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His smile widened. Oh, fabulous, I thought, and pointlessly tried to remember everything I’d thought since his arrival. Undoubtedly he’d caught more than a few interesting ones—though generally, both Quinn and Riley had strict rules regarding mind reading, and rarely indulged in casual telepathy. According to Riley, the thoughts of most people weren’t worth it.>“You have a deal.”
He nodded, then glanced at Jak. It took me several moments to realize that awareness had slipped from Jak’s eyes.
I raised an eyebrow. “There was no need—”
“There was. You trust him too much.”
Yet another comment people kept making. “Jak’s under threat from Rhoan. Trust me, he’s not going to print anything without clearing it first through him.”
“And now he can’t even consider writing about it because he won’t even be aware of it.” He knelt beside the Razan and appeared to be doing nothing more than simply looking at him—although I knew from past experience that he was riffling through the man’s thoughts. Then his gaze met mine again. “An Aedh has been active in this man’s thoughts.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning that while he knows the name and location of his master, any effort on my part to access it would immediately notify said master of the intrusion.”
“Well, damn.”
“Yes.” He paused. “It is possible to circumvent such blocks, but it takes time.”
“Which we don’t have. I suspect that if he doesn’t report back soon, it’ll make our quarry suspicious.”
“Which might just draw him out.”
“He’s not that type. He’s more likely to cover his tracks and start somewhere fresh.”
Although the ley intersection was near here, so he wasn’t likely to go too far from it. Still, we needed to avoid warning him just how close we were. “You can’t get anything useful from him at all?”
Quinn hesitated, and glanced down at the Razan again. “There’s three of them left. They live together in an old warehouse in Dawson Street, Brunswick West, and he’s more than a little pissed about running these sorts of errands when he was trained as a soldier. He believes he could take care of any intruders and be a hell of a lot less conspicuous about it than hellhounds.”
But hellhounds didn’t need to eat or drink or go to the toilet—they were on watch twenty-four/seven, until ordered otherwise.
“Where did he serve?” Although he didn’t look that old, Razan were linked to the life force of their masters and could live for centuries. Knowing which war might be handy to track down his real identity, because I very much doubted that the license and cards he carried were actually his.
Quinn hesitated. “He’s a Middle East army veteran. Retired about eighty-five years ago.”
Not very old in Razan terms at all. “And his name?”
“Mark Jackson. I can’t tell you at what point he became Razan, because that memory lies behind the shield.”
Damn. I squatted down beside the Razan, rolled him onto his side, and pointed to the barbwire tat. “Have you seen one like this before?”
Quinn shook his head. “But it is not usual for Raziq to mark their Razan with their own unique brand.”
“This particular brand has been seen on Razan who we are fairly certain belong to different masters.”
He half shrugged. “That is not unusual, either. There were Razan who served the Aedh priests at the gate temples who belonged to all. Maybe this tat signifies a joint venture of some kind.”
Which again lent weight to the idea that my father and this dark sorcerer were in cahoots, but I just didn’t think that was the case. Not now, at least.
Although it wasn’t like I could be sure of anything when it came to my parent.
“What about the pillars?”
Quinn raised his eyebrows. “What about them?”
“Well, can you ferret out any information about them—where they go, how they operate, that sort of stuff?”
“I can tell you most of that.”
