Game of Cages

Instead of ordering his men to shoot me, he laughed. He said something in Chinese, and I was hauled into the bathroom.

Someone was already in there, sitting on the toilet. It was one of his own men, bound and gagged. Thank God his pants were up.

They spun me around and shoved me into the tub. They made a special effort to tear Nicholas’s shirt.

I tripped over the rim and toppled back, smacking my head against the tile. I saw stars and the pain made tears well up. Damn, those tears made me furious. I was not going to let these bastards think—

“Mr. Lilly,” Yin said. “See? This is the spot where your friend would be, if I actually had her. It seems we were both bluffing!” He laughed with a high, girlish giggle.

I blinked the tears away. Yin was waiting for a response. “You’re full of shit,” I said. “You had her phone. Where did you hide her?”

“I do have her phone, but not her. She is a clever woman. Your society has more wit left to it than I’d heard.” He kicked the bottom of my foot. “Not in you, though. This fellow here”—he gestured to the man on the toilet—“is the one who let her escape, so he has taken her place.

“In many ways,” Yin continued, “I am an innocent in this world. I’m merely a financier with a mania for collecting. Without my collection, I would have no use for my money or these good, brave men. And I would have no use for torture.”

His tone was still calm and friendly. Nothing worried him at the moment. “Still,” he continued, “we can hardly employ such methods here. But I have other options.” He leaned close, wide-eyed and smiling. “I brought some of my collection with me.”

He turned toward the door. Well-Spoken handed him something wrapped in a black cloth. It was smaller than a T-ball bat. He unwrapped it with reverence.

It was a long knife, or maybe a short sword. I don’t know the difference and I don’t care. The scabbard was black and gleaming like polished stone. Yin drew it with a sudden motion, then held it up to admire it. The blade was straight, and as wide as two thumb widths. It had been honed and polished, and it looked like an antique. Yin held it up to the light as though he was about to discuss its history, then he turned and stabbed the bound man through the throat.

I shouted something inane like “Hey!” Bound didn’t have time to gasp. He froze, a grimace on his face. He looked around the room, finally stopping on me, and I thought how brutally unfair it was that I would be the last thing this stupid bastard ever saw.

Yin pushed the sword downward through his breastbone and stomach all the way to his belly button. He had to put his weight behind it, but it was not as difficult to cut through the bones as it should have been. Then he pulled the sword free. There was no blood, no cut, no wound at all. I stared at Bound, waiting for the blood.

Yin yanked off the man’s gag. Bound looked up meekly and said something in Chinese. Yin seemed amused. “He has just apologized to me.”

It’s an illusion, I thought. Yin had a trick sword, and Bound was playing along.

But I had no idea why they would bother; I was already in cuffs and at their mercy. I looked back at Bound and realized I needed to change his nickname. The ropes he’d been tied with were lying on the floor in pieces. His clothes were cut open, too. I’d been so focused on looking for blood that I hadn’t even noticed.

Bound slid down to his knees and hung his head.

“Do you see?” Yin asked, showing me the blade. There was a small sigil engraved near the hilt. “This mark is from the Ketrivisky Book of Oceans. This is a soul sword. It does not leave a mark on his flesh, but his will now belongs to me.”

The bastard had a ghost knife of his own.

CHAPTER TEN

Yin studied the sword. “It is not as powerful as it was in the hands of the man who sold it to me. I’m sure you know what happens to magic each time it changes hands.” He pointed it at me. “I wonder how many of the spells on your body I could cut before it shattered?”

Now was the time. “I don’t have files,” I said, not bothering to hide my hatred of him or my fear of that damn blade. “I don’t have any authority to guarantee your safety or the safety of your children. I only have one thing to offer: I can give you a spell of your own.”

Yin’s eyes narrowed on me and the sword lowered. “A spell?”

Bingo. “It’s the only one I know. Give me a big sheet of paper and a pen and I’ll draw out both parts for you. Then you let me go and leave us alone. We pretend this meeting never happened. I can’t offer more than that.”

He smiled at me. He was terribly smug. “I agree. Understand, though, Mr. Lilly. If you betray me, I will make sure others hear about our deal. I know how your superiors respond to trading spells.”

Two of his guys pulled me upright and unlocked my cuffs.

“Remember,” Yin said, “do not—”

“Just give me the paper and pen so we can be done with it.”

Well-Spoken brought them to me. I laid the paper on the bottom of the tub and wrote “for the mind” in the upper left and “for the hand” in the upper right. I’d only cast a couple of spells in my life, including the ghost knife, and while I couldn’t have re-created them from memory, this was how they had been drawn in the spell book.

On the left side of the page, I drew a couple of squiggles that might have been a hole in the ground and maybe an eyeball. On the right, I drew a couple of short lines that suggested a campfire. I have never been much of an artist, but considering what real sigils look like, that worked in my favor.

I handed them the paper. They cuffed me again.

Yin laid his hand over the drawing on the left. He knew enough to recognize the danger in looking at that part of a spell before he’d learned the right-hand drawing.