The 13th Mage (24 page)

“No, Owen,” Aeoife’s voice drowned his emotions like a bucket of cold water.

“Isn’t it wonderful?” Said Jennifer, looking at Rossini, smiling like a teenager in love, “I am so pleased for you Mrs. Crow, it’s so nice to see old people in love.
Not that you are that old Mrs. Crow, nor you Mr. Rossini, you are very young looking, both of you.
Oh, I think it’s so romantic.
Don’t you Owen?”

“What is so romantic?”

“Mrs. Crow and Mr. Rossini, they are back from a date.”

“Working dinner, Owen, your mother was kind enough to keep me company until your return, nothing romantic I assure you.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that Mr. Rossini,” said Aeoife smiling, “your friend is a real gentleman Owen.”

“Your mother?” Asked Jennifer, “Jesus, how many more of your relatives do I know Owen?”

“Adoptive mother,” he replied, giving Aeoife a nasty look, “and no other relatives, come on, we better get back to your computer.”

“Leaving so soon?” Asked Aeoife.

“We left something running on Jennifer’s computer before coming over, we have to go and check on it,” Owen replied ripping Jennifer off his rival’s arm and pulling her toward the door.

“Yes, of course, we better get going,” said Jennifer, smiling away.

“I’ll come with you,” said Rossini, but Aeoife held his arm.

“I think Owen sees you as a threat to his manhood Mr. Rossini, it might be best if you left the young ones on their own.”

“I heard that!” shouted Owen from the front gate.

“But I need to observe them, his condition intrigues me.”

“You cannot know the flavor of a strawberry simply by looking at it Mr. Rossini.
Besides, the overtones of possessive love are rather destructive, and it is possessive love Owen feels at the moment, a weak and powerless state which poses no threat to a man like you.”

Rossini took Aeoife’s hands in his and looked into her eyes, “so my fair lady, you know why I am here.”

“Yes.
And I can assure you I will do everything I can to help you in your quest.”

“But I
am your son’s rival as you said. Y
ou cannot possibly want to help me find a way to defeat him.”

“I like you Mr. Rossini, I am now certain that Owen will never have to face you in combat, although you have both thought so for a long time.” She looked out at the young couple walking away, “change is upon us,” she added.

Owen lay on the sofa while Jennifer
typed
away at her computer.

“This little gadget is fantastic,” she said, “taps into every satellite up there, goes right through their firewalls.
Brilliant.”

The net curtains were lifting to the gentle movement of the night sea breeze.
Owen looked ove
r at Jennifer. She had her back to him. T
he light from the computer screen
was making
the edge of her hair look like an aura of fire.
Around her a multitude of colors danced, bright and beautiful.

“Why do you think it was so easy to get out of that place Owen?”

“I wouldn’t worry about it.
It was all staged for you to be able to get away, although I don’t think Andrews expected you to come back for me, nor to attack him, Andrews is a Council Elder, it is one of Elder traits to underestimate non-Elders.”

“Did you like the way I made him afraid?”

“Yes, how did you do that?”

“I learned it in Hell. When you died.”

He looked away, Jennifer was no ordinary mage.
No one he had ever met could learn magic that fast, by looking, seeing, feeling or even hearing about a skill, she could replicate it.
What was she?

“There is something you still haven’t answered Owen,” she said.

“Yes?”

“Why did you tell Harry Johnson that Heather was your daughter?”

Because she should have been, thought Owen.

“I didn’t think I would see either of you for a long time, if ever again.
I wanted to make sure you were well provided for.”

“I can take care of us pretty well you know, I have decided I am going back to school, get a degree and will earn a good living.”

“What if something was to happen to you?
What of Heather then?
I was only thinking of her best interests.”

“Well, you can put that right when all this is over, can’t you, you will tell Harry Johnson you are not her father.”

Owen turned around to face the wall, he was tired, it had been a long three days.

The grass was greener than green, the sky blue as an ocean, the trees covered in a canopy of spring leaves.
A young man walked by the lakeside, whistling.

Sean.

“Who are you?”

“Don’t you recognize me?”

“Owen, my younger brother.” Sean said taking the younger man in his arms.

Owen felt a pain in his heart, an old wound, a pain so deep, so old, he had buried it before he had become a self.
He cried.

“At last you have come, I have waited, long I have waited for this moment,” Sean said, his voice broken.

They looked at each other.

“You are slightly taller than me,” Owen said.

“And less refined,” Sean answered.

They laughed the same laugh.

“We need to talk,” Owen began.

“If it’s about Jennifer, she no longer loves me.
It’s ironic.”

“What do you mean?”

“Now that you have found me I can go back to Earth, you are the only one who can take me out of here.
Now I would be able to go back and there is no reason for me to go.
It is you she loves now and I don’t blame her. She is much better off with you.”

“You can go back?
All this time all you needed was for me to come for you?”

“Yes.
It’s one of their laws, they prefer to keep us here on our own rather than have our siblings coming over all the time and putting revolutionary thoughts in our minds.
Seeing as we are strongly linked once the twin finds us it’s not worth them keeping us here any longer.”

“That is why it is against the rules for us to find out about our twin.”

“Yes, against the rules.
I didn’t find out about you until Jennifer mentioned you, how is she?
Did the Mages take her and Heather to their safe-house?”

“Sean, we need to have a little talk.”

Jennifer stopped playing with the satellites and turned round to show Owen what she’d found, but he was fast asleep.
She went for a blanket and quietly covered him up.
She stroked his hair, “sleep tight,” she said kissing him on the cheek.
Heather looked so much like him,
that
no one would ever know he wasn’t her father.
No one need know.

He smelt good. Different to Sean, not the same at all, she thought.
One little kiss wouldn’t make a difference, no one would find out.
She leaned over and kissed him on the lips.
Tears rolled out of her eyes, the last time she had kissed him on the lips was when she said goodbye to his body in that terrible desert, now here he was alive and well.

It should have been him, she thought.
He should have been Heather’s father.
If only she had met him before she met Sean.
If only she could change the past and make it right.
None of this need have happen.

She sat beside him, watching him sleep.
He was seventeen hundred years old, yet he was so normal, apart from his powers.

She wondered how his life had been, what he was like when he was truly twenty years
old and not seventeen hundred.

She was holding a stick, her arm was brown and strong, a man’s arm.
She drew a circle in the dirt and a cross inside it.

“East, power of Air, Spring and Rebirth. South, power of Fire, Summer and Life.
West, power of Water, Autumn and Old Age. North, power of the Earth, Winter and Death.”

It was Owen’s voice. S
he was inside Owen’s body sometime in the past.

“Owen.”

“Who… who are you? Are you the Goddess of the
Sacred Circle
?”

“Owen, go to the
spring, look at your reflection
in the water.”

“Yes my Lady.”

He walked to the
nearby spring, leaned over and looked at his reflection.
It was Owen alright.
Young, identical as he was now, a little thinner perhaps.

“Who are you?” He said looking straight at her.

She pulled back quickly and fell against the coffee table.

Owen gave a little moan and carried on sleeping.

Dear God, what I have done, she thought.
Whatever it was, it was too late now, what was done was done.

The next morning Owen was in extremely high spirits, by the time Jennifer got up he had breakfast ready and a map printed out with what he thought were the coordinates of the Shadow headquarters.

“Oh God, not
England
again,”

“Yes, and look closely,”

“
Nottingham
? Isn’t that where Robin Hood lived?”

“Well, where the evil Sheriff lived, Robin Hood lived in
Sherwood Forest
.”

“My God,
She
rwood Forest
still exists, look
it’s still in the map.”

“The
second map is a city breakdown. A
pparently they took him to a mortal hospital.”

“Why?
Surely with their powers they could fix him much quicker.”

“Most mages have a protective shell, we put in place when we are mortally injured, it is
meant
to stop our adversaries from m
anipulating us when we are down. H
e must have had enough time to activate his.
Which means mage power cannot be used on him now.
He will keep himself alive until he repairs the damage, the other
Shadow obviously thought taking him for mortal medical care would speed things up.”

“So my plan sort of didn’t work out.”

“I think the place they took him to first, the one you marked last night, might be of importance, it’s only thirty miles from
Nottingham
.”

“Did you have a good sleep last night?” Jennifer said remembering the night before, blood rushing to her face.

“Yes, why?”

“Did you have any strange dreams?”

“No, nothing strange.
How about you?”

“Me? No, nothing.”

“Anyway, there is a direct flight from
Dublin
to the
East
Midlands
Airport
, which is only five miles from the first location.”

“You want to us to leave right now?”

“We’ll finish our breakfast first.
Besides, it’s not us, but me, I’ll leave after breakfast,” he answered matter of fact.

“What about me?
You can’t expect me to sit around while you go off on your own do you?
Besides, it’s not you the Shadow want, it’s me,
so
they’ll come here anyway.”

“No, you can stay here but not idle, you will Borrow into my mind and learn all the magic they throw my way.”

“What will that gain us, apart from probably getting you killed?”

“We cannot eliminate the enemy, we cannot eliminate negativity Jennifer, and the only way to
defeat it
is to become stronger than it.
You have to become stronger than the problem, stronger than the Shadow.
Stronger than the group of
Thirteen
. They are not interested in me,
which
will give us an advantage,”

“What makes you think I will be able to learn all their magic?”

“Have you not noticed that that is what you do, learn every bit of magic that comes your way?”

“Now that you mention it.”

“No one else can do that Jennifer.
You are different.”

She looked at him puzzled.

“Special,” he added.

She thought she was different to every other mage she had met so far, but thought that was normal, that all mages were different to each other.
Although Owen had already told her there were only two types of mages, the Elders, which were mind oriented, and the witches, who were more earth based.

“Borrowing,” she said, “look into your thoughts, be inside your body. Won’t that make you capable of looking inside my mind too?
Can’t you learn what I learn?”

“Yes, I guess so, if we make the link strong.”

“But you would be able to look into my memories too, won’t you?”

“Not if you don’t want me to, I wouldn’t violate your privacy.”

“Good,” she said, “don’t.”

She didn’t want him to find out about the previous night.

Jennifer looked through the maps, it was a good plan, practical, but she didn’t like it.
She didn’t like the fact that she would be staying behind, after all this was her battle, not his.

“I need to see Heather, Owen.
I miss her and my milk is drying up.”

She felt tears well inside her eyes and looked away.
Why did she have to start crying? She hated when her emotions let her down like that.

“It won’t be long now, hold on just a couple more days,” he answered wrapping her in his arms.

Jennifer felt a sob working itself up her chest, she hated that too, any form of sympathy triggered a shower of self-pity, she tried to get away but Owen wasn’t about to let her go.

“I will always be here for you,” he said cleaning her tears away and kissing her forehead.

I love you too, she thought, but only to herself.

Borrowing had its shortcomings, it was completely passive, anything else would be possession. Once they made the mental link, Owen left.
It was going to be a long trip back.
Jennifer found that Borrowing into Owen’s mind while he was awake was very different to him asleep, the thoughts were stronger, in fact it was like they were in the same room and in the same body.
She also found that she had to control her thoughts, one layer was private, another was public, but finding the borderline was the most difficult thing of all, so she didn’t think anything privately.

She watched through his eyes and he typed his PIN into the cash machine and mentally looked away, or tried to, but she floated out of his mind and stood above him.
Owen looked up and smiled.

“That won’t work. Y
ou are too visible like that, besides, it would be harder for you to capture their magic that way.”

She forced herself back into his mind, “I was only, I was… your PIN is supposed to be secret.”

He laughed.
“I wouldn’t have used it if I didn’t trust you, come on, concentrate.”