I’d seen it. It was pretty impressive. Two thousand bucks’ worth? That depended on what I walked out of here knowing. So I told him about Smyler and how I’d watched the murderer burned away to carbon in a magical angel net, and how more recently he’d tried several times to stab me.

“Strange one,” said the Boy slowly. The flame was entirely blue now, the room cold to the eye as a 1940s gangster film. “Strange . . .” Other than the flicker above the Sterno can, the only movement was the Boy’s head as it pulled in short jerks against the tubing that held him, as if his body had decided to escape while his brain was busy talking. “Strange to think . . . who’s buying? Who sells . . . ?” He trailed off. His eyes had rolled up beneath his lids. “She makes seashores with a sea shell,” he said then, as calmly as discussing the weather, but the way he spoke made him seem very far away. “She masks. No—he must . . . ? Mastema? Makers with more of the tiny tiger bright light. Paper white light. White when you . . . while you—”

Then the Broken Boy gasped, and everything between his nose and his shoulders torqued violently to one side, as though struck by some huge, invisible fist. I had seen what happened to him when he plied his talent, but this was something different. For a moment afterward he just hung quivering in his harness of tubes like an exhausted butterfly halfway out of the chrysalis. Tico and one of the others actually scuttled forward, but a quiet yet distinct hiss from the Boy sent them back to their places. The blue flame wavered at their approach and retreat. By the time it had settled, the Boy had found his voice again.

“Sorry, Bobby,” he said, each word a dry scrape. “Can’t do it for you. Something . . .” He worked for air. “Something won’t let me. Something stronger. A lot stronger . . . than me.”

Which sucked, because it pretty much proved that Eligor or someone else near the top of the food chain was definitely after me. Could it be someone I hadn’t suspected? That fat demonic bastard Prince Sitri had certainly enjoyed the opportunity to yank my chain and his rival Eligor’s at the same time. But if he was the one who’d sent Smyler after me, this was a lot more complicated than I’d guessed. No, the odds were strong on the grand duke himself, Caz’s former boyfriend and current captor. And if the Boy couldn’t give me any information about Smyler, that meant the undead little fucker was going to keep coming after me, and I’d have to keep improvising. How many times could I get lucky?

If Smyler was off-limits, then I had to concede that the best defense would be a good offense, as sports journalists like to say.