11

THIEVES LIKE US

An hour later

Still trapped with Texas and Michigan in the World Quest pit of despair

Okay, maybe five minutes was not all I needed. Especially when one of the people I was talking to was as stubborn as Texas.

“You know what I think?” Texas said, his voice screaming loud and clear across my headset. “I think you want them to find us. That this is all just some giant treasure hunt to you—one big excuse to hunt down Shangri-La.”

“What I’m trying to do is stop them—” I heard an electrical snap across my headset. “Hey, asshole, what the hell happened to my audio?” I said, but the only place my voice sounded was around my room.

“How? By leading the fucking pack?” Texas continued.

Son of a bitch, he’d cut my mic output. No way was I letting them have an argument with me when I couldn’t argue back.

Carpe, get my mic back on, I messaged.

“We’ve got your messages too, you know. We run the game, remember?”

I heard my mic click back on; apparently I was allowed to speak again. “I’ve been trying to find you because I don’t want the IAA to win. Call me sentimental, but I’d rather not see anyone else subjected to their personal brand of screwing people over.”

“And I’m guessing that the IAA offering you a pardon makes no never mind to you?” Texas said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

Why did everyone always assume the worst of me? “Been there, done that. They fuck you over. The end.”

“Look at it from our perspective, Owl,” Michigan piped up again. “Even if your intentions were good, all you’ve done is lead them closer.”

“And you keep underestimating them. If I’d left them to their own devices, one of them would have stumbled onto your hiding spot and you’d have been none the wiser. And if you haven’t noticed, the mercenaries they’ve brought in are serious—as in guns and explosives serious.”

Michigan and Texas went silent. The fact that the World Quest avatars had the best graphics in the game made it look as if Texas was glaring at me. Considering how well we got along, he probably was.

I closed my eyes. I didn’t have time to convince them . . .

Texas sighed. “All right, say we believe you—big fucking if; what do you plan on doing about it? Let me guess, we just let you stroll into our hideout.”

I made a face. “No, asshole, you can keep your fucking hiding place.”

“Everyone calm down,”Michigan said before Texas could add insult to injury. “Hypothetically, what is it you’re proposing?”

“Okay, the first step in dealing with the IAA in my opinion is to screw them where it hurts—”

Texas snickered. I ignored him.

“In this case, figure out whatever the hell it is they’re after and why now. I have the first part of that equation. I was really hoping you two could shed light on the why now—beyond the fact that they want magic they can use.”

“How about you shining a giant floodlight on the game?” Texas said.

The more I’d run it over in my head, the more I wasn’t buying it. Me turning up artifacts couldn’t be the whole story. I was a pain in their ass, but even I didn’t have those kinds of delusions of grandeur.

There was a pause on the line. Carpe was keeping oddly silent.

“What?” When there wasn’t an immediate answer, I was certain. “What are you two not telling me?”

I heard Michigan sigh. “We were hoping you knew something on the IAA’s motives.” His avatar even took on a reticent expression. “To be honest, we were worried. Well, we kind of assumed—”

Texas answered. “What he’s trying to say is that we figured you wanted to get your grubby hands into Shangri-La and were orchestrating this whole fiasco.”

“Oh, come on. Seriously? I am not that much of an asshole.” Petty thievery, maybe, but break into Shangri-La? I’d thought about it, fantasized in my dreams a couple times, but even I have lines. “Besides, I wouldn’t know where to look. And you can be damn sure I sure wouldn’t get the IAA involved. Do I look that stupid? Don’t answer that, Texas,” I added as one of them cleared their throat. “They came to me—”

“And offered you a deal.”

“Breaking into my apartment to threaten me, then opening a bounty on World Quest is not a deal. Worse, now they know I’m not playing ball, so they’ve offered me up to the mercenaries. And no,” I said, pointing at the camera, “you can’t offer me to the mercenaries to get your own necks out of trouble,” I added.

I waited, a prickly feeling like static crawling over my skin as their CGI avatars appeared to converse. It was like a flashback from when I’d had a fever and had been convinced I was in the game. I pushed the sensation aside. I was just watching a game with very good graphics and having an LSD-like flashback from the curse . . . probably happened all the time.

“They’re not above making a show of things to set an example,” Texas said, but without his usual bluster. “I’ve seen it before; remember the Aztec dig back in 2005?”

“They let them go free after a couple weeks in jail, said it was all one big mistake,” I said as my memory jogged. A couple of grad students on a Mexico dig had been caught telling supernatural tales to impress coeds on spring break. A couple kilos of cocaine had ended up in their luggage.

Texas snorted. “Yeah, funny how they never told that to the drug lords the IAA lifted the cocaine from in the first place. They still don’t get a good night’s sleep.”

“I think we should tell her,” Michigan said.

“Why? So she can tell the mercenaries?”

I banged my head on the desk. “I already told you I’m not working with the mercenaries. Tell them, Carpe.”

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean you can’t?”

“I mean I don’t think she’s working with the mercenaries. They’re chasing her too—but it’s not like I know for certain.”

“Carpe, you’re a lousy World Quest partner,” I said, then turned my attention back to the World Quest dynamic duo. “Okay, ignore the part about not being certain. You heard him, and you like him, and he doesn’t think I’m dirty. That’s got to count for something?”

Texas’s avatar narrowed his eyes and glared at me. “What is that thing I keep hearing about you? Something about a brother standing in a Mexican whorehouse?”

I swore. I was blaming Benji for that one. “Look, will you stop it with the insults? I’m trying to help, not lead you to the mercenary slaughter.”

Michigan piped up. “No offense, Owl, but intentions aside, you kind of have a reputation.”

“He’s got a point,” Carpe said.

“Carpe—stop helping. And what happened to me saving the world twice? From an army of the living dead and getting you that stupid book.”

“Okay, I had a pretty big hand in guiding you toward the book—but yeah, if you consider that three months ago an army of corpses flooded L.A., she kind of stopped it.”

I gritted my teeth. “Thanks for that resounding endorsement. Really gets me right here,” I said, slapping my chest over my heart.

“Hey, I’m trying to help. I’m not like you; I won’t corrupt my own morals to do the right thing.”

The audio feed snapped. “How the hell are you two one of the best teams in World Quest?” Texas said. “Jesus, it’s like listening to a couple of three-years-olds. Fucking unbelievable. I’m starting to think we should say to hell with the game and take the whole thing down.” There was a sigh. “All right, I’ve heard enough. You two are both in my asshole books.”

“Me?” Carpe piped up. “What did I do?”

“You threw your teammate under the fucking bus. Who does that?” Texas said.

“Have you met her?”

Oh, for the love of— “Go to hell, Carpe.”

Texas snorted. “I’m putting an end to this twisted three-ring circus now. Owl, you and your fucking elf can take your IAA shit storm and—”

“Wait.”

We all went silent as Michigan spoke up. “It’s because they found out we’re in Shangri-La. They weren’t certain before, but somehow they got confirmation. That’s what started this new hunt.”

That wasn’t what I’d been expecting. I’d assumed the IAA had known they were in Shangri-La. I mean, that was where the clues had led. “How . . . who told them?” I asked.

“You’re my first choice.”

“Frank—enough.” Michigan let out a breath. “We know you didn’t tell them. For the most part the last four years we got lucky. We weren’t exactly high up on the food chain.”

Texas jumped in. “They knew it was a possibility we’d found it, but I don’t think any of them really believed we could find it—or any trace of it.”

“In the last few weeks that changed. At first we thought it was one of you two figuring out that if we had it on the World Quest map, it had to be real. But then the time line doesn’t work out,” Michigan said.

“You’re not the first treasure hunter they’ve gone after in the last few months. I don’t think you even made their list of first choices.”

“Let me guess, I trash just as many sites as I don’t?” I said. Captain picked that moment to jump up from his nap, scattering my papers and letting out a startled chirp. I caught most of them before they cascaded off the desk, then shoved Captain off them before he could do any more damage.

“No, more than everyone knows the IAA fucked you over pretty spectacularly and even they’re not stupid enough to go chasing rattlesnakes,” Texas said.

“Fascinating character assassination aside, that still doesn’t answer the why NOW—” The last part I had to shout because Captain decided to let out another long meow.

“What is that?” Michigan asked.

“My cat,” I said, and scrambled to grab a glass he knocked over before it rolled off the desk. Captain hopped to the floor and slinked for the door.

“My God; not only are you loud and obnoxious but your animal is too?” Texas said.

As if in answer, Captain let out another wail. I frowned. He was crouching by the door, alert, his tail twitching rapidly and his ears back.

A cold chill hit me. My cat didn’t do that unless there was something wrong. Like vampire or Naga wrong . . .

“Alix?” Carpe said, sounding hesitant. He’d met my cat.

I opened my mouth to say something but was cut off by a muffled bang in the hall, followed not by yells but by a deafening silence.

“Hold on,” I said, and headed for the door, where Captain was huddled, growling. I peeked through the fisheye. A heavy white smoke filled the bottom third of the hall.

“Shit.” I pulled out my cell and texted Rynn. Rynn? I texted into my phone. Any idea what’s going on in the hall outside our suite? I really hoped that was some kind of security exercise, because the alternative . . .

An alarm sounded. Loud and piercing, not unlike a fire alarm. The dreams I had of an impromptu security exercise faded like most of my half-baked, hopeful wishes.

“What’s going on?” Carpe said, a hesitant tone in his voice.

The heavy smoke was filtering under the door now. I tried to pull Captain away while I scrambled through my bag for my gas mask, but it was no use—he was back growling at the smoke coming under the door. Damn cat. “Hey, Carpe—you still have access to the Japanese Circus security systems?” I said.

“On it already.”

If anyone could hack into the Japanese Circus security systems. . . . I turned my attention back to Michigan and Texas. “Look, guys, I hate to cut our conversation short—”

“Alix, I’ve got mercenaries in the Japanese Circus. They’re on your floor,” Carpe interrupted, his voice not panicked exactly but more animated than it had been a moment before.

“We’ll be in touch,” Michigan said.

“In the meantime, try not to burn the world down,” Texas added before their audio feed snapped off. I slid my gas mask on.

There was a banging at the door.

“Alix?” came Carpe’s voice across my headset. “Just getting into the cameras now. You’ve got a group of mercenaries outside your door.”

Fantastic. “How many?” I said, lowering my voice as another muffled bang sounded right outside my door. I checked my phone, but still nothing from Rynn.

“Best guess, four, but it could be more. They’ve flooded the entire floor with smoke, and it’s running havoc with the cameras and sensors.”

Damn it. I glanced over to where Captain had wedged himself under a table by the door, as if waiting to pounce on whoever might be entering his territory.

Great. Now he was taking affront to non-supernaturals. So much for socialization. My cat was going to get himself killed.

And me with no weapons that would work on humans besides a metal chair. I grabbed Captain and pushed my desk over, forming a barricade before settling in behind it. He let out a growl of disapproval but didn’t launch an outright attack on my hands. I took that as a win.

“Quiet,” I whispered at him and did my best to tune into the mercenaries behind the door.

It was faint, but they were talking in Spanish, if the “para” and “silencio” were any indication. Hunh. Not the Zebras. I didn’t think the South Africans would be stupid enough to break radio silence; they hadn’t during any of our previous encounters.

If they weren’t bright enough to keep their conversation down, maybe we’d get lucky with radio. “Carpe, are you picking up any of their conversation?” I whispered.

“My Spanish is rusty, but something about a door?”

I heard the unwrapping of something, and then what I thought was “get back” mumbled in Spanish.

Shit. I scrambled for the couch and grabbed a couple of pillows to press against our ears before diving back behind the overturned desk. I noticed the journals—Jebe’s and Neil’s. I grabbed them, shoving them inside my belt.

No sooner had I managed to get Captain under a pillow than an explosion rocked the room.

Even though I’d been prepared for it, I was dazed. It took my ears and head a few seconds to stop ringing. When I did take the pillow off, I wasn’t alone. There was a barrel of a military-grade rifle pointed in my face over the desk—no, make that two of them—held by two men dressed in black paramilitary gear and wearing gas masks that rivaled mine.

I swallowed and managed to restrain Captain before he could launch himself at anyone holding a gun. Two more men moved into the room after hand signals from the one on my left, and I thought I caught a fifth taking up point in the hall by the door. It was hard to tell with the smoke.

“Hey? Alix?” came Carpe’s voice in my headset.

I ignored him, keeping my eyes on the mercenaries.

They were all wearing masks. The one on my left, pointing the gun at me—the same one who had signaled the others and who, I reasoned, had to be in charge—motioned me to stand up with the barrel of his gun. I started to rise, slowly, buying myself time to think. He jabbed the barrel into my chest. “All right, all right, I get the idea,” I said as I stood, still gripping Captain under my arm, much to his chagrin. Tough. If I got the chance to make a run for it, the last thing I needed was a loose cat behind enemy lines.

I waited for them to say anything, but all they did was secure my suite; the two who weren’t holding me at gunpoint went from room to room. I let them. Always good to cooperate when the people holding guns weren’t hitting me.

They found a couple of the weapons Rynn kept lying around, though I highly doubted that was all of them.

They should have said something by now. “Look, guys, isn’t this the part where you talk and start making demands?”

They ignored me as one of the ones who’d searched my suite spoke into his radio, in English this time. “Secured the objective. Stand by to transport.”

Objective? Wait a minute, the only thing they’d secured was me. Damn it, the IAA really was serious about handing me over to the ­mercenaries—apparently first come, first served.

“You’re making a huge mistake—” I tried.

The one who spoke English—a large man over six feet tall—glanced at me this time. “There is no mistake,” he said in a gruff voice, showing me his phone screen—a picture of my face with a lot of Spanish below it. “You are the rogue archaeologist we are being paid to retrieve.”

“Rogue archaeologist? Is that what they told you?” From the way the others deferred to him, I was betting he was the one in charge. “Look, dude, I hope they told you more than that—”

I was cut off by one of the subordinates still holding a gun on me. I didn’t catch all of it; it was a Paraguay accent, one I wasn’t as familiar with, but I understood “incommunicado.” Their partners, or whoever they were supposed to meet up with, had gone silent.

But they seemed more surprised than they should have been. I mean, this was a casino full of supernaturals. It dawned on me . . .

“Dude, I hope the IAA told you more about this place than there was a rogue archaeologist inside.”

“You’re a thief,” the one I figured was in charge said, as the others tried again to bring up their mercenary friends. “Antiquities, specialized.”

They didn’t realize who this casino belonged to . . . or, more importantly, what this casino belonged to.

Oh man, it was going to be a bad day for these guys.

I tensed as he began rifling through the folders that had spilled onto the floor. I was acutely aware of the two journals under my shirt.

More attempts to raise their friends led to a heated exchange.

“Look, I really think you guys are firing a few puzzle pieces short—”

“Quiet, and turn around. Slowly put your hands on your head or they shoot your cat,” the one in charge spat at me before nodding at his two companions, still training their guns on me.

I did as they asked and placed Captain on the carpet, grateful that he didn’t bolt. Then slowly, like the man said, I put my hands on my head. Maybe I could still talk some sense into them. “Look, there’s still time to leave now and chalk this up to a big misunderstanding . . .” I started.

One of the guards behind me hissed. Still, I kept going. These guys might be assholes, but much like me, they were on someone’s payroll. The longer this went on, the worse it was going to be for them. “I’m offering you guys a freebie here—”

“We can handle an incubus,” the one behind me said, pushing the barrel into my lower back.

So they did know there were supernaturals in here. Still . . . “That’s really not the one you need to be worried about. Didn’t you guys wonder why the Zebras are sitting things out in a hotel at the end of the strip, drinking beer?”

“Cowards,” one of the two behind me spat in heavily accented ­English—the one on my right, who hadn’t spoken until now. “Lazy, waiting to see what you’ll do next. We’d rather take the money now from under them.”

Oh man. Greed and arrogance were the true downfall of people every­where.

The rattle of a snake’s tail sounded from somewhere down the hall. Another nervous look exchanged between the mercenaries.

I craned my neck until I was facing the one holding me. “Tell me, did you gas a Japanese woman on your way in? Expensive heels, designer suit, red lipstick and nails—hard to miss?”

One of them snickered.

“Because if you guys did, I so can’t help you.”

The sound of a rattle grew louder. The three other mercenaries in the room stopped in their tracks and looked at each other. Sometimes there really wasn’t anything I could do to save other people from their own stupidity.

The gun jabbed between my shoulder blades, making me stumble forward. “What trick is this?” Captain started sniffing the air and let out a quiet growl from where he was crouched by my feet.

“No trick.” Another shove.

I heard the hiss of green-gold leather scales sliding against the expensive carpet, and I licked the nervous sweat from my lip. Not that I was huge on the idea of handing a couple humans over to Lady Siyu to chew on, but at some point I had to pick my moral battles. The question was would she take these guys out before or after they got nervous enough to fire the guns.

Hands still on my head, I turned around and looked the mercenaries in the eyes—the only part of their faces that showed through the masks. “The IAA, your boss—whoever told you I was here? They must have it in for you, because they didn’t tell you the most important thing.”

They exchanged another glance as a louder hiss sounded through the hall, as if emanating from the walls themselves. The mercenary in the hall shouted a warning.

Once they had me outside the casino . . . I needed to stall. “Don’t get me wrong,” I said, “the incubus is scary and is probably going to hurt you really badly.”

“Quiet,” the mercenary said. He motioned for the two men to grab me, and the four of them, towing me, exited into the hall to join the fifth, who’d been on lookout. Taking point down the hall, each on edge, they picked up their gait, heading for the elevator.

I searched the smoke for Lady Siyu, but where there’d been the sound of her scales a moment before, now there was nothing.

I flinched as something wet dripped on my face. For a second I thought it was sweat, but sweat didn’t burn. I glanced up as cautiously as I could.

Suspended on the ceiling of the hall, blended in with the gold-and-green baroque wallpaper, was Lady Siyu. She was Naga’d out, fangs extended and not a trace of her human guise remaining.

Whatever you do, Owl, under no circumstances are you to lick your lips. “So I’m curious; what does the mercenary handbook say about strolling into a dragon’s lair?” I asked.

That got their attention. “Dragon?” one of them said.

“She’s lying, there’s no dragon.”

I watched the numbered light move. The elevator would be here in a few more floors. Lady Siyu better hurry up . . .

I saw the glint of gold-green scales as she moved above me, closer to the mercenaries. I figured that was all the warning I was going to get. I made ready to jump. “Good news! You’re about to become the cautionary tale.”

The elevator chimed its arrival, and I dove out of the way as Lady Siyu dropped from the ceiling, taking out three of the mercenaries before they could retrain their guns, and knocking out at least one for the long haul. She moved like lightning after that, immobilizing the other two with her teeth while they were still on the ground.

Two left standing. Unfortunately, they were positioned in a way that made it impossible for her to take them out in one shot, even with her speed and the added length of her tail.

She went for the sure thing—the last lackey standing closest to her.

Time for Owl to exit stage left. I started to crawl toward the now-open elevator. Something grabbed my foot. They didn’t let go. It was the remaining mercenary. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll run,” I shouted, aiming a kick at his face.

Whether it was pride or panic, he wasn’t listening. Before I could deliver another kick to his face, he had me around the waist and positioned as a shield.

“That was about the stupidest—” I began. He jostled me to shut up.

Lady Siyu had finished with the other mercenary, and she hissed, turning on the remaining member of the group. “Stay back,” he shouted.

I caught a glint in Lady Siyu’s eyes.

Yeah . . . nuts to seeing just how far “accidents” got tolerated in the Japanese Circus.

I threw my weight into my hip and tried one of the throws Rynn had shown me. In theory, when I pushed my hip back and threw, my opponent was supposed to sail over my shoulder and fall flat on his back, splayed out. It hurt. I should know; Rynn had shown me enough times before I’d figured out the break fall part.

In practice, my hips went back and hit something akin to a brick house. I’d like to think I knocked the wind out of him, but that was being generous.

Well, on to tried-and-true methods.

I kicked back and up between his legs—hard. He didn’t yell or scream, but there was an audible exhale of breath. I don’t care how well trained you are as a mercenary; a well-trained kick to the groin loosens any man’s grip.

It wasn’t much of a gap, but it was enough. I stamped on his foot and got myself a little more space—enough to slide out.

He was blocking the elevator, so I turned and ran for the exit door, slamming into it before taking the stairs up, two at a time.

There was an inhuman shriek behind me, Lady Siyu I presumed, followed by another bang at the exit door. I sped up even as my legs and lungs protested, taking three steps at a time instead of two. Ankles don’t fail me now.

I could hear the heavy boots behind me. He wasn’t taking the stairs quite as recklessly as I was, but I had no doubts my cardio would give out before his did.

I rounded the corner and saw the twenty-third-floor door ahead of me—Mr. Kurosawa’s floor.

I hesitated, but only for a second. I ducked as a bullet struck the cement above me. Didn’t have time for smart plans—I threw myself into the door as hard as I could, then spilled onto the bloodred carpets and bolted for the massive black-and-gold doors. Please be open, please be open.

I threw myself into the doors. I don’t know what I’d been expecting, but it hadn’t been for them to swing open to the maze. Either Mr. Kurosawa knew what I was about to do, or the ghosts figured another pansy was about to join their ranks; as if in anticipation, the slot machines were silent for once, not even their lights flickering in the dark.

I heard the bang of a door behind me. Let’s hope the ghosts and dragon were feeling altruistic today. I ran for the nearest set of machines, but something Rynn had told me over and over again made me skid to a stop short of the dark marble tiles that denoted the start of the maze itself: “Never go in on your own.”

Something told me that was not the rule to push today, so I searched for somewhere short of the maze to hide. One of the machines off to the side, a 1970s-era slot machine, started to chime and spew coins on the floor. I hoped that was a ghost’s way of offering me an alternative. . . .

I slid behind the machine as the black doors swung open once again.

I didn’t dare peek, but I did listen as the heavy boots slowed.

I quieted my breath.

“I’ll give you the snake lady was a surprise,” he called out as he made his way around the front of the casino, “though I still don’t believe in your dragon nonsense.” He spit on the black floors, as if punctuating the statement.

I listened to his footsteps and wondered if he’d stopped short of the dark, smoky tiles. Some instinct telling him not to continue forward.

Another step . . .

It would be so easy, so easy to just let him disappear into the maze. He’d been shooting at me—with bullets—and they’d been about to kidnap me. I jumped as a slot machine behind me spit out a single gold coin, of a denomination I didn’t recognize. Nothing loud enough to attract the mercenary’s attention, but enough to get its warning across.

I swore under my breath. “I really hate my morals sometimes,” I whispered to it. I hoped the echo in this place would hide my location . . .

“Don’t step on the dark tiles,” I shouted. “Just put your weapon down and surrender.” I swore, covering my head as gunfire sounded around me. A number of slot machines began to chime and spew coins. When the gunfire stopped and I wasn’t dead, I continued. “If you thought the Naga and the incubus were bad, you haven’t seen anything yet.” This time though my voice didn’t come from where I was. It twisted, as if coming from the depths of the maze itself.

“You’re in there? Aren’t you? Hiding.” The mercenary made a derisive noise and spit on the floor again. “You can’t fool me with your ghost stories.”

As if that was a cue, one of the machines in the maze began to chime. Others followed, until there was a veritable path of lights and sound leading into the slot machine maze’s heart.

“You can’t cover your tracks with sounds, thief. I know exactly where you are!” he called out. Over the noise I heard the fall of his footsteps as he stepped over the line of smoky marble.

The maze went silent, and a few heartbeats later I heard the shout, then the bloodcurdling scream. I plugged my ears and closed my eyes. Damn it, this wasn’t what I wanted. But there were only so many things you could do to save someone.

Still, it never sits well with me. Stupidity gets you dead, but it’s awful final. Call me sentimental, but I’d rather see people learn from their mistakes. Not die from them.

The slot machines were silent once more, and through my plugged ears I heard the familiar click of heels against the tiles. I frowned. I hadn’t heard the doors open again. I peeked around the slot machine.

Back to human form, Lady Siyu strode out of the maze at a leisurely pace, her eyes bright snake yellow and fixating on me as the click of her heels beat out a sinister tempo.

She might be human again, but she hadn’t bothered to hide the blood that now covered her face and her suit. And she was dragging the mercenary behind her as if he’d been a feather doll, not a six-foot grown man.

“I never thought I’d live to say this, but am I ever glad to see you—” I started.

Lady Siyu hissed. “The feeling is fortunately not mutual,” she said. She stepped onto the white tiled foyer and deposited the mercenary none too gently, before beginning to prod him with her foot and sniff at the air above him. She then turned her yellow snake gaze on me. “Wonders do not cease.”

“What? That I didn’t end up dead?” I said, scrambling out of my hiding site. “It happens, you know—”

“That you managed to execute a halfway decent strategy. Luring him into the maze and then pleading with him not to enter.” She gave me a reappraising look. “Wonders never cease, thief. I am impressed.”

A pit formed in my stomach. Lady Siyu thinking I’d planned to lure him into the maze was worse than the fact that I hadn’t managed to convince him not to. Much worse.

Lady Siyu picked the mercenary up by the collar and continued to drag him toward the exit.

“Come,” she shouted over her shoulder when I didn’t immediately move.

“For what?”

She glared.

“I mean, not me . . . I know why you don’t want me in here—” Owl, stop babbling. “Where are you taking him?” I asked instead.

Her red lacquered lips parted in a smile—the first one I had ever seen, I think. As vicious and cold as she was. “Why, so he can be questioned, of course,” she said, and pushed open the massive doors.

And of course I’d been stupid enough to ask. Without asking I could have fooled myself into thinking they just tossed them out on the curb.

Okay, probably not that, but you’d be surprised what my imagination can come up with under stress.

I followed. I could lie and say I didn’t have any option, and it was mostly true if you took out “death by angry Naga” as an option. But in all honesty? Like I said—some days you had to pick which moral battles to fight. Some of my brain wanted to fight out of principle, but mostly it decided that this wasn’t the one to pick.

Did that make me a bad person? Days like this, I wasn’t so sure.