“Hello?”

Marie heard the American woman from the store's back room, crowded by new stock and her back stock of standard merchandise. Only an American would be so gauche as to yell upon entering Marie’s Curiousities instead of looking around first. Marie flexed her aged- fingers feeling the pops as well as hearing them. She closed the box she'd been investigating that had nothing to do with the store.

The woman’s voice rang out again, “Hello?”

Marie zipped her pale pink, lounge suit, using her “Retired American Working Because She’s Desperate” look. She stepped into the sales floor, appearing right behind the counter with her cash register, “Oui?”

In stilted French, the dower brunette tried to say, “Good Morning, I hope you’re well. I’m sorry to ask but where is your occult books?” It came out sounding like a toddler on its best manners but asking for “magic pies with regrettable lines” or some such non-sense.

Marie eyed the display on the round table in the center of the room. It was covered with figurines representing a variety of dieties with corresponding candle colors. The books beneath the table were those featured in many book store's new age sections. “Were you looking for books with magic?” Marie asked, she gentled her smile and bent forward submissively. It was a gentle tilt, but the woman responded.

“Thank you so much for speaking English. My app lessons aren’t as helpful as I thought.” The woman stretched out her tanned, unweathered hand, “Hello, I’m Sylvia Stein. And yes, sorta,” Sylvia’s nervous tic had her pushing strands of hair out of her face as if she needed to see more clearly, though her hair appeared to be perfectly coiffed and obedient.

Marie mimicked the movement, that patted her elegantly styled curls atop her head. “I’m sorry?”

“Real magic,” Sylvia said out of the side of her mouth, her small, dark eyes widened to look around them. “You know, the stuff about ley lines, rituals, and local hot spots.”

Marie chuckled as if delighted with the opportunity to share her secrets with a fellow practitioner. It earned her yet more confidence of the American. Inside, Marie's heart clammered with excitement; she restrained the dangerous impulse to jump up and down. “Oh, I have just the thing.” She motioned to an innocuous display in the center of the wall to the north. When Sylvia stepped to lead the way to the wall, Marie walked in line behind the young woman. Marie’s Sight, the gift from gods to see other dimensions over the static world inwhich everyone lived, allowed her to see the hole in Sylvia’s heart chakra.

The Sight also allowed her to track the energy she expelled drew out the sigil sealed spell over Sylvia's heart and watch as the related energy filled the void. When Marie joined Sylvia’s side at the bookshelf displaying a mixed the modern day world’s best theories in mysticism, the bond between them was fully established. Marie would be able to tap that connection if ever she needed to do so.

Sylvia said, "Oh Good. I'm hear on vacation with my best friend and she really knows a lot about this stuff."