Memories of days that never happened haunted my dreams. In such dreams I returned to a world that had only existed before the one I lived in. A lesser world, darker and more hopeless. A world where the magic books I possessed had no longer existed.

I opened my eyes to the night and heard the voice of a feline speaking from the shadows near the open window of our room. In the ranch motel, La Cucaracha, we had stayed for almost a week. It was then that I met the place's most sorcerous denizen. He had just killed a field mouse and dropped it. When I was awake he began to speak to me. I dared not look away, such cats were not cats and to unbehold them was usually a provocation of their capricious predation.

"You understand what I am saying?" He asked in the high language of the cats.

"Yes." I purred in Felidaen.

"I am Mister Melty Cheeses-Good Lovin' Jesus-Mittens." The deadly beast-wizard introduced itself, translating his name into Felidaen. "You may refer to me as Mister Melt"

"What can I do for you, Mister Melt?" I asked humbly.

"I have come with a message and a warning and news." Mister Melt paused and licked the back of his paw. "First the news: the war has begun and all must now choose a side or be used as fodder in the first great battles."

"I oppose the destruction of this world and wish to see a New Dawn." I stated which side I was on.

"Then the warning is next: you are already undoing the work of the side you are on. Each action you have taken and will take will assist your enemies and thwart your true allies. You must listen carefully and not act rashly. Your enemies are using you." Mister Melt warned me.

"Then what must I do?" I asked.

"Thus the message: you must restore the fallen pillar and do no harm to those that remain." Mister Melt advised.

"The witches?" I asked. I thought he was referring to the Coven, for they were sometimes described as 'pillars'.

"Indeed. One is long dead. You now have all that is written about such a time. The Winds Of The North details the time of exile of those that survived. The crown is still out there, a great secret. Those that seek it thought that the answer would be in that Book of Lilith. They are your true enemies." Mister Melt explained.

"The cats are not the destroyers?" I asked with suspicion.

"Don't be ridiculous!" Mister Melt objected. "If cats were the destroyers and already have the weapon, The Majara, then how do you explain that they have not used it? No, we have such a weapon to prevent destruction, not cause it. It assures that the honorable covenants must be observed by both sides in this war. Otherwise we would become severely annoyed."

"The death of all things that annoy cats." I recalled.

"That is all, for now. You now know what you are supposed to know. Read the book and learn the rest on your own time. I will not speak to you if you see me about the farm and I do not expect your reverent gaze. I have a life as a farm cat here, my reward for great service to the Goddess. Perhaps someday you will be rewarded with a simple life and you will understand that I might come and go when I am not on official business." Mister Melt instructed me to his presence.

"Don't treat you like god spawn and ignore you without approach." I comprehended.

"I would be personally grateful." Mister Melt purred and left me there. I had much to contemplate.

"I do not trust them. They have the weapon and claim it is for the good of all." Cory spoke up, having listened to the whole conversation in silence. "And what sort of name is it, anyway, 'Mister Melty Cheeses-Good Lovin' Jesus-Mittens?'. Don't cats know when they have said enough?"

"Don't all cats have three names? I thought he was honoring us by telling us all three of his names." I argued objectionably. Cory hopped up to me and tilted his head at an angle, examining me out of the corner of his eye. Then he said:

"My Lord presumes that cats regard honor as honorable. What is honor to a cat?" Cory questioned my judgement.

"He seems nice. He even said I don't have to look at him during informal meetings." I smiled facetiously.

"That is absurd! He only said that because you will see him in the daytime when he has no magic to smite you with. What? Is it supposed to be an impulsive kill with a delayed reaction? He lives on a farm, people ignore him all the time. He can't smite them all!" Cory cawed with irritation.

"I am not worried. Mister Melt sounds like he is retired, or partially retired. They only have nine lives." I defended my position, grinning at Cory's agitation. He got on my nerves so often that it gave me pleasure to ruffle his feathers. Nothing got him more undignified than powerful cats looming over us with their menacing shadows and the apologies we had to make.

"I do not trust him." Cory concluded. He hopped away and sulked while making a noise, that to a crow, is a kind of unhappy laugh, knowing something that should be funny and was not. I nodded in his direction and then got up to go and start reading the book we had.

I was not surprised to discover it was translated from a dialect so old that it almost didn't make sense, even in Aramaic. I picked out a word and then another and after awhile I got my phone out and started using a translating website. I got through the first chapter that way. It read:

"Amen. Praise be to the merciful God. I am Winds Of North, daughter of Lilith. Winds Of East was the oldest. In exile, a black cave without time, I write this: to say I am now her oldest daughter. My sisters are the Winds Of West and Winds Of South and they cannot know what I know. Fire shall belong to the grandsons of Seth, to the black magic of Araek and the candlelights of the prostitutes of Can. Only our cousin, Cain, keeps fire sacred, a son of Adam, but one of ours. A man of magic and chaos. The fire's light is in his eyes and I can see him staring at me from this great distance of time and space. Our cave of exile has grown cold and dark. We're now only three of the four that our mother made. May a hundred and eight seeds of each man be born as monsters from the spoiled earth. May Hell yawn its twisted punishments in a holocaust of all that Man has built. When all the lost gems of Lilith's crown are one, may magic bring Dusk to this world. This curse is true and with the blessing of vengeful God. For earlier this day Man beheaded our dear sister, Wind Of East, and took from her head the magic of flames. Praise be to the vengeful God. Amen."

I was not surprised by the story. It was the hand of its author that disturbed me. I had met her and her sisters and they had spared me, although I was their enemy. It was disturbing to think that I was not who I thought I was, that I was not truly their enemy. The book, The Winds Of The North - Book of Lilith, had more chapters and I feared their contents. I was not ready to know so much or to understand the deadly design I was caught up in.

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Yet I could not stop reading. As my eyes scanned the ancient writing I began to somehow recognize certain words that were repeated often enough. The names of the Lilim, their allies and enemies, Araek, Cain, Seth and others as well as the Majara, their mother's crown, given by her first husband as a gift to command the life and death of all Creation. This divine Creator then accepted her divorce and married her to Adam, before there was an Eve. She found the arrangement humiliating and disgusting and rebelled, the Majara becoming shattered in the process and her own body becoming forfeit. Not before she gave birth to the last of her daughters. There were originally four of them and they inherited one-fourth of their mother's powers of magic. When I had concluded the book I knew what the cat had spoken of, better than even the cats knew.

My only question was: who else wanted this book? The witches? Undoubtedly, but who else? There was a sinister force that oppressed them and was their adversary in the war. Some other side that the cats felt they needed to act as a referee, keeping the most powerful weapon on the battlefield for themselves. I could barely comprehend it at that time.

There was a knock on the door and with it an urgent Agent Saint. "The police in town have arrested a witch. She was seen with Detective Winters before the ambush and they found her at the crime scene at the book store."

"One of the Triad Killers?" I said doubtfully. I had learned that they called themselves Lilim and that they were not vulnerable to human weapons or tactics. No man could surprise them, we were like small children compared to their strength and willpower. Not to mention that with a spell they could make the guns of the police fall apart or cause the entire police station to fall asleep. "That's not possible."

"Yet it has happened." Agent Saint had her knife.

"I will wake up Detective Winters." I told her and she went to get her car. With great effort I managed to wake up the heavy sleeper, Detective Winters.

"Is the building on fire?" He asked, annoyed.

"The local police have caught one of the Triad Killers." I told him.

"This ought to be good." Detective Winters was getting dressed. He reached under the bed and got Streetsweeper, the automatic shotgun that had died and become resurrected with him. Despite its uselessness he held it close, reminding him that he had a second chance.

"Only I know anything useful against her. I'm the only one with a theory as to how she is now a captive." Cory flitted to my shoulder.

"Do tell us." Detective Winters led us outside. It was early morning light and the FBI were gathered to depart for the police station where one of their suspects awaited.

We rode with Agent Saint while Cory briefed us.

"This witch is not a witch at all. She is a daughter of Lilith, she isn't even human. Over time they must take new bodies, but the creature is always the same. Witches that pledge their service to them become the new Coven. That this transference occupies most of their concentration and their energy, thus inhibits their magic. There is no reason to assume that they are all alike after so much time since the Dawn or that they ever were. How different are siblings among mortal creatures?" Cory postulated.

I recalled my own brother. Aldrick Briar was nothing like me. He had married at a young age, joined the Army, fathered two sons and hated animals and magic. My right hand hurt as I remembered when we were boys and my older brother had tried to shoot a crow. I had protested and covered the end of the barrel. The pellet was still stuck in my hand after all these years.

"My own brother betrayed me and took my mate for himself when it was agreed among my people that I must have died. This is almost unknown among crows, for him to challenge that I was a liar and could not contradict the expectation that I had died. I was the one exiled, but only because I refused to be killed instead. Our Trial Of Truths was nothing but a lie. I am still alive." Cory told us all his story, suddenly. I wondered at its relevance and so did Agent Saint and Detective Winters. Then Cory added the value of his example:

"She does not agree with the truth of her sisters. She is come to parley. Her powers are at their weakest and she is not attuned to her own magic. For her it is time to negotiate." Cory surmised.

"I think he is right." I sighed. His logic made sense, given what we knew sofar.

When we arrived at the police station I saw that the FBI was ready for anything. Almost every agent was holding a weapon and not half of them were firearms. Agent Heller had, in his hands, a wood cutting ax with its blade dipped in silver.

"I am surprised your agents are so prepared." I told Agent Saint.

"We have seen enough. Even the other team is starting to adopt unconventional approaches in dealing with this case." Agent Saint sounded proud of her men for being so adaptive. Since she had hand picked her own team and won the hearts of the other team, I was proud of her, instead. Their advance was as though they expected another ambush.

The police station was very small and we got inside to find that the few local cops were all gathered to hand over the suspect. The chief of police had a document detailing a confession of conspiracy to commit murder and listed several victims.

"Lord and I will go and talk to her before she is removed." Agent Saint looked at the creature's signature and she sheathed her weapon. Everyone relaxed and felt like she had everything under control.

We were soon walking down a darkened corridor with one light flickering and I could see the fear in her footsteps.

"Must go now." Cory clicked apprehensively.

I beheld her and recognized her. She had spoken on my behalf. I asked her:

"Which one are you? Of the Lilim, I mean?" I sounded polite and terrified.

"Ariel, Wind Of West, ruler over all the magic of Earth." Ariel spoke and her voice made our bones vibrate and our souls quake. She still had enough power to escape if she wanted to.

"It says here that your name is Martha Spiral, an entrepreneur that owns Fetter Industries. A real Atlas Shrugged style matriarch. You have a patent on a new kind of steel." Agent Saint sounded disappointed.

"I am also she." Ariel agreed. "And many other names and fortunes. I also rule this world from a throne in the shadows. It is easy when one has watched humans since the very beginning." Ariel sounded tired.

"Then how is it possible for you to be here?" Cory demanded. "Is it not some difference between you and your sisters? A time in your existence when you change from one body and one life to another? You are at your weakest, am I correct?"

"You are correct, wise bird. Is that the entirety of what you know? You have read my sister's book. I have not." Ariel admitted. "I do not know everything. I do not own everything and I am not complete." Ariel confessed.

"Your candor betrays you." I spoke up. "I have met enough great and old things to know that when they say so much it is to hide something of magnitude."

"My sisters would never look for me here and hear what I am about to say." Ariel replied.

"You are ready to make a deal." Agent Saint sounded pleased.

"Our enemies have something that makes this war desperate. My oldest sister knew how to undo the curse we have put upon this world. She does not want to. She claims that it is through destruction by fire that we shall vanquish our enemies. They would rise up, take it all for themselves anyway. It is a scorched strategy to leave all in ruins so that nothing will remain for them, or for us." Ariel did indeed sound weak and tired.

"The Book of Lilith describes that your mother is entombed somewhere and that the return of her daughter's crown would break the curse. Is that what you seek to know?" I offered. She hesitated and said:

"Yes."

"Where is this place? The Book of Lilith does not say." I asked.

"You will know it in dreams. It is impossible to say where it is with just words." Ariel promised. "It is the location of the crown, that is of concern."

"The crown of flames?" I asked. Ariel said nothing. "Where is it?"

"It is very close by. Our enemies have excavated it. My sisters believe the best thing to do is to fight them. I do not agree." Ariel elaborated only a little bit. "I can say no more, my loyalty is with stronger forces."

"We understand." Agent Saint sounded disappointed again.

"Perhaps you will find yourselves ending this war." Ariel added as we left her there.

We could not take her with us, due to some sort of technicality. The FBI waited outside while a judge arrived to the adjoining courthouse. Her lawyers were already waiting.

"Let's go." Agent Saint decided.

Back at La Cucharacha we watched her come out of the courthouse on the news. There was no mention of the FBI, only that her outrageous bail was set and she was free to go. Agent Nomak got up and turned off the TV without the remote.

As everyone shuffled slowly out of the lobby it was just me and Agent Saint and Cory. We looked at each other and shrugged. She said quietly and optimistically:

"I would say this counts as a break in the case."