As she spoke, Matthew rose and went to the window. He stood there, hands in his pockets, his shoulders stiff, as Cordelia finished explaining that Lilith had sent the demons in Nelson Square. “She wanted me to understand,” she said, “what it meant to have that power. To be able to wield Cortana as a paladin.”

“I should never have taken you to the barrow,” said Matthew. He faced the window, unmoving.

“Matthew,” Cordelia said gently. “It’s not your fault.”

Thomas rubbed at his arm, where the compass rose tattoo showed through the white of his sleeve. “So all this time, Lilith has been taking different forms to manipulate and trick you—trick us. When you saw Magnus at the Shadow Market, that wasn’t the real Magnus, was it?”

Christopher looked stunned. “But why—?”

“It was never the real Magnus,” said James. “I should have guessed when he came to our home here. His magic was the wrong color.”

Christopher’s brow was furrowed. “But Magnus was rather helpful,” he said. “He helped us solve the question of the pithos.” He tapped his breast pocket, where the adamas object now rested. “Why would Lilith do that?”

James watched Matthew, who was still staring out the window. “She had to earn our trust and make us believe she was Magnus. And remember, she is Belial’s enemy. They hate each other. She would not mind helping us defeat him. What she really wanted was to have me take her back to Edom, and it almost worked.”

“I must tell Magnus about this,” said Anna. “He can be sworn to secrecy, but he must know. Who knows what else Lilith may have done, while pretending to be him?”

There was a murmur of agreement. Thomas, his eyebrows knit together in thought, said, “So if Cordelia is Lilith’s paladin, how were you able to get rid of her?”

James smiled. “Your revolver, Christopher.”

“You shot Lilith?” said Christopher in disbelief.

“Doesn’t seem right, shooting a demon,” said Anna. “Unsportsmanlike. Though, of course, I am glad you did it.”

“I don’t understand,” said Christopher. “There’s no way Lilith could be harmed by ordinary runed weapons. And as unusual as it may be, the revolver is nothing more than a runed weapon.”

“But it worked,” protested Matthew.

“It’s a miracle it worked. It shouldn’t have worked,” Christopher said. He turned back to James. “But you knew it would, didn’t you?”

“I strongly suspected,” James said. “You told me yourself you performed all sorts of enchantments on it, trying to make it work. I remembered you said you had done a sort of modified Nephilim protection spell. And then I thought about the protection spells.”

“Yes,” said Christopher, “but—oh!” His face lit up with understanding.

Thomas smiled a bit. “All right, all right, explain it, one of you. I can see you want to.”