“Persuasion, then.” Noam shook his head, discarding the semantics. That fear still gripped the base of his skull, white knuckled and refusing to let go. “I thought about it. I decided... I won’t tell anyone. I’m sure you couldpersuademe to keep silent, or whatever, but you won’t have to. Just for the record.”
“I’d appreciate that,” Lehrer said wryly.
In the far distance, someone set off a firecracker: a sharp snap and someone’s answering whoop of ecstasy.
Eventually, Noam made himself say it.
“Have you used your power on me?”
“No.”
Noam grimaced. “I suppose you’d say that either way.”
“Probably,” Lehrer admitted. “So, you’re just going to have to trust me.”
A hard gift to grant. Lehrer must understand that. He and Noam were alike in that way. They’d both grown up in environments where trusting the wrong person would get you killed.
When Noam was a young child, his grandmother used to tell him terrifying stories meant to keep him close to home—or make him Catholic, as his mother had always implied. It was no secret Noam’s grandmother disapproved of her son’s conversion to Judaism. So she told him stories about La Llorona, about El Boraro. About El Mandinga: the Evil One, a silver-tongued devil wearing the guise of a handsome man.
If he speaks, close your ears. If he follows, you pray. But never look him in the eyes; a single glance, and your soul belongs to him.
Noam met Lehrer’s clear-glass gaze.
“What about Sacha? Did you persuade him?”
Lehrer didn’t blink. “Sometimes.”
“Did you...” Noam faltered. He swallowed. “Did you... make him... do all of that? To the refugees? Just to undermine him?”
“Of course not,” Lehrer said, more firmly this time. “Sacha was a xenophobe and a bigot, Noam. You know what happened to witchings in the catastrophe. To myfamily. Do you really think I’d perpetuate that on another minority group?”
Heat flushed Noam’s cheeks, but he couldn’t just give in. Not now. Not after everything. “I have to ask.”
“I used my power on Sacha because he had to be stopped,” Lehrer said. “Atanycost. I care about nothing as much as I care about this country. I was there when this nation was born, Noam, and like hell will I watch it die at the hands of a baseline.”
There was a roughness to the way Lehrer said the words. The lighting out here reflected strangely in his eyes, like something moving beneath the surface of a lake.
“You turned me in to Sacha.”
“I did.” Lehrer’s expression did not change.
“Why?”
“I needed Sacha to think he still had a chance. While he was distracted with you, my men surrounded the government complex.” Lehrer seemed less human now than he once did. Now he was cold and utilitarian, as precise as an elegant machine. Those moments Noam had glimpsed true emotion were more fractured and unnatural than the mask itself. “And I knew if I sent Dara to save your life, he would kill Sacha for me.”
Which Dara did.
All of them—even Dara, who had been so suspicious of Lehrer’s motives—were just easy pawns in Lehrer’s game.
The ache lingered in Noam’s chest. When he turned his gaze toward the electric lights strung overhead, Lehrer reached over and set his hand gently on Noam’s leg.
“I’m proud of you,” Lehrer said. “I asked a lot of you these past several weeks. But you kept your head, even when all seemed lost. I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating. In many ways you remind me of myself.”
Nothing Noam felt made sense anymore, as if his thoughts and his body were completely divorced from each other. He’d think,I’m happy, even as his lungs convulsed around a new breath. He’d think,Everything is perfect now, while his skin burned and his hands formed fists.
“How’s Dara?” he asked.
Lehrer paused. His hand stayed where it was, but it had gone still, a heavy weight against Noam’s thigh.
