The Magus Chronicles

Signal Flame

Halfway across the world, in the tiniest flat known to San Francisco, Theodora White opened her eyes and they glowed, just for a moment, the same bright orange as the light Glory has emitted.

The glow vanished as quickly as it had come, but Theo had felt enough. She sat up on her mattress, feeling around for the flip-phone she had purchased ten days ago when she arrived in San Francisco from another world. The number she dialed was much longer than ten digits, but it was several times out of any earthly area code. It rang through to voicemail.

"You have reached Lee Adamson, which is probably not what you meant to do. Lets hang up and pretend this never-"

Theo hit redial. She had to hit it four more times before she got an answer.

"Who is this?"

"Glory is awake."

A few moments of silence. Theo stood up and walked to the thin window that looked out on the street.

"Fuck." Lee said finally. "How did you find out?"

"There was an energy wave. I imagine anyone with psychic powers felt it, but people who know Glory-"

"Will know exactly what it is."

Theo rubbed at a scar on her stomach, then at the snakes that coiled around her brow. "Lee, if we're right - and we know we are - she won't be able to function. She's been buried for well over ten thousand years by now. She has no access to her powers. She's cursed. She might be insane - she certainly was the last time she was conscious. I don't know - I have no idea what she'll do next."

"Then we need to find her as soon as possible." Lee said.

"Are you here?"

"No. I'll need some time to get Through. You find out where she is. I don't care who you have to maim or sell secrets to. If something goes wrong Glory dies or she destroys the world. I'll get through, I'll get Hel and you try to make contact with Sam."

"Hel is in a military bunker somewhere in Nebraska."

"I can find her. I can always find people who live outside my rules."

Theo went to the broken mirror propped up against the wall. It had come with the apartment, cracks radiating from a central break point too narrow to be a fist. Maybe a pole end. Theo examined her frightening, serpent eyes, her mane of snakes that served for hair. The tiny scales that ran across her scalp merged with her nut brown skin. The Joan Jett shirt was from a stash she had unearthed before entering the city. Theo put a hand on her hip, mentally rewriting the plans she had made for the week. She had come to San Fransisco for a job, but that job would have to wait, probably be cancelled. They needed to be together, making plans as soon as - faster than - humanly possible. 

"Do you want to talk to Rex?" Theo asked, turning to look for the spandex she had abandoned somewhere on the floor. "Do you wanna pass through his gate? It might be quicker."

"Let me get back to you on that. Call me when you have news."

Theo could not hold in all of her building anxiety. She allowed herself one small, whispered concession. "Lee, this could be - this could be so, so bad." 

"We've seen bad things before." Lee was comforting, as only Death could be. "And we will see this through." 

"Okay." Theo breathed in and out. "Okay, I'll call Sam." She cut the call.

Lee, in another plane of existence, slowly solidified into physical form. She worked hard to calm the panic that was rising in her slowly accruing body. She chose the construction she liked best, the one that was closest to who she had been originally - six feet tall, African, maybe sixteen or seventeen. She let her hair fall in long twists, molding the ether into a dark jean jacket and battered Timberlands. She found a hair tie, and puled the twists back into a ponytail. She allowed emotion to rise and fall inside her - anger that this was happening now, regret that she would have to leave safety and normalcy for the strange world of the living, fear for Glory, fear of what Glory might do, fear for what might happen to the world.