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Part 2 of 6

We live in a world where emotions can lift people from their sorrows as easily as drown them within. They cause you to strive for something better or hold you back, wielding control both unmeasurable and unmistakable. But what if, for some, emotions held a tangible power, if they could use the emotions of the world for their own benefit? What is the chance that someone would abuse that gift?

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Chapter 4 - Pain

Like Lydia, Ilina offered Ken no time to change his mind. After a shared hug, the first in nearly three decades, with his father, she guided him from the shop. However, she proved more entertaining to follow than the Cabot leader. Almost he could distract himself from his decision in watching her short skirt flick back and forth, something she knew, as he did nothing to dampen his feelings. In fact, she seemed to put something extra into her stride as reward for volunteering.

After passing through more hubs, Ilina stopped before a door and looked at him. Briefly she smiled, when his eyes darted upwards to meet hers, before her face returned to beautiful neutrality and she said, "We only have five weeks and Gary never lets us rush his work."

"Gary?"

"He's our changer."

"Gary?"

"Only Gary in his most recent incarnation. From what I’ve heard, this is the first time, while practicing his art upon himself, he did not remain a sister. Without his saying it, we suspect this is the last life he will give the Samodivas."

A transformation, or a body switch as most called it, offered the most common way to extend a magic user's life beyond those techniques used by all magic users. Though, maybe better to say the most accessible, rather than common way. Even then, that was akin to saying that a Lear jet is accessible to a mundane. Both because it required a tremendous amount of magical energy and an incredibly skilled practitioner to perform. Everyone wanted a skilled changer as a member of their clique and a changer’s fees, in magical energy, often equaled that used for the transformation. Which meant they possessed everything needed to achieve their own transformations. A good gig, but it seemed this Gary no longer wanted to use his abilities on himself. And from reading the tone of her voice, Ilina thought him crazy to give up a good thing.

Based upon her early to mid-twenties appearance, Ken guessed her true age as no more than fifteen years greater than his own. Combine that with her assignment, chosen from amongst all the options available to the Divas, and he accepted the confidence Ilina portrayed in herself, it seemed unlike the cockiness others showed when trying to prove their worth. She impressed him, impressed all of them at the tea shop, which explained one reason he did not take the opportunity to back out when she gave him the chance. Yet at the same time, her presence provided another mirror in which to measure himself and in this instance it felt good to find himself wiser.

Understandable when you looked at it from her viewpoint. While he could not say Ilina only experienced kindness during her life, few could say that, he did not doubt Ilina liked herself right now. A life where youth and beauty held a power way beyond vanity for her and her sisters. To give it up would seem almost anathema to her.

Yet Ken knew how life could grow pale. His own unchanging past, present, and future formed the foundation upon which he made this risky choice, just as with his predecessors who made riskier and riskier choices until they need not worry about it anymore. Though each waited longer than he before first stepping on the path to their own doom. To him, it made sense that everything could grow tiresome, even the good life. How could losses of friends and loved ones not grow heavier the more lives one lived? Why would the scene from Highlander with Queen's song, Who Wants to Live Forever, not be true?

"Quit talking about me and come in."

Turning to the voice, Ken suddenly felt less sure of his wisdom. Hulked in the doorway stood a huge man, both tall and wide, with the face of a journeyman boxer, one whose scarred face showed he made promoters happy by his ability to take a punch and put on a good show. Easily could he appear a dark and foreboding character, if not for the smile on his face.

With the eye-roll perfected by every teenage girl, fortunate enough not to fear her parents, Ilina accepted the invitation, forcing Gary to step aside. "Kenneth, this is Gary. Gary, Kenneth Cabot."

After he watched her walk by, something not quite a leer on his face, Gary turned to Ken and said, "Welcome, Kenneth."

"Hello there. Please call me Ken."

"Very well, Ken, let's see if you're a valid candidate for this transformation."

"But I thought..."

"That, because you are shorter than our target, everything thing else is a go? Actually that's just the first trial before you get to the ogre. Time for his test."

In moments he found himself sitting beside Ilina on a leather love seat. Meanwhile, Gary, in a matching, though heavily worn, armchair, stared into space. Knowing the man cast a spell and not wanting to distract, Ken waited. Once more slipping into the ongoing argument about the wisdom of his action.

"Well you are a blood-type match, but the metatarsals and phalanges present a bit of a problem."

Ilina voiced the question that sprang into Ken's mind when he realized the changer spoke. "What?"

"Bones, bones, bones. The key to my magic, the foundation of a transformation. Still they're funny things, they can be lengthened, thickened, even thinned, but none of us can figure out how to make them shorter. And Ken's metatarsals and phalanges, which are foot bones by the way, are longer than the targets. While she wears a size 39 shoe, the best we can manage for you is a size 41."

"That's not much of a difference?"

"True, in fact I expected worse. In the last few decades it seems like most teenage boys are part clown."

Ken said, "I'm older than I look."

"Ahh, you're that Cabot. That's good, I wondered why they let you volunteer."

"Yep, I'm old enough to make my own decisions. And while I'm not familiar with sizes 39 or 41, they seem close enough to go ahead. Let's do it before I lose my nerve."

Ilina asked, "Gary, is everything else good?"

"Nothing I can't handle."

"Okay I will leave you two boys to it." Ilina said, before surprising Ken by offering him a hug and a kiss on the lips. "Thank you, Kenneth, you truly are one of the good guys."

Dazzled, Ken could barely muster a farewell, Gary jarring him from his reverie when he said, "Distracting, isn't our Ms. Ilina? I tell you, if I weren't so old and weren't so ugly I might be tempted to see if I could distract her myself."

"Because of your last transition?"

"Ahh, did she tell you about how they all think I'm crazy?"

"Not in so many words. Besides, like me, I suspect you're old enough to make decisions about your life all on your own. No I was wondering, ummm...you know, did you like girls before? Or was it because of the change?"

"Ahh, yes that is something that would interest you, isn't it? But it isn't as easy to answer as you probably expect. The reason for that is that I am old, well beyond being old enough to make my own decisions. In my prior lives I had relationships with both men and women, but the latter not until after I transformed into a target who liked women. But it is different now, as a man, the physical attraction is greater - the smell, the visual, while before the attraction was driven by less tangible thing. So yes and no. I suspect the same will happen to you. A transformation links you with a target and though you will not have experienced her experiences, you will remember them. Past pleasures will combat prior taboos in your mind, particularly those driven by outside, societal forces. Not that it means you must act exactly as she would act. It’s just that our target likes men, given the chance, you likely will as well. But that choice is up to you and, don’t worry, if you try it out you’re not going to turn into some sex-mad nymphomaniac."

"I don't know if that eases my mind or not, but nothing about my decision is easy. How does it work, the change I mean?"

"The old stand by, even mundane books about magic, not like ours, but the imaginary type, mention the law of similarity. That concept provides a starting explanation for my ability to link one person to another, to make a finger like a finger or an eye like an eye. Even those organs that are different between a woman and a man have analogues, though each party requires the matching analogue. So if either of you had donated a kidney, had your appendix removed, or lost a digit we could not continue. That not being the case, as proven during my earlier check, we require a trigger. Long ago, changers found the best trigger is the memory of feelings. For weeks I have studied our target, delving into the depths of her mind, searching to find physical memories. During the transformation, I will make your body re-live these experience again and again until it learns to react the same way, as if her body is your own. And after these hundreds of analogues are linked within your consciousness, no doctor could distinguish your body from hers."

"Do I have any part to play?"

"You must accept those memories as yours. Though don't worry, your mind is full of empty space for us to use."

“Will I keep this Heather’s memories when I change again?”

“Yes, though like all memories, they will fade. However, you must take care with overloading yourself with new recollections. I know we’ve promised you another form, but it won’t be possible for at least a year from the completion of this transformation. Does that change your mind?”

Ken thought about it for a moment. His chance to escape, but while the price to pay grew higher, the value of the reward remained worth it. Shaking his head, he asked one last question. "Will it hurt?

"Some of the truest physical memories involve hurt, but there are ways to mitigate the pain."

Mitigate - to lessen the severity, an interesting word for Gary to use. Fuzzy in its actual implementation, being true across a huge range. Yet a lifeline to which Ken would soon grasp. For while floating in a pool of ice water, which held the title of worst thing ever for only a short time, he discovered something even more horrible

It started with a stubbed toe. A metal bed frame, the bane of all, he felt the pain blossom repeatedly, the blood vessels bursting into bruise, the nail cracking and breaking away. He lost count of the number of times Gary made him relive that act, but when he finished, there still existed nine more toes to go. Coffee tables, doors, walls, Ken found himself reminded of all the things one could accidental kick. Lessons in dancing en pointe, led to memories of walking in pointy toed heels, cramming the toes together for awkward boys to step on during junior high and high school dances. And that only accounted for her toes. But it could be worse, didn't Gary say the cold water and the pills he took mitigated the pain?

He ran from first base hundreds, thousands of times. Feeling the his feet pound onto the ground, his ankles, knees and hips rotate, calves and thighs strain, arms pump, jaw clench, all to end with the sliding shorts under his uniform not quite protecting thighs from the pebbles of the hard and poorly raked ground around second base.

Even before experiencing the real thing, he endured and silently cursed as many periods as any teenage girl. But one stood out, since it occurred more than a month after the ill-planned and drunken night when he...she lost her virginity to a clumsy, drunken, and rubber-less boyfriend. It added a dimension of panic and worry that Ken could live without, though it distracted from the memory of thrusts, caresses, and the smell of sweat. A lesson learned, but after learning of her parent's impending divorce, many Friday and Saturdays resulted in that alcohol fueled buzz where the skin of his head felt separated from his skull. Invariably those nights led him to a bedroom with one of a short string of boyfriends, which proved Gary's theory. It did not feel repugnant, yet neither did it feel storybook spectacular. Each time different, sometimes better than others.

But pleasures seemed more difficult to process than the physical pain. Pain proved little different from what he lived through as one of the smallest in many classes of clown footed idiots. Experienced once, he easily lived through it again for Heather. So in time he learned to throw a baseball exactly like Heather Theis. He could perform her steps, both jazz and ballet, from all of her last five years of dance performances and competitions. Heather's friends and families now appeared less like strangers in his mind, he almost felt he could pretend to be her.

Which did not mean he could be her. Too much still made them different. In his entire life, Ken only let himself grow close to two people, the old magical security blanket, and one of those tossed him aside so the other no longer knew he lived. Since that heartbreaking moment, he made friends but kept his distance, became the proverbial loner. But Heather, she loved people, needed them around her at all times. She could never figure out what to do with herself when alone, which explained why her activities always involved teams or groups, why she loved parties and made so many friends. Even when they brought her pain, she would never abandon them. Something that confused Ken, despite feelings of jealously at the pleasure they provided her in the past.

It left her not quite Heather, but also not quite Ken.

---

Chapter 5 - Shame

"I don't like Russians."

Ilina's statement came from nowhere and caused Ken's focus to shift from a surprisingly tasty dessert of strawberries and peppercorns to the blond's face.

"Though I no longer hate them," Ilina continued. "Time has allowed that blackest of emotion to grey into firm dislike."

Twenty four days earlier Ken exited the pool of freezing water in which, over a period of six days, he did not quite get changed into the person the Diva's deemed necessary. A judgment that led him to a type of beauty salon. There a simple spell turned the stubble on his head into a match for Heather's shoulder length hair. They also pierced his ears twice and his navel once, gave him a manicure and pedicure, and removed all unnecessary hair - from the eyebrows down.

A physical match, Ilina arrived with a suitcase full of workout gear and enrolled him in Heather Theis boot camp, run by Dannika, a petite brunette with a sergeant-major complex. She drilled him on Heather's style, movements, mannerisms, and relationships. Often with intricate role play sessions where the brunette and her helpers cast glamour's of people and places. With every bit of praise for Ken's newly delicate ears hard earned, he barely contained his joy when Ilina rescued him the previous evening. From the boot camp they went to her two bedroom apartment in Karlovy Vary, a city in the Northwest of the Czech Republic. Today she served as his guide in the real world.

It proved more interesting than scary.

Just above freezing, both dressed in the fall uniform for Czech girls; blue jeans, boots, sweater, and leather jacket. True, the boots had heels, the jeans were tight, and the bomber style jacket hid none of that tightness, but Ken found himself surprised how much attention he, not just Ilina, received. The amount of desire he harvested made him feel powerful. Yet it also seemed to lead to Ilina's announcement. Karlovy Vary, a pretty city of old world charm, boasted a spa industry that drew many tourists, particularly from Russia. One group, consisting of five young men, attached themselves to the pair of young looking women during their walk to the Embassy Hotel for lunch. Mostly forgotten Russian language classes meant he understood little, but Ilina knew everything they said.

Ken said, "I've been in too many schools with too many buffoons to think only Russians act like that?"

"What? Oh you mean those boys who just left? You're right, they're all the same."

"I wasn't. You need confidence and friends to act that obnoxious."

"You should have tried, Heather." Ilina said. "Sometimes it even works. Who knows, in a disco, I may have let the one in the red scarf pick me up."

Some lessons during the boot camp proved easy to digest. The easiest of these revolved around the name Heather. Since Dannika insisted everyone call him by her name, he caught on much faster than Homer Simpson becoming Mr. Thompson. More difficult to understand, the new triggers in his mind. Smells, tastes, or songs could lead to memories never lived. Red scarfs must be included in the mix, for Ken instantly visualized who Ilina referenced, pulling his image from an empty drawer in his mind labeled handsome.

"But no, it isn't the buffoons, as you so appropriately named them, who reminded me of my dislike of Russians. It's the two couples who just came in, sitting to our left. The man on the left looks like someone I knew. Him I hated."

Years of movie watching stopped Ken from a whiplash head spin. Neither did he reach into his purse for a compact, both of which he now carried. But the approach of the overly attentive waiter, even as Ilina waved him away, provided the perfect opportunity to look. Two men in their early forties, probably wealthy businessmen based on the quality of their suits, accompanied by two glamorous brunettes.

"It must be tough for you to live in Karlovy Vary?"

"Part of my penance."

"I don't understand."

"We need more privacy and more wine for me to explain."

Ilina proved impervious to all wheedling and cajoling. She paid for the meal and when they left the hotel she did not turn towards her apartment. Instead they visited a number of clothing stores and a wine shop, in which they bought a bottle of LeoÅ¡ Horá¡k chardonnay. All told it took three hours before they sat across from each other at the kitchen table, jackets and boots off, with glasses of wine in hand.

Ilina said, "Physically I matured early, but magically I blossomed late."

"Blossomed? We call it quickening."

"Too gender neutral for the Samodivas. Not that I understood what happened when it happened. The magic died out in my family a number of generations ago, which removed us from the list of those with the right to know. Then it reappeared in me at the age of sixteen. And so...no...first I should ask, what do you know of the Prague Spring?"

Caught up in his appreciation of the chardonnay, it took Ken a moment to comprehend the question. "Was that in 1968, when the Soviets invaded Czechoslovakia?"

"It's more what led up to their action."

"Sorry, I don't know much. I knew it was '68 because Jaromir Jagr wears the number in memory of the event. Oh yeah, there was also a movie, umm...Unbearable Lightness of Being, but I can't remember much about it."

"That's because you probably watched it for the lesbian scene." Ilina laughed when he took a large gulp of wine in answer, before she continued. "Not that the movie would teach you much about what happened, the author, Milan Kundera, thinks the movie poorly portrayed what he wrote. But even his book does not portray it to my satisfaction, though I doubt I can do a better explaining.

"In today's world, with democracy's victory it is easy to consider the Prague Spring as a rejection of communism, but it wasn't, more a repudiation of Stalinism. My mother and father were part of the movement. Yet they were socialists to their bones, they just believed people deserved more freedom. After all, to them, socialism was about all the people, not just the people in charge. So they could not conceive of the idea that the rest of the Warsaw Pact would interfere, not even the Russians, for they were their brothers and sisters as a Slavic people and in ideology. They, along with their cohorts, were so very wrong. Ideology warps around those who love power. Thus my parents made themselves a target. And that made me a target."

With all melody siphoned from Ilina's voice, Ken felt a sense of foreboding. He did not want her to finish her story, but something in her mannerisms would not let him bring it to an end. Probably the almost matter-of-fact way she spoke, matter-of-fact if you ignored how far into the past her eyes looked.

"Not a target of the armies of our allies and self-proclaimed saviors, whose invasion seemed no more dangerous than a training mission. True, some of ours were injured or killed or martyred, but if you give boys guns and the tacit approval to use them then death will follow. Instead we quickly remembered fears of our own Stá¡tná­ Bezpečnost and their elder brothers in the Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti, state security perverted into a proving ground for wannabe tyrants. They first paved the way for the armies and followed behind with coercion, subversion, and threat to return the Czechoslovakian Communist Party to its laughable glory.

“But as the days passed it seemed we may escape their attention. My parents convinced each other they were too small to matter. In truth they were. Small enough not to prioritize, but in the Soviet managed world nobody was too small to terrorize.”

A pause led to a shared drink of wine, before Ilina continued. "The man in the restaurant reminded me of Valeri Ubysh, Captain in the KGB. Who, nearly seven weeks after the invasion knocked on our door along with two local thugs from the StB. I never learned if it was mischance or intent for them to arrive on a evening when my parents worked late, leaving me alone. Whispered tales of horror and missing friends left me cowed as they barged in, took a seat in our living room, and said they would wait for my parents return. With the confidence bestowed upon him by the cheap, dark suit that served as their uniform, Ubysh asked me about my parents and their friends. When it became obvious he knew more than I, overwhelming silence filled the room. Finally, to escape, I offered them a cup of tea, which led to the end of silence as Ubysh spun his cup in its saucer, all the time watching me, judging me.

"I will never forget the sound his cup made nor how much my hope flared when he kept looking at his watch. The relief when he said they could wait no longer. But that relief disappeared at his next words, spoken to the two thugs, 'Time to leave, but as a message to the parents, the daughter is yours.' As much as their ilk now protest innocence, saying they only followed orders, the men who belonged to those organizations were not good men. Cruelty lurked too close to their surface, yet even they were surprised by the command or offer or maybe dare. So while their eyes leered at me throughout their visit, they hesitated. Hesitation Ubysh quelled with a single sneer. A strong, powerful man making other men, who assume they are strong and powerful, feel weak. They needed to respond, to prove themselves."

If truly Heather, he may know how to respond, but she’d retreated into the furthest depths of his mind during Ilina’s telling. The best available option, really the only option, required him to speak the truth. "I don't know what to say."

"There is nothing to say, Heather. Besides I have had over four decades to put that day in the past, besides...no, again I need to close another path before continuing. What did you think about your first time out as a pretty girl?"

"No wonder your order is so powerful."

"Yes the never-ending desire of men serves us well. But it comes so easy that it limits many of us."

"Like someone born into wealth, who enjoys their quality of life and has no desire to work hard enough to make it even better. I can understand their reasoning, it feels good, even if desire is a minor emotion. Better than dislike from bullies, which I know well and have found feels of similar intensity."

Ilina said, "Yes desire and dislike are two sides of the same coin. Could you sense a difference beyond intensity? I cannot"

"No, magically they feel the same. The only difference is an mundane understanding of their impact. Therefore, the awkwardness of desire is something I can manage, for it gives me what I want. But it is not worth reaching the same goal via dislike."

"Because what you gain can do nothing to diminish what you lose?"

Ken said, "Exactly. I can't cast a spell to distract, to impair, to hurt, because it may give me away. My best hope for power required me to run away from those who offered it. I did not feel the same fear today, I could soak it in and it felt good."

"It also makes me feel good, even when I did not understand why it made me feel that way. Unfortunately the first of these times occurred on that terrible November evening. But not knowing anything about magic, I believed these wondrous feelings came from the physical degradation. And you need to remember I was not awash in desire or dislike, instead it was their elder siblings, lust and anger. Probably my mundane, as you call it, terror triggered the blossoming as a defensive mechanism. But since I knew not how to use the power or even that I could, the result caused as much long term harm as short term good. After all, what type of freak would be empowered by such an experience? It was hard to like myself after that day.

"Worse, I did not hide it from my tormentors. I cursed their feeble manhood, which triggered their hate, that most potent of emotions, and made me feel even better. I laughed at them. This amused Ubysh, who stopped any further actions against me. His words, as they left, made it seem he felt proud of me, something I knew would not be true of my parents. Therefore, I did not tell them what happened. The only ones who knew about it were the four of us from the apartment that evening, but only Ubysh and I cared. He, because he saw something in me, and I, because of how it changed me. Over the next weeks he never seemed far away, it allowed him to prey upon my self-loathing and my desires to re-experience that rush. Soon I became his mistress. When he left Czechoslovakia I returned with him to Moscow as his recruit, enrolled in a KGB run school that taught pretty girls to be westerners, in my case an American. A good student, I soon lost my accent and after graduating, became a KGB temptress. That is why I deserve penance, I lured three decent, though weak, men into my sponsor's clutches. If a distant cousin, a Samodiva, had not discovered me, I would have continued to grow harder. Until I could not escape."

"And Ubysh." Ken asked.

"His superiors removed his particularly stain from my soul when he made a mistake they deemed unforgivable and tossed him down the hole into which he had sent so many others. Fortunately when I escaped, I could focus upon healing rather than revenge. But for that I needed to stop hating myself, something my cousin knew I could not do without help. So she introduced me to Brennus the Prausi, he took me in and made me whole."

Brennus the Prausi, a name wrapped in story and myth. A name known by magic users, feared by magic users, for he led the Boiis, those immortal warriors from the past. Feared, for no magic could touch them, because no magic could match what shaped them. Ken's mind flooded with questions about this mythic figure, not least why one would seek a slayer for a healer, but he would not burden Ilina further with her memories. So he did not ask.

---

Chapter 6 - Nervous

For some unknown reason, he and Dalton found themselves driving through the mean streets of London in a cool car, though whether an American muscle car or a European sports car he could not tell. Something to do with a defensive driving course, but why did police department to which they belonged send them to England and how come they found themselves patrolling the streets? Strange, particularly since they drove on the right side of the road, as if still in the States. A wonder they did not cause an accident. Almost as if...wait, Dalton just turned into an alley full of gang bangers, who surrounded the car, each carrying a bat, tire iron, or chain. Outnumbered, the cousins reached for their .44 Magnums. Still it would have gone horribly wrong if they didn't suddenly find themselves in bus, actually something more of an airport shuttle, driving along a country road. The gang-banger threat in the past, Ken read the course material until they pulled into the farm where they would billet.

"Heather, time to wake up."

"Huh?"

"We had a nice day off yesterday, but today we need to get back to work. So re-pack your bag and put on some exercise clothes." Ilina said, before leaving the guest bedroom.

Probably more time with Dannika, Ken thought with a groan. Unlike his own life, Heather's involved a lot of activity, much of which he virtually experienced during his transformation. But virtual experience did not satisfy the drill sergeant, she made him throw balls until his arm ached and learn every one of Heather's dance competition performances from the last five years. Expecting another exhausting workout, he wore shorts and a sports bra, a pale blue Adidas warm up suit over top. After a breakfast of tea and poppy seed filled kolaches, they stepped into the paths between the worlds and did not stop until after tiredness caused Ken to begin switching the duffel bag of his Heather gear from shoulder to shoulder.

"Choose one off the rack on the left wall." When he did not move, Ilina asked, "You're not one of those anti-fur people, are you?"

Looking at the numerous winter coats hung about the room, he answered, "No, but why do I need to wear a fur to visit Dannika's?"

"You passed her program. Today you start with a new instructor. We're off to Pythia's Retreat where Brennus will instruct you in self-defense."

Many magic users knew of Pythia's Retreat, but few could expect welcome in the Boii's home and even fewer knew the mountain into which to find the entrance into their world. Excitement at joining the first group died when Ken realized Ilina’s plan. Although gender rather than legend caused the sudden case of nerves. Beyond a few moments after his transformation with Gary, who didn't really count, his only post-girlification encounters with men occurred during the prior day's walk, which happened in Ilina's protective sphere. Now she casually planned to place him in the care of a man, probably surrounded by a bunch of other men. He didn't feel ready for such an encounter, which the blond probably knew. No doubt, beyond self defense, she saw this as the next step in becoming comfortable in his new skin.

"I'm not sure I'm ready, Ilina."

"We can call it off if you want, Heather? However, our plan will have you on your own, amongst men as well as women, so it's a fear you will need to overcome if we hope to catch the killer. And you won't find a safer place to get your feet wet than at Pythia's Retreat or a more trustworthy guide than Brennus."

"I'll try, but I won't promise it will work."

The tentative agreement offered all Ilina needed, choosing a full length, sable coat with matching cap and mittens for her charge, she chose a white mink for herself before leading the way through a door into a frigid blast of wind. High in the sky, they stood overlooking a chasm of swirling snow. Familiar with the entrance, she spun in place, a guiding hand on Ken's arm pulling him about. Even then, the frigid air sought the gaps of skin between collar and cap, sleeve and mitten, and the cold seeped through the thin, rubber soles of his trainers. Before them stretched a tunnel, barely wide enough to walk side by side. Bright lights encased with in ice, which formed the walls to either side, made for a strange glow, but showed a metal door at the end of the tunnel. The lights also highlighted disks and cylinders, frozen just beneath the surface layer.

Eyes wide at the network of wires running between the disks, Ken stuttered as he asked, "A-a-are those mines?"

"So I've been told."

"But why? Who would be dumb enough to attack them? And how could they get here to attack?"

"The Boiis climbed the mountain to take the Retreat from its prior occupant, the one who cursed them. And in a time of helicopters it would be easier now, though I doubt anyone could catch them unprepared. There is also the door through which we entered." Ilina admitted. "I don't think they truly fear treachery from us, but they think in longer terms than most. Friendships can end, enmity can grow, which makes them unabashed at reminding even allies what type of foes they would be."

"The stories about them aren't enough?"

"One would think so. But some in the magic community are incredibly obtuse, buoyed by their own power. From what I heard, their ilk were once buried in the ice to serve as warning before explosives."

"Even after we got explosives." Said a male voice, made tinny through a speaker. "But after we became friendly with the lovely Samodivas, some felt the practice would tarnish their views of us."

"That's Brennus." Ilina said, as they hurried along the tunnel. The door, worthy of nuclear shelter, opening into a slightly warmer section of the cave, one stretching only twenty feet before a second hatch barred the way. Two more hatches greeted them before they stepped through into a pocket world.

In a life of blah, magic provided one outlet Ken utilized whenever given the chance. An ability to travel the world greater than even those with money, which over the years provided him the opportunity to visit all types of tourist destinations where a fourteen year old would not stand out as strange. What he saw allowed, combined with the sudden memory of where else he once heard the name Pythia, allowed him to instantly recognize Delphi. But not like he saw it on his visit, instead it stood here in its full glory.

Yet the vision did not hold his attention for long.

From a nearby bunker, its cinder block appearance unlike the columned and white stone buildings of the past, walked a man. Dressed in a grey t-shirt, navy shorts, and a pair of runners, Ken's found himself thinking of a high school gym teacher. When he came closer, Ken realized the man could only exist as a gym teacher in a movie, the one all the girls fantasized about. Just before he stopped, even that idea disappeared, for Brennus would never play such a minor role. The handsome drawer in Ken's mind, which first contained an image a Russian boy with a red scarf, flew open fast enough to bounce off its runners, seemingly eager for another file. A few inches over six feet, with broad shoulders and a tapered waist to match, he wore his reddish-blond hair neatly trimmed, and smiled at them with both his mouth and eyes. The type of man who always made Ken feel small, but who now seemed both less and more frightening through his modified vision.

Smiling at Ken, he reached for the duffel bag and said, "Hello there, I'm Brennus, but call me Bren. Everybody but Ilina does."

"Ke...Heather Theis," Ken answered, allowing the man to slip the bag from his shoulder. "Ilina said you could teach me some self defense?"

"Every pretty girl needs training, Heather. Even more-so for pretty bait."

"She volunteered, Brennus." Ilina said, hearing censure in his voice.

He looked like he wanted to argue, but said, "I suppose. And I can't deny it’s a worthy cause. You sure you want me to run the training, Ilina? Ash is the best."

"I think Heather would find Ashter rather overwhelming right now. But since it is your area of expertise, you decide. Now it's time for me take off, I have a lot of work to do in order to ensure everything is ready on Halloween."

Brennus said, "Here Heather, give me your coat and hat, we have a storage locker for them. I’ll also tell Brice let Ilina out, while you keep her company."

With both arms full, he headed back to the bunker. Once out hearing range, Ilina said, "Don't worry, Heather. You're in good hands with Brennus, he’s fully up to date on our plans."

"I supposes, it's just that I wish you told me where I was going before I got dressed."

"Wearing a pair of those shorts I brought you at Dannika's? Don't worry, they're not too bad." Ilina said, her smile growing larger.

"They have no inseam."

"Think of the view as Brennus' payment for the lessons. But don’t worry, it will be hands off appreciation, you’ll need to instigate any hands on type."

"That won't be happening, Ilina!"

"It would help you get in touch with your feminine wiles."

Pursing his lips primly, as Ilina stepped into the last hatchway of the exit, Ken said, "I don’t think so."

"And it would provide armour against what happened to me. Besides, he is amazing."

Before Ken could reply the door closed, an inevitability since her last statement left him speechless. He also worried about Brennus overhearing the conversation, like before. Therefore, when the man stepped from the bunker and waved towards an electric golf cart, the brunette spent the entire walk to it trying to determine the answer. True a smile did decorate his face, but one no different than during their introduction. Probably best to assume Ilina's remarks went unheard or to accept the man would pretend he did not hear.

The duffel bag, along with a cooler, taking the place of golf clubs and Ken in the passenger seat, they drove towards the hill in the distance. The final gravel path took them to the stadium, complete with Herodus Atticus’ seats and arched entrance. There, in the middle of the track, stood a pole holding a stuffed, training dummy.

“First, what do you know about fighting?”

“If I run away fast enough, I don’t get hurt.”

“A lesson I need to learn, maybe you should be teaching me,” Brennus said. “How about magic, does your family teach either defensive or offensive arts?”

“I’ve never had access to enough power to pursue such knowledge, besides Walter, one of our family elders, does not think it offers much value.”

“Wisdom runs in your family. Of all the magic I’ve witnessed, little is as useless as so-called battle magic. True, it can be deadly as part of an ambush, but there is too much chaos in a fight to control a spell. Things happen so fast that a good idea in one moment is bad in the next. Plus, most casters do not own the discipline needed to ignore the insanity around them. And if they do, the same craziness makes a target react in unusual ways. Often fear will protect a mind from other, normally greater, fears.”

Ken said, “What does that leave for me?”

“Well you are in excellent shape. Over the next four days, we will attempt to mold that fitness into a, well not a weapon, that’s impossible in the time we have, but hopefully into someone who can surprise the bastard.”

“Is that my best hope, to surprise him?”

“Surprise is a wonderful tool, particularly against those who are confident in their abilities. And best to judge this murderer worthy of his confidence, which means he is probably has the ability to physically deal with his victims. We should not plan on you winning a fight with him, but even the most competent can be surprised. With the blows I will teach you, it may be possible to disable him or give you a chance to escape. Since you’ve already perfected running, that should be your main goal. To distract and run away”

“So you’re going to teach me to kick him in the balls.”

“Well it would do the job, but...actually, why don’t you go kick the dummy in its non-existent balls.”

Surprised, Ken looked from Brennus to the dummy and back again.

“Go ahead. It’s hung at a height to simulate a 6” tall man, which is as good as any estimate of our murderer's height.”

Unsure of the lesson, but knowing he would learn one, Ken climbed out of his seat and walked to the dummy. There he wound up and kicked the dummy, as hard as he could, right between the legs, making it jump about on its chain. He turned, a questioning expression on his face, towards where Brennus still sat in the cart.

“That would definitely prove disabling, but what do you need to pull off such a kick?”

With the question, Ken replayed the kick in his mind and saw where Brennus led. “For him to be a real dummy.”

“Exactly. It’s slow, easy to evade, and it does not take much talent to grab your leg. Plus you need to consider what you may be wearing; heels, tight jeans, long skirts, any thing affecting your balance or flexibility makes it an even more difficult possibility. Now don’t think I am arguing against an attack to the junk, given an opportunity hit him right there with whatever is available, be it your foot, knee, fist, elbow or forehead. Beyond that, by the end of our training, I hope to teach you how to strike faster, with more strength, and know more targets where an attack can be almost as effective. But before working on that, let’s do some stretching and then practice your wisest skill, running.”

Again Ken thought of a gym teacher. How many times did one tell the class about some fun activity they would do, only to send them out for run first. The stretching he did not mind, it came natural ever since Heather’s memories synced with Dannika's lessons. Yet it definitely put him in the right frame of mind and unthinkingly, just before starting the run, he removed his warm up suit.

“Va-va-voom.”

And, once more, there went the gym teacher comparison.