Chapter 10

When I awoke the following morning, all of the squishy was gone. I had things to do today and didn’t have time for romance. I thought that I had nearly finished Book 3, as no new pages had appeared and there were only a few pages left in the book.

I didn’t get a lot of studying in that day, as shortly after breakfast, the phone started ringing. It turned out to be more new customers wanting charms and amulets. Most of the orders I could fill from the extras I had prepared while working on the previous orders. Some would need to be prepared now, as they were for things that I hadn’t made the last time.

One order was troubling. It was for two amulets, and they would have to be prepared the old fashion way, as they required ingredients that I didn’t know a spell for. The ingredients required were unusual and could only be obtained at Chinese medicine stores – Tiger penis and Shark fin. I would need to go downtown to obtain them. I had really raised my rates for these two amulets, as they were a pain to prepare to ensure they worked as intended. They would also necessitate finding a store that had the ingredients in stock.

Before setting out, I called the store where I had purchased similar products previously to ensure that they had the required ingredients in stock. It turned out that it was a good thing that I had called ahead, as that store was currently out of those items. It seems that someone had purchased their entire supply of them the previous day. The owner was sorry, but said he wouldn’t have any for several weeks until a new shipment arrived. However, he did give me the address and phone number of a cousin of his who also sold medicine and had what I needed in stock.

A quick call, to the cousin’s store, confirmed that they had what I needed on hand. I had never been to this new store and looked it up on the internet. It was located in an area of Atlanta with narrow crowded streets, but it was the only source I had, other than going to every Chinese medicine store across Atlanta in hopes of finding what I needed somewhere. I sighed in resignation, before getting started, and went upstairs to change clothes.

“Come on, Al. We need to go downtown. These two amulets are going to be a pain to prepare, but I’m charging them enough to make it worthwhile,” I told my Familiar, when I was ready to go.

“What amulets?” he asked, as he stretched and then looked up at me.

“Two male fertility amulets. Someone wants to be sure they can get it up when they want,” I told him.

“Maybe I could use some of that when Alva comes to visit,” he said, as he joined me.

“Somehow, I don’t think you’ll have that problem,” I told him with a smirk.

The trip most of the way to Atlanta was uneventful. There was the usual heavy traffic and a few accidents to deal with, but nothing out of the ordinary. Of course, traffic IN Atlanta is another matter. It appeared to be even heavier than usual, and I needed to go to an older part of the city with even narrower streets than usual. On top of that, the city had been converting some of the one way streets back into two way streets, which just created even worse traffic jams.

It was on one of the still one way streets where the problem developed. The green car that had been in front of me for some time suddenly jammed on his brakes for no apparent reason. I hit mine immediately and screeched to a stop just behind him, without hitting him, but it was a close thing. On quickly checking my rear view mirror, I saw a dark colored pickup coming up behind me at a high rate of speed. He was not going to be able to stop before hitting me and didn’t seem to have noticed that traffic was stopped in front of him.

“Oh shit!” I said in a very unladylike voice before I noticed that time had slowed down considerably for me. People on the sidewalks hadn’t moved in the time I had been checking the rear view mirror, and the pickup behind me had slowed substantially.

“Get us out of here,” Al told me in a louder voice than usual.

“How?”

“Transfer us,” he said. I had never transferred anything as heavy as a car before, but the spell came to me, as I considered it. This was also when I noticed just where I was. I was stopped in the center of the intersection of the street that I was on and the one way street that ran at a right angle to it. The idiot in front of me was still stopped for no apparent reason, as there was nothing in front of him now. The pickup behind me was still speeding in my direction, and I was about to become the middle of a traffic accident.

This was also when I noticed the strong Ley Line that crossed the street that I was on at an acute angle, and that there was an empty parking space up the street a hundred feet or so ahead of me. Drawing a huge amount of Magic from the Line, I cast the transfer spell while tracing its glyph on the steering wheel of my car. In a flash, we were gone and suspended ten feet in the air over the parking spot. I released the remaining Magic very slowly, and the car slowly settled to the pavement in the parking space, parallel to the curb. I turned then and looked out the rear window of the car, as did Al.

The speeding truck hit the stopped green car where I had been only seconds before with a loud BANG. I could see the hood of the pickup crumple as the front end of the truck smashed into the rear of the green car pushing it forward a number of feet while it smashed in the rear end of the car. The windows of both vehicles exploded in broken shards of glass, and there was the screech of tearing metal. The sound of the crash could be heard for blocks around the site of the accident. Another car, that I hadn’t noticed before, was also passing where I had been, but in the right hand lane. He was applying his brakes, and you could hear the screech of brakes and tires, and see some smoke from his tires, as he came to a stop beside the pickup, but where I would have been if I hadn’t transferred.

I could see that the speeding pickup had hit the stopped car in the rear and had collapsed the entire rear of the car in addition to the front of the pickup, trashing both vehicles and creating a huge accident. Not more than a few seconds later the accident became even worse. A huge garbage truck, the kind that lifts the large containers up and dumps the contents into the body of the truck, ran the red light of the crossing street at speed and crashed into the accident with another huge BANG, creating an even worse mess. That crash could also be heard for several blocks.

He also still had the arms for lifting the containers in the down position, and they rammed into the pickup and the car with a loud thud and the scream of torn metal, shoving both vehicles into the car stopped beside the accident before the garbage truck struck the accident with an even louder BANG and pushing all three vehicles across the pavement with a screech of protesting tires. This caused a fire as the gas tank of the stopped car had been ruptured by the accident, and the sparks of metal on the roadway set the gas on fire. Instantly, everything was enveloped in flames with a loud ‘POOF’, creating a conflagration that spread to all four vehicles.

I had considered putting out of the fire with a spell, but Al interrupted me.

“This wasn’t an accident,” he told me, much to my surprise.

“It wasn’t?”

“No, but who ever planned it didn’t realize that there was a Ley Line that crossed this street near the intersection. Otherwise, we would have been the intended center of the ‘accident’,” he told me.

“So whoever planned it wasn’t a Ley Line user, but whoever hired him or them could have been,” I said.

“Yes, very likely,” Al agreed. “Very sloppy work,” he added, before telling me, “Time to leave.”

“Yes, we still need to pick up those ingredients, but we will be very careful picking them up and when we deliver the amulets,” I assured him.

I only needed to pull out of the parallel parking space that I had transferred to. It was far enough up the street that there was no involvement with the accident. Traffic was stopped and backed up on both streets behind the accident, so I had plenty of room to get into the correct lane to make the turn onto the next one way street that ran in the opposite direction to the one the garbage truck had been on. The light was also green when I got to it, and I made my turn and was away from the scene of the accident. I could already hear sirens, as I drove away.

We eventually found the store that I was looking for. The street that it was on was still one way, as it was narrow and had parking on both sides of it. I needed to park a half a block away from the store, but was lucky to find a spot to park. Someone had pulled out just before I got there, and I managed to pull into the spot and get parked with only a little trouble. I hate parallel parking. There wasn’t any choice here however.

On exiting the car, I cast a double ward around it, and then a double ward around Al and me, before heading back up the street to the store. The exterior of the store was painted red with gold trim and had oriental dragons, also in gold. The lettering on the large front window was in Chinese characters with English below them. I cast a double ward around the store also before entering it.

A small bell sounded as I opened the door, and I was greeted by an older Chinese lady in traditional Chinese clothing. She had on a mid-length black blouse with red satin trim. The long sleeves were very wide at the hand end. Below this was a long flowing dark blue skirt that reached the floor and hid her feet. There was a black girdle that held the blouse closed around her waist. Her gray hair was in a bun behind her head. She was short at no more than five feet tall and appeared to be at least 65 years of age. She said something in Chinese before switching to English on seeing me.

“How may I help you?” she asked.

“I was directed here by the owner’s cousin. He had sold all of his stock of Tiger penis and Shark fin, but told me that I could obtain some here,” I told her.

“Yes, ha bian and yu chi. We have both. You are then Madailein Kavanagh, who my cousin called about. How much of each do you require?” she asked in accented English.

“Just a small amount. I need them for two amulets that I’m making for a customer,” I told her.

“I have bottles as small as 15 grams. Will that be enough?” she asked.

“How large is 15 grams?” I asked, not sure just how much that was. She produced two small brown glass bottles and opened one. It was nearly full.

“This is the Shark fin. The other bottle is not quite as full,” she told me. I looked into the bottle and saw only a gray powder. The label on the bottle was in Chinese.

“That should be sufficient. I only have the two amulets to make,” I told her.

“That will be $52.65 then,” she told me and took my breath away. She must have seen my reaction and had probably seen others react the same way.

“Is best quality Siberian Tiger penis. Verly expensive. No charge for Shark fin,” she told me with a smile.

I was certainly glad that I had raised my prices for those two amulets. With the cost of the ingredients and the labor involved, they would definitely be that expensive. I opened my purse and paid her the money before carefully placing both bottles in my purse. The woman had wrapped them in a piece of Chinese newspaper for cushioning.

“Have a good day,” she wished me, as I turned to leave.