Leaving Artemis to stay close to Mrs. Fisher and alert us if she needed anything, Athena and I decided to search the house by starting in the basement and working our way up. Finding an item of magic in an otherwise non-magical house sounds like a pretty simple task, doesn't it?

It isn't.

In a household run entirely on electricity (thank you, Nikola Tesla) it can be hard to pick out a single small item from all the background noise of ambient magic, so you have to learn to filter that out. In a warded home like the Fishers', any spells designed to detect magical items also had to take the wards and runestone anchors into account. Otherwise, all I’d detect would be the wards and their anchors.

Then there's the fact that unless you're dealing with an item that has a tremendous store of magical energy in it (the ritual dagger that Brenna tried to steal from me immediately came to mind), it can be difficult, or even impossible, to detect it from more than a few feet away. Detection spells therefore have to be finely tuned and customized on the fly, and often have to be held active for extended periods of time. Like, for three or four hours, as you walk around with your hands held out towards the items you're walking past.

It’d be even worse if I tried using a visual detection spell, the kind that overlayed a visual representation of ambient levels of Anima onto what you're looking at, similar to viewing auras. Considering how much Anima is used daily for even mundane things - like toaster ovens and electric lights - those spell can very quickly give you a headache. They did me…and I'm not talking a little headache. I'm talking full-blown migraine.

Finally, everything needs to be checked, from the lowliest tennis ball to the most expensive-looking painting. Some spellcasters could be pretty indiscriminate about what they enchanted when they were in a hurry, as long as it would hold what they need it to.

Okay, I'm exaggerating a little. Tennis balls don't have the material resources to hold much Anima and wouldn't be good for holding serious, long term enchantments. A little common sense needed to be applied...but nothing should be overlooked. I use tennis balls as an example because Jonathan once used an illusion of one to disguise a heavily enchanted sphere of platinum with gems embedded in it. I spent hours trying to locate the damned thing, and must have walked past it without checking it a dozen times.

Looks can be deceiving.

So I wasn't all that surprised when - as Athena and I were carefully working our way through Mrs. Fisher's sewing room - we were called to dinner a little over five hours after we started, without having found a thing. And we hadn't even made it to their small attic.

I exhaled and released the detection spell I'd been holding on and off for hours. Fortunately, they don't require much energy.

"Is it worth picking up after dinner?" Athena asked, sounding as weary as I felt.

"Probably not," I admitted. "I doubt we'll find anything. It was kind of a stretch to begin with." We started downstairs as I continued, "I think we should catch a quick nap after dinner. Sleep for an hour or two and then stay up all night."

"You think there'll be another...incident tonight?"

<> I asked her telepathically.

She nodded. <>

<> I agreed reluctantly. <>

Athena smiled. <>

Over dinner, we finally had a chance to get to know Rose and Phillip. Rose was fifteen going on twenty, and for some reason the word 'vivacious' came to mind the moment I met her. She was pretty, with dark hair framing delicate features and bright green eyes, and there was a vibrant energy about her that told me she had as much magical talent as her little brother. I had a feeling she'd be breaking hearts soon enough.

Phillip, the eldest of the Fishers' children, was on the cusp of eighteen and ready to leave the nest. He had his father's short black hair and brown eyes, and was already of a height with Joseph; in fact, they looked so alike that there was no question they were father and son.

It had crossed my mind that perhaps one of the older children had become involved in something that had set off this round of attacks on their family, so I spent a lot of time talking to them as we ate. I learned that Phillip had applied to both Oxford and Cambridge to study physics, and wished him luck getting into them. He had plenty of magical potential and a quick mind, like his younger siblings, so he wouldn't have much trouble getting into any university he wanted.

Rose wasn't as scientifically minded as her big brother. She was fascinated by literature and poetry, excelling in her secondary school English classes and admitted - in a conspiratorial whisper - to not trying hard enough in math and the sciences. Both of them were quick to laugh and neither rose to the bits of conversational bait I laid out as we talked, mentioning my own studies and how they related to magic. Neither seemed to have Billy's interest in magic.

Both of them seemed like good kids, and cursory searches of their bedrooms hadn't turned up anything that led me to believe that either had an interest in the occult. Kids, especially teenagers, love to read about and experiment with the darker aspects of the supernatural. Anyone of that age who says they don't like to occasionally wrap themselves up in a blanket and read a book of ghost stories by flashlight (magelight or candle optional, but much more fun) is pulling your leg. And I'm told that kids love to tell one another scary stories during sleep-overs and at summer camp.

I wouldn't know. My childhood wasn't exactly normal. I never really had any friends my own age. If I made a new friend, it didn't last long thanks to parental influences. I confess to being a bit bitter about it...I feel like I missed out on things I shouldn't have. But it is what it is.

Anyway, that (very natural) fascination with ghost stories and spooking one another is one step away from playing with a spirit board, or chanting 'Bloody Mary' in front of a mirror by candle light. Jonathan had taught me that it wasn't uncommon in poltergeist cases to find books on the occult and spirit summoning in the bedroom of one of the family children. I'd already seen it twice myself.

Frankly, you'd be surprised by how often it happens. Kids don't know any better, or don't think the warnings are serious, or are even feeling rebellious and simply want to do what they've been told not to. I did it once or twice myself while I was Jonathan's apprentice. I came bloody close to doing an amateur performance of the old 'Sorcerer's Apprentice' story when I tried to clean with magic at the tender age of fourteen, barely a year into my apprenticeship. Jonathan had a good laugh about it and took the opportunity to teach me some actual household cleaning magic.

But an unsupervised child with enough Anima - like Philip or Rose - could inadvertently summon something genuinely nasty while playing with the occult, however innocently. And, of course, there were some teenagers who were angry enough at their parents and the world (however silly their reasons might seem to the rest of us) to do it on purpose.

I'd already seen that once too. It hadn't been pretty, and the end result wasn’t something I liked thinking about.

Fortunately, as I said, neither Philip or Rose seemed at all interested in such things. Athena and I bedded down in the Fishers' guest room to get a few hours of sleep, secure in the knowledge that we weren't resting in a hidden den of dark magic.

I was gently shaken awake by Rose a while later, the clock beside the bed telling me that it was a few minutes past 9:30. The sun had set and all was dark outside the window. I seemed to have been woken last, since Artemis and Athena were both yawning and stretching already.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Rose smiled. "Sorry to wake you. Mom said to give you a little shake when we went to bed, and I won the coin toss."

I sat up and returned her smile. "Thanks, Rose. Sleep well."

"Thanks," she started towards the door, then stopped and turned to look at me again. "I'm going to sleep a lot better tonight knowing that you're here. Phil won't admit it, but he will too."

"Hey!" Phil's voice protested from the hall outside. "I was never worried."

Rose giggled and I smothered a laugh, then raised my voice a little to bid him good night as well. Both of them made their way to bed as Athena and I readied ourselves for our vigil.

Athena buckled her gunbelt and sword harness back on, then sheathed her sword on her back and spent a few moments checking her gun. Produced by a small French arms dealer, her LeMat revolver was distinctive in its use of a larger than normal cylinder that held nine .44 caliber shells around a larger barrel that took a single 16 gauge shotgun shell. It was a big, heavy gun, and looked almost comically oversized on her slender frame - but she handled it like a born gunslinger after only a few months of practicing with it.

She carried a variety of shells with different payloads, marked with colored bands to indicate what they held so that she could recognize them at a glance. Now, I saw her making sure that the center chamber held what I recognized as a silver buckshot round, which had proved incredibly effective last time we'd spent the night at the Fishers' home.

I checked my under-armor briefly, then buckled on the birthday present I'd received from my mom and Jonathan. It was something they'd worked on together, a home-made belt with several pouches and slim round tubes on it. The pouches were similar to my bottomless bag, in that each one could hold a couple of cubic feet of cargo, considerably more than they appeared able to, and would deliver the desired item into my hand by reaching in and thinking about it.

I just had to remember what was in each pouch, which was easier than it sounded. As a wizard-in-training, my memory was honed to almost photographic quality.

The tubes were similar, but designed to hold potion vials, wands and rods, and then a foot-long one on my right hip for my staff. My bottomless bag was invaluable for keeping all manner of things needed for spellcasting handy, but that's not really what it was designed for and it had left me fumbling through it once or twice. My new utility belt had been purpose-made for quick and convenient use.

After a moment's debate, I added a silver-bladed dagger in a sheath to my belt, just in case, then turned to Athena. "Ready?"

She nodded. "Shall I prepare the kitchen?"

I considered for a moment. Kitchen or living room? The living room would be more comfortable, but the kitchen opened onto both the back and one of the side yards, where the living room only opened onto the front yard. It had been the wards at the back yard and that very side which had been stressed, so...

"Yes, let's set up in the kitchen," I replied finally. "I'll take a turn around the house with Artemis while you do that."

She smiled. "Yes, Mistress."

While Athena carefully cleaned the small kitchen table and counters - one never knew when one would need a clean, flat surface to mix components on without risking them being contaminated - and started boiling some water, Artemis and I slipped out into the back yard. The hot water was primarily intended for tea, but it could prove useful for a variety of things.

It was a dark night. The moon was a waning sliver that would be gone completely in two more nights, which could account for the timing of these attacks. The new moon was traditionally a time for working dark magic, though not for any real metaphysical reasons - it was just harder to spot people doing things they shouldn't be. There were a couple of new moons during the course of the year that were times of power, but they were more useful as times of renewal than anything else.

I considered calling up a magelight, then decided there was no point in making myself an easy target or announcing my presence if it had somehow been missed. I would have to rely on Artemis's superior senses to guide me, and made a mental note to buy - or make - a good pair of night-vision goggles as soon as I could.

Artemis - sensing the direction of my thoughts - stayed close by my side as we slowly prowled the perimeter of the wards again. I didn't expect that anything would have happened to them since I'd examined them that morning, but it couldn't hurt to check, and we needed to make a circle around the house anyway. As expected, they were strong and solid, and we found nothing out of the ordinary.

As we returned to the kitchen through the back door, I was surprised to see Mr. Fisher sitting at the little table, sipping a mug of tea. I glanced at Athena, who shrugged, then came all the way in and closed the door, leaving Artemis outside to prowl the yard. "You're up late," I said in a conversational tone.

I am not the most subtle of people conversationally speaking. I prefer to be straightforward and if not blunt, at least honest. Even years of magical study - a field in which subtlety is vital - only mildly softened that edge of my personality.

"Why am I still up, you mean?" He asked with a tired smile.

I shrugged, unruffled. I was used to people seeing through my conversational gambits. "I wasn't expecting you to be," I said, taking a steaming mug proffered by Athena and sitting at the table across from Mr. Fisher.

"I can't sleep," he admitted. "I'm worried about my family."

Athena moved to stand by the window as I smiled gently across the table at him. "I'm sure we'll get it all squared away tonight," I replied, doing my best to be reassuring.

"Do you think so?" He asked quietly, setting his mug down. "Maggie told me you didn't really find any clues when you examined the wards earlier. Did you find anything when you searched the house?"

"I do think so," I said firmly. "It's true, I don't have much to go on, and I didn't find anything while going through the house." I smiled a little. "I didn't really expect to, but I want to make sure I leave no stones unturned. I'm here to ensure the safety and health of your family, and I take that very seriously. Since I didn't find any clues, my job tonight is to be a bodyguard."

"Which we already know you're very good at," he agreed. "Do you have any ideas about what we might be dealing with?"

"Lots of idea," I said wryly, "No evidence." I sipped my tea. "I don't think it's the same sort of thing as last time, though."

"Oh?"

I felt a sudden wary attention from Athena and half turned to see her peering out the kitchen window into the night. At the same time, I replied, "The stress that was placed on the wards feels more like they were being tested by counter-spells with the eventual intent of bringing them down." I slowly turned my mug in my hands. "If someone starts that again tonight, I'll feel it and be able to back-track the spells to them."

Athena's tension eased and she snorted quietly to herself, so I returned my attention fully to Mr. Fisher. Artemis must have been playing mind games with her. "At any rate," I said, "I think we'll get it sorted out tonight."

"How far away could someone be and still challenge the wards like that?" he asked.

I considered the question seriously for a moment. "Well, theoretically they could be hundreds or even thousands of miles away. But it would take a tremendous amount of power to do it at that distance and still accomplish what you could do with a considerably lesser amount of power while being a block or two away. I don't think they'd be far."

Mr. Fisher nodded and lapsed into silence. I sipped my tea, then quietly asked, "Mr. Fisher, can you think of anyone who'd want to hurt your family?"

He shrugged. "I'm a prosecuting attorney," he replied. "I'm sure there's quite a few criminals who I helped put away that would like a piece of me. But I don't recall any of them being magically talented on this sort of scale."

I nodded, and we sat in silence for a few minutes. Finally, Mr. Fisher rose and put his mug in the sink. "Well, thanks for taking the time to talk with me, Miss Kinnear." He smiled. "I think I'll be able to sleep now."

I returned his smile. "I'm glad. Rest easy, we're on guard."

When he was gone, Athena half turned from the window to look at me. <>

I gave her a startled look. <>

<> she repeated. <> She frowned. <>

I sat back in my chair and chewed on my bottom lip as I considered her question. Finally, I sighed. <>

Athena nodded and returned her attention to the window. <>

I smiled and reached out to Artemis. <>

<> Artemis replied smugly from wherever she was lurking in the back yard.

<> I rose and went to stand beside Athena at the window.

<> Artemis said. <>

I peered out the window at the big oak tree in the Fishers' back yard. Its leaves had already grown in thick, and I couldn't catch even the faintest glimpse of my familiar's white fur. <

When she replied, I could practically hear her contented purr. <>

She knew full well that I'd probably send Athena out to do a patrol around the house before long. I shook my head a little, smiling. "When you go to have a look around," I said quietly to Athena, "Stay clear of the tree."

Athena sighed. "She's planning to drop out of the tree on me?"

"You or anybody else who comes along," I confirmed. "Better to keep her focused and out of mischief than to tempt her, hmm?"

"Of course, Mistress," Athena said with a smile.

We stared out into the night together and waited for whatever was going to happen.