Concentrate, Aleister. You can master this. Calm yourself and breathe.
I took a breath, then another.
Gradually, the storm raging in me subsided.
I reached out and touched Vex’s gift and it rose to meet me. With a thought, my will gathered, faster than ever before. I kindled a piercing spell and hurled it at my assailant.
Time returned to normal as my spell stabbed through Jones’s shoulder. The same one Elaine had wounded. Blood spewed from the hole and he screamed, clasping a hand to the wound. The undying flames coating his hand flickered and died, his concentration broken.
I hit him again, this time with a rush of wind, flinging him down the corridor. He landed hard, crying out as he rolled. But he still commanded the power of the Nail, and regained his feet in seconds, his shoulder already healed.
“How?” he spat at me. “You had nothing left!”
“I found more,” I said.
He threw his free hand toward me.
I saw the shape of the spell and pushed it with my will.
It fizzled.
He tried again.
Once more, I countered it.
Again, and again he tried to kindle something, anything. I stopped each attempt, never moving a muscle. At last, he shrieked in frustration and charged me, his footfalls unsure and his body unbalanced. I felt no magic, and realized he meant to fight me hand-to-hand. I let him come, gathering will into my muscles. When he came within reach, I stepped into him with a burst of unnatural speed and hammered my fist into his chest.
At least three ribs broke from the force of the strike, increased tenfold by my will. He sailed from his feet and crashed into the stone. The fall drove the breath from his lungs, and he lay there, fighting for air.
“Adligo te.” My spell snapped tight, binding him to the floor as if with chain. I strode to his side, bent down, and took the Nail.
Its power thrummed through me, rich and heady. It spoke to me, begging me to use it. I slipped it into a pocket, and the feeling disappeared.
“This isn’t over, Crowley,” Jones gasped, spittle flying from his lips.
“Yes. It is.” I felt him slipping into unconsciousness, and I wrapped my will about his mind, keeping him awake. “Where did you get the Nail?”
“Go to Hell.”
“Eventually. Now, answer my question.”
He stared at me, mouth closed.
When I tired of waiting, I sighed. “The hard way then.”
I closed my eyes, sending a tendril of power into the base of Jones’s neck. After a moment I found his spinal cord, the entryway to his entire nervous system. I surged my power into it, sending electricity roiling through his body. His back arched, and he howled in pain, a primal, desperate sound.
“Where did you get the Nail?” I asked again.
Sweat soaked his face. He shook his head.
I hit him again. And again.
“I can’t,” he screeched at last. Tears and blood streamed down his face. “He’ll do so much worse to me if I tell you.”
“Tell me his name.”
He swallowed hard. “Kill me.”
I hit him with the electricity again and again, until his skin blackened. Still, he refused to tell me.
Tear the information from his mind, Vex said.
You ask me to violate Knight Mage law. They’ll execute me if they find out, I said, shocked. Most other injuries magic could cure, but not a mind break. If Jones survived, his mind would be lost forever.
We must discover the identity of the puppeteer pulling Jones’s strings, Vex insisted. He already broke a dozen laws tonight. He forfeited his rights long ago.
I couldn’t disagree. Too much rode on this. If Jones didn’t act alone, we must discover the others involved. I gathered my will and blasted into Jones’s psyche, sweeping aside mental shields, stripping his defenses, and baring his essence. Memories of childhood, of his training, loves won, and loves lost unfolded before me. I sifted through them, looking for how he acquired the Nail.
The Nameless City and the sarcophagus housing the Book appeared before me, but not the recollections of the drawings. He’d been there. He’d infiltrated the City and seen it for himself.
Unexpected sadness filled me as I realized that the Knight Mages failed to protect the Book.
Then, I found what I sought.
Jones sat on a bed in a rundown inn. A man sat in a chair in front of him, hooded and cloaked, the Nail in his outstretched hand. I waited for the stranger to look up, to say or do something to reveal his identity.
A new power crashed through Jones. Violently, the memories closed to me, and something shoved me from his mind. My normal sight returned.
Jones gasped for air. His eyes bulged from their sockets, his skin turning an angry purple.
“No!” I reached for him with my power. He couldn’t die, not now, not when I’d come so close to finding the puppeteer behind the marionette. Yet, even with Vex’s tremendous power coursing through me, Jones’s mind remained closed. I fought this new power, but before I could break through, Jones gasped one last time, and the light fled from his eyes.
“Damn it!” I pounded Jones’s chest. “Goddamn it!”
I collapsed against the wall. What kind of magic could close his mind to me like that?
Vex offered no answers.
I stared at Jones, dead on the floor. The Book of Thoth would not leave Egypt now, and Baker and I would see that it remained hidden there, never to see the light of day, much less British shores. Many lay injured, but no other dead. Work remained, but for now, we had won.
Why did it feel like a loss?
18
For Better or Worse
Elaine stirred and groaned. I shook myself out of my thought and hurried to her side.
Vex’s power had waned, but more than enough remained for the work ahead. I reached out with a tendril
