Circle of Stone

Circle of Stone

## Blurb

**THE CIRCLE WIDENS**

For Alastair Stone, problems rarely come one at a time. He’s busy helping an old friend with a case of blackmail when he’s contacted about a mysterious wave of minor crimes in the Oakland area—one that might involve magic. He asks Verity to look into it.

When tragedy strikes and the petty crime spree leads to a friend's disastrous near-death, Stone hurries home to investigate the situation himself. What he finds suggests terrifying new connections to a problem he thought he’d already dealt with.

As the situation escalates and puts more innocent people in harm’s way, Stone, Verity, and Jason will have to rely on each other—and a growing collection of allies both old and new—to track down a dangerously unstable enemy before he snaps.

And as if all of that weren’t bad enough, a powerful, shadowy figure resurfaces with an offer Stone might not be able to refuse.

## Plot

Ben Halstrom is a slacker, living with his mother and working only when necessary. One night, while he’s delivering some goods for his boss, Julio, Ben’s van is broken into and the merchandise stolen. He tries to get help from his mother, but while waiting for her to call back, he finds his phone battery has died. Panicked, because Julio is not a nice guy, Ben uses some of his magic to keep an eye out for Julio’s thugs while he begins walking. A nearby warehouse lights up with yellow-green energy, and Ben feels compelled to go inside, where he finds a beautiful *something* floating in the air.

## Quotes and One-liners

Jason, on his bachelor party: “As long as you don’t ship me off to another dimension or anything, I’m good.” “That still leaves me a lot of leeway…” Stone mused.

A short while later, Ben leaves with no memory of his interaction with the beautiful thing, and hitches a ride home. He walks in on two men, one holding his mother’s dead body. The other says they only meant to hurt her, not kill, but that it was Ben’s fault for trying to skip on Julio. Ben snaps and uses his magic to attack the men, killing one and leaving the other unconscious. Ben flees and begins a life on the streets, where he discovers that his magic is much stronger and easier than used to be. In fact, his orange aura now has a yellow-green band. Looking around with magic sight, he finds others have it, as well, though very few. Several are street kids, and Ben hatches a plan to help the kids, and make a little money while he’s at it.

Alastair Stone is working on calculations for a private portal in his Encantada home when Aubrey calls with an urgent message from Roderick Selby, an acquaintance and former employee of Desmond’s. He’s in trouble and desperate for help. Stone portals to London and meets Selby in a seedy pub to hear his story.

Selby, who works in France, met a woman in a café in Paris. She seemed to like him a good deal, and invited him to her suite. He woke in a strange hotel, alone, with no memory of the previous night after leaving the café. He was shortly contacted by a man claiming to have incriminating video of him. When he meets the disguised man, he’s shown graphic video of himself brutally raping the woman from the café. The man gives Selby three days to steal an antique magic tome from his employers, or the video will be released to them and the police. Selby swears he would never do such a thing to a woman, and if he did, he had to have been drugged or magically forced somehow. He begs Stone to solve the mystery, and swears he’ll turn himself in if he did, indeed, rape the woman.

Stone has little to work with, but Selby is borderline suicidal, so he begins the next day by portaling to Paris to check out the room where Selby woke. Finding nothing useful, he’s about to head to either the café or where Selby met the blackmailer, when he receives a call from Leo Blum. A series of low-level crimes with no evidence left behind, in Oakland, has Blum suspecting one or more mages are involved. A witness even reported seeing someone floating up to the roof of one scene. Committed to helping Selby, Stone says he’ll ask Verity to look into it.

The cheap apartment where Selby met the blackmailer is just full of magical traces that indicate strong magic, and that it’s likely the blackmailer had run the same scam on others. Stone questions Selby again, hoping he can remember more details, and urges him to meditate and write down every detail that comes to mind – and to not kill himself yet.

Verity meets with the Harpies to enlist their help in tracking down those responsible for the magical crime wave. Several are hesitant, particularly Greta, who has no love for the rich, powerful Stone and is disinclined to do anything for him. Verity wins their grudging assistance. She and Hezzie stay back as the points of contact, while the others go out to put out feelers. Lara calls to tell them a young minor talent named Daisy, a hard-core metal head, mentioned to friends she was attending a classic rock concert that night – a show outside her preferences and very expensive. It seems a thin lead, but Verity tells the Harpies she, at least will follow up on it, but she hopes the others will help.

Stone’s trip to the café to try to bait the woman Selby had met is a bust, so he calls Selby, only to find out the blackmailer has changed his mind and wants the book that night. Selby has already gone back to his employer’s house and retrieved the book and is on the train back to Paris. Stone walks him through the events of the video he’d been shown. A small discrepancy catches Stone’s mind, and he insists on accompanying Selby to the meeting with the blackmailer, secretly. In the back room of a dive bar, the blackmailer demands the book, but a disguised Stone wanders in as if by accident. He drops the ruse and tells the man his scam is over. The man says he’ll release the video, and Stone tells him to go ahead, nearly giving Selby a heart attack. But Stone tells him there never was a video, it was all an illusion displayed on the laptop screen. Stone grabs the man with magic when goes for a gun, and scares a confession out of him. Not wanting to kill the criminal, he demands the man cut himself and drip his blood into an empty beer bottle. Stone can find and deal with the man any time if he gets out of line again. The guy swears he’s done with the scam, which was the woman’s idea, anyway.

Verity is gratified when all the Harpies show up to search the concert arena for Daisy and the other mage criminals despite the fact that none of them approve of her relationship with Stone. She gets them inside with an illusion, and they split into pairs to search. Verity gets the idea to search for magical auras from above and levitates to the catwalks near the ceiling. She spots Daisy in the balcony and texts Greta and Tani, who are in the area. When they begin to close in, Daisy spots them and panics, blasting them with magic as she runs. Greta is thrown over the balcony railing; it happens too quickly for Verity to stop Greta’s fall from a distance. Once she makes it there, the crowd of concert goers and EMTs is too dense for her to get to Greta to do any healing. All the Harpies can do is get to the hospital Greta is transported to.

Ben’s mage kids, meanwhile are freaking out, especially Daisy, who is convinced the woman she threw is dead. Ben manages to calm them with a call to the hospital; someone tells him the woman is critical, but alive. The group is still ready to stop working with Ben – their deal was no one gets hurt. Ben manages to convince them to lay low for a while, and they’ll regroup later on.

Stone, finished in Paris, takes a portal to A Passage to India, but is redirected to a doorless room where he finds Aldwyn Stone, his many-times great ancestor. Stone is stunned. Aldwyn appears no older than mid-forties, though he admits he was the one entombed beneath the Surrey house, betrayed by James Brathwaite and his own son, Cyrus Stone. Alastair tells him Brathwaite referred to Aldwyn as a fiend, then has to explain that Cyrus killed Brathwaite but his echo remained in the house until recently (See House of Stone). In any case, Aldwyn says he merely wanted to meet Alastair, and that he has a wealth of knowledge that’s been lost to mages over the last few hundred years that he can share with him.

Stone is wary, of course. He asks about the tense staring contest between Aldwyn and Kolinsky at Caventhorne. Aldwyn warns Stone not to trust Kolinsky; he plays a long game of self-interest.  Alastair has a pot-kettle moment, but lets it go; he at least has confirmed that Kolinsky is much older than he appears. Aldwyn deflects a number of Stone’s questions so, realizing he’s not going to get him to talk, he asks to be sent home; he has things to do. Aldwyn summons a portal with only a gesture, and Stone returns to Palo Alto with a lot on his mind.

Greta’s prognosis is not good; she’s comatose and may never walk again, and Verity blames herself. She’d filled Stone in, of course, and he was waiting for word on Greta’s progress. He brings Jason up to date, and he wants to help track the kids down and stop them. A waiting game ensues; Greta wakes but the possibility of her walking is still unknown. The Harpies and Verity are consumed with that, and Stone is limited by his job and other factors, so no progress is made on finding the kids – they’ve gone to ground.

Jason calls Stone and Verity together for pizza one evening, saying he has news. He introduces Stone to Amber, and announces that they’re engaged. Stone also learns that she’s part bear shifter, and a bounty hunter. He’s also flattered and honored when Jason asks him to be his best man.

Acting on a growing idea, Jason meets with Blum to get his input. Jason wants to contact magically-aware mundanes to create a sort of information network to help identify and track criminal mages. Blum is in agreement in theory, but doesn’t believe the idea will work, and he doesn’t want civilians getting hurt.

Ben, also keeping a low profile, is struggling between his grief and depression, and a growing anger that seems to be coming from someplace outside him. He decides they’ve waited long enough; those kids owe him loyalty and it’s time to go after Julio, the man who killed his mother.

Unable to just sit around, Stone cruises the shabby part of Oakland, looking for magical activity, aware that it’s a long shot at best. He spots a ley line where he’s sure one shouldn’t be, and verifies that with a call to Verity to consult her map. The line acts strangely, going off course toward an abandoned warehouse, then resuming its true path. On investigation, Stone finds the largest rift he’s ever seen inside the warehouse. He can feel it trying to influence him, to draw him in. And it’s not a rift identified by Desmond’s globe. Stone wonders if his closing of the other rifts caused this one to open, and would it happen again, maybe in a more populated area?

After Stone breaks into the East Palo Alto shop, a tense conversation with Kolinsky confirms that yes, that is likely exactly what happened. Stefan warns Stone not to try to close the rift and suspects he doesn’t have the knowledge and power to do it in any case. Stone asks Kolinsky to be more available to consult, and to consider allowing Verity to take an oath so she can help with the rift issues.

Meanwhile, in Prague, Ian is relaxing at a club, thinking he should call his father, at least to catch up. He’s fully aware that Stone wishes he’d settle down and study magic or attend university or – something. Suddenly a mysterious, beautiful blond shows up at his table. He introduces himself as Gabriel, and he’s been wanting to meet Ian; he’s aware of Ian’s father, though they’ve never met. Gabriel is intense and seductive, and their chemistry is immediate. Even so, Ian is wary; Trin Blackburn was a good teacher of caution, at least. Gabriel offers himself as Ian’s teacher, but says he’s not a big one for business before pleasure, and to think about it.

Jason’s mundane network idea begins to bear fruit, with several ‘in the know’ mundanes answering his email recruitment. He brings Verity in on the idea, and they set a meeting with those interested, to discuss possibilities. The result is promising, with the group agreeing to keep eyes out for criminal magical activity. One member of the group, a teen, stays after the meeting and tells Jason and Verity about a couple of kids who said they’d met a man who offered to ‘help’ with their magic. One of them seemed very nervous and wary. The whole thing seemed sketchy, so the teen passed it on.

After updating Stone, Jason and Verity follow the teen’s information to an Oakland mall food court, where some of the kids hang out, particularly a girl with a monkey tattoo. They spot her, and Verity uses some magical subterfuge to get the girl aside, away from her friends. She tells them a man approached her and offered to show her magic and help her use it. He was creepy, so she bailed, but other kids she knows went with him. She tells them where the man approached her.

Verity calls Stone, finding parts of the girl’s story disturbing. First, the man seemed to assume the girl didn’t know she had magic. More importantly, he somehow *did* know, which should have been impossible – mages can’t detect other mages unless they’ve recently done magic or have magical items on their person. With still nothing actionable on that front, Stone goes back to his concerns about the rift. He calls Blum and gives him the general location, and asks him to poke around and see if any unusual activity has happened in the area.

Ben, increasingly unstable, calls the kids together and tells them there is one last job to do and then, if they want, he won’t bother them again. He gives a tearful, impassioned accounting of his mother’s death and asks them to help him get to Julio, the man responsible. When some of them balk, Ben loses it, blowing out the windows in the room where they’ve met. He calms down and apologizes and manages to convince them to help him get into Julio’s night club, and just help spot him. He promises no one will get hurt, except Julio, who deserves it. He’ll contact them when he’s ready.

Stone makes time to visit the rift again, this time to set up wards and illusions to keep people away. If he couldn’t destroy it, he could at least minimize any potential harm. Blum contacts him with information on a strange case in the vicinity of the rift. A Ben Halstrom’s van was found nearby, stripped. Ben himself is missing but, at his house, his mother was found murdered. Her dead attacker was there, too, and evidence indicates he was forced to stab himself in the neck. Ben matches the description of the man who’d approached the street kids about their magic.

Stone finagles access to the Oakland PD evidence storage locker for Ben and his mother’s things, and heads up there to meet Blum. At the same time, Verity and Jason are following a lead to a party that Daisy might be attending. Stone selects a framed photo of Ben and his mother from their effects and does a tracking ritual to find Ben. Something fights him, a yellow-green energy, flinging him around the unit. He wakes to Blum yelling at him. He’s wounded, bleeding from a deep gash in his shoulder, and Blum is beside himself. Stone lets him bandage the wound, then takes off, leaving an angry Blum behind. Ben and the rift are connected, and it’s protecting him.

At the party, Verity spots Daisy and manages to get to her, to tell her that others are coming to punish her for what happened at the Arena. Before she can get Daisy away, she sees some of the Harpies beginning to arrive - fortunately, non-mages. Verity levitates herself and Daisy through a skylight to the roof, though they’re spotted. Daisy is terrified; she never meant to hurt anyone. She tells Verity about Ben, and how he seems to be going crazy. He has a plan to get revenge on the man who killed his mother. Verity gives her both her cell number and Stone’s, asking her to call when Ben reveals his plan. As Kyla and Tani arrive on the roof, Verity casts invisibility and levitates Daisy away, knowing her friends are going to be enraged that she protected the girl who nearly killed Greta.

Back home, Stone removes the bandage on his wound to find it’s already more than half-healed. As he finishes closing the skin, he remembers his ‘miraculous’ recovery from Garra’s magical Drano, wondering if it’s connected to Calanar, where he also ’should have’ died. Meanwhile, Verity finds the Harpies have let themselves into her apartment. They’re furious at her, but she does a good a job as she can to convince them that Daisy, a kid, didn’t mean any harm and struck out in panic when Greta went for her. When they leave for everone to cool off and think, Verity wonders if she’s lost her friends, and her girlfriend.

Ben, struggling with his two halves – old, timid Ben, and new powerful and angry Ben – finds new Ben much stronger. He decides that Julio will die tonight, in front of all his men and hangers-on.

Stone visits Verity, whose been refusing all calls and texts, wallowing in depression. His understanding and her natural temperament begin to draw her out as she relates what she found out from Daisy. She gets angry, though, when she realizes Stone has information, too, and is holding back. He explains he’s under oath, but maybe she can help him work around it. With careful questioning and by drawing inferences, Verity manages to conclude that a rift has opened and affected Ben Halstrom somehow. She suggests that she could happen to stumble onto the ley line and the rift, and if Stone just happened to be with her… She swears only to look, not try to interact with the thing.

On the way, Daisy calls to tell Verity that Ben has brought them to Julio’s club, Caliente, in nearby Fruitvale, to deal with Julio. They reroute, fighting traffic, and Stone calls Blum to tell him about it. As they speak, Verity spots the lights of first responders around the club, and Blum tells them a man has taken everyone inside hostage, saying he has a bomb.

Inside, Ben had spotted Julio, who ran. Enraged, Ben uses magic to pursue and to blow guards out of his way, not even trying to hide it or avoid killing. He locks the entrances and tells everyone he has a bomb, but he won’t use it if they give him Julio. Stone and Verity have to make their way through a warren of connected warehouses to get to him, through a stage door a fleeing guard tells them about. Verity smells smoke, and freeing the trapped clubbers becomes even more urgent.

Stone goes for Ben, whose shields shouldn’t stand up to pure Calanarian power, but do, while Verity tries to control the fire started when Ben flung a guard into some of the stage lighting. Ben kills a man he’s holding inside his shield in retaliation for Stone’s attack, while Daisy is screaming to Stone that something is controlling Ben. Thinking quickly, Stone weaves an illusion of Ben’s mother, always disapproving of his use of magic, shaking her head and gesturing for Ben to stop. Ben has a complete breakdown, dropping his shield and other magic.

Verity can’t get the fire controlled, so she and Stone break down the doors to let the trapped clubbers out. He then goes to the collapsed Ben to place a block in his mind to stop, or at least minimize, the rift’s influence. Ben is sobbing, saying he never wanted any of this. Stone has reason to worry that others are out there, influenced by the rift.

Later, Verity is hopeful that she’ll be able to heal her relationships with Kyla and the Harpies. Stone gets a call from Blum. Ben Halstrom has disappeared from the psych facility where he was incarcerated. A ‘relative’ came to visit and then they were both gone, with no one remembering what the relative looked like, and nothing on security cameras.

Selby invites Stone to London for a pint and he agrees. Selby thanks him for his help once again, but says his employer fired him, not wanting any hint of impropriety associated with them. On his way home, Stone calls Aubrey and asks him to contact Selby about assisting him at the Surrey house.