There are only two things I’d ever known the shadow to fear. Inquisitors – I’d known about Irish for a few months, and I’d blown that off as some kind of fluke until I met Cat, and realized she probably feared the whole damned lot of them. The second were those predators from the Abyss, the lights she’d shown me in the workshop earlier. The ones that had terrified her so thoroughly I’d almost blown my own damn brains out trying to get away from them. They inspired a terror in her that made her fear of Inquisitors look like a mild dislike in comparison.

Funny to think of my shadow not being the predatory one. She’d always had that feel to her. Just me, imposing the order of my own reality on something I couldn’t understand.

“Alice?” Irish squeezed my shoulder, and I finally looked up at him. “What is it, Alice? Tell me.” The look on his face finished the sentence with I’d rather hear it from you, which was sort of heartwarming, I guess. Except I sincerely doubted he wanted to hear any of this from anyone.

I shook my head. “What do you want, Owen? For the information. The details. The proof.”

Owen rubbed his hands together. “And now we’re ready to discuss the matter. As for what I want in return… a favor. That’s all. A favor done at some future date. From all three of you.”

“Oh, I’m not in this.” Grace put both hands up, shaking her head. “I don’t want anything to do with favors from Owen. I have enough trouble on my plate.”

“You don’t want this information for the Knights?” Owen made a surprised expression, sitting up a bit in his chair. “Vital intelligence on your enemies?”

“If it’s so vital, you have to tell me anyway.” She crossed her arms again, staring Owen down. “That’s the geas.”

“The geas? Oh, you mean the one that blew apart with the wards around the library?” Owen returned Grace’s withering glare with neutral aplomb, simply waiting her out.

“Do we need to know?” she asked, turning to me. “What have you figured out? Do we need to know the rest?”

“I want to know.” I tucked the lighter and my pack of cigarettes in my coat pocket, avoiding Irish’s eyes. I could feel the man staring at me, like he was trying to will me to tell him. He probably was, come to think of it. “I’m in. Whatever you want. Just don’t fuck me over too hard, or I won’t ever bring you candy again.”

“That’s harsh, Alice. It’s like you don’t trust me.”

I snorted and shook my head, lighting another cigarette with hands that shook. If what I suspected were true, it explained a hell of a lot. My throat was a little scratchy from the chain-smoking, and I was thirsty. I didn’t really want another smoke, but it was a good reason not to look at Irish. I didn’t need to look at him to feel him through the shadow, standing there still as a statue with his expression carefully blank, like he was already bracing himself for the worst. He had no idea.

“Fine. Fine, then. Me too.” His hand tightened on my shoulder again, and we looked at Grace.

“Damn it.” She chewed on her thumb for a moment, staring at us. “All right. If it’s that important, I’d better know too. What are talking about here, Owen? What kind of favor? I won’t be getting called up in the dead of the night to go kill someone for you or anything like that.”

“Oh, no, not at all. Nothing like that. My goodness, what do you take me for, a human being?” Owen gave an offended little sniff. “Really.”

Grace treated him to an expression that looked dubious on her human projection. She settled down, perching in her chair, waving one hand for Owen to get on with it. Owen smirked, or made a reasonable approximation of a smirk, and straightened up, eying us over the lenses of his glasses as he prepared to lecture.

“Alice, you’ve learned your Randall was Leonard Feist, the Devil.” I nodded. “What are his influences?”

“Influences?” I raised my eyebrows. “Couldn’t say. I don’t know much about him. I tend to steer clear of the Majors.” Owen tsked at me, as though I’d let him down, and he glanced to Grace for an answer.

She shrugged a little. “Leonard has his fingers in a lot of pies, but Detroit is his biggest concern, that I know of.”

“He has a formidable reputation, though.”

Irish, Grace, and I traded nonplussed glances. “Well, yes,” Grace said.

“How do you think he manages that, with Detroit as his biggest influence? Detroit, with its poor economy, high crime, vanishing population and negligible assets?” He watched us for a moment, lips pursed. “Anyone?”

Irish heaved a sigh, apparently impatient with our ignorance. “He’s got Owen.” I looked up at him, surprised, and he rolled his eyes at me. “Come on, then, d’you think if I’d known about Owen, I’d have let it go on this long? We’ve taken out nests of these things before.”

“Correct. Well done. Leonard is a master at the art of blackmail, and his talents are well suited to finding the skeletons in the proverbial closet. I am a potent font of information on my own, though the geas and wards limit me somewhat. He controls me, and ferrets out secrets and weapons and tools of the highest order. He isn’t the first to make an arrangement with an outlander of my kind, although he’s enjoyed some of the best success at it. And Mr. Hayes is also correct in that the Order makes a point in removing these sorts of ‘embassies’ when they discover them. Can you guess why?”

“They’re too dangerous.” Irish snorted, crossing his arms as he stood next to me, watching the outlander with cold eyes.

“Improperly managed, yes, they can be,” Owen allowed, with that little smile again. “More importantly, they’re competition.”

Grace made a funny little choking noise of shock that made Irish look at her, and I rubbed my face tiredly. He glanced down at me again, and now I could see the first hints of alarm cracking the coolness in his eyes.

“What do you mean by that?” he asked, wary.

The shadow poked at me, and I felt her unease as she directed my attention to the subtle vibrations of a second conversation she’d just noticed. Hushed voices just outside the building. The wind outside was picking up now, and between that and the distance, I couldn’t make out the words, but I recognized the voices: Randall – Leonard – Damian, and Tyler.

Shit. I sat up a little in the chair. I absolutely could not have them disrupting this conversation before Owen had a chance to finish explaining. I had the feeling Irish wasn’t going to accept my guesses, however correct they looked to be. What could I do?

Inspiration struck, and I nudged the shadow back, instructing her to carry our voices out to the men. Let them hear the whole thing, and Leonard wouldn’t dare interrupt until he’d finished hearing it. Tyler was impetuous enough to barrel in here regardless, but both Randall – Leonard – and Damian would hold him back. They’d want the information, for one, although they’d be suspicious as to why they were getting it.

Owen sat forward in his chair, pinning Irish with his gaze. “Grace, what do you know of the other members of the Major Arcana? Specifically the Hierophant or Judgment?”

“I don’t know them at all. They mostly stick to Europe, don’t they? They’re a couple of the older regime,” she said to us. “I don’t even think they ever come to America.”

“Not if they can help it,” Owen agreed. “But they don’t have to. They’re very powerful, and their agents are everywhere.”

Graced studied Owen for a long, quiet moment as she did the math, then turned her full gaze on Irish. “Are they?”

Owen and I also looked to Irish. “Oh, my, yes,” Owen said.

Irish straightened his shoulders, jaw set hard. “Out with it.” He I couldn’t tell if he’d figured it out yet.

“I have access to the archives of data compiled by Leonard Feist, the Major Arcana known as The Devil. In a very real sense, I am the archives of The Devil,” Owen said. “A little less than six hundred years ago, the Hierophant and Judgment formed an alliance. This was long before the Arcana even existed, of course. In those days, they were just a pair of magicians who had, in their quest for power, reached out to other worlds for sources of energy unavailable in this world. By working together, they succeeded, and attained power known to only a handful of mages in the course of history. Thomas the Rhymer, or Merlin, for example.”

“They harnessed an outlander,” I said, and Owen nodded.

“Specifically, a hollowman. From it they were able to harness phenomenal power to fuel their magics, and from its blood they were able to create an elixir to extend their lifespans. The Devil’s archives indicate they were both heavily involved in the historical Inquisition. Highly placed in the Church, and based in Barcelona, the two of them used agents of the Church to hunt down other magicians. Feist knew that Henry Croner – Judgment, that is – used the Inquisition for his own benefit. Hedge magicians who had secrets of real power were taken in and broken and had those secrets tortured out of them.” Owen shifted in his seat, looking for a more comfortable exposition posture, and continued. “Since my wards were broken, and I was free to investigate, I have learned for the first time about the nature of their captive hollowman. All that was known before was that it was quite powerful, and kept in a secure stronghold whose location is their most carefully protected secret. Alice, have you guessed what sort of outlander came to inhabit their human prison cell?”

“Yeah.” I flicked ashes as Irish tossed me a startled look. “The predators. The lights stalking in the dark.” Irish and Grace gaped at me, and I shrugged. “My shadow comes from a huge, dark place. I call it the Abyss. Part of why I don’t sleep much is because sometimes we dream about it. Imagine a hundred billion shadows like mine, swarming through a night sky without stars. They’re sentient, but they don’t have a language like you’d think of it. It’s not so much a culture as it is an ecosystem. Mostly, they fight over scraps. Any flicker of light, or small patch of warmth, and they go after it like piranha. When there’s no food, they attack each other – the strongest are full of energy, and the others try to take it. It’s an act of will to fight off the smaller, weaker shades.”

Grace whistled, long and low. “That sounds delightful.”

I grinned. “Doesn’t it? Turns out, those dreams were happy memories for her. The good times, when the… flock? Herd? Whatever; it was the times when they weren’t afraid.”

Owen nodded. “Ecosystems are complex things. And where there are creatures that graze…”

“…there are ones that hunt.” Grace breathed.

“Yeah.” Just talking about this set my shadow on edge, and made my nerves jitter. “I’ve had other visions of the Abyss. There are predators there. They’re hot. They’re bright. They put out all the signs that tell the shades food is plentiful and free for the taking. The shadows are drawn to them, like moths to a flame. Then the predators feed.”

Irish shook his head, wide-eyed and amazed. He’d obviously never stopped to wonder what sort of world my shadow had come from. Maybe he’d just assumed, like I had, that the shadow was the top of her food chain. “They eat the darkness?”

“No.” I sighed. “My shadow isn’t really a shadow, Irish. Not literally. But she does eat light, and that makes a shadowy effect. I’ve taught her to stick to the shadows, where she can move and reach out without being seen. The darkness is just… a side-effect. She’s not solid.  No bones or blood, no muscle tissue or sinews. Just her mind, reaching out, feeling and tasting what it encounters. That’s what the predators eat, Irish. They eat minds.”

Owen sat back in his seat, looking up at the vaulted marble arches above us. “Predators. That’s a very descriptive name. But it’s not what Judgment and the Hierophant called their hollowman. Can you imagine what it must look like? A human woman, merged mind, body, and soul with a being of blazing heat and blinding light? She would dazzle the eyes that dare look upon her. She would scorch the earth where she trod, and her touch would burn, like a sword of fire. They called her an angel.”

Irish sucked in a deep breath between his teeth. I nodded, seeing it clearly in my imagination. The hollowman would be beautiful and terrible. The host’s mind, if it survived the process of being merged with the predator, would be consumed shortly thereafter. “Owen? What sort of magicians are they?”

He blinked owlishly at me, through his glasses. The tiny facets of his eyes danced in the warm light. “Can’t you guess?”

“One of them is an artificer,” I said. “That one could work out a way to contain the creature. The other one is an enchanter, and would be able to control it.”

“Just so.”

“How would they feed it? My shadow gets weaker when she’s hungry. They wouldn’t have been able to call up shades to feed it, would they?”

Owen cleared his throat. “I dislike guessing, Alice, you know that. However, I doubt that they’d have to do that. The creature would feed on willpower, essentially. With an enchanter at the reigns, they could force it to feed lightly, sparingly, from groups of people. Particularly if they could get a group of people together to focus on the creature…” He shot a sly glance at Irish. “A group that willingly devoted themselves. Prostrated themselves to it. Prayed to it.”

“Dear God,” Irish breathed.

Grace spoke up. “With an enchanter behind that kind of power… they’d be able to control people with surgical precision. Drain away all their resistance, and you’d have an army of willing puppets after it fed.”

“Yes.” Owen cleared his throat, and loosened his tie somewhat. “Heinrich Kramer was an enchanter with a remarkable ability for subtle control, even all those years ago.”

“What?” Irish was suddenly on his feet, and he had his blade half-drawn. “Saint Heinrich? What are you implying, monster?”

Owen blinked up at Irish, utterly unconcerned. “Heinrich Kramer. Henry Croner. It’s a small matter of mistranslation. And possibly a bit of deliberate obfuscation, I suppose. He’s more commonly known in certain circles today as Judgment. The founder of your Order is a member of the Major Arcana, Mr. Hayes.”

“You’re lying!”

Owen rubbed the back of his skull, as though his head hurt. I wondered how much longer he’d be able to stay outside his library. Had they ever tested his limits? “It makes a certain amount of sense, doesn’t it?” he continued. “Grace?”

She looked like she wanted to argue, but she reluctantly gave a nod of agreement. “If, and mind you, that’s a big ‘if,’ the Order were meant to weed out competition, then yes. That does make sense.” She frowned. “It’s not like you to make assumptions, Owen. Or even deductions or logical conclusions. You deal in facts. Do you have any to support this theory? Any at all?”

“A few. In 1790, the Order of St. Heinrich lay siege to Glastonbury Tor, eliminating the ancestral group of druids who carried on the teachings of Merlin. In 1938, Henry Croner was photographed at the funeral for Almarhum Sultan Sir Alaeddin Sulaiman, the fifth Sultan of Selangor. In the photograph, he is wearing a sword that matches the description of Excalibur. A blade that had been in the care of the Merlinites. Also, there is the matter of the blood samples.”

Irish let his sword fall back into his scabbard, and collapsed back into his seat. “The bee sting earlier. You took some of my blood.”

“I did, yes. Since my escape, I’ve taken blood samples from you, your daughter Caitlin, and Father Tanner. Who, by the way, was terribly difficult to locate. Also several thousand other residents of Detroit, just for a comparison and control sample. Tanner, Caitlin, and Mr. Hayes all have a certain… element, shall we say, in their blood. It hearkens to the outlands, this element, and it was an element I’d only ever encountered once before. In your blood, Alice.”

“What?” This from Irish and I, in unison.

“You left some of your blood behind at the residence of one Don Polrowski, the former zoning commissioner. When I cleaned the premises off the map, I cataloged and indexed your blood sample along with everything else.”

“You’re the cleaners?” I did not see that coming.

“Shut up!” Irish hissed, waving a hand at me. “Are you saying I’m a bloody hollowman? A corrupted thing of darkness and hunger?” His voice got very low and threatening. “Are you saying that about my daughter?”

“Hey!” Everybody ignored me.

“Not at all. For one thing, the element of the otherworldly was much, much stronger in Alice’s blood. She is a hollowman, after all, and contains a being from that world. The changes to her body chemistry are subtle overall, but still much more pronounced than in the three of you. I’m simply saying that this element is something I could measure and quantify. On encountering it a second time, I can recognize it. You are not in any way a creature anything like Alice. But what you are – what’s in you – it most certainly comes from the Abyss.”

Irish tried to say something, but all that happened was that he gaped like a fish. He looked at me, with his face gone white and his whites showing all around his eyes. He looked to Grace, who looked back with a projected expression of pity. This was like his excommunication all over again, with the whole world dropping out from under him, and it surprised me with how hard it was to watch. Finally, he put his face in his hands, falling forward out of his chair onto his knees. “Oh, my dear God…” he whispered. Lowering his hands, he looked at them like they were something twisted and alien attached to his wrists. “What am I?”

Owen opened his mouth to answer, but I waved him into silence. I knelt down next to Irish, and awkwardly put my arm around his shoulders and took one of his hands in mine. He looked at me like he was lost, totally adrift… and he didn’t pull away from me. I half thought he would. “Irish?” I said, keeping my voice soft but steady. “You remember what I told you last night? About vampires and werewolves?” He blinked at me, but I didn’t see any comprehension there. I sighed. “You never listen when you’re sure somebody’s wrong. Even when they’re not wrong. Think, Irish. You assumed they were outlanders, like Owen, or corruptions, like Grace.”

“Excuse me?” We ignored her.

“You even said you thought they were some kind of demon, and I laughed at you. Remember? Because that’s not how it works, Irish. They’re natives of this world – now. The first werewolf was a hollowman, Irish. The first vampire, too. But they took that bit of the Outside, and they blended it with humanity. That combination changes the rules, and our universe comes to accept it, over time. Werewolves breed true, did you know that?”

He nodded, slowly, and I sighed. “That’s why hollowmen are killed on sight, under Arcana law. We’re often infectious, and if we manage to contaminate something else?” I pointed at Grace with my cigarette, and she hung her head and dropped her projection. Irish drew in a sharp breath, but didn’t react as surprised as he should have. I think he saw at least partway through that little illusion she’d set up. Probably not the whole thing, but certainly some of it. “Sometimes it breeds into the race. It makes monsters. And those are natives, do you realize what that means? It means they belong here, and our universe doesn’t try to expunge them. Whether Grace likes it or not, this thing she’s become… it’s far enough removed from the outlander that from now on it’s a part of our world. Like vampires, and werewolves.” Now Irish and Grace were staring at me. “And like you, Irish.”

“What… what did they do?” He’d gone a rather ashen color. I shook my head, mute, and glanced to Owen for the specifics.

“First?” Owen asked. “This is conjecture, of course, but based in the facts I’ve been able to gather. I got blood samples from two psychics during my sweeps, and those genetic markers are present in you and Caitlin and Tanner, also. So. Here’s what I suspect: Judgment and the Hierophant used their captive angel to harness the power of a congregation. Worship and devotion were fed to it, and the creature used that to generate more of its light and heat – which produced magic the two of them could harness. One day, perhaps early in the Inquisition, perhaps even before it officially started, a psychic came to the church to see the angel.” He massaged his skull again, and I thought I saw some sweat on his brow. That was worrying. Irish put his near arm around me, and clung to my side like a drowning man. “What is a psychic, exactly? Not much reputable research has been done on the subject. They don’t use magic, though they might replicate the same effects. Scrying or clairvoyance, both accomplish much the same thing, do they not? Let us define a psychic as a human being endowed with an enormous surplus of willpower. Enough that they can affect the world around them, tangibly, with just the force of that will. What a feast that must have been for the angel! With Kramer at the helm, they would eventually have determined which person in the congregation was so gifted. Then they would have taken them for study.”

Irish shook his head, and I noticed tears coming from his eyes.

“Alice described the predators and the shadows of the Abyss for us. The predators require a strong will to make a good meal, and the shadows get stronger the better fed they are. I suspect the light the predators shed actually strengthen the wills in their prey. Focuses it. As the shadows approach the distant predator, lured by the light and heat, they would fight amongst themselves for the prize. The strongest among them would consume the weaker… and the shadow that reached the predator at last would be big and strong and delicious.”

My shadow whimpered, and I soothed her as best I could, while making sure she was still channeling the conversation out to the men on the steps outside. She didn’t like what we were talking about, and I really wasn’t sure how much she understood, but she was still well aware that I had a void bullet in my pocket. She obeyed.

“A single target to feast upon, rather than a swarm of minnows,” Owen continued. “It makes sense. Proximity to the angel would have enhanced the ability of our hypothetical psychic to focus his will, even as it allowed the angel to feed on that will and render the psychic pliable and controllable. A fascinating sort of symbiosis, no? The obvious step to take would be to breed the two of them.”

“No.” Irish shook his head, but Owen carried on, ignoring him.

“I would suppose the Confessors were their first successful strain. From what I can glean from their DNA, they would be well suited to seek out other talented psychics from the population. Working with the Church investigators, they’d have complete freedom, too, to go anywhere and talk to anyone. And if they chose to take someone away, to interrogate them for heresy or collusion with Satan? Why, who would tell them no?” Owen lifted his hands in laissez-faire shrug. “These new psychics could be bred again with the angel, or with the Confessors themselves. It’d be no different than breeding a stronger, more loyal dog from a stock of half-wolf canines. It’d just take longer – but so long as they had their captive angel, they had time aplenty. And with each passing generation, the stock only got stronger. Psychic agents with the power in their blood to harness their own belief, and convert it into focus. Power. Faith that moves mountains, indeed. The tattoo artifact you wear incorporates dozens of loyalty charms. Among them, a love spell, unless I’m mistaken.”

“Yeah, it does.” I agreed, still watching Irish, who was still watching me. I waited for him to say something. Anything. I was betting on a hearty “Fuck you!” but he was silent, eyes full up with a kind of dreadful horror and pain.

“It must have been a very intricate breeding program.” Owen tapped his lips with a finger, gazing idly at the floor as he thought. “I’m sure there were many recessives, who carried the genes for these talents but would never express them. They’d have been bred with the actives, or with the angel herself, to increase the chances for an active in the next generation.”

“Elaine?” Irish rasped. “No, it’s not true.” He didn’t believe what he saying, though, I could see that on his face. He shook his head anyway. “It’s not. I loved my wife. ”

I patted his shoulder again, in another awkward there, there. “I’m sure you did, Irish. But you had a little help.” I held my hands up and out in the harmless gesture, and shook my head. “And they kept it active even after you lost her. Couldn’t have you being unfaithful to her memory, could they? Passing those genes along into the general pool?”

“And they certainly couldn’t have you picking your own mate. No, they had a heifer picked out for you long before you ever met her.”

“Heifer?” Irish got to his feet, shrugging me aside in the process. There was murder in his eyes, and although his hands were still shaking, they were tightly clenched fists.

Owen blinked. “What? No, sorry, that’s mind-bogglingly offensive, isn’t it? I believe I was trying to make a joke.” Owen shook his head again, rubbing his forehead. “I may be slightly inebriated. The toxins are getting to me.”

Grace sat up straight with a little “Oh!” of dismay. “Stop distracting him!” she hissed at me when I looked at her.

Irish turned on me, fists still clenched at his sides. “So this is your answer? This is what you’re going with? That I and my whole family are inhuman monsters? Bred to kill monsters because the monsters who made us don’t like competition?”

Owen stood, too, interposing himself between us. “Your ancestors stole the secrets of the greatest wizards of their age. It was a different time, then, and powerful magicians were few and far between. In between the sacked libraries and the stolen relics of power, they were dispatched to destroy anything supernatural, since their masters knew all too well that if those powers were correctly harnessed, it could mean they would face a rival willing and able to steal their relics and minions.”

“I am a human being!” Irish snarled, nose-to-nose with the inscrutable Owen.

“In part, yes. But you are also so much more. Is it a label you need? A name to put on your condition? Very well, Mr. Hayes. I quote your own scriptures: Genesis 6:4, ‘The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.’”

Irish blinked. “What? Nephilim?”

“Indeed. The bastard offspring of angels and humans. Legendary heroes and mighty warriors. You’re a being whose faith is harnessed to reinforce his will. And with it, you are capable of incredible deeds. You see the future, anticipating your foes’ actions in combat, and predicting where they will flee. Sideshow telekinetics bend spoons; you augment your own strength to throw forklifts at your enemies. You heal from your wounds with incredible speed, but only when your heartrate is pounding. At rest, you heal like a normal human. The harder you push yourself, though, the more unstoppable you become.”

“That actually explains a lot,” I chimed in from over Owen’s shoulder. “When you were fighting Jada you were dodging before she even threw a punch, sometimes. And there’s no way you should have been able to take a hit from her – unless you were softening the impact and recovering from the blows ridiculously fast. And that gas tank that shouldn’t have exploded… some of the angel’s fire, maybe, or some kind of pyrokinesis.” Irish goggled at me. “And a slightly inhuman set of taste buds might explain your godawful taste in booze,” I added.

Grace stood, too, stepping gracefully down from her perch as her impossibly-jointed legs unfolded themselves. She made an eerie chk-chk-chk noise with her teeth, and we all looked her way. Maybe it was how she cleared her throat now? “Okay, this is fascinating, but I think all the bases have been covered. It’s time Owen went back home.”

“Is it? I do admit that I don’t feel very well. Is this pain?”

She nodded. “Probably, yes.”

“Ah, that explains it.” Owen glanced around. “You know, this place is filthy. I hadn’t noticed before.”

“Oh, God,” Grace backed away, and Irish and I followed her lead. “You should probably head back soon, Owen.”

“Let me think…” Owen settled back in his chair, less gracefully than usual. “Have we covered all of it? Two Major Arcana members behind the formation and organization of the Order, breeding their soldiers out of a captive hollowman to kill the rest of you off and, when the world is sufficiently purged of rival elements, achieve probable world domination. Yes, that sounds like all of it.” He glanced around the room. “Should I tidy up before I go?”

“No!” Grace raised both taloned hands in protest. “Ah, no. No, we’ll take care of it.” She tossed a frightened look at me. With both eyes. “We’ll do it, right, Alice?”

I had a sudden rush of adrenaline as I flashed back to the zoning commissioner’s house, disappearing bit by bit last night while I talked to Tanner. The last thing we needed was to see the Michigan Central Station evaporate away around us. Assuming we didn’t go with it, that is. “Yeah, sure, we got it covered. You head back to the library.”

Owen stared at me for a long second, considering, and I felt the shadows move and shift and sharpen as she sat forward in my mind, staring out of my eyes at Owen. She was like ice in my veins; two outlanders studying each other, weighing each other up.

Finally, “I believe my judgment may be more than just slightly impaired. I should probably go.” Owen stood up and straightened his suit jacket, rubbing his forehead again.

Behind us, the doors creaked open. Grace and Irish spun to look. Owen and I glanced at each other again. Owen gave the slightest smile, as he realized I’d been funneling the conversation out to Damian and company, and I shrugged. What else was I going to do?

“Leonard, how good to see you. I was just leaving.” The chandeliers and chairs winked out of existence, plunging the room into darkness. My shadow sighed happily in my head, and back by the doors, another flickering light flared, a palmful of fire in Tyler’s hand.

“So I heard.” Leonard strolled into the room, hands in his pockets, stopping at the edge of the light Tyler had provided. It wasn’t much light. There wasn’t enough magic to allow for a very impressive fireball on Tyler’s part. Poor guy. It kind of ruined his entrance. “Back to the library, then?” Still, it left Leonard dramatically silhouetted, so that part worked out well for them.

“Indeed,” Owen said, pulling the sleeves of his jacket down over the cuffs of his shirt. In that moment, Tyler’s flame sputtered, and Owen moved. I felt him shift in the darkness, not even really a step, but more like he was in one spot in one second, and next to Grace a beat later. I flinched, and Grace pulled in a breath as he snatched her arm.

“How very helpful of you,” Leonard went on. He couldn’t see us, standing in the darkness as we were, so he couldn’t see Owen lean his head towards Grace and whisper… something. Grace gasped, and I frowned. There was no way my shadow should have missed that. We should have heard every word. Owen had done something to block us out.

“I had no intention of escape, sir,” Owen said as he stepped back, a real step this time. What did he just do? I could feel Grace trembling in the dark. Tyler’s fire flared bright again, and I could see the strain on his face, even from this far away. Lacking ambient magic to tap, he was drawing on his own reserves. His own nervous system, the body’s electrical plant. It was either an impressive display of skill and power, or he was wearing some kind of battery artifact. Owen was back in place, as though he hadn’t moved. “You’re far too distrustful, Leonard. It’ll get you in trouble someday.”

“Possibly.” Leonard stood, raising a hand to shield his eyes from the light, peering into the darkness in our direction. “Don’t let me detain you, Owen. I’m sure Alice can fill us in on the rest, before we execute her.”

“Are you still going to execute her?” Owen sounded surprised. “That seems unwise. Still, I suppose it’s your right.” Leonard frowned at that, tucking his hand back into his pocket as a soft buzzing noise began to hum through the air. I took a step closer to Irish, to get the hell away from Owen. The air around him vibrated. “Alice, Mr. Hayes, Grace.” Owen sketched a little bow that I doubted anyone but me noticed. “A pleasure dealing with you. I’ll be in touch.” The hum roared, and I jumped, even though I was expecting it. Grace and Irish did, too, and just that fast the air was full of buzzing little bodies that poured upwards, and were gone.

“Fuck,” I muttered, jittery. I jumped again as Irish caught my hand in his and squeezed. “Are you okay?” I whispered. I didn’t move my lips, but then, I didn’t have to. The shadow was all over the room, and she whispered the words right in his ear. He shrugged.

Leonard stepped down the little rise of stairs, into the room, hands still in his pockets. He paused to crane his neck upwards and check out the architecture as he came, Tyler and Damian a step behind him. Their island of light approached through the darkness, and I decided to allow it. For now.

“It’s a lovely old building, isn’t it?” he said, stopping about ten feet from us. The light from Tyler’s flame reached us, now, washing us in a flickering orange glare. I could feel the shadow eying it, greedy as ever. “I don’t suppose you’d come along quietly, would you? It would be a shame to make a mess of the place.” He met my gaze with a little smile, a little gleam in his eye, a little challenge. He was still in his dress slacks and polished shoes, but over his pressed and starched white shirt he’d put on a fisherman’s vest. It had what looked like dozens of pockets, and knowing him, each one had a nasty little surprise inside. He’d also over-accessorized, with a ring on every finger, and half a dozen pendants and lockets draped around his neck. This close, I could feel a nimbus of power around him, and I knew he’d brought his own magic supply. His toys would work just fine.

I took stock of the situation, rubbing my jaw. Grace would fight on their side, obviously, and her enchantments weren’t my main worry. Her speed and those giant talons were. I’d be willing to try her magic to magic, but I wasn’t much of a physical fighter, and Irish wasn’t in top form. Running wasn’t an option. She’d chase us down in seconds and cut us down as easily as though she were playing tag.

For that matter, Tyler’s fireball, small though it was, should have used him up by now. Since it hadn’t, it was safe to assume he had a battery of his own, and the sad little display was a sham. His dark skin gleamed, and the flames he held in his palm gave his angry face a sinister cast of shadows. It was an effect I knew well, and I had to appreciate the artistry there. His battered biker’s leathers and dreadlocks were a marked contrast to Damian’s tailored grey silk Armani.

Damian’s shoes clicked on the tile floor, so he was apparently here in person. His strawmen had a tendency to float above the ground. Without my welding visor, I couldn’t see the constellations of spells orbiting his aura, waiting to be aimed and released, but it was a safe bet they were there. And he’d had time to revise his arsenal after our last encounter. Time to prepare for me. He smiled at me, from behind a pair of gold-rimmed designer sunglasses, and his handsome smile somehow managed to look chilling.

The magic field here was so low as to be null, which meant I didn’t have a lot to work with. I hadn’t brought a battery of my own, dammit. I might be able to use the shadow to tap or drain whatever devices they were using, but I couldn’t be sure. It might take time, and if the batteries were made by someone a lot better than me – and Leonard was a guy who could count on Edison always taking his calls – then I couldn’t count on it.

And then there was Leonard himself. Unlike the two other men, he didn’t look like he was itching for a fight. Rather, he looked thoughtful. That could be good or bad for me, depending on about a million factors. If things got violent, I decided I was going for him, first. Oh, sure, he was a dowser, and in theory, you wouldn’t expect that to be much use in a fight. But you’d be wrong. He could find weak spots. Holes in someone’s defense. If he’d done his homework, he’d already searched the world for the one thing I couldn’t defend against. He was dangerous.

Still. Damned if I was going quietly.

Table of Contents / Chapter Forty >>

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Black Alice © Marci Sischo and James Agle | All rights reserved.

Image credit: Michigan Central train Station by Urban Archeology (CC)