“I wanted him to realise that he didn’t need you,” he gasped.

I yanked my hand away and down towards his mouth. But it was too late. A spine-chilling rattle sounded from deep within his throat and his eyes rolled back into his head. Staines was dead.

I fell backwards, staring in horror at his corpse. How in the hell had this happened? I’d been gone barely twenty-five minutes. I hugged my arms round my body. I’d failed him. If I’d only gotten here just a few minutes earlier, I could have been in time to save him. This was my fucking fault.

Shakily, I opened up my mind to call Corrigan with my Voice.

Lord Alpha?

A heartbeat later he answered. What the hell do you want?

I need…I stopped, taking a deep breath, then began again. You need to get round to my place.

Just because I’m re-joining the council, does not mean you have carte-blanche to have me at your beck and call. I’ll put up with you when I have to but the rest of the time, my previous wishes still stand. I do not want to see you or speak to you. I’d appreciate it if you could respect that.

I closed my eyes in pain. Corrigan, you have to get here.

If you’ve gotten yourself into trouble yet again, then get that bloody faerie to help you out.

Sensing he was about to cut off the connection, I blurted out. It’s not me, Corrigan, it’s Staines. You need to get here. He’s…Oh shit. He’s dead.

There was a heavy oppressive silence from the Brethren Lord’s end. It seemed to go on forever. Finally, his Voice returned, a dull monotone bouncing around my skull.

I’ll be there within the hour. Then he snapped off.

My phone started ringing. Initially I ignored it, remaining where I was by Staines’ body. After several rings, I shook myself and gingerly tiptoed over to pick it up, trying not to step in the pools of blood that lay in sickening glossy puddles around the floor.

“Miss Smith, it’s the Arch-Mage. I’ve just received intelligence that the Divination spells we have set up for Endor have been set off. It appears he returned to this plane for around ten minutes, then disappeared again. We’re tracking what his exact location was right now. I should have the information any moment now.”

I didn’t answer.

“Miss Smith?”

“Don’t bother,” I said. “I know where he was.” I looked back over at Staines. He was clutching something in his left hand.

“What? What do you mean?”

I put the receiver down, hanging up even though the Arch-Mage continued talking, and walked back over to check it out. It was a piece of paper. Uncurling the already cooling fingers of the were-bear, I extricated it and carefully unfolded the corners. It was smeared with blood, but I still recognised it as the note I’d left on my front door. Underneath it, however, something had been added.

I’ve been reading about you. It appears that you’re even more interesting than I realised. I dropped by to say hello, and came across your friend instead. Sorry about the mess.

E

I balled it up in my hand, then backed away into the corner, and huddled down to wait.

*

It wasn’t long before Corrigan showed up. He must have broken the land speed records to get here so quickly, I thought dully, as I opened the front door to let him in. I knew his shifter sense of smell had registered the blood long before he’d stepped inside, but I gestured him towards the kitchen anyway, then moved out of his way. Silently, he brushed past me and went in. For a few moments there was nothing, then I heard a keening howl of pain and anguish that ripped right through me. I briefly closed my eyes, then trudged outside to give him some privacy.

Wishing for once that I smoked, I rested against the rough stone of the building’s exterior. At least sucking on a cigarette would have given me something to do. I kicked my heels pointlessly against the wall instead, only looking up when a screech of tyres signaled the arrival of a vehicle. The Arch-Mage, Alex, Max and Larkin all stepped onto the pavement. Their faces were pale. Then three other cars pulled up, and several shifters piled out, overtaking the mages who remained standing in front of me. They barely glanced in my direction, heading immediately inside to join Corrigan.

The Arch-Mage stepped forward. “What happened?”

I explained in as frank a manner as I could, and passed him over the note. He stared down at it, then nodded grimly and entered, Max and Larkin at his heels. I stopped Alex before he could follow them.

“We need some fucking palladium and we need it now. I can’t afford to tiptoe around the Ministry and their lack of finances any more, Alex. Either you’ve managed to get hold of some, or I’ll need to get the money from the shifters and the Fae now.”

“I don’t have any,” he said, “but I know where to get it. And it’ll be of a higher quality and more useful than anything you could pay for.”

I waited.

“Russia.” He licked his lips. “There’s a mine about sixty miles east of Moscow.”

“So all I need to do is waltz in with a pickax?”

“The mining company that runs it ships out what they collect at the end of every week. They won’t miss a small amount.”

“You’re telling me to steal it?”

He shrugged helplessly. I lifted my eyes to the heavens. Breaking the law and getting on the bad side of a bunch of wealthy Russians didn’t strike me as a particularly responsible thing to do.

“That’s not going to work, Alex. I need an alternative that’s going to let me source it legitimately.”

“We don’t have much time,” he began.

I exploded. “I know we don’t have much fucking time! But I’m not going to start causing more problems than I’m solving. Not this time. Find someone who can help.”

The expression on his face was strained. “Okay. I’ll go to the bookshop. Maybe they can suggest something.”

“Go.”

He nodded and took off down the street. I clenched my jaw. Helping the poverty-stricken mages avoid losing face almost seemed like a pointless task in the wake of Staines’ bloody assassination. If we could get hold of some palladium, and if Balud’s research was correct, then we might just have a shot at beating Endor. It was going to take all of us working as a team to manage it; I couldn’t keep pulling the lone wolf stunts.

But a large part of my role was to keep the three groups happy so that they could actually collaborate effectively as equals. Revealing the mages’ lack of money, inadvertently or otherwise, wouldn’t do that. Assuming Alex found a way to obtain some palladium without breaking the law, I was in a position to travel to Russia straight away. A flight to Moscow wouldn’t last more than a couple of hours. Even better, a portal would be instantaneous. Factor in the journey to the mines, and whatever it took to get someone to just give me some palladium for free, and it couldn’t take more than twenty-four hours. If it did, then I’d just have to give in to what was probably inevitable and get the Fae and the Brethren to stump up the cash after all. I nodded to myself. It was a compromise. An image of Staines’ battered body filled my head. I’d get vengeance for him one way or another. We might not have been friends, but that didn’t mean he had deserved to end like that. Not on my watch and not in my home.

Several of the shifters came out just then, carefully carrying a thick roll of carpet. Max and Larkin were following. They must have cast an Illusion spell so they could get Staines’ corpse out without any humans noticing. Then the Arch-Mage exited with Corrigan, who lifted his head and stared at me, anguish lining his face.

“Where were you?”

“At the bookshop. I was late getting here to meet him.”

“Deliberately?” he snarled, with a sudden flash of irate emotion.

“Um…” I was confused, but equally trying to tread gently.

“Because he pissed you off yesterday. Were you deliberately late?”

I shook my head, suddenly understanding. “No. Honestly, no. Slim found something important about Endor that he thought would help. I was only gone for twenty-five minutes. It must have happened so quickly.”

Tension seeped out of every pore of Corrigan’s body. “I’m going to kill him.” He said it quietly. In a way, that was scarier than if he’d been shouting.

I thought of Staines’ last words, about proving to Corrigan that he didn’t need me and just nodded. It wasn’t as if I’d been a hell of a lot of use up till now.

“We’ll get some people to clean up your flat,” the Arch-Mage said.

I didn’t react. I wasn’t going to live there ever again. “We’ve got four and a half days until he shows up at Loch Ness,” I said instead. Deciding not to lie outright, I continued on. “I have a lead on something that might help us defeat him. Instead of meeting this afternoon, we should start working on getting as many people up there as possible. We’ll need to make sure we don’t scare him off, but have enough troops on the ground to take him on.”

“Do you need some help? I can spare a few people.”

I shook my head at the Arch-Mage. “No. I may be out of contact until later tomorrow though.”

Thankfully he didn’t probe any further. He still seemed dazed from the scene of carnage just a few feet away.

“Can you get in touch with the Summer Queen and let her know what’s happened? And tell her to contact the kelpies?”

“I’ll do that,” he agreed.

Corrigan was watching me. “Where will you stay?”

I avoided looking him directly in the eyes. “I’ll crash at the bookshop. There’s already a camp bed set up there for Aubrey.”

“What if he shows up again?”

There was no need to ask whom Corrigan was referring to. “Alex is there now. I’ll get him to put a ward in place. That’ll give me enough warning to prepare, even if he manages to break through it. I had quite a bit of success with Tom this morning.”

Corrigan’s face was emotionless. “I heard. We will have a service for Staines on Friday morning, then travel up to Scotland after that. It would be good if you were there.”