His wristwatch told him it was half an hour later than he'd hoped. Then a blaring horn told him he ought to get the car in gear and move.

He just missed crashing into the Westwind as it braked in front of him, his mind too full of how to disguise any final approach, how to use the cauldron's stored power, what elementals or spirits should be conjured and summoned, how to discover what guards and barriers Luther had amp;

But if Niall was going to try to get anywhere in one piece, he'd have to stop thinking and start paying attention. All the planning in the world wouldn't do him any good if he became a strawberry stain on the road. Carefully, he crawled the vehicle through the choked traffic jams of Munich, following the signs for Ingolstadt.

"Fine," Michael said quietly. "The patches are good, which makes me like the deal. Pity about the respirators, though. I would have gone high for that."

The man shrugged his shoulders. "Anti-viral I can't do. No one has that kind of thing to hand. Give me a week and it could be done, but that's very specialist. What you're getting will filter out gases and bacteria, and that usually only comes with the big money deals."

"Okay. We agree to sixty-five for the specialist requirements. You can have them for us by ten tonight?" The man nodded agreement. "You've got my number. Call me at nine-thirty to arrange a pick-up point. Now, the small matter of the deposit."

"Fifty per cent," Walter said flatly.

"High for a sixty-five-grand deal," Michael retorted.

"If I reneged on deals and took off with the money, I wouldn't be sitting here," the man said. "I'd be a dead man. In my business, cheating people doesn't pay. Rip them off now and then, sure, but not cheating. I work on percentages. No percentage in that."

Michael grinned. "Well, look, say a deposit of thirty in round numbers. I got credsticks charged in tens. That square with you?"

"That'll do. A pleasure doing business with you, Mr. James. When I call, you let me know what numbers of basics you need, the pistols and armor, and we'll agree on a final price, right? I only need thirty minutes to round those up. Like I said, it's a pleasure doing business with you."

The man finished his drink, picked up the folded newspaper in which Michael had discreetly placed the credsticks, and left without another word. Michael paid the bill, then collected his cashmere coat, and also headed for the door, intending to hail a cab.

Unfortunately, he never got that far.

As he fell, dimly aware of what was happening to him, he clutched at his coat pocket and squeezed the little metal card inside it. The last phone call he'd made from New York had been worth every last cent. Behind him, the elf vanished into the shadows of the back alley, fleeing from the shouts and screams, desperate for a door to get through, any damn door in sight.

He found one.

Tom was prowling up and down in the suite at the Metroplitan, waiting for Michael's return. Time was beginning to get short. The printer connected to the Fuchi began to chatter. Serrin looked at the troll and waited for the paper feed to deliver the pre-scripted message to him.

Hi there. I'm afraid something nasty has happened to me. If this is triggered, it means the BuMoNa medical service has picked me up. Getting insured was the right move. You 'II have to contact BuMoNa to find out where I am and whether I'm still alive or not. If I'm dead, it was

nice knowing you all. By the way, all the money is in bills and credsticks in the laminated suitcase.

Disbelievingly, Serrin tapped in the number of the German medical service. After an initial inquiry, he was reduced to a string of mumbled yes's and no's. Finally, he hit the Disconnect key and stood dumbfounded, not knowing what to do.

"What's going on?" Tom growled. Serrin still hadn't told him what the printed message had said.

"Michael's in intensive at a hospital downtown. Shot in the back, kidney rupture, the bullet went through the spleen. Systemic shock. Spinal damage a possibility. Hit on the sidewalk outside the Tarantel."

"Fragging hell," the troll muttered.

"They want his next of kin," Serrin said quietly. Their eyes turned to Kristen. She sat uncertainly, biting on her lower lip.

"Kristen, I think you've got to go to him. If he can speak at all, maybe we can find out what happened. Tom, you and I will have to make the meet," Serrin said, his voice steely. "If we don't meet your ork, it'll hose everything. Kristen, can you manage this? Yes?"

She nodded and got slowly to her feet. "I'll do what I have to," she told him.

"So will we." Serrin felt alone, even with the others there. Until now Michael had been the planner, the one always on top of it all, and now that task had fallen to him. He also felt keenly that the Englishman might well die because of him. But Serrin didn't feel guilty. All he felt was icy anger.

"Let's get a cab," he said to Tom as he headed for the money in Michael's case, "and then let's hire every last fragging gun we can get our hands on."

The cab carrying Serrin and Tom curb-crawled Grenzs-trasse twice before Gunther chose to reveal himself, motioning for them to get out of the auto. They paid the driver, pulled up the collars of their coats, and stepped out onto the sidewalk. Serrin didn't like the weight and feel of the credsticks in his pockets, and he was desperate to hear from Kristen about how Michael was doing.

"Your friends are a bit thin on the ground, man," the ork said to Tom as he led them across the street.

"One of them just got hit in the back after buying weapons for you guys if you're taking the job," Tom replied. "He's in intensive."

"You bulldrekkin' me?"

"Sure. I come here with tens in sticks and bills and we're bulldrekking you. We even shot up our own man, right? You want us to take you to the hospital so you can see for yourself?" Serrin snapped angrily.

"All right, all right," Gunther said. He ducked into a back alley and motioned them to follow as he rapped on a slogan-splashed door. It opened and he disappeared into the gloomy interior.

Following him in, Serrin wished that orks were more prone to using deodorant. The six samurai and the woman, the Cat shaman Tom had mentioned, were waiting with a variety of unimpressive pistols leveled at them as they entered. Their dirty jeans and frayed jackets confirmed for the eyes that they gave jack squat about personal hygiene.

"Now you tell us everything," the shamam said. "You lie and I'll know it. You're masking," she said to Serrin,

"that might cover you. But I can read him just fine. Now give it all to me."

"Two things first," Serrin surrendered, knowing he really didn't have much choice. "One, we had a friend shot up real bad about thirty minutes ago and I need to make a call to find out how he is. You can enter the code, verify that it's legit. Second, well…" He paused and ran his fingers through his hair. "This is going to be one long crazy story. You probably won't believe half of it. All I can say is that we can pay you a hell of a lot of money to come with us and scan it for yourselves. Meaning you," he said, meeting the shaman's intense gaze. "You can assense the place when we get there. It's just outside Regensburg. We want to make the hit at dawn."

"That can be done if we start out before midnight," the shaman said casually, turning to Tom. "We've got time to hear you out. Now talk, troll, and make it good."

"You can only see him for a minute," the nurse told her. "He's asleep now, resting. He's very poorly still. Please try not to disturb him." She scowled suspiciously at the marriage registration. This scrap of a girl certainly didn't look like a suitable match for the wealthy man who'd purchased the best coverage money could buy. His clothes, and the money inside them, didn't speak of someone likely to marry this African waif. But the girl had the ID and the doctor had agreed to let her see the man.