The men across the street propped against the buildings while smoking cigarettes were trying too hard to look casual, Ling thought. The same four men had been following him and Stubbs since they’d arrived in Chihuahua. He wasn’t sure if Captain Sanchez had sent them in addition to their escorts, who’d traveled with them and showed them around town as though they were honored guests. But the two soldiers, Jeffe and Inigo, hadn’t paid the tails any mind, so either they weren’t aware of the added security or they were very good at ignoring them.

“You really need to relax, Tsang.” Stubbs sipped a glass of some golden liquor their guides had pressed on them. “It’s not every day a gringo and a Chino are treated like this.”

“They fatten pigs before a slaughter, too.” Ling narrowed his eyes on a man in a serape and sombrero. The man tugged the brim of his broad hat lower. “We can’t just sit here.”

“What do you think you’re going to do? Take that stinking mutt there”—he hitched a thumb at Cymon, who lay in the sun with one eye open—“and go sniffing around the countryside for the girls?”

“Better than sitting around stuffing our faces. For all we know, the Alabama sisters might already have passed Diablo back to Javier Punta and moved on.”

“They haven’t.” Stubbs said it with the calm assurance of a hunter who had his prey in the cross hairs and one eye on the predator stalking him. “I’d know if they had. Besides, between that group of tagalongs you’ve been glaring at and our earnest tour guides, we wouldn’t get two blocks before we were arrested and thrown in jail ourselves. No, I much prefer this to the hospitality of the warden.” He leaned back in his chair, lacing his fingers behind his head. “Try it sometime. You can learn a lot if you just close your eyes and listen. For instance”—he cracked one eye open—“General Vidal Cabello is visiting the nearby garrison.”

“The one they call El Toro?” Ling sat up. Even he knew about the Mexican general’s vicious reputation. The Division had him on a list of Kukulos warlocks suspected of committing atrocities against innocents. “What’s he doing in Chihuahua?”

“That is the question.” Stubbs closed his eyes again. “Rumor has it there was an attack on the army garrison outside of the city a few nights ago. A couple of very strange deaths, they said, had befallen their men. Heads cleanly wiped from their bodies, only they couldn’t find the heads.” He cut him a look. “Sound familiar to you?”

The Devil’s Revolver was the only weapon powerful enough to do such damage, as far as Ling knew. If it was Diablo, then Hettie was closer than they thought. “We should investigate.”

Stubbs waved a hand. “I am investigating. You might think I’m taking some kind of vacation, but you can learn a lot more by smiling and being quiet than by interrogating every stranger you meet.” He swished his drink in his mouth. “Mmm. That is just delightful.”

Ling set his teeth. He was fed up with the Pinkerton agent’s stalling and condescension. While he was aware it would be foolish to go after the Alabama sisters himself, lounging around the city with Stubbs was not getting him anywhere closer to his goal.

Perhaps it was time to part ways with Thomas Stubbs.

“You’re getting that look,” the Pinkerton agent remarked archly. “That ‘I’m going to do whatever I want’ look. Not much of a poker face on you, is there?”

“I don’t gamble.”

He chuckled. “No, I don’t suppose you do. But then, you always were the good son, weren’t you, Tsang Li Ling?”

Ling stilled. He’d pronounced Ling’s name in his mother tongue perfectly. Thomas studied his drink in the light. “I had you checked out, of course. Couldn’t figure out how a Celestial Paladin healer with your English skills ended up in the employ of the Division of Sorcery but got assigned to watch some brat in the middle of nowhere.” He sipped more of the liquor. “Ling Tsang, or Tsang Li Ling, son of Tsang Wai Keung and some peasant woman. Your father’s a magistrate in a little town in Hupei province. Important man with a lot of honor.” He raised a brow in contempt. “You people put way too much emphasis on that.”

“Honor is all some people have,” Ling gritted.

“That what you tell yourself? ’Cuz honor won’t bring back that girl you killed.”

Ling’s fingers curled. His temper had gotten him into a lot of scrapes. But he didn’t lash out. His anger was turned inward.

Stubbs smiled slowly, his gray teeth like little tombstones. “I know you were sent as far from your family’s honor as possible. And I know the Division found you in San Francisco, a drowned rat running dope for the local dens.” He picked his teeth. “I do wonder what kind of hell they put you through to make you join ’em. Things weren’t fun when I was in the Academy, and they sure as hell didn’t get better over time. So I’m guessing they gave you an ultimatum—work for them or die in prison. That about right?”

Ling stared straight ahead, blocking out the nightmarish memories threatening to overwhelm him. He thought about happy old times before his exile—flying kites with his half brothers and half sisters, reading to his mother under the big tree in the courtyard. He thought about the sumptuous Mid-Autumn Harvest festival feast, the cacophonous lion dances on their doorstep at New Year’s …

He thought about poor Siu May, eyes staring straight up from a too-white face while her lifeblood pooled around her …

The horrors surfaced. The long, foul boat ride to California. The muddied streets of San Francisco’s Chinatown. The Division goons who’d caught him carrying a package whose contents he hadn’t known about. The bargain for his life …

“The Division must’ve done a number on you.” Stubbs’s voice drew Ling out of his nightmare revelry. “What’d they tell you? That you’d earn your honor back? That they’d send you home someday if you did well?”

“I owe the Division my life.” A ball of fire burned as bright as truth in his chest.

“Not much of one, though, wouldn’t you say?” He filled his cup with more of the golden liquor. “I worked for the Division for more than fifteen years before I realized I could have more. That’s what makes America great, Tsang. You’re free to become something better.”

“Like a hired mercenary?” he retorted blandly.

“The Pinkerton Agency is a legitimate business. And the pay’s better than what the Division is giving you, I bet.”

It almost sounded as if the man was trying to recruit him. To what end, he couldn’t say. “I’m not concerned about pay. I’m doing what’s right for everyone, Abigail Alabama included.”

“Right, this whole ‘indigo child’ business. The Division’s been chasing that particular devil for a while now.” He scratched his nose. “Not worth it, in my opinion. Few times they’ve actually gotten ahold of one hasn’t ended well for anybody.”

Ling ground his jaw. “Abby needs help. She’s a danger to everyone around her.”

“Keep telling yourself that. The road to hell is paved with good intentions,” Stubbs quipped. “But to my mind, any man who drags a little girl kicking and screaming to the Academy knowing what’ll happen to her there is more of bastard than I could ever be.” He shrugged. “Then again, for the right price, I might shoot her in the face. They paying you enough to do that, Tsang?”

Ling’s chest constricted until his vision turned gray. He rose from the table suddenly. “Where you heading?” the Pinkerton agent asked snidely.

“Outhouse.”

He passed blindly through the café and exited through the back door. The air was a little clearer here. With a quick glance around, he grabbed the edge of the porch’s overhang, pulled himself onto the roof, and lithely scaled the clay downspout onto the top of the building. With light footsteps he jumped the gap over to the next building and made his way across the city.

He didn’t know where he was headed. He just had to move, to flex his muscles and scramble over stone and brick to get away from Stubbs, from their tails, from the harsh memories and his sudden attack of conscience.

He reminded himself that joining the Division had saved his life. But he still had nightmares about his accelerated training at the Academy. He vividly remembered the beatings and torture he’d endured to test the limits of his gift. He would never forget the way they’d hurt other students—some of them barely children—just to see how many he’d heal before he passed out.

Those grueling trials had forged him into the man he was today. But at what cost? He was a Paladin-class healer, sworn to do no harm with his magic or his abilities as a healer. That meant nothing if he was willing to bring Abby in knowing she’d be subjected to the same torturous trials he’d faced. Worse, likely. The Division would take the most extreme precautions with Abby. She’d be treated like a rabid animal …

Could he do that? Could he drag her away from her remaining family to be leashed and bound and probably put under a sleep spell for the rest of her short, horror-filled life? He’d practically watched Abby grow up.

He ran faster, skating across the rooftops and leaping over the short walls to outrun the darkness. His breath rasped harshly from his lungs, the sun’s searing glare bearing down on him like a judgment. The rooftops ended, and he stopped. There was nowhere left to go but back the way he’d come.

He glanced down at the empty streets below. He’d outrun his tails … but he could never outrun himself.

“I was wondering when I’d finally get you alone.”

Ling spun around, heart hammering. Jeremiah Bassett leaned against the chimney, watching him narrowly as an owl might watch a mouse.

“How did you find me?”

“I can find anything. Didn’t Stubby tell you? Back in the Division, they used to call me the Hound.” He pushed off the hot brickwork. “Woof.”

Before Ling realized what was happening, the old sorcerer threw a talisman at him. The thing sprouted in an explosion of green, and in a flash the vines wrapped around his legs and snaked up his torso, tenacious tendrils and burrs hooking into his clothing, clamping his arms to his body. The more he struggled, the faster the vines grew around him. He collapsed to his knees and fell onto his side, cocooned in green. Jeremiah slowed his incantation, his words devolving into a fit of phlegmy coughing. He pulled a flask from his side and took a swig.

“Where are the Alabama sisters?” Ling gritted out. Surely the old man hadn’t been stupid enough to bring them to Chihuahua?

“They’re safe. Safer than they’d be with you, I reckon.” He eased down into a crouch. “I need answers. Give me what I want and maybe I won’t slit your throat.” Jeremiah leaned in, eyes shaded by the mangled brim of his well-worn hat. “Tell me about Abby and this indigo child business. There isn’t anything in the Arcanum about them.”

There was nothing to be gained by withholding the information. And Bassett was a pragmatic man, if a touch paranoid. Perhaps the old sorcerer could convince the Alabamas to listen to him. “Indigo powers are a subset of magic the Division has had little success in studying. Every generation, only a few indigo children are born.”

“And you think Abby is one of them.”

“The Division tracked reports of Grace Alabama’s difficult pregnancy. Her symptoms were consistent with reports of other mothers who’d given birth to indigo children. Many of them do not survive the labor, but Grace did … and so did Abby.”

“So how come in all those years you worked on the farm you didn’t notice anything? That girl was never right. You saw how they had to keep an eye on her all the time.”

Ling didn’t appreciate having his oversight pointed out to him. “Her behavior was … consistent with other symptoms.”

“You thought she was simple,” Jeremiah concluded. “Like some kind of idiot.”

Ling growled. “Have a care for your words, Mr. Bassett. I respected the Alabamas. John and Grace treated me with decency and gave me food, shelter, and work when no one else in Newhaven would.”

“I wouldn’t have, either, given the choice. I always knew there was something hinky about you, and not ’cuz yer a Celestial.” He took another swig from his flask. “Did you ever peg me as a Division man?”

Ling pursed his lips. Yet another of his oversights thrown at him. “I didn’t make the connection for a long time. I thought you were a drunk living off John’s good graces.”

Jeremiah scoffed. “You don’t live as long as I do without knowing how to evade the Division. Had you mentioned me, they would’ve come for me, John, and Diablo. But you didn’t know anything about that either, did you?”

Ling frowned. The Division rarely shared information they didn’t think was pertinent to their agents’ missions. His first encounter with the legendary Devil’s Revolver had been when Hettie had bonded with the mage gun accidentally. He’d only learned its history after she’d fled Sonora station with Abby, and he was sure he still hadn’t heard the whole story. Some things just weren’t in his pay grade. “It wasn’t my primary concern.”

“And what about now? You planning on taking Diablo from Hettie? Pretty neat package, ain’t it? Two sisters, two of the Division’s most wanted. Frankly, I’m surprised they only sent you to get them.”

Ling raised his chin as much as the vines would allow. “I have my mission.”

Bassett scoffed. “The perfect Division lackey. No questions, no initiative, no curiosity. Just get the job done, isn’t that right?” He shook his head, eyes growing wet. “You could’ve saved John and Grace. You could’ve saved Hettie. If you’d said the right thing to the right person instead being an inscrutable yellow bastard…”

He trailed off, his voice raw, and he laughed bitterly again. “Tell me”—he leaned in, his breath reeking of whiskey—“does it eat away at you, knowing you could’ve saved them if you’d done something different?”

Yet another choice he would never live down. But he’d resigned himself to that mistake a long time ago. “You of all people should understand the situation. I have my mission. I’m doing what’s best for Abigail. As long as her power goes unchecked, she’s a danger to herself and everyone around her.”

Bassett blew out a cloud of fumes. “This isn’t a black-and-white choice, Tsang. It’s not ‘take her in or let her be.’ Just tell me how I can help her.”

The desperation in the old man’s voice made the cracks in Ling’s conscience widen. Jeremiah regarded him narrowly. “What’s that look?”

“I told you. No one has ever had a chance to study indigo powers … because every indigo child ever found has died before the age of thirteen.”

Jeremiah’s glazed eyes hardened as he drank that in. “So that’s why the Division wants her so bad.” He stood and paced. “They want to study her before she buys the farm. Put her under a glass jar and poke her full of needles, cut her into pieces, burn and break her until she can’t take it no more—”

“They won’t do that.” It sounded as if Ling were only trying to convince himself of it. “She has to be … sequestered for her own safety.”

“Did you even go to the Academy? Do you have any idea what they do there to little kids? It was bad enough in my day, but now, the things I’ve seen—”

“Bassett, you don’t understand. Abby is the Division’s worst nightmare. Everyone within a ten-mile radius of that little girl is in danger—Hettie, Walker … everyone.” The only thing that pushed Ling on in his mission were the images in the highly classified file he’d been shown to notify him of what was at stake. All he had to do was think of the photos of the abominations he’d glimpsed to remind himself that failure was not an option. “You wouldn’t be out here away from the girls if you hadn’t already seen something in her powers that disturbed you.”

His words struck a chord. Bassett wiped a hand over his mouth as Ling went on. “I’m telling you, it only gets worse. She’ll get stronger. Abby’s powers could reshape the world and reality as we know it. If you don’t believe me, go to the asylum in Yuma.”

Bassett backed up a step, eye twitching. “What’s in Yuma?”

The sorcerer’s brief relapse gave Ling the opening he needed. He breathed deep and fed a thread of his Qi into the vines. The tendrils grew and grew, sprouting leaves and flowers that withered and died and were replaced.

But life had its limits, and soon there was nothing left in the vine to keep growing. His bonds shriveled, becoming brittle. Jeremiah realized too late to fight with a counterspell.

Ling burst out of the shell in an explosion of splinters.

Jeremiah drew his gun and unloaded a path of bullets in Ling’s wake as he rolled over the lip of the roof.

A canvas canopy broke his fall. He dropped through the tearing fabric and crashed into a covered cart before hitting the ground. He spared only a second to regain his breath before rolling to his feet and limping into the main street, where Bassett’s bullets might attract some attention.

A block east Jeffe and Inigo turned a corner, frantic. They exclaimed and started toward him. The tails emerged from cross corners, melting into the shadows as Ling made each one of them.

“Señor Tsang, we were looking all over for you,” Jeffe said with nervous relief. “Señor Stubbs said you’d disappeared. You should not have left on your own.”

“I was attacked and dragged away by two men on the way to the outhouse.” He forced a little fear into his voice, hunched his shoulders and trembled. “I think they were looking for money, or maybe a ransom. They dragged me here and beat me.”

Inigo exchanged glances with Jeffe. “The city can be quite dangerous, señor. There are many who do not like el Chinos. You must not go anywhere without an escort.”

“You are right, of course.” Ling bowed his head, looking properly chastened. “I will not be so careless in the future.”

He didn’t look behind him. He knew Bassett was watching him walk away from what should have been the scene of his demise. Bassett would not miss his chance a second time.

Ling could only hope the old sorcerer would listen to him and go to Yuma.