Downpour

“She may be right, but if I can do it, the cost won’t be small.”

He snorted in derision. “You’re that greedy that a quarter of a million dollars isn’t enough?”

“That’s not the cost I mean. You say the magic users around here fight dirty in the off-season. How dirty?”

“Used to be they just did what they were going to do and pretended everything was free for the taking— even if it was someone else’s. They’d at least say sorry if they stepped on one another’s toes, though that was about all they’d do. Now they’re getting mean and trying to control things, and whatever they need to do it, they will. Even if it means doing some serious hurt. There used to be more of ’em.”

“What happened to the rest?”

“Some left of their own accord. Some of ’em . . . I don’t want to think about it.”

“What do you think I’m going to do about them? Your wife wants them to go away, but originally she told me she wants them dead. It sounds like she’s not the only one to have that idea. She even suggested that one of them killed your father-in-law and dumped him in the lake for the power. If the rest of the crooked magicians around this lake think the best thing to do is kill people and one another, what alternatives do you think I’m going to be able to offer?”

He stared at me and I stepped past him, going up the stairs on my own to Jewel’s room.

Jewel Newman didn’t seem much more excited to see me than her husband had. Maybe she’d had time to reconsider . . . but I doubted it. Probably she just didn’t like me any more than Geoff did; an ugly necessity is the least loved thing in the world. She didn’t turn to see me as I let myself in. She just sighed heavily as she sat in the chair between the bed and the window, staring at the lake outside with a tray resting on her lap. Tarot cards lay in a random spill across the surface.

“I knew you’d come back.”

“I imagine you know a lot of things you don’t talk about.”

“What good would it do me?”

“Probably none. The people who believe would use that knowledge against you. The rest would just laugh and think you’ve lost your mind.”

She made a noise that might have been a laugh or might have been a cough. “As if some of them don’t already think I’ve lost that.”

“I don’t think you’ve gone around the mental bend, just that you’ve lost control—or want to grab it.”

She sniffed. “You’re brash, but you’re not foolish, at least.”

“Oh, I’m definitely foolish. Only a fool would take this job.”

“Oh really?” she asked, finally turning her head to look at me. “If you’re a fool, then what good will you be?”

“What else is a fool good for but walking into danger? Of course, I’m not a complete fool, just enough of one to say yes to this insanity.”

“And to my money.”

“Certainly to that.”

“I think I liked you better when you weren’t so venal.”

“No, you didn’t. Because you couldn’t figure out what handle to twist me by. But I’ll tell you, the money’s not enough.”

“I won’t go higher.”

I walked closer and pulled one of the hard little chairs away from the table at the end of the bed and sat down on the other side of the window so I could face her. I noticed in passing that the card topmost on her pile showed a man in motley about to step off a cliff. “It’s not money you have to give me,” I started. “I want your promise—the most binding promise you can give—that you’ll let me do what I consider necessary.” I started to press on the Grey, letting the black needles of compulsion and persuasion grow between us. I didn’t try to hide them from her, but I wasn’t sure she noticed as I continued. “You’ll back me if I ask you, even against your family or your husband or the law. Do you understand?”

She shivered and pulled back from me. “What? How dare you ask that of me? Don’t you know who I am, what I can do to you if I choose? I may be sick and dying, but I’m not gone yet and I don’t—”

I cut her off, pushing harder as she resisted. “I know exactly what you are.” OK, I was lying, but I bluff well. “But if you could do this yourself, you wouldn’t need me. I’m not afraid of you and I won’t be hampered and hog- tied by any sudden regrets or attacks of conscience from you. If you want this done, it will be my way. It was your father’s ghost who got me into this and it’s his murder I have to solve. After that, this whole nasty web of magic and murder has to be torn down. I won’t kill these people for you—I’m not an assassin—but I’ll make them go away. I’ll break their hold on the lakes and find a way to take down whoever killed your dad. After that . . . it’s on you. Because I’m not here to build anything: I’m here to destroy something. Do you understand that?”

She straightened up defiantly, though I could see it cost her to do so. The cold black points of my demands pressed against her and I could feel her shudder through the Grey. She could resist the geas—the magical contract I was building between us—if she tried hard enough. I wasn’t pressing it with any great weight or determination. I had no interest in forcing her: I wanted her cooperation. It was in both our interests, I hoped—unless she was lying to me, in which case, I’d have to deal with her, too.

Jewel breathed heavily, fighting, I supposed, against her impulse to be in control and plow me under like a weed. I could feel her distaste for this agreement as a burning in the back of my own throat. She didn’t like having to play by anyone’s rules but her own. I felt evil for the way I’d done it, but I had her and she knew it.

She glared at me, settling back in her chair and letting the black points of the geas cut into us both. I twitched at the sudden cold, piercing sensation of it and she gave a satisfied smile that lit her eyes with malice.

“All right,” she said. “You do what you must and I’ll back you. But you’ll stay till the last dog’s hanged. No running out.”

“No running out,” I agreed. “But I will need the money up front.”

She struggled in the web of the geas. “What?” she screeched.

“You offered it and I’m accepting. And that’s how we’ll go. Geoff and I can haggle the details of how it’s paid out.”

Her narrowed glare should have cut me to ribbons, but she was not at the height of her powers anymore and she had already tied herself to me. She was stuck with it. “Agreed,” she ground out, choking on her rage.

I let the pressure off, feeling the icy shape of the geas ease into an invisible but unbreakable binding between us. “Call Geoff up and we’ll do the paperwork, unless you’d rather you didn’t have to watch. . . .”

Jewel growled, but she caught her breath and pressed a button on the remote that rested on the bed beside her. “Geoff, bring up the checkbook and some writing paper.” She didn’t bother to exert herself to send out a voice of command. She knew her husband would do what she wanted.

I nodded and got up to wait on my feet for Geoff. I knew it would make Jewel happier if I weren’t posing as her equal when her husband came in. Her pride was still a formidable power on its own and it didn’t hurt me to let her keep it—for now.

The smoldering glare she kept on me while we waited let me know she hated me. I’d have disliked me, too, for knowing what a calculating liar she was; it hadn’t slipped past me that she’d never said a damned thing about finding her father’s killer in her proposal.

Suddenly she grabbed my hand, her expression tense. “Draw a card.”

“What?”

She pointed at the messy pile of tarot cards. “Pick one. Now.”

I plucked a card out and flipped it over onto the top of the pile. Jewel’s eyes widened, but she said nothing, staring at the image of a stone tower blasted by lightning.

SIXTEEN

Geoff Newman wasn’t pleased with the arrangements, but he played the role of