Brokke shifted in his seat. “He can make sendings but not receive them.”
“Then call him on the damned phone. Look, I didn’t come here to chat. I want Vize. I don’t care if he’s useful to you. Find someone else to do your dirty work. His usefulness to you has run out.”
“I will be the judge of that,” Donor said.
I leaned over the desk. The attempt at intimidation had no effect that I noticed, but it made me feel better. “Then let me warn you. I will hound him until he is in custody. Anything he does will be done with me breathing down his neck. I will disrupt every plan I can. I will expose every manipulation. I will undermine you at every turn, Donor.”
He murmured a chuckle. “In other words, Mr. Grey, you will do what you have always done.”
“I don’t work for the Guild anymore,” I said.
He smiled. “Officially.”
“At all,” I said. “Maeve is no friend of mine.”
“I have been at this sport much longer than you, Mr. Grey. Denials from the enemy mean nothing. Affirmations mean less.”
“What you and Maeve have going on is not my concern. That was another life for me. I’m not interested in you anymore. What I care about now are four dead bodies, including Gerda, in my town that lead back to you. I won’t shed any tears for her, but I’m not going to let Vize run loose.”
He arched an impatient eyebrow. “Perhaps you should find out who killed Gerda, then. I’m sure it wasn’t Vize.”
“Asking Vize a few questions might help. Where is he?”
“He’s gone rogue,” Brokke said.
“You’ve lost control of him?” I asked.
Donor glared at Brokke, and I sensed the flutter of a sending. The dwarf flinched but set his jaw. “It matters not.”
“I don’t believe you. I saw him in TirNaNog. He has an army of followers. That’s got to matter to you,” I said.
“Those people support my cause, not his. If Vize turns against me, they will not follow,” Donor said.
“Really? Like what’s happened with Eorla Elvendottir?” I asked.
His cheekbones tinged red in anger. “Eorla and I will resolve our differences. She will have no choice. It is no concern of yours.”
“It is if you don’t resolve it. Because if you don’t, then I doubt you can control Vize’s followers either,” I said.
The color faded from his face as he resumed control of his emotions. “Enough of this discussion, Mr. Grey. I will not help you find Vize, but I will not hinder you. Now, it is your turn to answer my questions. Why does Maeve fear you?”
“I seem to have a knack for disrupting her plans without intending to. I annoy her, but I don’t think she fears me,” I said.
“The Wheel of the World turns, and we follow, Mr. Grey. We influence It as much as It influences us. If you obstruct Maeve’s influence, then she has reason to fear you. Your absence in the world might clear her path,” he said.
“Maeve doesn’t turn the Wheel of the World. The Wheel turns, no matter what she wants,” I said.
“Among the common people, that is true, but those with real power do, in fact, move the Wheel. We cannot stop It, but we can change Its course for a time. If Vize had succeeded in TirNaNog, the world would be different right now. The dead fairy queen changed the outcome of that encounter,” he said.
“Her name was Ceridwen, and you’re right. She did change things—for the better. If she hadn’t warned Maeve, Boston would have been destroyed, and Tara would be yours now,” I said.
“You closed the gate to TirNaNog, not she. That kind of power is what Maeve fears. The ability to take power away is as powerful as power itself. I am beginning to wonder if I should fear you, too.”
“Give me Vize, and you have nothing to fear from me,” I said.
He rose from the desk and resumed the Aldred Core glamour. “That, I think, is a promise you cannot make, never mind keep. I wish you well, Mr. Grey, but, more, I wish never to meet you again.”
As Donor strode from the room, Brokke glared at me. “You fool. You just signed your death warrant.”
32
After his portentous announcement, Brokke clammed up, fearing the room was bugged. I expected no less from the Teutonic Consortium. The Guildhouse was riddled with listening devices. It didn’t bother me so much when I thought they were the good guys. Using a sending, Brokke asked me to wait for him in Copley Square. Not long after I settled myself on a bench near the park, he appeared on the sidewalk along Boylston Street and entered the Boston Public Library. I will be in the upper stairwell, he sent.
Since the riots, any number of agencies had people keeping an eye on me. As a high-level advisor, Brokke no doubt had his own spies to contend with. I waited a few minutes, checking if he was followed or I was being watched. The square and surrounding sidewalks were crowded with tourists, businesspeople, and shoppers. Any one of them—several of them—could be working for the Guild or the Consortium.
I crossed to the main entrance of the library and entered the cool quiet of the old building. I climbed the marble steps without hurrying in case someone was, in fact, watching. In the portrait gallery of the third floor, Brokke lingered near the entrance to the special collections rooms. The top floor of the old library received few visitors unless a new exhibit was on display.
“No one is up here,” Brokke said. “If you sense someone coming up the stairs, I’m going down the elevator. You can still sense body signatures, correct?”
“I can,” I said.
He moved into the gallery space. “You should not have gone to Donor. He will kill you now at the opportune time.”
“I’m no threat to him,” I said.
“Not in any way you understand, but you will become one. He needs Vize to finish what Gerda Alfheim failed to accomplish,” he said.
“Is this faith stone the real deal? Can it really be that powerful?”
Brokke checked over the railing before responding. “It is perhaps the greatest stone ward ever created. Kingdoms were founded with it. Battles were fought over it. It made small men great and great men tremble. It grants the ability to sway men to one’s cause with utter fealty.”
“So, how does some dumb-ass like Veinseeker end up with one of the most important artifacts from Faerie?” I asked.
Brokke stared at the murals, a series of portraits showing the progression of religious history from paganism to Christianity. The pagans came off like the bad guys. “You are here-born, Grey. You have no idea what Convergence was like. We didn’t go to bed one night and wake up the next day in a new world. We were thrown here amidst war and confusion. Our memories were damaged. We didn’t know who we were. Most of us still don’t. Things got lost.”
After a hundred years, Convergence was still reverberating through the world. Whatever had happened between the Celtic and Teutonic fey that caused the merge was still being fought. Old wars died hard. “Veinseeker claims he doesn’t have it,” I said.
True surprise came over Brokke’s face. “You’ve met him?”
“Yep. He’s kind of a jerk,” I said.
Brokke worried his hand through his hair. “Then a confrontation is inevitable. The Wheel of the World turns as It will.”
I leaned against the railing and crossed my arms. “Really? Because I met the guy? I’m getting a little sick of the cryptic comments, Brokke. You’re playing me for something. I don’t like being played.”
“Meeting Veinseeker pulls you more into Donor’s web. You’re already connected to Vize and Alfheim. Maeve is watching you. The closer you get to the stone, the closer you come to death at Donor’s hand,” he said.
“I didn’t ask for any of this.”
“But you don’t walk away either. If enough people walk away, the inevitable struggle doesn’t happen,” he said.
“Is that what your vision tells you?
He wandered the gallery, looking at the wall murals. “I made a mistake a long time ago, Grey, and I do not want to repeat it. When Convergence happened, I had a vision of the end of everything we know. When I shared my vision, I lost control of it, and now I do not know where it ends,” he said.