father.''
Rinaldi smiled warmly. 'Regrets gain nothing, son.
You must look to the future.'
'Easy to say,' Sam said with a wave of his hand taking in their cell. He shrugged and said, 'So when Dog speaks to me, it's not a betrayal of God.'
'Your totem is a link with…' Rinaldi quick answer died abruptly. 'Did you say your totem speaks to you?'
'Yeah. He doesn't always make sense and sometimes he talks too much.'
Rinaldi put a hand on Sam's shoulder and stared earnestly into his face. 'But he talks directly to you? In words?'
'How else does anybody talk? Other than dragons, that is.'
'I don't know; I've never spoken to a dragon.'
'Try to avoid it. They're accomplished liars,' Sam said. Bitterly, he added, 'Like elves.'
'Twist, how many times have you spoken with… was it 'Dog'?'
Rinaldi, intent with his own thoughts, had paid no attention to Sam's sour tone. Sam forced thoughts of her lies away and tried to answer Rinaldi civilly. 'Dog sure enough; he kind of looked like a mutt I once befriended. I guess we've had three or four conversations now. He teaches me songs. Crazy, isn't it?'
'No, not at all,' Rinaldi said. He thought for a moment then said, 'When was the last time?'
'Just before she… just before I got shot.'
'You were facing death?'
'That was later.' Sam laughed nervously. 'I guess
I'm a little confused, and I'm confusing you. Must be the aftereffects of the drug. When I talked to Dog, Herzog had been helping me break through to the spirit planes. He wouldn't help us against the Circle, but he was willing to take me through the ritual so I could get the power I needed to face the Circle's abominations.'
'The Circle? What circle?'
'A bunch of renegade druids who call themselves the Hidden Circle. They're homicidal manics. My…, ' Sam paused, '… friends and I were trying to stop them.'
'Twist,' Rinaldi said softly. 'Tell me about this
Hidden Circle.'
Why not, Sam thought. If he and Rinaldi were really captives of elves, nothing would get back to the Circle. Sam knew how much the druids hated metahumans; these elves wouldn't be allied with the Circle. If Rinaldi's presence and the 'elven captivity' were some kind of subtle ploy, what did it matter? Sam was on his own now, and even Dog's songs wouldn't be enough if he were in the Circle's hands.
Sam recounted his involvement with the Circle's machinations, beginning with the bungled extraction of Raoul Sanchez and ending with the disastrous raid in the East End of London. The priest's questions were sharp and probing. Sam's answers seemed to disturb Rinaldi. Throughout the tale, Sam observed the priest's growing agitation. If he was an actor, he was very, very good.
Rinaldi listened to Sam's recounting of the runners' speculations as to the druids' plans, then said, 'Twist, we've got to get you out of here.'
Sam could see the intensity in the priest's face. Sam revised his opinion. Rinaldi had spoken freely and offered aid without asking a reward. If Sam rejected that kind of selflessness, he would never be able to trust anyone again. But then, was trust important to a shad owrunner? Sam was surprised that he didn't need to think about it long.
'Call me Sam, father.'
Sam and Rinaldi talked for hours before the grindting rasp of the opening cell door interrupted them. A* pale-skinned elf entered as soon as the door had risen high enough to clear the shock of yellow and pink hair ethat stood straight up from his scalp. His pointed ears ! were especially prominent against the shaved sides of his head. Though his manner was nonchalant, Sam noticed that the elf kept a hand near the weapon holtstered low on his right hip.
The elf stepped to one side of the doorway and a ishort, squat shape took his place in the arch. Their fsecond visitor was neither an ape nor a man, but someling in between. Thick brown fur sheathed its torso land lower legs, while a fine, sparse fuzz covered the f rest of its body. The digits of its hands and feet had sharp, thick nails that were almost talons. The narrow, broad-nosed face shifted expression from fearful skitteriness to a threatening snarl and back again. It wore no clothes, but carried a bundle of cloth from which Sam could see the soles of a pair of boots projecting. The elf grunted at the hominid and pointed at Sam. The furred being crouched at the sound of the elf's voice and looked at him. It made a few guttural noises. The elf repeated the sound he had made more loudly and jabbed his hand emphatically in Sam's direction. The creature shuffled forward, side-stepping toward Sam, and rapidly shifted its gaze from Sam to the elf.
When it was a meter from Sam, it tossed its burden at him and scampered out of the cell to stand hesitantly just on the other side of the threshold.
Sam caught one of the boots and what seemed to be a shirt of fine white silk. The other boot and the rest of the clothes landed on the floor around him.
'Drek-eating munchkins,' the elf muttered. He made a barking noise and stamped his foot in the direction of the hominid. The munchkin bared its teeth at him and hissed, before spinning in place and scampering down the corridor. When it reached a group of its fellows clustered where the corridor forked, it stopped, hopping back and forth as it screeched at the elf. The elf stamped his foot again, and the whole group of munchkins pelted out of sight around the corner.
'Must be tough getting good help around here,'
Sam said as he bent to gather up the fallen garments.
Rinaldi chuckled, but the elf only frowned.
'Dress,' he ordered.
'There are only clothes for one. What about Father
Rinaldi?'
'He stays here.'
Sam started to protest, but Rinaldi's hand on his arm stopped him.
'It's all right,' the priest said. 'But you'd better clean yourself up first. You obviously have an interview with the Lady and there's no point in making a bad impression.'
'What about you?'
'I expect she's had her fill of me. Go on. I'll still be here when you get back.'
Sam had time to think while he showered in the cell's small sanitary alcove. He continued thinking as he put on the clothes that had been brought for him. He had even more time to think on the trip to the audience chamber. He spent most of the thinking puzzling over the why of his capture. He found no answers.
He realized that he knew damn little about Hart. His runner contacts vouched for her competence in the trade and pegged her as a hermetic mage. Both those things he knew were true from his personal experience of her. But the streets had no tale to tell of her origins. She was supposed to be a mercenary, but what if she were not? What if she had been an agent of the Shidhe all along? He knew so little about her past. Although the subject had never come up, he realized that he knew no more about Hart than he did about Sally Tsung. His involvement with Sally had sprung into being almost overnight and become a tempestuous affair quite unlike his earlier involvement with the staid Hanae. Like Hart, Sally was strong-willed and quite sure of what she wanted. Their becoming lovers had been mostly her idea. Mostly. But what of his involvement with Hart? Whose idea had that been?
The Man of Light had preyed on Sam's own loyal impulses when he had suggested that Sam was betraying Sally by his involvement with Hart. But Sam knew Sally had been through lovers before. He doubted she had gone without comfort since he had left Seattle. It just wasn't her style. He was both comforted and disturbed by that thought. She had done a lot in helping him adjust to the shadow life, and he wanted nothing but the best for her, but he had been raised to believe in fidelity.
So what had he been doing fooling around with
Hart?
He didn't have an answer. His feelings roiled under the heat of suspicion planted by the Man of Light. Was it real magic or just the old biochemical magic of hormones and psychological need?
