IT WAS AFTER MIDNIGHT BY NOW AND TIME FOR HARD-WORKING men and women to be in bed and asleep, but the ragpicker had an appointment to keep. The one thing he had learned over the long years of his life—the one thing that had served him well in his demon work—was that humans were duplicitous. Skeal Eile was no exception; he might have been worse than most, in fact. So the ragpicker had known better than to trust much of anything he had to say. The Seraphic might promise he would secure the black staff from its newest holder—this boy, Panterra Qu—but it was more likely than not that even if he did so he would not relinquish it once he had hold of it. A man like the Seraphic was hungry for power, and he would already know the staff would give him command of magic beyond anything he possessed.

So Skeal Eile would keep the staff for himself.

Or at least, he would try.

The ragpicker had been careful not to tell the Seraphic either his suspicions or his real intentions. The other might believe that the ragpicker trusted him to secure the staff and would simply wait around for that to happen. He might believe the ragpicker wanted the Seraphic to do the work for him. But the ragpicker had learned long ago that if you wanted something done, it was never a good idea to rely on others. Others were never as committed to achieving your goals as you were.

So let Skeal Eile think what he wanted to. Let him believe he had value. Don’t reveal the truth about what he was really needed for. Don’t tell him that when he provided information, he revealed far more than he knew. So much so he would have been appalled, had his understanding of what was happening not been deflected just enough to cloud his memory. Best if he remembered only certain things. Best if he didn’t think too carefully on what was going to happen next.

The ragpicker’s plans for the Seraphic, in fact, were complex and far reaching, and they would work best if the latter remained ignorant of true goals. Trusting the truth with such a man was a fool’s game. The ragpicker had spent sufficient time during the past few days learning about the Seraphic and his order, about how the people of his village regarded him and how he conducted himself as the self-appointed leader of his sect, to know what to expect. It was enough to enable the ragpicker to take the measure of the man and to determine accurately what was needed to secure his cooperation. Just enough, not too much—that was the key to what the Seraphic needed to know.

That way he wouldn’t realize he was doing the ragpicker’s work until it was too late.