Neophyte / Adept (50 page)

“What does that look like to you?” he said.

I shrugged. “Like the four cardinal points?” I said.

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

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

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

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

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

My ring was my Four Protectors.

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

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

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

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

Finally, I got it.

“
The aether,
”
I said.
“
The is the aether.
”

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

So did that mean my three circles were surrounded in Magic?
Ballard, Lennox, Selwyn, Marek? That they
all
could craft? Or were they protecting me
from
Magic?
I didn’t understand. Magic split
FOUR ways––But there are only THREE Houses––but there
are FIVE elements––and there are Watchtowers.
What came next?

My heartbeat started doing funny things.

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

Was
that
accurate?

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

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

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

Chapter 10
– The Fifth of Fourth

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

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

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

“I’m in. Tell me. You’re freaking me out,” I said.

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

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

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

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

“But what
are
Watchtowers?” I said. “What do they do?”

Asher and Laurinaitis grinned ear-to-ear.

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

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

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

She drew the seven-sided star as well.

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

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

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

“We need to flip the pentagram,” said Manon, “so it’s like a
body––with a Head. Or one horn.
There.”

I watched her fill it in.

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

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

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

I looked at the SPIRIT
,
thinking it was the crucial piece––and mentally word-hoarded what
she’d just said. If I couldn’t do magic by thinking it, I would ape it instead:
flagrante
, I thought.

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

“You can’t see air either. Unless it’s smog,” I said.

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

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

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

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

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