The next several months were relaxed for the Ebon Cross. Mammon and Colt worked on their urban renewal project and Adele completed her sophomore year, getting almost perfect grades. Throughout the spring Miguel and Adele dated but it wasn’t until after school ended that he asked for her help.
He explains that he trying to make up for his misdeeds with the Painted City, sponsoring positive activities to counteract the darkness in the streets, such as skateboarding contests and driving out crime. But he has a spirit problem too tough for him to handle alone. A spirit of vandalism, grown strong without Painted City’s predation, has gathered a group of spirits of mugging together to drive down property values. Adele calls Colt to look into it.
Colt decides to scout out the situation and spends a day hunting through Shadow, watching the spirits. He counts four muggerlings and determines them to be a minor threat. He then searches harder and tracks down the leader, Broken Mirror, to the spiritual reflection of an abandoned house. The strange spirit is made up of shards of mirror reflecting the eyes and face of a cat. He is able to determine it is more dangerous, able to shoot blasts of razor edged mirror shards. He calls the rest of the cabal to discuss their next course of action.
Mammon meanwhile is chatting with Zio about business, both mundane and magical, as the Ebon Cross and the White Passage manage and alter the geomantic landscape. He realizes he has seen a nearby woman several times over the last few weeks. Suspecting that he has been followed and recognizing her as a mage, he approaches her. Though she tries to deflect his questions she does reveal her Shadow name, Number 5. Recognizing her as a Guardian, he ask what she is up to. Unfortunately she is not allowed to tell him. Mammon leaves, cutting all sympathetic ties to her.
The majority of the cabal meets at the sanctum along with Miguel. The exception is Valkyrie who has been busy with work and the Adamantine Arrow. Mammon asks if anyone else has been followed recently but it seems that he alone has been singled out. They decide the best course is to summon the spirit and trap it in a spirit jar. Adele leads the summoning with the others aiding.
An hour later it arrives, along with one of its muggerlings. The party is alerted to their extra guest by some space magic cast earlier by Mammon. They go ahead anyway and command the angry spirit to get into a magical jar prepared the day before by Mammon. The muggerling tries to hold it back but is too weak. The spirit enters the jar and is imprisoned. The weaker spirit fumes in Shadow, ranting that mages are stealing spirits. When questioned, the muggerling, called Brick in the Alley, explains that various nature spirits have gone missing.
They let Brick go and Miguel handles the remaining spirits on his own. Mammon decides to ask Athaliah about his mysterious stalker. She admits that the Guardians of the Veil are also following her, likely looking for devil worship or Left Handed practices. She thinks Pispir is behind this, trying to thwart her attempt to take his seat on the Council. She tells Mammon this will pass soon. Mammon brings up the missing spirits, which apparently means something to Athaliah. She quickly says she will look into it. Mammon for his part takes to staying at the sanctum where the Guardians do not attempt to spy on him.
Meanwhile Adele decides to contact Midas and learn why he helped her last summer and in the years before. Using Merlin as an intermediary she sets up a meeting with Midas in a nearby city park. First she checks with Mammon, asking him to guard her mind and meet up with her later to check if she was mentally influenced somehow. She also asks if talking to the Seers of the Throne is even legal. Mammon agrees to help and says that as long as she does not end up working with them, she should be fine with the Lex Magica.
Adele heads to the park bench, feeding the ducks. After several minutes, Merlin points out that she has been joined in Shadow, by the large shape of Midas. Awkwardly they chat, neither eager to give away information. When she prompts him for his reasons he subtly admits to being her father. He explains he had to hide her and leave her with foster parents for her safety as well as his own. Being his daughter she could be used a tool against him. Once she was a mage, she fell into the Silver Ladder’s clutches and was under too many prying eyes. As to her mother, he is quiet, saying he doesn’t feel if he has the right to reveal her. He doesn’t believe that she is in the city. Adele convinces him, as a sign of trust, to transfer Merlin’s loyalty to her. He does, reluctantly. Afterwards the conversation breaks down into awkward small talk as the many years and distance make any connection hard. Somberly he leaves, carried away by a firebird spirit.
Mammon and Adele drive back toward the sanctum. Suddenly a gray jaguar sideswipes them, driving Mammon off the road and into a ditch. Adele looking into twilight, sees that car is possessed by a hybrid wolf-car spirit. As they get out of their car, the possessed vehicle turns around for another strike. Mammon quickly puts up a ban in front of him and as the creature slams into it, it skids off the road. Adele calls Colt in the meantime, who grabs his rifle and jumps into his pickup. Meanwhile as the spirit tries to get out of the ditch, Mammon places another ban on top of it, freezing it in place. He follows that up by jacking up the wheels. Adele also gets Mammon’s car out of the ditch. Meanwhile the spirit is in anguish as its ban against staying still comes into effect. Just as a state trooper arrives, the spirit leaves car, all the time glaring at Mammon. The car is wrecked, metal crumpled and glass shattered as the spirit leaves the claimed car. Mammon is able blow off the trooper’s questions as a trick of the light. As he explains, the car was like that when Mammon swerved off the road. He and Adele then quickly leave, meeting up with Colt down the road. They begin to discuss what happened. Someone sent a mad spirit after Mammon, but who?
Valkyrie has been busy trying to save the Adamantine Arrow. Their leader Lealtad is planning to strike the Gary Consilium under the pretext of liberating it from the Iron Hand. But she and Quick know that their leader really hungers for revenge for the death of Hippolyta. The two mages realize that an attack on the Iron Hand’s home ground will end badly. They have been trying to work out how they can make her see reason. Alternatively they could force her out. With Valkyrie’s faction building, her moderates now have greater numbers (if not experience) than Lealtad’s hard liners.
Quick brings up the topic of the new Arrow mage in town, Eckhart. Apparently he is a senior member of the order, on the level of Lealtad herself, but with a much more moderate stance. He is visiting on personal business but was invited to the Monastery for a planning session by Lealtad. Whatever he said, it blew up into a huge argument and he hasn’t been back to the Monastery since. Quick and Valkyrie arrange to meet him at his hotel. In person he seems to be a nice old man and apparently well informed on Valkyrie’s exploits. He explains the argument was due his holding with the idea that a leader must be wise, which is not what he thinks her plan is, particularly since it is motivated by her personal desires and not a Consilium mandate. On the subject of stopping Lealtad, he says a takeover could be done democratically but only if Valkyrie was already an Adamant Sage, something that would be difficult given the current political stranglehold that Lealtad has. Otherwise their only option seems to be to persuade her to hold off her attack.