Irish had the cabbie drop us off in front of Lightning Video, a couple of blocks down from Owen’s place. I stretched after I got out of the cab, taking in the dark, gloomy clouds overhead and the sturdy red brick building. “What are we doing here?” I asked. “Did you want to pick up a movie for later?”

He paid the cabbie with a smile, and waved as the car left us on the sidewalk. “You got to get your toys, didn’t you? I have a cache here.”

I followed him around behind the storefront, kicking some broken glass out of my way and checking the graffiti in the alley for gang tags I might recognize. “Really? Right here, next to a major Arcana site? Right under your nose, as it were, eh?”

“I knew it’d come in handy someday. Didn’t know when, or why.” He led me toward a big empty lot out back that joined up with a handful of cluttered and abandoned backyards. There was an overgrown gravel drive leading to the vacant lot, and signs that the place had been used for parties and dumping. We traipsed though the knee-high wet grass around a steel drum that had been used for a campfire at some point. Empty beer cans and half a torched sofa. “It was like that a lot of the time,” he said. “I’d get a feeling, an idea… it was the Voice of God telling me what I needed to know. Sometimes it led me to a certain place at a certain time, sometimes it’d tell me to prepare a bolthole or a getaway car at a certain place. It never led me wrong. I miss it. The certainty.”

We stepped over a rusted barbed-wire fence that had been knocked over years ago and entered a yard belonging to a half-burned house. Plywood was nailed over the door, even though the back porch was a collapsed and sooty ruin. The ground floor windows were likewise boarded up, and the roof was sagging down. There were a lot of houses like this around the city. Empty places that sat in ruin because nobody wanted to foot the bill to tear it down or rebuild. “And sometimes it told you to draw something that hasn’t happened yet? Like that picture of me with your sketchbooks?”

“Ah, that was a bit different. I’d just… feel it coming on, and if I let it happen I could see the picture taking form. Wait here.” He stepped into the wreckage of the porch and ducked under the damaged flooring, crawling out of sight. I sent my shadow following after him, and to my surprise she actually went. The crawlspace under the porch was, surprisingly, quite dry, and Irish had hidden a large trunk under a tarp back there. She followed his every movement as he moved by feel in the gloom, dragging the tarp aside and crouching to work with a padlock on the trunk. I was surprised to notice the lock had braille coding on the three rotating dials, and Irish read it easily, snapping it open in seconds.

“Is this going to take long?” I called in to him. The shadow inventoried the contents in seconds, and we watched as Irish stripped to the waist, pulling out a clean tee shirt, still in the wrapper. Over that he strapped on a Kevlar vest, and added a flannel shirt. There was another long coat in there, too, and a belt with ammo, a pair of grenades, and some small metal tools. The belt had two holsters on it, and only one of them had a gun in it. He added the .45 he had brought with him to complete the set. There was a rag, that he used to wipe down his sword, and when it was dry he slid it into a metal mesh scabbard that clipped to his belt. The whole process was done with efficiency and he was climbing back out, looking much more presentable, in just a few minutes.

My shadow had found the flask of whiskey, too – that he’d left in the trunk, untouched. Interesting, that.

“Fast enough?” he grinned at me as he emerged, finding me leaning against the porch off to one side, smoking.

“What is it with your family and grenades?” I asked, flicking my butt off into the weeds. “And when did you learn braille?”

He looked back under the porch, and then back to me. “Ah. Well, I’m set. Let’s go see your expert.”

“Ah?”

“I’d assumed your shade let you see in the dark, but that isn’t right, is it?”

We cut through the lot again, kitty-corner toward the intersection. “Nope. Seeing is something you really need light for. We don’t see in the dark. That’d be silly.”

“Your… she fills the darkness, right? Feels the contents?”

“Yes. Also the taste and smells… she can hear, sort of. It’s more like feeling the vibrations of the sound.”

“And when the bar went black, that was yer shade filling the room?”

I shrugged. “Well, partly. Partly it was her, eating the light.”

“Handy.” Irish reached up, scratching at the back of his neck, and ripped a price tag off the collar of his shirt. “So what do your Arcana folks call it? Noctomancy? Shadowmagery?”

“Are you kidding? They don’t know about me. Come on, let’s go. I’m late enough as it is.”

“Late?”

“I should have been here last night. Had orders to get here, actually… time kind of got away from me.” I started up the street. “Tyler’spissed at me…” I shook my head as we crossed Vinewood. “It’s lucky they’ve got their hands full with the hollowman, or I’d have had Tyler hunting me down last night.”

“How pissed are we talking?” He stopped to look up at the two-story church we were passing, Carter Metropolitan. It was a pretty building, old-fashioned and stately, red brick and white trim, with a tall steeple looming over the corner of the church. Irish studied it thoughtfully, and hurried to catch up to me as I hustled across the street, hoping to forestall any further conversation for now. I was doing it again! Just like in the junkyard, when my mouth had run away from me. Dammit, why was I doing that? “We’re heading for the old library, aren’t we?” he asked as he caught up.

“George Lothrop Memorial, yep. And he’s pretty pissed. And getting moreso the longer it takes for me to get that info for him from Owen.”

“This Owen… lives in a library.”

“Has for years. Well, decades.” I paused on the corner, and ran my hand through my hair while we waited for a semi to pass. “They brought Owen in back in the early 1900′s. Built the library around him to hold him down.” Irish blinked at me.

“Hold him down?” I jogged across the street as Irish called after me “What the Hell are we meetin’, Alice?”

I stopped on the island, frowning up at him as he joined me. “Owen’s an outlander.”

“Fuck, of course he is!” Irish threw a hand up, disgusted. “How many of the bleedin’ things have yer lot got runnin’ around, Alice?”

“Just the one!”

“Jaysis, it’s one too many, isn’t it? Now d’yeh see why we –” He stopped himself with an effort, drawing a deep breath and shaking his head. He turned to glare at the passing traffic for a moment. I could see the line of his jaw, set hard. He turned back suddenly, surprising me. “Wait, just the one? What about you?” I met his glare, but remained silent. “Ah,” he finally said.

“Ah.”

“You said they don’t know about yer shade?” I nodded. “But how could they not?”

“You didn’t,” I pointed out as we reached the opposite sidewalk.

He frowned. “I guess I thought yeh were bein’ careful around me. With the witches, couldn’t yeh let yer guard down? At all?”

“Oh hell, no. Outlanders are… they’re a big deal. Harnessing one into service, like Owen, is… well, it’s like a nuke.” Irish’s eyes got really wide, and I waved my hand to forestall his reaction. “Not literally! Relax, man! It’s like how when a nation becomes capable of stockpiling nuclear weapons, suddenly all the other nations in the world are watching them. Judging them. Assessing what sort of threat they could represent, and who they’d likely be a danger to first and foremost. Deciding whether or not they can be trusted with that much potential to do harm. Think Iran.”

“This isn’t soothing me at all, Alice.”

“Yeah, well, it’s not meant to. Detroit’s Arcana has Owen, and that’s a huge deal. Other cities, other enclaves, would give their left nuts to have him. Carl summoned his hollowman hoping he could harness and shackle it, making himself a player on par with the entire Detroit Arcana in one move. If he’d succeeded, either he’d suddenly be a major mover and shaker or, more likely, the Major Arcana would dog his every step until they managed to kill him and either banish his outlander for good or harness it for themselves.”

“Ah.” I smiled. That was becoming his new refrain. Irish was studying me, processing that. “So that’s what you are, and they don’t even know it. You’re a major power, thanks to your shade.” I smiled wider, as we preened at the praise.

“I survived a fight with Cat, didn’t I?”

“Did yeh? Seems to me you were dying. Not the point, though, is it?” I could feel Irish watching me, waiting for some response, but I turned, heading up towards the defunct library. “Honey didn’t know about you either. Do ye have anyone who you could confide in? Anyone who really knows ye?”

“Gene.”

“Gene’s dead, Alice. That’s really sad.”

I frowned at the gated fence surrounding the library, refusing to look at Irish. The gate was locked with a big, heavy chain and a sizable padlock. Irish wandered a few steps further, hands in his pockets, eying the neighborhood. He seemed dismayed to find the place so damn … normal.

The old library fronted on West Grand, so we were looking at its rather imposing front doors, surrounded by worn brown brick and broken windows. Despite the fact that the lawn had been kept up and the property fenced to discourage vandals, the windows weren’t boarded over. It was actually pretty pleasant-looking for an abandoned building, almost picturesque, set back a dozen or more feet from both roads, with its neat yard and trimmed bushes around the building. There was nothing spectacular about the place. It had an old-fashioned, Thirties sort of look to it, with the brick and big, arched windows surrounded in gray trim, molded stonework around the doors and roofline, and wide steps leading up to the main entrance. It had probably been a very inviting, welcoming sort of building back when it was open, and even now, in its slow ruin, it had only a little of that eerie feel empty places pick up.

“I suppose there’s me,” Irish said, somewhere behind me.

“What?” I turned to look at him.

“I know ye. You have me.”

This time I sneered, registering surprise as my shadow purred confidently. Why did she like that idea all of a sudden? For his part, Irish noticed my blinking in surprise and scoffing and seemed amused by it. “For what that’s worth, eh? All right, then, where’s yer bleedin’ security demon, then?”

“He’s probably out back.” I turned back and knocked on the fence pole, and as I did, the shadow made herself a still, cold knot in the back of my head, silent and hiding. I wasn’t sure if the demon guard could sense the shadow’s presence or not, but he was a canny bastard, and she had always played it safe around him. She still radiated pleasure and satisfaction, even as she hunkered down, and if anything it was even more annoying than the gibbering panic I was used to getting from her. I rapped at the pole again, harder this time, my face hot.

“Alice?”

“What!” I snapped, and Irish pointed past the fence. I looked over and saw a shimmery ripple, like heat waves, curling around the corner of the building. I frowned, concentrating. This was the tricky bit with meeting a demon, and I was already slow off the mark, but… I glanced up again, and the shimmer was gone, replaced by – I glanced back at Irish. “Fucking really, Irish? Really?”

“What?” Irish said, puzzled.

The demon approached, a big hulk of a man, easily seven feet tall and seeming as wide as the front of my car across the shoulders. He had long black hair and a ruddy sort of color to his skin, like he’d gotten a bad sunburn. His eyes were black and glassy and dead, like a cheap doll’s eyes. He was dressed as a security guard, sort of. If security guards wore uniforms made out of black leather and lots of straps and spikes. The black cap with the goat’s head/pentagram badge on the front was a nice touch, though.

“They take their shape from human minds,” I muttered over my shoulder to Irish. “Usually I aim for something a little friendlier-looking.” And unlike humans or other magicians, I actually had to work at it, since I had an extra occupant in my head messing up the process. “At least he doesn’t have horns,” I sighed, shaking my head.

“What’re ye on about?” Irish hissed at me. “They’re always big.”

“Sam,” I said, nodding a greeting as the demon approached the gate. He peeled his lips back from his yellowed teeth in an approximation of a grin. The expression looked plastic, fake, a mask he had put on for my benefit. “I’m here on Tyler’s say-so. Want to open the gate?”

“Sure thing, Alice. You were expected last night,” Sam said, reaching down for the padlock.

I got an uneasy feeling. Sam was never helpful. He wanted to banter, to talk. We limited his human interaction pretty severely, and he was starved for it. He seemed almost eager to let me in, and that was… disconcerting. He froze as Irish stepped up behind me. His beady dark eyes narrowed, and the smile twisted into an equally plastic-looking grimace. He drew his hand back, returning it to his pocket.

“What’s he doing here? Aren’t you in enough trouble?”

“You know him?” I glanced over my shoulder at Irish, who stood with his arms crossed, jaw set, glowering through the gate at the demon, but otherwise behaving himself.

“I know his kind.” Sam transferred his dead gaze to me, studying me. “I suppose he said he’d kill you if I don’t let you in.”

“Doubt it.” I pulled my cigarettes out, tapping one out. “Pretty sure Tyler’s going to be bent right out of fucking shape when I call him and tell him I can’t get in, though.”

“Doubt it.” Sam waved a hand negligently, and my cigarette lit itself. “You’re out, Alice. Damian’s issued instructions that say you’re to be treated with extreme prejudice.”

“Demonic Rent-a-Cop says what, now?” My jaw hung open as I stared up at Sam, lit cigarette dangling from my lip.

“Summoned an outlander? Ring any bells?” Sam grinned down at me, bracing his arms across the top of the fence as I stepped back so I could see him without craning my neck.

“I did what?”

“Yeah, ‘fraid so. Also, rumor has it you’ve been fraternizing with the Irishman.” Irish nodded, and Sam gave him a friendly nod in return. “That you?”

“Retired. But aye, that’s me.”

“Not helping!” I hit Irish in the chest, hard. I stood there a moment, listening to my heart beat, a bit too fast, feeling my stomach fill up with fluttery, panicky butterflies. Had Carl fingered me for the hollowman crime? But how? Or had the Knights linked me to the junkyard, and Jada’s death? The shadow poked at my thoughts, my alarm having caught her attention. She seemed remarkably calm. We didn’t need anybody’s permission, she felt. Detroit was our city, not theirs. Let them try to chase us out.

She didn’t know how powerful they were, how many of them would come down on us. She didn’t know how they’d hound us… how they’d make it impossible to hide.

“I’m not allowed to leave the grounds, but if you’d come in here I’d be ever so happy to kill you both. Tell you what, I could even make it quick. How’s that?” Sam leered down over the fence, leaning on it.

“Ye could try,” Irish offered, drawing his gun and aiming it right between Sam’s eyes.

I hit him again. “Still not helping.”

My foster families when I was a kid, my apprenticeship in Haiti… my marriages. And now the Arcana. Every fucking time I found someplace to belong, something happened that turned it all to shit…

I had to think. I could still fix this. Give them Carl, and prove he’d been the summoner, not me. Benny could alibi me and explain my presence in the junkyard, which they would hate but there were no explicit laws against working with vampires. Irish would be harder to get around, but if I could give them solid intel about the Order from him… the news about that tattoo, maybe… or give them Tanner? That might work…

Fuck, it was only impressive that it’d taken this long for it to fall apart. And now… Shit. It wasn’t like I could move to a new town and start again. The Arcana was a global organization. They’d find me.

“You’re going to shoot me? Sure, it’s been a while. Go nuts.” Sam chuckled, his amused grin revealing a mouthful of yellowing sharp teeth. He sniffed, and his nostrils gaped huge and wide. “Wait. Something’s wrong with you. Something’s different.” Another sniff, followed by a delighted smile. “Let me guess: you’ve been outcast, haven’t you?”

Irish flinched.

“I’m right, aren’t I? God’s soldier, used up and thrown away. I’ve seen it before, you know. When they’re done with you, they hunt you. Have they started yet?”

“Sam, shut the fuck up,” I growled, slapping the fence and making it rattle.

“You know, if you’re interested in seeking new sponsorship, I can give you back everything you’ve lost.” Sam’s tone was off-hand, friendly, even.

“What?” Irish took a wary step back, staring up at the demon.

“My master is an angel, remember? Just a different zip code, that’s all.” Sam shrugged, offering that leering, grimacing grin again. “Power’s easy. They took yours away, we can give it back. Just like that.” He snapped his big, meaty fingers, and I saw his nails, curled and burned black.

“Why would you do that?” I cut in, shooting a quick glance at Irish, who looked entirely too thoughtful for my liking. “So he could hunt down your kind again? Sam, that’s just stupid.”

“Is it?” Sam shifted a little, eying me. “The Order has a whole chain of command, a whole system of men who systematically destroyed Mr. Hayes’ life. His family, too, I bet. I’ve seen it before, and more than once. These men betrayed him, used him, and perverted the ideals he dedicated his life to uphold. We would restore his might so that he could exact revenge against them. We love revenge.”

“Sure, and if the Order falls, none of us would still challenge your lot, is that it?” Irish shook his head, disgusted, as he put his gun away again.

“You’d take the Order down?” Sam asked, letting his eyes widen in a show of surprise. “Wow. That’s a tall order. No, I was just suggesting you purge the corrupt element from it. Wreak vengeance on the guilty, and leave the righteous to their task, if you wish.”

Irish studied the demon, gaze slowly narrowing as he thought it through.

“You’re saying they’re all guilty.”

“Might be.” Sam shrugged again, smirking.

“No,” Irish said, and I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding.

“Had to ask.” Sam shook his head, faking an expression of regret with a little tsk sound. “If I could snag an Inquisitor, it’d mean a big promotion for me.”

“I’m already excommunicated. Already damned. What’s there to snag?”

Sam raised his eyebrows. “You think the Order have the power to do that? Really? Even now, you think they’re on the side of God? Wow. No, friend. You’re not damned. Shoot, sign on with us, and you still might not be damned. It’ll depend on what you do with the power we give you. Me, now, I believe the old saw. Power corrupts. I think eventually, you’d be on our side even if you didn’t know it. Why, with the credit I’d earn for a deal like that, I’d be able to free myself of the geas that keeps me here. Even if you only exacted revenge on, say…one man, that’d be a good bargain.”

“One?” Irish raised his eyebrows. I could almost hear him thinking about Tanner.

I stepped between them before Irish could say something stupid and pointed at the padlock. “Sam, open the gate. You’re letting us in.”

“I am?” He blinked in surprise, but after a second’s hesitation, moved to unlock the gate. “You’re actually coming in? That’s really nice of you, Alice. You won’t feel a thing, I promise. I’ll even make sure you’re all the way dead before I do anything fun to your corpse.”

“No, Sam. You’re letting us in because the Knight of Swords authorized it. I need to get answers from Owen for him, and I need Irish, here, to help with that. Each of them knows things, and I need to get them together to get the facts that Tyler sent me for.”

The padlock clicked open, and Sam opened the gate with a flourish, bowing and gesturing me to enter. The smile he wore didn’t look fake or plastic at all, this time. Just hungry.

“Alice?” Irish asked, looking unsure.

“You do remember the part about how the Knight of Pentacles ordered you killed, right?” the demon asked, waiting for me to cross the threshold onto the Library grounds. My stomach was a cold knot at the very thought, so yeah, I remembered.

“I remember.” I stepped through the gate, and Sam snarled at me, a single row of yellowed teeth in his mouth. But that’s all he did. “Come on, Irish.”

“Why isn’t he killing you?” He asked, with an insulting amount of suspicion. It was like he didn’t trust me or something.

“Because he’s bound by his geas, that’s why. I’m here with authorization, and it doesn’t matter if I’m an Arcana member in good standing or if I’m top of the most-wanted list. What matters is the authorization. After this visit, if I came back, it’d be a different story. Right, Sam?”

Sam spat on the ground in disgust, but continued to hold the gate open like a good doorman. “What if Master Grant, the clever Knight of Swords, had rescinded his permission? Did you think of that?”

“I did. I was guessing that he’s been busy, and has other things on his mind.”

Irish stepped through the gate, watching Sam carefully. The demon made no move. He looked at me, and raised his eyebrows. “Good guess.”

“Thank you. Now come on, we’ve wasted too much time already.” We crunched our way up the gravel walk, and after another sharp look at Sam, the door opened by itself to welcome us into Owen’s home.

We stepped into the abandoned library, and the door swung shut behind us soundlessly, closing with a gentle click that echoed in the cavernous main lobby. Irish turned in a slow circle, one hand at his hip, on the butt of a gun.

“My God, Alice,” he said softly, face pale.

“Relax,” I said, shrugging out of my coat. The library was pretty warm, actually a bit on the stifling side, to be honest. Probably all the honeycombs and wax made for great insulation. The walls and shelves were completely covered in runneled ivory wax, pooling along the edges of the hardwood floor in slick, rock-solid puddles. Overhead, honeycombs were growing down from the ceiling like stalactites. There was a low droning hum in the air, soft enough to be more felt than heard.

“Owen! I’m here!” I shouted, wandering deeper into the lobby. Behind the check-out desk, Owen had set up a sort of parlor. He’d left the fireplace intact, and there was a cheerful fire blazing there, the main source of light in the large room. Up above, a weak glow came from windows and skylights mostly obscured by the wax. Several books were blazing merrily away in the flames, and some lay open to reveal pages that were blank and empty. Even the covers were blank. There was an antique coffee table with a silver tea service, and a few overstuffed armchairs.

Irish followed me, pausing to stare into the library. It was full of silent honeycombs, growing over the bookshelves, the walls, the ceilings. The combs had completely swallowed the staircase that led up to the second floor balcony, and though that was lost to darkness, I knew from experience that it was all combs up there, too. My shadow uncoiled and relaxed, pooling around my feet. She loved the humming buzz that resonated through the air and in the floor. Still, she never seemed inclined to explore. Not here.

“Owen?”

“A moment, Alice.” The pleasant alto voice echoed out from the depths of the library.

“Okay!” I tossed my coat over one of the armchairs. “Irish.” He was still staring into the library, wide-eyed. At the sound of his name, he started, turning my way.

“They don’t have six sides,” he said, like that was the biggest problem with gigantic alien honeycombs overtaking an abandoned library. Oddly enough, that was the first thing that bothered most people about the place, according to Owen. Apparently, humans come hardwired to expect hexagon honeycombs. These had too many sides, or too few.

“Yeah. I suspect it’s a filing system. The hives store information. It’s kind of Owen’s thing.” I shrugged, digging the Oreos and honeybear out of my coat and setting them on the table. “Have a seat.”

Irish cast an uneasy glance around the dimly-lit lobby. “Where are the bees?”

“Not here.” I waved around the lobby, grinning. It didn’t seem to reassure Irish any. “I’m not actually sure what else is here. I’ve never seen anything but Owen. He does call the place a hive, though, so I expect there’s something else around.” I set out an assortment of cookies on the bone china plate, and squeezed a generous portion of honey over them. Then I added more cookies, and more honey.

“A… hive?” Irish joined me in the circle of cheery yellow light spilling out from the fireplace. “This Owen, he built this?”

“Sort of.” I flopped down in the armchair. “I guess he used to live under the library, but when the city closed it down, he sort of took the rest over. Caused a hell of a panic with the local Arcana at the time, from what I understand. I might have the order wrong. Might be he took over the building, so they closed the library. Either way, see, the library was supposed to hold him down, keep him from expanding like this. It didn’t. The Arcana had to scramble to re-secure the place after that. They had to renegotiate Owen’s contract and everything.”

“His contract?” Irish scowled at me as he settled into a chair opposite me, adjusting his scabbard as he sat.

“Yeah. Like a rental agreement. Think of this like an embassy.”

“That is a very good analogy, Alice,” came Owen’s smooth, cultured voice. We both looked up, to see Owen step smartly into the firelight. I think I actually heard Irish blink. “Pardon the delay.” Owen was impeccably dressed, as usual, in a tailored navy suit. He wasn’t a big man, a few inches shorter than me and not much heavier, but there was an unsettling air about him. He looked like he’d been left out in the sunlight too long and faded – wheat-blonde hair neat and business short, skin like smooth polished ivory. He wore glasses with silver wire frames and rectangle lenses that perched near the end of his nose and made him look perpetually disapproving. He spared a glance for Irish, then looked me over.

“You’re late, Alice.” He joined us by the fire, and the light flickered and glinted in his eyes. They were human shaped, but black and faceted, like a bug’s.

“My bad,” I said. No need to explain to Owen. He’d know what I’d been up to all night. Knowing was Owen’s thing. “Irish, this is Owen. Just as he is a guest in our universe, please remember that we are guests in his hive. Be polite, and be courteous, and you’ll find Owen will respond in kind.”

“Oh, indeed. Oho, I see you brought me sweets! Alice, you are so thoughtful!” Owen lifted a sticky Oreo and twirled it, daintily lifting it from the sticky mess and keeping as much honey on the cookie as he could. He lifted it to his face, and… well, it’s hard to describe. His lips would approach the cookie and bits would break off and end up in his mouth, but it wasn’t entirely clear as to how that worked. Best guess? Owen had mouthparts that weren’t entirely apparent. He devoured the first cookie in seconds and immediately reached for another. “Coffee? Tea?”

“Coffee for me.” I lifted the teapot and poured myself a cup of strong, hot black Kona. “Irish?”

“Tea would be nice?” he said, watching as Owen dismantled and inhaled a third sticky sweet treat. I poured him a cup from the same pot, and this time a rich brown dark tea poured forth. “Earl Gray?” I guessed, and Owen shook his head.

“Mr. Hayes prefers Oolong.”

“Does he? Huh. So, how bad is it, Owen?”

Two cookies came off the plate, Owen juggling them in his hands to keep the honey flowing from one to the other before gobbling them down. “It isn’t good, Alice. Tyler and Grace were here this morning. Tyler was quite upset, and asking if you’d been here yet. Grace was in a great deal of pain.”

“He came here himself? But he hates you.” Irish nearly choked on his tea, and shot me a wide-eyed look of horror. It took me a second to realize what was bothering him. “Oh, no, Irish. It’s cool. Owen thrives on honesty. I wasn’t being rude.” I smiled at Owen and shrugged. “I told him to be polite, see.”

“That you did.” He nodded politely at Irish, and smiled, his mouth full of sticky bits of black cookie clinging to his teeth. “It was kind of you to be concerned about my feelings.” Returning his attention to me, and carefully collecting three cookies this time from the plate, Owen went on. “So, Alice, Tyler sent you here to get information for him. So you’re entitled to the information I gave him, I suppose. Let’s see… The hollowman causing so much trouble in the city is strong, easily strong enough to return home. But something is holding it here. The ritual of binding succeeded, and to the best of my ability to guess, I’d say it is seeking out those who bound it.”

Irish nodded. “The Deputy Mayor. The Zoning Commisioner. The District Attorney. Carl from the City Planning office.”

Owen tapped the side of his nose, leaving a smear of honey in the process. “Just so. Among others. Those are not the same men and women that Tyler spoke of, but it seems reasonable to assume they are connected.”

“So if we do nothing, it kills the people who brought it here, and then it leaves?”

“Perhaps. It’s certainly strong enough to leave if it wants to. I cannot say it would choose to do that, however.”

I leaned forward, sipping my coffee. “Do you know what kind of Outlander it is? What does it do, what is it afraid of? Can we kill it?”

“You’ve touched it. I can smell it on your flesh, even now. And on Mr. Hayes’ boots. The mist that bleeds from the human fleshshelter is the Outlander’s body.”

“Damn. Foggy bastard.”

“As you say. Tyler had a pair of rings, salvaged from a woman and a man in the city Treasury Department. From their bodies, rather. From what was left.” Owen smeared one hand in the puddle of honey on the plate, and pounded his fist down on the bag of cookies. Reaching into the bag with his sticky fingers, he scooped up crumbs and fragments and brought them to his mouth, consuming the goodies in seconds so thoroughly that not even a smudge of crumb or honey remained on his long pale fingers. “The rings are artifacts, and are part of the ritual used to summon the creature. They channel the power of the binding ritual over a wide area, like a net. I gather that they were supposed to control the creature as well, but from the horrible ways the wearers continue to die, I don’t think they work very well. Tyler believes you made them.”

I snorted. “If I’d made them, they would have worked.”

“I could not confirm that for him. Only that an artificer of some skill would have been needed to craft the set. Tyler has summoned an artificer from Ohio to come up and examine them. Jacob Stills.”

“The one who made that wand for Grace. He’s a hack.”

“So I have heard. From you, mostly.”

“Was that all?”

“He was quite agitated about Grace’s condition. She was exposed to some worms, it seems? They bit her, last night, from what he said. One or more may have burrowed into her body. She is changing. Becoming much like the creature that attacked her.”

I remembered the spidery woman Corruption Tyler and I had killed. The thought of lovely, sophisticated Grace warping and twisting into that buglike creature was sad. It seemed like a waste. “Will she be all right?”

“Do you care?”

“Not a lot.” Irish shot me a startled look at that, but I ignored him.

“No, of course not. You only ask because it is the expected thing to do.” Owen waved a hand dismissively as he took a long pull of honey right from the plastic bear. “Aaah! Delicious! Damian is trying to work a spell to purge the infection, but so far with no success. He is dividing his attention between that and finding you, Mr. Hayes. He believes you are hunting him, and that he must find you first, and the time he spends in this pursuit is enraging Tyler considerably. He acts as though he loves Grace, and her condition has him quite upset.”

“He might,” I said. “That would explain a lot, wouldn’t it?”

Irish set his teacup down, nodding. “Okay. So that’s what the Knight of Swords got when he came here? Can you tell us what he didn’t learn? What should he have asked about, but didn’t because he was too upset to think clearly?”

I glanced up from my coffee at the question. “Ooo, good one.”

“Aye, I know. It’s like I’ve done this before.” Irish rolled his eyes.

“I don’t know… is that in the spirit of our accord?” Owen tapped his lips thoughtfully, studying us.

“What Alice would have thought to ask about that Tyler didn’t,” Irish clarified. “That should qualify.”

“Say, you have a point, sir. Yes. He didn’t ask about what went wrong with the ritual. One person was the key, the pivot point of the ritual. To that person the Outlander would manifest, and that person would seize control of it. By the look of the cracks in the stones of the rings he brought me, it would seem that two people were fighting to be that pivot point. Two who wanted the power for themselves, and it is likely that dissonance that made it go wrong.”

“Carl,” Irish said. He wanted power for himself, he was connected to everyone, he was even in City Planning, where he could use his slow-but-potent geomancy to build the power for the ritual. He’s one. Who’s the other?”

I sat back in my chair. “It’s Benny. Benny, who’s been stuck working for his grandmother for forty years. Benny, who even if he became a vampire himself, would still be her slave. Forever. Benny wanted power, in a bad way. Has to be him.” My head was spinning. In a few hours the sun would be down and Benny would be awake. Benny, with the added supernatural oomph that comes with vampirism, and a ring that might allow him to remote-control the hollowman. Whoa.

“Before we go…” Irish started, and I gave him a sharp look. “Do ye know anything about the Order?”

Owen nodded, slowly.

“About Inquisitors?”

“I do. But that information is not cleared to either of you under the terms of my contract.”

“I need to know if I can regain what I lost. The Order is corrupt, and the Grace of God is not theirs to dole out. I know it. They did something to take it away from me, to cut me off from the Lord when I’d need His guidance the most. There’s a bloody demon on your front lawn who says he can fix it, and if he can do it there must be another way. If you know of it, I’ll pay whatever price I must…” Irish registered my boggle-eyed expression, and added, belatedly, “…within reason, o’ course.”

Owen looked at him with the most baffled expression I’d ever seen on him. “Mr. Hayes… I would happly trade with you for whatever information I have… but…” He shrugged and sat back. “I must admit… I don’t understand what you’re asking.”

“My strength, in times of need. My protection, from the forces of evil. My intuition, guided by the Holy Spirit. The abilities I used on behalf of the Order for all these years! How do I get them back, man?”

Owen looked to me, completely nonplussed, and spread his arms. “Alice? I don’t understand.”

I stood up and pulled my coat on. “It’s okay, Owen, I think I do. You are a crafty thing, aren’t you? I thought you never gave anything away for free. Come on, Irish, we’re leaving.”

“But I wanted answers, and you said this was the man who had them.”

I dragged Irish to his feet and took his tea away from him. “Anytime, Alice,” Owen called, as I hustled Irish toward the door. “Thank you, again, for the cookies! I do hope you’re not killed!”

“Thanks, Owen. Me, too.”
Table of Contents / Chapter Twenty-Eight >>

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Photo credit: Kalocsa Episcopal Library and Image of a Honey Bee.