Chapter 10

We all met in the large parlor when dressed, even Angus was there and looking much better after a good night’s sleep.

“There isn’t enough food here to make breakfast for all of us. There are two possible choices for what to do. The first is to go into town and buy food, bring it back, and then make breakfast,” Kaera stated.

“The second possibility is for Max to transfer all of us to the farm, where I have plenty of food, and we have breakfast there. This would solve two problems: one, we would all get to eat, and two, we would be back home, which Max would need to do eventually anyway. Also, Angus would get to see the farm,” Kaera finished. I noticed that Kaera was definitely more assertive now that her level of Talent had increased.

“Yes, and there are chores to be done also. The need to do them didn’t stop just because we are on a trip,” Nick added in support of his Wife.

“That sounds reasonable. We can pick up food in town later today,” Jill said in agreement.

“Is that okay with you, Angus?” Nick asked, turning to his friend.

“Yes, I’m fine with that,” Angus answered. He was much improved this morning.

“Do we transfer from inside or outside?” Nick asked next.

“From outside,” I told them, and we all rose and headed for the front door. Angus looked a bit disturbed as we exited the house.

“Is there a problem, Angus?” I asked on seeing this.

“I don’t like leaving the house open when I’m gone, and I no longer have a lock that works on the front door plus my Magic is still weak,” he told me.

“There is nothing to worry about. I cast a small shell to enclose just the house and protect the books last evening, when we went to get Kaera. It’s still up, though not tinted. I am going to add my wards to it, and it will be able to withstand any kind of attack,” I told him before casting my wards and adding them to the shell. It glowed briefly as they combined, and Angus could see what the shell enclosed.

“Your Talent seems as strong as it was previously. You haven’t had any problems with it after casting all three of the medical spells in a row to heal me?” he asked, still somewhat surprised.

“No, I haven’t had any problems. I just needed to recharge my battery afterward, so to speak,” I told him. We all joined hands then, and I cast the transfer spell. We vanished from Angus’s property to appear on Nick’s farm inside the shell there. Angus seemed surprised.

“You actually moved all of us here in just one transfer!” he said in surprise

“Yes, what were you expecting?” I asked.

“I thought there might need to be a stop midway,” he told me.

“I’ve never had that problem,” I told him.

“And you aren’t tired or anything?” he asked.

“No, just hungry, but I was hungry before we left,” I told him with a smile.

“Jill and I will start the fire in the stove while you men start on your chores. We’ll start on ours once the fire is going,” Kaera told us before turning to Angus.

“You can sit inside in the parlor, or in the rocking chair on the porch out here. Guests don’t do chores,” she told him before taking his hand, as she and Jill headed for the house.

“We need to change clothes,” Nick told me, and we followed them. The chores were soon finished even though they were performed later than usual. Jill had collected the eggs, and Kaera had a big breakfast ready for us when we finished washing up from the chores. It was while we were having breakfast that Jill brought up the subject of the farm.

“Nick, we were wondering if you would sell Max the farm so the two of you could move into town?” she asked. All eating stopped, and everyone stared at Jill. There was silence for a number of seconds.

“I ... I didn’t know that you were interested in being a farmer, Max,” Nick said.

“Well, I wouldn’t be able to start for a while. I still need to finish the removal of those responsible for the murder of my Children, and the suicide of my Wife, but after that Jill and I will want to settle down, and here is as good a place as any. Additionally, it’s away from the prying eyes of most of the press and the politicians. There would be too many problems if we settled down in one of the major or even most minor cities. Here we can be mostly anonymous,” I told him.

“Kaera and I talked about moving to town last night, but didn’t see why anyone would want to buy the farm since it’s located so far out of town,” he told us.

“We will need to make a few changes after we move in, but that won’t be for a while,” Jill told him, but seeing the look on Kaera’s face, she added, “Of course, we are ready to buy it whenever you are ready to sell.”

“I would need to finish getting in the crops, and selling the horses, plus the hogs would need to be butchered, but they take care of that in town now, and even deliver the meat all cut up,” he told us.

“We’ll need to look for a house too,” Kaera added.

“There isn’t any rush, I’ll be studying with Angus for a while, and then dealing with a Don in New Jersey to learn who he recommended to his Nephew in Atlanta. We can transfer back here at any time to check on you. I’ll be paying in cash for the farm, so you won’t need to take out a mortgage on the house,” I told them.

“Yes, but how will we be able to continue buying things in town?” Nick asked.

“Aren’t you drawing Social Security at your age?” Jill asked.

“Social Security?” Nick asked, as if it were a foreign concept.

“Yes, you’ve been paying into it every year when you pay your taxes. Haven’t you filed for it?” Jill asked.

“No, didn’t know we was eligible,” Nick told her.

“Who does your taxes?” she asked.

“Fellow in town has done them for years, and his pa before him. They never mentioned it, just told me how much I needed to pay,” Nick told us.

“You need to check on this, Nick. If they give you any trouble, let me know, and I’ll have a talk with them,” Jill told him, and I could imagine the kind of talk she would have with them.

“We’ll let you know what we decide,” Kaera told us and smiled at Jill. We finished breakfast following that and were soon ready to return to Union City with Angus. On arriving at his house, he had some questions for me.

“Can you really afford to buy his farm and actually pay what it is worth?” he asked.

“While eliminating the bad guys in Atlanta, I managed to acquire a substantial sum in cash and gold that they would no longer need. It’s more than enough to keep us for quite some time,” I told him, but didn’t mention that it was upstairs in his house in a box.

“I didn’t know that Nick lived in so primitive a place,” he told me following that.

“It’s not all that bad, but we will need to make a few improvements before we move in,” I told him.

Later we drove into town with Angus and visited several stores for groceries plus other items that he, or we, needed. That afternoon following lunch, Angus started my studies in the den. Over the next four weeks, I spent much of my time in there reading from his various books or discussing Magic with him. Jill joined us at times to increase her own knowledge of Magic also. While I had learned to speed read in the Army, it wasn’t all that helpful with my study of Magic. Still I had no trouble absorbing what the books had to offer in the way of spells or procedures. At times I was so absorbed that Jill would need to drag me away from studying to eat or get some sleep.

“How did you acquire all of these books?” I asked Angus one day during a break from studying.

“My Family has been collecting books on Magic for several generations. You can see that some of them are quite old, but they all have a preservation spell on them. My Father continued the practice, though he had no real Talent, as the Talent seemed to have faded away in our branch of the family. Neither my Mother or Father had an active Talent. My siblings didn’t either. I, who was the last one born, was the only one who had a Talent, and a strong one at that, or so I thought until I met you,” he told me.

“I have continued the Family’s practice of acquiring books on Magic, but it has become much harder in the last thirty years. Since my Parents and then my siblings passed away, I have done even less to acquire new books, but they no longer appear to be available either from old book stores or even on the Internet,” he told me in a sad voice.

“When we leave, I’ll leave the two shells in place. With your level of Talent, you’ll have no trouble raising or lowering them, and they will keep the books safe from the government and the Magic Haters,” I told him before going back to studying the book that I was currently on.

Saturday, the 31st of October, was the full moon and the start of Samhain. The moon rose just after six thirty that evening. The sun had already set, and we were well into twilight before it was high enough to be impressive. Nick had gathered materials for a huge bonfire in one of his fields, and after lighting it, we danced around it to the sounds of Celtic music played from the DVD that Jill had brought with her and the portable music system that we had purchased on one of the trips to pay her utility bills. We had also kept Calisa supplied with essentials.

Following the dancing, we sat and watched the moon and the fire until it had burned down to coals, and we drank some of the ale that we had brought with us. The five of us had a very enjoyable time and returned to the farm house when the coals of the fire had burned down sufficiently to not be a fire danger. Kaera had prepared some food for us, and we ate before I returned Angus to his house. Jill and I were staying at the farm for the night to help the Kanes move to their new house the next day, Sunday, the 1st of November, New Year’s by the Celtic calendar.

Nick had sold us the farm on the 20th of October. They had found a lovely little house just outside of Sneedville a few days prior to that, and paid for it with part of the cash from the sale of the farm. The horses had been sold to a couple of other local farmers, and the pigs had been sent off to the butcher. They would be taking their few remaining chickens with them as there was a coop behind their new house. We would be helping them move their furniture and other belongings by Magic naturally. Nick would keep an eye on the farm for us while we were away.

Earlier, they had gone to Kingsport to apply for Social Security. Jill had gone with them to insure that they weren’t cheated or taken advantage of. They would be receiving their first payment from Social Security next month.

We returned to Angus’s house in time for supper late on Sunday afternoon. When Angus learned that we were going to leave on Tuesday, the 10th of November, he insisted that we replace the bed cover on the pickup with a metal cover.

“If you leave that canvas cover on there, the hoodlums in New Jersey will rip it open and steal all of your possessions,” he insisted.

“I could ward the entire truck, then they couldn’t get into it,” I assured him.

“And reveal that you are a Wizard or Magic user?” he asked.

“You’re right, it wouldn’t be good to warn them that we can use Magic,” I had to agree.

“You can get a metal cover that opens on springs and is lockable. There is a place outside Erie that sells and installs them. One of my students a couple of years ago got one there. He said they were pretty reasonable,” Angus told us, as Jill had joined us.

“How will I find it?” she asked.

“I’ll go with you. I know where it is, as I went with him when he got his,” Angus told her. He was doing fine, having completely recovered by the second day after I had cast the three Medical spells. They drove up there on Tuesday, the3rd of November, and returned late that afternoon with the cover installed. It even matched the color of the pickup.

“They had one that had been in stock for quite some time. In fact, they needed to blow the dust off of it, and wash it before installing it,” Jill told me. “The charges were quite reasonable once I used a compliance spell on them,” she added with a smile. Angus had been smiling the entire time she was telling me this.

I wrapped up my studies on Sunday, the 8th of November, and we packed most of our things on Monday the 9th. Jill made sure that Angus had enough food and other things on hand to last him a good month. You would have thought she was his Mother, the way she reminded him about eating and changing his clothes as well as cleaning the house and doing the laundry. Angus only smiled at her chiding and agreed to do as she said. I was sure that he would do as he wished, whatever that was.

Following a good night’s sleep in the Parent’s bedroom, which we had moved into when we returned from the Kane’s farm back in October, we were up early on Tuesday morning, and I loaded the pickup while Jill made breakfast for all three of us. Before we left, I warded the bed of the pickup to ensure that no one was able to get into it but Jill or myself.

Following extensive goodbyes with Angus during which we promised to return to see him, we were on the road by 0830. I had fueled the vehicle yesterday as well as checking the rest of it, so we could drive back through Union City without any stops to take US Route 6 back to exit 166 of I-79, and then drive south on it to exit 116, which was its intersection with I-80. We took I-80 going east all of the way across Pennsylvania and into New Jersey to exit 47, where we picked up I-280 for twelve miles until it reached I-28, the Garden State Parkway, a toll road. We were only on it for five miles or so before exiting onto Morris Avenue (Jersey route 82) and driving into Elizabeth.