Chapter 18

The next few months were spent in feverish preparation and long hours as the various Bureaus of the Council trained their frontline staff to meet and defeat any incursion based on the known powers of the Nephilim. The Council seemed to be concerning itself with trying to break the mindblocks of the Mages of the Nephilim but also including Ímar Ua Donnubáin. We received no progress reports as the Council itself seemed to have withdrawn into isolation, leaving the various Bureaus to simply get on with defending our world in a fragmented manner with no real overall control. That was the impression many in my Section felt. As to Nephilim incursions themselves, there were no major ones recorded though we and the Coalition set about dealing with various minor ones with a vengeance. The Nephilim seemed determined to place a fifth column upon our Earth ready for the day when they could launch a major invasion. This kept our Seers quite busy. Along with various members of the Enforcement Section, we were helped by Mage Henry's Security Section who boosted our numbers and assisted ably in containing such incursions. What we mostly found were the equivalent of special forces military types trying (and usually failing) to blend into a society they simply could not comprehend and who were no challenge for even the most junior of Mages. All these incursions came from the outer realms and we had no indications of a forward or hidden base on any of the empty Earths, not that spotting one would be easy. It's a big old world after all and we had access to thousands of them. We did manage to recruit a few more Mages to make up our losses from the magical community as a whole and not from the other Bureaus. But not as yet enough to make up our losses and many of our injured had returned from Loegria to at least bring the European Department for Investigative Studies workload back to manageable levels.

Mage Roxanne had been in contact with the other known magical using races and governments and had at least received acknowledgement of our problem. Only the Æsir admitted to having come into contact with the Nephilim and were seeking any information about them that they could get as the Nephilim's technology was a lot better than the Tuatha Dé Danann's, whom they'd previously been in conflict with. Æsir society itself had been able to mobilise its entire population against the few incursions they'd become aware of and had extirpated them root and branch, though with far higher casualties than we had. They were very much interested in acquiring modern arms to assist in dealing with the Nephilim. They'd come to realise that archers and pikes were no match for accurate long range gunfire. The Council ignored their pleas as ever, though I suspect that the Bureaus made a large profit supplying them with job lots of AK47's and field mortars from excess Warsaw Pact stocks along with the ammunition as well. Though mostly this activity was well above my pay grade as it were but working for Morgana made me privy to a lot more than the average Mage working for the Department, that, plus Morgana knew I could be trusted to keep my mouth shut.

In the mundane world the Vietnam War and the political consequences within the USA raged on and the UK government began to become mired down in its province of Northern Ireland though none of this really affected Mages as such. Though the Nephilim had taken to trying to insert their special forces into the war zone in Vietnam, hoping to take advantage of the confusion, very few, if any, however, survived contact with the North Vietnamese and their communist allies as they were usually taken for spies or infiltrators.

The hunt for Heinrich went on, though many presumed he'd simply escaped to an alternative Earth or perhaps to the Outer Realms and the Nephilim. I know Morgana had her doubts though and she'd tasked Arch and his team to begin to carefully track him down with the aid and assistance of the other Bureaus of the Council. Surprisingly he also requested of Morgana that I be permitted to assist, well surprisingly to me, seemed that Arch and his team had been impressed by my ability to see what was actually there rather than just rely on magical senses. Róisín was seconded to Morgana as her assistant in the meantime until further notice.

We had returned to Heinrich's apartment in Shanghai to begin our investigations, after the Council had released it back to the Magical Control Committee and Mage Liang to dispose of as they saw fit. Which considering the earlier Bureau meeting meant inviting Arch's people in to look for things the Council may have missed or overlooked. Almost the first thing I did was to start taking measurements in the basement and compare them to measurements taken upstairs. Although I discovered that the basement was slightly smaller than the upper levels, there was no sign of anything hidden as such. The rest of the team were going through the sparse copies of Heinrich's stationary and documents whilst I carried on with my physical examination.

Again I could sense that something was not quite right with the layout of the basement, though it was proving a lot more elusive than the previous time. Finally, deciding to follow a feeling I had, I went back upstairs to the apartment and casting a minor aversion spell ventured out to check the outside of the apartment. I noted that there was a definite well or moat to the front of the building over which passed the raised steps into the ground floor. There was quite a bit of rubbish piled high in the moat, concealing the floor level of the basement. I used my mind to lift it out of the way, revealing a couple of windows, or rather a set of glass bricks set into the floorway below, indicating a further basement or sub-basement which appeared to have been overlooked. There appeared to be no way down to the level either, though that wasn't really a problem as all I did was to jump the railings and allow my power to gently float me to the ground below to see what I could see through the windows, which wasn't a lot as there appeared to be years of grime covering them. Focussing my powers I soon had the glass clean and could see what appeared to be a large office cum living area, but not looking as if it had been in use for a while, in the place where we had thought no other basement was, or rather had taken the time to come outside and look for. I called Arch and the rest of the team and they made their way down to have a look.

"Odd," said Arch. "I can see it but not sense it, easy to overlook too."

"Well, if we can't detect the entrance, so we'll have to go in here, I'd suggest caution, if it's important it will be guarded," I said.

"True enough," said Arch. "Everyone Null up, I'll take first hit."

We all activated our Null Amulets and watched as Arch removed the brickwork with his power and was promptly hit by a massive lightning bolt which flung him back along the moat but left him only dazed, not injured.

"Your turn now, Erin," he said with a grin when he'd gotten his breath back.

Mage Erin dropped into the basement followed quickly by Mages Angéle and Alice, their Null amulets blazing, as some titanic powers came into place to prevent their entry. The rest of the team quickly scrambled in as well, including myself after I'd activated a few more Null amulets and dropped them inside. I'd begun to think we'd bitten off more than we could chew when the defence wards finally gave out and several relieved Mages looked thankfully at their amulets, most of which had more or less gone to the edge of their activated state.

"Too close by far, John," said Arch. "I think we may need some heavier duty ones in the future for occasions such as this."

"I'm working on them during my copious spare time," I replied, to the grins of the team who knew exactly how hard the Department had been pressed the last year. "Unfortunately despite giving the Council the jigs and plates along with the necessary techniques to make them, they haven't yet been able to emulate my success, so I spend a lot of time making amulets for specific Mages on request. Makes me a nice tidy profit, but doesn't give me a lot more time for research."

"You mean that the Council can't copy your amulets, John?" asked Mage Angéle.

"Apparently not," I replied. "Though I've demonstrated the technique to them five times now."

"Guess that explains the failed amulet of the Nephilim Mage," mused Arch as we gazed around the sub-basement.

"I think we've found where Heinrich lives," I said. "Or was living."

The basement was light and airy, with a set of wards designed to make it look like it was open to the sky. It was also furnished in immaculate ancient Chinese style and comfort and looked very pristine which was confirmed by a scan which detected a family of Brownies hidden in a nest behind a cupboard. The team investigated carefully looking for booby traps over and above the defence wards and finding any number of them, both physical and magical.

"Guess he was expecting us, or someone like us," said Arch as he carefully undid a slim tripwire attached to some sort of projectile bladed weapon hidden in a wall panel.

"Certainly seems to be set up to trap Mages who are Nulled up," I said.

"Yes, but not ones who are careful," said Arch. "Plus he can't have been here too recently as you can't live like this, dodging traps, that's why we use wards tailored to us."

"Unless there's a master on and off setting we can't see yet," I said. "Easy enough to use telekinesis if you know where they all are."

"True, but the bastard has them all shielded so we can't," muttered Arch.

I carefully checked the room over with my eyes looking for anything that didn't seem quite right or out of place. I wandered over to a small occasional table which matched the style of the room perfectly, though the vase on it did not being of a modern European design. Knowing Heinrich's reputation, I carefully checked it over both magically and physically before taking a pencil from my pocket and attempted to gently tilt the vase to get a look underneath it. At first I couldn't get it to tilt so approached it from various angles until one did. The vase was attached underneath to a small lever which clicked into place and allowed a spiral set of steps to descend from the ceiling into the room giving access to the basement above along with a startled set of shouts from Mage Liang's people.

"Six months we looked along with several Council members and no one suspected a thing," groused Mage Liang as he descended into the sub-basement. "All our scans told us this was solid earth underneath; we even tracked the odd worm."

"It's a clever use of shielding," Arch said. "But we had warning of how good he was from the hidden stairway."

"True, but we couldn't find a switch up here and we pressed and pulled every brick, lintel and peg," said Liang. "We never thought to check outside, dammit!"

"A lot of us have lost the ability to think in real world terms," said Arch. "Hence why I have John along with me, because he hasn't."

"Any signs of Heinrich?" asked Liang.

"Someone was here within the last couple of days according to the Brownies," said Mage Erin. "But they didn't know who as they were being fed regularly and kept out of the way as is their wont."

"One or two items of paperwork so far, but nothing conclusive. I suspect whoever was here knew that it would be discovered eventually," said Mage Alice.

"Must be something," I said. "Otherwise it would have been abandoned. I doubt it was a way station and there haven't been all that many Nephilim infiltration squads in your Area, Mage Liang."

"Yes, John, your suspicions match my own, there must be some reason to keep using it rather than clear it out," said Liang.

"We'll keep looking," said Arch.

I wandered about looking for other out of place items, though nothing immediately sprung to my eyes though the dimensions of the sub-basement did seem off to me, though nothing I could put my finger on yet. It wasn't until I stuck my head up on the spiral stairway that I spotted the oddity in the dimensions and came down to examine the walls opposite where we had jumped in.