It resembled a jewelry store, with multiple racks of necklaces, bracelets, and enough other sparklies to keep a serious accessorizer busy for days. He took me straight to the back, where a locked glass display case backed in red velvet held some fine old pieces. As he unlocked it he said, “You must remember never to let the Magistrate touch you. We’re not sure how he managed to pull you out of your body the first time, but we know it was at great expense, both in terms of power and time. That’s why he’ll want you to do most of the work yourself the second time around. Since you haven’t willingly left your body, he’ll find a way to trigger that exodus if he can. But he won’t be able to if he can’t physically touch you.”
“Or kill me.”
Raoul gave me a you-could-have-gone-all-day-without-saying-that look. “Obviously.” He pulled a delicate, octagonal bluish white stone out of the case and handed it to me.
“It’s gorgeous,” I said.
“It’s best worn near the center of your body,” he replied. “In ages past, men and women wore it on a long chain beneath their clothing. But since you have a rather convenient piercing, I took the liberty of mounting it for you.”
“Cool!” As I replaced the gold stud I currently wore in my navel, I said, “What’s it do?”
“It protects the soul during flight. It will shield you from any sort of attack the Magistrate may launch should the worst happen.”
“Thanks. Really.”
Raoul nodded. “I wish I could do more.” He stopped. Shook his head. Looked at me through hooded eyes that said,
If I were the man I should be, I would do more
.
“Rules are rules,” I said simply. “I don’t understand them all yet. I don’t agree with half of them when they’re explained to me. But I know sometimes they’re all that separate me from the guys Pete sends me after.” I gave him the straight stare he’d earned. “I appreciate your help. But I don’t expect you to do my work for me. Or to stick your neck out so far it snaps.” Okay, considering the way I’d died the first time, maybe that was the wrong metaphor. We looked at each other for another three seconds. And then we both smiled.
“You’re amazing,” Raoul said.
His words warmed me, deprived as I was of genuine compliments. I let them carry me back to the house. Played them over and over in my mind as I prepared to face the Magistrate, strapping the sword to my back with a special belt Raoul had given me that was completely hidden under my bland brown tunic and black hijab.
“I’m amazing,” I told my reflection in the bathroom mirror. It didn’t seem convinced. Maybe it was too busy trying to remember that first visit to hell. Not the part about Mom. That was just too disturbing. The before, when Uldin Beit had presented her case to the Magistrate and his court. Something about that scene, I thought, had inspired me to give up my card-shuffling acumen, which I was desperately wishing I had back at this very moment. Something I’d missed had required that sacrifice.
Now I thought maybe I’d witnessed the secret to the Magistrate’s downfall. Not that I wasn’t pretty confident in my sword-fighting abilities. Especially after Raoul’s high praise. But it never hurt to have an edge. (Ha! Jaz made a sword pun! What a gas.) So I played the scene over and over again in my head. Trying to remember details I’d registered only with the back of my mind. For some reason instead of lingering on the Magistrate it kept jumping to Samos and those strange glowing eyes I’d seen behind his office door.
That’s not going to help. What’s the Magistrate’s weakness? What did you see?
I headed to the kitchen, still racking my brain, which was starting to ache from the unaccustomed just-woke- up-dammit strain. “They were sitting in a circle,” I murmured. “There were twelve ugly-ass demons plus supermodel Magistrate. They talked. Then the whipping. But the whole event was about Marking me.”
I gave up. Let my subconscious chew on it for a while. Maybe it would regurgitate something useful while I choked down some toast and juice. And wondered why nobody else was stirring. I finally decided the card game had gone on well into the morning. Figuring they might not make it through the next night, Dave’s crew had probably stretched their time together as far as it would go before they began nodding off into their poker chips.
Cassandra and Bergman had used their distraction to retire to the guys’ room, where they’d worked till God knows when on what they now called their save-Dave device. I hoped they’d made ample progress. Because I planned on needing it soon.
“It’s quiet in here,” I told the cabinets, which stared back at me stoically. I scanned the kitchen. The room should’ve cheered me. But I hadn’t felt this bummed in a while. Going off to fight your battles alone, without a friend or loved one to see you off, sucks. And if I didn’t come back, they’d never know what happened to me.
I thought briefly of leaving a note:
Off to kill the Magistrate. Raoul taught me how to find neutral ground on another plane and summon him there. No biggie. Just a life or death struggle that may slightly muss my hair and call for a new manicure when all’s said and done. Oh, yeah, there is that bit about the risk to my soul. But don’t worry. My new belly gem should have that covered. Maybe. Of course he didn’t mention that it would protect any of the other souls connected with mine. Nothing to fear, however, I’ll be back in a flash. Or, alternatively, a pool of blood. In which case, tell Vayl . . .
What? That I wished he hadn’t turned into a complete ass on this job? Because after that kiss I’d thought we were right for each other. Only now I wasn’t so sure. A man who will forsake you for his obsession, which includes taking a stranger’s blood, is not one who’ll treat you well anytime soon. I caressed the ring in my left pocket. I’d had the right kind of man. One who’d known what I was worth. I could never settle for anything less.
I walked out the door, the windows beside which Vayl had temporarily mended with some slats of wood he’d found in the garage. People glanced at me as I made my way down the street. Most of them seemed simply curious. But a couple — purely hostile. Though I’d darkened my hair and skin, I was clearly not a native, and two gray-bearded men didn’t approve of me walking around unescorted. But I wouldn’t be alone long.
The portal hadn’t moved since I’d glimpsed it the first time and then used it to visit Raoul. People walked right through it as if it didn’t exist. Well, it didn’t for them. Because they didn’t have the Spirit Eye to see it. Didn’t know the words to open it. I did.
