Magic. 301
Copyright© 2024 by James McDonald
Chapter 17: Conclave Memories
You would think after six years of conclave assemblies, I would be pretty comfortable. But Karen’s appearance created a bit of an uproar. Quiet but very interesting.
Most interesting was the constant questions about what or spell I was using to attract such a wonderful and amazing woman as Karen. The universal belief was that there was some kind of charm or runed geas on her ring, because no woman could appear that powerful, that beautiful and then be attached to a man as ordinary as a kid named Hank.
Kind of made me feel a bit insecure when all the mages asked me what I had that grabbed the attention of such a wonderful and beautiful woman.
So, during some of the time on the dance floor, I decided to ask her about that.
“Honey, you could have your pick of anyone here, you know that, right?”
“I already do. And he’s young enough to be trainable, old enough to be housebroken, puts the toilet seat back down, and doesn’t leave wet towels on the bed. And I love him.”
That was the single most important thing that I took away from the two nights of Conclave.
We did gain a lot from some informative conversations. Informative because those people from the different covens around the world were all seeking to ask us to conjoin with them (as Clan Lambert and as The Witches Caldron) and their organizations. As new members, of course. At the bottom of the seniority tree. And no pets allowed.
The French, Italian and English were all somewhat unhappy with our “Thanks, but no thanks” responses to their “Offers of membership”. They seemed to feel that we should be honored to join their ancient organizations.
The Middle East covens were even more insistent. They felt that we not only join them but that we adopt all their different rules. After all, we were clearly a power in the making and should carry on with their traditions. They were not happy that we had already gotten (And translated and read) their different “secret” documents. They were not happy that we were already able to quote directly the different tales of the bible’s antique sayings. Going back to Moses and his famed tablets.
And all of them were universally upset that we felt that we could forge our own way into the 21st century with our even balance of honest business and respect overall. And that the “American upstarts” (in partnership with the Fae, and under the sponsorship of the American Council) were now opening a school for Mages, Hedge Witches and possible wizards with open admission to all. This threw a serious wrench into the workings of the “Old and Established” means of educating new Mages. Dire warnings were cloaked in the various greetings that we got from most of the people about that. Reggie was also assaulted about his “lack of control” over his dominion. He took it the same way we did.
“Hank is a separate entity with the formation of his Clan. And I so far have no reason to find anything that he has done to be against the benefit of Mages, Witches, Hedges and wizards around the world. Unless and until someone presents me with evidence to the contrary, I will continue to support him and all of his projects” was his resounding announcement.
Moving Right along.
After the first night of Conclave, I could not help but wonder what Karen was going to wear the following day to the business sessions. The Medusa dress had left a definite impression (and serious blood flows) in everyone who saw her. I was almost as shocked to see the Versace business outfit that she wore on Saturday.
“Honey, you look like you are going to meet with William. I admit that you are still stunning, but this is over the top in terms of business casual, isn’t it?”
“Hank, you just wear what you are wearing and leave Natalie and I to carry the business water. Besides, this will just make them take us seriously.”
And they did some serious diplomatic business. The English coven representatives seemed to be totally disconnected from the English Circles we had been doing business with. I don’t think “Sir Robert” had any idea of the level of intelligence we had on him or on Thomas Heatherington. At lunch, when we were reminded of the current warrant for me in England, I reminded him of the difficulty to get the American State and Justice department to take it seriously. He was not amused.
“There still is Justice in England. And we have many things we want to have you answer for” was Thomas’s reply.
Far more interesting was the Russian contingent. And for good reasons. The Production of artifacts was dependent on gemstones and that was dependent on the restrictions we had placed on Runed artifacts. Brazil, Taiwan and even China were all insisting on the registration and linkage of charged artifacts to owners. Which the different Congresses of Mages were upset about, but the manufacturing and recharging organizations were not. Evidently theft of artifacts that had been going on for hundreds of years had come to a crashing halt in Poland, the former Russian Republics, and in Germany. The linkage of power of an artifact to the owner of the artifact had almost totally eliminated the black-market theft and reselling of artifacts.
So, our rules were finding fertile ground around the world of artifact manufacturing. Which upset a few of the Councils. Oddly enough, none of the circles. There appeared to be a significant disconnect between the Old Ruling class and the new hedge witches and younger mages. But that seemed to be the mark of the world universally. But there were some things which did still adhere to the old order. And we were going to take some actions to prevent bad repercussions.
Sunday was a casual Q&A about our plans for our upcoming nuptials. Everyone wanted to know when and where. And when we offered invitations, many replied with “Thanks, we will pencil it into our Calendar.” Except Sir Robert and his henchmen. They desperately wanted to attend and hoped that we would reserve seating for them.
I thought this was rather interesting, given their history of some cold treatment in the past. I vowed to encourage Helen to keep a close eye on the operations in England.
Conclave Aftershocks
In England
“Can you believe the insolence of that so called Wizard and his tart?” Robert Barron thundered to his aide Featherstone.
“He does seem to have a talent of arousing your ire, Sir Robert. I wonder how he is finding out the things that he is finding out?” Featherstone replied.
“I don’t know. But it is a serious violation of our privacy. And those two tarts acting as if they are his acknowledged designates. One is simply infected with an ectoplasm parasite. No real magic of hers at all. And that blonde tart is almost totally insufferable. Her snickers and smiles at our proposals and our issues is insufferable. She’s not a real Mage. She’s a entitled battery with a pretty face. And this Handfasting’s is an absolute slap in the face of our history of Christian culture.”
“But he’s not just a mage, Sir Robert. He’s an actual wizard.”
“But a weak one. He cannot be very much as young as he is. And if he really intends to bind to this woman in June, then we need to know where and when exactly so we can prepare a bit of a surprise for him. And one for her first.”
“Well, is there any idea of where this Blasphemous Rite is going to occur?” Sir Robert asked his friend Thomas.
“We have heard from some sources that it is supposed to take place in eastern Tennessee at some outdoor hilltop. Something about a long-range vista like the Salsbury hill location that they loved so much last year.”
“Can we get people into that area? Can we possibly get snipers there to provide some means of breaking up their little celebration?”
“As we get more information, we can develop a better plan. It seems to me that we are looking to be out of theater, and we need to start to train some people now” Thomas answered. “I’m sure we can get a team assembled, but we have to find support for them there or It’s a suicide mission”.
“If they aren’t mages, they don’t’ count.” Robert replied. “We can always find more people in the SAS or SBS to take up our cause.”
The unseen monitor in the corner listened carefully to the two Englishmen who were unaware of her presence. She was sure that Helen would be very interested in this development. And something should be done about this soon. This was the overheard discussion that was played back to Helen from the sprites assigned to Robert Barron and Thomas Featherstone.
In Georgia.
I was drunk on the beauty of my consort. My Fiancé. My future wife. Karen. What can I say. She was magnificent at Conclave, and I got kind of tired of hearing from everyone “What kind of spell are you using to attract such an amazing woman?”
Kind of made me feel a bit insecure when all the mages asked me what I had that grabbed the attention of such a wonderful and beautiful woman.
I worked to prove myself worthy of this woman when we got home late in the morning. Karen was a continuous ripple of energy, and I had three or four peaks myself. All through that night. And we were very late getting to early dinner on Tuesday evening. To the smiles, slanted eyes, and smirks of everyone there.
After fifteen minutes of teasing, I took the bull by the horns and set an agenda at the table.
“Ok, people. We admit that we were a little energetic. But we are both old enough to know what our limits are and young enough to exercise them. So. Natalie and Jerry, I want to hold a business organization meeting on Saturday. This is a new year and a new century and I want to build a business construct that will take advantage of what we have discovered so far and find opportunities for our future. As well as safeguard all of us from any critical events that pop up.”
“Hank, did something happen while you were at Conclave?” Natalie asked.
“Karen, you are supposed to leave them drained. Not energized” Paula said with a snicker.
“Hank, what did you get from the conclave?” Jeffery asked. “Any sign of any threats?”
“Not specifically. But I got some bad vibes, and I don’t want to leave any openings. We’ve been growing very fast this last year, and I want to solidify what we have, determine what we are going to do and avoid any unfriendly events like last June. Natalie, I want to schedule a meeting for this weekend for the executive committee and a general meeting for the goals going forward.”
“How big a meeting and what agenda?” Jerry said.
“Two separate meetings. A daytime meeting with Martin Bujold as an advisor and our gnome accountants from the Bank in Brazil. I want to lay out the vertical structures for our businesses showing the different pillars of income and the connection points within our business structure. And one in the evening with just the Clan leadership and a briefing from Helen.” Hank said.
“I admit that we are growing like Topsy, Hank. We probably should get some formal structure in place if we are going to keep expanding like we have been. We’re a lot bigger than just a jewelry store anymore.” Natalie said.
“I also want Deamonous here for the Daytime meeting. I have a feeling that his leadership and operations with the Dragon Corp is going to be critical in the future, and I don’t want to have him unknowing of what we need.” Hank continued.
“That means Barbara and Jeffery in from New Mexico as well. And what are we doing about the school and expansion?” Jerry asked.
“Let’s set that up for the thirteenth of this month as a noon meeting. We need to get some final structure on funding and support for that education school under the American Council and with our clan management. We haven’t had issues yet, but we should head off any that we can see.”
“Well, Hank, you certainly have been energized. Karen, don’t do this too often, we won’t be able to keep up.” Natalie said, teasingly.
“Don’t worry. I’m too sore to do this too often.” Karen said in reply.
I just blushed.
Natalie promised to have a first draft of an agenda out for review this evening and after the edits we would distribute it to all the parties for invitation. And yes, we were providing lunch.
Interested Parties.
“So, Martin, what exactly is Hank talking about this weekend?” Reggie asked his treasurer.
“I’m not sure, Reggie. But he seems to have gotten some different vibes from the Conclave and Natalie said that he’s looking to provide a better structure for Clan Lambert.”
“Well, he is getting into all kinds of things. It would be nice for me to have some advance notice of what is coming up next. Be sure to take good notes.”
“I will. At least we are getting some advance notice. I wonder what the Europeans will think?”
“Are they even invited? Do we care about the Europeans? They have not provided anything with any value in the last seven years, and I don’t think that there are any new ideas coming out of there. England is the worst of the lot with their focus on two centuries ago. Pax Britannia is a dead issue since the nineteen fifties, despite Reagan helping with the Falklands.”
“Pride makes people do stupid things” Martin replied.
“Yes. Let’s hope we can avoid their stupid as much as possible.”
In the meantime, Arno was talking with two of his elves about this same upcoming meeting.
“Setno, Riska, I realize that both of you are full members of Clan Lambert, and as such have loyalty to him, but do you have any ideas you can share about this upcoming meeting that Hank is sponsoring, and what the agenda is?”
“Your highness, I think that this is the result of some casual discussions at Conclave. Karen and Hank made a dramatic appearance, and a couple of people were a bit shocked at Karen’s confidence and the announcement of the betrothal. A marriage of equals is a rare thing in the Mage society. And the Wizard one as well.”
“I agree. But the conversation I have heard in the bar is that there is really no external change with respect to any other covens, or the Fae community. I think that the problem is that Clan Lambert has grown so far and so fast that Hank wants to get organizational structure and controls to minimize conflict and increase the spread of knowledge across the clan.” Riska added.
“So, since you both are “Clan Members” I assume that at least one of you will be there to represent.” Arno said.
“Not really. He does have Carl and the Goblin accountants from our Fae Bank involved. I think he’s wanting to solidify and streamline the financial controls. I know that the Goblins and the Gnomes in the Crystal Palace will have a presence, as well as some of the captured humans. I don’t know what the agenda is yet, but I am sure we can pass it on as meeting minutes.” Setno replied. “So far, it’s Clan Lambert executives and company involved.”
“What about his plans for his nuptials?” Arno asked.
“So far, Barbara has taken over site planning, along with Deamonous and the sprite Springtime. Karen is buried in gown selection with Yana Marenko. And Hank is blissfully sitting on the sidelines being quiet and doing what he’s told. There is a lot of interest in the location. Karen wants a view, and green, and outdoors. Deamonous wants security and safety for all participants. There were some mutterings from some of the circles about the possibilities of a disruption, but I don’t know how serious that is being taken.” Setno said.
“Probably very serious by Deamonous and Jeffery. Both of them are focused on Clan Security.” Riska said.
“One thing I can’t help but wonder is the cost of this expansion. I know what the costs and expenses are for our kingdom. I wonder what the budget is for the operations of Clan Lambert?” Arno thought aloud.
“I think that’s one of the items being talked about in this meeting. Budget and expenses. I know that the last year’s expansion has been a high-cost expense. And I don’t think Hank is ignoring the fact that all of the gold in all the streams as well as all of the artifacts out there have a finite limit. The kid really does have a fifty-year-old brain” Setno said.
“I want to thank you both for your work as interfaces between our kingdom and the Clan. It eases my mind greatly having such a firm friend as Hank leading what is really a power in the magical world. I shudder to think how it could be much worse if there was a different leadership.” Arno said.
“Yea. Like that Other Lambert. Hank has done an excellent job managing the ruffians in the Crystal Palace. They actually seem to want to help the clan wherever Hanks wants to lead.”
“Yes, Riska, I agree. Hank does a magnificent job of managing his people. We could do a lot worse.” Setno said.
Arno nodded his head in agreement.
January 6, 2001. Augusta Ga.
“Well, Hank, Are we ready?” Karen asked.
“I think so. And how about you, darling?”
“I think so. This afternoon is going to be a pretty extensive exploration for us, isn’t it?”
“More then before. No more winging it. Now we do a plan.” Hank replied.
Today’s meeting was a partial rehash of past business, but a new definition of business verticals, as well as horizontal communications and responsibilities. Gone would be any remaining confusion about roles and responsibilities. And the unveiling of the Threat Assessment team would probably be new information to some of the participants.
Outsiders to today’s meeting in the morning and afternoon would include representatives of the Fae Court, American Council of Mages, visitation from the Council of Wizards, and each of the “Columns” of Clan Lambert. The columns were one of the first items being discussed in the morning, to assign formal identification to the roles and identifying the leadership of each column. Hank hoped that revealing some of the
Natalie would be the co-chair with Hank taking the seat at the head of the table. Karen would be next to him as his partner. This could be confusing except that the four of them had worked out this during the previous week. With Karen and Jerry acting as spouses and general supporter of the chairs.
Also in attendance was Deamonous, representing the Dragon Corp. And Pae’le and Par’ma as the leaders of the Gargoyle Home Guard. This was very unusual in that these groups almost had no recognition to the outsiders, and only vague understanding of their roles. The Sprite Springtime was also there representing the transportation group for the Witches Caldron.
Hank felt that all of these contributors deserved recognition, and credit. And a say in how Clan Lambert was going to move forward into this next century.
“Good morning, everyone. Thank you for coming to our first quarterly meeting regarding organizational plans, goals and risks for Clan Lambert as a business as well as a social entity. I hope that by publication of all of our goals and plans internally and with some external advertising we can reduce any concerns or issues about our growth.” Hank said as an opening.
“I’ll now hand the organizational explanations over to Natalie and Barbara, as they are both vitally involved in our business.”
And thus began the organizational briefing. Which had a few surprises to some.
First was The Witches Caldron. Which was the general source and sales point for both Clan Lambert and all customers in the Wiccan World. A Web page was opened and managed by the team in California to provide definition of goods that were being handled and delivered by either Human freight or Fae Delivery. Customers had to open accounts to provide payment either to or from the local branch of SunTrust bank in America, or the other financial institutions internationally. All transactions were paid and based on Grams of Gold held in trust in Uruguay or Switzerland or Grand Turk. The buyers could select either Grams at current value or local currency for the transaction. Buyers and sellers could negotiate price, delivery and goods but the common denominator was always going to be Grams of Gold. No charges or interest associated with the accounts.
This arrangement seemed to be flying in the face of current bank practices, but (as Hank repeated) “We are not in the banking business. This is an exchange of goods between individuals with a common balance. Both sides benefit.”
Martin Bejold raised his hand at this point.” Hank, that’s a pretty simplistic view of what Banking is all about in society. You have to recover the costs of the organization that is rendering the service of governance of the transactions.”
“But that’s the bank’s business. Our pricing on the front end has to reflect our costs of overhead for running the Caldron, and the bank costs of the transactions in their business.” Hank said.
“So Clan Lambert is not interested in transaction costs except as a shipping company?” Martin continued.
“Exactly. Our refined minerals in storage at the banking institutions is our asset as a measurement of value of goods bought and sold. A free market with a common denominator of value.”
I am going to have to follow this pretty closely to see how this will continue to work, Martin thought to himself. For witches and mages and wizards, this may be a pretty good way to do transactions, but we need to keep it in house. It’s going to be complicated to supervise.
With the banking transactions out of the way, next up was costs of the Caldron, the site, listing and managing of goods including photos of goods being offered, and the overhead of shipping, inventory management, and all of the other business issues of running this “Column” of Lambert Enterprises LLC had to be worked out. And that took almost an hour of the meeting.
At the break for snacks, Hank queued up the next “column” of interest. Lambert Jewelers and Artifacts. With two major columns. Estate and custom jewelry and Artifact Charging.
“This is by far the biggest arena for our impact on the Human and non-human world. I intend to merge the three different stores of Artifacts, furniture and clothing sales under this column because they are all discreet retail sales to the general public as well as the Mage community. We’ve captured a lot of interest in London and Antwerp as well as New York with our cutting, sales, and distribution of natural and man-made gems. And Marenko clothing is expanding both Leather and accessories sales into these arenas as well. We want to keep a clearly “visible” chain on these products to avoid any unnecessary and unwanted attention by any of the federal, state and local noses into our business operations. We all realize that investigation never stops, but we need to be able to anticipate these interests and road block them.” Hank said,
“We need to find a continued diamond mine myth to add to this. We all know that jewelry is one of the main stays of wealth transmission in the underworld, shifting valued stones as objects from one point to another. We need to do a better job of back stopping interests.” Jeffery said. “That’s how I broke BCCI in Miami, through the use of stones as elements of value from one dealer to another.”
“I think that the New York Diamond Exchange is a pretty good wall on that order” Natalie said. “So far it’s worked. We’ve been able to inscribe all cut stones through their records there and it’s been a good back drop. Karen, has William heard any rustlings in that area?”
“Not from New York. The English on Bond Street are not happy with the competition. But what else is new.?”
“I think our best move there is to separate charging costs from item pricing. We need to define and cloak the issues of charging objects separate from the objects. No more listing “Charged vs. Ordinary” Prices in the Jewelry stores, either in Georgia or in New Mexico.” Barbara said. “After all, that’s what led Karen to the Lounge in the first place.”
Karen blushed and said “That’s what twigged my interest after I was thrown out of the reception room the first time. And following Lady Pierce to the lounge with no idea of what she was going there for. And then running into Hank. Best and worst experience of my life.”
“You have our sympathy, darling. Hank is destructive to many normal things.” Natalie said with a smile.
Conversation around this continued until almost noon, with careful exploration of means and methods of concealing the manufacture of Diamonds and other stones as well as building paper trails on the source of the larger new artifacts. Once again, keeping things in plain sight was the key to getting authorities to look elsewhere.
After Lunch, the focus settled on Mining operations. “I’m worried that we may run out of sources within rivers, streams and lakes for artifact mining, and we might want to explore different channels for finding and extracting gold, silver and other precious metals.” Hank said. “Also finding more Leyline locations to take advantage of resolving power in Fumerals, as well as measuring the ongoing yield and strength of our three existing ones.” Hank led off after lunch.
“Hank, I think that it’s a twofold process.” Martin interjected. “We have information that we have been accessing with the different federal and state natural resource agencies exploring mine sites that have been abandoned as being “worked out”. There are many sites dating back to the 1700s which are no longer economically or environmentally safe to operate. The use of artifacts in mining these areas is our hidden card. So going into those areas with limited license is possible. Also continuing to mine downstream lakes, rivers and other water features is a good tactic to continue. So long as no one else figures out what we are doing.”
“You know, Hank, there are other sources of materials of value. I wonder how much so-called garbage has elements that we could mine, refine and reuse with the help of magic charged artifacts?” Jeffery asked.
The entire group was silent for a moment. “What we need to do is define what elements we want to capture and then design artifacts that can attract them. If we can find a way to do so in areas where we are able to plant and retrieve our capture artifacts with no observation, we could broaden our selections.” Hank said.
“Only challenge to that is identifying the elements that have value and then to seek them and store them. And find a paper trail to show how we obtained them” Peter said.
“So that identifies our three pillars of economic interest. Now we have to look at our three pillars of personal interest.” Hank said.
“That means first of all things, Security. “Natalie said. “And that’s composed of two primary roles. First is threat detection and analysis. Helen, this is your spot first.”
“When Hank decided to form a threat detection group, it was interesting that this leadership team chose me. My major is European history, and the different stresses and activities that led to the decline of European status globally and the stresses that led to the first and second World Wars. As well as all the nasty little conflicts that have continued. My charter with Clan Lambert was to find those as early as possible in both the real and Magical world that would constitute a threat to our membership. After the invasion at Arch Park I, it was apparent that we needed to see those threats as quickly as we could. And from that devise defense against actions both foreseen and unforeseen.” Helen said.
“Helen, so far there has been no action which you have not provided some good warning about, and you are not responsible for any of the actions we have had to take where you had no advance warning. In terms of response and planning to respond, you have worked excellently with our team, as well as our Defense teams to counter any aggression we encounter.” Hank said. “Keep up the good work.”
“Thank you. At this time, we have five gnomes doing global monitoring of messages as well as approximately thirty Sprites in direct contact monitoring activities against high value and high threat entities. The Sprites are on rotation between delivery and monitoring of high value entities and so far our costs of operations have been relatively low. I do worry that we may have to dedicate more resources as we uncover more threats.”
“Helen, I have a concern. While I am delighted with your success so far, I believe that it is time to develop an organizational chart for your group that identifies critical entry points for information and for analysis. Also, we need a listing of possible targets to monitor in the future as well.” Hank said.
“I admit that there is a lot of information coming in.” Helen said. “How wide do you want distribution of this intelligence information? And who manages it?”
“Helen, you have a need for a couple of assistants. I want you to interview them among Clan Lambert and find at least two deputies to assist you. I know it will take some time, but we cannot have any situations where you are overwhelmed with information and not time to perform an analysis.” Hank said.
“And if that’s all for Helen, our next contributors to the security portion are Deamonous and Jeffery.” Natalie said.