*Author's Note: Thank you for those who encouraged me (and one who beats on me) to get on to the next book. I hope you all enjoy.*

Semper Fidelis

Chapter 1

Did you ever stop and take a breath in the midst of a rather important moment in your life and notice all the little and sometimes even large events that led up to that point in time? Could something so simple as choosing a peanut butter and jelly sandwich instead of using bologna really be the deciding factor to if I live or if I die days later? Does God have our lives all scripted out and we merely perform the actions and the dialogue he envisioned for us before we were even born? Some believe that to be true, though I prefer not to think of myself as a puppet on a string. I do intend to ask Uriel the next time we chat; and oh yes there most certainly will be a next time I have decided! But I guess I am jumping a bit ahead. I really should get you caught up first before I lay this all on you to decide. Okay, so where was I?

Over the course of the last several days Harry was once more immersed body, spirit, and soul into another magical crisis. This one was huge, and while I tried to offer support to him where I could, I quickly saw this was way beyond my abilities. He understands that I expect him to call upon me and not protect me from every little danger if I am ever going to become confident in my abilities. I knew that when he chose not to do so it was for a very good reason in his mind and I agreed to respect that.

Knowing Harry and my father were into something dangerous like that now drove me to study even harder, though I must admit there was a lot to distract me. I could not get out of my head a feeling of dread that something bad was going to happen. I do not know how else to explain it. I could just sense something big was coming our way. It bothered me so much I even asked Harry to take care of my dad, something in all the years the two had worked together I never had done before. Harry agreed and asked me to research if my family was descended from nobility to answer another related question that he had but did not want to share with me just yet.

I had no idea why he was asking this, but I promised, as a good apprentice should, that I would do so immediately. Thankfully even though I am a bane to computers I know how to ask friends to do this type of research for me. I knew at best it would be a few hours and may even take days so I took the opportunity to study more on my own. In all the years my dad had been a Knight of the Cross, which was my entire life, I had never felt as scared as I did at this time.

I was still over at Harry's waiting for the results and sitting in a lotus position trying to work on my focus of will when the phone rang. I had heard this particular noise before dozens of times but something about this time shattered my meditation completely and the magic I was slowly gathering and holding slipped through my concentration and my fingers back into the very air around me. I had held magic in the face of bullet aimed at me, but now the simple ring of the telephone threw me for a loop.

It rang two more times before I was able to pick it up and speak hesitantly. "Hello?" I asked in a tone that suggested the actual fear of what I was about to hear.

"Molly." In a single word I recognized both that it was my mom's voice and that she was crying. "Come to Cook County hospital." She said. "It's your father…" I was out the door and on my way in under three minutes.

It is weird the things that run through your mind at times like this. I guess it likely has something to do with facing your own mortality and putting your life into perspective. Part of me knew I should be thinking about my dad, but for some bizarre reason I focused instead on the 1967 Ford Mustang I was driving and how I had acquired this car.

My high school graduation that previous summer was a rather anti-climatic event as far as such things in my life go when all things are considered in perspective. I shared with my classmates the sense of thankfulness that this period in my life was at last coming to an end, and was especially grateful that it was even doing so on its established regular schedule which had not been a complete guarantee after I had dropped out of school for a month or so before Harry made me return. Still, even after beating these odds, I did not feel the sense of overwhelming accomplishment of a noteworthy task completed that those around me did and that we were being told by our parents and teachers we should be proud of.

I understood for the mostly seventeen and eighteen year olds that made up my class this was in many cases their greatest personal success they had yet achieved. It was a chance for them to stride across the stage in front of family and friends and show the world they were ready for the challenges their futures would offer them. I suspect to a student they felt themselves to be almost like the demigods of old.

By comparison I can't really say it was all that big a deal in my own life considering all the trials and tribulations I had been through in the past year. In fact, graduation did not even make my most impressive event for that particular season, though to be fair even I have to admit I do live a rather abnormally interesting life as of late. I gotta wonder if Clark Kent felt the same way I was feeling when he walked across the stage at Smallville High?

As you might have guessed my sarcastic side, which is pretty much my dominant if not only side some days, therefore laughed silently during each of our graduation rehearsals. I would sit there wondering how many of my peers for whom 'the sky is the limit,' which was our recycled theme for this year's ceremony, would really be reaching for the heavens in a few short years and who would still be grounded? I was pretty certain there would be a significant greater percentage that would still be living in their parents' basement when they turned thirty than those who had discovered new worlds for them to conquer; worlds outside of video games I mean.

How many of the class jocks saw professional sports contracts and dollar signs in their futures as they crossed the stage would instead be balding, overweight, and bragging ten years from now about how their high school football days were the pinnacle of their life's success? I had no doubt their stories of scoring on and off the field would far exceed any hope of comparison to their reality.

How many of our beauty queens would end up a decade from now alcoholic couch potatoes watching soap operas while being interrupted by screaming brats. And then having microwaved dinner of last night takeout leftovers would be waiting in vain for husbands who were 'working late' at least three nights a week?

Yeah, I guess I can be pretty dark at times when everyone else is rejoicing. It is probably just in my contrary nature, but it does provide me occasional images to smile about.

Or maybe it was that I could not get as excited about my 'next great step in our lives' because I had already been living my own ever since I had become Harry Dresden's apprentice. At that moment when I had accepted this course to stave off a death sentence my path had been pretty much set for me, and was not one that allowed for much contemplation of alternatives. While I had no idea as a little girl this is what would become of my life, I have to admit I never really secretly wished for the normal female path of career, wife, mother or any order that you might place those three events in.

I always rode my train on a different life track than those around me and I did so proudly. You therefore won't find the name Molly Carpenter called out in our senior yearbooks as 'Most Likely to' do anything because I do not fit into any of those types of role model lives. And the types of things I actually am most likely to accomplish just don't regularly appear in such volumes, and especially not when the yearbook is produced for a Catholic high school.

If I had any friends who were lawyers I think there is probably a good class action lawsuit for wizard apprentices in the making against schools if I were so inclined. Would you believe they do not have a category for 'Most likely to battle a Pagan goddess?' Nor is there anything related to 'Most likely to be elected The Merlin' only 'Most likely to be elected President' as if this lesser title was somehow harder to achieve. As I saw it this second job changed hands every four years, or sometimes even sooner for because of the occupant's criminal activity or death.

The current Merlin by comparison had been holding his office for centuries and showed no signs or stated plans of giving it up in this coming century either. Based upon his power no one dared accuse him of crimes, and I am pretty sure he could not die unless he chose to do so because he was just too damned pigheaded in his ways to make my life any easier in this way. And even if he did I would likely need to be into my own fourth or fifth century of life before I might even be considered for such a position. So with all this in mind don't give me any crap that becoming President was some significant occupational accomplishment in comparison to what it takes to become the head of my profession. And therefore yeah, the school yearbook was not one of my favorite subjects to discuss.

To be fair, I had never wanted to be Ms. Class Popularity, Valedictorian Brain, or Wonder Woman Team Athlete. In fact went far out of my way to avoid even the consideration of any of these types of roles for myself. This was a specific choice of mine and not because I wasn't smart enough or particularly athletic. I just had never been drawn to showing myself off enough to get such public honors.

I knew I had it in me to do these types of things if I tried. I had recently been awarded my yellow belt in Aikido by my master and friend Karrin Murphy, probably the toughest cop you could ever fit into a five foot Barbie doll sized body. The personal respect I had garnered in her eyes as she wrapped the six foot golden belt around my waist for the first time was worth more to me that some acknowledgement of ink on a yearbook page or a trophy to gather dust on my parent's mantle.

Because my life had become so different from the norm, I just could not get into the whole graduation scene that summer as much as my classmates did. If I had a school arch enemy it would be our head cheerleader and she was the spokes model for school graduation it seemed. Jenny Mercer, the most popular girl in school, excuse me while I gag, for example could not wait because her parents were buying her a brand new convertible as a graduation present. Yeah, she was getting a thirty grand toy for doing nothing more than passing classes and making tear filled acceptance speeches at each one of our proms over the past four years that always included the statement that "she was so surprised she won." Yeah, that noise you hear right now is me vomiting over here again. She also dated my brother.

I made sure not to attend our senior prom because this year because I knew I be forced to ask her if her surprise at winning this time was just a lie to get more sympathy or she was really just too stupid to catch on to her guaranteed shoe in victory after the previous three years. Yeah, and princess now gets a new convertible from mommy and daddy too! I will have to look for a spell that makes new leather smell like skunk, preferably dead road kill that has baked for a week on the road. Did I mention that with sarcastic I can also occasionally be cruel? I will try to cast it when Daniel is not in the car; well I will at least consider not casting it then.

By the way my family has nowhere near as much money as Jenny's did partly because she was an only child and I was the first of seven so the money we did have had to go to more pressing long-term needs. Go find out what private schools cost and do the multiplication and you will see what I mean. And this is while my parents are also trying to save something for one or more of us to go to college. I do not think they are too upset it won't be me.

I had assumed my own graduation gift was likely to be a set a hugs from my family, yes even Daniel, and probably a family heirloom or two from my grandmother as an acknowledgement of my achievement. She and I were very close, in fact she loved the fact that I colored my hair and made no judgments of my tattoos or piercings, saying only that she wished she was young enough to live life like this again. Yeah I guess I should mention she and mom do not always see eye to eye and I might get some of my rebelliousness from her. And while her gifts would not be a car I looked at the reality of the situation. It's not like I could use a brand new car anyway. New technology and I are not the best of friends.

I might as well get this out of the way now. I am a wizard, well technically a wizard apprentice. Before you get the wrong ideas let me clear this up for you. Being a wizard does not mean I play with tarot cards, pull furry rodents out of a pointy hat, or am training to walk down the sides of building in Las Vegas. Those are stage magicians and making that type of comparison to what I do is like an architect being compared to kids playing with Lego blocks. Stage magician skills revolve around sleight of hand where as a true wizard's skill is able to smack you with an invisible hand from the other side of the room. There is nothing up my sleeve but some kickass power. Okay not all that much compared to Harry, but impressive to those without it all the same.

Like I said I am only an apprentice, but still that pretty much sealed the fate for my immediate future. I had been gifted at birth with the spark of magic, though if you catch me on a bad day I will say cursed. I do not know the actual numbers but I figure that maybe one of every hundred thousand people are born with this spark and almost always it is because one of their parents had it as well. In my case it is my mother, though my father's sideline occupation may have played a role in this as well.

Mom had been born with the spark of magic like me, but she had chosen to never develop it. She had not had anyone around her to explain how it worked. As far as she understood it was evil and she wanted to deny it as part of herself. She chose instead to let it grow dormant within her, perhaps hoping it would not be passed along to her children. Yeah, you see how well that plan worked out for everyone.

In reality, she probably has done pretty well. While I certainly have the spark, which manifested in my mid-teen years, my brothers Daniel who is seventeen, and Mathew who is fifteen, do not appear to have any signs of this gift themselves. The next in line, my sister Alicia, just turned thirteen so is only coming into the age where her power might manifest. We will see in the next two years if mom's good luck streak continues after I defied all her hopes and expectations, which she often claims to be my sole purpose in life.

I guess it is only fair to say I hardly make my mother's life easy. I am not the most obedient daughter that has ever graced a parent. Every mom likely pictures having their own beautiful princess, who probably looks a lot like Jenny Mercer, growing up with smiles and able to sing so beautifully so as to make the wild birds land on her outstretched hand. Yeah, that is so not this apprentice wizard.

I am tall, nearly six foot in height, which I get from my father, and am considered relatively attractive based upon the fairly common number of appreciative looks I get from males who are not related to me. Currently my hair is white, no not very light blonde, I mean bleached white. It used to be blonde for a while, then half pink and half blue, my two favorite colors of cotton candy, and then was blonde again until I lost a bet with my mother. The bet was actually a wrestling match with her where I was allowed to use all my yellow belt Aikido moves and she just used the skills she had picked up 'here and there' as she put it. I figured I had this one in the bag. While Murphy might have kicked my butt with more flair and grace than my mom did but I think the question of who could do it to me faster would require a photo finish. In fairness did I mention she literally makes chainmail?

That brings us to the results of the bet. Had I won our match, my mother had agreed not to complain about my choices of clothing for an entire month. So sure was I of my victory that I had a whole thirty days of outfits planned out even that would have made this nearly torturous to her. These outfits contained lots of leather and lots of halter tops that my mother absolutely hated to see me wearing. Yeah, getting my butt kicked meant those don't get worn nearly as much as I had thought they would.

Since she won I was forced by the bet to 'dye my hair to a natural color.' You will not I said 'a natural' not 'my natural' color. I was naturally good at finding loopholes much to a certain pagan goddess's dismay. So out of a complete sense of spite I chose to dye my hair white because it was the most unnatural natural color I could find. When mom raised her eyebrow at my choice I pointed out I looked just like grandma Carpenter and she does not dye her hair. Small victory but I was finding wiggling through the clauses in contracts was a talent I was forced to practice for my own survival.

In addition to the white hair I sported a few tattoos, my largest being a snake that started at my neck and slithered in directions and areas that do not concern you. I also had some piercings in similar locations, visible and not, that I liked and mom hated, which was a double bonus for me. I was still upset that Harry, my wizard mentor, made me give up the tongue stud.

This happened all because of a single incident of my mistakenly casting a 'frog' spell rather than a 'fog' spell which did sort of demonstrate effectively that precise pronunciation is probably a good thing at this point in my wizard apprentice career. So after doing battle with a six foot frog that I created out of magic, trashing one part of the apartment and eventually leaving Harry's laboratory covered in ectoplasm goo, the tongue stud went away. Like I said, it's not like I will be asked to play a princess in an upcoming Disney movie. I figure my role in this life was cast as wizard not princess anyway; and to be fair I am pretty damn good at this wizard thing, at least that is what Harry has said when he was not criticizing my skills.

As I hinted at early about six months ago, I, apprentice wizard Molly Carpenter, had defeated a Pagan goddess and stopped some really bad guys from doing some really terrible things, in the process setting right a sixty year old evil. I'd love to see Jenny Mercer take down a golem much less handle being shot at by crazy Nazi wizards and still come out on the winning end. Only a few people of course know I did this but still it was now a prominent entry on my wizard resume as far as I was concerned.

Even cooler is I had been paid pretty well for all of this. I had banked nearly five thousand in cash and four small bags of diamonds that my friends the Rothsteins, who happened to run a jewelry business, estimated were worth twenty-five thousand dollars a bag also. That meant for a week of work I had made more than one hundred grand. I could buy Princess Jenny's convertible three times over if I so desired. But Harry had shown me acting out such petty desires was below the noble reputation of wizards. Therefore I contented myself with just thinking about it and smiling. Well that and researching that skunk smell spell I talked about earlier.

You would think that a teenage girl with access to that kind of cash might go on a mad spending spree. Well you would be right. The diamonds I put away safely because I really did not know what to do with them and they really were very pretty to look at. As I saw it, men could have their dogs. Diamonds did not leave messes on the floor or require you to stand out in the rain while they did their business. I did blow about two of the five grand of cash I had been paid on a new wardrobe, much of it the very clothes I was not allowed to wear around the house, the professional dye job on my hair, and even started looking for an old Volkswagen for my own car since Harry's was fairly reliable if not stylish. Unfortunately the only ones I found seemed to be the stripped down models that Harry's mechanic had been using to keep his running.

That problem was solved for me on graduation when to my complete surprise my parents did in fact give me my own convertible after all. Mine was a 1967 convertible Mustang and had it been in restored condition it would have been easily a match for Jenny's brand new BMW. Yeah, my parents did not have that kind of money.

When I got it, it was rusty and dented and the top was ragged, but it was the first car that was all mine and I admit I cried when dad gave me the keys. I would not have traded with Jenny if she had asked. Well I might after I turned over the engine in the school parking lot for the first time only to have it blow smoke. The way the engine roared though made everyone look my way and you know what, I realized I love it.

Another two grand of my cash went into a quick body job restore with Harry's mechanic. He proclaimed the engine was in good shape after cleaning out the cylinders so the money went to knocking out the dents, repairing the rust, a new top, and a new paint job. Almost everyone has a bright cherry red convertible so I went for a metallic sapphire blue. I loved the color and by midsummer the car, and its driver, were getting looks of approval when I took it out on the road. And with Harry's mechanic, the car was running three quarters of the time at least.

Mom had not pressed me to sign up for college in the fall and you may have noticed it was not something I spent any significant period of time considering. I do not know what arrangements she had made with Harry but it seemed for the next few months my total focus was to be upon getting better control over my wizardry abilities, that or I was going to be forced to put on an orange paper hat and work my summer at Casa de Taco to get experience of working for a living. I chose practicing magic.

It is not like I resented the idea of more practice anyway, though I could not tell either of them that. I can argue that I had made a pretty good showing in my own initial solo outing, but I also knew it had been a very close thing on more than one occasion. The idea of building up both my power and my magical stamina was not something I was opposed to even if I did take every opportunity to complain about how unfair it was.

These complaints though seemed to fall upon deaf ears as Harry continued to refer to me as grasshopper rather than god-killer moniker which I made a pretty decent argument for having earned this title. I was smug until Harry conjured up a small being of the Nevernever before my eyes in his summoning circle and the sprite explained how the darker powers were currently taking bets on how long Harry's apprentice the 'God-Killer' was likely to live with all the beings of the Nevernever thinking how cool it would be among their kind to claim being the one who had killed the so called God-Killer. That bit of first hand information did not make me feel all that happy with myself. Grasshopper was just fine from that moment on.

Now for those you not gifted with magic let me offer that wizard apprenticeship is not merely the learning of magical control and the casting of spells. There is a tremendous amount of study that takes place. In many ways it is like learning history or politics. The Master, Harry in my case, is required to teach the Apprentice, one rather cute and perky former high school girl, all of the various powers and competing interests in the magical realm and the key events from magical history.

Why has the Black Court of vampires nearly been driven to extinction? It is because one of their fledglings killed a woman dear to a certain aspiring author, who you will know by reputation. This author wise enough to know his limitations chose instead of seeking out the creature himself to do battle and likely die to instead write a fictional account of such creatures and let the world hunt them down for him.

Magical history is filled with such trivia and Harry has demonstrated that it is important to know and understand this as much as possible so when dealing with such creatures you do not inadvertently insult them. I gather from Harry's stories it is perfectly fine to purposely insult them, it's only the inadvertent slanders that must be avoided.

Harry explained to me that his own lessons as a boy under the tutelage of his master Justin DuMorne required sitting and memorizing these facts so he could be later tested by some other wizard referred to only as 'Bob.' I think Harry named that dusty skull of his in the basement after this guy, or maybe it's his actual skull, as sort of an honor to the hours of rote memorization he was required to perform. Yeah Harry is a little weird.

Because he did not feel that was the best way to learn, Harry required that three nights a week for I joined him in going over to his friend Billy's apartment and role playing Arcanos. Yes, apprenticeship through role-playing games. If everyone knew about this there were nerds in my class that would likely have been able to challenge the Merlin! So for every week of the summer my character, which just happened to be a young female magician, had to work side-by-side with Billy and his group of nerdy friends called the Alphas, fighting those creatures that Harry threw against us.

Harry explained that for the most part Arcanos had gotten a lot of the details of these creatures right. He even said he suspected that some wizard of the White Council was probably behind the game's design and was raking in the profits from of his own years of study. To that end over the summer Harry served as the Master Gamer providing storyline after storyline for the Alphas and I to solve through a combination of outright battling and my character's spell work. And to make this all just a little more realistic, he forbid my character from learning any spells outside of those that I myself could cast.

Many of you might think this is a wonderful way to learn, and I have to admit that compared to rote memorization it certainly was a more preferable method. But that does not mean it did not have its drawbacks as a teaching tool. For example when faced with a swarm or little flaming fairies, they are called flame sprites, my character decided to cast a wind spell to either blow them out or away. Good idea right? Yeah well it happened at a rather exciting part of the game and when I said Ventas servitas as I was supposed to, well I released real magic.

On the bright side I am not all that powerful with this kind of spell, though I guess my excitement of the moment was helping fuel it. All and all not such a good thing when you consider Arcanos is played primarily with lightweight dice and even lighter weight paper. It took us an hour or so to clean the apartment back up. Totally unfairly, Harry decided not to award my character any experience points for this successful attack either. I guess all in all I got off light on this punishment all things considered.

By the end of the summer my character had advanced in magic spell hurling more than I felt I had, but as far as learning went I have to admit I knew more about the things in the Nevernever than I had ever known before. The stories that Harry and the Alphas provided about their encounters with the Summer and Winter courts filled in even more details for me. I could also recite basic details on the various vampire courts, the most common creatures of the wyldfae, and a scattering of the various evil types of wizards and mortals that one could encounter.

The glaring gap in my study was the subject of dragons, something I pointed out to Harry and asked him if such creatures also existed. He gave me a sidelong look and said that they did indeed, they were incredibly powerful, and he thought it best to avoid them at all costs. Thankfully there did not seem to be many of them. When I asked for more details he merely laughed and said there were others around who probably had much better insight on these creatures than he did and that I should seek them out. He refused to tell me who he was talking about which almost always meant it had to do with my parents. Believe it or not I could not find a casual way of broaching the subject with them over dinner so my questions went unanswered.

You might as well know there was another issue that took up a significant part of my time that summer and early fall. It was the sword Fidelacchius that had once belonged to my adopted grandfather Shiro and now sat half the time displayed upon Harry's mantle and the other half of the time in the umbrella rack by the door. I was fascinated by the sword. There really is no other way to describe it.

My dad being the current senior member of the Knights of the Cross meant that I had more than enough personal experience to know better than to try out the sword. That is not how these blades were passed along to their next owner. Instead the owner had to be found worthy of the blade by the holder of it and be offered the chance to wield it.

Harry, having been given it by Shiro's literal last request, was supposed to find the one best suited to take up the mantle of carrying it. I only knew that the holder had to define the very concept the blade was formed to demonstrate. My dad carried Amoracchius, the sword of love. No one who knew my dad could deny that love was his defining character. If I wanted to be worthy of Fidelacchius then it stood to reason I must prove I had faith. Yeah it is one thing to understand it; it is a whole different thing to actually do it.

Believe it or not I actually started trying to better understand all this by talking to Father Forthill. I am not really sure which one of us was more surprised to find me coming to see him outside of normal church services. And I think I nearly caused him to stumble and sit down when I asked him to help me better understand faith.

For the record, Father Forthill is not a stupid man. He likely knew what my objective in this learning was from the very start. That being said I have to admit his eyes seemed to twinkle as if I had received his unspoken blessing to take up this quest. God of course ultimately decided on who he picked to carry his three swords, but I had a feeling father Forthill might be willing to put in a good word for me if the two ever got around to this subject.

Unfortunately the priest was never really able to get me to fully understand. He taught in the same way that I learned about this subject through Catechism and while I grasped the concept behind the words, I never felt like I really understood them. It would be like me explaining magic to someone who had never touched the spark inside them or did not have it.

After three or four discussions we ended back with the very same sentence he started with. In this world there are two types of truths. There are those we can prove with our own eyes and are able to be comprehended by man regardless of his personal beliefs. These are science and their results are known as facts.

Faith on the other hand is the truths we know to exist without proof. Which is great except just how does one demonstrate they have faith? I am not about to pick up poisonous snakes. I may think my tattoo is cool but I know the difference between ink and scales. Thank you no.

I am also not about to step off a building buoyed by the fact that I know God will save me. Father Forthill was very strict about repeating that demonstrations of faith are not tests for God. In the end he explained that perhaps this was something I should meditate on and see if I gain any insight that way. I took this as a convenient way for me to be told to study more and seek my own answers rather than relying solely upon him. I did that, though not likely in the way he expected.

The next time I was over at Harry's house while he was off doing whatever fully certified wizards and Wardens do, I carefully removed Fidelacchius from its sheath and laid it upon a piece of white linen and then traced around it with a black marker. I then weighed the blade before placing it back on the mantle where it was resting at this time.

Over the next week I searched all the martial arts stores in the greater Chicago area until I finally found a wooden practice sword that roughly matched the dimensions and weight of the true blade. Having that I went to Murphy and asked her to train me because she was the only one I knew besides my parents and Sanya perhaps who could.

Karrin explained that sword training normally does not begin until much later when a martial arts student has acquired higher belts, but my previous adventure with her was enough to allow her to bend this rule in my case. So in addition to my twice weekly chance to let Karrin knock me around, I also signed up for a one hour course of abuse with a wooden sword. I suffered this by keeping my eyes upon my goal. Thankfully Harry never caught on to this or he would have immediately understood my plan and nixed it.

If you have ever been to a hospital you will know that parking is nearly impossible to find when you are in any type of a hurry, which most people racing to hospitals usually are. For some reason those other people who merely come to fill a prescription seem to get all the parking spots right up front by the doors while those racing to see a dying family member or make it on time to an appointment are forced to park so far away from the building that they require a passport.

I did not even try to look for something close and instead took the first available spot I came to out in the boondocks and instead ran for the front door. I was thankful at that moment that my wizard training had demonstrated the foolishness of wearing high heels so my currently attired sneakers were just what the doctor would have ordered.

I raced up the stairs toward the pair of doors where a janitor was cleaning the glass and had inadvertently blocked the both entrances with his cleaning cart. Nearby was another old man, this one dressed in the yellow robes of a Buddhist monk and the two appeared to be chatting quite amicably without noticing my apparent need for haste seemingly as if this were a nightly event for the two of them.

"Excuse me sir it's an emergency." I said with obvious duress in my voice between gasps for air.

The old man cleaning the door glass straightened up. He was small and wearing blue coveralls. His name tag read Jake and he had the round belly of an aged man along with short curly grey hair and beard that was almost silver in color against his darker skinned features. He wiped the last part of the window and then turned toward me with clear blue eyes.

"I apologize for causing you a delay young lady when you are obviously concerned for a loved one." He said opening one door and pushing his cart inside as I waited impatiently to make my way past him. I was just reaching for the other door handle when he spoke once more. "Can an old man offer you one more thought young lady before you race off?" He asked and a rare but familiar sensation rolled over me.

It was not the feeling of a magical being that wizards can sense; well not magic like I thought of it anyway. Instead it was a sense of holy righteousness that I had occasionally felt before. Now and then when Father Forthill was in the midst of one of his better sermons I would get a whiff this sensation, though in those rare cases it was fleeting, like smoke carried on the wind. Inevitably mom and dad would praise those talks as if they were indeed messages from God himself.

The most powerful encounter I had with this feeling was six months ago with Ishmael Rothstein when we set free souls killed and trapped in the Holocaust. The old rabbi was at the very peak of his religious power performing an act that would have been recorded in the Old Testament as a miracle of faith had it occurred twenty-five centuries earlier. It was the power of true belief and I could feel this old janitor wore it about himself like a comfortable shirt. This alone was enough to give me pause and then nod for him to proceed since words were failing me.

"Working here I have seen many like you sick with worry for those they care for thinking their loved ones may not leave ever here." He said calmly and soothingly. "For some patients that is true, for more it is not. But for all of them it is merely what was meant to be." He said.

I had no clue what he was trying to convey beyond the obviousness of his words though I sensed there was much more. Had I not been distracted by the need to find my mom and dad I might have tried to puzzle it out for myself. Instead I went for the expedient and truthful course. "I do not understand." I said honestly after a second or two of pause.

He smiled and pushed his cart into the hospital once more looking over his shoulder at me as the dark glass door swung shut behind him. "It is simply Molly." He said surprising me by using my name. "You merely need to have faith that all will be as is intended." The way he said faith resonated within me like a chord being struck and brought me up short before entering.

"Have faith. Do not let these events distract you from what you must do child." The door of dark glass closed behind him making me lose sight of him and his cart for only a moment. I pulled the door beside it open, the one my hand had been resting upon, but in that instant he was gone. And not just him but his entire cart of janitorial supplies as well had simply vanished like the best veil I could cast, though being a sensitive mage I had felt no gathering or release of power. In a half second he and his cart were nowhere to be seen in the large open reception area of the hospital.

I turned quickly to look and see if the Buddhist monk was still there or if I had made up this whole encounter in my mind. I thankfully found him sitting calmly and silently on the steps holding a flower out to me until I turned to regard him. "Would you accept a flower from the Temple of Inner Harmony young lady?"

I took his flower as a means of respect and slipped it into my coat pocket before turning to my own issues. "You were just talking to an elderly janitor." I said as he looked on at me without expression. "Would you happen to know his name?" I asked figuring if he answered that easy question it would prove I had indeed saw someone.

"Names are merely words we clothe ourselves within." He said. "Some are wishes, some are lies, and a very few hold true power and enlightenment. Which one would you be looking for?" He smiled at me in a manner that bespoke he was at peace with the world around him, and obviously knew more than I did.

"Would enlightenment mean I have to don an yellow robe too?" I asked sarcastically.

The old man laughed. "That would only be necessary if you truly desired to do so." He said. "Personally I find your white hair more appealing than an image of you I might envision with a bald head." He paused and the intensity of stare was suddenly much stronger and nearly physical. He looked as serious as Ishmael had and I was starting to wonder if this was a trait all religious men were capable of.

"But you sidestepped my question." He continued. "Do you truly wish enlightenment?"

"You sidestepped mine first." I said defensively. "I just want to know if there was a man standing here a minute ago."

"Ah you doubt your own eyes." He said. "That is bad. And yet that is very good considering all." Okay this guy was really starting to get annoying. Could we just please answer the question so I could get on with my business or have myself committed for observation?

"And?"

"And yes young lady there was indeed a man standing there a moment ago cleaning the glass." He replied. "If you had faith in yourself you would have known that." He said.

The fact that this stranger had chosen to use the word faith as well set me back wondering what was to come, but he merely resumed his lotus position and offered another of his small odd flowers to the next family of three coming up the stairs who all politely declined it. The old monk seemed unphased by this rejection and also by my continual stare in his direction and merely waited patiently and ignored me.

Not knowing what else to do I decided to take my leave at this point and enter the hospital. There was still no sign of Jake or his cart in the big open reception center that I could see and none of the dozen or so people waiting even looked my way. I tucked the mystery of the disappearing janitor away and headed to the desk nurse to ask about my father.

The news was not good, but I had sort of been expecting that it wouldn't be. On the bright side the nurse was able to tell me he was alive and in surgery. She gave me directions and I was off.

Five minutes later I was entering the waiting area outside the emergency room and immediately saw my mother because of the familiar coat she was still wearing. I came up short noting she was all alone sitting in the corner with her head in her hands. I never before had seen her look so small and fragile as she did at that very moment. My mom and I do not agree but I respect that she is every ounce a fighter. The woman had gone up against fairies with only a carpenter's nail gun in order to come rescue me from some really bad things. Now she was a shattered shell; the panic of losing my father too much of a blow for her natural stoicism to handle.

I walked over to her and laid my hand on her shoulder causing her to look up at me. "I am here mom." I said to her as she tried to rally her own strength for me. "It will be okay. We just have to have faith."