“I thought if you were a woman, you were a mambo, not a houngan.”

“Once, if you were a woman, you could not be a houngan. And once, if you were a woman, you couldn’t be a soldier.” The look she gave Frances was probably meant to be quelling.

“Power is most things to most people,” said Frances. “When you talk about power in the City, do you mean money? Politics?”

“I mean energy,” China Black replied.

Frances’s expression made me think again of predators. “The ju-ju kind?” she asked with a hint of distaste.

“Not usually. Like you, he has little interest in the spirit.” China Black’s teeth flashed, just for a moment. “He wants to control electricity and fuel. If your vehicle was powered by methane, he would have it confiscated, because in the City no one may use fuel he does not profit from, and he neither makes nor taxes methane.”

While China Black and Frances eyed each other, I stole a glance at Mick. He was leaning back, legs crossed at the knee, cradling his teacup. He didn’t look relaxed. He was waiting for something, and until it came, there was no way to tell what.

China Black put her teacup down and said to Frances, “What is your name?”

“Frances Redding.”

“And you are… ?”

Frances raised her eyebrows. “Female? A Scorpio?”

“You know what I’m asking.”

“Then I’ll bet you know the answer.”

“Then it can do no harm to tell it to me.”

Frances’s jaw worked a little, as if she might be biting the inside of her lip. “I’m a Horseman,” she said.

It might not have surprised anyone in the room; still, there was a moment of silence for the enormity of the fact.

“And so are you,” China Black said, turning suddenly on Mick.

He started, looked up with a jerk. “Yes, ma’am.”

“What brought you here?”

“Impulse,” said Mick, with a shrug. “Nothing particular.”

After a moment China Black turned to Frances. “And you?”

Frances leaned forward and laced her tanned fingers together. Meeting China Black’s eyes, she said, “I came here to kill someone.”

“Ah. In the interest of the general welfare, I think I am entitled to ask who.”

“His name is Tom Worecski. He’s also a Horseman. He was the leader of the group that betrayed… that started the exchange of things that go bang.”

“That betrayed humanity?”

Frances shrugged. “It seemed, on reflection, a little melodramatic. And not quite true. I think the grudge belongs to the Western Hemisphere.”

“The world is not so large that half of it can afford to ignore what happens to the other half. I would let it stand at ‘humanity’ — but maybe I am an unforgiving old woman. And maybe you are, too.”

“Maybe. If, when I find Worecski, I decide he’s become a saint, I’ll see if I can forgive him.”

“You haven’t found him? Then why do you think he’s here?”

Frances rubbed the space between her eyebrows absently. “I’ve trailed him here. I followed the wreckage he left behind him over the years — he’s a great one for wreckage — and the little personal motifs. That’s all we had as identities, once we found that the relationship between body and soul was tenuous.