“What the devil is Betty doing here?” — those were the exact words with which I burst into Donald’s office. I’d meant to go to my uncle, but that would have been going too far, and I already had plenty to discuss with Donald. Besides, I’d caught a glimpse of Albert and knew perfectly well he wouldn’t be in his son’s study. I wouldn’t have dared speak to the old man in that tone, much as I might have liked to.

  “No one thought to ask you,” Donald snapped back.

  “When you’re home, drop in on Eugene and have him prescribe something for your memory. You’re cousins, aren’t you?”

  “I’m related to Betty as well.”

  It couldn’t be that simple. If Donald had dragged her here because of some family connection, he’d never have admitted it. And that connection was about as substantial as mine with Daphne Kinkaid: the only thing we shared in our blood was water.

  I dropped into the guest chair.

  “Don’t try to fob me off. She tried to bewitch me. Because of her, the whole clan nearly ended up in such a mess she ought to be scrubbing chamber pots for the rest of her life.”

  “That is precisely what she’s been doing of late: tending to the gravely ill, washing them, emptying bedpans, and zealously scrubbing lavatories. In short, she’s earned a chance at redemption.”

  “It didn’t look that way to me. She spoke to me as though nothing had happened!”

  “What did you expect? For her to tear her hair out and grovel at your feet, begging forgiveness? The past six months have been genuinely difficult for her. If we keep hounding her, as you suggest, we’ll end up with another Alexandra. We’ve granted a small concession; let her work and prove she’s worth it. Especially as the work ahead of her is hardly pleasant.”

  “She’s staying in Farnell?” I shot to my feet.

  Donald rose as well and brought his fist down on the desk so hard the surface cracked. He must have employed one of his magical abilities, or an amulet, for effect: the papers jumped and a pen rolled onto the floor.

  “Sit down and stop shouting! Do you know, I sometimes wonder which of you thinks himself more important — you or Bryan. You’re both useful, in some cases nearly indispensable, but at times you behave worse than children! In Avoc they’d tear Betty apart. We can’t send her abroad. Hell, we can’t even place her in a neighbouring county — too risky. Here she’ll be under my supervision and continue to be of use to the clan. Do you think there are many volunteers willing to work with juvenile offenders? Not just toss them a couple of pounds, but truly work — feed them, teach them, treat them. Delve into their problems, explain that the world is cruel and harsh, yet not everyone in it is their enemy; that it’s possible to live differently without theft, without lies. You were one of the first to shout that it was wrong to use children, you wrung a promise out of Bryce that everything would be done properly, and then you calmed down. And after that? Let others do the work, you’ve already played the hero?”

  “I work as well, if you hadn’t noticed!” I snapped, dropping back into the chair.

  “That’s now,” Donald retorted, picking up the pen and sitting down too. “Once the orphanage is up and running, you’ll hide behind your training.”

  “Leave training out of this — that’s sacred!”

  “Fair enough, I went too far. But I expect a couple of hours’ volunteering from you each day.”

  “You can forget that. A couple of hours once a week.”

  “Five days. I’ll grant you the weekends…”

  “Two!”

  “Four!”

  “Three!”

  “Agreed!” Donald smiled. “Did you want anything besides coming here to yell about Betty?” He looked exceedingly pleased with himself.

  What the head of security had said about the work was true enough, but he’d tricked me. I didn’t yet see how, but he most certainly had. No honest man grins that smugly. Very well. I’d spoil his mood now.

  “First of all, you’re not a very nice man, and don’t try appealing to my conscience again. I’ve firmly taken note that your words aren’t always sincere and ought to be verified first.” McLal’s smile faded slightly, but what I said next made him truly glum. “My first meeting with the street urchins went rather well, but I allowed myself a small improvisation which will cost us a few extra pounds…”

  I didn’t recount everything from beginning to end, only the essentials: we needed appraisers and money. Not just proper funds, but quarters too, lots of quarters, though that could wait. For now, we needed the gifted. Even if they weren’t capable of perceiving subtler matters, the presence of magic in an object could be detected through physical contact. Though those with the Sight would be more reliable. One never knew what sort of rubbish the little thieves might try to pass off as jewellery.

  Having offloaded the responsibility onto Donald, I returned to Knuckles. He hadn’t been wasting his time: he’d polished off a couple of cutlets with Worcestershire sauce and was eyeing the ribs. I ruined his pleasure at once, though I couldn’t resist grabbing a cutlet sandwich and a bottle of fizzy drink for the road.

  I ate carefully, trying not to stain my suit, while keeping an eye on our surroundings so we wouldn’t repeat the previous incident: if Knuckles braked sharply, the cutlet could easily end up on my shirt. At the same time, I was training my ‘rear view’, stretching the limits of it, glancing left, then right, then surveying the area behind without turning my head. The last made me slightly dizzy, but during one such ‘circle’ something unusual caught my attention in the Cooper’s rear window.

  I can’t say what exactly put me on edge, the street was empty, yet I shifted the sandwich to my left hand and looked more closely, peering into the subtler planes. And there, on the pavement beneath the wall, I saw a figure wrapped in mist. What was more, the figure was maintaining a very respectable speed on his own two feet, keeping pace with the Cooper. Knuckles wasn’t racing, true, but neither were we crawling along an empty road.

  “Remind me where we’re headed?” I asked, hurriedly chewing.

  “To One-Eyed One-Leged’s lot.”

  “Hunchback, One-Eyed… How did you manage to become a leader without any serious disfigurement?”

  “I used to be Scrawny.”

  “You’re not exactly stout now.”

  Though, come to think of it, before we met he’d looked as if he never ate at all: skin, bones, a pair of knuckle-dusters, and a sack of stolen earnings. Now there was no comparison, he’d filled out, grown into himself. One could call him Mr. Sparrow without embarrassment.

  “I am! You just didn’t notice. And One-Eyed’s eyes, and legs, are perfectly fine. He tucks one leg up so it looks like a stump and wears a patch over his eye. People give more that way. He’s a beggar, and so’s the whole gang. They ought to be the first to bite at a free offer.”

  “I’ve heard beggars earn rather well. Better than most of your lot.”

  “Former lot,” Knuckles corrected. He seemed to like being Mr. Clint Sparrow far more than Knuckles these days. “And that’s true, with one caveat: they get far less respect, and they have to pay tribute. Hardly any fighters among them, so if rivals intercept them, they’ll be stripped and thrashed. It’s no picnic, but in the slums they’re the only ones who never went hungry. That’s why I wanted to put in a word for One-Eyed…”

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  I finished the sandwich, wiped my hands with a handkerchief, and took out my spellbook. Knuckles noticed and fell silent at once.

  “I’m listening,” I prompted.

  “Trouble?”

  “A tail under a glamour. What were you saying about One-Eyed?”

  “He’s a decent bloke. Your age. I know that’s a bit old, but perhaps you could take him on for reform? After all, he didn’t steal, he took what was given. No need to drive him out of the city like the others.”

  “He didn’t work, Clint.”

  “As if it’s that simple. As though wealthy folk lie awake dreaming of hiring a servant from the slums. I was lucky, and I clung to that chance with my teeth.”

  I probably had something to say in reply, but at that moment I was preoccupied with another question: who was following me, and why? Another gang member hoping to curry favour with the king of the criminal world? Doubtful. Anyone who could maintain such a pace without visible strain was certainly gifted, and the gifted did not become ordinary thugs. Unless his talent was counterbalanced by the intellect of a cork, but such men were usually taken under someone else’s wing. Power unburdened by wit can still be very useful.

  Ah! A little more of this and my head would split from the possibilities. My hand rested on the book, yet I did not open it, still weighing my options. As I thought, I continued to peer at the mist-shrouded figure, not trying to discern his features. At that speed it would have been difficult even in perfect visibility, but to glimpse his essence, which the magical fog concealed far more securely than his face.

  “Much farther?” I asked. “Start weaving… No, keep relatively straight, he might guess.”

  “So straight or weaving?”

  “Pick the furthest point from us along the edge of the slums and take the longest possible route with the fewest turns.”

  “That’s at the other end. The way we came.”

  “Then choose the other end!” I snapped irritably.

  Knuckles took offence and fell silent, while I went on thinking.

  Option one: don’t get involved. Turn round and drive home. In that case, the enemy, whoever he was, would realise he’d been spotted, grow cautious, and next time return prepared for such a development. As it was, he was already exceedingly careful. I might not have noticed him at all, had I not been practising my ‘rear view’.

  Option two: try to kill the bastard. Surprise was on my side. Only in this version so many things could go wrong that it was impossible to count them. Besides, there remained a small chance that this runner had been assigned to me, if not for protection, then for simple observation, by a third party such as Kate Blair or de Camp. It didn’t feel like Kate; the runner was a man. Her men were still nestlings, whereas this one’s hands and face had been weathered by the sun. As for de Camp… why would he?

  Option three: step out and ask.

  No. I’m not suicidal.

  There was something in the figure… a flicker. Blood? Or had I imagined it? That mist… The magic of it did more than cocoon his body; beneath his clothes it glowed in scattered blotches. An amulet would shine as a single concentrated point. Innate magic would either leave no trace at all or, on the contrary, illuminate the elemental source. This one’s source seemed empty, as far as I could tell.

  There — again, beneath the grey-blue veil, several green sparks flashed. Either enchanted clothing… or tattoos hidden underneath. And who do we know that deals in magical tattoos?

  I opened the book. Acceleration and Precision, that would do for Knuckles Stone Flesh as well, just to be thorough. For myself I’d replace the first two with potions, and activate Stone Flesh from the ring, and the Stone Shield too. Under no circumstances would I take Memory. If anything went wrong, I had no desire to remember it for the rest of my life.

  The most important thing now was to activate and hold terrakinesis.

  With two fingers of my right hand, I traced above my left wrist. A large, complex diagram, two separate parts of a spell hovered in the air above my jacket sleeve. Harry had thought that one through admirably.

  Now slowly. Carefully. I had no right to make a mistake.

  My will gently embraced the smaller central fragment of the spell and pressed it against the larger one. Terrakinesis engaged. I felt the crystalline blades concealed in my sleeve and the entire mass of earth, asphalt, stone, and brick surrounding the Cooper. The car was moving relatively slowly, yet in my mind one set of stones replaced another at forty kilometres an hour. It felt like washing one’s face with gravel.

  For a full minute I balanced on the brink of losing the spell, teeth clenched, barely able to breathe. Relief came only when I focused on the sole objects not moving within that chaos, the crystalline blades.

  “Clint, pick a spot, make a turn, and accelerate sharply to the next one. Brake just before it. I’m getting out. Don’t switch off the engine; we may need to bolt. And don’t you move. You stay behind the wheel.”

  Knuckles understood me. Still nursing his grievance over my sharp tone, he said nothing, but he floored the accelerator and wrenched the steering wheel left. The Cooper roared and shot across the block in an instant.

  As I’d hoped, our pursuer accelerated to keep pace. But before the next corner, Knuckles executed such a savage braking turn that we nearly rolled, lifting onto two wheels. I leapt from the Cooper before the second pair touched the ground and activated the stone shield from the ring.

  Unlike my previous steel shield, this one was not flat but three-dimensional. I had replaced it at Harry’s insistence — stone and earth were my element. Still, it would have been interesting to see whether the steel shield might have sliced the pursuer’s legs off if thrown edge-on at that speed.

  I hurled the stone shield at roughly a forty-degree angle. The stranger noticed the grey, semi-transparent slab flying at him, but had no time to react. It struck his knees with a sickening crack. His body pitched forward onto the surface with such force that the charge in the reservoir stone dropped almost to nothing.

  Inertia dragged him across the shield, flung him into the air. He sailed some four metres with the grace of a rag doll, then crashed down and rolled another two. The magic concealing him collapsed, replaced by the green glow of regeneration.

  And there was plenty to regenerate. Both knees were twisted at unnatural angles, his left arm hung limp, his face was smashed. Yet none of that prevented him from pushing himself upright on his right hand and turning towards me.

  The man bared his teeth. Yellowed, blood-smeared fangs slid from beneath his split lips, coarse fur spreading across his face. The wave of transformation travelled downward from his head, joints snapping back into place as they realigned.

  No need to peer into subtler planes now — a werewolf. Shifters never undergo such a complete transformation.

  The realisation was both comforting and terrifying.

  Comforting, because I knew what to do next.

  Terrifying, because I might not manage it.

  The key was not to hesitate, to press the advantage and not allow the werewolf to recover while the agony of transformation and regeneration still tore at his mind.

  Two crystalline blades shot from my sleeve at bullet speed. In flight I set them spinning, turning them into makeshift circular saws, and reached for my pistol. Before I had even drawn the weapon, one of the blades sliced through the werewolf’s right elbow. The diamond edge sheared the arm clean off. The second blade was less fortunate: the mangy brute’s left arm snapped fully straight a fraction before impact, the joint and bone shifting aside, and the blade carved through muscle only.

  The beast roared. Paying no heed to the loss of a limb or the fountain of blood spurting from the stump, it hurled itself at me. But its damaged legs betrayed it; the standing leap went awry. Instead of closing the distance between us, the werewolf ploughed muzzle-first into the old cobblestones and skidded to a halt a mere metre away.

  I had time to draw the pistol, take aim, and fire three shots into the obligingly presented back of its head, and three times I saw lead and magic strike sparks from an invisible shield. How fortunate I hadn’t aimed at the head with my first attack.

  The werewolf surged upright. In a flicker of panic I fired twice more into its chest. The bullets punched holes through it, but the creature scarcely seemed to notice. I slammed the shield into its skull. The reservoir stone died, but the ring did its work: the monster’s right knee buckled, delaying it just long enough for the crystalline blades to drive into its temple. They sank halfway in and stuck fast. That skull was tougher than the finest steel.

  I watched the fury fade from its eyes, and with it, the fire of life. The creature swayed forward, but before it could fall, it collapsed onto its haunches and then toppled sideways. The remaining hand flopped against my left shoe, leaving a pair of scratches on the impeccable polish.

  I had forgotten the Cooper was behind me. Instinctively I sprang back, took a step, and collided with the open door. The werewolf had nearly reached me. Thank God I hadn’t been arrogant enough to try and take it alive.

  “So we’re not running after all?” Knuckles called.

  His voice brought me back to myself. I had relaxed too soon.

  “Wait.” I scanned the street carefully, ready to dive onto the back seat at any moment, but saw no one. “Help me get him into the boot.”

  “He’ll get blood everywhere!” my driver protested.

  He wasn’t afraid of corpses. Like me, he probably no longer saw people in these creatures. But blood… Six months ago, in a skirmish with a fledgling vampire, he had blown its head apart with a punch from an enchanted knuckle-duster. Brains had been everywhere. Compared to that, this was nothing.

  “Oh, to hell with it. I’ll ask Harry to clean it with a spell.”

  “He’ll sooner make you practise the spell yourself.”

  “With my way of life, it wouldn’t go amiss. Think how many suits I could have saved.”

  The crystalline blades were lodged so firmly in bone that I couldn’t wrench them free. In any case, their charge was spent; they were useless for now, and I didn’t waste time. We cleared spare clothes from the boot, shifted the toolbox into the cabin, and heaved the body inside. The severed arm went on top. No sense leaving it in the road.

  That was that. Home, to charcoal-grilled meat and, perhaps, a bottle of beer. Today, I’d earned it. I wasn’t going anywhere else. And neither was Knuckles.