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“Why not?” She looked around, eyes huge.
“Because people notice you when you run.”
“And they won’t notice if we walk right by them?”
“No.”
And they didn’t, being too focused on each other to pay us any attention.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t true of the ones who burst out of the hidden stairwell behind us a moment later. “There!” somebody said, and a spell shot over our heads, missing us only because Rico jerked us down at the same second.
He didn’t have to jerk Fred, who had already hit the ground, still staring at the mages ahead of us. Until the wall beside his face burst into flames when the spell hit, making him curse and draw back. And lose his grip on the little group of thieves.
Luckily, they were too busy fighting with each other to notice. And with the guys behind us, who they assumed had just attacked them. And it didn’t look like the Black Circle was any better at talking out differences than the Silver.
So much for not altering the time line, I thought grimly. And for once, hoped my murderous acolytes actually were, and that none of these men had been fated to get out of here anyway. But there was no time to worry about it now, no time for anything except scrabbling forward on hands and knees as the battle raged above us and we made for the door.
Which we somehow hit before anything hit us, maybe because Rhea was shielding for all she was worth.
At least, I assumed that was why a spell deflected off the air maybe a foot above our heads, hit some other mage’s shield, and then went ping-ponging around, striking shield after shield before finally finding a target in the ceiling.
And blowing a hole in it.
Plaster rained down, dust billowed out in a choking cloud, and the door we’d finally reached was thrown open. And a bunch more mages ran out, drawn by the crazy. But thanks to the camouflage we’d just unleashed, they didn’t see us.
Until they fell over us.
Rhea’s shield had given up t
he ghost at some point, so I felt every bit of the boot to the ribs I took when one of the mages tripped over me. And then Rico jerked the remainder, who were trying to draw back into the room, out into the fray. Boots stomped, coats were slung in my face, and the yelling, cursing, and spell slinging suddenly intensified. But I didn’t care. I had my eye on the open door, and I dove for it, the others sliding, crawling, and, in the case of Fred, rolling through along with me.
And then someone slammed the door.
“Like that’s going to help?” Fred said, his voice a little high.
“No, but this will!” Rhea snarled, and smashed her hand down on a small button on the wall.
I’d taken it for a dimmer, but I guess not. Because a shield shimmered into place right in front of my face a second later, almost close enough to cut off my nose. But it didn’t matter, because we were in!
Chapter Thirty-seven
“Oh,” Rhea said softly, her anger evaporating into shock as she stared around.
And, yeah. The place looked a little different now. The coffee table was cracked, the many sofa cushions were slashed, and the bar had been emptied of its crystal and most of the booze. A few half-empty bottles were lying on their sides, above stained and dirty carpeting, leaking onto the imprints of dozens of muddy boots. It looked like we’d arrived at the tail end of the pillage.
Which made it strange that the safe was still there and still intact, despite the van Gogh having gone.
A moment later, I understood why.
“Shit!” Rico jerked back his hand.
“What is it?” I hurried over.
“Wards.”
“But they’re supposed to be down. That’s the whole point of this!”
“The safe was probably set up to be independent of the house grid. Either that or—”
