanda’s desk. Amanda Staten. Amanda the Cat Sidhe.
Emma shot to her feet and strode across the room. Without ceremony she stuck her head into the conference room.

“Amanda, can you do something for me? Focus on the office, as it appears to you, think on what is significant about it to you personally.”

Closing her eyes she raised her athame. She didn’t chant, chanting was a dated technique. Converting a chant to a mathematical function enabled a suitably trained mind to condense what would be hours of repetitive ritual into moments. The numbers spun in her head like sparkling stars. She forced them to her will, first grasping the office in her own mind, then reaching out along the skein of energy that linked it to the spell caster. Finally she reached out for Amanda’s mind. It was strange, tainted with alien perspectives that Emma couldn’t begin to guess at. Amanda wasn’t entirely human, and that made her view of the office sufficiently different to provide Emma with her third point. Sweat rolled off her brow, she really should have written this out, rather than try to keep track of so many variables at once. With a final surge of will she bound the equation into the waiting blankness of her athame. The pen rose a fraction of an inch from her palm and pivoted, pointing slightly south east.

“Got you,” she breathed in German.

Shiloh’s entrance pulled Mandy’s attention away from Cat, but didn’t hold it for long. Mandy had barely managed to process what Shiloh was saying—and all of its implications—before Emma appeared, almost as suddenly.

The urgent tone of her voice brought Mandy to attention, and Mandy found herself complying with Emma’s request almost before she’d decided to do so—once someone told you to think about something, it was almost impossible not to.

Because she could guess why Emma had singled her out, Mandy focused on things no one else was likely to notice. First, the scattered, less-frequented rooms at PHI that housed most of her favorite napping spots; then, the way that, no matter where she was in the building, she could usually hear the cadence of familiar voices from the next room. Next came more immediate details: Emma’s confident posture, the way she practically thrummed with energy. The still-strong smell of Cat’s grief, overlaying everything else.

And then she heard Emma’s sharp inhale, and she knew they’d done it.

Mandy relaxed.

She had braced herself at the sound of footsteps, though she recognized the cadence just before Shiloh (and then Emma) had strode through the door. Cait sidhe were hard to surprise, but easy to startle, and Mandy had never managed the bored mask that her mother and uncles had worn so well. Her mother could recline languidly against a wall, cool as cream, and only someone who knew what to look for would ever guess that she was afraid. Mandy could make her face blank of expression, even hide what she was feeling, but she would never have that impossible air of nonchalance.

At least she wasn’t alone in being uneasy. Cat looked so very small, curled up in her chair while information flew around the room and over her head. Shiloh had been so caught up in what she was saying that she didn’t seem to realize how much she was scaring their client.

At first, Mandy was at a loss. She’d already given Cat the water, which pretty much exhausted all of her unobtrusive kindnesses. She couldn’t very well give her another one.

Glancing at Emma and her athamae, Mandy decided the kindest gift she could give right now was an explanation. “She’s doing a tracking spell,” she said quietly. Mandy made herself meet Cat’s large green eyes, though only for a second or two. “Whatever happened out there, Emma’s trying to trace.”

It took a moment but Catherine finally calmed down and focused on the question Mandy had asked. Cat knew her ghosts alright; waterfront, old hospital... Probably places where people died. Suicides, regrets... Robert made a twitch with his lips and shook the thought from his head. He wasn't interested too much about existence of ghosts, but he nevertheless wrote some details up. The mass lack of emotions and emptiness at the places filled with ghosts... But not peace. Whatever that meant, team would think about that later.

Robert leaned back and was about to open his mouth when Shiloh stormed in. Pointing a finger like accusing Rob from stealing a candy. ”You! That wand you've been taking pictures of, where is it?” Robert was about to say something before he realized what Shiloh had said.

But she hasn't been at the meeting? ”Don’t look surprised. I hacked your phone a year ago, since it was faster than waiting for you to email me the pictures of whatever artifact you were looking at. Did you think I spent all my time down there looking at books and counting stone fertility icons?”

Well, of course not, but... To hack his phone? How on earth she dared, how she even knew what his phone was capable of?!?

---

Year and half Ago...
”A fine piece indeed. And you know what the best part is, Shiloh? It's connected in the same network with my computer! Cloud storage, they call it. Boy, what on earth they think of next...”

---

I'll bug her house for-...

”Listen to me” Shiloh snapped at Sol. Very few dared to interrupt Sol, so Robert was once again dumbfound. Without really knowing what to say or what to think, he listened before he realized that he had to write this down. Luckily Shiloh stopped to inspect the symbols, so he did catch up quickly. Descriptions ran from the mouth, and the old team – Shiloh and Sol- were once again at the deduction games. Seek and reveal... Conductors... Would do something that fed into another working... Museum equipment disappearing few months ago, six weeks ago disappearing...

“Wait a minute. Where’s Morgan?” Shiloh said after a small pause when she heard about ghost being torn apart.

Robert spent a second to recover from a sudden break of silence. "She's with Jacob and Emma. There was some noise." He said, not really happy about focus on 'most dangerous agent in the organization'. He tried to shift the subject when Emma stormed in. "Amanda, can you do something for me?"

Robert listened quickly before asking Shiloh "Ahh... Runes of Transport. Feeding into another working. That staff" Robert said, pointing towards the staff. "It's been scratching something. Would it work like that?"  He hated not knowing about exact details of magic.

Shiloh turned her head, looking at Robert, "What? No, nothing like that. Whoever was holding that wand could move energy from one place to another, or maybe change it. You see things like this on Aztec sacrifice tools - they would channel the life of the sacrifice into some kind of magic working." The woman shook her head, "And Morgan wasn't out with Emma and Jacob, unless she turned into a little girl. Does anyone know where she went?"

Robert rubbed his forehead. Mandy was trying to explain the situation to Catherine, so someone had to try to stay professional. "I don't know... Is that important at the moment? There's a-"

"Oh, tiny gods. You don't know what she is, do you? Don't you people ever talk to one another?" Shiloh said, her tone one of exasperation and resignation and alarm. She waved a hand by her head, as if shooing thoughts away, "Yes. Yes, where Morgan is is probably the most important thing right now. Please, someone tell me she's out getting coffee."

"I heard the outer door shut a few minutes after she, Emma, and Jacob left to investigate whatever disturbance was happening in the main office," Sol said, his voice solemn, concerned, "Would you care to tell us exactly what this is about, Miss Grey?"

Robert too was thinking that there was explanation to do. Firstly, he didn't know what Morgan was. Definitely not human, he had known for ages. It was probably the reason the two of them spoke very little, even if it was about common cases. But he had put an enormous trust to Sol, so he had kept his trackers off her. Secondly, the case itself didn't sound any more promising. At least what he understood from Shiloh the ghosts were not taken for any happy trip. And if that related to Morgan somehow...

"It's about the ghosts," Cat said, breaking the quiet after Sol spoke, "Isn't it? What you're talking about, Miss Blackwood, they're connected."

Shiloh nodded, "You should offer her a job, Sol. She's right, these things are connected." She looked sharply at Sol, "And I'm not going to tell you 'exactly what this is about,' Tanner. That's not my secret to give away, and it's not my problem none of you have done the legwork. You need to find Morgan, and you need to find her right now."

Robert let out a sigh. He should have put the tracker in Morgan's jacket when he had the chance...