I closed my eyes for a few seconds, blanking my mind, then turned my attention to the discussion of terms.
“It’s clear how badly you want that spirit back,” I said. “Let me start off by asking for something you should be giving for free anyway. We should get rid of that demon in the factory, and to those ends, we need fire.”
“A lot of fire,” Maggie said.
■
The Shepherd took ten hours to find, even with the ability to follow connections.
In the end, we split up, each of us picking a different hospital. Then we waited for people to die horribly.
Once the Shepherd showed up, Maggie and Ty tailed him, and we collectively headed his way.
I was just glad that Alexis had a phone. The lack was an inconvenience sometimes.
He was waiting for us when we arrived.
How did one negotiate with something that didn’t speak?
“Whatever you’re doing,” I said, “I presume you’re loyal to Conquest. But… there’s a story behind all that, isn’t there?”
He didn’t move.
“You deal with memories. Echoes, permanent impressions. The creature we’re talking about, it eats memories. It eats everything about a person, including the connections. So if you had someone die, driving you to-”
He was shaking his head.
“No?” I asked.
He shook his head again.
“All the same, if it keeps doing what it’s doing, it means less ghosts, less power to you.”
He shook his head again.
How the fuck was I supposed to argue with this bastard?
“Conquest wanted to stop it, I want to stop it. Are you telling me you want it to keep doing what it’s doing?”
He didn’t move.
This weary man, restless in his pursuit of ghosts, willing to torture and mutilate those ghosts to make wraiths… I couldn’t appeal to empathy. I apparently couldn’t appeal to power, when death was the most abundant, endless resource around.
What leverage did I have?
“You’re the guy that didn’t collect me,” Evan said. “You just left me there.”
The Shepherd didn’t answer.
“You’re a pretty shitty person,” Evan said. “And you know what? You didn’t get me. You won’t. I’m an undead sparrow, I’m awesome, and you suck. You’ll keep sucking unless you listen to Blake, because he’s kinda awesome in his own way.”
The Shepherd didn’t budge.
Too much to ask for?
“I won’t come after you,” I said. “I won’t do anything direct, unless you give me reason or excuse to. But so long as I’m around, so long as you’re stonewalling me? I’m going to screw with you. I’ll take your ghosts out from under you. You’ll have competition, which is something I’m thinking Conquest was helping you with, giving you a monopoly. And if there’s a ghost you’re looking for, if there’s something you want? You’ll have to worry now. Maybe there’ll be other Evans…”
He stared.
“Or you can give me permission to use magic outside of the bounds of the contest, and I won’t. And there’s even the chance that I could die and be erased…”
I trailed off.
He was already writing. Using his stick in the snow.
I barely recognized it as a signature.
He walked away.
“Can we use that?” I asked.
“We’ll have to,” Rose said.
The Hyena’s hilt was a weight at my side.
We have a majority opinion, no use asking the Eye.
“Let’s get me my implement,” I said. “And then we’ll get in touch with the Knights and talk about the attack on the factory. No holds barred.”
7.11
Dinner simmered on the stove, the pot lid didn’t match the pot a hundred percent, and the rattling was a constant background noise.
Everyone was gathered in my living room, waiting for me to speak.
I had an impulse to drive them out. It was dumb, running contrary to things I’d decided, said, and done before.
I was tired, and a part of me was used to being alone, even as I paradoxically craved companionship. I still felt raw where the memories had brought memories back to the surface. The discrepancies and false notes in the memories Conquest had subjected me to made it worse, if anything, as my mind itched to resolve and compare notes, even as my heart didn’t want to go anywhere near that stuff.
“So,” I said, “Alexis, Ty, maybe even Tiff, this might a moment that your entire life has been leading up to.”
“All moments are moments our entire life has been leading up to,” Ty said.
“I know,” I said. I had to suppress a sigh. “But I wanted to be dramatic and clever, and there aren’t many ways to do that without lying.”
“Keep going, Blake,” Alexis urged me.