Riordan had his marching orders. He could handle this. Don’t die. Buy time for reinforcements. Fuck up the enemy’s plans. Save everyone he could. Strangely, the further he got from the pack house, the more relaxed Riordan felt. There was this mindset that hit when he was on a mission. The unimportant things fell away, distanced to be addressed at a later time, and time slowed to a series of moments. Winning was a matter of stringing those moments together into a path that led through danger to victory.

At some point, Billy was going to have to tie Riordan up. Since the guard was on his side, that was going to likely be held off until the last possible moment. It would be way better to be tied up as a human. Shifting into a badger was a hell of a way to get out of most constraints. He could be one hell of an escape artist in that form. Berko had hated that her hyena form was worse for that kind of infiltration tactics than either his badger or Qusay’s cobra. Not that Qusay ever took those roles as team lead. He wasn’t afraid to, but it was Riordan’s right to risk himself first.

He was the vanguard and he was damned well proud of that fact.

Having resolved that, Riordan shifted back to human. He left his seatbelt off for long enough to rummage through his half-formed mage kit in his pockets and consider his options. He had likely about half an hour before they got where they were going. Perhaps longer, if they had to go around some of the forest sections that Riordan had walked through in his escape. Perhaps shorter, if they were going to some property removed from their main compounds or the ritual site.

If his enemies were smart- and signs were definitely pointing that way, at least when the crazy wasn’t messing with them- then he was going to be searched and his supplies taken away as soon as he arrived. They probably didn’t know how to read the magical signatures on him though. His shifter nature and the spells Frankie had already placed in him and all those spiritual scars he was accumulating made his aura even more of a mess than most. The death mages hadn’t seen a natural mage before, as far as he could tell. Spirit magic threw off most regular mages as it was. Riordan wasn’t sure he could hide a spell from them, but he was also pretty damn sure that he could hide what the spell actually did.

If only his casting abilities weren’t such shit.

He had a handful of rocks, a jar of dried lavender, a pad of paper, and some writing utensils. His well of power had recovered to basically full during the investigation downtime, as had the pack well. He could spare some magic for highly inefficient spells.

What he needed the most was protection from the sort of compulsion that was puppetting Billy. Riordan had been able to ward off the fast cast version in the spirit realm, but the spell had lacked the physical anchors there that could so powerfully boost death and blood magic. He wasn’t going to be able to win a magical duel in the real world. As such, he needed to make it so he could respond with mundane attacks to their magical ones.

Spells tied to objects could be taken from him. Circles drawn on himself could be washed off. He needed to either anchor the spell outside of himself but have it stretch to cover him or he needed to be able to breathe the spell into his core, the way he had done with Frankie’s spell forms. Those spell forms were so advanced compared to his current skill level as to be laughable to attempt.

Riordan wished he had someone he felt alright to use as a proxy. He was pretty sure he could manage a redirect, substituting another target for the spells, if only he had someone he was willing to sacrifice that way. He could try a redirect to an object, but that would be a much harder misdirection without any similarities to bind the effect. Blood would be especially important for that sort of spell defense, he suspected.

He suppressed a groan, realizing the depths of his magical ignorance. There had to be a hundred different approaches to this, but everything he was coming up with required either skills or materials that he lacked. Riordan needed to start from the other end again. What could he do with what he had?

Studying the limited materials, Riordan let his mind relax, letting memories and ideas flow through as he searched for inspiration. Then a thought caught his attention and Riordan went back to study it again. When preparing for conflict, Lucinda and Frankie had done spells far beyond Riordan’s skill, but Mark had stuck with boosting what he could naturally do. By drinking his spell.

Lavender was edible. Eating a spell wouldn’t last as long as breathing it in, but it would be just as hard to steal.

Hell, paper was edible too, if he wanted to take that sort of approach. Riordan had grabbed the lavender because he knew that its magical affinities included purification and protection. That would be perfect for the effect he wanted, even if Riordan wished for more herbs and things to mix to draw out the affinities he wanted. Lavender was also used for things like sleep, love, and peace, which weren’t the focuses he required.

His eyes fell on his other supplies. Perhaps there was some other element of the spell preparation he could use to draw out the most from the herb. Riordan started with the pad of paper. It was lined, which made it less than ideal for magical circles or symbols, but he thought he could write out his spell to have greater effect than if he just spoke it.

And yet, when Riordan began writing, what came out was a prayer instead, written in cramped, curling Hebrew.

O Lord, grant that this night we may sleep in peace.

And that in the morning our awakening may also be in peace.

May our daytime be cloaked in your peace.

Protect us and inspire us to think and act only out of love.

Keep far from us all evil;

may our paths be free from all obstacles from when we go out until we return home.

He stared at the words, feeling them resonate with intention. He was going into battle, asking to be cloaked in peace and to be guided to act out of love. It felt… right. This wasn’t a war with good guys and bad guys. Hell, most wars weren’t that clear cut either. Yet, the people Riordan sought to protect were on both sides. He wanted to protect, end evil, and then return alive.

Riordan tapped out a sprinkle of dried lavender over the prayer. Protection. Purification. Peace. Love. Healing. Rest. It was all there.

He reached for the stones, letting intuition guide him. He had known he would use the clear quartz. It was the most universal stone he had in his set, one that worked as an amplifier and clarifier. No matter what, it would be useful to draw out just a bit more from his working. The rose quartz and desert rose stone he also drew out were less expected, but felt correct. Rose quartz was a stone of love and peace, compassion and forgiveness. It was a stone for letting go of negativity in favor of higher emotions. Desert rose was a strange round stone with naturally forming ridges like petals. It symbolized that all things were possible and reaffirmed one’s purpose in life. It dissolved restraint and obstacles that would hold him back.

Riordan stared at the stones. Had he always had these instincts towards what felt magically correct or significant? He’d always been more in tune with his animal side as a child than his siblings, but he’d also never hungered for more knowledge or secrets of magic. He’d never hung on the knees of the pack shaman, waiting for wisdom to fall from their lips. He’d just done his own thing. Which, in one way, was a sign that he’d felt a different way to reach understanding than just transmission of tradition. He’d just never listened to that instinct anywhere but the heat of a mission.

He’d never been a good subordinate in a pack or army until his team. It had always been as if he could sense when his orders were flawed on some level and it would get under his skin and aggravate him. As a honey badger, especially a young one, he’d reacted about as well to that feeling as could be expected. Which is to say, aggressively and belligerently. With his team, Riordan had felt things were right for the first time ever. It had been such a relief that he’d ignored that slowly growing itch as things went wrong. He hadn’t wanted to see, until things reached the point that he couldn’t ignore how twisted their missions had become.

Then again, there was the question of how safe being an instinctive caster really was. There was a reason that spells had gotten codified from those first fumbling attempts. People typically wanted repeatable effects without a ton of strange side effects.

Riordan’s lips twisted in a rueful smile. He could only imagine what Frankie would think of his makeshift spells and their probable consequences.

That didn’t stop him from using the stones to grind the lavender into his written prayer, in the order of rose quartz, then desert rose, and then the clear quartz. He hardly made it into a fine powder or anything. Mostly he just mushed the dried leaves against the paper, making smudges. That didn’t matter as much as the intention behind his actions. Riordan could feel the potential tingling in the air around the paper. He thought he even saw wisps of magic curling around the written words, but he wasn’t sure if that was real or just his overactive imagination. He hadn’t poured any power into the effect yet, just prepared the materials to anchor and boost the spell he was going to cast.

Billy continued to ignore his actions. The death mages clearly weren’t used to capturing other mages, much less shifters. Their restrictions were dangerous, but generalized. Billy wasn’t going to interfere with Riordan unless it hit those restrictions. Indeed, he was driving very smoothly and avoiding potholes as much as possible on the shitty Michigan roads.

Riordan contemplated his preparations and tried to visualize how to turn all that potential into a spell. Did he need to do some sort of precise movements? How specific should he make the effect? He’d written in Hebrew. Did that mean he should cast in Hebrew this time instead of Yiddish? He felt the tension rising in his muscles again and stopped. He closed his eyes, breathing rhythmically and letting go of the need to cast the spell “right.” He wasn’t going to get it right by any existing standards.

All Riordan could manage was effective. He could work with that.

Trying not to let doubt or worry about his casting methods leak in and interfere, Riordan filled himself with intention and purpose. He wanted a protection against negative manipulations, especially those that would harm himself or others. He wanted to purify out nasty blood magic and let it pass out of him. He wanted to think clearly and act correctly. He wanted to be a peaceful sword, a knife blade excising only the poisoned flesh from this wound.

The words of the prayer he’d written tumbled from his lips in cadenced Hebrew. Then Riordan whispered a request to something to protect him so that he might protect others. He wasn’t sure if he was praying to the god of his Jewish upbringing, calling on some spirit for aid, or just asking the magic itself to arrange itself to an effect. Riordan wasn’t even sure that those three options were truly distinct from each other.

As soon as the words ended, Riordan tore the paper from the pad, wrapped it around the lavender, and then tossed the small bundle in his mouth. It tasted horrible and Riordan couldn’t help the grimace on his face as he swallowed it down. The taste of paper and ink tinged with a bitter plant note lingered, but the burning tingle spreading through his body and blood distracted Riordan from that taste quickly. He pitched forward to brace against the back of the passenger seat, gagging, as the spell raced through him.