One day toward the end of her training, Marci had been sitting in the cafeteria, off in a corner, and William, her favorite instructor, had walked up and sat down across from her.
“So,” he’d said. “Want to tell me about it?”
“What?”
“Jolene told me there’s been something on your mind for the last week and she couldn’t get you to talk about it. Maybe you’d be more comfortable talking to me? I feel like we have a certain rapport.”
“Yes,” she heard herself saying. “We do. All right.”
William smiled and sat down across from her. He had one of those smiles that made you think everything was going to be fine, no matter what. “Spill it, then,” he said.
She opened her mouth and closed it again. Words were harder than numbers, because they could mean so many different things, and even more when arranged differently. It wasn’t that she didn’t know the answer; it was that she wasn’t sure if there was a way to say it that wouldn’t be offensive. But one of the things that made William a good teacher was his patience.
“Here’s the thing that bothers me,” she said finally, speaking slowly and choosing her words as best she could. “We’re doing all of this research, right? Into curing diseases, and ways to improve infrastructure using magic, and all of that.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Well, it bothers me that we’re keeping it secret. That maybe we can cure myelogenous leukemia. How can we just keep that to ourselves?”
“Oh. Yeah. I know.”
“It bothers you, too?”
“Yeah. Only, what’s the alternative? We’d have to reveal what we can do. Then what happens?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yeah, neither does anyone else.”
“They aren’t burning witches anymore.”
“I know.”
“In all this time, someone must have, you know, revealed things. Or tried.”
“Yeah.”
“What happened?”
He said, “That’s something that’s supposed to come up a little later in your training, but what the hell. There’s a division of the Foundation called Investigations and Enforcement. We call it the Ranch because they’re a bunch of cowboys. They handle that sort of thing.”
“Handle it.”
“Yeah.”
“How?”
“A sorcerer’s ability to detect and tap into the grid can be removed.”
“Oh,” said Marci.
“You won’t need to learn that unless you want to work for I and E.”
After a moment, she said, “Do you think doing that is right?”
He shook his head. “I wish I knew.”
* * *
“Hey, Laughing Boy,” said Susan. “How are the eyes?”
“Getting better. You, in particular, are a delightful fuzzy blur and I can tell you have black hair, which I couldn’t have yesterday. And that must be Marci behind you.”
“It’s me,” she said.
“How are you, Marci? Doing all right?”
“My vision’s healing faster than yours, but I have some burns on my face and neck that are going to take a few weeks and that I’ll have fun explaining to my boyfriend.”
“Yeah. Sorry. Where are you staying?”
“They put us up in a hotel,” said Susan. “Saved the expense of a slipwalk, since they knew we were going to be here anyway. When are they letting you out?”
“When I can see again. Probably day after tomorrow. Shame about Vasilyev. He seemed like a decent guy.”
“Yeah.”
“You doing okay, Hippie? I mean, with what happened?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Let’s just not make a habit of it, okay?”
“I’m good with that.”
“All right. So. Theories? Hippie?”
“About what, Don? What happened? Pretty easy, isn’t it?”
“Oh? Lay it out for me then.”
“Whoever is behind this knows eventually we’re going to be on to him, figures we’ll pull in Vasilyev—”
“Stop a minute. How does he know about Vasilyev? How does he even know Vasilyev exists, much less what he can do, and that we’d call him in?”
After about ten seconds, Susan said, “They have someone on the inside.”
“That’s how I read it.”
“Damn,” said Marci.
“What do we do now?” said Susan.
“Now, Marci and I recover, and we hope no more bodies drop until we’re ready.”
* * *
This time the pilot wasn’t talkative—or else was nervous about having done Matt the favor. They made the trip mostly in silence after the initial, “Hey,” and, “How’s it going?” At the end, Matt said, “Thanks for the lift,” and that was that, and he stepped out onto the field at the Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base Fort Worth. From there, it was a quick jump to Arlington, and a meeting with Sheila McKenzie. The meeting took place in her basement, surrounded by the various pieces of computer equipment she was putting in, taking out, repairing, or testing.
She got a little nervous when she realized he wanted information and wasn’t a potential customer. He put on his best reassuring voice and, when she wasn’t interested in drinks, offered her $200. She was reluctant to talk about the Foundation, but he managed to convince her that he knew so much already, there wasn’t any harm in it. They settled on $250, and when Matt left he took with him a great deal of advice on virus prevention you could use even if you weren’t a sorcerer, and an address in Madrid.
* * *
“I was relieved to hear from you,” I told Charlie. “I was afraid we’d be done.”
We were in a closed office building in Glendale and I hadn’t heard from him in three days. We sat in adjacent stalls in the men’s room, and it was only later that I realized how ridiculous it was.
“I am hoping I’ve bought us some time,” he said.
“So we can continue?”
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes as, well, emotions hit me. Then I said, “Good.”
“I’ll leave a bag in this stall, with your hotel info, plane tickets, and the artifact. Still going to New Orleans. I’ve got all the details written down.”
“This one’s big. I mean, for me. This is the key.”
“For me, too.”
“Once this is done, Whittier is open. Defenseless.”
“Yes. And we’ll have to move fast, before he realizes it.”
“That suits me. Sooner the better.”
“I know.”
“All right. What is the artifact this time?”
“Nasty, Nick. It is very nasty.”
“Good,” I said.
* * *
The first thing Donovan did when he got home was make a Skype call. “Hey, Hippie. Did I interrupt anything?”
“Nope. Did we catch another body?”
“No, just need someone to talk to. About the case, I mean—sorry, not having a personal crisis or anything.”
“I know,” said Susan. “To have a personal crisis, you need a personal life.”
“Yeah.”
“I wonder how Marci does it.”
“Hate to be cynical, but the over/under on that relationship is six months.”
“Yeah. So, anyway, what’s up?”
“I’ve got this thing buzzing around in my head, and it won’t settle down. It’s one of those nagging, something-is-bugging-me-I-don’t-know-what deals.”
“I know the feeling. Let’s hear it.”
Donovan sat back in his chair. Hippie Chick was resting her elbows on her computer desk, hands steepled, listening. “All right,” said Donovan. “We’ve figured there are two people, right?”
“Right.”
“One civilian, and one guy supplying artifacts. Call him the supplier.”
Skype revealed a smile from her. “If you liked him you’d be more creative.”
“True. So, here’s the thing. Why isn’t the supplier using the things, too? Isn’t bringing in another person adding to his risk?”
“Only if he’s found. He’s trying to insulate himself. You know what he’s risking if he gets caught.”
“What if he isn’t?”
“Hmmm?”
“What if he’s already been de-sorcelled?”
“That’s not a word.”
“Yeah, whatever it is. What if?”
Susan was silent; Skype showed him furrowed brows and a serious look. Finally, she said, “Maybe. That would explain some things. But wait. No.”
“Hmmm?”
“If he can’t use the artifacts, how can he tell what they are?”
Donovan nodded. “That’s it. That’s the piece that’s bugging me. Good work.”
“Answers?”
“Well, the mostly likely is that I’m just wrong about the supplier. If I’m not…”
Susan said, “What? If you’re not, what?”
“Oh, sorry. If I’m not, it means there’s another player. He’s working with someone on the inside.”
“Our spy.”
“Yeah.”
“Our spy might be pulling all the strings.”
“Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking.”
“Shit.”
* * *
I arrived at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International on Frontier Flight 702. It was around four in the afternoon when I arrived at the Ritz-Carlton, right on Canal Street in the French Quarter business district. I wished it weren’t in the Quarter itself—if there’s anywhere in the world that screams “distractions!” more than that little bit of New Orleans, I don’t know it. But it was where I needed to be.
I kept myself in the hotel; I didn’t even go out for beignets, which is a major sacrifice once you’ve had them. But it was a question of focus. I didn’t know what had gone wrong, or what Charlie had done to fix it, but it seemed like this would be a really bad time to get sloppy.
I was so close.
Just one more between me and Whittier.
The massive knot of betrayal I felt was all tied in with the rest of it—the sound of the door shutting behind Joan, the pile of unopened bills on the desk, each one an accusing finger, watching them tow my car away while I imagined all the neighbors shaking their heads, the gradual realization that none of my friends had called in weeks—all of it tied into one lump of hate, with one name behind it. Who would I be when that was gone? Could I go back, start over?
Stop it, Nick. Get your head back in the game.
This would be, according to Charlie, the trickiest of them all, because I had to use two different artifacts: one, as usual, a polished stone, but the other, to be used first, took the form of a pair of cheap sunglasses. I would have to put them on, look at the target, touch the left side, and say, What time is it? Then I could use the other in a more usual fashion.
It didn’t seem like it would be all that hard, but it was still two things instead of one, and that made me a little nervous.
I napped a little. I was surprised, when I woke up, that I’d managed to fall asleep. I went down and got more coffee, had a bite to eat. It was hard, doing nothing, especially with the Quarter right there, out the door and around a corner. But I was there to do a job, so I just waited.
Finally, around 9:00 PM, I had a light supper and went to the lobby to begin my vigil. I spotted the security camera and made sure I found a place to sit that was beyond its scope, and identified a path out so it wouldn’t pick me up when I left after the excitement started. I picked up a magazine and pretended to be reading it as I sat there. What I was actually doing was going over the routine in my head. This one was easier than some, because there were no words to say; I just had to rub the stone briskly with both hands while focusing all of my attention where I wanted it to happen. The stone was a deep blue with hints of red, and unlike the others, it had been carved so facets were showing. As I sat there, I wondered about the person who, so long ago, had shaped it, polished it, and then loaded it with a spell like a bomb, carefully recording—for himself, or another?—how to set it off. Would he approve of how I was using it? Did he hate evil as much as I did, and would he be pleased that his craft was being put to good use? I wanted to think so.
Just after 3:00 AM, Alexander Young, dressed in a Hawaian shirt, shorts, and white loafers, came into the lobby, obviously drunk, which excited no notice on anyone’s part.
Not that I had intended to show him mercy anyway, but the white loafers made it easy.
* * *
“It seems, Mr. Longfellow, that our friend has struck again.”
“All right, Mr. Becker. What are the details?”
“The victim is Alexander Young, a New York native, on an extended vacation in New Orleans. The exact method is as yet unknown but resulted in Mr. Young burning alive. The time was this morning in the very early hours.”
“But, I assume, a connection to the Mystici is known?”
“More than a connection, this time. He was one of their sorcerers, doing much the same thing as your Ms. Sullivan, although they aren’t organized the way we are.”
“He was good, though?”
“Very. He specialized in defensive and protection spells, against both sorcerous and mundane attacks. Whether that is significant, of course, we do not yet know.”
“And yet, they managed to kill him.”
“Indeed they did, Mr. Longfellow, unless you want to put an impossible amount of weight on coincidence.”
“All right. What else can you tell me about him?”
“Pure mercenary, Mr. Longfellow. He had accumulated immense amounts of wealth, although we don’t know how. He lived in New York, but traveled at least half the year. He owned two yachts, though he rarely used them—”
“You know a great deal about this one, Mr. Becker.”
“Yes.”
“Then perhaps you know this: Is there a connection between him and Mr. Lundgren?”
“In fact, there is, Mr. Longfellow. I was about to mention it. They’re friends. They grew up together in Chicago.”
“I see.”
“And in looking into this, we discovered something else. Mr. Lundgren owns, in secret, considerable interests—especially real estate, in California.”
“Let me guess: San Diego area.”
“Exactly.”
“You’ll email me the exact address and so on?”
“I already have, Mr. Longfellow.”
“Very well, Mr. Becker. I’ll get back to you as soon as I have something to report.”
He checked his email, then made the calls, reaching everyone with no trouble. He was pulling things out of the closet when his cell rang.
“Jeffrey, my hero. What’s the word?”
“Lots of words, Captain, starting with ‘thanks.’”
“You got paid?”
“Yeah, and the check didn’t even bounce.”
“They sent you a check?”
“No, direct deposit. I sort of meant virtually didn’t bounce.”
“Yeah. Anyway, glad to hear it.”
“You’ll like the next bit even more.”
“Okay, I’m listening.”
“All those names you sent me connect. All of them. Like a chain. Lawton-Smythe to Blum, then Blum to Wright, then Wright to Lundgren.”
“What’s the timing of the calls?”
“Starting with the one a few months ago, all of them within forty-eight hours.”
“No shit?”
“No shit.”
“So it’s like moving up a ladder or something.”
“Exactly.”
“That is going to help, man. I don’t know how yet, but that’s huge. Send me a bill, and look up one more name.”
“I will, and what?”
“Alexander Young, two-one-two area code.”
“Okay, on it.”
“Jeff, you are the best that ever was.”
“Fuckin’ A right, man.”
Donovan disconnected, checked his pockets, locked his apartment, and headed down to the laundry room. Andrea from 204 was there doing laundry, so he had to wait and make pleasant conversation with her for twenty minutes before she wandered off and he could safely use the slipwalk.
* * *
Marci stood up from her computer and shut it.
“Uh-oh,” said Lawrence. “I know that sound.”
“What?”
“When you shut the computer that way, you’re going to do something mysterious.”
She smiled. “You know me too well. You might become a security risk.” She wrinkled her nose at him.
“I’m not sure,” he said, “that that’s funny.”
She walked over to stand between him and the basketball game on TV. She leaned over and touched his forehead with hers. “Now you look like a cyclops,” she said. “I would never let any harm come to a cyclops.”
“You’re going to protect me? Jesus. What about my fragile male ego?”
“You’re on your own with that.” She kissed him and grabbed her coat.
“Going to wear something green?”
“What?”
“Saint Patrick’s Day.”
“Oh, didn’t even think of it. Uh, my coat is kinda greenish, isn’t it?”
“Mmmm. I’d call it olive. Hey, Marci?”
“Yes?”
“When you got hurt, you scared the shit out of me.”
“I know.”
“This thing you do. It’s really important?”
“Yes, my love.”
“And is it … no, never mind. Just, be careful, all right?”
“I will.”
She closed the door behind her and wiped her eyes. She went around to the back of the house and let herself into the shed. She took the hand rake and dug into a spot on the dirt floor, pulled back, exposing the trapdoor. She replaced the tool, then went down the door, closing it after her and turning on the light.
She said, “Exterior Seven-three-nine Canal Street, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA,” and walked down the stairs.
* * *
Donovan’s shoulders were tense. He looked around, and, yeah, so were Marci’s. Hippie Chick was fine, but she was a freak. There were a few people in the lobby: a couple having a quiet conversation, a businessman working on a laptop, a little girl who seemed to be waiting for someone, two people in different corners talking on their phones. Nothing indicated that someone had died there earlier that day.
“You’re a freak,” he told Susan.
She didn’t turn around. “Hmmm?”
“Never mind. So, why no crime scene tape?”
“Ruled an accident,” said Susan. “This is New Orleans; they want it to go away as fast as possible. Remember Vegas? Look. See where it happened? You can see the scorch marks. But—nothing.”
Donovan nodded. She was right, of course. “He ran outside, it seems. There isn’t even any smoke damage.”
They were getting a few curious looks from people in the lobby, but nothing untoward.
He walked up next to Marci and spoke softly. “Is it possible for you to do your thing less obviously?”
“Um,” she said. Then, “Yes, I think so.”
“Just, you know, people.”
“Right.”
She strolled into the middle of the lobby, Susan walking with her as if they were having a conversation. It wasn’t a completely convincing performance: Marci’s face went slack, and her eyelids drooped. But it was good enough that no one called security.
After a couple of minutes, they strolled back together.
“Okay,” she said. “I think I have some of—” Her face changed. “Out,” she said. “Move.”
She led them, or pulled them, or pushed them not out the door, but farther into the hotel, past the front desk.
Behind them, the lobby exploded.
A second, a minute, a lifetime. Not enough time to do anything, but too much to do nothing. What now? How long has it been? Seconds? Minutes? Heat of the lobby behind him; were those sirens? Call Becker … no, no time. Has to happen now. Pull it together, boy. You said you could lead this team, and they trust you. Pull it together. It isn’t about the yelling, or the alarms, or the thick, choking smoke behind you, or people streaming out with the is this real? look even though they can see it is. It isn’t about any of that; it’s about making the right move and nothing else. Pull it together now.
Now.
“Marci. Generate some bomb fragments.”
“Out of what?”
“Out of thin fucking air. I don’t care. Where’s the nearest grid? Find it; use it.”
Marci said, “Someone just tried to kill us.”
“Yeah. I know. I need bomb fragments. Convincing ones. Then you’re going to go invisible, and you’re going to put them somewhere that—”
“Jesus, Don. You really think we can fool an arson investigator?”
Susan was looking at him: calm, confident. He took a breath. “I think,” he told Marci, “that an arson investigator is unlikely to believe in magic if given any alternative at all. Marci, don’t argue. This needs to happen now.”
She stared at him, then nodded. “I got it covered,” she said.
“I know you do.”
* * *
“I know you do,” said Donovan, and turned away and got out his cell phone. He was, no doubt, calling Upstairs, and saying, Don’t worry about it; I have my people on this. We can handle it, no problem.
Well then, Marci figured, she’d better handle it.
Invisibility was the first step, and the trouble was, casting invisibility didn’t come naturally to Marci. Bending light was a pain. Drawing from the grid was easy, but maneuvering the light around her felt like trying to scoop up water in a hand with splayed fingers. She knew others who insisted it was one of the easiest spells, but for her it was slow and laborious—and knowing that she had to hurry didn’t make it easier.
There was a line right outside the door, and, thank God, a point less than a hundred feet away. She touched it, caressed it, held it.
In the end, she got about halfway there with the invisibility and decided that was good enough—there was plenty of smoke in the air, and that would do half the job, wouldn’t it? And creating a filter for the smoke and holding it in place while creating the fake evidence was going to be a tough juggling act even without the light bending.
Air had a tangibility light did not; that part wasn’t hard.
She moved into the area, and discovered there was still fire, or, at any rate, heat; she drew on the grid and pulled some of the smoke around her and made it into insulation—and was hit with a wave of dizziness. She stopped for a moment, let her connection to the grid stabilize. She’d be generating a lot of heat by now, but at least that wouldn’t be noticed in all of this.
Where?
Jesus. What did she know about arson investigation? What would they look for? Well, wires and scraps of metal, maybe. Where to put them? She couldn’t see well, and the smoke and the light bending she was doing didn’t help. But, okay, somewhere around—there. Maybe it wasn’t the actual center of the explosion, but it had sure been hit hard.
There was no shortage of carbon all around her, and there was—ah, yes! A hole in the floor had exposed rebar. They’d have to tear the floor up anyway, right? So pull some rebar from a place that wasn’t exposed; no one would notice. And she didn’t need much. Just touch it, feel roughness—hot—and go deep. Deeper—
Flinging whirling speeding, match the motion, match the speed, hello my friends, talk to me come to me whirl differently now just a little and little more molding like wet clay with a form implied by shape, how the lines swirl around you, my friends, and turn turn turn to every atom there is a weight and a form to every molecule under Heaven I cast my loop here and no you haven’t changed, not really, heat from my skin a growing hunger but such a little change to steel, and there’s copper wire in that wall that they’ll have to tear down anyway, shards of metal bits of wire cast around and let go let go before you burn up, the very grid point hot don’t need it anymore, walk, you can walk, don’t make Susan come in and get you, dammit, just walk—
She stumbled out of the smoke, coughing, into the arms of a bug-eyed monster who turned out to be a fireman. He asked if she was all right, and took her to a truck where they gave her oxygen and wanted to take her to the hospital for evaluation, but no, she was fine, really, just caught a bit of smoke, that’s all.
Donovan and Susan were twenty feet away, looking at her. She winked and gave them a thumbs-up. Then a cop came up to her, wanting her name and asking if she was a guest, but she did her these aren’t the droids you’re looking for thing, and she was back with her team.
“You okay?” said Donovan.
“Yeah,” she said. And, “I think I got it.”
* * *
Donovan didn’t let himself start shaking until he was back home and had a drink in his hand. Even then, though, shaking with nervous energy, he held it together; there was something that needed to be done now, because there might not be much time left.
He made another Skype call—one he hadn’t made in close to a year. The face came on after about thirty seconds, so tanned he could tell over the distortion, and smiling.
“Hey, Grampa,” said Donovan. “How’s retirement?”
“Hey, Chump. It’s great. I fish, I watch the Buccaneers, and I sleep like a baby.”
“And you’ve grown a beard. Too lazy to shave?”
“Damn right.”
“So, you don’t miss it?”
“Yeah, I miss it. Every time I go to the bank.”
“Check.”
“You okay, Chumpy? You don’t sound like yourself.” The old man seemed to be staring intently at the screen.
“Yeah, had a bit of a rough time, but came through it okay. You know how it goes—you get shaky after you’re safe.”
Grampa may have nodded. “Got a replacement for me yet?”
“Yeah. A girl named Marci. She’s doing good. You’d be proud of her.”
The old man smiled wide enough that Donovan could see it. “Bet I would. So, you caught a case?”
“A tough one. Nasty. It’s made the news twice.”
“Oh?”
“State Senator in California drowning in her swimming pool?”
“Nope, missed that.”
“Terrorist bombing at a hotel in New Orleans?”
“Oh! Yeah, I heard about that. Everyone’s heard about that.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I thought they caught the guys who did it.”
“They caught bullshit. They picked up two loudmouth skinheads and they’re going to pin it on them so they don’t have to admit they have no clue.”
“We doing anything about that?”
“Not my circus, not my monkeys.”
“Seems kinda shitty to just leave them there, Chumpy.”
“I don’t get to make that call. And, you know, skinheads. I’m not crying with sympathy.”
“That’s what I don’t miss about the job.”
“Yeah. So look, I’m kinda stuck. Can I run it down for you? Just give me anything that comes to mind.”
“Sure. What’s old age for if not dispensing bullshit and calling it wisdom? Let’s hear it.”
Donovan gave him chapter and verse, including speculation and stray observations. Grampa listened, probably nodding from time to time, until Donovan finished.
“So, that’s the story. Anything?”
“Well, it’s pretty clear that there’s an endgame here. Maybe two different ones.”
“Right.”
“You’re going to have to figure out at least one of them.”
“Yep. The question is, how?”
“Okay, Chumpy. I’m gonna get a bit abstract here.”
Donovan felt himself grinning. “I’m listening, old man.”
“Sometimes the reason you can’t make out a shape is that you’ve got all the lines, but they’re blending into the background.”
“Yep, you’re right. That’s pretty abstract. What’s the background?”
“The Mystici. All of this is happening around and through them.”
“So, you’re saying I need to learn more about the Mystici?”
“Yep.”
“What exactly do I need to learn?”
“If I knew that, I’d just tell you. But from what you say, that sounds like the thing you’re missing.”
“So, how do I find out?”
“One thing you’ve always been good at is irritating people. I don’t mean in a bad way, I mean just, you know, staying on them, annoying them until they react. Then you use their reactions. Remember the card cheater in Atlantic City?”
“Yeah. So, your point is?”
“Go bug Upstairs until they tell you the shit they don’t think you need to know. That’s what you need to know.”
Donovan felt himself nodding. “Grampa, you’re the best.”
“And don’t you forget it, Chumpy. You’ll let me know how it plays out?”
“Depend on it.”