Read Online Wild Hunt by Margaret Ronald - Free Book Online Page B

seemed simple enough that it could have been worthwhile in any case. I wasn’t hurting for money at the moment, but I’d been living paycheck to paycheck for so long that having any kind of cushion had its own appeal. “Hang on. How are you going to find out which thing’s been stolen?”
    Abigail hesitated, then gave me a narrow look. I had to restrain my impulse to sit up straight and present my homework. “Since you’re acquainted with this sort of matter,” she said, using the same tone of voice as my mother did to describe toilet humor, “I suppose I can tell you. I’ll be calling up my great-great-grandmother and asking her directly.”
    “Whoa.” I held up my hands. “Wait a minute.”
    “Do let me finish. My great-great-grandmother is buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery, at the feet of Isabella Stewart Gardner. She owned the boxes, she knows what’s in them, and she should know where they came from. She’ll tell me what was stolen, and how to return it.”
    “But you’re a blood relative,” I said. “And we’re talking necromancy now.”
    Abigail shook her head. “That’s a very New Age term for it. Besides, my belief system precludes meaningful existence after death in the physical world.” I tilted my head to the side, and she sighed again. “You might as well describe talking to a portrait as holding a conversation.”
    “Portraits can’t answer back. The dead can.”
    “Don’t split hairs. Like talking to an answering machine, then, or the recorded response on an automatic call. Necromancy would mean actually contacting the spirit, while this is just…” She waved one hand dismissively. “Research among old effects.”
    “Research or not, it’s still dangerous for a blood relative to do that kind of work.” Magic didn’t have many constants—it depended too much on the magician in question, the ritual or heredity or favors involved, and so on—but the one thing that affected pretty much every kind of magic was blood, in both the literal and metaphorical sense. Actual spilled blood would do strange things to a spell, and family ties could enable certain actions, which, since family members were aligned on that level of blood, could be good for some rituals but made possession or other complications a much more likely danger. “Can’t someone else do it for you?”
    Abigail gave me an affronted look. “I’d rather not bring in anyone else. I’m not happy about this whole situation to begin with, and I’d rather not announce to the world that my great-great-grandmother owned stolen property.”
    I drummed my fingers on my desk. “I could do it.”
    She glanced up from the contract. “What?”
    “I could do it. I know the basics of a graveyard ceremony, and I’m not a blood relative. It’ll be safer for me.” And whatever it is that’s scaring you about it, you’ll have some breathing room.
    “You’re not—” Abigail stared at me, one of her hands twisting against itself as if scrubbing something from the fingers. “You would do that?”
    “I—” Oh, crap . I could tell this was a bad idea, but I was going to go ahead with it anyway. “Maybe. Or at least I might be able to find a way around it.” She gave me a skeptical look. “Boston’s undercurrent has been isolated for a while. There might be problems here that you wouldn’t run into elsewhere, and maybe some alternate avenues. Ones that wouldn’t endanger you. Atleast let me look into some things first, before you do anything drastic.” Looking things up was easy enough. Maybe I could find some way to do this that didn’t involve either putting Abigail in certain danger or—as my first instinct had been—putting myself in her place.
    Her mouth quirked into a sad smile, but she nodded. “I’ll write down what I was planning to do. You can tell me what elements should be cut out.” She flipped the contract over and began writing in a careful hand.
    “Just give me a day or two. I’m sure we can find