She winced. “The airport?”

“Yeah.”

“That it?”

“No,” I said. “Nicodemus also had these…call them guard dogs, I guess. Except that they weren’t dogs. I don’t know what they were, but they were ugly and ran fast and had big teeth. But all of that isn’t what makes them dangerous.”

“No?” Thomas said. “Then what is?”

“The Fallen,” I replied.

The room fell silent.

“They’re beings older than time who have spent two thousand years learning the ins and outs of the mortal world and the mortal mind,” I said quietly. “They understand things we literally could not begin to grasp. They’ve seen every trick, learned every move, and they’re riding shotgun for each coin holder—if they aren’t in the driver’s seat already. Every one of them has a perfect memory, a library of information at his immediate disposal, and a schemer that makes Cardinal Richelieu look like Mother Teresa hanging around in his brain as an adviser.”

Thomas stared at me very hard for a moment, frowning. I tried to ignore him.

Murphy shook her head. “Let’s sum up: an unknown number of enemies with unknown capabilities, supported by a gang of madmen, packs of attack animals, and superhumanly intelligent pocket change.” She gave me a look. “It’s sort of tough to plan for that, given how much we don’t know.”

“Well, then that’s what we do next, isn’t it?” Molly asked tentatively. “Find out more about them?”

Thomas flicked a glance at Molly and nodded once.

“To do that we’d have to find them,” I said.

“A tracking spell?” Molly suggested.

“I don’t have any samples to work with,” I replied. “And even if I did, somebody on their team was able to obscure Mab’s divining spells. I’m nowhere close to Mab’s league. My spells wouldn’t have a prayer.”

“If they’ve got that much of an entourage, they’re going to stick out anywhere even vaguely public,” Murphy mused. “A gang of toughs with no tongues? If the Denarians are in town, that should make them relatively easy to locate.”

“Last time they were holed up in Undertown,” I said. “Believe me, there’s plenty of room for badness down there.”

“What about the spirit world?” Thomas asked quietly. “Surely there’s an entity or two who could tell us something.”

“Possibly,” I said. “I’m on speaking terms with one or two of the loa. But that kind of information is either expensive or unreliable. Sometimes both. And remember who we’re talking about. The Fallen are heavyweights in the spirit world. No one wants to cross them.”

Molly made a frustrated sound. “If we can’t track them with magic, and we can’t find them physically, then how are we supposed to learn more about them?”

“Exactly, kid,” I said. “Hence the whole ‘war council’ concept.”

We ate in silence for a few minutes. Then Murphy said, “We’re coming at this from the wrong angle.”

“Eh?” I said wittily.

“We’re thinking like the good guys. We should be thinking like the bad guys. Figuring out what they had to face and get around.”