Wyck Index

Wyck's Visual Collage

Wyck's Friends

Thomas Book - Complete

Part 1

A Funeral

Funerals. I hate funerals. They always remind me of her.

Some funerals are full of alcohol, others are full of wives and mothers throwing themselves at the coffin screaming and pleading with their God. Some people say that funerals are times of reflection and when families come together, but what do you do when you have no family? The only real family that a Wizard has are the few friends he makes on his journey. Even still, being a Wizard is like being in a Fraternity; you're only Brothers when there's drinking and parties. As soon as it gets rough, you find out who's got your back. Funerals reminded me exactly how few people had mine.

I was surprised that I got the invitation. I knew that Mouse had died, but I didn't expect this. Mouse was Nat's cousin so I guess it was a invitation based on tradition and formality than familiarity. Natalya's grandmother, a woman whose influence could be felt in almost every corner of the family, made the invitation in her own name. She was one of the few people in the family that didn't blame me for Nat's death. She knew what I did and why I did it without ever being told.

As soon as they pulled the casket from the back of the car, I felt the first drops of rain on my face. The storm clouds didn't appear on any forecast and I'm sure that all of the local news stations would be baffled why it rained over only one part of the city. If there was every any doubt, the rain had proclaimed the nature of the boy's death. Mouse had been murdered.

The motley bunch of mourners were gathered around the pit dug in the corner of the cemetery. Fifty people gathered around as the rain began to swell in the clouds. The old women with their floral scarves and carpet bags could have stepped out of a village in Eastern Europe. The old men, what few there were, stood beside them like scarecrows with big black umbrellas. I could see that almost everyone there had a small bag to be placed as a gift to Mouse for his journey to the Other Side. I saw bags with clothes, some food and I think one even was going to give him new pair of shoes. The Gypsy were always such practical people.

Since I was here as a guest of Baba's invitation, I didn't know quite where to stand for the funeral. I've always been more of a fringe-watcher than someone who jumps into the middle of things. I was content to stay at the edge and pay my respects - and then Baba appeared beside me. I'm not going to tell you that I jumped. That would be a lie.

I squeaked

My well-rehearsed icy exterior was disrupted by a five-foot nothing old woman who has never spoken more than two words in English. That tough old broad fought the Nazis. I swear it. She was as quiet as a fart in church. She just smiled and extended her old, grandmotherly hand for me to take and with the force of a team of oxen, dragged me over to stand beside the grave. She made it a point to involve me and the others wouldn't question it - not directly. So I found a spot beside a guy that had the smile of an insurance salesman and a woman who was incredibly too tanned for April and reeked of cheap perfume; it's that new fragrance - Bad Taste.

By the time they had the small, white casket arranged for their final fair-the-well, I felt a shiver crawl up my spine. The rain was already soaking through my overcoat, but it wasn't the cold water that I felt. It was a presence. Someone or something had gotten close enough for me to pick up the ripples. Granny Baba felt it too. Before I could really get a sense for what was pinging on my magical radar, she had pulled a small, draw-string bag from her purse and sprinkled something over the grave. I don't know if the family knew what she was doing, but it was Baba - she was from the Old Country and no one questioned her mojo.

Gypsy magic was NEVER to be ignored. The Rom had been fighting spirits and demons centuries before the inqusition and had managed to survive even the cleansing fires of the Church. Whatever it was that Grandmother Baba had sprinkled on the grave was probably some kind of protective blessing - the same ones that all grandmothers have I'm sure; the gypsy simply do it with more flair. I smelled lavender and something that reminded me of week-old laundry, but whatever it was made the 'blip' go away. After the first few shovels of dirt were tossed into the grave, I took my cue and turned to leave. Marco, one of Natalya's brother, gave me a dirty look and muttered some Romani insult under his breath. He couldn't publicly say anything to me while at the funeral - especially while under Baba's watchful eyes, but I knew that he'd love to break something over my head if he were to ever catch me out and alone.

Just as I was getting into the Jeep, I saw something shiny on the steering wheel and paused. Someone in my line of work doesn't do anything without some degree of paranoia. Sticking into my steering wheel was a square nail; like the old ones used to shoe horses. This one was silver; an old Gypsy ward against witches and Magi. Though not all of the wards from the Old Country still worked, nailing a witch's footprint with a silver nail was one of those that still packed quite a sting.

I glanced over towards Marco and the other brothers that were watching like a pack of dogs, snickeringly eager to see if their message was received. I would have liked nothing more than to fling a little of my own mojo at them, but the family didn't deserve it. Marco would step over the line sometime and Granny Baba wouldn't mind if I put him back in his place. I took the nail and stuffed it into my pocket and drove away from the graveyard and within a minute or two I was out of the rain. Handy thing, too. My jeep liked to leak.

UPDATE: 4-09-08

You would think that a Mage would be able to repair a leaky jeep-top with a flap of a finger, but not all magic works that way. Besides, magic can get addictive. If I start using it to repair every little thing that has gone wrong in my life - I'd be worse than a crack-addict. Duct tape is just as good as any spell, sometimes better. I had taped the tear in the cover a week ago and I thought that it was going to hold until I could get paid by Mr. Tweed. I love antique dealers - they're so twitchy about hauntings and they pay well. Payday was in two days - according to his secretary, so I just had to coast along until then. By the third stop-light, I had gotten past the mourning clouds around the grave yard and back to clear skies. The jeep would dry out eventually.

My jacket and shirt were soaked, and all I could think of was grabbing a shower. The smell of the graveyard was still on me as I pulled into the old firehouse that I called home. Natalya has been gone for almost a year now and I remember it all; the smell of the fresh dirt around the grave, and the thud of the rain on all of the umbrellas. It was the same sound today. Why do sounds like that always stick with us?

I was half out of my shirt when I heard something break in the back of the apartment.

"Six?"

My cat had a tough life. When Nat got him, she said that it was the number on his cage. I said that it was the number of lives that he had burnt through. According to the vet, he had been poisoned with antifreeze, electrocuted, and shot at least once. I'm fairly certain that if there was a nuclear holocaust, the few things left alive would include cockroaches, twinkies, New York rats and Six. He was great for naps. He was so mellow, orange and so round that he could pass for a buddha statue.

I heard it again and I knew that it was a lot bigger than a cat. With the appearance of a 'something' at the funeral and Marco's warning, it could have been anything. I wasn't going to take any chances. Crossing from the top of the stairs to a hall table, I found my insurance and tried to sneak closer.

Magi are practical folk. Traditionalists get burned at the stake. Living through two Witch Wars had taught me that if you rely on magic to save your life, you're not long for this world. My insurance was in the form of an antique Colt revolver. It only had six shots but it had never missed what it was pointed at; at least that's what the ghost said when I got it. My insurance was always kept loaded. I never understood the logic of having an unloaded gun in your home.

With each step, I found myself hoping that it was Marco. I -wanted- it to be him. Dropping a nail on me is one thing, breaking into my home was crossing the line. I couldn't think of what would be worse: having him arrested or taking him to Baba for punishment. When I got close enough to see what it was, I was disappointed. It wasn't Marco. It wasn't a wraith either.

It was a kid, barely older than the one that I just saw buried.

*** Chapter 2 ***

The guy stood there, caught. Well, he was almost more of a kid than a guy. He had somehow gotten upstairs and was standing in my office. That was a mistake.

My apartment was on the second floor of the fire house that I had inherited from my uncle Julian and my office was in the back, right corner. It was where Julian kept his journals and all of the rare books he had collected over the years. It was a combination study and library with bookshelves lining three of the four walls and a display of artifacts on the fourth. It was my study; my space.

How did he get in?

This kid had to have crawled up the fire escape or something. I don't have much for anyone to steal; nothing worth much to anyone outside the Trade. You don't really see many people trying to steal rare books - there are a lot of things that are easier to steal and easier to sell. I was expecting Marco to send me a message, but sending a kid was something unexpected. He was too clean to be a street-rat and didn't have the look of a junkie. This threw me; enough that my mind blanked. Maybe he was here for a book? Well, he found one; Me.

"Who sent you?"

It was all that I could ask. As stupid as it sounds it was still a legitimate question. If he was one of Marco's boys then I figured that he was here with some kind of message. He started to move rather than answer my question and I chose to make my intentions clear. Cocking the hammer on a pistol is the universal gesture for Don't Move.

He raised his hands in the counter gesture of Don't Shoot. That's when I saw the mark. On the inside of his left wrist was a tattoo. Not just any tattoo, but an alchemical symbol; sulfur. The symbol was easy to identify for anyone of the Walden Witches who had picked up a book on alchemy, let alone anyone in the Trade. It was a combination of symbols; a cross with not one line but two across the center bar - the bottom line wider than the top. At the bottom of the center bar was a figure-eight set where the two orbs meet at their intersection. The presence of the symbol could mean anything - he could be marked by a cult, a gothy, high-school click, or worse.

As much as he was shocked at being caught, he was twice as confused by my question. He looked from my eyes to the muzzle of the pistol, back to my eyes and then to a window nearest the fire escape. I didn't want to shoot him, but I didn't want to let him leave until I found out if he had stolen something.

The end of the hall was the access door for circular fire escape. He glanced around nervously for a way out and I stepped into the room from the doorway as I cupped the butt of the pistol with my left hand like I had seen on all of the cop shows. I wasn't the best shot in the world but I was hoping that he wouldn't figure that out. Just then, as the edge of his vest hung up on the strap of his satchel I could see the edge of a red, leather journal tucked into his belt.

That was reason enough for me to blow a hole in someone. I know people have their reasons to steal, but grabbing a journal is about the most serious sin I could imagine. The only reason I didn't shoot first and ask some questions of his ghost was that he was standing between me and a parchment fragment framed on the wall. I was such a bad shot that I might accidentally shoot through the kid.

He looked like he might try and run so I cocked the pistol's hammer; universal language for 'don't move'.

"I got something from Mouse," he said with a lilt of fear and trembling in his voice.

"Mouse is dead. Keep talking." I responded; the mask of confidence and authority becoming tainted with the fresh memory of the funeral.

"You're Book, right? Mouse said to bring this to you if anything happened to him." The kid explained and tried to reach for the edge of the journal.

I didn't know if was on the level or not so I barked out a warning that I would shoot him if he tried anything.

Just then, as carefully pulled the journal from his belt, the tinkle of silver bells filled the room. As though a dozen wind chimes had suddenly been hit by the same gust of wind at the same time, the room was filled with a silvery cacophony. One of my protective wards had been tripped.

Something was trying to push its way into the fire house.

Then it hit me, if the boy had meant me harm there would already be the sound of the tiny silver bells ringing as soon as I got inside. Even half-soaked as I was, I wouldn't have missed such a warning. What was going on?

"Thomas," the voice of my tutor beckoned from a mirror on the wall behind me. "We are under attack.

"Who is that?" the boy asked pointing to the form of a man who appeared only in the reflection of the mirror on the wall of antiques behind me.

"Who is this?" Sir William, my tutor, asked with the same, imperious tone he once used for his students back at Oxford; Oxford in 1732.

"I don't know. What's coming?" I asked as I twitched the barrel of the pistol in my hand to signal the boy to have a seat.

"You, what's your name?" I asked as I eased the pistol's hammer down.

"Wyck," he answered and watched the reflection in the mirror - wondering how he was shown there yet there was no person in the room.

"Can't you people have normal names for a change?" Sir William groaned.

"Sir William?" I asked as I reached for the wooden staff that rested against the window behind my desk.

A storm was coming yet there were no clouds. Just as rain had appeared to mark Mouse's funeral, the darkness of a coming storm had blotted out the sun over my house. The windows grew dark and the wind began to whistle outside. The breathy whistle twisted in its pitch to become a whirr and then into a wooshy howl.

"Tornado?" Wyck asked as he stuffed the burnt-red, leather journal into his satchel but remained seated and finally drew his eyes off of the mirror.

"By the air. This is no spell Thomas. Something is in the wind." The tutor explained.

"Lilitu," Wyck muttered as though he were figuring out a cross-words puzzle.

"Be silent boy!" Sir William commanded.

"Don't be saying things you don't know nothing about kid." I grumbled as I held the staff defensively across my chest.

Once I had calmed my mind a bit, I focused my thoughts on the energies of my staff and the protective wards around the fire house. Once I had the right image caught in my mind I slammed the butt of the staff into the wooden floor of my office as though I were driving a nail. Well, that's almost what I was doing. I needed to drive the energy around me through my staff straight through the floors of the building until it reached the bedrock below. Once it hit real earth it could fan out to each of the four hearth stones that uncle Julian had buried at the four corners that marked north, south, east and west. They were my own, personal, magical claymore mines.

The wind's howl began to drown out almost every other sound though I could still hear Wyck's voice cursing his luck over and over again. The boy left the chair he was sitting in and curled up in a ball away from any of the windows. I couldn't stop what I was doing to stop him but he wasn't going any where. I needed to focus on the defenses.

It wasn't something that I could call up all the time, but Julian's journals described the stones as a 'rainy day weapon'; something to only be used one in a great while since it took so long for them to recharge. As soon as the energy reached the stones they erupted in a torrent of arcane energy. Whatever supernatural darkness that had surrounded my home ate the magical equivalent of a dozen lightning bolts. With the shriek of pain and defeat, the darkness faded with the suddenness of a summer shower.

"Fuck..." Wyck commented as he slowly opened his eyes and relaxed his muscles.

I had to force my fingers to let go of the staff I was holding on so tight. I hadn't used the stones before and I severely underestimated how much juice they needed to work. I was all but exhausted as I turned to look at the boy. I noticed that steam was rising off of my forearms and chest; the result of channeling so much energy through my staff. I didn't have the energy to fight with Wyck and thankfully I could see he was more afraid of what was outside than what was inside.

"Start talking kid..." I put the staff back against the corner of the window next to the bookcase and eased myself into my chair. Just to make sure that I wasn't finished with him, I clapped the pistol on my desk and rested my chin on my fist.

This was going to be an interesting story.

Part III

The headache began in the base of my head, back where your neck and your skull meet. It was a dull ache that began to seep into me like the chill of cold breeze. It takes a while for you to fully realize it but by then it's too late.

I wasn't sure, at first, whether the headache was more from casting the spell through the stones or listening to Wyck attempt to mutter through an explanation that had so many um's and 'uh's that I lost track what he was trying to say.

"Wait... wait." I told him and pulled the pistol from the top of my desk and slid it off into the drawer in front of me. I could tell that his eyes were starting at it like it was the only thing in the room. He really was just a frightened kid and I had turned things up a notch by waving a gun at him and that was before some...THING tried to huff and puff and blow my walls down.

Wyck eased himself into a chair across from my desk and with a glance over his shoulder to the mirror on the far wall, he let out a long, slow breath and tried to relax.

Sir William, hovering in the reflection in the mirror, folded his arms like a disapproving parent waiting for a child to try and explain their way out of trouble. Since he could only move from reflection to reflection, he was able to walk about in the mirrored version of the room as though he were in it with us. The professor, as I liked to call him - though he had no resemblance to the character from Gilligan's Island - walked over within the anti-room and leaned against a seat under a window between two bookshelves.

"Ok. All I know is that Mouse found me the night before he died and told me to hang onto something for him." Wyck began and placed the red, leather journal onto the desk between us.

"He said that if anything happened that I should get it to you no matter what," he continued.

My eyes paused on Wyck, I wanted to wait for a second to see if I could pick out any tick of a lie in his face. He was either very good at looking like a frightened, nineteen year-old kid who had gotten in way over his head or he was just too freaked out to lie about it. I shifted my attention from his face to the book on the desk and shrugged a bit. It wasn't one of my journals, I could tell by the design.

Let me take a minute here to point out that wizards in general are book snobs. Whether it's old leather tomes of arcane knowledge musty with age or papyrus scrolls made fragile with the passage of time, we know from books. Aside from the rare books that I had collected while working for my uncle Julian, I had a lot of journals that recorded my own experiences with magic and such.

Most of my journals were hand-made; a skill that Julian insisted that I learn. Knowing how books were put together made it easier for me to appraise their value.

The journal on the table in front of me was hand-bound, that was easily pointed out just by seeing the edge. The cover was thin leather that had been died a shade of red ochre, like rusty dirt. Whoever bound it didn't know what they were doing with dye - the color was uneven and splotchy. That's when it hit me.

It wasn't leather dye.

The journal was dyed in blood. Not dipped in, but worn into the leather itself. The blood had dried once and had been reapplied over and over again to give the whole cover an oddly rust-like appearance.

It was about as big as one of my own journals - half the size of a regular piece of printing paper. I could tell that the leather was warn darker across the spine where someone had held it and their own body oil and sweat had been infused into the leather. The journal was packed full of pages, at least two-fingers thick, and the front and back cover were tied together with a black braided cord of something that looked like horse's hair.

Though normally I would never peer into someone else's journal - it's almost a sin amongst Magi - but I wanted to see what Mouse may have died for. As my hand brushed against the surface of the journal I felt a spark - not unlike being shocked by having your feet rub across the carpet and reaching for a door knob.

"Warded," I commented.

"Really," Wyck asked and reached for the book. Before I could warn him he plucked it off the table much to my surprise. He was unaffected.

It occurred to me that Wyck had probably touched the book a dozen times since Mouse had given it to him. Why would it suddenly react to my touch and ignore his?

Unless it was warded against me.

Now I was definitely curious what was between those blood-stained cover, but I would need to hear more about what Wyck knew before I jumped into something. I was really good at leaping before I looked and after last year's problem with the high-school coven of necromancers, I had promised myself to try and be more patient.

"Ok, keep talking. Where did you see Mouse last? What did he look like?" I asked and glanced to Sir William in the reflection. He was already circling the mirror-verse of the room and looking at the journal on the desk in front of me.

"Uh, he found me at Fagan's place."

"Where?" I asked having only the mildest idea who 'Fagan' was outside of the context of Oliver Twist.

"Fagan. He's an alley-runner down near the Warrens."

This didn't sound good. Alley-runners were basically black market entrepreneurs that were willing to find and sell you whatever you wanted to indulge in - so long as the price was right. Drugs were only the tip of the ice berg for these folks. You got the vice, they have the price. I didn't know what kind of runner Fagan was, but if he was anything like the Dickens character he probably dealt in stolen property. Mouse was an occasional thief, but it was always small-time stuff; dvd players, CD's, stuff that a kid would like.

"Was he supposed to meet you there? Was this something already arranged?" I asked and shifted back in my chair a little.

"No," Wyck explained. "But I'm always there on Tuesday nights. Great place to pick up some...um... work."

"So he found me there and took me off to the side. He didn't look too good; kinda pale," Wyck described.

"Pale?"I asked. Mouse was one of the street gypsies. He lived here and there around the city and was rarely out in the day. Pale was a normal state for him. Anyone who would have known him would have known that. I wondered exactly how well this kid knew my now-dead friend.

"Not just his usual emo-pale, but anemic, paper-white kind of pale,"Wyck countered.

"Thomas," Sir William muttered.

"Was he hurt?" I asked.

This was actually the first bit of information that I had about what happened to Mouse. All I knew was that he was dead - jumped from a building a few days ago.

"His clothes were torn and he was sorta scratched up," Wyck explained with a half-glance towards William's mirror.

"Thomas..." Sir William repeated though with more emphasis - trying to get my attention but I wanted to hear about what happened to Mouse more than what the old ghost had to say.

"Scratched?" I repeated.

"Well, more like clawed. There were three big scrapes down his back and it looked like someone had ripped into his jacket."

Now we were getting somewhere. Wyck was on the run from something that had tried to grab him. Whatever it was almost got him and he ran to Fagan's place trying to find help.

"So then what happened," I asked and leaned forward in my chair only mildly aware of the journal on the desk.

"Thomas!" Sir William barked and just as I looked over towards his favorite mirror I could see black flames beginning to erupt from the reflected form of the book. The journal in front of me was still perfectly normal, but its reflection was starting to be consumed by the purple-hued, black flames of magic.

I stood up with a shock and knocked the journal off my desk. It hit the wooden floor with the sizzle of a bit of fresh slab of meat on a hot grill. Wyck flinched and recoiled into his chair as though the book were going to bite his feet.

"What?" he yipped.

"Get the book, "I told him and pointed to where it fell.

"Hell no!" He retorted.

"Dammit, it won't hurt you. Pick it up." I lied. I had no idea what it was doing, but I was hoping that since the book hadn't hurt him this far that it wouldn't hurt him now.

"Fuck that." He scrambled out of the chair and backed away from the book as though he expected it to blow up now.

The flames were now a column of black fire in the reflections of the mirror. I didn't have much time. Sir William was now across the room in a smaller mirror on the wall so that he could keep an eye on Wyck. I reached out my right hand and spread my fingers while I called up the words of a spell to mind.

"Winds I command thee...to bl.."

Usually, I would say the word 'blow' and a big gust of wind would barrel out from my hand and knock back whatever was in front of me. It's usually was only good for small things but I thought that it could at least scoot the journal across the floor and hopefully into the circle of copper in the corner. It wasn't my main protective circle - that was in the basement, but it should have been enough to hold whatever was happening in the Netherwhere.

However, as I pronounced the final word and the power of the spell popped in my ears, I felt a huge fist of wind slam into my gut. It doubled me over and knocked me back into the shelves behind me with a crunch. The shelves were built to hold several dozen pounds of books and were sturdy to the touch. Sturdy enough that when my back slammed into them I swear I heard a pop or two. Not good.

I was a barefooted, crumpled heap of still-damp jeans. Whatever hit me went right through the protective bracelet. I hurt in places I didn't know could hurt. It took some effort but I finally managed to twist my head so that I could look out to see where the journal was on the floor - unmoved by my spell.

The wind that I had tried to call to move the journal was now spiraling and twisting around the room like a miniature tornado. Books were being blown off their shelves and free pages swirled in the air with a growing roar in my ears.

"Put it in the shukle," I muttered through a rapidly swelling lip. I couldn't pronounce the word through swollen lips.

Wyck seemed to have understood what I was saying and scampered over on his hands and knees to pluck the journal up and tossed it towards the circle that had been scorched into the wood of the floor. As the journal left his fingers, a hefty tome came off a nearby shelf and clocked the boy in the side of his jaw; enough that it forced him to bite into his lip.

As soon as the journal's cover touched the wood inside the circle the wind died as though someone threw the switch on a big fan.

I lamented not keeping the reams of blank paper for making journals in some kind of a container and not loose on one of the shelves. The floor of the office was about a finger's thickness with loose pages and I slowly tried to rise. Being hit in the gut was worse than power crunches in the gym. I got my shoulder blades about three inches off the ground before the pain hit me and I collapsed back onto the wooden floor with a dull thud.

"Ow..." I exclaimed, trying to make light of the pain.

I rolled over onto my stomach and pulled my knees under my gut. I could feel the lump on my lip swelling with each throb of the pain in my back and stomach.

"Kid, you ok?"

"Wyck," he corrected me.

"I'll take that as 'yes'." I commented as I reached for the staff beside me and used it as a crutch to get to my legs.

Sir William clicked his teeth as he looked at the mess of blank paper all over the floor. "I tried to tell you, Thomas, that I thought I recognized the ward on the journal."

"Try harder next time," I groaned.

"Some kind of reflexive magic or something? Bouncing back whatever was cast on it only worse?" Wyck offered. The boy had an uncanny knack at chiming in at the right time with the right information.

"Ok, Wyck," I began reaching up with my hand to gently touch the bruise on my lip just to see how badly it had already swollen. "You sound like you know a little something about what's going on so don't make any plans on leaving until we've had our talk. For now," I glanced towards the circle and scattered pages on the floor. The swirl of the wind had moved the pages from their perch on one of the shelves to cover the floor but thankfully none of them interrupted the continuity of the protective circle opposite the door to my office.

Circles had been used in magic since the beginning. They were for holding things in or keeping things out. The small circle I had burned into the wood of the floor was for keeping things in. It was only about three feet across so it wasn't really large enough for summon something but it had come in handy as an extra layer of protection on more than a few times.

Sir William's shifting from one mirror to the other caught my attention for a moment and I turned to him but only just to see how badly my lip was swelling. "Pick up the pa..." I started to tell the boy.

Wyck was already on his hands and knees starting to gather the papers into neat stacks. He didn't wrinkle a page or dog-ear a single corner. The kid was meticulous, far more careful with the pages than I would have given him credit especially considering his appearance. With his help I was able to step to the circle without having to walk on the blank pages and I stared down at the journal.

It laid there innocently. Anonymously. Patiently.

"One book to rule them all," I muttered.

Sir William just rolled his eyes at me from his side of the mirror at the allusion.

"Professor - can you tell me anything about the book?" I asked as I bent to help Wyck collect the pages and put them back onto the shelves as well as a few other books that had fallen in the micro-storm.

"Nothing, Thomas. Not a thing. It has been warded against my sight. Actually, there are wards against almost anything one could imagine placed on that book."

"That would take a lot of umph to be able to layer all of that magic onto something like that, wouldn't it?" I asked and stepped over to the old wing-backed chair behind the desk and eased into it with my staff as a crutch.

Wyck pulled himself back into the chair opposite my desk but turned it around so we could both watch the book sitting there within the circle like someone had simply dropped it from a nearby shelf. The black flames had died out or had stopped through some other means. I had only seen flames like that once before and I didn't want to bring myself to even think of what it could mean.

It was bad.

Very bad.

"So what happened after Mouse gave that to you at Fagans?" I tried to continue the conversation while I had the presence of mind to do so.

Wyck shrugged and turned back towards me. "Dunno. I was already on my way out when he found me. He just asked me to hold onto it and then went to go talk to Fagan about something."

"That's it?" I asked and began to realize that I was bare-footed and half out of my clothes when this whole problem started. I needed to either get a shower and clean up completely or just put back on what I had taken off and ignore the feeling of walking around in wet denim.

Or not.

"He was going to meet me the next night and we were going to hold up with this guy I know. He likes to party and he likes 'em young. You know, get off the street for a while."

"I..uh... see," I tried not to judge but I really didn't like hearing that Mouse was willing to sell himself for a safe place to crash. He could have come to me and I would have let him sleep on the couch or something.

"So did Mouse find you?" I asked as I stripped off my damp socks and winced as I could feel some bruises forming on my back.

"Nope. I waited and waited but he never came. I tried to look around for him but no one one the street had seen him since he was at Fagan's place."

That settled it. I knew that I needed to go and find out what this Fagan guy knew. Getting Wyck to show me where I could find him could be a bit more complicated.

"How... WELL... did you know Mouse?" I asked trying to at least sound polite.

"We were close," he responded enigmatically.

"Ever seen his tattoo?" I asked - testing just how close of a connection there may have been between them.

Wyck blushed. His eyes dropped from mine and he looked away immediately. Whether he wanted to conceal the details of the relationship from me or not, his face told it all.

"Oh. Ok, " I commented just trying to change the topic as quickly as possible, "Well, I am going to need your help if I'm going to find out what happened to Mouse and what's up with that book."

"I'm down." He replied and stood up as though he were ready to charge off that very minute.

"Whoa there boy. Have a seat. First thing's first." I pointed to the journal, "First, I need to lock that up somewhere until I can figure it out what it is and who might have killed Mouse for it."

"Then we can go talk to Fagan. Once you get me there, you can head off and do whatever."I explained while I stood up and tried not to let the deep inhale of breath sound too much like a moan of pain. " I don't want you to get in any deeper than you are."

"I'm already in over my head," Wyck snerked darkly.

"Sir William," I asked while stripping off my still-damp shirt. The centuries-old spirit appeared in a mirror nearest me on the wall and inclined his head as though he were waiting for me to finish the request. "Please keep an eye on Wyck here while I change my clothes."

"Certainly Thomas," he nodded and turned his eyes towards the boy in the chair and leveled him with the full weight of his professorial death-stare. In life Sir William was a professor at Oxford in the mid-sixteenth century. He was more than accustomed to staring down students of various degree and putting the occasional upstart in his place with just a glance. Since his death and eventual enforced servitude, he had gained quite a sum of arcane knowledge though his ability to influence the world of the living was limited, he could cast his own illusions and make people think otherwise.

I looked directly at Wyck, enough to make eye contact with him, and told him to stay in the office. He nodded and I headed out and down the hall to change out of my wet clothes.

Water Gathering

Gathering water can be difficult when you still live in one of the towns that survived the flash.

Running water only works part of the time so you're never really certain when it will decide not to work for you - usually when you need it most. Winter is one of the worst times for the water to freeze up or when they can't get it fixed that quickly.

So, you do what our grandparents did and stock up.

Right now my basement is as stocked as a wine cellar - just with bottles of water. Anything that could hold water has been washed and converted into use. We are truly a 'Green' society because recycling isn't just a cool idea - it's a fact of life.

When the water goes out, it could take a week to get it turned back on. This is when people start dipping into their water cache for everything from flushing the toilet, doing dishes and sink-baths. Showers and baths are usually on hold until the water's back on.

In some parts of the town, you can't get running water because the pipes broke and they're too far down to dig by hand. Though we've been able to rebuild most of the digging machines after The Flash, we don't have any pipes to replace the ones that ruptured with the cold.