Seth awoke, stiff, aching, mouth parched, and stomach howling in rageful hunger. He was in the back room of what appeared to be a clothing store, on his side, with a man he was slowly realizing was an EMT crouched over him. Jessica and Mariah stood behind him and Seth could see the faintest shimmer of grass-green transmutation magic around Jessica’s hands.

Seth groaned, trying to sit up.

“Easy there, buddy.”

“Here,” said Jessica, moving forward at a speed that almost knocked the EMT over. She produced a bottle of blue Gatorade, but Seth could see a faint aura about it. “The electrolytes his doctor prescribed.”

The EMT stared, scratching his head as Seth took the bottle and drank it. It went down his throat like ice, but as the liquid met his ravenous stomach, the hunger began to seep back to a manageable, non-nausea-inducing level. “That’s… just Gatorade, miss.”

“We add special packets to it. He’ll be fine now, he just forgot to drink it this morning.”

“Uh-huh.” The EMT slowly stood up as Jessica watched Seth drink the whole bottle. The relief felt amazing. “I know what you said, but I really think maybe you should get him to a doctor to be checked out. Just my professional opinion. And he definitely shouldn’t be on the slopes today.”

“Yeah, thank you,” said Jessica, the perfect combination of sweet and curt in her voice. “We’ve got it from here.”

Seth saw the man’s expression flatline from concern to some sort of mask the EMT probably used to deal with less-than-cooperative patients. “Right.” He turned and walked to the door at the front of the storeroom and left. Mariah still stood there, arms folded across her chest.

“You know,” said Jessica, turning to face Mariah but remaining crouched in front of Seth. “I didn’t invite you to stay.”

“Oh, I know,” said Mariah. “But I care about people, and if someone who I’m becoming friends with has a seizure I’m going to make sure they’re okay.”

“He’s fine,” said Jessica.

“Jess,” I said, my throat still a bit dry. “It’s alright. She’s not hurting anyone.”

“Mhm.” Jessica narrowed her eyes. “But there’s things we need to talk about.” She smiled. “Could you please give us a minute?”

“Right, no.” Said Mariah. “Sorry, this whole pretense thing-“ her voice shifted to a rolling brogue. “Is just a gas, isn’t? What Order are you?”

Jessica sunk her forehead into her palm. “Power-gravity, I swear…” She stood upright. Seth did as well, a bit more slowly, reaching out to one of the shelving units to help him uncoil his stiffened legs. “Saint Grigori’s. Maybe a bit assumptive, but Saint Brigid?”

“Bang on.”

Jessica rolled her eyes. “Well, good. Honestly. Your ring’s probably buzzing all over the place here isn’t it?”

“Oh, aye. Been jumping about right proper some thirty miles out from this town. And near him as of today? Damn. Wasn’t sure what it was until I saw you deepthroat a bag of beef jerky, but only a few things would do that.”

Jessica nodded. “Two and two is easy enough to put together, but you see the other equation?”

“Oh, the nightcrawler? Yeah, I’ve seen it just fine.”

“So it is-“

“Unfortunately.”

“Dammit.”

“Leashed, too.”

“Fuck,” growled Jessica.

“Hey, hey, now.” Mariah extended her hands. “No need to get the more jumpy orders involved. I’m here on Orders orders. The idea is to fix this before Sacer, or you lot, or even worse, the Paladins get involved.”

“God,” said Jessica. “Terra’s the worst.”

“Oh, I know.” Mariah looked at Seth, noting the confusion on his face. “Knights Ignis-Sacer, American Order. From the Knights Templar. Paladins of Terra, they’re the zealots that branched off. They’d be keying up a solar smite and a memory wipe if they knew there were bloody nightshades here.”

Seth’s eyebrows shot up. “Seriously?”

“Oh, yeah, and you’d be dead on the spot with that nasty bloodcurse you’ve got. Strong kid if you’re not turning yet. How long as it been?”

“About twelve hours,” said Jessica.

“Bloody hell, are you a bloodline?”

Jessica laughed. “We don’t know what he is, but he’s not human. It’s kind of an Order secret, and I’m kind of guarding it even though I don’t know it myself, so unless you want my Order to get uppity… I’d leave it.”

Mariah shrugged. “Seems about right for OMF.”

Jessica now folded her arms across her chest. “Oh, and Saint Brigid doesn’t keep secrets?”

“You know how Russians are, I’m assuming you are one.”

“Guys,” interjected Seth. “Maybe we chill? Mariah, you’re a mage?”

She nodded. “Order of Saint Brigid. Out of Ireland if you can’t tell by the accent. Just supposed to blend in when on mission and, uh,” she looked Seth up and down. “I am definitely on mission right now.” She looked back to Jessica, sticking her hands in the pockets of her snow pants. “So. You two want to see what I’ve got, or should we just chill in the back of this overpriced gear store?”

Jessica shrugged, keeping her arms crossed. “Set up in the hotel?”

“I am, though not penthouse like you guys.”

“You checked?”

“You have a Grigori cross. I spotted it when Seth here put his shoulder through my sternum because he was preoccupied with a muffin.”

Jessica inhaled slightly. “Alright, that one’s fair.”

“Yeah, after how hostile you lot were are the Summit?”

“I…” Jessica laughed, and Seth could see worry in her demeanor. “I’ve been here.”

“Oh, you’re active. He must be very, very important then.” Mariah drew the second very out quite a bit.

Seth moved so he stood between them, but off to the side. “How about we just go to your hotel room?”

She looked Seth square in the eyes. “Three’s company, isn’t it?” She made a series of somatic gestures in the air. “Wards down, please.”

Jessica let out a long sigh. The world blurred for half a moment, followed by the sound of rushing air as they translocated. The feeling wasn’t quite disorienting, more like having the ground jolt under your feet. It felt something like a small earthquake. What really weirded Seth out was the sudden change in smells, temperature, even the humidity levels in the air as they now stood in a less-than-penthouse-lavish, but still grand suite.

Two king sized beds filled the room, one with the sheets messed up, the other still made and covered with dozens of magical reagents: crystals, bones, goblets of varying sizes, unlit candles. Amidst all of that lay more than a handful of thick tomes, some open, some closed and stacked on top of each other. The shades were drawn on the windows, but the lights were on, illuminating a large whiteboard that had been wheeled into the room and placed in front of the shaded windows.

A remarkably lifelike map of Telluride had been drawn on the whiteboard in what Seth first assumed to be dry-erase, but soon realized was far too realistic to be drawn by non-magical means. Mariah crossed over to the white board and waved her hand over it. The drawing shifted west, moving over the mountains and then zooming in on what Seth surmised to be the dying glade of pine trees they had encountered the necromancer and the wendigo in.

“Bastard’s here,” said Mariah. “And violating so many of the Grimm Laws.”

“So what we saw was right? He is pulling more than he’s supposed to from the environment.”

Mariah raised her eyebrows. “Oh, you went here. Makes sense. Wendigo sticks mainly to this area, he’s leashed, but gets his collar off now and again and our friend has to make a collection run. If you glanced at any of the newsboards down in town or looked at local social media traffic, you’d see that there’s a fair number of disappearances. Cops are actually all over the locals, but they haven’t started casing the resorts just yet. Mainly financial reasons for that.”

“So the cops are bribed by the resorts?” Asked Seth.

“Uh, yeah. Pretty much. If they start showing up here, guests are more likely to learn of the disappearances, and the resorts trying to keep that hush-hush, especially since it’s a peak season.”

Jessica crossed over to the bed littered with magical items. “Quite the collection.” She picked up an obsidian goblet and lifted it into the air to inspect it. “Mixing potions or making offerings?”

“Both.” Said Mariah, her expression drawing closer to hostile as Jessica inspected the items. “Though you probably should have done those as well before running headlong into that.” She jabbed her finger onto the map.

“Well, you knew I was OMF, but you didn’t warn me? You know, since you spotted my cross.”

“Suspected. I didn’t-“

“Guys, what the hell?” Said Seth, raising his voice. “Are you two from rival Orders or something?”

“Well, no,” said Mariah. “We-“ This time she shot an outright glare at Jessica. “Just don’t agree on a lot of things.”

“Yeah, like what right Orders have to interfere in each others’ business?”

Seth let out an exasperated sigh. “God. You two. Explain. Now.”

They both glared at each other.

“Jessica! Spill,” growled Seth, feeling some of his anger beginning to bubble up from within him.

Jessica looked away from Mariah to Seth. “The Order of Saint Brigid is dedicated to the eradication of undeath and those who practice necromancy.”

“Okay, so? Don’t you dislike necromancy?”

Jessica looked down for a moment. “Um. Not exactly.”

“Jess…”

She looked up and put her hands on her hips. “It’s the specialty of my Order, alright? I don’t like it because I’ve missed a bunch of formal training on it because, well, because I’ve been watching you.”

“Oh,” said Seth, glancing at Mariah, who watched the interaction with a raised eyebrow. “That makes a lot of sense, then.”

“Yeah. It’s a little bit embarrassing. I study it in my own time, but I haven’t been to Moscow since I was a kid. Field agents sometimes get tutors… I never did. And because necromancy is a field so fraught with legalities… Practice without a tutor is ill-advised.” Jessica’s face twisted a moment.

Seth saw a flash of genuine sadness from his friend at her missing out on what seemed to be very important to her. “I’m sorry.”

Jessica looked away from them both. “Don’t- Don’t be. I’m a Class Seven, my way is basically paved once I’m done with this assignment.” She looked over to Mariah. “Don’t stare.”

Mariah held up both hands. “Hey, that sucks. I can’t imagine if I missed out on, I don’t know, exorcism training. I’d be devastated if I was my age in my Order and didn’t know.”

Jessica shrugged. “Well, life of a field agent. I’m sure every other Order knows how we embed.”

“Wouldn’t have to if the unification would just happen…“

“Yeah, but then all Orders have to follow the same rules.”

Seth’s confusion kept wanting to be overtaken with impulsive, unreasonable anger. He forced it down. “Hey. Guys.” He said in a measured tone. “Could you please explain things as you talk, maybe? What’s the unification?”

Jessica sighed and made a gesture towards Mariah. “She can explain it better, she’s clearly been to Summits.”

Mariah looked up to the ceiling for a moment, thought, then spoke. “It’s the idea of all the Orders unifying into one Order. No more OMF, Knights Ignis-Sacer, Crowleyan Circle… Just the Order of Magi.”

“It’s not just that,” butted in Jessica. “I may not be up to date, but I know that some Orders want to overthrow the current governments and unite the world under magical rule.”

“Those are extremists.”

“Those extremists hold council seats in several Orders.”

“Only the Paladins, really. And none of them sit on the Consular Arcana.”

“And the Setites. And I know there’s one in the Rosicrucian Temple.”

“Crowley’s people hardly count-“

“Guys!” Seth ran his hands through his hair. “I need a history book, or something. Can we just stop arguing and maybe work together to figure out a way to get rid of the necromancer, the wendigo, the nightcrawler, and my damn bloodcurse?”

Both of the girls looked halfway between embarrassed and annoyed. Jessica crossed over to Mariah and held out her hand. “Truce. We can be rival Order members again after we keep higher from nuking this town?”

Mariah took her hand with very little hesitation. “Good enough for me.”

“Damn, quite the little adventuring party we got going here.” Seth’s eyes bulged and he slowly turned his head to the right. The bathroom of the suite had its lights off, and standing there in the darkness, was his subconscious. Grinning teeth glinted in the shadows. “Hello, Seth.”