Turn to Stone

Turn to Stone

## Blurb

Dr. Alastair Stone, Occult Studies professor and powerful mage, is walking off a breakup in San Francisco when he encounters a desperate woman preparing to jump off the Golden Gate Bridge. She can't stop hearing voices and seeing her stalker ex-boyfriend--a man she's certain hasn't left his home in the Midwest. She's sure she's going crazy.

Stone doesn't believe it. Convinced something supernatural is behind the manifestations, he's compelled to investigate--which marks him as a target as well. Before he knows what's going on, he's drawn into a web of murder, illusion, and jealousy that threatens not only the woman's life, but his own.

When he finally discovers the truth about the stalker, the only way to stop the attacks is to take the fight to its source--knowing full well that if they do that, he and the stalker's victim could be walking into a deathtrap.

## Plot

*Turn to Stone* *is a standalone novella set between the events of Stone and a Hard Place and The Forgotten.*

Alastair Stone, dumped by his latest girlfriend, is wandering San Francisco near the Golden Gate Bridge when he spots someone who appears ready to jump. He levitates up and talks her out of it, and into going with him for coffee to talk it out.

Erica tells him she's an ex-cop from the Midwest whose former boyfriend, Jack, became controlling. She dumped him, but he framed her for drug possession. Suspended from the job, she relocated to SF, but now she's hearing voices, and seeing her ex in places he can't be. The voices had told her to just end it all, which was how she ended up on the bridge.

### Pause here a moment WARNING, Possible Spoilers Ahead

Stone can see magical traces around her, and says he can help, if she'll give him some time for research. Next day she calls and they meet for dinner, but she thinks Stone is coming on to her and gets antsy. He calms her, but when she tells him someone stole her childhood stuffed toy, he insists on going to her place to investigate. Paranoid and angry, she tells him to leave and not contact her.

Erica calls late the next night in a panic - things are moving around and her ex is watching her from a mirror. Stone tells her he'll be there in an hour. On the way, Stone is attacked by shadowy red and black tentacles - on the freeway, doing 90. They blind him. He's able to slow the car and fight them off, but then he's stopped by a CHP officer for his erratic driving.

He finally meets with Erica and she tells him what happened. He convinces her to let him investigate her apartment for traces left by the events. When they arrive they find the apartment in order - no objects flung around. Stone finds fading magical traces, though, and concludes someone is using illusion to harass Erica - real name Cassidy. She asks Stone to stay the night, for protection, and he agrees. Jack calls, having had someone find her number, apologizing and asking if she's OK, can't she just come home. Stone has her tell him she's met someone and she likes him and won't be coming back. Stone explains he wants Jack's attention on him, and admits to the attack on the freeway. Cassidy is upset, but goes along with it. Stone sends her to bed while he waits up. Nothing happens, and Stone goes home, telling Cassidy to call if anything starts up again.

He waits a few days, then calls, concerned whether anything has happened to her. She says no, she's fine, it's been quiet and she's just trying to get her life back to normal. She even made a new friend at the gym. They leave it at that, and maybe getting together again soon. The next night Cassidy calls and says something weird has happened and asks him to meet her at the diner again. He drives up, only to have a waitress give him a note and message that she got called in to work, and can he meet her there. Stone is suspicious, but goes anyway to a run-down warehouse district.

He enters a warehouse through a partially open door. He hears Cassidy call for help and, just as the lights go out, he realizes it's an ambush - Cassidy wouldn't have left her real name with the waitress. He's attacked by six figures, but realizes they are an illusion. They disappear, but then two real thugs jump him and start beating him. He slams them with a concussion spell, threatens them with lightning, and they flee.

Stone, hurt but not badly, pursues in his car, following the illusionist's magical traces. He finds the guy - Jerome - in a rundown apartment and intimidates him into telling all he knows. He was supposed to make Cassidy think she was crazy so she'd go home. Then, he was supposed to kill Stone, but leave Cassidy alone. His orders came from an unknown mage, who sent him a picture of Jack to use in his illusions.

Stone makes a deal with Jerome to tell his boss he succeeded in killing Stone, then calls Cassidy to check she is alright. She's suspicious of his tone and orders him to come over. He does, and she starts patching him up and demanding to know what happened. He fills her in and confirms Jack is behind it all, and that he has a plan to take the fight to Jack and his partner, now that they'll think he's dead.

Stone devises a plan for Cassidy to call Jack, saying her new boyfriend had ghosted her, and she was willing to come home to Indianapolis for a visit and see if they could work things out. Jack buys her a plane ticket, and Stone finds a seat on a flight an hour later. Cassidy is supposed to meet him at the airport, but she isn't there when he arrives. A man named Bobby meets him at baggage claim and tells him he's Cassidy's friend - she'd spotted Jack and left, asking Bobby to meet Stone. Stone is suspicious but goes along.

When they get to the guy's van, a man with a gun is waiting inside. They take Stone to a restaurant/club, through the back, while he plays the terrified mundane. In a fancy private salon, a man named Kresge demonstrates being a mage, while Stone pretends to be an amazed mundane.

Kresge says he has an arrangement with Jack. Stone is going to record a message saying goodbye to Cassidy, then will be killed so she understands she can't walk away from Jack. They position Stone in a chair in front of a camera with the three of them around him with guns, and tell him to read from a paper he's given. Stone fritzes the camera with magic, flings the henchmen away as well as their guns, and slams the doors shut.

Kresge finally realizes Stone is a mage, and a strong one. He sends his goons away and tells Stone he won't fight him or kill him. It's only business, and only because Jack is holding some past nefarious business over him. He'd personally be glad if Jack died. He tells Stone where to find Jack and lets him go.

Stone is searching Jacks house for Cassidy when Jack suddenly appears with a shotgun and fires. Stone shields and ducks, while Jack fires again. Stone grabs the shotgun away, but Jack produces a handgun. He's about to shoot Stone when Cassidy grabs him. They wrestle for the gun, and she's shot. Stone flings Jack into the fridge, and he lands, unconscious. Cassidy is wounded and Stone begins to call 911, but sirens are already approaching. Stone stays until Cassidy wakes from surgery to tell her that not only will Jack be charged with what he did to her and Stone, but her coworkers from the PD had been coming forward about his other activities, including framing her - she can have her job back. He leaves for California, with a brief thought for what might have been between them.