Phil was already scratching around in Coop’s skull, looking for traps, illusions, and dead drops. So far, so good on that front. The first hard curse hit him as he passed a broom closet near the base of the staircase. A second hit as soon as he rounded the corner that led to the stairs. A third curse meant to rattle his bones until they cracked hit him at the bottom of the first step. They all passed right through him, evaporating or leaving scorch marks on the floor and walls.

In his head, Phil yelled “Geronimo!” each time a curse hit. Another one of his less charming nervous tics. Coop was about to tell him to pipe down when Phil said, “Trip wire on the third step.”

Coop knelt until he could see light reflecting off the monofilament, then stepped over it.

“Don’t stand up yet,” said Phil. “There’s another at throat level on the next step to get you if you spotted the first wire.”

“I see it,” said Coop, ducking.

“The rest of the stairs look clear. Just be ready for more curses. There are plenty more ahead.”

“Got it,” said Coop. “You’re not your usual chatty self, Phil. Anything wrong?”

“I’m just hurt is all. I try to give you advice on your life choices, your fear of intimacy, your fear of death, and here they come all wrapped together in one nice package and you don’t even mention it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Giselle. I always liked her name. She’s like someone Poe should have written a poem about. Something long and gloomy about a jilted lover spending his last miserable days eating sandwiches on her tomb.”

A curse hit Coop square in the stomach, bounced off, and melted a nearby Ming vase. Phil giggled. “Nice shot, cowboy.”

“That one burned a little,” said Coop.

“Just like love, if you get my drift.”

“A triceratops with a learning disability would get your drift.”

“Watch out for the peacock chair on your left. There’s a blowgun in the back,” said Phil.

Coop stopped and pulled a small graphite glider from a side panel on his backpack. He sailed it past the chair and a dozen spikes, like kitchen knives, shot from the back, embedding themselves in the wall.

“Ouch-a-rama. That would have been a good one, huh?” said Phil.

“Good call,” said Coop.

“How much farther to Goldfinger’s vault?”

“One more floor.”

“Uggghhh,” said Phil, like a six-year-old asked to do the nineteen-times multiplication table. “Doesn’t the DOPS have teleportation or something? Why can’t we fly past Babylon’s party tricks?”

“I forgot my jetpack.”

“If I believed that, I’d strangle you in your sleep.”

“You’ve been at the DOPS longer than I have. Why don’t you talk to management?”

“They don’t listen to ghosts. It’s complete ectoplasmic oppression over there.”