They passed through the small setup, which wasn’t a full clean room so much as a tent that had a filter attached. After Nick zipped the back closed, Lawless opened the front, and they stepped into one of the interrogation rooms.
There were two people inside, an officer and another member of the CDC. The officer was sitting down in the metal chairs that were purposefully uncomfortable, bent over his knees, his leg jiggling. The CDC had taken their advice about the Mehmud Observation Circle although the magic was fading fast. The circle still lingered on him, just enough that Nick saw hints of the alchemy on his bones.
Both of the people in the room looked up, and Lawless waved her coworker out. Nick exchanged a glance with Zahide. The circle they’d seen on McArdle was small, barely the size of a coin. These were larger, spreading the entire length of the officer’s arm.
“Hey”—Nick checked the officer’s uniform—“Gile. I’m King, this is Zahide. I’m going to put a new circle back on you so that we can see what’s going on. It shouldn’t hurt.”
Gile looked up. “Am I going to die?”
“We don’t know,” Nick said because he wasn’t Parker, and he could never look someone in the eye and say, “I’m not going to let you die,” without knowing how he was going to keep them safe.
Parker would say it and mean it, and it wouldn’t matter that he didn’t know how he was doing it. Because if he said it, it would happen.
“Officer, stand up,” Zahide said, no-nonsense and her order so firm that Gile got to his feet. She glanced at Nick, and he walked forward, sketching another Mehmud Observation Circle quickly. He was careful with the detailing, making sure that every line made sense.
When he raised it and placed it on Gile’s uniform, the circles on his bones looked even worse. With a fully functional circle lighting him up, it was obvious how bad it was. Every bone was covered with moving circles, and Nick stepped forward before he could even think to worry about how the infection spread because what he saw was impossible and terrible.
The language most alchemists used was based on Latin, with some variations depending on origin. His father called those bastardizations not true alchemy, but it was still closer to alchemy than witchcraft.
This spellwork moved so fast, spinning so quickly, that Nick struggled to read the language he’d learned at the same time as English. Parker was wrong—the spells weren’t shifting like a translation key from a Cracker Jack box. Instead, each time the spells turned, they added another layer, a new element of spellwork.
“It’s a countdown,” Nick said.
Zahide swore.
“How much time do we have?” Lawless asked.
“Let me time it,” Zahide said. “The most complicated circle on record was eighty layers deep.”
“But this will be less.” Nick pointed at where the circles were edging closer. As they gained layers, they were expanding toward each other, and once they touched, they’d disrupt the next circle. It would lead to an explosion.
“Am I going to die?!” Gile asked, taking a few steps back. “No. I’m not going out like this.”
He took a few lurching steps toward the door, but Zahide was faster, brushing her fingers over a trap circle that released immediately, gluing him to the floor. “Calm down.”
Gile shouted out, trying to pull himself free. He was moving too much for Nick to read the circles.
“Gile!Calm down,” Nick said. He waited for the officer to meet his gaze. “I’ve been counting, and we have a good fifteen minutes before anything happens. I can’t help you if you’re moving around. I need to see this spellwork. Do you understand?”
Gile swallowed, his head bobbing, his mouth working before he finally nodded.
“Okay, hold out your arms,” Nick said.
They had to move quickly. As soon as the circles touched, they’d interfere with each other, and everything Nick feared when Parker drained a circle would happen.
As soon as he started reading the circle spinning on Gile’s forearm, he inhaled sharply. Zahide was there instantly. She squinted, but the circle was spinning too fast.
“What do you see?” she asked.
“It’s custom,” Nick said. He wasn’t sure she’d understand the code, but she jerked her head, looking at him in surprise.
“Are you sure?” She kept her tone flat.
“Yes,” he said. He moved his gaze, following the spellwork until he was staring at the circles that rotated on Gile’s torso.
Custom was code for made exactly for someone. Alchemy circles were complicated, and creating new ones was the sort of thing that took years in any normal circumstances. An alchemist as talented as Nick could create one on the fly, but not something designed to hurt exactlyoneperson, not one designed for Redmond Gile, male, 32 years old.
What he saw on Gile’s ribs made his mouth go dry.
