“Like yours?”
“No, his hair is dyed.”
“And yours is natural?”
“Something you’ll never find out; that’s for sure. But his isn’t meant to look natural. It’s a fashion statement, bright scarlet, but with heavy black eyebrows.”
“Does not ring a bell at all,” I said. “Maybe Victor’s heard of him, or maybe he’s new in the city. What made you pick up on him?”
“He wasn’t shielding that well—I could hardly have missed him.”
“Maybe he wanted you to notice.”
“Maybe. Anyway, you live close. I thought you might want to drop by and then we could have a talk with him.”
“Give me five minutes,” I said.
“Hold on,” she said. “He’s leaving. Got to go.”
“Wait, wait,” I said quickly. “That might not be the best idea. If he’s letting you notice him, he probably wants you to follow. People have been dismembered, remember? If your idea about a practitioner is right, you don’t want to be confronting him alone.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“I’m sure you can, but it’s not worth the risk. Use your head. I’ll be down there in a few minutes.”
I got a reluctant agreement out of her, and by the time I got to the café she was drinking another latte, sitting at an outside table.
“I should have followed him,” she said.
“Not worth it. If you’re wrong, it doesn’t get you anywhere. If you’re right, it could be a big mistake.”
“I guess. But I don’t think I’m wrong about this.”
“So why do you think he was following you?”
“Well, if I’m right, and a practitioner is behind this, he’s got to be aware of me. I’ve been asking a lot of questions, poking my nose all over town. Maybe he wants to see what I’m up to, whether I’m a threat to him.”
“Or maybe he was trying to get up the nerve to hit on you.”
“Aren’t you sweet? No, there’s something going on with this guy.”
We tossed a few ideas around but didn’t get anywhere, and eventually Ruby finished up her latte and headed home. I got a cup of coffee and sat there with Lou for a while, watching the Mission denizens stroll by. The demograph ics of the Mission were changing—fewer Hispanics, more yuppies and faux hipsters. And it was a younger crowd these days, most of them younger than I was. Then I realized they were the same age as they’d always been. I was the changing demographic, growing older every day, imperceptibly but inexorably. After ten minutes or so, Lou nudged my knee, in that deliberate fashion he uses when he wants to alert me to something.
I scanned the area, and it didn’t take long to see what he had scoped out. Across the street, staring intently into the front display window of a bookstore, was the redheaded stranger. His back was toward me, and he was using the reflection of the street in the window to keep an eye on me—a trick he’d no doubt picked up from countless bad TV movies. But even though his back was turned, there was no mistaking him. He had a mop of curly red hair, dyed an entirely unnatural red. Not the ideal appearance for trailing someone on the q.t. Which meant that I was supposed to see him. Which meant . . . what?
Abruptly, he turned away from the window and walked away, moving at a good clip, but not fast enough to keep me from following if I wanted to. The advice I’d given Ruby was perfectly sound. There was no reason to follow him, except curiosity, since I didn’t see a practitioner being the answer to our murders. And if by chance I was wrong, the downside could be considerable. I pushed my chair back, beckoned to Lou, and took off after him.
He ambled casually down Valencia, to Sixteenth, then over to Mission. Without so much as a backward glance, he descended the stairs to the BART station. I always carry a ticket with some money left on it for just such situations, so I inserted my ticket and breezed through the turnstile, not far behind.
Lou scooted under, staying close to my feet. Dogs aren’t allowed on BART, and whenever I take the train I use a small backpack for him to ride in, layered over with a minor concealment spell to make him look like an old sweater on casual inspection.
That wasn’t an option, so I used some talent to cast an aversion spell over my feet and told him to stay close. It wouldn’t hide his presence, but it would keep people from glancing down to see him as long as he stayed close. Casting the aversion spell directly on him would have been better, but it would have taken time I didn’t have and a lot more energy. I could maintain the spell on my legs without much effort; if I had to make it a discrete spell and attach it to him as he moved along, it would have been a more difficult thing to maintain. Besides, except for the BART police, nobody cared.
The redheaded practitioner got aboard a southbound train, which was crowded as rush hour wound down. I squeezed in at the back end of the same car, Lou crowding close so he wouldn’t get his paws stepped on. One thing was now clear—this guy was playing a game with me. I had an impulse to push through he crowded car and confront him on the spot. That would throw a monkey wrench in his plans.
But that wouldn’t be the best idea, for the same reason a cop wouldn’t confront an armed suspect in the middle of a crowded subway car. A lot of things could go wrong and probably would, with serious consequences for innocent passengers. And bad guys seldom care about collateral damage.
The car was crowded, with that eclectic combination of passengers you get only in a big city. Neatly dressed Asians with briefcases. Teens with piercings, carrying skateboards. Rough-faced men with callused hands, on their way to work or on their way home. Stolid-faced women of indeterminate race. Each of them has a life, happy or sad, unknown to their fellow travelers. Eight million stories in the naked city. Or a few hundred thousand, in any case.
Right across from me sat a young Hispanic couple with a baby and a toddler. The man had one of those serious faces, with a faraway look, thinking his unknown thoughts of unknown places as the train moved along. The toddler noticed Lou and stared at him, fascinated. He looked up at me, and when I smiled at him he hid his face in the man’s lap, but he was unable to resist peeking out.
When the train reached the Glen Park station, the red-haired practitioner got off. I followed him up the escalator, not getting on until he had reached the top. I was staying well back in case he was preparing a surprise for me. I had no fear I’d lose him—he’d make sure of that.
He headed up Bosworth, away from the commercial area around the station. After a few blocks it was clear where he was headed: Glen Park itself. The park isn’t one of those manicured showplaces; it’s an urban wildlife area nestled right in the middle of a thoroughly developed neighborhood. Set in the bottom of a tiny canyon, it’s hardly a park at all—more an overgrown area choked with trees and brush, with a stream running through that provides a miniature riparian environment for frogs and snakes and small mammals and even a coyote or two.
I followed him into the park, letting him still keep a good lead, until eventually he came to the loop that runs along the far end. It was getting chilly, and apart from a few hardy dog walkers, the park was almost deserted. As he disappeared around a bend, I stopped to take stock of the situation.
He was obviously setting up a confrontation. And he had chosen the time and the place, giving him an immense advantage. You never want to fight someone on their own terms or on their own turf, unless you have no choice.
A couple of years ago I would have let it go. But lately I’d developed a macho streak, a reluctance to avoid a challenge, along with the feeling I could take care of myself under any circumstances. Looking back over the last couple of years, a case could be made for that being untrue—most of the things I’d handled had been as much about luck as skill. But sometimes, confidence is as important as ability. Unless you let it overwhelm your judgment, at which point you’re sure to crash and burn.
So I wasn’t about to blunder ahead totally unprepared. Being able to improvise has its advantages—there is an infinitude of situations and threats, many of which you cannot possibly foresee. A well-crafted spell is useless if it doesn’t address the problem at hand. Sometimes I have to scramble, but in the end I usually come up with something that works.
But I had learned to prepare when it was appropriate. I had only enough energy to set up one prepared spell, though. Any more than that, and I wouldn’t have enough power left to deal with the unexpected. And there were two things to worry about. One was a magical attack, but since I wasn’t going to be caught off guard, I figured I could handle that. But those poor victims had been torn apart in a purely physical manner. When you deal with magic every day, you sometimes forget how deadly a mundane attack can be.
What I really needed was my shotgun, but it was resting uselessly at home. So, a magical equivalent might be in order. I looked around for a branch or other straight section of wood, and found just what I needed a few feet off the trail, a six-foot branch with the leaves stripped off long ago. I broke off the little side branches until I had a relatively smooth staff. I worked some dirt into one end, letting some energy flow out into it, forming a magical barrier. Then I squatted down by the small creek that ran through the park and dipped the other end into the water. Again, I let energy flow, but this time I kept it up. The water flowed into the staff, filling it up as it backed up against the dirt barrier. I held it there until the pressure built up to the breaking point before pulling it out. I capped the other end with a binding energy woven into more dirt. Now if I needed it, I could quickly rub that dirt off, release the energy, and the pressurized water would spurt out like a fire hose.
That may not seem impressive, but fire hoses and water cannons are what get used for crowd control. A stream from a two-and-a-half-inch hose will knock you off your feet and send you tumbling along the ground. With enough pressure, the stream can even break through a weak brick wall. And my enhancing would provide at least twice the pressure of an ordinary hose.
At that pressure, an ordinary hose would pick me up clear off the ground. It would be like trying to hold an angry anaconda. But magic does have its advantages—I’d be able to direct the flow as easily as I would a simple stick. Now I was set—a wizard with a staff, at long last.
Lou was shifting back and forth on one paw and then the other, not exactly nervous, but keyed up like a boxer before an important bout. I motioned him over toward where the path exited after looping around.
“Stand guard,” I told him. “Bark if he comes out this way.” He looked at me and moved closer to the entrance. “Other side,” I said. He ignored me.
That made me think again. Lou knows a lot more about tracking than I do, and he wouldn’t ignore me for no reason. Maybe he felt is was too dangerous to separate. He did have a point; it was a lot like those slasher films where the idiot teen says, “Let’s split up. You check out the attic. I’ll head down to the basement.”
Then I realized there was no point in leaving him to guard the exit anyway. This charade had been designed to set up a confrontation. Whoever this was, he wanted to engage me. He wasn’t going to slip out the back the minute I got close. That would have made the entire charade pointless. I nodded to Lou and we started along the path together.
It was narrow and closed in. After a short quarter mile, the path started to curve around and head back. Lou was walking a few paces ahead of me, nose twitching, acting more like an actual dog than a magical companion, seeking out danger on a practical level. When he stopped, one paw raised halfway up, I knew we’d reached the crucial place, and I gripped the homemade staff tightly, one hand on the dirt cap.
Even so, it almost got me. It burst out of the bushes and launched itself toward me with a noise like an explosion of frightened quail. Time shifted down into slow motion—not the magical kind, but the type that happens in a car crash. It stood upright on two legs, and was huge, at least six feet four. I saw dark fur and long arms with claws the size of a grizzly bear’s. I saw teeth, gleaming white. They were almost the last thing I ever saw.
I tore the dirt off the end of the staff and simultaneously pointed it in one motion. A stream of water gushed out and struck the creature full in the chest, sending it flying. My idea had been to knock down whatever attacked me, then use talent to bind and neutralize it if I could. But the water hose worked too well. It went head over heels back into the bushes, and it must have hurt it and scared it as well, because instead of attacking again it took off. I heard the sounds of crashing branches as it bolted through the tangled undergrowth. Round one to me.
Lou took a couple of steps forward and looked back at me to see if I wanted him to follow. He didn’t seem that eager. From the glimpse I’d got of the creature, I wasn’t, either. I shook my head.
“Not this time,” I said. “Let’s not push our luck.”
We made it back out of the park without any trouble. There was no sign of our red-haired practitioner. Glen Park is close enough to my flat so that I could walk home, though it took about forty minutes. On the way, my mind churned. Too many questions, which was rapidly becoming my default state of mind every time things got weird.
But I had learned something, and it was important. The question of whether these murders had been done by a creature out of the energy pool or by a mad practitioner was no longer one of either/or. It was both. But was it a creature like the fake Ifrit, but under magical control? Or was it a sentient being, like the Wendigo, working in partnership with a practitioner? And if so, why? One thing was clear—unless and until I figured it out, more people were bound to die.