“He will if you make him want to,” Deirdre had said.

It was time. Anders brought the car to a halt two blocks away from the flat. Deirdre climbed out. Beltan unfolded his long frame from the backseat.

“I’m ready,” he said, one hand in the pocket of his jeans.

Deirdre touched his arm. “Make sure you’re seen.”

He nodded, then turned and took long strides down the sidewalk, vanishing into the gloom.

Anders leaned out the window of the car. “Is your radio working, mate?”

Deirdre held the device to her mouth to test it. She heard her voice emanate from inside the car. She gave him a thumbs-up, then tucked the radio into her jacket pocket, alongside something else.

“Good luck,” Anders said, winking at her.

The car sped away down the lane. Deirdre didn’t like letting him go by himself, but she had no choice, not if this plan was going to work. Besides, it was too late for him to warn them. If one was keeping watch, then at that moment he was already observing Beltan open the door of the flat. Deirdre looked at her wristwatch, letting thirty more seconds pass. Then she started moving.

She walked quickly down the sidewalk and up the front steps of the building. If the Philosopher was right, it wouldn’t take long. She waited a few seconds in the lobby of the building, eyes on her watch. The plan called for Beltan to be alone in the flat for three minutes, not one second more. With thirty seconds to go, she started up the stairs.

Five seconds still remained when she reached the door of the flat. It was closed; no sounds emanated from the other side. She drew in a breath to steady herself. Was Anders in position? What if he wasn’t?

There was no more time to worry about it. The watch ticked the last seconds away. Deirdre slipped a hand into her jacket pocket, then pushed through the door of the flat.

The sorcerer was killing Beltan.

It was hard to see. The flat was darkened, and only a few scraps of light filtered around Deirdre into the living room, but her imagination filled in what her eyes could not discern.

The window was open, and the night air billowed the white curtains like the garb of a ghost. Beltan was on his knees, his head thrown back, the cords of his neck standing out. One hand clutched at his chest. The other gripped a small glass vial filled with dark fluid. The sorcerer stood above him, clad all in black, a smile frozen on the serene gold face. One hand reached toward Beltan. The sorcerer’s fingers curled together, and Beltan jerked as a spasm passed through him.

Fear stabbed into Deirdre’s chest, as if it was her heart the sorcerer was stopping with a spell. And if she didn’t act quickly, in a moment it would be. She pulled two objects from her pocket—and fumbled them in sweaty hands. They fell to the floor: the radio, as well as something sleek and silvery.

A squawk emanated from the radio. Before Deirdre could move, Anders’s voice crackled out of it. “Is that you, Deirdre? Are you in position yet? I can’t see anything in the flat; it’s too dark in there.”

The sorcerer hissed, and the gold mask swung in Deirdre’s direction. Beltan drew in a gasping breath, but he still couldn’t move; the sorcerer had not lowered its hand. And it had another. It stretched its left hand toward Deirdre’s chest.

There was no time to think. Deirdre dived to the floor, grabbing the things lying there. She punched a button on the radio.

“Now, Anders!” she shouted. And with her free hand she gripped the other object and flicked a switch.

A beam of white-blue light pierced the darkness of the flat, slicing crazily through the shadows. Deirdre threw down the radio and gripped the flashlight in both hands, angling the beam upward. It struck the sorcerer’s gold mask, and the Scirathi staggered back, dazzled by the sudden light. Beltan started to struggle to his feet.

Again the sorcerer thrust a hand toward the blond man, and Beltan grunted, falling back to his knees. The other hand pointed at Deirdre, and she gasped as pain crackled through her. She couldn’t breathe; the flashlight started to slip from her hands.

Something hissed through the open window, and there was a soft thunk. The sorcerer took a step back, and a soft exhalation of air passed through the mouth slit of its mask. Then the Scirathi slumped to the floor.

Although he had been under the spell of the sorcerer longer, Beltan was the first to recover. As he knelt above her, Deirdre could see his green eyes glowing faintly in the dark. He helped her sit up, and a ragged breath rushed into her lungs.

“Are you all right?” he said, his voice hoarse.

She nodded. Her heart had resumed something like a normal cadence in her chest. The sorcerer’s spell had not done as much harm as she would have thought. “How is he?”

Beltan moved to a dark lump that sprawled on the floor. “He’s not moving, but I think he’s still conscious.”

Good. The drug was working exactly as it was supposed to. She had feared Scirathi physiology might be different, but it wasn’t. For all their powers, they were still men.

Deirdre groped for the flashlight, then crawled on hands and knees to Beltan. She trained the light down, onto the crumpled form of the sorcerer. Its body twitched, and gurgling sounds emanated from behind the mask. A silver dart protruded from the center of its chest.

“The mask,” Beltan said. “Take it off. He’s powerless without it.”

Deirdre hesitated, then with trembling hands gripped the edge of the gold mask, pulled it off, and handed it to Beltan.

The sorcerer was not a man after all. The face was a blasted landscape of scar tissue, crudely stitched wounds, and oozing scabs. The ears were gone, and the nose reduced to two pits above the featureless slit of the mouth. However, the bone structure—plain to see—was fine, even delicate. This sorcerer was a woman.

Or had been once. Now her face was a ruin from which all traces of humanity had been cut away with the blade of a knife. Only the sorcerer’s eyes were recognizable as something human. They gazed at Deirdre with hatred. And with fear.

“It looks like everything went off without a hitch,” said a cheerful, if breathless, voice behind them.

Both Deirdre and Beltan glared at Anders as he stepped into the flat.

“Or not,” he said, grin fading as he shut the door.

It hadn’t taken him long to get here from his position in the hotel across the street. He had been stationed on the third floor with the dart gun, waiting for Deirdre to shine the light on their target. Once he got off his shot, he must have run here to the flat. Good. That meant he wouldn’t have had time to communicate with anyone else.

Anders knelt beside them. “Gads, that’s a nasty sight.” He looked up from the sorcerer. “Are you both all right?”

“We’re alive, if that’s what you mean,” Beltan said, his voice still ragged.

“Let’s talk to her,” Deirdre said.

Anders reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a syringe. He handed it to Deirdre. She took off the cap, flicked the syringe to remove the bubbles, then inserted the needle into the sorcerer’s throat.

“This will relax the muscles around your larynx. You’ll be able to talk, but that’s all.”

Anders started to reach for the dart embedded in the Scirathi’s chest, but Beltan grabbed his hand.

“No, leave the dart in place. We do not want her to bleed.”

Anders swallowed. “Good point, mate.”

“Blood,” hissed a voice like a serpent’s. It was the sorcerer. The slit of her mouth twitched. “Give me the blood. . . .”

“Never,” Beltan growled. He made sure the glass vial was stopped tightly, then slipped it into his pocket.

The mysterious Philosopher had been right; Beltan had indeed possessed something that would tempt a sorcerer. That morning, they had used alcohol to wash the blood from the bandage Beltan had kept from Travis’s arm. Most of the alcohol had evaporated, leaving only the residual fluid in the vial. It amounted to only a few drops of blood, no more, but it was enough. The moment Beltan had opened the vial in the flat, the sorcerer had appeared, drawn out of hiding by the scent of such power.