“Whatta ya say? Not only do you get the location of Quetzalcoatl, you get your fickle nature as the giver and taker of flame cemented into the history books. All you have to do is what you normally do, just the other way around.”

More whispered bickering. Finally: “Agreed. We will help put out the flames as best we can. We cannot put them out ourselves, but we can assist where possible, and not hinder where it is not. Now, where is the forgettable god?”

“Sitting in a bottle at the bottom of a hole in Mictlan.”

Silence. Then more whispered bickering. “We were hoping it was . . . closer.”

“Getting to him is your business. A deal’s a deal. You have your information. Now get blowin’.” I get a distinct sense of grumbling, like a frustrated child who’s just lost at marbles kicking a can down the street. “Oh, it’s not all bad. You still get to play with fire. It’s just a different game.”

A blast of wind swirls around us, blowing away smoke and ash, then everything goes still. A moment later, no longer blowing through the streets, ash begins to fall like snow.

“I’m dreaming of a gray Christmas,” I say, catching a handful of ash in my hand. I’m still dripping wet, so it’s sticking like lint. Letitia slaps me on the back of the head.

“The fuck was that for?”

“You’re making jokes while people are dying,” she says.

“Have you met me?” I say. “Cut me some slack. I made it rain and I just commanded the wind. I’m like fuckin’ Moses or something. Now let’s go find our arsonist and end this.”

—

Letitia’s car is half a block up, covered in a layer of ash an inch thick. The other cars on the street—not many at this hour in Downtown—aren’t exactly pristine, but it looks like all the ash and dust that was blown off them was deposited on Letitia’s Crown Vic.

“They’re like a goddamn child, aren’t they?” Letitia says.

“A deadly, arsonist, psychopathic child, yes. Don’t forget what they did to the security guard just to get our attention.” I wince, my step faltering.

“You all right?”

“Yeah.”

“Necromancer thing?”

“Necromancer thing.” Ever since we got down to the lobby I’ve been feeling more and more deaths. No big waves of them, but clusters. A handful here, a dozen there. It’s like standing in a hailstorm. I still feel the small ones, but the big ones really sting.

More worrisome are the ghosts. I can feel the population really starting to stack up. That’s not usually a problem, but too many into one area and things get a little dicey.