THE REJUVENATION CENTER

“—ucking cut you!”

I slapped Brand’s hand away from the radio dial and swerved back into my lane. “Why do you always jump to cutting?” I demanded. “Use your words if you don’t like the radio station I picked.”

Since the pop rock song was off and he’d got his way, Brand settled into the passenger seat with a smirk.

I was driving our beat-up old Saturn toward a corner of the city almost exactly due south of Sun Estate. While summer brought the earliest sunrises of the year to New Atlantis, we were still a half-hour shy of one. The air around us was the gray-tinged black of pre-dawn.

Nothing short of an emergency would have normally got me out of bed before sunrise, let alone two hours before it, which is when Lady Priestess had called with an urgent request. All I knew was that an unknown barrier had appeared around the rejuvenation center, and they couldn’t reach anyone inside by phone or text.

I’d given myself thirty minutes to add a few stealth and infiltration spells to my sigils—at her vague recommendation—while an even-grumpier Brand went from room to room assembling his leathers and chest harness.

“It takes so much longer to get out the door now,” he yawned. “I miss Half House.”

“No, you don’t. You’ve got dozens of people to boss around now.”

“I’ve got dozens of people who need to be bossed around because their heads haven’t grown out their ass yet, which is the state they’d need to be in to do what they should be doing without being told. Why didn’t Lady Priestess tell us any more about what to expect? Were there any background noises?”

“What sort of noises did you expect me to hear?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Scions-clutching-their-pearls angst? Man-being-eaten-by-crocodile screams? We usually know more before we take a job.”

“Good thing it’s not a job then. Can you hand me my coffee?”

I waited a beat, but no coffee edged into my peripheral. As streetlamps sliced blades of yellow across the windshield, I gave him a quick look. “What?”

“This isn’t a job?” he asked.

“No. It’s a favor. I guess that’s the sort of thing Arcana do for each other.”

“So we’re not getting paid?” he asked, louder now. “Is this the sort of thing we can look forward to now that you’re a part of the Arcanum?”

Okay, maybe he wasn’t grumpier than me, because my temper flared. “How should I know? Did you see me leave the last Arcana meeting with an orientation manual, Brand? There was no orientation.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” he said, but handed me my coffee.

I sighed into the plastic lid. “Thank you.”

He waited until I’d taken a long, caffeinated sip. “But she emphasized stealth spells? That’s all you have stored in your sigils—stealth spells?”

“Hell no. Most of my sigils were already topped up. Oh! Addam lent me a sigil with Telekinesis in it. Well, I stepped on his head by accident first, but then he woke up and lent it to me.” I predicted the turn of Brand’s face. “Air conditioning is out in our room, so we slept on the floor. But, hey, Telekinesis. That’ll be fun if I get to use it.”

He flicked a look my way that had us both almost smiling, because let’s be honest: we’d been cooped up on the estate for a while, and the truth was that we really, really hoped we’d get to use more than stealth skills.

We’d relocated to Sun Estate months ago. New Atlantis had been no different from the rest of the world: we struggled with the birth of a novel coronavirus. A heavy investment in magical remedies had allowed us to contain our outbreak so we no longer needed masks or social distancing. But we’d also had to close our borders and cut off contact with the human world until they found their own vaccine solution.

Personally, I’d spent the quarantine months focusing on little except the rehabilitation of Sun Estate. I’d picked up my father’s mantle and was the Arcana of the Sun Throne, and I needed a base of operations. I needed a compound. I needed, eventually and pointedly, a heavily fortified compound.

Kicking out all the ghosts and ghouls that had taken up residence in the ruins of Sun Estate was an expensive and tedious process. Every literal square foot of safe ground we gained was measured in hundreds of dollars and hours of spell-work, largely using an incredibly difficult and special magic taught to me by Lady Priestess—which explained why I was on her radar. But we’d finally reached the point where a sizable percentage of the estate was safe behind wards and other protection.

We’d moved the Dawncreeks onto the estate as well—Anna, Corbie, Layne, and a newly rejuvenated Corinne. Anna, Max, and Quinn spent half a week with us, and half a week at Magnus Academy learning how not to stab someone with the wrong fork during a formal dinner. I had just started holding regular court sessions, which meant I had homework of my bloody own. Things, in all, had been very domestic lately.

“So you and Addam are dressing in each other’s sigils now?” Brand asked.

“I’m not going to be baited.”

“Just making conversation. Take a left up there.”

“It’s easier if we—”

“Left,” he barked. “Look at the windows on that building. There are green and amber lights around the corner.”

His instincts were always quicker than mine. I turned left, and sure enough, there was commotion around the bend in the block ahead of us.

“Does that mean you don’t like Addam being around so much?” I asked him after a pause.

“Don’t you dare fucking use me for cold feet.”

“I don’t have cold feet! I was just worried it might feel weird. I’m checking in with you. Addam’s practically moved into the estate.”

“Yeah, and it was weird the first time he wandered into the kitchen in his boxer briefs. Now it’s called morning.”

“He still hasn’t officially joined the Sun Throne. He’s still technically a member of Lady Justice’s court.”

Brand turned in his seat so hard that the seatbelt groaned. “Why do you sound worried?”

“I didn’t say—”

Brand tapped his head, indicating it hadn’t been anything I’d said out loud.

But amber and emerald lights were now dancing across the hood of our car. Ahead of us, just around a corner, was a line of wooden sawhorses blocking off the mouth of an alley.

Immortality was a myth. Sort of.

Through closely guarded rejuvenation magics perfected by Lady Priestess’s court, Atlanteans could make their bodies go on forever. The mind was another matter entirely, though, which is what made immortality a myth in practice. After half a millennium, most people, one way or another, found ways to die.

I always suspected that those who lasted longer, like the Tower or (reputedly) the Empress, were just smarter at knowing how to reinvent themselves. I suspected the trick was building a mental firebreak between shitty life experiences in order to find the desire or motivation to attempt another hundred years on the same rickety roller coaster.

That said, nearly all Atlanteans of even modest means took advantage of Lady Priestess’s magic. She practiced rejuvenation at two centers on the island, and the particular center before us was the premier facility, where heavily funded courts sent their people for complete life-cycle rejuvenation. It was a process that involved several stages and weeks of residence.

Put together, this created a number of uncomfortable scenarios and a dozen times as many questions. The building treated a clientele of powerful people. The idea that someone had created an uncrossable barrier around the facility wasn’t nearly as worrisome as the question of how and why.

The guarda official who appeared at the driver’s window went from bored to formal in a finger snap when I told him my name. I saw him give the Saturn the side-eye, but he ordered one of his people to valet park the car.

“Crowd forming,” Brand murmured when we were on the sidewalk. He nodded in the direction of people in clean uniforms by a nearby sawhorse.

The officer heard that and said, “Morning bakery crew. They were the ones who discovered the barrier and called it in.”

“Still no contact with anyone inside?” Brand asked.

“Nothing. No reply to texts or calls—we’re not even sure the messages are passing through. Lady Priestess herself is on the scene. I can—”

“I am,” Lady Priestess said from behind him. “Here, that is. I’ll speak with Lord Sun now.”

The officer bowed his way out of the conversation as Lady Priestess stepped forward. She was a short woman edging into middle age, with-straight brown hair and cat-eye eyeglasses that pulsed with the power of a sigil. Her voice was as wispy as her wandering attention, which begged to be underestimated.

“The barrier is around the corner. Just down there. I’ve tried all the tricksy magics I had on me, but nothing seems to work.” She said this while staring intently at Brand, who tensed a bit and shifted his weight to the balls of his feet.

“Has the guarda ascertained how far the barrier goes beneath the ground?” I asked. “Or whether it’s a dome or wall?”

“Details,” she said, waving a hand airily, and still staring at Brand. She said, with something like pride, “I have had over three dozen children. None of them have ever had a Companion.”

And then she turned and walked away.

Brand and I waited a good ten seconds before exchanging glances.

“Did she just brag that she’s never bought or stolen a human baby?” Brand whispered.

“That would mean she just called me a kidnapper,” I said.

“I wish. Kidnappers usually have plans. You can’t even match your fucking socks. Not to press a button on that whole kidnapping thing, I mean.”

“Not to,” I agreed, but added the weight of the comment to everything else piled on my shoulders.

“Lord Sun, Lord Saint John,” a young woman called. She rolled over in an electric wheelchair from the direction Lady Priestess had vanished. Her hair was short and bleached platinum, and she wore an expensive business suit. She craned her head up at me and said, “My name is Bethan. I’m Lady Priestess’ second oldest. She asked me to answer any questions you might have.”

The Papess Throne was renowned for its fertility. I’d heard somewhere that Lady Priestess staffed her senior roles with direct descendants only, to keep attempted coups within the family.

“What do you know, Bethan? And call me Rune.”

“Brand,” Brand said.

“My lords. I’m afraid we have more questions than answers at this point. When the morning staff tried to enter through the back, they encountered the barrier. My mother and I were on-site within the hour, and we’ve tried what techniques we had on hand to break through. We were unsuccessful. We tried all the elements. We tried to phase through it, and to establish a portal to the other side. Nothing has worked.”

“How far up or down does it go?” Brand asked. “Do you have drone footage?”

“It’s a dome on top. The drones didn’t spot movement in the windows, or anyone in the interior courtyard. We can see that there is electricity inside, though, which is something. As for underground, we sent people into tunnels that extend below the facility and join several buildings in the area. The barrier walls are present there as well, albeit curved. We suspect the totality of the barrier is less a dome than a sphere.”

“Has it injured anyone?” I asked.

“No. Touching it causes no effect. It’s simply . . . there.”

“And you want me to try breaking through?”

Bethan smiled. “My mother appears to think you or Lord Tower may be able to help, yes.”

“You called the Tower?” Brand said before he could help himself. Then he gritted his teeth. “He’s behind me. He’s behind me right now, isn’t he?”

I looked over my shoulder. “Nope.”

“Thank fucking God,” he said under his breath. “It’s too early.”

“What do we know of the people who are supposed to be inside the building?” I asked.

“We have eighteen clients on record from multiple courts. An evening staff of twenty-one, and an overnight staff of thirteen. We haven’t been able to pinpoint our last point of contact, but I have people trying to contact the evening staff, who would have departed by eight o’clock last night. If we can account for them, it helps narrow the incident window.”

Eighteen clients across multiple courts. High-value individuals from different houses. This had the making of a diplomatic incident. I understood now why the Tower had been contacted. If something had happened to the clients, it wouldn’t send ripples through the city so much as fracture lines.

“Show me the barrier,” I said.

Bethan dipped her head and escorted us away from the guarda activity. Her chair made almost no sound at all as it moved. She saw Brand’s glance at the crowd and said, “We’re keeping the employees and guarda out of the building’s sight-lines.”

“Then you’ll want the guarda to turn off their patrol lights. The colors are reflecting everywhere.”

“Not that you’re going to keep this quiet much longer,” I added. “Morning commute is starting. In a half hour, we’ll be swamped with foot traffic.”

“Still, I’ll have the lights turned off for now,” she murmured, and began typing a message on her phone. She wore mesh, half-finger gloves that left her thumbs exposed.

As we headed down an alley that connected with the side of the rejuvenation facility, Brand pulled a set of compact binoculars from one of his pockets. Layne had bought them as a gift with their first hospital paycheck, now that they’d been moved from unpaid hospital volunteer to part-time aide. Their necromantic abilities had allowed them complete immunity to the coronavirus, making them a critical asset in the early days of the hospital’s pandemic response.

While the binoculars made sense now, Brand found a lot of other occasions to whip them out and brag—coffee shops, imminent postal carrier deliveries, teenager acne watch. I suppose that’s why I didn’t mention he was about to bump into the invisible magic barrier.

“Fucking hell!” he said, and recoiled.

“So we can confirm it causes no physical trauma,” I said.

“Did you see that there?” he accused.

“Absolutely not,” I said. I made a show of squinting hard at what was, to me, a wall of flaxen air, not unlike the dimness of sunlight on a cloudy day. “Ah. There. There it is.”

Beyond the barrier was the edge of a tree-lined plot of grass that led to the front entrance. The building was like a block letter O, with an open area in the middle. It was not a translocation, oddly enough. The center was custom built over the last ten years, using bricks baked from the healing mud of Italy’s Bormio region.

“Give me a minute, please,” I murmured, and stepped right to the edge of the barrier. I closed my eyes and tilted my head, pushing my face into the morning’s dampness. The magic in front of me was strong. Wickedly strong—maybe stronger than anything I’d seen outside the Convocation’s own protections when the Arcanum was in session.

I’d seen Lord Tower crack barriers before. I was not sure I could. Then again, Lady Priestess and her people hadn’t had luck either. I could live with failure in numbers.

I looked back down the alley as two people turned into sight. One strode forward with definitive, advancing footsteps; the other made no noise.

“Rune,” Lord Tower said. “Brand.”

“Where’s Corinne?” Mayan, Lord Tower’s Companion, asked.

Brand froze—he knew Mayan was aiming at a target, he just didn’t know where the target was placed.

“Corinne is home with the kids,” I said slowly.

“The trained Companion who spent over eight weeks in this facility is home,” Mayan summarized. “With the children.”

I gave Brand a look that said, Fuck? Brand gave me a look back that said, Fuck!

“We picked a small party for the infiltration,” I explained.

Mayan gave Brand a good hard stare. “I’m establishing a command center. One of my people will be on comms. The link will be magic—light-based—which we think will work better than wireless tech. Excuse me while I make arrangements.”

“You bring out such a playful side in my Companion,” Lord Tower said to Brand, as both Mayan and Bethan excused themselves.

“Can you see that barrier right there?” Brand asked, pointing behind him.

“You’ll need to call on deep magic first,” I said quickly.

The Tower flicked a look at me, flicked his eyes upwards in what may or may not have been an eye roll, and said, “Oh. Yes. There it is.”

“Can you tell who made it? Or how it was made?” I asked. He walked forward until the tip of his shiny black shoe touched the point where the barrier curved into the earth. He reached out and placed a fingertip along the dim glow. “Arcana-level work,” he finally said. “Maybe a principality?”

“Not an Arcana?” I asked.

“No Arcana I know did this. There are very few other options beyond principalities, and of those most are so remote as to be implausible.”

Principalities were simply Arcana without formal courts. The lack of thrones kept them from being true power centers in the city, but also afforded them a certain ability to operate under the radar.

“Do you have a suspicion about who or what created it?” I asked.

The Tower continued to run his eyes along the barrier—high and low. “You’d be surprised how many truly dangerous hypotheticals I monitor on a daily basis. Whether this is related to any of them? That’s why I am here.” He began to calmly remove the links from the cuff of his bespoke shirt.

“Would you mind, sir, if we discuss a practical matter,” Brand said. The sir was like a road flare. “In the spirit of Arcana courts working together, it would be gauche to discuss compensation. But, being that we’re a very young court, perhaps you may be able to share some equipment or field tech with us.”

Brand didn’t often make the Tower smile—or genuinely smile—but he got within shooting distance this time. “I thought you and Rune had already upgraded. Purchased . . . drones and earbuds?”

I sighed. “Corbie borrowed the earbuds without asking. He wanted to tell us what the bottom of the pool looked like.”

“Then I must make a gift of the light-based technology Mayan is bringing. It’s a new spell—I have hopes it’ll outpace modern jamming technology. Although, Brandon, you should remember that Lady Priestess is now in your debt. In a way, that is compensation. A favor is a powerful thing.”

“Of course, Lord Tower,” I said, before Brand could share his views on favors between courts. (“Fucking Monopoly money.”) I had a much better appreciation for favor banks than he did.

As he began to meticulously fold the sleeves of his shirt, the Tower asked, “Are you excited for your gala?”

He was referring to my formal, ridiculously public, and upcoming coronation. “I spend a good portion of every day thinking about it,” I said honestly.

“I’m excited,” Brand volunteered. Which would have been odd, if you didn’t know that he’d been allowed to choose half of our gift registry.

“It’s a necessity,” the Tower said. “Formal exchanges of power like yours are public gestures, yes, but they’re also one of the few times Arcana gather in a show of force. Ah. Mayan.”

Mayan handed me two headsets while also extending his hand to Brand, saying, “Phone.”

Brand hesitated a second, then passed his phone to Mayan.

“I’m downloading an app owned by the rejuvenation center. Lady Priestess has provided the both of you with full user permissions. The app has blueprints, client information, and also monitors patient vitals. Check those first, if the app works inside the barrier. I’ll also have a field agent online with you. Her name is Julia.”

“No,” Brand said immediately. “No thank you. I have experience with her. She’s not a team player.”

The Tower said, “She annoys you.”

“Yes,” he said.

The Tower simply smiled and waited for Mayan to proceed. Brand hid his sulk behind his binoculars, staring at the facility.

“Julia can link you with any of us for private talk,” Mayan said. “The public channel is restricted to people authorized by the Arcanum. For now that includes Julia, the two of you, Lord Tower, myself, and Bethan Saint Brigid.”

“We’ll try to establish contact as soon as we’re inside,” I said. “But we need to get through the barrier first. Since we’ve just got the two headsets here, I’m guessing that means you don’t think we’ll be able to bring the entire barrier down.”

“I’m not sure yet, but at the very least, I can get the both of you inside,” Lord Tower said. “You should—”

“Rune,” Brand snapped. “Use Addam’s searchlight trick. Third floor, three windows from my left.”

Addam had invented a mix of cantrips—lens and light—that, when combined, created a piercingly strong beam. I didn’t ask any questions because I felt Brand’s urgency. I whispered the words and aligned the cantrips, and aimed the beam at my feet. When the magic stabilized and I had control of it, I swept it along the bricks of the rejuvenation center until Brand grunted and I hit the window he’d referenced.

Brand stared through his binoculars as Mayan pulled out a set of his own. The two studied whatever they saw quietly.

Brand said, “Looks like blood.”

“Nice spot,” Mayan said after a pause.

Brand held the binoculars to my eyes so I didn’t need to drop my light. It took a second, but eventually my depth vision adjusted, and I saw it. Half a handprint on the lower edge of the glass pane. My light brought out the liquid red sheen.

Brand snapped the binoculars shut. “They have electricity inside. Even if they don’t have outside communication, someone could be flicking the lights on and off, fucking Morse-coding us. But instead we have blood and barriers.”

“Hostages?” Mayan murmured. His lips settled into a grimace. “Or bodies. Let’s get you in there.”

“I’ll hold the barrier for you and Brand,” Lord Tower said to me. “Find out what you can. I’ll work on bringing the barrier down for larger forces. Brace yourselves.”

The period for small talk was over, and I felt adrenaline washing through me. Lord Tower stalked up to the barrier. He undid the first button of his shirt, revealing a leather strap tied around a bundle of old, bent nails. He touched them, and the release of mass sigil magic nearly blew us off our feet.

Car alarms went off three seconds later, and an alley cat screeched. The magic gloving the Tower’s hands was so hot I could see a mirage haze around his fingers. He lifted both hands, tensed, and then slammed them into the barrier.

For a second—for barely the inhale of a single breath—nothing happened. Then his fingers began to blister and burn. A bubble of blood appeared below one nostril, quickly turning into a thick red stream.

“Gods’ teeth,” he swore, and as he did, I began to smell cooked flesh. A low groan escaped his lips, and his eyes widened in surprise. It barely lasted a second until it firmed into resolve. His wrist muscles bunched as he increased the force of his push against the barrier.

“Can I help?” I said loudly.

“Be ready,” he gasped. “Be . . . NOW!”

I saw a portion of the barrier thin to the palest of yellow. Since Brand couldn’t see, I grabbed his nondominant hand and shouted, “In my tracks!”

I ran through the split in the barrier, Brand my shadow. As I passed the Tower, I saw his hands up close. The tips of two fingers were already gone.

“Clear!” I yelled the moment we were on the other side.

The Tower dropped the spell. He may have sagged back, but it was hard to tell, because Mayan was already behind him for support.

“Headsets,” Brand said in a clipped voice. We divvied the sets up and adjusted them. He tapped the on button of his own pair and said, “Are you online Julie?”

“Oh, don’t be an asshole,” I whispered, because I knew enough of Julia from the Lovers raid to know she hated the name Julie.

“Julia here,” she said, as unflappable as I remember.

“Julia, this is Lord Sun,” I said. “I need a private link with Lord Tower. Right now.”

“Understood. Hold.”

Brand gave me a curious look, but let me have a moment. He stepped off to the side.

“Rune,” I heard in my head.

There was a level of strain in the Tower’s voice that made my heart skip. I said, “Don’t be a hero. Get medical now.”

He either breathed hard or chuckled. “That took . . . effort. I admit to having misgivings, now, about sending you in on your own.”

“I’m never on my own,” I said, and gave Brand’s back a quick smile.

“I was speaking in the plural, and I am still concerned.”

“Do you think this is one of your daily world-ending hypotheticals?”

A pause. Then, “I do not know. I’m calling for backup. Buy me time, Rune, but do not engage. Please.”

My heart skips became drumbeats. I hadn’t ever needed a level of backup beyond the Tower. He was the city’s backup.

I switched back to the public channel, confirmed Julia was there, and joined Brand under a chestnut tree, where he was likely scoping our best point of entry.

We decided on the staff entrance. The path to it had less cover than the tree-filled acreage by the front doors, but also the least number of windows to be spotted from.

“So that’s our plan?” Brand asked, tapping the mute button on his headset. “To buy Lord Tower time?”

I tapped my own mute button. “When the barrier comes down, they’ll rush the building. If whoever created that barrier is still on-site, things will get loud fast.”

“So we’ll stay quiet, poke around, and try to figure out what we’re going to end up fighting.”

“Piece of cake,” I overstated.

“Cake doesn’t give the Tower a nosebleed,” Brand said. He saw that I made a face. “What?”

“Did you see the Tower’s hands?”

“What about the Tower’s hands?”

“He lost some of his . . . er, fingers. The tips of them. They burned away.”

Brand didn’t even attempt a joke. All it took was a half-inhaled breath for him to understand the magnitude of that statement. He exhaled the word, Fuck.

We started moving toward the door. “Maybe we should try to get Corinne on the line, too,” Brand said uncertainly as we crouched behind a hedge and duck walked. “Should we have woken her up?”

“Yes?”

“I’m just not used to having other people to think about when we go in the field,” he said quietly in a rush.

“Me too,” I hissed back in total agreement. “I was just getting used to having Addam to call on when the shit really hit the fan, and now we have people we’re supposed to assign on a daily basis. Either management is good or it’s fucking terrifying.”

Brand unmuted his mic. “Jul . . . Julia, we’re in sight of the door. There’s a keypad.”

“Obtaining code from Lady Saint Brigid. One moment.”

Brand pulled out his phone while we waited and booted up the application that Mayan had downloaded. “They’ve got thumbnail photos of staff and guests. And . . . I see the vitals menu. Shit. This better not be working.”

“Brand,” Mayan said through the mic. Just that one word. Not unlike how Brand often just says my name as if it were an entire soliloquy.

“Yes, I know I’m live,” Brand said testily. “And this app better be broken, or else you’ve got seventeen flat lines.”

“This is Bethan Saint Brigid. I helped create the app. Are you looking at a menu that shows nine squares per screen? And are the squares blank, or truly showing a flat line?”

“Nine squares, and I can swipe up to see more. Eighteen squares total, seventeen flat lines and one blank. What does that mean?”

“It likely means seventeen deaths.” Her voice sounded like chalk—dry and rasping. “If a square is blank, it means that person has either been removed from the premises, or the armband tracking their vitals has been disabled or removed. I . . . must speak with my mother. In the meantime, you can use bypass code 115599 to open almost any door except the center’s vault.”

“Can we track where the bodies are?” I asked, and Brand shot me a quick glance of approval.

“Not normally. There are privacy concerns. Our IT people could configure something, but as data is not passing through the barrier you’ll likely find . . . what you’re looking for before then.”

Brand muted his mic and said, “Worst scavenger hunt ever.”

We kept low and made for the door. Brand typed the bypass code into the keypad, and the light below the number zero flashed from red to green.

We each took a side. I shook my hand and sent a burst of willpower into my sabre, now curled into its wristguard form. The metal softened and stretched, then scraped over my calloused knuckles. It solidified into a sword hilt that could shoot firebolts on command.

I scanned high and far, Brand scanned low and near, and we went through the door.

“Clear,” we both whispered in unison, and stepped into a cheerily painted employee area with hard floors and yellow walls. There were banks of lockers and coat hooks, and the air conditioning was set to arctic levels.

Moving low and slow, we advanced into a long, tiled corridor that headed into the public areas of the building, and also branched off to a large administrative office suite. We sifted into the suite first, at the headset advice of Bethan. She said the night manager shared an office with the daytime director.

The carpet and walls were teal with white trim. The main room had two desks. One was nearly buried under potted plants; the other was lined with bedazzled, framed pictures of a smiling girl in pigtails.

Brand tapped my shoulder and nodded toward a glass-walled office to our left. As he moved toward it, he nudged the mouse on each desk, checking to see if the computer was locked or open. All of them were locked—except for the monitor in the boss’s office.

Brand sat at the desk and alt-tabbed between open applications. There were only two: email, and some sort of security interface.

“Purse on the chair,” I said. “And there are sneakers under the desk. Maybe she changes into them when she leaves work?”

Brand looked over his shoulder, where I was hovering. He muted his mic. “So we’re both going to do this? We can absolutely both do this, instead of having you stand guard at the door to watch for killers.”

“We’re also in danger the entire time you’re making a long, sarcastic point, you know,” I whispered, but went to stand guard at the door.

“Lady Saint Brigid,” Brand said into his mic. “The night manager was looking at camera feeds in the building. The one in front of me is outside a room with a green door.”

There was a quick, surprised intake of breath on the line. Bethan said, “That is extremely unusual. It sounds like a residence. To access that camera without good reason would be an unforgivable invasion of privacy.”

“Do we have permission to scan recent emails?” Brand asked.

“Yes,” Bethan said after a noticeable pause, maybe to consult her mother. “We trust your discretion.”

It was good she did, because Brand had already started scrolling through emails.

“Check the sent box,” I suggested, which got a grunt from Brand. I sneaked back over to the desk but kept my sabre pointed at the doorway. Brand had pulled up an email the night manager had sent.

“Who is Jane Bludrick?” I asked over the headset.

“The senior director,” Bethan said. “She uses that office in the daytime.”

“Your night manager sent a message to Bludrick. It says: J, please pull the records on Jade. There’s some tension around her. I’m concerned.”

“Amongst each other, the staff refer to guests by their suite names,” Bethan said. “The video, the door—that would be the jade suite. I’m going to step off the line for a moment and have my people pull up client records.”

Brand tabbed back to the security interface. It took some trial and error, but he figured out how to tile the screen with all the building’s cameras. There were over twenty-five squares, and over half of them showed blue error screens.

“We’ll have to ask her if these cameras were always broken or offline,” Brand murmured.

“If what is broken?” a new voice asked.

It took me a second to realize Lady Priestess was on the line. Brand clamped his lips shut and refused to speak, because he hated talking to Arcana he didn’t know. So I said, “Most of the security cameras are offline.”

“We do not operate with broken equipment,” she said.

“Then we’ll assume it’s intentional,” I said. I pointed to a series of images on the bottom. “That’s downstairs, Brand. The building’s physical plant is in the basement. All the cameras are working.”

“If they’d infiltrated or extracted from there, why not destroy those cameras first? And I think those images are the attic—look how the roof slopes.”

“So maybe not a basement or rooftop entry,” I said.

“Or they were already here.” Brand shook his head, frustrated. Too many variables. He expanded some of the screens at random, probably looking for bodies or signs of violence. We saw none.

Just as we decided to head further into the first floor, there were three clicks on our headsets. Julia said, “I’ve opened a private channel for the three of us. Just tap the bud three times. I thought you might need the privacy—the main channel is crowded.”

“Oh,” I said. “Thank you. That’s a good idea.”

“You’re welcome, Lord Sun.”

Brand was trying to give me a meaningful eye roll about Julia’s efficiency, but I pretended I couldn’t see. We both triple-clicked back to the main line.

“There’s a cafeteria and spa on this floor,” Brand told our audience. “We’re moving there now.”

We backtracked to the main corridor.

“Should we go check that jade room?” I asked.

“Let’s clear floors as we go. Residences are on three; the medical units are on two. We could see if there are records on this person creating tension.”

I started to agree with him, but Brand’s hand shot up. He stiffened, turned his hand into a knife blade, and slashed it to my left.

“Holy shit,” I whispered as I saw what he did.

Sabre aimed, I stepped into a small room with thick cement walls. There was a built-in series of locked slots, not unlike safety deposit boxes. And dominating the room was a massive vault door. The door was open and hung at an angle. The hinges on the upper right had popped loose, and, at about chest-height, the metal near the opposite edge was ragged and torn.

“Those are finger marks,” Brand whispered. He fit his hand into the indentations. “Not weapon marks. Not claws. Just hand strength.”

“Lady Saint Brigid, your vault is compromised,” I said.

“Please, call me Bethan. Did you say finger marks?”

“The door was torn clear. What sorts of things did you keep in the vault? Could that be the reason for whatever is happening?”

“There would be a small supply of currency, for daily needs. But the vault is mainly used to store client sigils. We do not allow sigil spells on the premises—we don’t want anything to interfere with the rejuvenation magics on the second floor. But . . . Why take them? You can’t steal sigils.”

That was close to the truth, but not precise. Sigil ownership was a complicated bond, affected by ancient magics not dissimilar to that which enforced our vows and oaths. Sigils could be bought and sold. They could be inherited. And they could even be won through the death or defeat of anyone who had a claim on the sigil, so long as that claim wasn’t first shared with others.

I muted my microphone. Brand did the same. We looked at each other for a long moment, but it turned out no words were necessary. We both knew that absolute conquest and flat vital signs opened the door to an entirely plausible theory. They’d figure it out themselves soon enough. We unmuted our mics and walked into the vault.

There was enough room inside for both of us, with space to spare. Everything was in disarray. Bins had been overturned, their contents scattered. Objects—sigils—littered the ground. I crouched and lightly ran my fingers across a corncob pipe, a tortoise shell monocle, some plain metal discs.

“Interesting,” I said.

“All of these baskets are empty,” Brand said. “Those are sigils on the ground?”

“They are, and they’re really . . . specific. They look like junk, actually. Not very fashionable.”

“Says the man with a cock ring on his thigh,” Brand said, and the fact that he hit his mute button first was the only reason I didn’t punch him in the kidney.

“They’re random,” I continued in a firm voice. “It’s like . . .”

“Like someone picked what they wanted. Like they were shopping. If I was robbing sigils I’d take them all. A corncob pipe can still be used to light people on fire.”

“Are you muting, Brand?” Mayan asked.

Brand scowled, but unmuted. “The vault was rifled, and plenty of sigils were left behind. Whatever happened, it feels . . . personal? Amateurish.”

“We’ll run an inventory,” Bethan said. “It’ll be easy enough to find out what’s missing.”

“We’re going to head toward the—”

An intercom system gently pinged overhead. Lady Priestess said, “Good morning, guests. I hope you had an enjoyable night’s sleep. The facilities are officially open, and your experience is our most singular purpose. I’ll now ask LaShawna to read today’s news.”

The programmed message ended in silent news-lessness.

Over the com, Lady Priestess said, “I was told a recording of my voice would make people feel welcome.”

The vault didn’t have any more to tell us—though I did pause to slip fingers into the indentations on the door, which were smaller than mine.

Back in the corridor, we slowly advanced through the first floor, passing closed spa, boutique, and retail suites. The only space that was open and accessible was a cafeteria that was much too upscale to be called a cafeteria. Inlaid coral lettering above the door called it the Commissary.

“There,” Brand whispered, pointing to a table with a glass of wine on it. “Awkward seating, there’s a better view by the window, but someone wanted walls at their back. And . . . blood.”

I stepped around him and looked at the bottle of red wine on the table, along with the crystal wineglass with wide hips. There were spatters and smears of blood along the tabletop.

“Someone sat here for a late-night glass of wine? They were hurt and then bled?” I guessed. “Not much blood though.”

“Rune,” Brand said, in the tone he used when he wanted me to look more closely. I noticed that he’d also muted his mic.

I bent close to the wineglass. It wasn’t just spattered with droplets of blood. There were bloody fingerprints on it. I touched a finger against one of the larger droplets on the tabletop and saw that it was gelatinous—old enough to still be liquid, but not fresh. And . . .

Ahh. And there were smears under the glass.

“Someone sits down and gets hurt,” Brand said. “How does blood get under the glass? Play it back again, but imagine someone already covered in blood sitting down and casually drinking a glass of wine. Imagine that someone being our killer—what does it take to sit still and relax after something like that?”

“Are you muting again?” Mayan said. “Explain what you’re seeing.”

Brand took a quick breath through his nostrils, unmuted his mic, and said, “Julia, private channel with Mayan Saint Joshua, please.”

“Connected,” Julia said.

“You’re leaving it on mute,” Mayan immediately criticized.

“I am,” Brand agreed. “And maybe fucking remember that I know how a fucking headset works, and maybe fucking think we’re maybe fucking saying something or seeing something the Tower wouldn’t appreciate us saying on a public line. Or maybe we’re trying to minimize dialogue while we’re trapped in a barrier with a killer.”

“Julia, please return us to an open line,” Mayan said. Then, brittle, “Brandon Saint John will update us as it becomes convenient.”

Brand gave the glass another squint, then angled his gaze upwards. “I don’t like this. We’re not going upstairs with a target on our fu—on our backs. We’re maintaining radio silence and moving to a private channel with Julia. She can pass you the running commentary.”

No one had time to protest, because the Tower immediately said, “Proceed.”

“There is more information first,” Bethan said quickly. “We have the guest log. I can identify the families—” She stopped, a pause so slick it may not have even happened. “And names of those involved.”

This was Atlantis. We were not human. I didn’t blame Bethan—the living were always a far greater threat than the dead. I’d be more worried about which families had lost loved ones today, too, as opposed to the currently theoretical survival of the actual kin.

“How many guests are throne affiliated?” I asked.

“Is that relevant right now?” Lady Priestess asked.

“Only to see if it affects me,” I said bluntly. “Lord Tower?”

“There’s a male scion from a lesser house of the Crusader Throne. A female scion from a greater house in the Bone Hollows. And there’s a member of a . . .” A half-second pause. “A family that once pledged to your father. The Ambersons.”

“I know them,” I said, surprised, and that sounded so naïve and stupid that I almost broke skin when I bit my lip.

“Who is staying in that green room?” Brand asked. “The jade room.”

“That’s the interesting thing,” Bethan said. “It’s what we call an Alan Smithee package. It’s our highest degree of anonymity. It happens, sometimes, especially with Atlanteans who are technically under exile orders—it’s very expensive, and very secure. We maintain few personal identifiers beyond what we need to provide treatment.”

And payment, I thought. They’d certainly maintain the method of payment for someone who could afford such complete privacy.

“We need to go upstairs,” I said. “And Brand is right—we need to run silent. Lord Tower, I know you’ll look into the court affiliations to see if what’s happening is some sort of . . . I don’t know, unsanctioned raid? Or politically related? But I’ve got to be honest, I’m seeing a lot of personality in the violence so far. I think we may be looking for one person.”

“Understood,” Lord Tower said. “Brand, you’re positive that email you read said her? The troublesome client was called a her?”

“I’m positive,” Brand said. He mouthed, Because I can spell.

“Very good. Rune, we’ll hold contact unless imperative. Continue to buy me time.”

Brand and I both triple-clicked our earbuds. “Julia?” I said.

“Yes, Lord Sun.”

“Anyone else other than Julia?” I asked. Silence. I let out a gusty sigh. “That was annoying.”

“It so fucking was,” Brand said in an aggrieved voice. “Is this what it’s going to be like? Having all these voices in our head whenever we’re on a mission?”

“You keep asking me if this is what it’s going to be like,” I said. “I have literally shared every moment of my existence with you. When did you see me sneak away and have different life experiences?”

He went over and checked the lobby through a big archway. An elaborate, double-headed stairway snaked along the walls for two levels above our heads. Shaking his head, he knifed his hand back in the direction we came. “There’s a staff stairwell back that way. Let’s take that. I want a look at the medical facilities.”

So we began backtracking, clearing as we went all over again, because Brand insisted on stuff like that. The stairwell in the administrative section was eggshell-painted concrete and linoleum tiling, clean and functional.

We moved to the second floor. The medical units there looked like hotel hallways that had been accidentally decorated in healer equipment. The walls were freshly painted; heavy crystal vases held cut flowers barely a day away from their stems; and the magazines were all current.

“I smell smoke,” I whispered, “and there’s a crackling sound?”

“Electrical fire,” Brand said, breathing through his nose. “There’s burning plastic too. Julia, what’s our twenty?”

“You’re in the intake lobby. Ahead are the triage areas. Past that you’ll start getting into the actual rejuvenation suites. I’m trying to patch into their system to see if any fire alarms have been triggered.”

“We’ll find out soon enough. We’re running silent.”

“Acknowledged,” she said, and the headset went quiet.

Brand already had his knives out. I began touching my sigils. Angular facets of light appeared around my body, and a fever-flush raised the goose-flesh on my arms. I pulled Shield inside me, and sent Fire into my sabre hilt to strengthen its already powerful enchantments.

Balancing our body weight in a low crouch, we stepped around the nursing station and into a hallway. Examination areas were on each side, doors open, rooms empty. Ahead of us, the smell of smoke grew stronger, and a twitching gray flicker filled the nearby archway.

He swung left, I swung right, and I began tracking the corners of the room with my sabre to see if anything was prepared to jump out at us.

“Clear,” Brand breathed. “And holy shit.”

This room was filled with medical equipment and a row of reclining chairs. Under the electric hum of technology was something stronger and older, a type of magic unique to the Papess Throne.

At least three banks of hardware had been destroyed. Most of the monitors were dead, but one was flickering and sparking, filling the air with the toxic smell of burning plastic. Brand went over to one of the control boards. Torn wires trailed to a data port on the wall. A massive hard drive stuck out of the drywall about twenty feet away.

I spotted the blood first, spreading in a pool from behind a half-closed cloth curtain. We went over to it together, Brand four steps ahead to keep an eye on anything that may enter from the other side of the room. I lagged, thinking I’d be the one to check a pulse.

Then I saw the bodies.

“Jesus fucking wept,” I swore, and stomach acid churned up my throat.

My brain tried to piece the body parts together in my head. I wasn’t even sure how many bodies were actually piled there, because they were not whole.

And worse, so much worse, my brain decided to hijack this moment by making me remember other horrible and recent moments. Through memory’s eyes, I saw a young man crawling into a safe. I saw a floor littered with gleaming white skeletons. Saw waves of power coming off a noose, ripping metal insects into existence.

Brand muted his mic and whispered, “Stay with me, Rune.”

“Okay,” I said, swallowing. I breathed through my nose—and now I could smell the copper and shit under the acridity of burning equipment. I dug my nails into the palms of my hand until the pain sent the memories scurrying. “Okay. Okay. Julia, confirm for the others that there are fatalities. Details to follow once we clear the floor.”

“Confirmed,” she said, and clicked off the line to make her report.

“Torn vault,” Brand said. “That computer equipment must weigh at least two hundred pounds, and it’s been chucked through the wall.”

“The . . . torn bodies,” I added. “Strength. Sigil magic could do this—but you’d need overlapping spells to protect your joints and bones.” It was easier, treating this like a case. Like an investigation. “It’s excessive. That glass of wine downstairs? That’s dismissive. The sigils that were picked through? That’s dismissive. I’m reading this as temperamental noble.”

“Angry,” Brand added. “Someone is angry. Destroying equipment sends a message, even if it’s just a tantrum.” He nodded back to the pile of bodies. “They’re all in scrubs. I think they’re staff.”

“Blood trail leads from there,” I said, seeing the drag smears leading into another room.

Brand edged far enough toward that doorway until he could see what was beyond. “Capsules,” he said. “Like big tubes?”

“The rejuvenation chambers,” I said.

I joined him, and I did not look at the bodies again as I passed.

The destruction in the next room was even more pronounced. The huge machines—which kept scions in stasis for days or weeks while their bodies rejuvenated—were destroyed. Ripped out of their moorings; kicked across the room; flipped over.

There was a body on the ground by one of the machines. A young man with hair to his waist. His neck had been flattened or crushed. It was as thin as the width of my hand.

Someone coughed.

Brand and I both turned in fast circles, trying to pinpoint the source. I kept my sabre pointed, primed to fire.

Brand cut his hand toward a half-open door, and we moved toward it. He stopped with his hand on the knob and gave me a look. I nodded. He pushed the door slowly to quickly silence any squeal or creak.

Through the widening slice I saw rows of shelving units filled with pill bottles and elixir vials. A pharmacy?

We slid into the room, clearing the corners. Two people were hogtied on the ground with torn computer cords. Brand gestured for me to approach while he continued to walk around the shelving units, making sure we were alone.

A man and a woman. The woman was dead; she had no pulse. The man must have been the one who coughed, but he wasn’t conscious now. I put my hand on his wrist and felt a racing, irregular heartbeat. His face was raw and swollen from a beating. One of his eyes was blackened, its red bruise just beginning to show the faintest sign of purple.

First I sent a spark of willpower into my sabre. A garnet dirk boiled up from the hilt, which I used to cut the man’s ropes. Then I touched the emerald ring on my finger and released a Healing spell. I didn’t know where the worst injuries were, so I feathered my fingers along his jaw and sent the energy into him. The skin under my touch warmed and reddened like a sunburn.

Brand came back to my side. He crouched with a knee on the ground and studied the area around us. His eye caught an overturned tripod. He dropped to a push-up position, and from that angle saw something I couldn’t.

He reached under a desk and fished out a digital video camera.

“I can’t even tell what’s wrong with him,” I whispered. “I don’t even know if this is enough to stabilize him. What’s that?”

“Not sure. Battery is dead. But it’s not part of the security system, so maybe there’s some footage on here that’s relevant. Julia?”

“I’m here.”

“Tell Mayan there’s at least one survivor. Condition critical. Rune’s used a Healing on him, but he’s not conscious.”

“Acknowledged.”

We both had pockets, but Brand’s were usually filled with weapons of mass destruction, while mine usually had snacks. Or at least they did before I had a six-year-old running around my life; now I was just as likely to have acorns, which Corbie insisted our dinosaur liked. The digital camera was small but bulky, so I stuck it in my front jacket pocket.

We couldn’t do anything else for the injured pharmacist, so we backtracked to the main medical suite. There was another collection of offices along the north side of the floor. A plaque on the wall announced the area as Counseling.

“Weird,” Brand murmured, pointing to a richly carpeted spiral stairway inside one of the individual counseling offices.

“They all have a stairway in them,” I added, looking at the room on the other side of the hall.

There was a click on our headset. Brand said, “Something to add, Julia?” And then, grudging, “Thanks for maintaining radio silence.”

“You’re welcome,” she said crisply. “You’re right under the Playrooms. Staircases on the blueprints correspond with individual rooms above each counseling office.”

Brand spotted a blood trail, nudged my arm, and went into the office it led from. By a clear footprint, he knelt and peered. “Bare feet. Walking toward the medical area. It looks like someone came downstairs this way.”

“So they’d be below us? Unless they doubled back to the main staircase?”

“Unless they’ve left the building altogether,” Brand said. “Maybe the barrier is supposed to slow down the discovery of the bodies? Should we check upstairs? Or stay with the wounded?”

“I can’t do anything else for this man right now. I say we go upstairs—I want to see the jade suite.”

We went up the carpeted stairway to the third floor. At the landing was another room, nearly identical in size to the counseling office below us.

And that was where the similarities ended.

The third-floor room was decorated like the American 1970s, complete with an open closet filled with bellbottoms and polyester, and random kitsch like Chia Pets, a waterbed, and bottles of Campari on a sideboard. On a bamboo nightstand were red-glass vases filled with condoms, lubricant, and dildos.

And there was a body. A young man wearing a tie-dye T-shirt and nothing else was sprawled in a pool of wet carpet, a jagged slice of broken coatrack sticking out of his chest. The point of the coatrack had gone clean through his sternum so that the body appeared to be floating an inch above the ground.

“I know I should be looking at the body,” Brand said, “but what the fuck am I looking at?” He poked the corner of the waterbed.

“They do call it the playroom,” I said.

Brand shook it off and went over to the dead man. “Is this poor shit staff or guest?”

“Not sure. But he wasn’t torn apart. I’m thinking that this room wasn’t a destination, it was just a path downstairs. Or the killer was in a hurry?”

“Julia, what’s ahead of us?” Brand asked. “Where is the jade suite?”

“The guest residences are on the other side of the floor. Between you and the suites is a bar, an infinity pool, a gym, and more privacy chambers like the one you’re in.”

“Can you find us a roundabout route to the residences?” I said. “Something direct?”

“Yes, my lord. There should be two doors in this room. One of them leads to the staff area. That’ll avoid the public areas.”

“That one,” Brand said, pointing to a door painted the same color as the wall. He went over and laid a palm on the door, applying enough pressure to control the motion of opening it. When it was ajar enough for perspective, he raised his hand in a this way gesture.

The cement corridor outside was lined with doors to other playrooms. The corridor funneled into a square antechamber, which opened up into a massive room filled with racks and racks of clothing and accessories. Not much of it was modern—there was a huge selection of male and female clothing from centuries past.

On one table I saw a basket of pamphlets. The cover read: Revisit the decade of your youth in our certified privacy chambers, with our internationally renowned staff of intimacy therapists.

Rejuvenating bodies came with consequences. The stable hormones of adulthood were slowly peeled back, layer by layer, leaving you with the energy and adrenaline of youth. The rooms on this floor were where those hormones were . . . released.

We crossed an open space lined with mirrored vanity stations. There were two partially open doors in this area. Brand approached one, sniffed, and said, “Chlorine. Maybe the infinity pool.” I went to the other door and saw an uncarpeted hallway. It seemed to continue in a straight line to the other side of the third floor.

“Julia,” I said. “I think I see which way to go. How do we find the jade suite?”

“Lady Saint Brigid reports that each room is marked with a colored door. Once you’re in the resident wing, the jade suite will be the last door on the left.”

Since it didn’t look like the killer had come this way, we moved at a fast walk down the hall. The door at the end was closed, which Brand opened with more caution than I’d seen from him yet. He even had us slide low to the ground, to contain and misdirect our body space.

There was no killer on the other side. Just a kill zone.

There were bodies everywhere. We walked into the hallway, and even Brand took a second to remember to sweep his eyes in a professional three-sixty.

The violence was both efficient and graphic. I saw it clearly in my head: a strong spell-caster moving through a crowd of people without sigils or spells of their own. The killer had barely treated them as human, just as punching bags for their rage. Less than punching bags. Punching bags remained whole after you hit them.

“We’re going to need to walk through the crime scene,” Brand said. And since we’d been doing that since we set foot inside the building, I knew he meant that we were literally going to need to step on the crime scene. The blood spatter and viscera was everywhere. At least I wasn’t about to throw up this time.

“It’s not as bad,” I said slowly. “It’s bad, but not like the staff we saw in the medical area. Whoever did this wanted those people to suffer.”

I continued to speak as I followed Brand’s footsteps. “So imagine this happens in the middle of the night. Most guests are asleep. Maybe some are in the social areas. The killer is angry. People come to their doors to investigate shouts or screams. And . . . this happens.”

“I don’t think the killer is still here,” Brand said.

“No. I don’t either. Green door—up there.”

“We probably should just step aside and wait for the Tower to bring the barrier down,” Brand said.

“We probably should,” I agreed, as neither of us stopped walking.

In a way, the worst violence we’d seen yet was inside the jade suite, a plush set of rooms decorated in light green accents. There was a body there. She hadn’t been ripped apart—she’d been beaten to death. She wore a black apron over tan pants and a white blouse now soaked a deep claret.

There was a floor-length mirror by a chaise lounge in the corner. Medical gauze littered the floor. Brand poked through the pile with his dagger, showing how the ends were stretched and torn, not cut.

Though an open doorway was a smaller bedroom dominated by a king-sized mattress. The sheets were unmade and covered in items that radiated power. Sigils. None of them looked like they’d been placed there—they looked like they’d been discarded or tossed away. I peeked around the edge of the bed and saw where some had bounced and landed on the floor.

“Why throw away sigils?” Brand asked. “These are pretty generic—discs, pocket watches, hair pins . . .”

“They’ll be tied to bloodlines,” I guessed. “Some sigils aren’t tied to a single user, they’re tied to a family. Like Addam’s platinum discs. If you defeated Addam, you couldn’t take his sigils by conquest, since they belong to the Crusader Throne.”

Brand wandered back into the living area. I went over to a closed wardrobe and opened it. On the other side was a lot of unusually basic clothing, not quite what you’d expect from a wealthy customer. Simple sandals sat at the bottom of the wardrobe, covered in a flaking greenish clay. I filed that away—it was specific enough to be unusual.

I followed Brand back into the living room. I was half a second away from telling Julia that we’d cleared the room when Brand said, “Holy shit,” and knelt by the battered young woman.

“This was recording,” he said, holding up a cell phone that had been hidden under the woman’s arm. He showed me the lock screen. “She may have been recording what happened.”

He gently picked up the woman’s hand, wiped off her thumb, and rolled it along the phone’s button until it unlocked. He navigated to the camera functionality, and sure enough, the last item in the album was a nineteen-second video.

He tapped the play button.

Tinny sound. A crooked camera angle showing only carpet. The camera jumped as the person recording backed up jerkily.

Shouts. A woman’s deep, scratchy voice. A younger woman’s hysterical voice.

WOMAN ONE: You water-blooded fools! You incompetent perversions!

WOMAN TWO: My lady, the bandages, it’s early, you shouldn’t—

WOMAN ONE: What is this failure? Where is my youth!

WOMAN TWO: My lady, please! Please! Let me call the night manager, she’ll—

WOMAN ONE: [Screams in fury]

WOMAN TWO: [Screams in surprise]

The screams only continued from there, moving from shock to genuine pain, and finally to terror. There was no video of the people involved, just the shifting scenes of carpet at a distance, and then up close as the beaten woman fell. The video stopped suddenly after that.

“Gods,” I whispered, as a piece fell into place. And then something else occurred to me, and I repeated, though in a different tone entirely, “Oh, gods. Julia, confirm who is on this line.”

“My lord? It’s a private line. Just the three of us.”

“I need you to be sure.”

“I am. As sure as I can be. Should I—”

“Are we being recorded?”

“No, my lord. You’re a member of the Arcanum. I would never record you without your explicit permission. Is anything—”

“You will speak to no one of this. Not a supervisor, not a friend, not a lover. No one.”

The line went dead for a second before she replied, somewhat haughtily, “My discretion is absolute, my lord.”

“Julia,” I said, raising my own voice. “Tell me you understood what I’ve said.”

“Of course I understand. But I would never—”

Brand had been looking at me with a puzzled expression. He didn’t know why I was upset. But he understood what I was upset about. “He’s protecting you,” he interrupted. “Shut up and do what he fucking says.”

“I will speak of this to no one,” she said.

“Thank you. Vacate the line. Set up a direct communication with Lord Tower immediately. Ensure our absolute privacy.”

“At once.”

Brand didn’t even have time to raise an eyebrow. The Tower was there a beat later with a single, “Rune.”

“We found a short video. A woman I believe to be the killer was in a rage because rejuvenation hadn’t worked.”

“Hadn’t worked,” he said, with slight emphasis on the second word.

“It failed to make her young,” I said.

Lord Tower went silent. He understood what I was saying, and the potential implications of it. “Stand by. I have the assistance I need. We’re about to bring the barrier down.”

I went over to a draped window and parted a curtain. My willpower pulsed into my vision, bringing the barrier into soft definition. I felt Brand at my shoulder, his breath on my neck. Ten seconds later, the faint sheen of the yellow barrier turned pale blue. Then the blue deepened until delicate traceries of frost spread along the curve, thickening into a glacial shimmer. I felt the release of multiple mass sigil spells, and the barrier detonated into whorls of colorlessness not unlike snow.

I knew someone on the island who was a master of Frost magic, and who the Tower wouldn’t mind calling for backup.

“I think our big sister is here,” I said.

Everything became a mess of activity after that.

The Tower’s elite staff spread through the building. The wounded pharmacist was stabilized and taken to the hospital under armed escort. For a while, I heard the shocked sounds of Lady Priestess in the hallway, along with the throatier calmness of Lady Death. But the Tower sequestered me in the jade suite, asking Brand for a private moment with me.

He closed the door and spent a good two minutes just studying the violent diorama before him. And then he watched and re-watched the video clip three times.

“A woman. Mature, from the sound of the voice,” he said. “You saw no other signs of unusual magic activity?”

“Such as?”

“You would know. The forbidden sort.”

“No. Nothing that couldn’t be explained by sigil use in the hands of a very good spell-caster. You think I’m right, don’t you? That this was either an Arcana or principality?”

“I believe I do.” He went over to the mirror and stared at the bandages on the ground.

I’d learned recently that all powerful Atlanteans—the ones who topped the scales as either freelance powers known as principalities or as the Arcana who led courts—were marked by a unique, secret power called the Arcana Majeure. I’d used it before by accident, not knowing what it was or, most importantly, what the cost was. It wasn’t unlike using an imaginary sigil that was powered by your own life force. You never got back the life you expended. It ate away at your ability to rejuvenate. Lord Tower had told me the reason he always appears as a man in his early forties was that centuries of periodic Arcana Majeure use had made it impossible for him to rejuvenate younger.

What sort of life would an Arcana or principality have lived to prevent any sort of rejuvenation?

“Could this be the Empress?” I asked.

“I don’t believe so. I could have broken through any barrier she raised, at least.”

There was another matter I’d been waiting to bring up. I looked at Lord Tower’s back and said, “One other thing. Please don’t kill Julia.”

Lord Tower turned and gave me a beautifully blank face.

“This isn’t a fishing expedition,” I said. “You know exactly what I mean. There’s no reason Julia will ever link what happened to the Arcana Majeure. Why would she, if we’ve done as good a job as you think keeping it secret? And if we haven’t, shame on us.”

The Tower said nothing, so I did something I’d never done before, not ever.

“Anton,” I said. “Please. As a favor to me. I’ve got enough blood on my hands already; the only thing I can hold onto is that nearly all of them deserved it. She does not.”

He buried a sigh in the motion of pulling out his phone. He swiped open a text, read it, put the phone away. “Let’s join Lady Death outside. She and Brandon have moved to the courtyard.”

“Is that my answer?”

“Julia will be under constant surveillance for the next three months. If I hear so much as a word of this breathed through her lips, she will be handled. That is the best I can do.”

“Fair,” I agreed, and let it go. I had enough responsibilities in my life; I had no time to navigate this issue further beyond Lord Tower’s word.

Because he was the Tower, he didn’t bother with anything as mundane as an elevator or stairway. He brushed a manicured nail—from his unbandaged hand—over a ruby ring, held out his arm, and manifested a Door. The short-range teleportation spell looked like a miniature tornado until it anchored to the ground and stabilized. A circular portal now hovered in the air.

Lord Tower held out his arm, which I stared at. He shook the arm. I rolled my eyes and put my hand on his wrist. I felt the surge of his willpower as he guided us into the portal. Whatever he did seemed to affect the unstable nature of teleportation. Usually, I wound up on my ass, with gravity spinning around me like a snapped tether. This time I simply emerged from the other side standing on thick, springy grass.

Lady Death and Lady Priestess sat around a glass patio set, with Brand and Mayan at attention behind them. Everyone here knew what the Arcana Majeure was, which was not accidental. No one else—not even Lord Tower’s guards or Lady Priestess’s daughter—were in eyesight or earshot for this discussion.

Lady Death, a woman appearing near my age with the help of at least one rejuvenation treatment of her own, had dark skin; thick, shiny hair; and favored the color red. Her braids were gathered atop one shoulder, and nearly all of her jewelry invisibly sparked with the power of sigils.

“A grim morning, little brother,” she said. She nudged a chair with her foot, angling it toward me.

I sat down with the gusty sound of not-being-as-young-as-I-once-was. It bothered me that Brand was standing, but when I flashed a look at him, he gave me a small shake of his head.

“Those were hard sights inside,” she said. “You and Brand continue to take me to the nicest places. I still haven’t washed the battleship from my eyes.”

“We’re unlikely to have much time to speak alone like this,” Lady Priestess said in a distracted voice, fiddling with the corner of her cat-eye glasses. “Bethan will be suspicious. I have a lot of clever children, but she’s the most stubborn about it. She doesn’t know about the Arcana Majeure, of course. And I’m assuming we’ll mention that—because that’s a very likely culprit for failure to rejuvenate.”

“First—are we agreed that this is officially an Arcanum matter, and will be afforded our highest levels of confidentiality?” Lord Tower asked. “No one is to view evidence, or participate in the investigation, without Mayan’s explicit approval.”

Mayan dipped his chin at Lord Tower. Everyone else voiced their agreement.

“I have some thoughts about what Brand and I can do next,” I said. “We need to bag the shoes in the jade suite—the mud on them looked distinct.”

“It will be done,” Lord Tower said. “As for you? You have a court to run. Mayan will reach out if he needs assistance.”

I didn’t say anything right away. With only a little throat clearing, I said, “I would like to remain involved.”

“You are Arcana. You will remain informed,” the Tower corrected. “Your days of running down suspects are over, Lord Sun.”

“Oh,” I said. And I didn’t know what to do with that. My brain told me to get angry, but this was probably one of those times that my brain was getting me in trouble. So I did the throat-clearing thing again. “Given my experience, it seems like I should at least advise. I may have good insight.”

Lady Death threw back her head and laughed. “Oh, little brother, I will so enjoy becoming friends with you.” Then, more seriously. “Don’t be too eager for a seat at this table. It will come soon enough.”

I gave her a tight and not entirely ungrateful smile.

“Very well. While we’re together and the matter is fresh, let’s review what we know,” Lord Tower said.