"Then it will be better if you don't come inside with me. I'll have to go in alone. If I spread enough money around, I might learn something. They may be hostile to Serrin if seeing your face reminds them too strongly of who he came in with, right?" He tried to say this gently, then added, "It's just a fact of life, kid."
"Don't I know it," she said miserably.
"But if it wasn't for the description you've given us, we'd have nothing to go on. You've already done your bit."
They took the elevator down to the street and hailed a cab, which Kristen directed to the club. Michael got out, then paid the driver and told him to take Kristen back to the hotel. Too agitated to sit quietly as they rode along, Kristen began to search through her bag for the key card to her room, coming up with two instead of one. She sat looking at them blankly for a moment, then suddenly remembered that Serrin had given her his to carry in her purse.
By the time she got back to the Imperial and was riding
the elevator up to her room, a plan was already beginning to form in her mind. Sure, it was crazy, but she'd seen where Serrin kept his things and if there was enough money and if she could just figure out how to make the transfers amp;
Michael was back from the club within an hour. Money had bought memories. Of four men, members of a known street gang, and the part of town they claimed as their turf. He was puzzled, though. This wasn't how the previous snatchings had been carried out against Serrin, or even Shakala in this same country. A gentle knock at Tom's door told him the troll was still deep in reverie, trying to trace the elf. He was contemplating disturbing him, since he'd gotten his own trace of a kind, when Kristen suddenly burst out into the corridor.
"I think I know where he might be," Michael told her. "Trouble is, there could be an entire street gang around him."
"That won't be a problem if you can find ten thousand nuyen," she said cheerfully, sashaying past him into his room with a grin. He closed the door behind her and lounged against it, looking at her intently.
"What have you done?" he asked. She told him.
"You don't seem to like Humanis much," Magellan probed. "I hear you helped out in a few paybacks."
Serrin tried to work out where this sudden change of subject was leading. And he was also still cogitating over that phrase: someone like you. An elf. Me. Him. The kidnapper at the top of the pile. Elves.
"Got to protect your own," Serrin growled.
"Damn straight," Magellan said, with just a little too much wine in his voice. Then he again made an abrupt shift.
"Let's see what else you know. Sutherland's identified the ownership of the Umfolozi plant by now?"
"Ninety-nine percent," Serrin lied. "It was the British connection. The medical databases not on official computers. That's what helped him narrow down who had ready access." Another point scored. Another way of
tricking Magellan into believing he knew much more than he did.
"Clever. I hadn't thought of that," Magellan mused. He got up from his chair, stood up as if to pour another glass of wine and suddenly whipped around, grabbing Serrin by the lapels of his jacket.
"Who else knows?" he hissed.
Serrin had expected that. "We've made arrangements," he said coolly.
"Which are?"
"Do you honestly think I'm going to tell you? Suffice it to say the information is filed away for transmission to interested parties should anything unforeseen happen to us."
Magellan spat, muttering something that sounded like "drek." He'd bought it. For the first time in this long night, Serrin believed that he was actually going to get out of here alive.
"Who? How?" The red-haired elf shook Serrin bodily.
The mage faced him down. "So I'm supposed to sign my own death warrant by telling you? Michael isn't just good. He's brilliant. You won't find any trails. Anyway, what makes you think we're foolish enough to leave it only in electronic form?" he said calmly.
Magellan let go of Serrin and it was obvious he was thinking hard. Probably thinking it was worse than he'd feared. That Serrin knew almost everything and maybe even did know everything. Killing him even killing all of them would be futile now. What Serrin had told him was enough. Them searching through non-official databases that was Sutherland's brain at work. Magellan had only one card left to play now. But he would take a long time working himself up to being able to do it.
"Well, then, let's talk about our people, Serrin."
The plex was just so fragging big, and the troll had no idea where to search as he roamed astrally through the sprawl. Sure, he knew what he was looking for, but the haystack was so huge and the needle would be well-hidden. To find the elf, Tom's astral body would actually have to enter the very room where Serrin was. He couldn't just try to magically assense his location through whatever walls were hiding his friend from view. With a million buildings in the city, that would take forever.
There had to be a trace, he knew. From the spell lock Serrin used for detecting enemies. But, try as he might, hovering inside Serrin's hotel room attempting to pick up a trace of the locked spell got him nowhere. Serrin was simply a far more powerful magician and his masking hid the trace from the despairing troll.
An astral visit to the club had been equally useless. The auras of the people there were the same unpleasant mix the troll would have expected in a similar place anywhere in the world; aggression, lust, violence seething under the surface. That was never all, of course, and so Tom tried to seize the rare good energy; excitement, joy, a little love here and there, but there was nothing of Serrin. He began to work his way around outside. Still nothing.
Serrin, where are youl Tom felt a bleak sadness come over him. It wasn't just that the elf was gone, lost to him. The troll had also sensed the bond between the cynical, troubled spirit of the mage and the forlorn girl. He saw that they loved each other, but just hadn't figured it out yet. That Serrin might be dead, dying, that the possibility of love would be destroyed before it ever blossomed hurt Tom deep, deep down.
In the midst of these mournful reflections, the troll suddenly and to his utter astonishment suddenly felt a bite at the nape of his neck and he remembered Shakala. His astral body froze. He let himself become completely empty, just waiting, not feeling anything much except an awareness of himself.
It was pure instinct that led him now, led him straight to the dead zone.
22
Michael was just about to knock on Tom's door, which opened even before his knuckles made contact with it.
"I know where he is," the troll said, but he didn't look particularly elated or pleased with himself.
"Me too," Michael said slowly. "We're on our way downtown now. To pick up some heat."
From the way the girl was smiling, Tom knew she must have been the one to fix it. He wasn't going to ask how any more than Michael had demanded details of him.
"You guys take more rides than Karoo jockeys," the ork driver said as they piled into his cab. Then he studied the address written on the scrap of paper Michael shoved in front of him.
"Hey, I get triple rate for going there," he growled. "And you pay for any damage done to the engine, right?"
"You got it," Michael said and waved some money at the driver as the cab sped off into the night.
"You know our people are special," Magellan urged. "You were born knowing that."
"Depends on exactly how you mean it," Serrin said, still playing for time.
"Come on. You're a mage. You know perfectly well that magical talent is more common among our people than any other race on earth."
Serrin nodded. He also knew that in some places the percentages were even higher; the ancient lands of Tir na nOg, for one. But by now he'd figured out where this train of thought was heading. To get out alive, he would have to tell Magellan what he wanted to hear and then