“I don’t think she brought anyone,” Anne said. “Not that I could see.”
“Mm,” I said. “She probably wouldn’t need them.”
“Well, we didn’t talk long,” Luna said. “It was mostly about chance magic. I was kind of expecting her to quiz me but she acted like she knew all she needed to already.”
“Did she say anything about the case?”
“No. She did ask what I thought about Morden’s proposal, though.” Luna shrugged. “I told her that since I wasn’t a mage, it didn’t matter much to me. She told me not to be so sure.”
“Huh.” I wonder what she meant by that?
“So?” Luna said. “What about you?”
“Well,” I said. “I spent half the day sitting around in a very nice waiting room, and about half an hour getting very thoroughly threatened by Levistus. He says if I don’t play along with what he wants, he’s going to destroy me. He also implied he’d do the same to you.”
Luna, Anne, and Variam exchanged looks. “Um,” Luna said. “Details?”
I told them the story.
Once I’d finished, there was a brief silence. “Okay then,” Luna said.
“What do you mean, ‘okay then’?” Variam said. “Fuck that guy.”
“Vari, wait,” Anne said in her soft voice. “We weren’t there when you had to deal with this the first time.” She looked between me and Luna. “Can he really do it? Everything he’s threatening?”
I hesitated. “Put it this way—I wouldn’t like to test it.”
“We beat his assassins before,” Luna said.
“I don’t think it’s his assassins that we should be worrying about,” I said. “You remember the Nightstalkers? The reason they were left to go after me was because of him. It’s that kind of thing I’m really scared of. If he sends an assassin, I can fight them. But if he just gets other Light mages to do the work instead . . . He could probably turn half the Council against me if he really tried.”
“This is so stupid,” Luna said. “He’s got this fight with Morden. The whole Council is fighting amongst themselves about White Rose and this proposal with the Dark mages. And he decides to go after you?”
I didn’t answer. What I was really thinking was something so childish that I was embarrassed to say it out loud: It’s not fair. I already had Richard to worry about. Wasn’t one overwhelmingly powerful enemy enough?
“So fuck him,” Variam said. “He’s not allowed to do this.”
“Oh, yeah, that’s really going to help,” Luna said in exasperation. “We’ll tell him he’s not allowed.”
“Yeah, well, what else are you going to do?” Variam asked me. “Do what he tells you?”
“It doesn’t even sound as though he can,” Anne said. “Levistus said that he wanted White Rose protected. If Alex stays here and they go through with their plan and arrest them, isn’t Levistus going to blame Alex anyway?”
“Somehow I don’t think he’s going to give me the benefit of the doubt.”
“So no point worrying, is there?” Variam said.
“I don’t think it’s that simple,” Anne said.
“Well, we’ve got one thing going for us,” I said. “We might be juggling multiple enemies, but Levistus is too. He’s too busy with this political duel he’s fighting.”
“Until it ends,” Anne said.
“And if he loses, he’s not going to be happy.” I sighed. “On the other hand, if he wins, then he’ll have even more influence. And he wanted to go after me anyway. I’m not actually sure which would be worse.”
“Alex?” Arachne said. “Would you like a suggestion?”
“Please.”
“It seems to me that you have already established what your decision has to be,” Arachne said. “Even if you could aid Levistus—which may or may not be possible—you could not trust him to uphold his end of the deal. You would be adding to the resources of one proven to be your enemy. As well as mine. That is without taking into account that aiding Levistus would by default bring you into conflict with other factions of the Council. Besides . . .” Arachne looked down at me. “You know what White Rose are. You know what they do. Do you really want to help them?”
“No,” I admitted.
Arachne made a movement, something like a shrug. “Well then.”
“I guess that does simplify things, doesn’t it?” I got up and walked absentmindedly over to one of the tables, moving a pile of clothes aside to pull something out from underneath.
“Can’t we do something about Levistus?” Luna said. “I mean, he’s trying to subvert the Keepers. That’s kind of like treason.”
“It is treason,” Variam said. “Problem is, all the rest of the Council do it too.”
“But it’s still illegal. Couldn’t Alex go to the Council and tell them what he told us?”
“Levistus would just deny it.”
“Well, what if Alex recorded him? Wear a wire, like they do on those police shows?”
“You ever heard of a Council case getting decided by audio recordings?” Variam said.
“What do you mean?”
“You know how sound mages can reproduce any voice they like?” Variam said. “That’s why. No Council court’s going to admit it.”
“Well, what if—?”
“Um . . .” Anne said. “Alex? What’s that?”
Variam and Luna turned to look at me. I’d returned to the sofa and I was tossing a pale green sphere back and forth from hand to hand. “Data focus,” I said.
Anne looked puzzled. “It looks like the same one from before.”
“That’s because it is.”
“Wait,” Luna said. “Didn’t you say you gave it to Haken?”
“I gave a data focus to Haken.”
Variam stared for a second, then his eyebrows rose. “You seriously—?”
“Yep.”
“Are you nuts?”
“Somehow I don’t think they’re going to take me to court over it,” I said. “Besides, how are they going to know the difference?”
Luna was looking between me and Variam. “Wait. You gave Haken a duplicate?”
“Alex came to me yesterday and asked for my help,” Arachne said in her clicking voice. She was still working away on the pattern of thread between her legs: it was beginning to take shape, looking like a dress of some kind. “Those old focuses are quite simple to duplicate when you know the trick. You can’t copy the information inside, of course, but other than that there’s no easy way to tell the difference.”
“And what are you going to do when they do look inside?” Variam said.
“The only way they’d be able to look inside would be if they were the intended recipient,” I said. “How exactly would a Council mage explain that they were receiving a private message from White Rose? And how would they explain how they’d got their hands on it when it was supposed to have been in a Keeper evidence locker? They can’t go public either.”
“But won’t they know it was you?” Anne said.
“Maybe. Or they might just blame White Rose.”
“Wait a second,” Luna said. “Wasn’t it Haken who asked for that focus?”
“Yup.”
“You think . . . ?”
“I’ve been getting a bit suspicious of Haken over the last day or so,” I said. “I don’t know exactly who he’s working for, but it’s not just the Council. What I’d really have liked would have been to trace that focus he took and figure out where it ended up, but . . .”
“It would have been too easy to annul it,” Arachne said. “Besides, it wouldn’t have given you more than a direction.”
Variam still looked sceptical, but he stayed quiet. “I’ve been thinking the same thing as you, about getting some sort of proof,” I said to Luna. “I’ve got the feeling that’s what this thing is—the information inside, I mean. White Rose might get money for what they do, but their real power’s information. I think that’s what’s in here. Blackmail material. Probably meant for Levistus in exchange for some other information paid in kind.” I sighed and held it up to the light. “Problem is, we can’t read it.”
“If you can’t read it, why’d you take it?” Variam said.
“Bargaining chip.”
“Wait a second,” Luna asked. “It was Vihaela who sent this focus, right?”