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“It sort of happened at the same time.”
“Did you say eaten?” the man demanded.
“And then there was the cave-in and the car crash,” Sal added.
“You were in a car crash?” The wardsmith was starting to look like he thought his leg was being pulled.
“Yes, but it doesn’t matter,” I told him. “The ward felt like it was fritzing out even on the first attack.”
“Which attack?”
“The one by the war mage,” I said patiently.
He closed his eyes and breathed deeply for a minute. “Let me see if I understand. You were in a ley line. When you left, you were attacked. Your ward held, but it felt weak, and then . . .”
“I was attacked again and it collapsed. That’s why I think the ley line did it.”
“Unlikely. Out of everything that you say happened to you, the line would be the least likely to cause damage. This is far stronger than the average war mage’s shields, and even they—”
“You don’t understand. I wasn’t in a ley line. I was in the line, the one that ruptured yesterday. I was thrown directly into a fissure.”
“And the ward held?” he demanded incredulously.
“Yeah. Well, long enough for me to get out, anyway.”
He tinkered some more, muttering to himself. “You are a very lucky young woman,” he told me after a while. “I cannot think of another ward that could have withstood a threat of that magnitude. If you had not been able to channel the combined power of the Circle—”
“I didn’t.”
“I can assure you, you did.”
I was beginning to wonder where Mircea had got this guy. “No, I didn’t!” I said, exasperated. “My ward was designed to take its power from the Circle, but it doesn’t anymore. They cut me off. A friend of mine set it to draw from the power of my office instead.”
The mage packed up his big leather satchel. “Well, your friend obviously didn’t know what he was doing, because I can assure you—”
“My friend was an excellent wardsmith!” I said heatedly.
“And I am a master wardsmith with almost sixty years of experience!” he snapped. “I am telling you that your ward is set to draw its power from the Silver Circle. It isn’t doing so now, of course, because it needs repair. But it was doing so yesterday or you would be dead.” He closed his case with an angry little snick.
“Can you fix it?” Sal asked.
“In time. However, this isn’t something I can patch up here. I’ll have to take it with me—”
He stopped because her long nails, gold today, had wrapped around his wrist. “Drop it.”
He bristled. “I assure you, young woman—”
“Sweetheart, I haven’t been young in a century,” she said, baring bright white fangs.
He paled but recovered fairly fast. “Be that as it may, the fact remains that I can do nothing here.”
Sal looked at me. “You really want this bozo handling the repairs?”
“Not really,” I said, torn. I didn’t like the guy, and I sure as hell didn’t want him taking my ward off somewhere. My back already felt naked and wrong. But I really didn’t like the idea of facing the Silver Circle again without it.
“I’ll take care of it,” Sal said, relieving him of the ward. She stuck it in her bra as a couple of the creepy guards escorted the indignant man out. “But it may take a little while. Can you stay out of trouble for a couple days?”
“Ironically, that’s how long I have until the meeting with Saunders,” I reminded her. “I’d really like my ward back before then.”
