Saleh streamed through the wall, looking determined. I followed, keeping an eye out for anything unusual. Like someone with a really big axe.
Saleh floated through the wall of his bedroom as easily as if he did it every day. On the bed was the sleeping djinn. In life he'd been pretty normal-looking except for the skin color. No turban, gold earrings or Middle Eastern garb in sight. Instead, he had a mop of curly brown hair, a well-trimmed goatee and a Lakers tracksuit. He also had a head.
The alarm clock on the bedside table said 9:34. Saleh and I glanced at each other, then settled down to watch. It didn't take long.
At 9:52, I heard the sound of running feet and the clash of weapons as, presumably, Saleh's bodyguards faced off with the assassins. A moment later, one of them stumbled through the door, before a magically levitating axe took off his arm. A sword wielded by human hands bisected him a moment later, while the figure on the bed woke up, blinked his eyes blearily, and started to look around. Before he could focus, the second bodyguard was dead and Saleh's head was playing basketball with the clothes hamper on the far side of the room.
I barely noticed the gruesome denouement, because my eyes had fixed with disbelief on the sword-wielding figure standing over the scene. I would have gasped, but my lungs didn't seem to work, my body suddenly empty of anything resembling air. A sickening disorientation hit me, and for a moment I couldn't move, couldn't think. Time seemed to stop as I stared in hollow shock at the face, splattered by his victim's blood.
He looked different, some part of my brain noticed. Instead of a ratty T-shirt and a brown coat that looked like it had been through one too many battles, his lean form was poured into close-fitting black jeans, a matching button-up shirt and a rich black leather jacket. It was his usual look, but upgraded, as if he'd suddenly developed a sense of style. His hair also appeared to have been brushed recently, and the stubble on his cheeks looked more like a fashion statement than someone who had forgotten to shave.
It was his expression that was the most radical alteration, though. I'd seen him angry more times than I could count, but that particular arrangement of features, like a hunting bird about to snap the neck of its prey, was new. I looked into a pair of familiar green eyes in utter denial. All I could think was, No wonder he didn't want to bring me to see Saleh.
"I don't believe this!" Saleh complained. "I don't even know him!" We watched Pritkin wipe the bloody sword on a corner of Saleh's sheets before sheathing it in a long scabbard slung across his back. He walked out with an easy, unhurried stride, frightening and graceful. He didn't look back.
"Some guy saunters in here, hacks me to pieces and I don't even know him?"
"Calm down," I said, feeling light-headed and faintly ill. "Keep your head."
"I don't have a head!" he snapped, and started for the door.
"We had a deal," I reminded him.
"Your book's in Paris," Saleh threw over what would have been his shoulder if he'd still had one. "Try 1793."
I stared at him. "What?" Damn it—I should have known that wasn't coincidence.
"Yeah. A couple dumb-ass dark mages stole it from Merlin that year and—"
"Wait." I glared at the djinn, wondering if I was being had. "Merlin lived in…well, I don't know exactly, but he couldn't have still been alive in the eighteenth century!"
"He was part incubus—everyone knows that," I was informed testily. "And demons are immortal. Now hush up if you want this, 'cause otherwise I'm gone."
I hushed up.
"So, yeah, he was alive in 1793, when he lost the Codex to the mages, who put it up for auction at a little get-together on October third. Right before they bugged the hell out of the city to get away from the public executions and the fires and the mobs and the pissed-off half demon who was after their butts. Anyway, dress to impress and maybe you can get a look at it before they sell it off."
"But, if they're planning to sell it, it'll be guarded! There has to be a better time—"
"Merlin was guarding the Codex until the mages got their greedy paws on it and, trust me, Pythia or no, you don't want to go through him."
"Then what about later? Who bought it?"
"Even if I had all day, I couldn't cover all the rumors of where it went after that night. You don't care anyway, since if you want it before the spells unravel, you have to get at it early. And that's Paris, 1793," he said flatly. "Try not to get beheaded. Trust me, it sucks." He started for the corridor again.
"Wait a minute! Where are you going?"
"Where you think? I got a job to do."
"Saleh!"
He paused beside the door. "This is none of your business, babe. Thanks to mystery man, I'm incorporeal again. Ten centuries of accumulated power down the drain, like that." He tried to snap his fingers, but the lack of actual hands frustrated him. He grimaced. "Whatever revenge I can come up with is well within the rules. And believe me, I can be real inventive."
He streamed out, leaving me staring witlessly after him. Well, at least that explained how he'd managed to leave a ghost: he hadn't. The spirit was Saleh's natural state. He'd just saved up enough power to form himself a body, the better to wheel and deal with mortals, I assumed. The question was, did I go after him?
I doubted if, in his current condition, he could do Pritkin any real harm. Ghosts, even new ones, have a limited power supply, one that is eroded very quickly by attacks on the living. Saleh wasn't a ghost, but since he'd just lost most of his power along with his head, I doubted he was likely to do any better. Add to that Pritkin's formidable shields, and he was probably pretty safe. Too bad the same couldn't be said for me.
If Saleh found a way to communicate with the mage, to accuse him or berate him for the crime, he might let slip how he'd acquired his information. And that would be very bad. If Saleh didn't even know him, it seemed unlikely that Pritkin had a personal grievance against the djinn. Which meant that his reason for killing him was probably to keep him from telling me about the Codex. And if Pritkin hadn't balked at killing Saleh to keep it safe, why would I be any different?
In the end, I decided that the whole Saleh debate was stupid since I didn't know how to round up a djinn that didn't want to go. I finally shifted back alone, only to have Billy scream inside my head, "Get in the tub!"
When I just stood there, trying to catch up, he stepped out of my skin and gave me a shove, right in the center of my chest. Billy usually has trouble moving even small things, but he'd found some extra energy somewhere, because I almost flew off my feet. I staggered backwards against the old-fashioned claw-footed tub, lost my balance and fell in. At the same moment the corridor wall blew inward in a burst of plaster, wood and expensive wallpaper.
I lay among the debris, head spinning, eyesight going dark, for several confused seconds. The tub had been a restored antique, with the original solid cast-iron body. It had saved my life, but with a pounding head and dust-caked lungs, I was having trouble feeling grateful.
"Miss Palmer!" Pritkin's voice came from the hole where the door used to be. "Are you all right?"
I didn't look at him. I couldn't look at him. "Sure." I spit out blood—I'd bitten my tongue—and plaster dust. "Never better."
I climbed out of the debris and started for the sink, only it didn't appear to be there anymore. There was a sink-sized hole in the window, though, so I picked a shaky path across the destroyed bathroom and looked out. The fresh breeze was so distracting that it took me a few seconds to spy the remains of the plumbing eight stories below, in the middle of Flamingo Road. A taxi driver was standing outside his cab, staring at the big dent in his hood and looking puzzled. He looked up and our eyes met. I quickly ducked back inside. This place was about to be way more popular than I liked.