I opened my eyes, standing on a random Chicago sidewalk, immaterial and unseen. I turned my right hand palm up and focused upon that sudden kindling of light and hope, crystallized by the memory of that moment of triumph and joy.

“Flickum bicus,” I whispered.

The fire was every bit as beautiful as I remembered.

Chapter Twenty-one

It took me a couple of hours to work out how to make my trusty tracking spell function. I easily found several memories that I could use to power the spell; it was figuring out how to create the link to Molly that was hard. Usually, I would use one of the trusty traditional methods for directing thaumaturgy—a lock of hair, a fresh drop of blood, fingernail clippings, et cetera. That wasn’t going to work, obviously. I couldn’t touch them, even if I had them.

So instead of tracking Molly with physical links, I tried using memories of her in their place. It worked—sort of. The first tracking spell led me to the hotel that had once hosted a horror convention known as SplatterCon! It was closed now, and deserted. I guess maybe all the deaths at SplatterCon! had taken a toll on the hotel in the civil-court cases that followed the phobophage attacks. I took a quick spin through the place, hardly even flinching before I stomped through one wall after another. Except for a few transients who had broken into the building and were squatting there, I found nothing.

I went back over my work. The memory I’d used was one that had stuck in my head for some reason, of Molly here in this building. That must have thrown off the spell. It had homed in on this place because it had been part of the memory I used to create the link.

I tried again, this time omitting the background and picturing only Molly against an empty field of black. This second attempt took me to a police station from which I had once posted bail for Molly’s boyfriend. I figured I’d bungled the spell somehow, but took a quick look around anyway, just in case. No Molly.

“Okay, smart guy,” I said to myself. “So what if the memory-image you’re using is too old? You’re tracking her memory-self to a memorylocation. Which means you have to think of her as she is now to find where she is now. Right?

“Theoretically,” I said to myself.

“Right. So test the theory.”

Well, obviously. Although discussing a problem with yourself is almost never a good way to secure a divergent viewpoint.

“In fact, talking to yourself is often considered a sign of impending insanity,” I noted aloud.

Which hardly seemed encouraging.

I shook off the unsettling thought and worked the tracking spell again. This time, instead of using one of my earlier memories of Molly, I used my most recent one. I pictured her in her cast-off clothing and rags, as she’d been at Murphy’s place.

Forming a memory into an image that would support the energy required for a spell isn’t as simple as closing your eyes and daydreaming. You have to produce it in exact, even fanatical, detail, until it is as real in your mind as any actual object. It takes a lot of practice and energy to do that—and it is why people use props when they set out to do magic. A prop can be used as an anchor, saving the spellcaster the effort of creating not just one, but multiple, mental constructs, and supporting them all in a state of perfect focus and concentration.