I grabbed him by the hair so that I could introduce his forehead to the sidewalk, but his hair was cut nearly military-short, and I didn’t have a good grip. He twisted and got me in the floating rib with an elbow, and I wasn’t in a good enough position to keep him from getting out from under me and scrambling away, the sheathed weapon still in hand.
I focused my will, flicked a hand at him, and spat, “Forzare!” Unseen force lashed out at the backs of his knees—
And hit the mystic equivalent of a brick wall. There was a burst of twinkling, shifting lights, and he let out a croaking sound as he kept running. Something that glowed like a dying ember fell to the sidewalk.
I pushed myself up to pursue him, slipped on the wet grass next to the sidewalk, and rolled my ankle painfully. By the time I’d gotten to my feet again, he was too far away for me to catch, even if my ankle had been steady. A second later, he hopped a fence and was out of sight.
I was left there, standing beside my car on one foot, while neighborhood dogs sent up a racket. I gimped forward and looked down at the glowing embers of the thing he’d dropped. It was an amulet, its leather cord snapped in the middle. It looked as though it had been a carving of wood and ivory, but it was scorched almost completely black, so I couldn’t be certain. I picked it up, wrinkling my nose at the smell. Then I turned back to the car and closed the open door. After that, I untwisted the piece of wire that held the trunk closed, picked up a blanket-wrapped bundle, and went back to Michael’s place.
MORNING ON A school day in the Carpenter household is like Southampton, just before June 6, 1944. There’s a lot of yelling, running around, and organizing transport, and no one seems to be exactly sure what’s going on. Or maybe that was just me, because by a little before eight, all the kids were trooping out to their bus stop, led by Alicia, the senior schoolchild.
“So he grabbed the sword and ran?” Molly asked, sipping coffee. She apparently had a cold, and her nose was stuffy and bright pink. My apprentice was her mother’s daughter, tall and blond and too attractive for me ever to be entirely comfortable—even wrapped up in a pink fluffy robe and flannel pj’s, with her hair a mess.
“Give me some credit,” I said, unwrapping the blanket-wrapped bundle and producing Amoracchius. “He thought he took the sword.”
Michael frowned at me as he put margarine on his toast. “I thought you told me the sword was best hidden in plain sight.”
“I’ve been getting paranoid in my old age,” I replied, munching on a bit of sausage. I blinked at the odd taste and looked at him.
“Turkey,” Michael said mildly. “It’s better for me.”
“It’s better for everyone,” Charity said firmly. “Including you, Harry.”
“Gee,” I said. “Thanks.”
She gave me an arch look. “Can’t you just use the amulet to track him down?”
“Nope,” I said, putting some salt on the turkey “sausage.” “Tell her why not, grasshopper.”
Molly spoke through a yawn. “It caught on fire. Fire’s a purifying force. Wiped out whatever energy was on the amulet that might link back to the owner.” She blinked watery eyes. “Besides, we don’t need it.”
Michael frowned at her.
“He took the decoy,” I said, smiling. “And I know how to find that.”
“Unless he’s gotten rid of it, or taken steps to make it untraceable,” Michael said in a patient, reasonable tone. “After all, he was evidently prepared with some sort of defensive measure against your abilities.”
“Different situation entirely,” I said. “Tracking someone by using one of their personal possessions depends upon following a frequency of energy inherently unstable and transient. I actually have a piece of the decoy sword, and the link between those two objects is much more concrete. It’d take one he—uh, heck of a serious countermeasure to stop me from finding it.”
“But you didn’t trail him last night?” Charity asked.
I shook my head. “I didn’t know where I’d have been going, I wasn’t prepared, and since apparently someone is interested in the swords, I didn’t want to go off and leave . . .”
You.
“The sword ...”
Unprotected.
“Here,” I finished.
“What about the other one?” Michael asked quietly.
Fidelacchius, brother-sword to Michael’s former blade, currently rested in a cluttered basket in my basement—next to the