“Okay. Alright, Serrow. You’re in charge. What do you want us to do?”
One of Serrow’s show hands wrapped around one of Guyer’s hips, the sly hand hidden behind the DO’s back. Her other show hand held Guyer’s head, ready to crack it like an egg. That arm’s sly hand gripped Guyer’s hand, holding it high and away from her sidearm. Guyer’s opposite hand was unhindered, but fluttered ineffectively near her throat, as if panic were setting in.
“I want you to believe me.” The Barekusu’s voice was still far lower than a human’s but higher than when I’d heard her speak before. I wondered if it was a sign of stress, or of madness.
“I do,” I said. “I do believe you. You cast the spell on the angel tears to kill Saul Petrevisch. And that got out of control.”
Serrow was breathing fast, eye plates open, multiple pupils swirling as she looked for surprise attack.
“Other people were affected by the angel tears. Including you, right? At the guidepost, you heard a song, didn’t you? A buzzing song, that made you act. Made you do things.”
“It made me do things. But not that.”
“Not what?”
“We’re on the verge of something magnificent,” she said. “Weylan and I are about to uncover a truth that’s been hidden for millennia. If it’s rushed, then it will retreat once more.”
“You said the buzzing made you do things, but ‘not that.’ What did you mean?”
“You’re a detective,” she said. “You don’t arrest people before you can convict. The truth can’t come out before there’s proof.” She panted, her tongue a speckled pink shape peeking out past the fur draping her muzzle. “That was why Mr. Glouchester needed to be silenced.”
The muscles along my jaw clamped shut, and I focused on my breathing. I’d felt bad for her, believed that she was forced to strike out. But that was another lie. She’d fooled me, or I’d fooled myself. Either way, Glouchester’s death wasn’t an accident, and Klare had been more right than I realized.
“No,” I said, whether to her or myself, I wasn’t sure. “I’ve heard the buzzing. We’ve all heard it. What is that noise, Serrow?”
I watched Guyer from the corner of my eye. The hand that had seemed to flail ineffectively was actually stretching with purpose, toward the brooch on her cloak. The same brooch that was linked to her baton.
I spoke again, louder. I wanted Serrow’s attention focused on me. “What is it?” I asked. “What is the buzzing that’s trapped in these rocks?”
The Barekusu’s panting was heavy. “The sound of empty lies coming to light. I believe that I’d—”
Guyer gripped the pin, pulling it free, and in response the baton leapt from her belt, dancing, controlled by the manna that linked it to the brooch. She angled her hand and jabbed backward, plunging the pin into Serrow’s hand. In a perfectly matching arc, the baton darted between Serrow’s eye plates.
The Barekusu sorcerer howled from pain and surprise. She lunged forward, propelling Guyer in front of her. Jax rolled to one side, but I was slower. She swung her hand, crashing into the vent wall.
Guyer’s baton struck again, and this time Serrow released her hostage, shoving her toward me and Jax while she clawed at her eye plates.
Stumbling behind Serrow’s momentum, Guyer collided with me and we toppled to the warm stone floor. Serrow closed in, massive show fists swinging as she shouted, almost chanting, “Betrayal, betrayal, betrayal!”
In the midst of her ravings and swinging fists, I glimpsed the sly hand that had been obscured behind Guyer. It carried a simple wooden rod.
Guyer rolled, pulling me with her. A hairy show fist grazed my shoulder, numbing it to my elbow before crashing into stone still slick with my sweat. But there was something else I felt—the tangled cobwebs of a manna bond, wrapped around the wooden rod. I twisted back and pawed the air. There. I gripped it tight and pulled on it, drawing the energy into myself. It was like plunging my arm into deep water. The numbness and cold spread up my arm and over my body while the ringing in my ears dropped in pitch, becoming a resonant hum that surged through my bloodstream. But in all of that, I smiled, like a man sitting down to a steak dinner. I stared up at Serrow, past her eye plates, to the look of shock and wonder in her large eyes.
“I don’t believe,” she said, all her attention turned to me. Maybe that was why she didn’t see Jax.
He came in low, still crouched, dipping beneath Serrow’s head before springing upward and putting the whole of his body’s strength behind the double-handed strike to Serrow’s jaw. Her head shot up and struck the tunnel ceiling with a dull thunk. Her eyes rolled back, her eye plates clicked shut, and she went limp, collapsing on top of Jax with a heavy slumph like a load of laundry striking the ground.
Guyer pushed herself up and crawled past me, pulling at the unconscious Barekusu’s head and shoulders and screaming, “Pull him out!”
I scrambled to my feet, head reeling from the strikes and from the sulfur-tinged heat. Jax was conscious but shaken as we dragged him out from beneath Serrow’s limp form. We stayed there, leaning against the tunnel walls, breathing hard and staring at the unconscious Barekusu.
“What do we do with her?” Guyer asked.
“I don’t know.” We couldn’t carry her out, and we didn’t have handcuffs that would fit her.
Her eyes widened, and she pointed behind me. “The rope!”
I scrambled back to the backpack, and pulled out the rope we’d taken from the base of the scaffold. Guyer and I trussed Serrow’s arms and legs while Jax nursed his head.
“You sure you’re okay?”
He glanced up, wincing. “Does it matter?”
My nose was dribbling blood, and I wiped it away with the back of my hand. “I
