by the door, where my staff and rod were settled, along with my practice fighting staff, an unearned double of my wizardly tool, my sword cane, an umbrella, and the wooden cane sheath of Fidelacchius, one of the three swords borne by Michael and his brothers in arms.
The sword’s last wielder had told me that I was to keep it and pass it on to the next Knight. He said I would know who, and when. And then the sword sat there in my popcorn tin for years. When my house had been in-vaded by bad guys, they’d overlooked it. Thomas, who had lived with me for almost two years, had never touched it or commented on it. I wasn’t sure that he’d ever noticed it, either. It just sat there, waiting.
I glanced at the sword, and then up at the roof. If God wanted to throw a little help our way, now would be a good time to get that foreordained knowledge of who to give the sword to, at least. Not that it would do us all that much good, I supposed. With or without Fidelacchius, we had a fair amount of power of the ass-kicking variety. What we needed was knowledge. Without knowledge, all the ass kicking in the world wouldn’t help.
I watched the sword for a minute, just in case.
No light show. No sound effects. Not even a burst of vague intuition. I guess that wasn’t the kind of help Heaven was dishing out at the moment.
I settled back in my chair. Charity had returned to her quiet prayers. I tried to think thoughts that wouldn’t clash, and hoped that God wouldn’t hold it against Molly that I was on her side.
I glanced back over my shoulder. Thomas had listened to the whole thing with an almost supernatural quality of noninvolvement. He was watching Charity with troubled eyes. He traded a glance with me that seemed to mirror most of what I was feeling. Then he brought everyone a cup of tea, and faded immediately back to the kitchen alcove again while Charity prayed.
Maybe ten minutes later, Murphy knocked at the door and then opened it. Besides Thomas, she was the only person I’d entrusted with an amulet that would let her through my wards without harm. She wore one of her usual work outfits: black jacket, white shirt, dark pants, comfortable shoes. Grey predawn light backlit her. She took a look around the place, frowning, before she shut the door. “What’s happened?”
I brought her up to speed, finishing with my failure to locate the girl’s trail.
“So you’re trying to find Molly?” Murphy asked. “With a spell?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“I thought that was pretty routine for you,” Murphy said. “I mean, I can think of four or five times at least you’ve done that.”
I shook my head. “That’s tracking down where something is. I’m looking for where Molly’s been. It’s a different bag of snakes.”
“Why?” Murphy asked. “Why not go straight to her?”
“Because the fetches have taken her back home with them,” I said. “She’s in the Nevernever. I can’t zero in on her there. The best I can do is to try to find where they crossed over, follow them across, and use a regular tracking spell once I’m through.”
“Oh.” She frowned and walked over to me. “And for that you need her hair?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Which we don’t have. So we’re stuck.”
She chewed on her lip. “Couldn’t you use something else?”
“Nail clippings,” I said. “Or blood, if it was fresh enough.”
“Uh-huh,” Murphy said. She nodded at Charity. “What about her blood?”
“What?” I said.
“She’s the girl’s mother,” Murphy said. “Blood of her blood. Wouldn’t that work?”
“No,” I said.
“Oh,” Murphy said. “Why not?”
“Because…” I frowned. “Uh…” I looked up at Charity for a moment. Actually, there was a magical connection between parents and children. A strong one. My mother had worked a spell linked to Thomas and me that would confirm to us that we were brothers. The connection had been established, even though she had been the only common parent between us. The blood connection was the deepest known to magic. “It might work,” I said quietly. I thought about it some more and breathed, “Stars and stones, not just work. Actually, for this spell, it might work better.”
Charity said nothing, but her eyes glowed with that steady, unmovable strength. I thought to myself, That’s what faith looks like.
I nodded my head to her in a bow of acknowledgment.