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“The one at Central. The one that connects here.”
“No.”
“Yes. Look,” I said, forestalling another argument, because we were running out of time. “They needed a way to get their army here from Faerie, and a way to get it into the consul’s home without getting fried by the wards.”
“Stop. Just…stop. Okay?”
“No. And in fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if going in through Central wasn’t the plan all along. It was a little too well thought-out to be a seat-of-the-pants kind of thing. And with the focus on the consul’s home and the games, it wasn’t as well guarded as usual, and would be a much easier target than fighting their way in here.”
“I’m not listening to this.”
“And with a senator on their side…well, hell. They might not have had to fight for it at all. Good old Geminus could have offered to have his boys staff the place on the night of the finals, as a favor to the guys on duty. So they could watch the fights. And then just order his people to stand aside as a fey army waltzed in the door.”
“Do you hear yourself? Do you?”
“So maybe his death was a blow for more than one reason. But his allies figured another way to get inside, and it must have seemed like a dream that the Senate was actually keeping you right there. Sure, it was a hiccup when you were suddenly released, which was why they
contacted Cheung, thinking he was still your master and you’d be handed over to him. But you came to me instead, and then Marlowe took you back—”
“I’m begging you.”
“—and so everything was in place once again. You to bring their army in, and the portal to get it into the consul’s home. All they had to do that night was find you. And Radu, of course.”
I paused to check my makeup, and then stuck my compact in my little black beaded evening purse. If we wanted to blend in with the type of people who could shell out the price of a private jet for a ticket, I had to look halfway decent. Which would have been easier if I hadn’t tried to put on mascara during the bumpy ride over here.
“Geminus must have had the password,” I added. “As a senator, there would have been no reason not to give it to him. But he was dead. And it’s changed weekly, so even if he’d shared it with his allies—which I doubt—the one he’d had wouldn’t work. But as the senior person there, they assumed Radu would know the new one.”
“But you just said they didn’t know Radu was gonna be there that night!”
“But somebody had to have it, right? A portal isn’t much use if nobody can use it.”
“So why not get the password from the lead guy on duty?”
“They’d probably planned to. But he must have been killed in the initial assault, possibly vaporized when they went through the floor. But somebody told them Radu was there, or one of the zombies saw him—remember, the necromancer could see through his puppet’s eyes—”
“Yeah.” Ray shuddered.
“—and so they went after ’Du.”
“But they didn’t get him. They didn’t get either of us. They tipped their hand and got nothing!”
“Which is why they’re trying again tonight, at least according to Æsubrand.”
“And I don’t suppose he said how?” Ray asked sarcastically.
“He didn’t know.” I frowned at him, but not for the attitude. I was getting used to that. But because we were third in line now and he looked…well, less than a model of sartorial splendor.
Way less. His hair was sticking up in the back, his jacket sleeves almost covered his hands, and then there was that tie. That tie Would Not Do.
I grabbed it and pulled him forward.
“What?” he said, pulling back for a second, and then giving up. “You mean Mr. Know-it-all didn’t know the one thing we need to stop this? How convenient!”
“The bad guys weren’t the only ones to tip their hand last night,” I reminded him, trying to remember if it was over-under-over or the reverse. “Æsubrand did, too, when he showed up at Slava’s—”
“And ruined everything! If he wanted to help, he should have just let us have the fat bastard.”
“He said he would have, but he assumed I was there to assassinate him, and he needed Slava to back up his story. So he…intervened. And now he’s out of the loop.”
