“Why does Oda hate magicians?”
“Her brother was one. She killed him.”
“Why?”
“No one knows. They say he turned bad, went mad with his power. I do not entirely believe it. I think they lie, and so does she. It is a question that you do not ask.”
“Why did you ask the Order to come to the house in Marylebone, the night we were attacked? Knowing what they are – it was a risk.”
“A risk? To expose so many magicians to such hate, yes, well, I suppose… a risk.”
“Why?”
“I think you may guess.”
“Chaigneau didn’t know who was in charge of the Order – he said he followed orders, and so does Oda.”
Sinclair’s smile widened.
“Mr Sinclair,” I said, struggling to keep some patience in my voice, “are you the head of the Order?”
“No, dear boy, no! Just
“You use them?”
“A tool. If you know who those are who hate magic with such fire that they would burn the world to be rid of it, you can tame them, use them, direct them, yes? Yes, and when you need them, perhaps you can give them that magic that they long to destroy, point them at a target and say, ‘There is the sorcerer’ or ‘There is the shadow’ or ‘There is the demon’ or ‘There is the angel’, yes? And they will strike, and it will not go back to me.”
“They have decided to kill me,” I pointed out reasonably. “That has me a little concerned.”
“Chaigneau will follow orders.”
“How ironic.”
“Oda won’t,” he whispered. “Once she has her target, she will not stop. I can tell them to stop – difficult, perhaps, but then you can always say, ‘He is a lesser evil. Let him be damned in his own time.’ There are ways to spin these things. Oda will not stop.”
“If you knew that, why did you introduce me to her in the first place?”
Sinclair grinned, then flinched at the pain even of that, and gave a grunting sound. “Because you are Robert Bakker’s apprentice,” he wheezed, pressing his fat fingers into his chest like he was trying to massage the pain from his bones. “Because you are the blue electric angels. And if he were to take your power, to catch you and work out how to steal that life that keeps your eyes blue… well… well… imagine.”
“So you’d have me killed?” I said, forcing my voice to stay low. “Like that?”
“I would have anyone killed whom I deemed a risk,” he replied, voice rising in stern reproach. “And you always will be a risk. But, I think, you will always be smart, and smart enough to be afraid. And perhaps that will be enough.”
“We have something else we need to ask.”
“Go on?”
“Did you summon us? Did you bring me back?”
“No, Mr Swift. I would like to see Bakker gone, but to bring the blue electric angels into this world? No. A risk – indeed, a terrible risk. Such a deed would have required a sorcerer’s skills. I would suggest, in fact, that if anyone did summon you, it would have been Bakker trying to bring the angels into being, or, perhaps, his more sensitive apprentice, Dana Mikeda.” He let out a long, easier breath. “You will have to fight her, sorcerer. That’s how it is in these things. Neither of you, I think, can just walk away.”
“Dana Mikeda is my problem.”
“No,” he murmured. “Not any more. She serves Bakker now. He took her hand when they held your funeral with the empty coffin, and he said he was her friend, her new teacher; now she serves him utterly. He helped her when you were gone; she’s his apprentice now, not yours. And I would not like to think what he may have taught her; no, indeed. You may, in fact, save some time by directing Oda her way. You could eliminate two threats in a single stroke – the woman who…”
“No.”
“The Order hopes you will destroy each other; Bakker and Swift. Why should these two not do the same?”
“No,” I repeated.
“I can send the Order word, command them to…”
“Our blood is in your veins,” we insisted. “Some magics never change. Leave Dana Mikeda to me.”
His voice didn’t alter, nor did his light smile; but there was that edge there, that danger. “Kindly don’t threaten me, blue electric angels. You are so far lost in this world that the lightest push could send you toppling over the edge into madness. Save your anger for someone else.”
I swallowed. “There is one last thing I need to know.”
“Go on.”
“The night we were attacked, the first night I met you…”
“Yes?”
“Who attacked us?”
“At a guess, San Khay’s men.”
“And who sent the litterbug to attack me on my first night?”
“Those kinds of magic… Guy Lee.”
“How did Guy Lee know where I was?”
“I would suggest,” he said carefully, picking every word out like a piece of stuck apple from between his teeth, “that the house you were living in was sold on after your death to a woman who works for a company called KSP. KSP stands for Kenrick, Simmons and Powell and is the company run by Harris Simmons. I suggest that, since you clearly returned to a place of comfort in your old home, she phoned Simmons on the night of your resurrection and warned him that a naked, confused-looking man had just crawled out of the telephone lines and that perhaps someone should investigate. Lee would have been the one to send the litterbug; Khay would have been the man following on foot. You see – the Tower doesn’t like loose ends.”
I thought about the business card stolen from a wallet in my old home that I’d seen on the first night of my new life; Laura Linbard, Business Associate, KSP. I said, “I… I had friends, before this. I haven’t dared… it seemed risky to…”
“Until the Tower is gone,” replied Sinclair flatly, “everyone you knew or valued is being watched. Bakker will know by now that you are… perhaps shall we say… more than you once appeared. He’ll have worked out why the phones went silent the night you returned; he isn’t a fool. He will do anything he can to find you and if that means killing the people you once knew, he will. That’s the Tower, Mr Swift, that’s why you should really be fighting rather than from any motive of revenge; and when this is over that’s what I will tell people you died for – a good, heroic cause, rather than your loosely defined sense of injured personal pride. My advice, if you’ll take it – and please, consider it well intended – is to forget everything you were and everything you think you can continue to be; to stop imagining that things can go back to normal when Bakker is dead, and accept. You are not Matthew Swift any more.”
I nodded. “Mr Sinclair,” I murmured, “I feel I must tell you something.”
“Of course, of course.”
“There are times when I can believe that you are right.” I met his eyes, and he didn’t look away. “There are times when there isn’t
“Enlighten me.”
“When we are the angels, we do not care about the thoughts of men, or their laws, or their ideas, or their conceptions of morality. We are beyond that, above that, free from these petty fictions by which you live your days – laws, rules, duties, responsibilities. We are pure fire and light and life, and nothing can contain us or bind us, and
