“Ashes,” he said, as he rubbed his fingers together. “So you’re feeling traces of Mercier’s magic?”
“Probably.” Sebastian’s heart was beating too fast.
“But then what’s wrong? Besides the obvious, that some poor fellow was magically murdered in this very spot. You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Not a ghost.” Sebastian swallowed hard. “A mirror.”
“What?”
Sebastian looked up at him. “I need to call Zhang.”
There was an inn two blocks over with a phone on the desk. Lord Fine bribed the innkeeper behind the desk to take a smoke break while Sebastian got the operator on the line and was put through to the lobby of the Great Eastern.
Lord Fine leaned against the counter next to him. “How exactly is this going to work? Mr. Zhang and Miss Robbins aren’t simply hanging around waiting for our call.”
Sebastian relayed his message to the front desk of the hotel, giving the name of the town and the inn. Then he hung up. “Zhang is watching the hotel on the astral plane. He’ll see the message and call us here from wherever he is, if he can.”
“Magic,” Lord Fine muttered.
Three minutes later, the inn’s phone rang. Sebastian quickly grabbed it before the innkeeper came running back.
“It’s me.” Zhang’s familiar American accent was on the line. “What did you find?”
Sebastian spoke quietly into the phone, explaining what had happened.
“You picked up magic that felt likeyou,” Zhang repeated slowly.
Sebastian glanced up. “I’m your sentry,” Lord Fine said. “Talk freely, I’ll let you know if someone’s coming.”
Sebastian gave him a grateful look. “I thought I just heard Lord Fine in the background,” said Zhang in his ear, “except whoever that was sounded nice, so clearly I’m hearing things. Explain what you mean, it felt like your own magic.”
“There was something new in the alley today, something that wasn’t in London. I couldn’t weaken it, but not because it was too strong. Because it was like fighting myself.”
“Well, that’s not good.”
“Zhang,”Sebastian said. “You’re a paranormal scholar, say something more helpful!”
“Give a man a moment to think,” Zhang said. “You didn’t feel this sensation in London, so maybe it was the victim.”
“Is there any reason to think the victim was a paranormal?”
“No,” Zhang acknowledged. “So maybe the traces you felt are from Lord Blanshard.”
Sebastian frowned. “But that would mean we were wrong about Lord Blanshard, that he doesn’t have vampire magic but instead has magic like mine. Except I can’t kill anyone.”
Zhang hesitated.
“What?” Sebastian said.
“It’s just—you can’t kill anyone rightnow,” said Zhang. “But you can destroy traces of magic, and you can weaken auras.”
“So?”
“So we’re also missing a relic,” said Zhang. “Relics strengthen magic, and the missing brooch relic makes magic work on other paranormals. What wouldyoube able to do to magic and auras if you got your hands on the brooch?”
Sebastian frowned. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “My magic already works on magic—maybe it would do nothing?”
“Somehow I doubt that,” Zhang said dryly.
