Order of the Air Omnibus: Books 1-3 by Melissa Scott Read Free Book Online Page B

almost imperceptibly against him, but her hand was gentle on his shoulder, kneading the stiff muscle. “Like what?”
    “I dreamed about you before I met you. Well, not about you, exactly. About the plane and about the airshow. I knew that if I went something good would happen.” Lewis rubbed the heels of his hands against his eyes. “I do it a lot.”
    Alma took a deep breath, controlled, like she was taking off. “And this was a dream about something bad? Happening to you?”
    “I don’t know,” he said, and told her the dream, his heart slowing to normal as they talked, the quiet dark of the hotel room safe and anonymous around them. “I don’t know who that man was,” he said. “I’ve never seen him before in my life. But I will see him, I know that. And he’ll try to kill someone.” He looked at her sideways, her face pale in the reflected light from the street. “It’s ok if you don’t believe me, Al.”
    “I believe you,” Alma said slowly. “I believe you completely.”
    “You don’t think I’m crazy?”
    “I think you have an untrained clairvoyant gift.” Alma squared her shoulders as Lewis blinked. “That’s unusual, but not unheard of. I’ve known a number of clairvoyants. They’re more uncommon than more typical energy projection mixes, and for some reason it’s less common in men than in women, but some of the best known clairvoyants in history have been men. I wouldn’t say you’re unique.”
    “What?” Lewis sat up straight, the sheet pooling around his lap. She looked so awkward, sitting there in her thin teddy, biting down on her lower lip. He couldn’t snap at her. Lewis took a deep breath. “Are you some kind of Spiritualist?”
    “I tried to tell you,” Alma said. “I was trying to. But it’s complicated. At first I didn’t know you well enough and then….”
    “Then you were afraid I wouldn’t understand?”
    Alma nodded.
    Lewis reached for her hands, folded her strong fingers in his. He’d wanted answers, and he couldn’t complain now that he was getting them. “Ok. How about you start from the beginning?’
    “When I met Gil he was already a member of a lodge, the Aedificatorii Templi. It wasn’t an old lodge, but it had a pedigree.” Alma looked at him as though wondering if she should continue. “Technically it’s an offshoot of the Golden Dawn, founded by people who left the Golden Dawn when there was a horrible schism about twenty five years ago.”
    “We’re talking about a bunch of magicians here,” Lewis said slowly. “About black magic.”
    “No!” Alma looked indignant. “I should hope you know me well enough to know that I’d never be involved in something like that, never! Magic isn’t black or white, Lewis. Not any more than a machine gun is, or an airplane. It’s a tool that serves its user, just like any other. And what it does, whether that’s good or bad, depends on what someone is using it for.”
    Lewis nodded slowly. “My grandmother could find lost things,” he said. “It was a thing she did for people. She said it was a gift from God.”
    “Exactly like that,” Alma said. “There are some people who have these gifts, and it’s their responsibility to use them for the good of the world, for the good of humanity. To serve God in whatever form one prefers by serving His creation.”
    “In whatever form one prefers?”
    Alma bit her lip again. “The world is a really big and complicated place, Lewis. Lots of different peoples have tried to find the divine, and have made names for it based on what worked for them in their culture and time. You’re Catholic, but do you, personally, really believe that all Presbyterians are going to hell?”
    Lewis took a deep breath but didn’t look away. “No,” he said quietly. “I’ve known some good people who weren’t Catholic. Some really good people. I don’t believe they’re going to hell.”
    “My dad used to say that you should judge people by their actions, not by