Chapter Ten
It smells fu—friggin’ terrible,” Tripp complained.
“Yeah,” I said. “Potions are like that.”
“Magic potions,” he said. He shook his head. “Think I’d rather have the heebie-jeebies. Go to detox camp.”
“Feel free,” I said. “Be a lot less risk for me and my people. But Estevez would definitely send his demon for you there. Figure you’d last until the next sundown.”
“Yeah,” Tripp said sullenly.
We were in the library again. He was dressed in the nicest clothing I could find for him from the castle’s lost and found, trousers and a business shirt that more or less fit him.
Tripp was regarding the sports bottle we’d stored the two potions in skeptically.
I had on my black leather duster, and my other magical equipment was near to hand.
“Just like a sip, right?” he demanded of me.
“Give it a good mouthful,” I said. Then I added, drily, “Little more than a shot. I’m pretty sure you know how much that is.”
“Yeah,” he agreed, missing my tone. “Yeah, just usually, I don’t do shots of disgusting.”
“Shake it up first,” I said. “Otherwise, the silver settles to the bottom.”
Tripp sighed. But he shook up the bottle and put away a slug of the potion, grimacing.
“There you go,” I said. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
“It’s awful,” he replied sourly, snapping closed the cap on the bottle. “Silver? Seriously? Am I gonna get metal poisoning?”
“Silver is one of those things that doesn’t get on with supernatural evil,” I noted. “It’s pure enough, you’ll be fine. They put it on fancy cakes and things all the time.”
Tripp shook his head. “Man. Rich people.”
“It’s three now,” I said. “So, you take more of it on the threes. Six, nine, twelve, and repeat. Got it?”
“Yeah.” He sighed. “I got it.”
“Okay,” I said. “Remember the plan?”
“Yeah, you want me to be dumb,” he said.
“No,” I said patiently. “Dumb is trying to pull a financial number on one of the sharpest fraud and abuse analysts in Chicago, a place consistently known for the abundance and sophistication of financial fraud and abuse.”
“How good can she be, there’s that much that goes on?” Tripp asked.
“That kind of thing gets harder to track and prove the more of it is going on, not easier,” I said. “Max knows what he’s talking about. He says she’s a shark. So, you’re not going to jump in the water with her and dare her to bite.”
“Tell the truth,” Tripp said, shaking his head. “Yeah, lot of good that’s done me.”
I folded my arms and leaned on the wall. I stared at Tripp for a moment and then said, “You don’t tell people the truth because it lets you get what you want out of them. You know that, right?”
“Why else would you do it?” he demanded.
“Because it’s the basis of sincere human interaction,” I said. “Of genuine cooperation.”
“People don’t cooperate except when it gets them ahead,” Tripp said. “I’ll tell you that much.”
I took a deep breath and reminded myself where Tripp had come from. I hadn’t thought so differently than him once upon a time. Of course, I’d been about seventeen, but I’d grown up pretty rough. “Not where you’ve been,” I said. “But you’re trying to change that. Right?”
He scowled. He fiddled with the sports bottle. “I mean. Yeah.”
“Look, man,” I said. “The skills you need to be a crook are not the same as the skills you need to move out of that world. And the skills you need to progress in the new world are not the same as the skills you needed to get there.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you’ve got a lot of learning to do,” I said. “And that starts with being honest with people.”
“I don’t get how not schmoozing this IRS lady is going to help.”
“Because in her position, she has heard it all and has zero tolerance for bullshit,” I responded. “You try to sell her the same pitch you gave Max, she’s going to hang you out to dry without thinking twice. You tell her the truth—”
“And she’s gonna do it twice as fast,” Tripp said.
“Maybe,” I agreed, nodding. “Or maybe she’ll take you seriously as a human being. Maybe she’ll be willing to work with us. Maybe she’ll help you on your way instead of working to prove that you need charges pressed.”
“Why the hell would she do that?”
“Because you were straight with her,” I said. “That’s why they call them straights.”
Tripp grimaced. “And all I gotta do is just tell the truth?”
“Hell, no,” I said. “That’s not all you’ve got to do. But it’s where you absolutely have to start, or you’ll have nothing to build on.”
He shook his head. “This still seems like a bad idea to me.”
“You wouldn’t have made it past lunch alive yesterday if you hadn’t had my help,” I said. “How much worse could it get?”
“Yeah.” He sighed. “Yeah. I guess this is what it’s come to.”
Personally, I wasn’t sure telling the truth only as an apocalyptic final resort was a productive mindset, but so long as it was getting told, I figured Tripp was taking baby steps in the right direction.
The door to the library opened, and Bear and Fitz came in.
Bear was in her usual motorcycle jacket and jeans. She carried a bag over one shoulder that probably had a big-bore revolver or two in it, or maybe knives suitable for chopping down telephone poles, or possibly grenades. The Valkyrie was eclectic when it came to her violence.
Fitz was wearing Tripp’s bloodied suit and shirt. They were too big on him, and made the kid look like he’d partially deflated. He also bore his freshly carved wizard’s staff, wore a nervous expression, and looked a little green around the gills.
“Looking good, kid,” I said to Fitz. “How you feeling?”
“Nervous,” he said, frankly. “I’d rather be wearing my leathers.”
“Can’t be helped. The suit is what’s going to make this work. You read up on the Lurker?” I asked. I’d given him the book.
“Yeah,” he said. “It sounds terrifying. It can possess anything alive and be in several places at once? That’s screwed-up, Harry.”
“It can at least do that,” I corrected him cheerfully. “Plus, it’s malicious, it’s seen thousands of years of cruelty and spite, and can probably do worse things to you than you are literally capable of imagining.”
He swallowed. “Yeah. I feel so much better now, thank you.”
I put my hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “This is the business, kid. But I’ve fought things like this before and kicked their ass. Watch and learn, huh?”
Fitz took a deep breath and then nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I gotcha.”
I nodded encouragingly. “One more time, what’s the plan?”
My apprentice cleared his throat, closed his eyes for a second, and focused. “Okay, right,” he said. “I put up the illusion of Mr. Gregory. Me and Bear go out to the car out front. I get in the back and she drives. After that, I follow her lead until we get back.”
“Yep,” I said. “Good, easy-peasy.”
“I don’t know how long I can hold up an illusion, Harry,” he said apologetically. “They’re still new.”
“You just have to do it from here to the car,” I said. “Once you’re in and the door is shut, that should be enough.”
“Suit doesn’t fit,” Tripp pointed out.
I turned to Bear. “Anyone standing watch outside?”
She shook her head. “No one visible, at any rate.”
I nodded. “I’ve gone up against a lot of guys like Emilio. They get a little supernatural power, and because most people don’t have access to countermeasures, it goes to their heads. He’ll be using supernatural means—and that’s why it doesn’t matter if the suit fits or not, Tripp.”
“Huh?” Tripp said wittily.
“He isn’t watching with physical eyes,” I said. “And because of that potion you just took, the eyes he’s using aren’t going to spot you when you and I go out the back way. Not when they have all that blood on the suit to lock on to.”
“It’s dried,” Fitz pointed out. “I thought you said dried blood was useless.”
“It is—for establishing a channel with any amount of power running through it. But you can bet your ass that a demonic hemophage is going to lock on to it like a bloodhound.” I glanced at the window.
“The Lurker is out there. A bird, a rat, something. And with Tripp all veiled up, the only thing it’s going to have to lock on to is the blood on the suit. ”
Fitz grimaced. “Oh. Good.”
“Relax, kid,” Bear said quietly. “I been doing this a long, long time. I’m better at avoiding trouble than most. And if I can’t, I can at least promise you a glorious death.”
Fitz grimaced at her and said, “I know you meant that to be reassuring.”
Bear grinned. “Like the wizard said—this is the job, kid. Make peace with it.”
“Bear will probably be able to keep you from any serious threat,” I said quietly.
“You know what I’ve taught you about restraint, especially in public.
But I want you to trust your instincts. We’re up against capital-E Evil here.
Someone or something comes at you and you get the creeps, don’t talk yourself into thinking everything is fine.
Assume it’s a deadly threat. Kill it with fire. ”
Bear nodded firm approval of this advice.
“Jesus,” Tripp said quietly.
“Got it,” Fitz said quietly. He didn’t evince any nervousness about conjuring up fire.
Fire, he could do.
“Okay, kid,” I said gently. “Be smart. Be alert. Costume up.”
Fitz nodded once. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, opened them, and focused intently on Tripp for a moment and then released the breath with a murmur of “Maschera.”
The air rippled with the nearly imperceptible power of illusion magic, and suddenly where Fitz had been standing was someone who looked enough like Tripp to be his close brother, at least. Fitz had gotten a few of the details wrong, but from ten yards away, it would take a couple of different looks to tell the difference between the two of them—except for the expression of stern concentration on one of the faces and the confusion on the other.
“Wow,” Tripp said. “That’s what I look like?”
“Spitting image,” I said. I didn’t want him rattling the kid’s confidence. “All right. You two move out. Good luck.”
“Right,” Fitz said in his normal voice. The image around his face blurred a little when he moved his mouth, and he frowned, fell silent, and concentrated harder. Then he gripped his staff and turned to hurry out of the library, with the enormous Valkyrie pacing close behind him.
“Let’s go,” I said to Tripp, rising. “We go out the back door into the alley, get in the Blue Beetle, and we’re off.”
“Hey, uh,” he said. He held up the bottle. “What if this doesn’t work?”
“It will,” I said, taking up my staff.
“Yeah,” he said. “But what if it doesn’t? And more of those things follow us? How am I supposed to kill it with fire?”
I picked up my blasting rod and hung it on its thong inside my duster. “Don’t worry about it,” I drawled. “I’ll bring enough for both of us.”