World of Lupi 10 - Ritual Magic (31 page)

While the woman set up a pair of small floodlights, Lily pulled on a pair of the disposable gloves she kept in her purse. She approached the body carefully, avoiding the ashy smears that had been runes, and crouched.

The burned smell was strong. Some of it was from the dead man’s exposed skin.

He lay facedown in the dirt. Might not be much face left of it to see when they turned him over, judging by the way the back of his head looked. High-caliber rounds made a mess. A couple feet from his outflung hand lay a weapon—a Sig Sauer P226, either new or nearly new, she thought, playing her flashlight over it. Good gun, but no weapon’s much use if you’re shot from behind. She directed her light at his head, hoping to learn his hair color, but he’d worn a ski mask. What was left of his head was covered by knitted stuff.

The rest of his body seemed unmarked, aside from postmortem burns. He’d been maybe one eighty, one ninety, and under six feet. Dark turtleneck, dark slacks, dark athletic shoes, all good quality. His right hand was underneath the body. The outflung left hand lacked a wedding ring. No visible calluses. No sign of defensive wounds.

And the wrong build for Friar, dammit.

The floodlights came on. Lily put away her flashlight. Sergeant Armstrong began snapping pictures.

“I’m going to check out the spot I picked for the shooter,” T.J. said.

Lily looked at him, then studied the way the dead man had fallen. The bullets had to have been fired from the east . . . she shifted to check. “That patch of brush about thirty feet southeast of us?”

“Not a bad spot to hide while waiting to pick off your targets.” T.J. turned and headed for it.

Shooting uphill could be tricky, but the slope wasn’t bad there. “You think the perp was already in place?”

“I don’t see how he could’ve gotten there without being heard,” he said without turning around, “if anyone had been around to hear.”

Some lupi could move that quietly, but otherwise he was right. So why had he or she waited until the rite was under way? Could the shooter have wanted to create the instability Cullen had shut down with his pyrotechnics?

A large, black-and-silver wolf slid out of the darkness to meet T.J. at the brushy spot. T.J. froze. “Uh, right. Which one are you?”

“That’s Rule,” Lily called and went back to studying the scene.

No knives of any sort visible. The altar, singed now, was next to the body. Things had spilled when it tipped over—a metal chalice and some other stuff too crispy to identify right away, but no knife. “Why didn’t they use a circle?” she asked Cullen.

“They had one. It poofed when the rite was disrupted, leaving the hexagon. Which is not a stable array for a node.”

“They didn’t drive stakes through Angela Ward’s hands and feet like they did Debrett’s. Or this guy’s, for that matter.” Though she suspected he’d been one of the ones throwing the party, which someone else had crashed.

“It’s all in the timing. Look in the duffel. Uh . . . carefully. Just in case something else is there.”

She moved to the dead guy’s feet, where the duffel sat, unzipped. Sure enough, it held four metal stakes and a mallet. She rooted around, checking. No knife. “Why hadn’t they used these?”

“Most rites have three stages,” Cullen said. “First stage is traditionally called the invocation, though I prefer the term ‘definition.’ That’s when you invoke or define the powers you’ll work with and your intent. Second one gathers power. In this case, that meant tying in to the node, which would have happened at the very end of that stage. Third stage shapes and directs that power. They didn’t get that far, but it says nasty things about the kind of shaping they had in mind that it called for a form of crucifixion and murder.”

She chewed on that a moment. “You think they were planning to use the knife the way they did on Debrett.”

“Looks like, yeah.”

“But they were interrupted at the end of the second stage, when they’d tied in to the node. That’s why it went unstable?”

“Basically. I’ll spare you the long explanation of why this rite would do that when others wouldn’t. Short version: nodes are not safe.”

“I’m wondering if the shooter knew that would happen. Picked that moment on purpose. If the node went boom it would get rid of the bodies, wouldn’t it? And any other evidence the shooter might find inconvenient. Would he or she need to be familiar with the rite to know when they reached the end of the second stage? Or would they have to be able to see magic the way you do?”

“Huh.” Cullen’s eyebrows lifted. He looked over his shoulder at T.J., who was crouched on the near side of the brushy thicket, shining his flashlight over the ground. Rule was sniffing nearby. “From that distance . . . maybe not. It depends on a lot of variables, but it’s certainly possible he could feel it when the node was brought in. Likely, even, if the shooter was an experienced spellcaster himself.”

“Or herself.”

“You have someone in mind?”

“No, just keeping mine open.” Lily stood. “Would this hypothetical spellcaster know how long it would take for the node to go boom?”

“Without the Sight? No, and even with the Sight you’re just guessing. There are spells that would tell him it was unstable, but not how long it would take to hit the threshold. Well, there’s one that might, but it takes a couple hours to cast. He’d have to be remarkably stupid to hang around an unstable node that long.”

“Not to mention a body or two.” She nodded, satisfied. “Our perp didn’t hang around. He or she got the knife and got the hell out. Either he didn’t bother to make sure both victims were dead or he didn’t care. When the node went, it would take out anyone nearby. He wasn’t counting on the rangers hearing the shots. Or on you being able to do whatever you did.”

“I am a wonder and a half,” he agreed.

“Rule thinks he’s found something,” T.J. called, “but damned if I know what.”

Lily turned to see Rule loping up the slope toward them. The young patrol officer squeaked like a mouse, but she didn’t reach for her weapon, and the sergeant was made of sterner stuff. His eyes widened, but that was all. Rule stopped at the edge of the hexagon, his head lifting in surprise. His nostrils flared. He walked up to the body and lowered his head.

“He isn’t going to, ah . . .” The sergeant looked worried.

Lily pretended he wasn’t wondering if her fiancé was likely to eat the victim. “Wolves’ sense of smell is better than just about any other mammal’s, except for bears. His nose can be very useful.”

After giving the body a thorough sniff, Rule moved outside the hexagon—this time to the side near the drop-off. He sniffed that thoroughly, too, then peered over the edge. The drop-off was steep there. A cliff, really, with a rocky bit of beach below.

He Changed again. The patrol officer squeaked a second time, probably because Rule was now very naked. “Lily,” he said, “the dead man is Armand Jones.”

“Friar’s lieutenant?” She turned to look at the body. It was the right height and build. She’d hoped it might be Friar, been disappointed that it wasn’t, but Jones . . . that fit, too. “You’re sure.”

“Oh, yes. I made a point of learning his scent.”

“A falling-out among thieves, then. Not the way I first thought. Jones must have taken the knife. Sam did say it’s persuasive. Maybe it called to him or something, or maybe this was a power grab, pure and simple. Friar wanted the knife back. He would have known exactly when to fire to make the node unstable—”

But Rule was shaking his head. “Friar was here, yes. I found some of his blood outside the hexagon. I suspect he spilled quite a bit more inside it. He was among those shot, not the shooter.”

“But—is there a trail? Did he—”

“I think he went over the edge. I don’t see a body.”

She chewed on that in silence a moment. “Friar’s dead or badly hurt. Jones is dead. And whoever shot them must have the knife.” It didn’t make sense. Had the Great Bitch decided to ditch Friar and sent a new henchman to get the knife?

“T.J. and I found bullet casings by those bushes. That’s where the shooter was. That’s what I came to tell you. The scent I found there belongs to Miriam Faircastle.”

THIRTY-FIVE

“W
HAT
do you mean, you aren’t going to pick her up for questioning?” Lily wanted to reach through the phone and shake Karonski.

“Pipe down, Lily. You heard what Sam said about this knife. If she’s got it—and it sure as hell sounds like she does, or maybe it’s got her—we do not want to get close enough for it to start with the compelling and corrupting. We want Miriam Faircastle and that knife contained. Once she is, I can question her over the phone.”

Okay. Okay, that made sense. She was maybe a little excitable. “How do you plan to contain her?”

“Ruben has to sign off on this, but if he does, I want guards, armed guards, outside her home. We’ll evacuate her neighbors. We can’t let her leave and we can’t let anyone in there with her until Sam gets back.”

“Wait. He’s already left?”

“Right after you did. He wasn’t sure how long he’d be gone. Well, he said it would be at least two weeks for him, but from our perspective he might return anytime between now and a couple weeks from now. Something to do with the way he’ll travel through those dissynchronous realms.”

“Can Ruben authorize holding someone under . . . I guess it’s an extreme form of house arrest . . . for a week?”

“Looks like we’ll find out.”

Lily disconnected and frowned at the activity around her. The SOC crew had arrived and were having a meticulously grand time. Two were on their hands and knees, sifting the scrubby grass near the lookout point. One was carefully scooping bits of blood-soaked soil from just outside the hexagon into baggies. Friar’s blood, according to Rule’s nose, which Lily trusted at least as much as any DNA analysis. Rule and T.J. stood near the edge of the drop-off gripping one end of the rope Barnaby dangled from, sniffing at places a falling body might have hit on the way down.

Barnaby had an unusually good nose, even two-legged, but they didn’t expect him to find much. When Friar got supercharged by his goddess a few months before, he’d acquired several useful skills, including a trick like the demonic ability to go out-of-phase.
Dshatu
, demons called it. Friar had used it to get away before. From what Lily could tell, it was an immaterial state, which was probably handy if you found yourself falling off a cliff.

There was no shot-up, smashed-up body at the foot of the drop-off; therefore, Friar had probably gone immaterial when he fell. While he was out-of-phase, he wouldn’t leave a scent or blood trail. But he couldn’t drive a car while he was
dshatu
, and getting away would have been a priority. Rule had sent two of the others off four-footed to check spots where he might have parked a car.

Thirty feet away, two SOC officers were checking out the bushes where Miriam Faircastle had apparently waited on the best moment for murder.

The corruption must have leaped from Officer Crown to Miriam when Miriam was trying to remove it. In retrospect, that was obvious. He’d woken up screaming, but free of the taint; she’d gone on to plan and execute murder. Had they been wrong about the icky magic only being able to travel through organic substances? Had Miriam been stupid enough to ignore that safety precaution? Had she just been careless?

Whatever had gone wrong, Lily was kicking herself for not checking Miriam herself. It seemed so bloody obvious now. The corruption left the officer, so where did it go? Only that still didn’t explain everything. Why had the corruption compelled Miriam to shoot Friar and Jones and Angela Ward and steal the knife? If the corruption was connected to Nam Anthessa, then the knife itself seemed to be acting against Friar.

Lily huffed out a breath and told herself to brood later, when she had time. She turned away from the busy scene and headed for the south side of the trail.

Normally there was a bench on the lookout. Friar and Jones had moved it to make room for their rite, parking it on the smooth sand a little ways down the southern end of the trail. Cullen was sitting on it, eyes closed, either meditating or asleep.

“Got a question for you.”

“I’m busy.”

“Yeah, I can tell. Squeeze me into your schedule. Those fireworks you set off . . . they’d have been visible from a long ways off. If Miriam was watching, would she have known what you did? Or would she have thought that was the node blowing up?”

His eyes opened. He tilted his head, thinking it over. “Good question. It’s not something she would’ve seen before, probably not something anyone she knows has ever seen. Nodes don’t go unstable often, and when they do, they don’t often leave witnesses. I’ve read a description in an old journal, but she probably hasn’t. She doesn’t share my interest in old documents relating to the Art. So . . . yeah, she could easily have assumed her plan had worked.”

“Then she thinks she got away with it. Good.” Miriam would head back to her condo—was probably there now—and Karonski would station however many officers were needed to keep her from leaving. Would they be armed with tranq weapons? Should she call him and . . . no, she told herself, though her fingers twitched with the urge. Karonski was in charge, and he was certainly capable of thinking of that himself.

When her phone chimed, she immediately thought it was Karonski. Like most assumptions based on coincidence, that was wrong.

“Glad to learn that you didn’t blow up,” a familiar voice said.

Lily stiffened. She touched the mute. “Get Rule. Fast,” she told Cullen—who shot off the bench as if he’d been fired from a cannon.

“Shocked you speechless, have I?” Robert Friar said. There was an odd, breathy quality to his voice.

She unmuted the call. “I was trying to think of a polite way to say that I wish you had.”

“You’d settle for such an impersonal death? We are different, you and I. I’d find it deeply unsatisfying if someone else killed you.”

“I’m not picky. You took some bullets. How badly are you hurt?” She heard Rule call out something to Barnaby.

“Not fatally, obviously, but you will be pleased to know that I’m in a great deal of pain. Why don’t I tell you why I called?”

“I am curious about that. Among other things. You calling from a disposable?”

“Of course.”

Rule arrived at a run. Cullen was right behind him. She made a hushing gesture and pointed at the phone. In this form Rule couldn’t prick his ears, but he looked like he wanted to. She didn’t put it on speaker; no need on Rule’s behalf, and the microphone might pick up sounds she didn’t want Friar to hear.

“I wish to make a deal,” Friar said.

She snorted. “Yeah, that’ll happen.” Rule had gone on high alert the moment he heard Friar’s voice. He leaned close. Cullen crowded up to Lily’s other side, making sure he didn’t miss anything, either.

“You need me and I, unfortunately, need you. I’m too badly injured to save the world on my own tonight. I propose to put myself in your hands, entirely at your mercy, so we can do that together.”

“Saving the world being so high on your priority list.”

“I was attacked.” His voice was lower now. Rougher, with real emotion leaking through. It sounded like fury. “Nearly killed, although I’m quite difficult to kill these days. Armand
was
killed. The knife was taken from me and will be used by one who will place this world forever beyond the dominion of my mistress by destroying it. Yes, saving the world is high on my priority list tonight. Revenge is near the top as well.” He paused, and when he spoke again his voice had smoothed out. “I’m assuming you’re aware that I had an artifact—a knife—and that someone took it from me. I can find it.”

She met Rule’s eyes. So far, Friar seemed to be telling the truth. “Can you, now?”

“Because of the previous ritual, I’m linked to it. You want to find that knife, Lily. I will lead you to it. In exchange, you will refrain from harming or imprisoning me. Together we will take it from the person who now holds it, thus saving the world.”

“You trust me to keep my word?”

He chuckled. It turned into a coughing fit, which continued painfully for a moment. “Ah, that hurt,” he said at last. “My lung hasn’t healed yet. No, I don’t trust you. You and I are different, but not in that way. You’re a practical soul. You’ll kill me if you can, but not until you’ve gotten what you need from me. I will, however, trust the word of Rule Turner. He would also like to kill me, but if he gives his word, he’ll keep it. Is he listening, by the way?”

Lily looked at Rule.
Should we admit that?
He raised his brows.
Up to you
.

“Why should we believe you?” she asked, tacitly agreeing that Rule was with her. “Seeing as how your word isn’t worth used toilet paper.”

“I could, of course, be lying in order to lead you into a trap, but it’s unnecessary. If I’m telling the truth, I’ll be taking you to someone who’s channeling the power of a god. Someone who will certainly try to kill you, and may succeed. It’s quite amusing, really. By telling the truth, I may lead you to your deaths—and you want me to do that.” He certainly sounded amused, in a breathless way. A bullet to the lung? “I will, however, do my poor best to keep you alive until the knife is retrieved. I can’t do it myself, not in time.”

“What’s this business about channeling the power of a god?”

“What do you know about the knife?”

She wasn’t about to hand him everything, but she could prime the pump by telling him what he already knew or could guess. “It’s an ancient sidhe artifact you got from Benessarai. Lots of magic and what the sidhe call
arguai
. When you killed Debrett with it, it sucked up every memory of the man.”

“Almost every memory,” he corrected her. “Choosing him for the first sacrifice was a mistake. A natural one—who would have thought you’d have any memory of a man you never met?”

“What makes you think I do?”

“Come now, Lily. Just because I can’t eavesdrop on you doesn’t mean I can’t listen elsewhere, and cops are a talkative bunch.”

And with his magically powered luck, it would have been easy to Listen to the right person at the right time. “Why did you pick Debrett?”

“Why do you think?” There was a strong flavor of smirk in that statement. “But I shouldn’t have allowed my desire to make you suffer bias my choice. Not that I had any way of knowing you would be somehow protected, and I confess I do not understand that. Still, it was a mistake. Whatever memory you retained of Debrett created an imperfection, a tiny knot, that allowed someone else to hitch a ride on the power generated by the ritual.”

“Someone else?”

“A sidhe god. The one to whom the knife is linked.”

Sam hadn’t said anything about the knife being tied to a god. He had indicated the sidhe probably weren’t telling him everything, though. He’d called the information they gave him accurate but probably incomplete. “That’s bad news for you, since you want it for the Big B.”

“Bad news for all of us, since the god’s resurrection will destroy our world.”

“His resurrection.”

“Dyffaya áv Eni is the sidhe god of chaos, compulsion, and madness. Or he was . . . either present or past tense applies, since his current state is ambiguous. The sidhe killed him over three thousand years ago, you see. But life and death are not the same for gods as for mortals, and they vary even among the gods. If one who was born a mortal assumes a godhead, it is possible to kill the god’s body. Difficult, but possible. The sidhe achieved that much, but the individual who occupied the godhead retreated into it. Godheads may fade or change over the centuries, but they cannot be destroyed. Dyffaya áv Eni . . . that’s a call-name, of course. It means Beautiful Madness. Dyffaya still exists, but not in a manner that would make sense to you and I. He wants more than that limited existence. He wants to walk in the world again.”

“I’m sensing a contradiction. He wants to walk in the world, so he’ll destroy it.”

“It wouldn’t be destroyed instantly. It would degrade. Using the knife creates a certain instability. Perhaps your sorcerer is aware of this? I used it in a way that minimized the instability. My mistress wants to save this world and all who live here, not destroy it. Dyffaya won’t be so careful. The—” He stopped with a gasp and wheezed painfully for a moment. “I will be glad when that bullet finally works its way out. Dyffaya will enjoy himself here—the chaos of a disintegrating realm will feed him. Before the realm dissolves completely, he’ll leave. He has enemies in the sidhe realms he will wish to rebuke. You have, I believe, heard of the Queens.”

“Yes.” She exchanged another look with Rule. What Friar said fit with what Sam had told them. Did that mean it was true? Some of it, she thought, but how much and which parts?

“Have I persuaded you, Lily?” Her name sounded greasy and overly intimate in his mouth. “You and your inhuman lover? I think you can’t afford to dismiss me. Am I right? Shall we make a deal?”

She saw Rule’s opinion in his scowl. He shook his head to make sure she understood. For herself . . . Friar was right, damn him. She couldn’t afford to dismiss him. “I need to think about this.”

“I’ll call you back in a few minutes. Don’t delay, Lily. We haven’t much time. I arranged the second sacrifice for tonight for a reason. Whoever holds the knife now will use it tonight.”