"Don’t forget that the next Business Activity Statement is due soon," he added, getting back to business.
I grimaced, but suddenly wondered if the curious itch over his age had simply been a reaction caused by his stepping past our usual boundaries. Now that we were back on safe ground, the itch retreated. "Yeah, I know. And it’s still a pain in the ass."
He laughed again. "Anything dealing with taxes generally is. But it keeps us accountants employed. I mean, if the system were simple, anyone could do it, and then where would we be?"
I grinned. "Sunning yourself on a beach somewhere?"
"Good Lord, I could think of nothing worse," he said, and added, with a mock shudder, "All that sand!"
I laughed, said my good-byes, and headed out. The weather outside had deteriorated in the brief time I’d been at Mike’s and I shivered, wrapping my coat ends across my body in an effort to stop the wind from chilling me. But it didn’t help much.
I looked around for my bike, then cursed when I remembered I was still doing the whole cab thing. "Damn it, Azriel, we really need to find a way to stop the Raziq attacking our home, because I do not want to be living out of a suitcase—or without my bike—for much longer."
The heat of his presence snatched away the chill wind. He materialized a second later, standing at the bottom of the steps staring up at me.
"The only way we could ensure that," he said, "is by not taking the book anywhere near your home. They need the book as much as you, and they will not make a grab for one unless they can attain the other. Their trap in the sewers was evidence of that."
His hands were resting on the railings on either side of the steps, effectively hemming me in. It was hard to say if it was deliberate or not because, as usual, his expression gave little away. And even though the fact he’d warned that the mind link would deepen our connection, I was getting zip from him—and maybe I never would. I wasn’t actually telepathic, after all. Maybe all he’d meant was that the link would deepen on his end, not mine.
"Yet they attacked you and Ilianna yesterday when you both went there, and the book was nowhere near the house."
"Because they know I follow you and would presume I was with you rather than Ilianna. They would also have hoped that we possessed the book."
"My point exactly—they attacked without feeling the presence of the book."
"A move I doubt they’ll repeat. They will wait and ensure all pieces are in place before they attack again."
I frowned. He seemed confident, but I wasn’t so sure. The Raziq weren’t exactly the sanest inmates in the asylum. "But the minute I touch the book and bring it out of the gray fields, they will attack—and you’ve already said you can’t handle such an attack."