“Please do.”
The younger woman disappeared inside.
The old woman’s face took on a stern cast. “You will not waste my time, understand?”
The newcomer blinked. “Yes?”
“You’re going to tell me everything about the people you’re working for. If you don’t, or if you don’t produce anything satisfactory, then I’m going to say you displeased me. They’ll hear you out as to why, little will happen to me as a consequence, and you’ll be punished all the same. These people you work for? Their punishments are dire. Understand?”
“I… think so.”
“In exchange, I’ll give you some advice. It will go a long, long way toward making the next few centuries or thousands of years more tolerable.”
He nodded.
“Talk.”
“Um. I don’t even know where to start. That woman, she’s-”
“Soon to become one of the named members of the firm. ‘Partner’, if you want to buy into the lawyer theme. Describe her.”
“Describe- she’s nice? Strict, but she’s helping me out. It’s hard to see why she’s a diabolist.”
The old woman frowned. “Ah. I see.”
“She was saying I picked the wrong path. I probably did, but I don’t see why.”
“You’ve condemned yourself to… how long?”
“Five hundred and seventy-ish years.”
“You should try to forget the number. You won’t be able to, it’s one of the few things you have, now, but you should try. Listen to me, I want you to pay attention, you stupid little man. Whatever you were escaping? You’ve condemned yourself to five hundred and seventy-ish more years of it.”
“I was escaping a demon noble,” he said.
“And you’ll see a number more before your time is up,” she said. She sighed. “You’re useless to me. Everyone around me is useless.”
“Useless, ma’am?”
“You don’t know nearly enough. That you even think that woman is anything resembling nice or good? She’s about to become your absolute superior, second only to the powers they serve. She didn’t get there by being kind or nice. She didn’t do good things when she was a diabolist, before.”
“Neither did I.”
“It’s an entirely different scale,” the old woman said. “I’ve never heard of you. Contrast that to her… for history to reconcile the kinds of things she did, it might well have had to invent something akin to the Black Death, to sweep it all beneath the rug.”
“I don’t understand. The Black Death?”
“Something like the Black Death. I suspect she’s older. She’s not insane, which means one thing. She very likely enjoyed it. Her politeness, the veneer on the surface, it’s a mask she’s trained herself to wear, for this role. Don’t give her cause to remove it.”
He nodded, mute.
“I’ll tell them to send you my way again. They’ll know why I’m doing it, in large part, that I want to dig for information, but they won’t care. They’re too big, and I’m only one cog in the machine. When we see one another again, you’re going to give me better information.”
He nodded.
“Now,” she said, “One of your next few tasks will be grim. I know that they sent the last two to the apartments in Hamburg. The place was taken by demons, a transfer of property, demesne, to demons. The diabolist is still inside, and will be for a long time. When you go, it will be bad. It will continue to be bad, each time. They want to use this place as a whip, the threat of it will make you work harder…”
■
Levin straightened his tie. Several other junior partners and employees of the firm joined them.
Lewis was there, past the fence, at the border of the hole to the Abyss.
Looking past her, the practitioner could see the Thorburn girl from the mirror. Looking inside her, at the mess of connections, he could see something rattling around inside. Years with the firm had given him cause to learn to quickly identify possession with his Sight.
Barely even connected them to the old woman, he thought. But here, standing where I did six years ago, so close to where I talked to the old lady, hard to shake it.
“Motes,” Levin said, just to his left. The old man’s voice was gravelly.
“Looks like, sir,” the practitioner responded.
“Her sadism will be the end of her,” Levin said. “She’s even holding them back.”
The words were reminiscent of the description of Mahoun. Ramping up.
The collected group backed up a touch as they approached the scene.
“What a grotesque lot,” the sphinx spoke.
“Petty insults?” Levin asked.
“You seem poised for a war,” a woman spoke. Her ring burned when viewed with the Sight.
“You seem to be under the impression that this will be anything but one sided,” Levin said. “Lewis? Please. There are things to look after.”
Lewis nodded.
“Murr,” she said. “Please.”
The skull-headed imp acted.
Figures stepped out of the shadows, one after another.
Each one provoked a reaction.
A man in white, carrying pistols.
“Malcolm,” the little girl of the group said.
A tall man, thirty-something. It got a reaction from the Thorburns.
A man with a policeman’s jacket, square-jawed.
Others joined the ranks, one-by-one. Four figures were utterly black, head to toe, without features.
“Tricks,” Rose Thorburn the younger said.
“No,” the one the child had called Malcolm said. “I’m sorry.”