"One chance. Where's Jason? And if he's dead, so are you." I forced the barrel into her skin hard enough to bruise.

"I don't know who you're talking about!" she said, eyes huge. "I don't know a Jason."

And that infuriated me even more, that she hadn't even known the names of the men she'd used, of the lives she'd destroyed in pursuit of her revenge. I grabbed her up and dragged her back to the spot where the mage's body had already been reduced to cinders. "You sent him to kill me less than twenty-four hours ago. Ring any bells?"

"No!" She was crying and her nose was running and she looked like she was about to pass out. Some superassassin.

I deliberately stepped into the middle of what had been the mage's body. It collapsed with an inaudible sound, causing black particles to billow up around us. "How about now?"

"I swear I don't know what you're talking about!" she shrieked, then choked on part of her former colleague. "Please, let me pay you—anything you want. I have a big payday tomorrow—"

"Who were you planning to kill?" I demanded, wondering who was next in line.

She looked confused again. "No one. One of my marks—one of the men I'm blackmailing—has until then to pay me. And when he does, I could give you—"

"A blackmailer and an assassin. You do stay busy, don't you?" I took another vial out of my belt and held it in front of her eyes. "Tell me where Jason is, or you're going to die the same way as your friend here."

Her eyes fixed with horror on the tiny tube. It wasn't more of Dad's special dose—I was all out—but she didn't have to know that. "I don't know what you're talking about," she whispered, licking trembling lips, her eyes never leaving the vial. "I swear I don't know anyone by that name."

And something in her face made me pause. Because I'd been around enough fear to recognize it when I saw it. And terrified people seldom made good liars.

"There's a phone in my right coat pocket," I said abruptly.

Her eyes switched to me. "What?"

"A phone. Get it out. And be careful. If you make any sudden movements or any movements at all that I don't like, that's it. The same goes for trying an illusion."

She nodded and opened my coat slowly, carefully extracting my cell phone. She held it out to me, but I shook my head. "Hit speed dial one."

It took her three tries to get it right, because her hands were shaking. By the time she managed it, I was starting to feel a little light-headed myself from the blood loss. But then Dad's voice was on the phone.

"Who the hell is this?"

"Your loving daughter."

"Do you know what time it is?"

"Yeah. Do you know what Martina Colafranceschi looks like?"

That made him pause for half a second. "Yes. Why?"

"Later. Just tell me."

Dad hadn't been a war mage for over sixty years without being able to respond quickly in a crisis, which the strain in my voice told him this was. "Short, dark, busty—"

"Short?" I repeated, eyeing the tall, slim woman in front of me.

"Maybe five foot two. She was Ferretti's mistress for years, and he had a type: petite and extremely dangerous."

I noticed the inflection, but didn't need the warning. "I'll be sure to keep that in mind if I ever meet her," I said evenly. "Bye, Dad."

The woman cut the connection on my signal. "Who are you?" I demanded.

"O-Ophelia Roberts."

"And you're a blackmailer."

"Yes."

"And those men?"

"My bodyguards. One of the challenges of blackmailing powerful people is staying alive long enough to collect."

"Yeah. I guess so." I was putting the clues together, and not liking the picture they made. She'd run when she saw me not because she recognized me, but because I was a war mage reaching for a weapon. And she hadn't gone back home, because she wasn't a cool-headed assassin, but a panicked blackmailer. Which meant she wasn't the one I was after.

"Are you telling me this was all a mistake?" she asked shakily, openly crying now. "I thought you'd been sent by one of my clients who had decided not to pay!"

I looked numbly down at the ashes dusting away over the concrete, now being splattered with my blood. "I think I was."

It was almost 5 a.m. by the time I made it back to HQ. The halls were as silent as they ever got, empty except for an occasional early riser and piles of unpacked crates. The medical facilities were still staffed, but I didn't stop by. I'd done an emergency patch-up job on the way here. My shoulder felt like it might need surgery, but at least the bleeding had stopped. Anything else could wait.

Like everything else, the labs were still in the process of getting organized, with half-finished electrical wiring poking out of the walls and stacks of files and paper everywhere. A ward wove itself around my fingertips, its dainty tendrils like threads of fine silk as I opened the door to Simons's office. I pushed past it, setting off the alarm and bringing him running from the back.

"Oh, it's you," he said, his face relaxing. "Did you get her?"

"You waited here all night to ask me that?" I let my finger trail through the dust on a packing crate. "Such devotion to duty."

"We've all been working extra hours lately," he said, tensing up again slightly.

"That's what I like to see—someone looking on the bright side. Our guys are getting ambushed left and right, but hey, at least there's overtime."

"That's not what I—"

"It's a good thing we've stepped up recruitment. Assuming most of them pass the Trials, we'll have replacements soon. Speaking of which, how did you do?"

"What?"

"The Trials. How did you do?"

Simons looked a little squirrely suddenly. "I–I did fine. Obviously. Or I wouldn't be here. What does this have to do with—?"

"I bet you did. Just as I would have if I'd taken them. Because the spell doesn't work on us half Weres, does it?"

"I'm no such—"

"Then you won't mind taking a blood test, will you?" I asked innocently. "There are doctors right down the hall and lab facilities onsite. We can have the results in minutes."

He closed his eyes. "She talked."

"Oh, yeah. Roberts told me all about how she used her ability with illusions to help you fool the docs who did your physicals. They put you down as one hundred percent human, allowing you to infiltrate the Corps. You're the one who's been sending reports to your dark mage allies about our every move."

"They aren't my allies," he said, opening his eyes to glare at me. "They pay through the nose for everything I give them."

"So you're in it for profit?"

"What else?" he asked viciously. "Not all of us had famous fathers to pull strings in our behalf! If I'd applied to the Corps as I was, how far do you think I'd have gotten?"

"But you did get in," I pointed out. "You've been here over a decade. You're head of a department! Why turn now?"

"Don't be naïve," he sneered. "I've been feeding the dark information for years! It's only recently that the price has skyrocketed. Thanks to the war, I've made enough to retire on—pleasantly—in the last six months."

I smiled. "Glad to hear it. If only I had a little nest egg like that, I might think twice about turning you in."

"Is that what this is about? Ophelia puts the squeeze on me, and now you think you'll try it?" He looked almost indignant, like how dare I do something so dishonorable. Under other circumstances, it would have been funny.

"Why not? You know my reputation. I'm not a fan of hard work, and war is turning out to be very hard indeed."

The sneer on his face became a little more pronounced, but his shoulders relaxed slightly. "Aren't you afraid? The last person who blackmailed me—"

"Ended up dead, yes. But only because I killed her for you. Which I don't get, by the way. You're a war mage. Why not just do it yourself?"