“Hey, don’t get upset with me. I wasn’t trying to snoop around in your mind. Most of the time you’re guarded, but when you’re really upset or emotional, you throw out images and scents.”
“I do? That’s... weird.”
“Not really. You wouldn’t believe the way most people’s thoughts appear. I could tell you stories that would curl your hair.”
“Must be why yours is so curly,” I said, and she actually gave me a little smile. Sipping her second martini, Patience seemed to have recuperated from our adventure. I wished I could say the same. Although I hoped I projected an outward calm, inside I was going crazy.
“So, when we were running,” said Patience, “you threw out a picture. Something that looked something like...” She sketched a symbol on a paper napkin. It was similar to the drawings I had seen on the notepad in Sailor’s bedroom.
Seeing it now, I realized what it reminded me of: the strange thread web covering the map in the store where we had traced the route of the busload of witches from Texas.
Chapter 17
“Is it a demon’s sigil?” asked Patience.
I shook my head. “If someone with magical power sketches the sigil, it could be enough to summon the demon. Sailor wouldn’t have been stupid enough to do something like that.”
“But Sailor’s not magical, Lily. Not technically. Neither am I. We’re psychics. There’s a difference. We don’t conjure. Magical folks have the power to change reality; we only have the power to read it.”
“But when you and I combined forces, I could feel your energy.”
“I have remarkable powers of concentration due to my training. I’m able to combine it with others. That’s what you were feeling.”
“What about astral projection? That seems capable of changing reality.”
“No, it doesn’t—that’s what I’ve been trying to explain to you. Astral projection, like psychic ability,readsreality. It doesn’t change it. A person might take the information gathered and make decisions that changereality, but the psychic’s act of projection doesn’t, by itself, affect anything in the real world.... See the difference?”
I nodded, a bit stunned. I’d always lumped psychics in with magical folk, but what she said made sense.
“But my point is this: Because psychics aren’t magical per se, we can draw a sigil without summoning a demon. My aunt Renna, on the other hand, would have to be as careful as you are. She’s great at hexing, that sort of thing, as you well know.”
“Okay, important safety tip. But I still doubt that this image is a demon’s sigil.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“I think my grandmother’s coven is taking a circuitous route on purpose, making this symbol. I can’t imagine why they would do that.”
“I don’t know a lot about demons, but aren’t there some good ones?”
“Good ones?”
“Helpful ones. I mean, students used to call on demons to help them with their studies, or artists called on them for creativity. Things like that, right?”
“I’m no demonologist, either, but you’re right that people sometimes call on demons for help. It’s tricky, though. They’re only helpful if they’re kept in line, and that’s no easy task. Almost always, those who summon demons aren’t powerful enough to control them, and so the demon ends up turning the tables and controlling the person, instead.” I gazed down at the symbol, and shook my head. “No, I think it’s more likely something else. Could it be some sort of protective sign?”
“You’re the witch. You tell me.”
“I hate to say it, but I guess it’s time to go to Aidan for help. I need to ask him if he knows what the sign is, and...” I sneezed.
She fixed me with a hawkeye. “You might want to try some of those Chinese herbs for colds.”
I shook my head. “I don’t get colds.”
“Uh-huh.”
We sat in silence for a few minutes. My thoughts wandered back to Sailor’s apartment, wondering what Carlos would find and how I might gain access to whatever he found. Patience was staring at the tabletop, arranging crystals of table salt into little patterns. Good thing she really wasn’t magical, I thought, or merely by drawing things in salt, she might wind up spellcasting by accident.
She looked up at me. “I don’t suppose the point of all this could be to getyouout of the picture?”
