“Three days of obedience,” Pauz countered.
I turned to leave.
“Yes!” he cried out.
“Tell me you’ll go back in the book, and you’ll return to the book at my order, any time from here on out.”
He glared.
“I’m not fooling around, Pauz.”
“I so swear,” he said.
“All of you. Including your essence and power that you would cast out. I don’t want to carry a book that’s shedding your power.”
He remained silent, glaring.
I spread my arms.
He sat down, and the book closed itself, the cord winding around the exterior, the same weird bondage-style knot around the black leather tome that I’d seen before.
I collected it.
“You have what you need. At ten minutes past one this begins in earnest,” Conquest said. “Leave.”
“You have to relinquish your power over my Champions, by the terms of this contest.”
“Do I?”
“The terms were that you couldn’t command or assert control over anyone who wasn’t a champion of yours.”
“Very well. I will exercise no power over them.”
“Not good enough. Release Fell from the deals that hold him, for the duration of this contest. Rose too. The shackle has power over her, a weight on her mind and conscience, a reminder, it links you to her and her to you.”
I could see his expression change. It was quite dramatic, given how monstrous his face was, the skin stretched. The movement of a brow made skin slip and snap into new positions, baring more teeth incidentally.
“I see. You not only sought to undermine me, but to unshackle that which belongs to me?”
I nodded.
“Rest assured, Thorburn, when I take my victory, you’ll regret this contest of yours.”
I was already sort of regretting it. The forces arrayed against us were pretty ugly.
I had two assets that I was loathe to use, and one that might not answer the call.
“You are hereby freed,” Conquest said. “Let it be known, what I have claimed, I will reclaim.”
That done, he released Rose. The shackle came off.
She looked at me, wide-eyed, rubbing at her wrist.
Fell stood a little straighter, as if a burden had been lifted off his shoulders.
That done, I took the first step down the stairs. When I teetered, Rose used her grip on my hand to keep me from falling. Alexis, on my other side, caught me.
“Fuck you, Thorburn,” Fell muttered, behind my back.
“What the fuck are you saying?” Ty asked.
“I’m telling Blake Thorburn that if he thinks he’s done me a favor here, he hasn’t.”
“I guess I haven’t,” I said.
“I don’t need a rescue attempt,” Fell said.
“You’re getting it anyway,” I told him.
We passed down only one flight before we reached the base of the tower. We’d climbed four to six, easily.
Fell pushed open the door, and we didn’t pass into Toronto.
Not exactly.
We were in the spirit world that layered our own. The same caricature of a world that I’d seen outside the police station, when I’d very nearly slipped through the cracks and ceased being Blake Thorburn altogether.
A heavy fog hung over everything, and a dense falling snow made it harder still to see things.
The only cars were parked. There were no people.
“Um,” Alexis said. “Okay, I need another smoke. Ty?”
Ty took over in helping keep me standing. “Shit on me.”
“Careful,” I said. “Lies.”
My eyes were on the forces arranged around us. The Sisters, the Sphinx, the Shepherd, the Drunk, the Knights.
I felt a tug on my hand.
I looked, and saw Rose’s feet lifting off the ground. She was fading, eroding.
I let go, and she disappeared.
I felt the connection move. She’d returned to the reflections.
A bit less of a gap between the mirror world and this spirit world than it was between the mirror world and the real one. Rose wasn’t contained quite so strictly to the mirrors.
Which wasn’t necessarily a good thing. Vestiges were fragile, and she’d taken a beating lately, on a number of levels.
“You’re using the Hyena?” Evan asked.
“I’m keeping Conquest from using the Hyena,” I said.
“But-”
“I’m so lost,” Ty said, talking over Evan.
“Evan, Ty… All of you. I know you have questions, but… not now.”
I had questions, myself, but I was keeping my mouth shut.
I didn’t want to debrief or fill in the blanks while staring down the Sphinx and the rest of Toronto’s finest.
I made my way down the stairs, Ty at my side.
The Shepherd and the Elder Sister made their way to the door we’d just left, giving us sidelong glances as they walked.
“You entered through one door and left through another,” Isadora commented. “You’re standing on the other side of things.”
“War,” Fell said. “It’s not unusual for a Lord to do this, to minimize the effects to the real world.”
“I would argue which world is ‘real’,” Isadora said.
“The mortal world, if you will,” Fell said.
“I will. Things will bleed over.”
“They will,” Fell said. “Five champions to each side, and the rest of the players may pick their sides or sit this one out. With the kind of muscle he has, I don’t think things are going to be pretty for the residents of Toronto, even with this measure in place.”
Isadora nodded.
“It’s an arena,” Ty said.
“Essentially,” Fell said.
“He’s doing this so he can fight with no holds barred. It’s an advantage to him, but… this is something that’s in his rights as a Lord?”
“Yes,” Fell said.
I nodded.
“That book you hold offends my senses,” Isadora commented.
“There shouldn’t be taint spreading from it.”
“The book is tainted. Nothing spreads, but it is perverted, fouled,” Isadora said. “Please don’t move so much. You’ll spread the smell around.”
“Sorry,” I told her. “It’s still less offensive than letting Conquest hold on to it.”
“Perhaps. I’m not sure I like what I see.”
“You told me to go in there with my friends. I think you were right. Conquest maybe expected me to protect those friends, and he let his guard down, giving me the goblin and imp. Thank you.”
The sphinx shook her head. It was quite dramatic, all things considered. “Don’t thank me. You’ve started something, and I’m concerned that it’s the sort of war where there is no victor.”
“With all due respect, Isadora, daughter of Phix,” I said. “You didn’t help me before. If you don’t participate, you don’t get to complain when they don’t go the way you wanted.”
“I’m participating, Mr. Thorburn, rest assured.”
That said, she turned to leave.
Her wings folded around her, and she simultaneously stepped out of this world and into the other, adopting a human guise.
I squinted, using my sight, and I could peer into the real world.
“She left in a snit,” Alexis said.
Nick had approached while we talked to the sphinx. As a practitioner, he straddled this world and the mortal one. The ignorant were relegated to that other world. If I focused, I could make them out as silhouettes in the drifting snow and heavy fog.