Just a Little Magic Ch. 02

JUST A LITTLE MAGIC Chapter 2

I was stunned. Gobsmacked. Janine ... raped? And dead nine months later? The date Lillian had mentioned was less than nine years away.

I looked over at Janine. She seemed pretty calm - maybe she'd had a long time to get used to discussing this subject. I turned back to Lillian.

- "How .. how can you know this?"

- "I was tracking Janine's future. Obviously, not a day at a time. But I checked in on her birthdays. When I looked for her on her 28th birthday ... I couldn't find her."

"She was dead. She died a day after giving birth. I was shocked. But I also found it strange, because on her 27th birthday, she didn't have a boyfriend, much less a husband. I went back 9 months, to the moment of conception."

Lillian was also fairly calm as she told me this story. She had impressive self-control - or perhaps she'd also had time to get used to the facts she was relating.

"Janine was sedated, Pete. It wasn't a drug. It was a spell."

- "A magician?"

Lillian paused, to take a sip of her drink.

"No, Peter." she said. "It was an archmage."

- "Is an archmage ... like an archbishop - one step higher?"

- "An archmage is much more powerful than a mage. By several orders of magnitude."

- "Were you able to find out who it is?"

- "Yes." said Lillian. "His name is Robert Clifford."

***

My real father was an archmage? And a rapist? A murderer?

He'd gone to the hospital where Janine delivered the baby. He killed her, and stole the child. No: he was going to do that - in the future.

- "Why would he do that?" I asked. "It's unbelievable!"

- "I asked myself the same thing." said Lillian. "Why would he kill Janine? And why steal the baby? But then I wondered if he had done the same thing to someone else."

"It was difficult, time-consuming, and extremely painful. I'd seen your - Clifford. I followed him back through time, one day at a time. And then I saw it."

"One month before Janine's murder, he murdered a woman who had just given birth, in Osaka, Japan. Police were baffled, because her newborn child was missing."

"And one month before that, he murdered a woman in a hospital in Tampa, Florida. Her newborn baby had disappeared, too."

This was the freakiest story I'd ever heard. My father was a serial killer? And baby-snatcher? I glanced at Janine, but her face was expressionless.

"That made me wonder if there was a pattern of some kind." said Lillian. "Three dead women. Three stolen babies. Why would Clifford want these babies?"

I did a little research on the two other women, in Japan, and Florida. Do you know what I found?"

I shook my head.

- "Both of those women were from magically-talented families."

- "What? How could you know that?"

- "We know these things, Pete. If a magically-talented woman is looking for a magically-talented man, she can find one. We keep track of bloodlines. If Janine had wanted talented children, she might have found a Baba who would have suggested a mate like ... you."

Me?

I couldn't help it - I looked to Janine. There it was - that incredible expression that I found so daunting, and yet so appealing at the same time: half-closed eyes, the quarter smile ...

Damn. Janine and me?

- "Wait - what's a Baba?"

- "A matchmaker. She knows the magical families, and can find a suitable husband or wife - if you're looking."

"I'm sorry." said Lillian. "I got side-tracked. Back to the story: I looked into mysterious deaths of talented women, combined with missing babies. I wasn't surprise to discover that there were several - and none of the girls involved were married at the time. Then I began to backtrack, nine months earlier, to find out who had impregnated them."

- "No."

- "Yes. Clifford, every time. It took me a year to track him down on every occasion, but once I had a pattern, it was easier to follow."

- "A pattern?"

- "Oh yes." said Lillian. "That's the whole reason behind it. At first, I couldn't understand how the dates of the murders were connected. Then I went further back, looking for some kind of link between the women involved. May I show you something?"

She reached under their coffee table, and slid out a briefcase. Lillian opened it, and pulled out a single sheet of paper. She handed it to me.

JANUARY 9 2001

FEBRUARY 8

MARCH 9

APRIL 7

MAY 7

JUNE 5

JULY 5

AUGUST 4

SEPTEMBER 2

OCTOBER 2

NOVEMBER 1

NOVEMBER 30

DECEMBER 30

It made no sense to me. "I'm sorry ..." I said.

- "My birthday is December 30th." said Janine.

I looked at the paper again.

- "The woman in Japan? She was born November 30th?"

- "Yes." said Lillian.

- "And the woman in Tampa? November 1st?"

- "Yes."

I understood. But I didn't.

- "What does it mean?"

- "Count the dates, Pete." said Lillian.

- "Thirteen."

- "Do you notice anything else?"

- "They're ... about a month apart?"

- "Think of magic." said Lillian. "And the number 13."

It took me a moment. I was thinking of a Baker's Dozen, and playing cards (13 cards in each suit). Unlucky number 13. Magicians ... and finally I thought of female magicians.

- "Witches?"

- "There are 13 witches in a Great coven." said Lillian. "All of these women were - are - magically talented. And the significance of those dates? All 13 were born on the night of a full moon."

- "Is that bad?"

Lillian looked solemn. "Their children could be especially powerful." she said.

"But it's worse than that. Look at the dates of the rapes." She produced a second page from the briefcase.

JANUARY 14 2028

FEBRUARY 13

MARCH 13

APRIL 12

MAY 11

JUNE 10

JULY 9

AUGUST 8

SEPTEMBER 6

OCTOBER 6

NOVEMBER 5

DECEMBER 4

JANUARY 3 2029

"Thirteen women murdered. Their daughters all stolen at birth - and all conceived the night of a full moon."

"Robert Clifford is going to create a coven of witches: all his daughters, all conceived under a full moon - from thirteen magically-talented mothers, all born under a full moon."

***

It was too much to take in. Lillian gave me a few moments to absorb what she'd just told me. It didn't make sense. It was just too ... weird. Too monstrous.

I shook my head.

- "Wait - how can he be sure that these women will end up ... pregnant? And how can all of the babies be female?"

-"Magic." said Janine.

Oh. That.

- "Okay." I said. "If he only gets 12, that's not a coven - is it? So, if you were to get an abortion - wouldn't that stop his scheme? No reason to murder you if there's no baby to steal, right?"

- "Magic." said Lillian. "He would put a spell on these girls. They would find that they were happy to be pregnant. They would want to bear these children."

- "He's that powerful?"

- "Oh, yes. And with a coven like that ... the damage they could do is incalculable."

- "But .. isn't someone going to notice? I mean, if 13 women are murdered and their newborn babies are stolen?"

- "They'll be spread around the world, Pete. Think of it this way: roughly 360,000 babies are born every day. Slightly over 50% are female. Let's leave it at 180,000, for the sake of simplicity."

The frequency of children born into magical bloodlines is 1 in 25,000. That means that roughly 7 magically talented babies are born every day."

- "That's all?"

- "That's it. So, on average, 3 or 4 females. Sometimes, though, only one. Then there are the ones that don't survive to adulthood, because of illness, accident, war ..."

"When Clifford is looking for a magically-talented female born on, say, the 9th of January, 2001 - there may only be one - and she could be anywhere in the world."

"That's why a series of murders and abductions, spread around the globe, won't attract any attention until it's far too late."

That was depressing. Still, I had a few more brilliant ideas. That is, I thought they were pretty smart until I actually said them.

- "Couldn't Janine hide? Or move?"

Janine rolled her eyes.

- "Magic." said Lillian. "He could find her anywhere in the world."

- Well, couldn't you, like, gang up on him, or something?" I said. "What if the families of the other 12 women joined up with you? Aren't they mages, too? Couldn't you overpower him?"

- "Very few magically talented people actually develop their skills, Pete. Your mother and you, for example: you didn't even know that real magic existed. She has talent, but has never used it. Her skills are non-existent."

"We can't kill him, or even imprison him. We just don't have that kind of power."

- "What about -?"

- "The Police?" Lillian had actually read my mind again. "Do you remember my airline example? Besides, can you picture me in a police station, trying to tell them that my daughter is going to be raped and murdered ... eight years from now?"

It all sounded so hopeless.

- "There must be something you can do. We have to stop him, somehow." Oops - somewhere along the way, 'you' had turned into 'we'. But I would help, if I could. I didn't want anything bad to happen to Janine, or any of those other women.

"Can't you get help? From someone?"

Lillian gave me a tired smile.

- "That's what we are doing, Pete."

It took a couple of seconds for me to catch on.

- "Wait. Me? What can I do? I can barely move a playing card!"

- "That's actually quite impressive, for someone who's only been practicing for such a short time. But, no - we don't expect you to confront your father, or to challenge him."

- "Thank God for that!"

- "No, Peter. We can't challenge your father directly. But we are hoping that you'll help us to fool him. If we can't beat him, perhaps we can still deceive him."

- "And save my life in the process." said Janine. "Not to mention 12 more girls."

I looked at Janine. I'd lie down on railroad tracks with a train coming to save her life. And if there was the slightest chance that she'd think of me as a hero afterwards - that she might feel inclined to show me her gratitude - well, doing a good deed doesn't always have to be its own reward, right?

What an idiot. We're talking about a life and death situation - rape and murder - and I'm fantasizing about Janine.

- "I want to help." I said. "What can I do?"

Lillian paused, and looked me in the eye.

- "You can have sex with these women, and impregnate them before your father does."

- "I'm sorry - did you just say ...?"

- "Yes. If they're already pregnant, then he can't impregnate them."

She was serious.

It was the weirdest, most unbelievable, most insane thing I'd ever heard in my entire life. Okay - I had just turned 18, so it wasn't that long a life. And in terms of sexual experience ... well, let's just say that I knew more about magic - real magic - than I did about sex.

- "I think we've overloaded him, Mother." said Janine.

Ludicrous. Ludicrous piled on top of preposterous. Utterly and completely ridiculous.

The ladies took a short break. Lillian returned with a beer and a glass for me. Technically, I was underage, but consider the topics we'd been discussing, it didn't seem all that unreasonable for me to have a beer.

- "Thank you."

- "Are you familiar with the cuckoo, Pete?" she said.

- "The clock? Or the bird?"

Janine rolled her eyes again. "The bird." she growled.

- "Many species of cuckoo are brood parasites." said Lillian. "The female lays her eggs in the nest of another species of bird. Those birds end up raising and feeding a cuckoo as one of their own."

- "Is that real?"

- "Very. And what we're suggesting here is that you be the cuckoo to your father's agenda."

- "I'm sorry ..." I said. "It just seems ... far-fetched." Oddly enough, I believed in magic, so I could accept the idea of archmages, witches and covens, full moons ...

But I had a hard time believing that a dozen women would want to bear my child. Even one would be a bit of a stretch.

- "Our plan is quite complicated, Pete." said Lillian. "We know that you're not really much of a ladies' man at this stage."

- "That's putting it mildly." I said. Or maybe it was the beer talking.

- "We have almost eight years to prepare, though." she continued. "With our coaching, you can become a mage. We can also help you to become more attractive to women."

- "Really?" I didn't know which idea was more far-fetched: that I could be a mage, or that I could be attractive to women.

- "Magic." said Janine. She didn't add the word 'dumbass', but I heard it - again.

- "We'll train you, Pete." said Lillian. "We can help you to become a world-famous magician. We can also help you to become more ... successful with women."

"You'll be rich, famous, appealing ..."

- "Okay. Let's imagine - just for a second - that what you say is possible. Why would 12 different women agree to have a child with me?"

- "Magic!" said both Janine and Lillian, in chorus.

- "What? You mean, put a spell on them? Just like my - Clifford would?"

- "There's a big difference." said Lillian. "We'd be doing it to save them."

- "How's that going to save them? He'll just rape them, and then kill them anyway, and take the babies."

- "No. When he realizes that he's been fooled, he'll understand that there's nothing he can do about it. Revenge would be pointless - there would be no point in harming the women. He wouldn't want to risk antagonizing families with talent, either."

There was a big hole in her logic. Actually, several big holes. I couldn't quite figure it out, though; every time I tried to organize my thoughts, they scattered like hyper-active puppies. What I could do was ask more questions - those were just single thoughts.

- "Umm - what if he found out? Wouldn't he realize, before he raped them, that they were already pregnant? Or ... if he checked, afterwards - wouldn't he know that they were pregnant by someone else?"

- "That's precisely why we need you, Pete. Your magical bloodline is the same as your father's. They're virtually indistinguishable, like a signature, or a fingerprint."

- "Like magical DNA." said Janine.

I was still struggling to accept that, when a new thought struck me: "What about when he comes to steal the babies? Won't he still murder the mothers?"

- "We'll move them." said Janine. "But we'll make sure that he gets access to the baby. That's when he'll realize that he's been fooled."

That didn't make sense. If we could hide the mother ... wait - he would know?

- "He's going to know? He's going to know it was me?" I started hyper-ventilating.

- "He won't harm his own flesh and blood, Pete." said Lillian.

Really? I wished that I could share her confidence.

***

In the coming days, I found further questions and reservations about Lillian's plan.

- "Do you where he is, right now? Clifford, I mean." I couldn't bring myself to call him my father. I'd never known him, for one thing, and for another, I really didn't want to be connected to him in any way, given what he was planning.

- "He would know right away, Pete, if I tried to scry him." said Lillian.

- "Scry?"

- "It's a spell that allows me to watch someone from afar."

- "So you could find him, if you had to ..."

- "Drawing his attention to us is the last thing we want to do."

- "I know. But isn't there some kind of - I don't know - like a Council of Mages?" I was thinking of the White Council from Lord of the Rings. I wouldn't have minded having Gandalf, Elrond and Galadriel on our side.

But Lillian shook her head. "There's no such thing. Witches and mages are far too independent to accept any kind of authority. Except for witches' covens, which are usually no more than three - 13 is the absolute maximum - most wizards won't collaborate with other spell casters. It requires too much trust."

Janine reached out, and placed her hand over mine.

- "I trust you, though." she said.

I was the biggest fool in Creation. I was overwhelmed by all of the information Lillian had presented me with. It sounded crazy, and dangerous, and way, way over my head.

Yet all I could focus on was the fact that in order to save Janine, I would have to impregnate her. I would be having sex with Janine. And saving her life, of course. That too. She would be grateful for my help, right? She might even want to have sex with me again - afterwards.

Plus I'd be having sex with other women. Twelve other women. Okay, it'd be years from now. But still ...

I would be a hero. The hero who gets the girl. Girls. If I survived. If I could pull it off.

- "I just ... I don't know if I can do this." I admitted.

- "You can, you know." said Lillian.

- "You have to." said Janine, softly.

***

Janine and Lillian swore me to secrecy.

- "Who am I going to tell? They'd never believe me!"

- "We're serious, Pete." said Lillian. You can't tell anyone about the plan, or about your father. And you certainly shouldn't let anyone know that you can do real magic - especially your mother."

Janine saw my face.

- "What did you do?"

- "Umm ... Sammy kind of knows that ... the magic is real." I said. "It's not his fault. He was with me when your first package arrived, and -"

- "Who is Sammy?" asked Lillian.

- "Pete's best friend." said Janine. "His only friend."

I didn't object. That was harsh - but true.

- "Well, there's no point crying over spilt milk." said Lillian. "If he already knows about magic ... then he knows. But you must not tell him about the plan. Understood?"

- "Yes. Absolutely."

Then Lillian asked for permission to hypnotize me.

- "What? Why?"

- "To make it simpler for me to find you - to scry you, if necessary. I can do it easily with Janine, but you and I aren't related by blood. This will make it much easier for me to locate you, should the need arise."

I was hesitant. It sounded cool, in a way - like having some kind of Guardian Angel watching over me. But hypnotism?

"It will allow me to find out if there are any threats to you out there, Pete. Any danger. Then we can take steps to protect you." continued Lillian.

"We really have to do this if we're going to continue."

- "Okay." I said. When she put it that way ...

At first, it felt like soft fingers on my scalp, gently massaging - except that Lillian wasn't actually touching me. Then, it got a bit creepy: I could feel the soft fingers on the inside of my skull, stroking ...

Fascinating, but uncomfortable at the same time. Apparently it wasn't too uncomfortable - I fell asleep in the middle of the process.

Two hours later, I woke up.

- "You fell asleep." said Lillian. "That's not an unusual reaction. You seemed really tired, though, so I let you sleep a bit longer."

***

A week later, mother and daughter were prepared to explain certain aspects of their plan to me. They sat me down, and served me coffee.

- "First off," said Lillian, "you're going to have to travel around the world to meet these women. That will take a certain amount of money."

- "You're going to have to be famous, too," said Janine, "so that those women will want to meet you. It would really help if you could be cool enough, and suave enough to attract their attention."

- "Rich, famous and cool?" I said. "That's a bit of a tall order. How am I supposed to do that?"

- "We're going to help you become a world-class magician."

They were dead serious. And then a thought struck me.

- "You've been planning this since my 13th birthday?"

- "Long before that." said Lillian.

- "Wow ..."

- "And one more thing: you can't expect 12 women to want to bear your child the first time that you're with them. You're going to have to impress them. You'll have to become an accomplished lover."