Gabe had been a tad dubious about this ritual plan from the start. Not because he thought it would do any great harm, shatter the Pact, or hurt anyone. But, well. Because it wouldn’t do anything at all.
In this case, it was decidedly a damp squib. The men and women they met in a secluded bit of woodland were all very well-meaning, that much was clear. He’d escorted Isobel to the meeting point, as instructed, and then turned back just long enough to cast half a dozen charms on himself. It wouldn’t work if they got too close, but as long as he kept a bit of space, he could follow and see what happened.
Several older women had whisked Isobel into their circle when she arrived, glad to have someone young and strong to help with the final arrangements. The chatter as they went was all about other things they were doing for the war effort. From the snippets Gabe caught, that involved aggressively efficient gardening, the eternal knitting, and various more mystical pursuits. The men talked about the fire warden work, the on-again off-again discussions about some sort of Home Guard. And always the eternal question of where to get a decent cigarette these days. Nothing at all unusual there.
Isobel was, if not as capable of taking care of herself as Gabe was, entirely competent to manage in these circumstances. She wasn’t a duellist; she didn’t have his experience avoiding the things that ended in duelling. But she had a sharp eye for self-preservation, and for Gabe’s preservation, for that matter. More than he did himself, at least a few times.
He was worrying over Rathna, of course, which didn’t help. Especially not in the gap between escorting Isobel to her spot and waiting for the ritual to begin. He’d had to leave his journal locked up for the evening, in the room over the pub.
It was not a bad room as pub rooms went, clean enough and without any obvious leaks or mould. Not as nice as the inn where he’d met Rathna, though that might be a bit rosy in memory these days. He’d check in as soon as he could. He didn’t use the word pray lightly. He wasn’t a religious man so much as one aligned with the familial practices and traditions.
But he’d made his own offerings at the Ganesha shrine before leaving Veritas this morning, and at the family lararium. Then he’d spent a quarter hour standing by the pond, in one of the places he felt the land magic most strongly. That all would go well. That Rathna would continue to be safe. That her work would change the world, at least a little, for the best.
Here, well. He was less sure what it might do. There was a circle, and there was dancing to raise energy, but not the precise dances of the Council magics at Solstice or even what little he knew of the Fatae dances. It wasn’t the energetic circle dances he’d learned in Ritual class, or the country dances of the village celebrations in their part of Kent. He didn’t entirely know what to do with it.
No one had explained the particulars of the ritual, beyond what he directly needed to know, but Gabe had, of course, known what they were trying to do. Pool their magic, their energy, their desire and shape it and form it and send it out. They even had a simple enough focus, keep Hitler and all who were his on the far side of the Channel.
He and Isobel had talked about this. She’d been willing enough to share her vitality, the spark of her magic. The Penelopes were all trained in that, as Healers and nurses were, both to gather it up and to share it. There were times when a case would mean a Guard or Healer needed the help, and the Penelopes were there. And Gabe could see she was participating intently, concentrating on the dance and the chant and the shout that went up.
None of it did anything that Gabe could tell. Granted, he wasn’t in the ritual, but he’d certainly observed plenty he wasn’t directly involved in. All the Solstice dances at the Council Keep, for one, plus any number of others he’d been at. This was, well. Nothing. It fell flat. All that time and energy and fuss, all of him missing the May Day celebrations in the morning, and for nothing.
He took a breath as quietly as he could. They could learn from it. Learn where to focus next, who might actually be doing something that moved the needle a little. Winnowing out what wasn’t working was helpful, all his training as a Penelope had been explicitly clear. But it felt like a failure. And a failure of his, for all he hadn’t been the one designing or performing the ritual.
As they started to clean up what they’d put around the circle, he withdrew, back to the spot where he was supposed to meet Isobel and Peter Douglas. They came along quietly, with a hooded lantern, about twenty minutes later, to find him on a suitable bit of log.
“Uncle.” Isobel came and hugged him tightly. She took the excuse to murmur in his ear. “Keep up a good show, please.”
He would have anyway, but he was curious about what she was up to. She talked easily with Douglas about the area, not about the ritual at all. Once they were back at the pub, the publican let them in the back door. They went up to their rooms. Gabe found a sandwich and a flask of more or less warm tea waiting. He sat on the bed with a thump, until Isobel knocked on the door.
“Come in.” It made him push upright, and move to rest his hand on the doorframe, calling up the wards he’d placed when they arrived. There was a brief flare of luminescence.
Isobel raised an eyebrow. “Bit obvious for you, sir.”
She was doing all right, then to be that tad bit cheeky. Gabe waved his hand. “How are you? Eat, you need to eat.”
Isobel shrugged.
Gabe looked at her more closely. “Something put you off your food?”
“I feel queer in my stomach. Pass me the flask, though?” Gabe did so, then rummaged in his bag for the smaller flask of brandy. She nodded once and held the tea over for him to pour a bit in. She took a good swallow that seemed to help.
“From the ritual?” Gabe repositioned himself on the bed, then paused to unlace his boots and take them off. His bad ankle was complaining more than he wanted. It could be the weather, the rough ground, the fact he’d been not much use at all tonight. Probably all three. He rolled his toes, trying to figure out how much he needed to actually pay attention to the pain and how much he could go back to ignoring.
“The very tail end of it. How much did you see?” Isobel had settled on the end of the bed, one leg tucked up, facing him.
“Most of it, though I didn’t hear all the chat after. I left about twenty minutes before you came along.”
“They were talking about - one of them had been in touch with someone else. Somewhere else, they were careful not to let me hear the name. Some connection, and not in the ordinary sort of way?”
“One of the esoteric groups?” They’d both done their best to chart some of those out. The whole thing was the sort of unruly mess you’d expect if a dozen cats got some yarn, some ink, and a great deal of free rein. And that didn’t even get into the more obscure connections. The things like who happened to be at the same party as someone else, or bumped into someone in the lane because they’d moved to the same village. Gabe knew of at least half a dozen of that latter form without trying.
Isobel nodded. “More than one, I think. They wanted me back, and I made all the proper noises about whether I could get away and all that. Implying some other possible war work, maybe not nearby.” It was a good excuse, and one that no one could easily either argue with or check up on.
“Good, good.” Gabe frowned at the rest of it. “That doesn’t explain why you feel queer. What sort of feeling?”
Isobel took another long drink of tea and frowned. “Like it didn’t do anything. But it wanted to. All of that balled up together, and it didn’t go anywhere. Is that going to cause a problem for anything?”
“I suspect no one’s going to have a good night’s sleep, but that’s not so different from otherwise for a lot of us, is it?” It was true enough. Everyone Gabe knew with any sense wasn’t sleeping terribly well. The initial furor about the war and possible imminent invasion might have settled down among some parts of the larger population, but he knew too many people who had accurate information about what was going on. In some cases, it didn’t matter much whether it came from a touch of espionage, divination, or simply having some idea of the patterns of history. “We could have a look tomorrow, before we get back.”
“You want to get back to Veritas, though, sir. And I don’t think there’s too much to see, honestly. You’d want to do a proper thaumaturgical analysis, wouldn’t you?”
“Can you find it on a map later? Though, no, we probably couldn’t get a field team out fast enough.” They, like every other bit of Albion, were low on people. “We’ll sleep on it. How’s that? See how useful you feel it would be in the morning. I have my kit.”
“Sir.” It was a more agreeable sound. “You’re right nothing will change too much overnight.” Isobel relaxed a little more. “What did you think?”
“I don’t think it did much. Not for lack of earnest effort. But it didn’t go anywhere useful. If you wanted a bit more blessing for a patch of Kent, sure, that’s fine. Is it going to erect some great wall of protection? No.”
“And we can’t do that either.” Isobel knew the theory, of course, but the hopefulness in her voice was so complicated.
“The land is living and breathing, and we can’t make hard walls, not for a large space. A castle, at the outside. It would - it would suffocate. They’ve tried twice.”
“The Armada and Napoleon, right? And we got - storms and then weren’t there other problems?” Isobel frowned. “That’s a shakier bit of my history.”
Gabe snorted, then sobered. “Famines and oppressive taxes and people who didn’t have work. The Regency and George IV. Nothing good. There are some glimpses, if you look at the right records, of issues with the Pact. The Council was awfully active, visibly active.” He’d never quite worked up the nerve to ask Alexander about it directly. It wasn’t a period of Alexander’s particular interest, even leaving aside the fact Alexander’s grandfather had been on the French side of things.
Gabe knew enough to tell it had been bad, in complex ways. He was good at the patterns, and he could read some of the routine historical charts for them without even thinking about it. Some of those same things had started showing up already, even though other aspects wouldn’t be fully reported for some time. The extremely unusual cold winter, for one.
Isobel was watching him when he looked up again. “And that’s what we’re here for. To figure out what’s going on. And maybe help.”
“We are.” Gabe let out a long breath. “All right. We’re not going to do more tonight. Can you eat a sandwich, or do I need to worry about that?”
Isobel grimaced. “I’ll eat.” She waved a hand. “When do you want me up, sir?”
Gabe considered, pulling out his pocket watch. “Half eight, is that too early downstairs? And we’ll decide about the ritual site. We need to go part of the way there for the nearest portal, anyway.”
Isobel nodded and took herself off. Gabe immediately pulled his journal over, forcing himself to write several notes related to their work of the evening before thumbing to Rathna’s latest.
Finding out they’d made the portal work made everything better. It was tremendous news. He was up far too late writing back, thinking about what she’d told him, and reading into what she hadn’t yet put into words.