‘Don’t overdo it,’ Amber advised my caladrius. ‘You’re healed but you’ll be sore if you do too much.’
Loki settled down, perching carefully on my shoulder. Amber grunted her approval and kept on working. ‘You’re lucky I had a brain-swelling potion already made up,’ she mutteredas she painted runes on my forehead. ‘You definitely have a concussion,’ she diagnosed as I fought not to throw up.
‘No shit,’ I bitched, clinging to the chair as another wave of dizziness struck me.
‘Stay still!’ Amber huffed.
‘I’m trying!’
Ugh. Amber DeLea might be the Crone and a potion mistress to boot, but she had the bedside manner of a gargoyle forced to eat meat.
‘There!’ she said with satisfaction. She drew her magic along the runes, lighting me up like a Christmas tree.
I groaned as bones healed and flesh knitted. Healing was wonderful and instant, but it wasn’t painless. I gritted my teeth through the worst of it, then sighed as the pain, sickness and dizziness left me.
I slumped back into the chair in my lounge and looked at Maktel and Hanlon. ‘You sure you don’t want any healing? I’m as good as new now.’
Both ogres stoically shook their heads, but they looked rough as hell. They were still covered in the blood that had flowed down from their wrists and their car-wreck injuries, but neither one had wanted to leave my side until I was all healed. They seemed faintly nervous, toying with their clothes and shifting from side to side.
‘All right, suffer then.’ I sighed. ‘I find your inability to accept healing bizarre, but each to his own. I suppose all species have their foibles. This one can be yours.’
‘Pain moulds us,’ Maktel said stiffly.
‘That,’ Hanlon said, flashing me a grin, ‘and we heal fast. This time tomorrow, there’ll barely be a mark. It’s not worth paying a witch’s fees over twenty-four hours of discomfort.’
Amber sniffed but didn’t argue. Her invoices were the stuff of legend. She started to pack up her things, shoving potions andbrushes alike into her tote bag. ‘I’ll invoice you,’ she told Robbie, ‘since you’re the one who called me.’
Robbie nodded. ‘That’s fine. Thank you for coming so quickly.’
‘I was in the area.’
‘About that,’ I began, glancing at Maktel and Hanlon and wondering whether I should continue.
‘What?’ Amber asked impatiently.
Well, in for a penny, in for a pound. They deserved to know who had kidnapped them. ‘One of our kidnappers had the Domini symbol tattooed on his shoulder.’
Amber huffed. ‘Why asecretorganisation would ever tattoo a permanent mark of their allegiance on their bodies I will never know. It’s not exactly subtle.’
‘It’s the one flaw in Harry Potter,’ Hanlon agreed. ‘The Death Eaters all get marked, but not once does the Order of the Phoenix just march around exposing people’s forearms. Make it illegal to wear long-sleeved tops and the Death Eaters would have all been found in a few days. Bish bash bosh.’
Maktel shrugged. ‘It would have been a really boring story though.’
‘We’re getting sidetracked,’ I noted. ‘We can dissect the Potterverse another day. Let’s focus on the Domini. You know, theactualthreat rather than the fictional one.’
‘Right.’ Amber looked at me with something that, on anyone else, I would have called concern. ‘So you’re saying you’re in the Domini’s crosshairs?’
Neither Maktel nor Hanlon showed any emotion or knowledge at the organisation’s name. I wasn’t sure whether that was because they were already in the know about the Domini or whether – like Robbie – they had excellent poker faces.
‘I don’t know,’ I said slowly. ‘I don’t think I was the target. The whole thing was intended to stir up Anti-Creature sentiment. I got mixed up in the course of the investigation and then ininterview I got under their skin. They made some bad decisions, and here we are.’
‘They’re all dead now anyway,’ Amber noted.
‘Not all of them,’ I said slowly. ‘Angela Kerr is still alive. She was in on the planning, at least in the early stages, but she didn’t execute anyone. Still, she could be swinging for conspiracy to murder.’
The problem was, the only evidence I had was the memories I’d stolen from Kerr, and Faraday had already called off the kill order and made it clear I wasn’t to go near the widow. If I did, it needed to be off the books.
Robbie looked at me, his face unreadable, but I knew what he was thinking. If I used my sub powers on Angela Kerr, then that wasn’t something she was walking away from. He shook his head. ‘You can’t do it,’ he said softly. ‘Not now. Killing the others in the heat of battle is one thing, but deliberately plotting Angela Kerr’s death is something else.’
